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  “I haven’t called to criticize you.”

  (“Man, that’s a relief. I feel a whole lot better now.”)

  “Strem, you’re trapped, face it. Put the guns down. Their Guard must be watching you this second. If you make it clear that you’re surrendering, that they can take you without force, things will go much easier for all of you.”

  (“I’m not surrendering! I’ll be through this door in five minutes!”)

  “By that time, there will be five thousand waiting to greet you on the other side.”

  Strem’s voice was low. (“Did you see them?”)

  “They’re on their way. The charges in your guns must be getting pretty low.”

  (“But if we give up…”)

  “If you don’t give up, they’ll kill you. And Cleo. And Jeanie.”

  There was a long pause. (“Cleo, stop, turn it off. Shh, Jeanie, don’t worry, we’ll be all right.”) The buzzing ceased. (“Okay, Eric, we’re putting down our weapon. Now what?”)

  “Just a minute.” He turned his attention to Vani. Anxiety was another emotion that transcended planetary origins. Lines creased her brow, while other Kaulikans crowded past them in the tunnel, not realizing they were brushing shoulders with another of the wicked intruders. He pulled her to the side, along a thick beam.

  “Please,” she begged. “You have a secret you must tell me.”

  The truth would have to be administered in doses. He couldn’t blow her mind with talk of hyper jumps and The Union, not when he needed her most. He told her that Strem and two others of his friends had set off the alarm by trying to take forty gallons of coolant without permission. He did not mention the guns or the people they had stunned. Nevertheless, Vani was sufficiently shocked.

  “But if your world needs the fluid, why did not Strem put in a standard request?”

  “Our world doesn’t need the coolant,” he said, “we need it.”

  Vani looked around at the awful commotion he and his partners had started. “What do you need it for?”

  “To save lives.”

  “I do not know where it is stored except in that room I showed you.” She clasped her left arm around her injured arm, her whole body shaking. She wanted to help him, he could tell, but she was afraid.

  “I understand,” he replied. “But you must know someone who works with the coolant, someone who could give it to you and not ask a lot of questions.”

  She lowered her head. “There is someone…”

  He knew from his earlier examination of the Kaulikans that they had a unit of measurement called a squzz that equaled approximately four gallons. He told her he needed ten squzz.

  “But you have not told me why. Do you not trust me?”

  He squeezed her shoulder. “Trust me, Vani,” he said. She looked down at his hand, studying his calloused fingers, which were probably unlike any man’s she had ever known. Something in her face seemed to change, to darken, and he wondered if she were beginning to guess the truth.

  “I will get you the coolant. But I must go for it alone. I will bring it back here.”

  “Is the place you’re going to in the axis, in free fall?”

  She was avoiding his eyes. “No, it is at the farms.”

  “But you won’t be able to handle the weight. I must go with you,” he said.

  “No. You are a stranger to this world. The alarm was sounded by a stranger who was taking coolant. If you are with me when I talk to my friend, he will ask questions about you. This way is the best.”

  His suspicion left a bad taste in his mouth. He couldn't help it. “How will you carry the ten squzz?”

  “I will find a cart. I should hurry before talk of this spreads.”

  The ideal move would be for her to take the coolant directly to the air lock. But there were difficulties with this plan. He did not know how to describe to her exactly which air lock it was. He could give her his implant and let Sammy guide her with the help of Excalibur’s translator, but then he wouldn’t have an implant. He’d be out of touch and might even get lost. Plus, the implant, fitted in Vani’s ear, might frighten her further.

  “Could you bring the coolant to an air lock,” he asked.

  Now she looked at him, but it was a look of shock. “You are going to take it outside?”

  He nodded and pulled his inflatable bag from beneath his shirt. “Fill this with the ethylene glycol,” he said. “It holds approximately five squzz.”

  But she refused the bag. “I can get a container that will hold it all. Now I must go.”

  She did not ask which air lock. That was a bad sign, he thought. He asked her to be patient a moment longer. He contacted Sammy. “I’m going to give her my implant. You’ll have to guide her. What do you think?”

  (“Her excuses are logical. But I don’t know—”)

  (“Trust her,” Strem interrupted.)

  Had the situation been less desperate, Eric would have laughed. “What’s new at your end?”

  (“Now it’s them that’re trying to cut through the door. We must have fused it shut.”)

  “Don’t fight with them.”

  (“I hope they don’t believe in torture.”)

  “I have to say good-bye, now.”

  (“Just in case she brings more than coolant to the air lock, Cleo left a gun in your pressure suit.”)

  “But you just said to trust her!”

  (“To a point. Hey, you got a plan to rescue us?”)

  “Yes,” he lied. “A great plan. Sammy?”

  (“Go ahead, put it in her ear.”)

  “We’ll all be together soon,” he said, trying to sound like he believed it. He turned to Vani and told her he had another present for her. Pinching the tip of his ear up and away from his head with his thumb and index finger, he scraped inside the canal with the nail of his little finger. The implant popped out, a miniature silver oval, and floated in the air between them.

