‘No. No need for the expense. I imagine it’ll go out with the next ship.’
‘Then what’s he worried about? Nobody’ll read it for months.’
‘You’d have to know the superintendent to understand. He takes everything personal.’
‘Too bad for him, especially considering his current employment.’
Clemens nodded, looking thoughtful. ‘I found something at the accident site, just a bit away from where it happened. A mark, a burn on the floor. Discoloured, blistered metal. It looked a lot like what you found on the girl’s cryotube.’
She just stared at him, her gaze unblinking, uninformative, her expression unfathomable.
‘Look, I’m on your side,’ the medic insisted when she remained silent. ‘Whatever it is you’re involved in or trying to do, I want to help. But I’d like to know what’s going on, or at least what you think is going on. Otherwise I’m not going to be able to be of much use to you. Maybe you can do whatever it is you’re trying to do alone. I can’t make you talk to me. I just think that I can help, make it easier for you. I have access to equipment. You don’t. I have some knowledge that you don’t. I won’t interfere and I’ll rely entirely on your judgment. I have to, since I don’t have a clue as to what you’re up to.’
She paused, considering, while he watched her hopefully. ‘I hardly know you. Why should I trust you?’
He forced himself to ignore the hurt, knowing there was nothing personal in the query. ‘No reason. Only that without somebody’s help it’s going to be hard for you, whatever it is you’re trying to do. I hardly know you, either, but I’m willing to follow your lead.’
‘Why? Why should you? By your own admission you don’t have any idea what’s going on, what’s at stake.’
He smiled encouragingly. ‘Maybe I think I know you a little better than you think you know me.’
‘You’re crazy.’
‘Is that a hindrance to what you’re doing?’
She smiled in spite of herself. ‘Probably just the opposite. All right.’ She slid the black box out where he could see it clearly. ‘I need to know what happened here in the EEV, why we were ejected from our ship while still in deep sleep. If you really want to be helpful, find me a computer with audio and sensory interpretation capabilities so I can access this flight recorder.’
Clemens looked doubtful. ‘We don’t have anything like that here. The Company salvaged all the sophisticated cybernetics.
Everything they left us is either basic program and response or strictly ROM.’ He smiled sardonically. ‘I imagine they didn’t want a bunch of dumb prisoners messing with their expensive machinery.’
’What about Bishop?’
‘Bishop?’ He frowned.
‘The droid that crashed with me.?’
He was checked and discarded as useless.’
’Let me be the judge of that.’ A note of concern entered her voice. ‘His components haven’t been cannibalized or compacted, have they?’
‘I told you: nobody here’s smart enough to do the first, and there wasn’t any reason to waste the energy to carry out the latter. What’s left of him’s in fewer pieces than the prisoner who got killed, but not many. Don’t tell me you think you can get some use out of him?’
‘All right, I won’t tell you. Where is he?’
Clemens looked resigned. ‘I’ll point you in the proper direction, but I’m afraid I can’t join you. I have an appointment. Watch your step, okay?’
She was unfazed. ‘If I wasn’t in the habit of doing so, I’d be dead now twenty times over.’
VI
The candleworks was more than a hobby. While the installation’s sealed, self-contained fusion plant generated more than enough energy to light the entire facility should anyone think it necessary, it provided nothing in the way of portable energy. Rechargeable lights were a scarce and precious commodity. After all, the Company techs whose responsibility it had been to decide what was salvaged and what was left behind had logically assumed that the prisoners wouldn’t want to go wandering about the surface of Fiorina at night. Within the installation the fusion plant would provide all the illumination they wanted. And since fusion plants simply did not fail, there was no need to consider, nor were substantial provisions made for, backup.
But there were supplies, secreted by miners or forgotten by the evacuation techs, down in the shafts from which millions of tons of ore had been extracted. Supplies which could make life for prisoners and staff alike a little easier. There was plenty of time to hunt them out. All that was wanting was portable illumination.
The candleworks solved that, in addition to giving the inhabitants of Fiorina something different to do. There was plenty of the special wax in storage. One of those bulk supplies not worth the expense of shipping it offworld, it had originally been used to make test moulds for new equipment. A computer-guided laser Cadcam would model the part and etch the wax, which would then be filled with plastic or carbon composite, and hey presto-instant replacement part. No machinery necessary, no long, drawn-out work with lathes and cutters. Afterward the special wax could be melted down and used again.
The prisoners had no need for replacement parts. What equipment was necessary for their survival was self-contained and functioned just fine without their attentions. So they made candles.
They flickered brightly, cheeringly, throughout the works, dangling in bunches from the ceiling, flashing in lead moulds the prisoners had made for themselves. The industrial wax of an advanced civilization served perfectly well to mimic the efforts of a technology thousands of years old.
Prisoner Gregor was helping Golic, Boggs, and Rains stuff the special extra-dense illumination candles into their oversized backpacks. The inclusion of a few carefully chosen impurities helped such candles hold their shape and burn for a very long time. They had no choice but to make use of them, since Andrews would hardly allow use of the installation’s irreplaceable portable lights for frivolous activities.
Not that the men really minded. The technology might be primitive, but there was no significant difference in the quality of the illumination provided by the candles and that supplied by their precious few rechargeable fuel cells. Light was light.
And there were plenty of candles.
Golic alternated between shoving the squat tapers into his pack and food into his mouth. Particles spilled from his lips, fell into his pack. Rains eyed him with distaste.
‘There you are.’ Gregor hefted one of the bulky packs.
‘This’ll top you off. Golic, don’t fidget about. What’s all this damn food you’ve got in here? It’s not properly wrapped.’ The subject of his query smiled blankly and continued to stuff food into his mouth.
Boggs eyed him with disgust. ‘What the hell does he ever do right?’
Rains snorted. ‘Eat. He’s got that down pretty good.’
Dillon and prisoner Junior appeared in the doorway.
‘Hey, Golic,’ the bigger man murmured.
The prisoner thus questioned glanced up and replied through his half-masticated mouthful. ‘Yeah?’
‘Light a candle for Murphy, will you?’
Food spilled from his lips as Golic smiled reassuringly.
‘Right. I’ll light a thousand.’ He was suddenly wistful. ‘He was a special friend. He never complained about me, not once. I loved him. Did his head really get split into a million pieces?
That’s what they’re saying.’
Dillon helped them slip into the bulky backpacks, giving each man a slap on the shoulder after checking out his individual harness.
‘Watch yourselves down there. You’ve got adequate maps.
Use ‘em. You find anything that’s too big to bring back, make damn good and sure you mark its location so a follow-up team can find it. I remember four years ago a bunch of guys dug out some miner’s personal cache of canned goods. Enough to sweeten the kitchen for months. Didn’t mark it right and we never did find the place
