The Aftermath

SMELTER SHIP HUNTER:

AIRLOCK

Standing at the lip of the open airlock hatch, Theo saw clearly the curving flank of Syracuse, the long ugly gash in one of the fuel tank sections, the stumps that had once held the missing command pod, the new antennas he had painted on the adjoining portion of the hull, the backup command pod.

They were approaching the ship from its top, the side opposite the place where Vogeltod hung mated to Syracuse by the flexible connector tube.

Theo was in his hard-shell space suit with a new backpack that Dorn had provided; the cyborg stood beside him in a nanofabric suit.

“The living quarters are on the other side of the pod,” Theo told the cyborg, pointing with an outstretched arm. “The main airlock is—”

He saw that the airlock hatch was open, subdued red light glowing from it.

“Is Valker using our airlock?” he wondered aloud.

“I doubt it,” said Dorn.

“Then who…?” Theo saw two space suited figures outlined against the airlock’s dim red lighting.

“Mom?” he called over the suit-to-suit frequency. “Angie?”

“Theo! We’re coming over to you.”

“Okay! Great! Make it quick!”

Theo turned to Dorn. “Tell Ms. Apacheta to goose the fusion drive as soon as we get them aboard. Maybe we can take them in and get away from here before Valker’s crew can board us.”

Dorn shook his head inside the inflated bubble hood of the nanosuit.

“Too late,” he said, pointing.

Haifa dozen nanosuited men were jetting up from between the spokes of Syracuse and heading straight for them.

* * *

Standing at Vogeltod’s main airlock in his nanofabric space suit, Valker heard Theo’s call to his mother and sister.

“The kid’s still alive,” he growled.

“And the women are trying to jump over to Hunter,” Kirk said.

“Let ’em,” Valker snapped. “We’ll get there first. Come on.”

He squeezed the knob that controlled his suit’s propulsion unit and jetted out of the airlock. Five of his men followed him. He had left Nicco and three others behind to take over Syracuse.

As they maneuvered through the spokes of the big wheel-shaped Syracuse, Kirk laughed maliciously. “Nicco’s gonna crap himself when he finds the sugarpots ain’t on the ship.”

“So what?” said Valker. “Once we take over Hunter we’ve got the women, too.”

He could see Hunter hanging in the emptiness, rotating slowly. There’s the airlock, Valker said to himself. And two people standing in it.

“Hey, there’s the women,” one of his crew called out.

Turning slightly, Valker made out a pair of figures in hard suits jetting toward Hunter’s open airlock hatch.

“Good,” he said. “Let ’em get to the airlock first. We’ll hit ’em while they’re all crammed in there together.”

“What about hitting one of the auxiliary locks, too?” Kirk asked.

“They’ll be sealed tight. Why blow a locked hatch when we’ve got one wide open and waiting for us?”

Then Valker thought a moment. Turning to the two men handling the big welding laser, he said, “Slice a chunk out of the main thruster cone. I don’t want them lighting off their fusion engine and getting away from us.”

* * *

“Elverda,” Dorn was saying into his suit microphone, “as soon as I give the command you must push the main engine to full thrust.”

“I understand.” Her voice sounded tense in his earphones.

The two women were a scant hundred meters from the airlock hatch and coming on fast. But the half-dozen scavengers were not far behind them.

“Crank the command chair to the full reclining position,” Dorn told her. “You’ll be able to take the acceleration better that way.”

“Don’t worry about me,” she replied immediately.

But Dorn did worry. She can’t take a full g’s acceleration, he thought. Even with the stem cell therapy she received, her heart can’t take the strain. But if we don’t get out of here before those men come aboard…

“I’m programming the propulsion system for a one-g acceleration,” Elverda was saying, her voice tight but calm. “Tell me when.”

“Crank the chair down,” he repeated.

“Yes. Certainly.”

Theo nudged him with an elbow. “Here they come!”

In their space suits, it was impossible for Dorn to tell who was the mother and who the daughter.

Close behind them six other figures were speeding toward them: the scavengers from Vogeltod.

“Hurry!” Theo urged.

Dorn saw two of the scavengers peel off, away from the others. They were carrying some kind of bulky equipment. A weapon? he wondered.

“I’m ready to light off the fusion drive,” Elverda’s voice reported.

Theo was attaching a tether to one of the cleats on the hull just outside the airlock hatch. Before Dorn could ask him why the youngster jumped out into the vacuum and reached for the nearer of the two women. He pushed her toward the airlock, then stretched his arms out toward the other one.

Dorn grabbed at the woman as she coasted into the airlock and helped stop her headlong rush. “You’re safe now,” he said.

He could see the frightened expression on her face through her glassteel helmet. “For how long?” Pauline asked.

Theo clutched at his sister’s outstretched hand and tugged her toward the airlock.

“Thee! Look out!” Angela screamed.

One of the scavengers was speeding toward them. Theo pushed Angela toward the airlock hatch and turned to face the approaching man. He could see Kirk’s face through the bubble of his nanofabric suit, lips pulled back in a savage grin. He was brandishing a long, deadly looking power drill.

“I’m gonna finish you once and for all, kid.”

Theo jetted up and away from the scavenger, but the tether reached its limit and stopped him with an abrupt jerk that pulled Theo upside down. Kirk swung around, fiddled with his propulsion unit’s controls, and came swooping after him.

Theo dived toward Kirk, holding his end of the buckyball tether in both hands, and flicked it like a whip. Kirk flew into it, and Theo spun around him, wrapping the tether around Kirk’s middle, trapping one of his arms against his torso. Screaming curses, Kirk flailed at the tether with the drill, but the buckyball material was too tough even to scratch.

Theo raced back to the airlock hatch, where Dorn, his mother and sister were standing. A burst of light