  Vani took one look at it and shook her head, saying something he no longer had the means to understand. Eric reassured her the best he could with gestures. Finally, she nodded reluctantly and allowed him to jam the device in her ear canal, which was considerably narrower than his own. Suddenly, her eyes widened. Sammy must have said hello using the computer’s mechanical voice. If anything, this seemed to make her more anxious to get away from him. There were no hugs this time.

  Vani activated her scooter, and Eric watched as she glided toward the lit pulley bars and disappeared in the deeps of the central shaft. For a moment he contemplated following her. But, if she were going to betray him, he decided, he would rather know later than sooner. At least at the air lock he would have a chance of escape. With a quick look back in the direction where his friends were cornered, he shoved off to find the air lock.

  Retracing his steps proved to be easier than he’d anticipated. Eric crossed the void between engineering and the fuel tank and found what he believed to be the elevator Vani had originally used to take them to the central shaft. It was empty and he took it all the way to the rim and was let out on a corridor that seemed to stretch forever. But Strem and he had been lucky with their choice of entrance, for the door to that particular door lock was only fifty yards from where the corridor had dead-ended in another elevator; it was not necessary for him to stop and peek in every room to see if it was the right one. At this recollection he could have kicked himself; he could have told Vani how to find the air lock and kept his communicator, after all. Yet, having Sammy’s companion words in her head might have its advantage. That is, if she hadn’t removed the implant the second she had gotten out of his sight.

  The corridor had its pedestrians but none stopped to chat with him. He refrained from running, keeping a reasonable pace, occasionally nodding his head and muttering “boo”. This went on for ten minutes. Reflecting on how much distance he’d covered, Eric figured he’d circumvented almost the entire wheel. This didn’t bother him, knowing it was better to be a long time heading in what he knew to be the right
direction than to be lost on some shortcut. Finally, he spotted the end-of-the-line elevator and nonchalantly strode into the air-lock dressing room like it was his own sleeping quarters.

  The lockers were jammed with Excalibur’s pressure suits. Except for the helmet, Eric put on all of his gear, getting ready for a quick exit. He sat down and waited, holding the gun Cleo had thoughtfully left behind. Vani was not going to betray him, he told himself. She cared about him. She would bring the coolant. She was a nice alien.

  But he kept his finger on the trigger. It was fortunate that he was ready.

  When thirty of the slowest imaginable minutes had passed, when he was beginning to think he’d better take a brief hike outside and check with Sammy on Vani’s progress, the door suddenly burst open. Three Kaulikans were standing in the corridor: two men, one woman. The latter was dressed in black and was holding an object that was unmistakably designed for firing something at someone. Eric’s reaction was not one of fear. He just felt sad, terribly sad. She had lied to him when he had been prepared to tell her the truth. She would never reach Lira. He was sad for her.

  He had his gun resting on his knee, under his helmet.

  “Boo,” he said.

  The woman motioned for him to stand and come out into the corridor. He could see immediately that the Kaulikan society was not practiced in police work. Seasoned disciplinaries would have had guns enough for all three of them and they would have been ready for the simple trick he pulled. He stood slowly, then abruptly dropped his helmet and shot the woman in the abdomen, the flash of the weapon knocking her backward. The two men froze in surprise, making easy targets. Another couple of squeezes of the trigger and they hit the floor beside their comrade.

  The next meeting between human and Kaulikan civilization was already ruined. The golden girl of his dreams was gone. Next spring break, he was staying home.

  He snapped on his helmet and stepped into the air lock, slamming the door at his back. The controls presented no problems, and he was able to crack the overhead hatch and allow the atmosphere to escape. He then climbed the ladder and manually unscrewed the hatch the remainder of the way, throwing it open and poking his head outside. The black vacuum and the cold stars were not a welcome sight. He flipped on his head lamp and stood up on the hull.

  The hike to Excalibur was brief and painful. Eric really could not remember ever feeling so completely miserable in all of his life. It was no consolation that things were undoubtedly going to get worse before they got better. The familiar sight of Excalibur only brought a tinge of relief. Who could celebrate climbing into a time bomb? He stumbled into the freighter’s air lock and pushed a button. Air gushed around his legs. He leaned against the wall. He was exhausted.

  “What are you doing here?” Sammy yelled at him the moment he stepped into the cargo bay. Eric removed his helmet and immediately sneezed. After the sweet clean smells of the Kaulikan craft, Uncle Dan’s pride and joy stunk.

  “I was asking myself the same question.” He put a hand to his head, feeling pressure inside and out. “Vani sent their Guard after me.”

  “No, she didn't!”

  “She did. Never trust a girl with green eyes and white hair. Three of their people tried to arrest me in the air lock.”

  “Naturally, the Kaulikans started going through their air locks. But Vani didn’t send them! She’s on the line right now. She’s got the coolant. I was leading her to the right air lock when I heard you entering.”

