Zak came strolling over. “Hear the news?” he said.
We nodded.
“I took the trouble to run a calculation, since I was using a teaching machine at the time. If the
“Rather close,” another voice said. Yuri had moved in quietly to a position close beside Jenny.
“I wonder if ISA has anything up their sleeves,” Zak mused.
“Impossible to say. Anyway,” I said, glancing at Yuri, “it’s not our job to worry about ISA. Better we should find something new to dazzle the folks back home.”
“Was that crack directed to me?” Yuri said sharply.
Jenny said quickly, “I don’t think Matt—”
“What if it was?” I said casually.
“You ought to get your facts straight before you open your trap, Bohles,” Yuri said.
“What facts?”
“The fact that Atmospheric Studies works harder than anybody else in this Lab. The fact that we’ve run more probes into the upper atmosphere of Jupiter than the original plans called for. The—”
“Spare me the advertisement,” I said.
Yuri took a deep breath and was about to say something when Zak broke in. “Look, Yuri, we all know those things. ISA is starting to wonder why, with all this work, the Lab hasn’t turned up any evidence for life somewhere down in that ammonia atmosphere. I guess it’s natural for the rest of us—the ones who don’t work in Atmospheric Studies—to wonder, too.”
“There isn’t any answer, no matter what people like Bohles think,” Yuri said, jutting out his jaw.
“Okay,” I said, “give us a hard one.”
“I
So Yuri launched into a song and dance about the incredible hardships his group worked under, and how his father in BioTech was shouldering a staggering, superhuman work load—well, that was the implication, anyway. He gave us a lot of facts and figures to go with it, and those were interesting stuff, the straight scoop. As I listened it dawned on me that Yuri was going to be stiff competition for a staff position in the Lab. Commander Aarons and the others were going to be weighing him against me…
I focused my attention back on the conversation. Yuri was describing their latest descent, the one that malfunctioned from pressure overload.
“Meaning, it got squeezed to death,” Zak put in.
“—before it could report on its experiments to find life. But the package of instruments did show that deep in the methane and ammonia there is water and it is warm, as warm as this room is now. All the conditions necessary for life are satisfied.”
“Then why haven’t you found any?” Jenny asked innocently.
Yuri pressed his lips together. “We don’t know.”
“Yuri, you help put together the rockets that drop instrument packages into Jupiter. It’s not your fault if they don’t turn up anything.” Jenny said comfortingly.
“Right,” Zak murmured.
“What puzzles me is that your probes go deeper and deeper, until the pressure crushes them, and they still don’t find any living matter. No airborne spores, no bacteria, nothing,” I said.
“We’ll find some. Bohles,” Yuri said, with a sudden flash of anger. “Just give me elbow room. You will see results.” And with that he got up and left the room.
“Well, all this outdoorsy stuff didn’t calm
“Yeah,” I murmured, “he was going along fine for a while there, I guess we just reminded him of his problems and he covered up his worries by getting mad at us.”
“Pretty deep analysis, doctor,” Zak said.
“Go on, you two,” Jenny said. She got up and palmed the room lights down, and then left.
“I cast
“You can count me in as well,” Zak said.
“You’re going?”
“I don’t much want to, but the psych people say I should,” Zak shrugged.
We watched Jenny walk down the corridor and out of sight. Skirts are even more impractical in low gravity than they are on Earth—harder to keep from creeping up, for one thing—so everybody wears pants. But there’s no way to disguise a woman when she wants to be noticed, and Jenny departing was far more pleasant and interesting a view than the fake countryside of the meeting room.
“I think she’s a little miffed that her peacemaker attempt between you and Yuri fell flat. She’ll be okay by tonight.”
“Sure. See you at 1900 hours? Got to go practice my guitar.”
1900 hours meant a small party at Ishi’s apartment. Ishi’s parents maintain as much of the traditional Japanese life as they can, living 390 million miles from Nippon. They sit cross-legged on the floor, on tatami mats, and have delicately shaded woodblock prints on their walls. In the air hangs a faint background smell of rice and the salt tang of fish. It all blends together into a warm feeling of home.
Zak, Jenny, and I sat in Buddha position and took part in the ancient tea ceremony, exchanging small talk with Ishi and his parents. (My back ached, but I like the mild green tea.) Ishi didn’t seem bothered by the speculation over sending us Earthside. But then, nothing ever seems to disturb Ishi.
I didn’t mention his Lady X to him, even though I sort of wanted to. I didn’t have any specific questions in mind, but still… The best way I can explain it is that Ishi had
It was a quiet evening. After the party broke up I walked Jenny home. Making our way through the hushed corridors, with only the whirr of the air circulators, I noticed that I did feel kind of uneasy with Jenny. She was more like a buddy to me than a, well, a woman. Females have a clear moment when they change from girls to women, at least in the biological sense. Males don’t have that. I wondered if it explained some of the way I was feeling. Boys had no way to tell they were men. I mean, nobody pinned a badge on you or anything. So maybe in the back of our heads all the guys I knew in the Can were still boys, without that magic touch. Getting Laid was for sure one signpost, though. There just didn’t seem to be any easy way to do it. Society sure as hell didn’t help. And the whole damned business seemed so irrational, too. Why should I keep feeling that odd, diffused affection for Jenny? Maybe Zak’s kibbutzim analogy was right after all.
Anyway, when we stopped outside her door. I leaned over and kissed her. The idea seemed to go over. She put her arms around my neck and the ol’ pulse rate picked up a bit. But then she let go and smiled and stepped back and murmured something nice and that was it. I made a grin I could tell looked awkward and foolish.
I felt confused on the way home. I wasn’t very good at figuring out the swirl of emotions I had inside me. But then I shrugged.
Chapter 5
We assembled near the axis of the Can, already suited up. All Laboratory vehicles, from the small one-man shuttles Jenny and Ishi used, to the ion cruiser used on the Ganymede run, are kept in the center of the Can.
As I said before, the Can is a big rotating drum. Most of that drum is empty. The middle of the Can, except for the axial cylinder and the connecting spokes, is open to free space. Our cruiser was parked there and we had to
