“Damn it.” Surely Henry was all right. All he had to do was stay in the habitat. Had he checked Henry's water supply? But he'd plugged the habitat into the vine.
The networks had no control over the suit-to-suit-radio. He called to him. No answer. “Calvin, show me Henry's med readings!”
“You don't need the distraction. Talk. You need to talk so we know you're still with us. Your med feeds could be showing better, buddy.”
Kyle babbled about the time the feeder jammed completely just after the Styx got to Pluto, when a river of vines threatened to overrun Little Siberia. Henry and others had clambered out onto the surface. They'd fed vines back to the Hoytether trellis and set them climbing back toward Charon. Suriyah had stayed out there with him the whole time. Everyone else took turns. The story didn't seem to be coming out quite in order. Thinking about Henry wasn't right; he should be thinking about Lark. Why was she still silent?
“She's not in great shape,” Calvin said. “She's alive. We've been waking her up but she isn't staying awake long. She's been taking pain meds too.”
“Like father, like daughter, huh?”
“You imagine the sores you'd get sitting in the same place in a p-suit for ten days.”
“Yeah, well, I know what mine smells like after ten days.”
Calvin laughed. “I bet you do.”
“You don't have smell sensors built into these yet?”
“On the newer models.”
“It's a bad idea. Calvin?”
“Still here.”
How had he forgotten? “Wake up Lark now . I don't care how. Get her to fire the main motor for a few seconds.”
“Oh, right, we discussed that—”
“Check my position first and see if I'm out of the way. Henry too.”
“You're okay. You're almost underneath Shooter , but Shooter 's tilted. I'll get her to fire the motor, then guide you around to the channel. Hey, Lark!”
He kept climbing. Lark and Calvin negotiated. She spoke too low for his hearing, but she sounded angry.
He didn't see the exhaust itself. He saw a line of pale plants glow brilliantly, dissolve into colors, then explode in flame as heat reached the air veins. It ran for twenty seconds, and when it went off, vines still burned.
“Thanks, Calvin, I can see it myself,” he said, and angled around.
He had to pull himself into the forest to reach the channel. The vines were growing back ... but the going was suddenly much easier.
Kyle pulled up and over a half-charred leaf and stem-knot at an intersection. From here he could see a much bigger knot—and a darkly corroded metal claw, like a skeletal hand straining to break free. Shooter . The little ship was even more overgrown and tangled than when he'd seen it from the observatory. Flowers had sprouted everywhere, decorating it, making it look like a party bauble. He stopped a second and just looked, his heart flooding with the knowledge that he was going to make it. Calvin babbled in his ear—talk for the audience about how emotional the moment was.
“I'm afraid to go and look,” he said. Lark still wasn't responding to him.
He didn't feel his back or his body at all the last kilometer, just the soft give of the creepers in his hands and feet, the balance of his torso as he struggled to keep his center of gravity over the center of the stem. “Lark be safe ... Lark be safe.”
He was within thirty meters of the marble when the vines tangled around it shuddered and jerked up and down. What? Was the knot unraveling?
“Hi, Daddy.” Her voice was weak. She was using one of Shooter' s arms to wave at him. He breathed out, and then screamed triumph.
Calvin and his crew had spent hours trying to figure out what he should do. He had a belt knife—thin and insubstantial. It easily cut the edges of leaves, and wouldn't even dent a stem. He had a few hours, maybe more, maybe less. He was too tired to make sense of time.
Trying to untangle the ship appeared useless. Nevertheless, incident command had commandeered nearby computers and run thousands of simulations. They led him through the vines, one by one. Pull this part out of under—there. Yes. And then go around to the other side. Tug. Sure you can. Good. Now—see the one with the longest bell of flowers? Break that off. Pull here. Tie that down.
In the background, Calvin was talking Lark through a series of checks. He heard her talking back to Calvin, telling him to quit being so pushy, and Kyle laughed.
Kyle had made a new knot of vines, feeding the vines he was liberating from around Shooter into it to keep them from simply re-engulfing the bubble. His back was to Shooter . He heard a ripping sound.
He turned just in time to see Shooter lurch a few meters lower in the thinned-out net of stems that surrounded it. The ends of an arm dangled from above. Kyle had a rope tied to the marble. He pulled himself along it, fast, letting the vine he had been working on swing back towards Lark. It flapped out above the marble, safely out of the way. The door was free. By the time he got there it was swinging open.
His hand took his daughter's hand.
She was almost dead weight. Her boots flopped against the side door as he pulled, but her hands were gripping. He held her under one arm and looked inside. A backpack sat by her chair.
