She blinked twice and the radar image folded up and away. She clucked her tongue once, then twice. Her goggles gleamed and light-amp faded back for a second. She flew blind, the Gagarin winging into the slot, her hands light on the stick, keeping the ultralight centered between the cliffs. Another tongue cluck. Along the tips of the wings, phosphors woke to life, throwing a diffuse, soft white light over the flinty walls rushing past.
The goggles adjusted automatically and Russovsky could see again. A rumpled floor of broken scree, cockeyed temple-sized boulders and blown sand whipped past below her boots. Walls hemmed her in to either side, kilometers high and relentless, all jagged surfaces and overhangs. The whine of the engines rose, reverberating in the thickening air. A low hissing sound began to grow behind her in the east.
The planet's air was thin, though a human could stand outside without a z-suit. She would need a compressor and a filter to breathe, but it was possible. Such thin air exacerbated the planetary weather, making the wind and sky a menace to man and machine alike. In some places, like against the world-girdling ring of the Escarpment, a storm roared at every dawn, as the rising sun heated the atmosphere and pressed it against an impassible barrier.
Slot canyons cut through the Escarpment, knife-blade thin in comparison to the bulk of the mountain range. Gusts darted down the Slot, and Russovsky felt the Gagarin twist and flex in the air. Her chrono said she had fifteen minutes before the sun actually peeked over the eastern horizon.
By then a gale would be howling in the canyon, spitting sand, rock, and gravel westward like a cannon at three or four hundred k. The craft bucked, riding up on an eddy, and Russovsky's fingers gentled the aircraft back, away from the looming cliff. The wingtip, still glowing white, danced away from an obsidian wall, almost brushing against the ancient stone.
Russovsky corrected with unconscious grace. Ahead, a slab jutted nearly a third of the way across the canyon. Its eastern face was worn smooth as glass, a sweeping ebon wall rising up from the rubble. Russovsky's left hand brushed over the pressure control. Hydrogen hissed through fuel tubes running over her head. The wings stiffened, pressure rising. Motors whined and both airfoils levered up into a v. Gagarin slowed dramatically.
The ultralight swept past the slab, wing lights reflecting in an inky mirror. Beyond the monolith, there was a curving bowl of sand and – the vid-eye flashed urgently. Russovsky glanced over and saw a sharp angle in the darkness, distinct against the irregular wall of the canyon. She dropped the wings back level, then airbraked as the ultralight started to gain speed and drifted the stick to her right. Gagarin slowed into a stall. Hissing softly through clenched teeth, Russovsky feathered the engines and let the wheels touch down. A bump, a queasy sliding moment and the Gagarin slid to a halt on hard-packed sand.
Russovsky unfolded herself from the chair, thumbing loose her restraints, each motion quick and assured. Her left leg started to cramp, but she went stiff-legged for a moment, moving jerkily, letting the muscle relax. Working swiftly, acutely conscious of grains of mica and sand pattering down out of the dark sky above her, she triggered one sand-anchor with a tunk!, then leaned back into the cockpit frame and threw a switch glyphed "fold." The wings trembled in response, then began to deflate, hydrogen hissing back into the reserve tank behind and under the seat. The p-cell battery in the main wing joint woke up with a click and the controls dimmed in preparation for system shutdown.
While Gagarin folded up, Russovsky dragged her pack down from above the H2 tank and slung it onto her wiry shoulders. She was not a big woman – not and fly a Midge-class ultralight like the Gagarin! – but she had a lean strength and endless endurance. The pack conformed to her back, belt straps sliding around her flat waist like warm hands. A sharp tug freed the winch from the forward centerline strut. Monofil line whined out of the spool as she backed toward the right-angled darkness in the cliff face.
In the fading light of the wing phosphors, the rock glowed a pasty green. The angle stood out clear and sharp. Half of a trapezoidal opening, faced with cut stone – a door – yawned in the side of the cliff. Russovsky nodded to herself, unsurprised. Ephesus had been a dead, shattered world for millennia, but something had lived here once. Dust was blowing past now, clouding the air. Hurrying, she climbed up into the opening, then flicked a glowbean inside. Pale blue light spilled out like milk from a fallen pail. There was a chamber, a big one, with a canted floor and more sand. It seemed big enough for the ultralight.
Stepping carefully around the edge of the chamber, one hand on the smooth sloping wall, Russovsky slapped the winch-patch onto the wall opposite the door. Outside, the Gagarin was beginning to rock from side to side as wind began to stir in the sandy bowl. Russovsky counted to five, then ran back to the door. At the side of the ultralight, she ratcheted the sand anchor back in, then stabbed the winch control. The little motor woke up with a tinny sound and began to reel in the monofil. Sliding on its landing skids, the Gagarin bumped up into the door. Russovsky paced behind the aircraft, then put her shoulder against the aft cargo door, pushing. Wind-blown sand began to hiss against her back. Breathing hard into her mask, she shoved the Gagarin into the chamber. On the smoother sand inside, the winch continued to whine until the nose of the aircraft touched the opposite wall.
Russovsky ducked in, her head turned away from the canyon. The wind was rising to a monstrous howl, and the lee of the jutting slab was filling with a swirling dance of dust, sand and fingertip-sized gravel. Working swiftly, she uncoiled a length of fil-tube from her belt, then tacked it along one side of the half-buried door. At the top of the tube was a thumb tab. Snapping the tab down and away, across her body with a sharp motion, Russovsky unfurled the filament screen and dragged the gelatinous material against the opposing jamb. Pressing firmly, she ran the thumb tab down the side of the door. The material sheened pearl for a moment, then stiffened. Dust and sand rattled against the polymer, skittering away from the charged filaments. Carefully, Russovsky used the thumb tab to seal off all the edges and corners. By the time she was done, the rattle of sand was a constant drumming.
Russovsky flicked another glowbean against the ceiling, where it spattered and stuck, making a spray of cold cobalt stars. Despite a sudden feeling of exhaustion, the woman moved around the ultralight, checking the exposed surfaces for cracks, wear or abrasions in the silvery composite. The dust on Ephesus had incredibly corrosive properties. At the starboard engine she paused, clicking her teeth together. Her goggles dialed up high into the ultraviolet, revealing the faint glow of pitting on the intake nacelle.
Shaking her head in disgust, Russovsky removed her helmet and the over-goggles, revealing high cheekbones and a seamed, weathered face. She was not young, and the hot sky of Ephesus had given her a steadily deepening tan. Clipping the helmet and goggles to the back of her belt, Russovsky adjusted her bugeyes – it was dangerous to leave the moist human eye exposed to the raw air of Ephesus – and took the big v-cam from a flat pouch on her left thigh.
"Recor…cough!" Russovsky cleared her throat, tasting bitter alkali. She unclipped the suit's drinking tube and took a swallow. Her fingers dug into a pocket on her z-suit and she popped a round, polished stone into her mouth. When her throat had cleared, she started again: "Recording inside a manufactured structure at the eastern end of slot canyon twelve."
She raised the v-cam and slowly panned around, pausing on the door. By now the sun would have risen in the east, but the canyon outside was still pitch-black. The wind was still rising, making the monofil membrane in the doorway shudder. Completing her slow turn, she walked away from the Gagarin to the edge of the light thrown by the glowbeans. The chamber ended in a slick, glassy wall. There was another trapezoidal door cut into the rock.