Wasteland of flint

'Hai, Chu-sa.' Susan's face settled into a cool, lifeless mask. 'Do you require any assistance with your equipment?'

Mitsu put down the right-hand sleeve of the suit and rested his hands on his knees. He considered his exec for a long moment, then shook his head slightly. 'I should do this myself, Susan. Such things are traditional. If you have a moment, please check with Engineering and make sure they've rigged something to keep the comm-wire from fouling.'

Susan nodded sharply, turned and walked quickly out of the laundry room. Mitsu watched her go with a pensive expression. When the outer door hissed closed, he sighed and turned his attention back to the seals on the inner sheath of the armor. They always became stiff in storage, no matter what the armorer said. Sometimes they split, if not carefully looked after, reducing the wearer's flexibility.

The Palenque

A subtle change in the background vibration of the ship brought Parker awake, his head throbbing from too much alcohol and too little nicotine. He threw back the hood of his sleepbag and squinted blearily at his chrono. Three hours of wonderful sleep, he thought, feeling the onset of a crushing dehydration headache. I will never, ever, sit down for just one glass of Tukhachevsky's bathwater again. Ever. With or without herring.

The pilot spread his fingers against the wall behind his bunk. With the Palenque under constant thrust, the habitat ring was locked in place, allowing him to feel some of the vibrations traveling through the spine of the ship. Something had changed; he was aware of a distinct flutter. A reading light above his head let him see well enough to punch up the comm code for Engineering.

'Parker to Isoroku-san. Are you awake?'

'Yes.' The engineer's voice was terse and there was no video. 'Maneuver drive three has started to stutter.'

'Fuel feed?' Parker climbed out of bed and started to get dressed. 'Fusion chamber flow control?'

'I don't know.' Isoroku's face suddenly appeared on the comm screen. For a bald man in a Fleet engineer's coveralls, he seemed remarkably mussed. There were heavy bags under his eyes and a salt-and-pepper stubble darkened his chin. Parker assumed he'd been awakened from a sound sleep as well. 'Fuel core pressure is constant, which may mean an intake line problem. As a precaution, I am shutting down all three drives.'

Parker nodded, pulling a gray shirt on over his head. 'I'll get to the bridge and balance the other two engines. And I'll tell our furry friend what is going on.'

Isoroku nodded and the comm cleared to a default standby image.

By the time Parker pulled himself along the guide line into the bridge, Magdalena was awake and at her command station.

'What happened?' the Hesht female growled. 'Engineering reports all three drives are offline?'

'Yes.' Parker slid into the navigator's station and called up a drive schematic and the latest system alert logs and diagnostics. 'Drive number three started to develop a thrust flutter sixteen minutes ago. Isoroku has shut down all three maneuvering drives as a precaution.'

'How long will this take?' Magdalena was eyeing a chrono and flight plot on her display. 'We have an intercept window to match if we're going to pick up the pack-leader.'

Parker nodded, scanning through the diagnostic reports for drives one and two. They seemed to be running clean. The fuel system also seemed to be operating properly, which was troubling. Problem's going to be in the fuel-flow system inside drive three, then.

He punched codes for an engine restart on both drives, and then began working up a new thrust balancing configuration. 'I'm going to bring one and two back online,' he said to the hovering Maggie after a moment. 'But we can't increase individual thrust without exceeding our 'quiet' threshold. So…it will be an extra twelve hours before we are inside the pickup window over Ephesus Three.'

'What,' Magdalena said, throttling back her temper, 'if drive three comes back into operation?'

Parker made an equivocal motion with one hand. 'Then we might be able to squeak back into the window, but probably not. We'll just have to see.'

The 'Observatory' Base Camp

The Gagarin shuddered to a halt, wings creaking as they sagged, bereft of the lifting wind. Gretchen let go of the stick, grateful to be on the ground again, and tried to uncramp her right hand. Clouds of fine dust drifted past, gilded by the early morning light, obscuring scattered bunkerlike camp buildings. Groaning a little – all of her bruises were throbbing today – she reached up and toggled off the ultralight engines and power plant.

Outside, the camp had a familiar air of abandonment. The usual litter was missing – no discarded cans or forgotten clothing, no shutters banging in the wind, no stray half-feral dogs pacing stiff-legged in the streets – but Gretchen could feel the emptiness crawling between her shoulder blades.

I hate this kind of place. On edge, she swung out of the cockpit. Despite how things had gone in the slot canyon, the Sif-52 was slung forward under her left armpit, the pistol-grip only an instant from her hand. The weight of the gun was balanced by a bandolier of ammunition canisters. Gretchen turned on her heel, scanning the buildings for any sign of movement. Nothing caught her eye. The wind was gusting, smudging the sky white with dust, but nothing seemed out of place.

The camp felt dead, an abandoned toy cast aside by careless children.

Wrapping the kaffiyeh tight across her breather mask, Gretchen ducked under the wing and made short work of setting the sand anchors. Hummingbird approached, djellaba snapping around his legs in a dark, sand-mottled tail. He too was muffled tight, the glow of morning simmering in his goggles.

A hiss of static, then 'Is there a hangar?'

Gretchen pointed. The largest above ground building in the camp. 'Tight fit for two aircraft, but we'll manage. Better get them inside quick – the wind is picking up.'

Turning away from the wind, they both hurried across the quadrangle toward the maintenance sheds and the hangar building. Gretchen kept a wary eye out – her dislike of recently-abandoned places had not faded with age and time, only grown stronger.

If I have this sight, she realized, trying to suppress a chill of apprehension, then I might see whatever is left behind. The thought was not pleasant. Her curiosity only went so far.

'Locked,' Hummingbird said, gruff voice nearly lost in the hiss of the wind.

Gretchen knelt, checking the mechanism. A bolt and bar assembly, sliding into a quickcrete footing and secured with a cheap padlock.

'Just like our barn at home,' she said in amusement, rising and pulling a hexacarbon prybar from her belt. The tube extended with a snap of her wrist and a metallic clank. 'Just a moment.'

The lever slid in between the padlock and the vertical bar. Gretchen rotated the hexacarbon tube with a sharp, hand-over-hand motion and there was a groaning squeal as she put her shoulders into the turn. The soft steel of the padlock deformed like taffy and then parted with a ringing ting! 'Help me with the door.'

With both of them pushing against the articulated plating, the hanging door rattled up into the roof of the hangar, spitting sand and rust out of the tracks. Gretchen stepped inside, her lightwand raised high, and nodded in tight-lipped satisfaction to see the cavernous space empty.

'Good. Let's get yours inside first.' Gretchen turned back into the wind. Both Midge s were straining against their anchor lines, wings rippling like salmon skin under a heat lamp. 'It's getting stronger. Hurry.'

Heads down, they ran across the field, gossamer veils of dust rushing past. The still-rising sun was bloated half-again its usual size with rust.

'So.' Gretchen pulled a pressure door closed behind her, shutting off the tunnel leading to the hangar building. Taking care to keep dust from spilling onto the recycler apparatus around her neck, she unwound the kaffiyeh. Hummingbird had done the same, leaving his cloak and scarf and other gear