Wasteland of flint

Geosync Orbit Over Ephesus III

'We have orbital match in…three…two…one…Orbit match locked.'

Sho-sa Kosho's cool voice echoed in Gretchen's earbug. She and Magdalena were crowded into the secondary weapons station on the command deck of the Cornuelle, sharing a combat chair. The flat black display in front of them was configured into three v-panes, one showing an orbital plot of the planet with the Palenque and the Cornuelle in their velocity dance, another the view from the warship's forward cameras and in the third a colorful, annotated image culled from the sensors on Parker's suit as he stood in an airlock.

'Main engines at zero thrust. Steering at zero thrust.'

Around them, the officers of the Cornuelle began to go through a checklist in soft voices. Gretchen bit her lip, watching the image of the Palenque. The ship seemed intact, without visible hull damage or scoring. It was an ungainly monster in comparison to the rakish profile of the Cornuelle. The Temple-class were workhorse ships, with a big rotating habitat and lab ring sitting forward, squeezed around a command and sensor array platform. Behind the habitat ring was an enclosed shuttle dock assembly, surrounded by mushroom-shaped cargo modules, then a flare shield and the bulk of the engines. The Company logo, white on maroon, stood twenty meters high on the thruster fairings.

'Maggie, do you have anything on ship-to-ship comm?'

Maggie shook her head, long ears angled back. 'Quiet as high grass, sister.' Her claws made a tic- tic-tic sound as they worked the console. The view of the Palenque tightened, zooming in on an airlock beneath the command deck. The hatch was hexagon-shaped, with a clear window. Gretchen could see something through the opening.

'What's this?'

Maggie worked the panel and the image cropped, then zoomed again. There was a brief ripple across the v- screen as the console kicked in to interpolate the image. Gretchen leaned in a little, squinting through her com- glasses. There was an amber light shining above a control panel on the inner door of the lock. She tapped her finger on the v-screen. 'Do we have a pattern match for this?'

'Yes,' rumbled Magdalena in her I'm-working-on-it-already voice. A v-pane unfolded on the console display. It contained a schematic of the airlock control panel, with highlights indicating the meaning and use of each control, light and display. 'There is interior pressure, but the airlock is in manual mode – no power for the automatic mechanism.'

Gretchen nodded, pressing a fingertip against her cheekbone. 'Parker, did you hear that?'

'You bet, boss.' The pilot's v-feed shifted as he looked around the Cornuelle's lock. There were two Marines with him and Bandao. Both civilians were wearing dark gray z-suits, with bright Company logos on their chests, white-lettered nametags on each shoulder and over the heart. Both Marines were nearly invisible in matte-black suits far slimmer than the Company rigs. Both had nametags, but they could not be read in the ambient light. Gretchen frowned, but Maggie was already working. Text materialized on the v-feed, showing FITZSIMMONS and deckard above the two Marines. 'We'll have to crank the lock ourselves.'

'One kilometer,' Kosho announced. The Cornuelle was approaching on the last dying bit of her insertion velocity, coasting in not only to match orbital paths with the Palenque, but to come within eyeball distance of the abandoned ship. 'Three minutes.'

'Maggie, are there any other lights? Radio emissions? Any EM at all?' Gretchen leaned back in the chair. The shock-cushion adjusted, cradling her back. The Hesht tapped up an ambient light gradient over a ship schematic on her main control window. The derelict showed heat and light loss at the personnel airlocks and around the big shuttle bay doors.

'She's cold. Just waste heat from standby systems,' Magdalena said, 'but there seems to be atmosphere inside from end to end. The hull shielding is blocking everything else, but when Parker gets the telemetry relay in place, we'll know more. Still no response from the comm system or the tachyon relay.' Her shoulders shrugged in a rolling ripple of muscle. 'Station-keeping is still on line; she's not spinning or losing altitude.'

'Two minutes,' Kosho announced. 'Correcting roll with braking thrust.'

Gretchen felt a very faint shudder through the decking under her feet. The feed from Parker's suit suddenly showed the planet rolling past in the window of the airlock, huge and ruddy tan. Then the Palenque slid into view. Gretchen touched her cheek again.

'Parker, we're almost ready. Start your checklist.'

'Copy that,' the pilot replied and the feed-image bent toward Bandao. Each man would double-check his z-suit, his equipment, the telemetry relay, their weapons before the lock opened. The Marines were already checking each other's suits. All four men were wearing propulsion packs. Gretchen's request for a wire-tether fired from the Cornuelle to the derelict had been refused. Hadeishi had no intention of establishing a physical connection between his ship and the Palenque.

Gretchen turned, looking up across the control station behind her. Hadeishi was ensconced in a command chair, half enveloped in shock-foam and control consoles. Faint lights from his panel displays mottled his face and combat suit. Kosho sat slightly below him, on his left, and Hayes down and to the right. She and the Hesht were at a station in the third ring of the bridge, matching the position of the ensign, Smith, on the opposite side of the U-shaped deck. The Imperial commander raised his head slightly and smiled, meeting her eyes.

Hadeishi toggled on his voice channel. 'Near space scan, Smith-tzin?'

'Clear, Chu-sa. Two trailing asteroids, six low-orbit Company peapod satellites, no other ships, shuttles or unidentified objects. No radio or t-wave transmissions except the telemetry from the satellites. Everything's quiet.'

'Engines, Isoroku-tzin?'

'Hot, kyo, idling at zero thrust. Power plant is at twenty percent. Spin time to hyper is six zero minutes. Repeat, six zero minutes.' The engineer's voice echoed in Gretchen's earbug, coming from the downship channel.

'Weapons, Mister Hayes?'

'Weapons are hot, Captain. One flash bird rigged and solution locked. Point defense system is online and tracking.'

'One minute,' Kosho said softly.

Hadeishi nodded to her. 'Full stop.'

Kosho ran her finger down a control bar on her console. There was another slight shudder. In Gretchen's displays, a counter indicating meters-to-target slowed and then stopped. 'Six hundred meters,' announced the pilot. 'We have velocity match.'

'Are you ready?' Hadeishi's voice was soft in Gretchen's ear and she started. A blinking glyph in the bottom right corner of her glasses indicated they were on a private channel.

'Ready,' she said, swallowing. This was it. She changed back to the open channel. 'Mister Parker, have you completed your checklist?'

'Copy that, boss. We are ready to take a walk.'

Gretchen looked sideways at Magdalena. 'Cameras ready? Suit telemetry online?'

The Hesht grinned, showing double rows of white teeth like tiny knives. 'Cameras live. Recorders are rolling. Suit telemetry is clean. All bio readings are in the green.' The cat flicked a claw at a newer, smaller window on the console. Gretchen saw it showed a string of beadlike lights circling the planet. The peapod survey satellites Hayes had picked up. Excellent.

'Mister Parker, you are free to take a walk.'

Unconsciously, she bit her lip, eyes fixed on the v-feed of the Cornuelle's airlock. One of the Marines, Fitzsimmons, punched a code into the airlock control panel. The hatch opened swiftly and raw sunlight flooded into the chamber, picking out every detail with brilliant clarity.

Deckard stepped out into the void. He was briefly silhouetted against the monstrous glowing disk of the planet. Bandao followed, white jets of vapor trailing behind him. Parker followed and Gretchen felt a moment of vertigo as he stepped out over an infinite distance. Then the suit cam focused on the distant, surprisingly tiny image of the Palenque.

'Five minute count to contact.' Parker's voice was calm, even cheerful.