Sucking up his courage, Gomez walked up to Abbott and put out his hand, suppressing an urge to snap off a military salute.
“Professor Abbott,” he said, trying to keep his voice from shaking. “I am Tómas Gomez.”
Abbott grasped Gomez’s proffered hand in a crushing grip.
“Ah! Dr. Gomez! The man who’s raised all this fuss.”
Wringing his throbbing hand, Tómas replied, “Yes, I discovered the relic—”
“We don’t know yet whether it’s actually a relic, do we? That’s what we’re here to determine.”
“Yes, of course, sir.”
“Good. Let’s get on with it.”
Tómas led the little group through the automated inspection machines, noting that when Abbott smiled toothily at the facial identification screen there was a significant gap between his two upper front teeth.
“Family distinction,” Abbott said cheerfully. “Some damned gene that keeps cropping up every generation or so. My father had a gap you could drive a lorry through.”
Gomez made a weak smile.
“You keep Greenwich time aboard this habitat, of course,” Abbott said as the others of his group made their way past the identification screens. “That’s good. We’ll settle into our quarters for a bit and meet you for dinner at nineteen hundred hours.”
Seven o’clock, Gomez realized.
“Fine,” he said. “I’ll be at your door—”
“No need for a native guide,” Abbott said, smiling broadly. “We’ll see you at the dining hall. Thank you.”
Gomez realized he was being dismissed. “Well,” he managed to say, “welcome to Haven.”
“Yes, of course.”
Gomez stood there and watched the team troop toward the escalator that led down to the living quarters.
When Gomez entered the dining hall, he saw that Abbott and his crew had already appropriated one of the long tables. And there was an empty chair waiting for him at Abbott’s immediate right.
He sat down, selected his meal from the menu displayed on the tabletop screen, then turned to Abbott, who introduced each and every member of his team. Tómas forgot their names almost as soon as Abbott pronounced them, but he smiled and nodded at each of the astronomers in turn.
As soon as he finished the introductions, Abbott fixed Gomez with a cocked eyebrow as he asked, “Whatever gave you the idea of coming out here to search the ocean of Uranus, my boy?”
“The anomaly,” Gomez answered immediately. “The other three giant planets have thriving biospheres in their oceans. Uranus was apparently sterile. That didn’t seem to fit.”
“H’mm,” Abbott murmured. “You were flying in the face of the common wisdom.”
“New knowledge, new discoveries, often fly in the face of common wisdom,” Gomez replied. “Common wisdom often turns out to be wrong.”
A hint of a smile played across Abbott’s face. “True enough,” he said. “True enough.”
One of the astronomers across the table from Gomez, a long-faced, lank-haired young woman, challenged, “Do you really believe that this one little specimen you’ve turned up is evidence of an ancient civilization?”
Gomez glanced at Abbott, who sat with his hands clasped beneath his chin, the food before him ignored, eager to hear his response.
“Steel is not a natural metal. It is produced by intelligence.”
“Or dropped by one of the submersibles that investigated this ocean decades ago,” the woman retorted. “What you’ve discovered is most likely the result of an accident.”
“We’ve scanned the logs of all the submersibles that entered the ocean. No record of offloading a scrap of steel.”
The woman’s lips curved into a slight smile. “Maybe the people operating the sub had an accident that they didn’t want to report.”
Abbott broke in with, “That’s a possibility, don’t you think? Remote, perhaps, but a possibility.”
Gomez suddenly realized that they were testing him. “The submersibles were controlled robotically. There were no humans aboard, nobody to attempt covering up evidence of an accident.”
“Or incident,” said the young man sitting next to the woman.
Gomez continued, “We’ve scanned the logs of every sub that was in the ocean. There is no record of offloading anything, not even a bubble of gas.”
Abbott broke into a chuckle. “I’m afraid he’s already covered your hypothesis, Theresa.” Looking down at the dish in front of him, he said, “Come on now, let’s eat. The soup’s getting cold.”
DOUBLE CHECKING
Abbott took over effective command of Gomez’s investigation. His first step was to review every part of Tómas’s work.
Raven suddenly had nothing to do. Abbott’s team of professionals was tracing her work, and they did not want her in their way or looking over their shoulders.
“Good!” said Evan Waxman when she told him what was happening. “You can come back to work with me.”
Raven—wearing nose plugs wormed into her nostrils—replied, “I’ll come back to work with you, but that’s all. No fun and games. No Rust or other junk.”
Waxman leaned back in his desk chair and studied her face for a long, silent moment. Then, “You mean that, don’t you?”
Standing in front of his desk, Raven felt like a schoolgirl who’d been sent to see the principal. But she clenched her fists and said, “Yes, Evan. I mean it.”
“Alicia never sprinkled the Rust I gave her into your refrigerator, did she?”
Raven made her eyes go wide. “Rust? In my refrigerator?”
Waxman almost smiled. “Come on, Raven. I can see that you and Alicia have become friends. And become enemies of mine.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Evan,” Raven lied.
“Oh, yes you do.” Waxman leaned forward and jabbed an index finger in her direction. “Never try to fool me, Raven. You’re beyond your depth, out of your league.”
Raven stood there and said nothing.
“You’re fired, Raven,” Waxman said, quite calmly. “I don’t want to see your face again. Just clear your office out. And don’t expect to get anything more than the minimum compensation from now on. You’re on your own.”
“All right.”
“I expect you’ll make out all right. Selling yourself, as usual.”
“No, Evan. I’m not going back there.”
“Sooner or later,” he said, with a smirk. “Sooner or later.”
She made an about-face and strode angrily out of his office, past Alicia who sat rigidly at her desk, silent and unmoving.
Once Raven reached her own cubbyhole of an office and started cleaning out her desk, a thread of memory played in her mind. Something about a guy in the Bible who was fired from his job, wondering what he was going to do next: “To dig I am unable, to beg I am too proud.”
But what will I do? she asked herself. What will I do? One thing she was certain of, she was not going back to her old way of life.
The habitat gives everybody a subsistence payment, she knew. It’s not much, but it’s better than starving.
She remembered Alicia’s dream of running a store for women’s wear. Maybe I can work there.
Maybe.
Then she realized, I’m already working for Tómas! Maybe he can give me a salary. It doesn’t have to be much.
But what would he expect in return? she asked herself.
With some trepidation, Raven phoned Gomez as soon as she carried the meager contents of her desk back to her apartment.
Tómas’s broad-cheeked face appeared almost instantly on the wall screen in Raven’s living room. He seemed flustered, upset.
“Hola!” Raven said, forcing a smile.