  It was amazing how a little good news could pick him up. “Let me talk to her!”

  “No. You have to go back to the air lock.”

  “I can’t do that. I left three bodies lying in the corridor. How far is Vani from the air lock?”

  “I’ve got her in an elevator heading towards the rim.”

  “Steer her toward another air lock. She’ll freak when she sees what I’ve done to her people. I’ve got it. Send her in the opposite direction along the corridor. I’ll take another implant and a spare pressure suit. You track us both and when we get atop each other, let me know and I’ll look around for a hatch.”

  “You’re going to take her aboard?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Why?”

  “I like her.”

  Sammy nodded. “Maybe we could use her as a hostage.”

  “What?”

  “Sorry, another one of Strem’s ideas. I’ve got to stop listening to that guy. The Guard has him and the girls. They’ve removed their contacts and wigs. They know we’re from somewhere else. The Guard has also taken away their remote eyes on their belts so I’m unable to see where they are. But they’ve still got the implants in their ears. I can track them and talk to them.”

  “What’s our ship’s temperature?”

  “Off the dial. You better go.”

  The secret was out of the bag. He could tell Vani the truth with a clear conscience. He grabbed a communicator and suit and went out the way he had come in. Eric felt a surge of energy and jogged along the dark gully cut by the rim of the wheel. With his fresh implant, he could have spoken to Vani, but he didn’t want to confuse her with too many voices. Sammy could feed her directly with translated instructions.

  He had passed three hatches when Sammy told him to stop. (“She’s right beneath you,” he said.)

  Fortunately, the air lock was a duplicate of the other one, and he was inside and under atmosphere in minutes. Vani was in the locker room, standing beside a wheeled cart that held ten big bottles. She was a nervous wreck but she smiled for his benefit. He wanted to kiss her to thank her a thousand times over, and apologize for ever doubting her. Instead, he held up his spare pressure suit. She shook her head.

  “I do not like being in the vacuum.”

  “Sammy, tell her it will only be for a minute. Then she will see something more wonderful than can be seen from any mountaintop.”

  Vani listened seriously to the whispered words in her head, then chuckled. “But that was a dream.”

  It was real, he had Sammy tell her.

  She accepted the suit and he showed her how to put it on. The fit was lousy – it was too big and her broken arm didn’t help matters – but it would last her the distance to Excalibur.

  The air lock was not equipped with a lift. He had to carry the ten four-gallon bottles up onto the deck one by one. The cart, however, could be folded and he was able to fit it through the hatch, saving himself several backbreaking trips between the air lock and the ship.

  When the two of them were assembled on the hull, the coolant at their feet, Vani began to have trouble maintaining her balance; the surroundings were eerie enough for Eric’s star-traveled instincts, and she apparently didn’t go outside often, if ever. He took hold of her good hand, worried how her injured arm was holding up without the sling, and they set off at a careful pace, the cart rolling smoothly over the metal floor. It occurred to him that he had not even checked to see if she had gotten the right stuff. He would have given a lot to be able to read her mind as the bulk of Excalibur began to loom out of the night.

  She hesitated at the entrance to the air lock. But as he began to unload the bottles, she stepped inside and leaned in a corner, supporting her wrist. She was scared but he could see a gleam in her eyes through the faceplate.

  He was praying that the whites in Sammy’s eyes didn’t frighten her. If they did, he wasn’t taking off his contacts. Or his wig, for that matter.

  Sammy was not there to greet them in the cargo bay. Strem and company must be keeping him busy, Eric thought. He pulled off his suit and helped Vani out of hers, once accidentally tugging on her sore arm, causing her to wince. She stared at the many stacked cartons and he pointed to her opant jacket.

  “See, I told you I had thousands of them,” Eric said.

  Yet, she did not understand what the strange ship and cargo meant. He lugged the coolant bottles to a capped pipe in the rear corner, then got Sammy on the intercom.

  “Shall I pour it straight in?” />
  “By all means. Is it ethylene glycol?”

  He popped the top of one of the containers, took a sniff. “A vintage year.”

  “I’m going to enjoy watching the temperature go down.”

  “I’ll be up on the bridge in a minute.” He added, “If Vani chokes when she sees your face, don’t take it personally.”

  When he had the coolant safely circulating around the Preeze Cap, Eric led Vani toward the control room. Every nook and cranny fascinated her.

  “I have never seen a ship like this. Where are its rockets?”

  “It doesn't have any.”

  “But how does it...?”

  She stopped. It was a tribute to her fine manners that she did not faint. Sammy, who must have been shaving while they’d been coming through the air lock, was clean-faced and trying to stand up straight, as he greeted her in the sleeping-quarters hallway.

  “Boo,” he said.

  “Smile,” Eric said.

  Sammy smiled. Vani looked from each of them, back and forth, then slowly reached out and grasped Eric’s white locks, pulling off his wig. He held his breath. She pointed to his eyes, as if to say, the same as your friend’s? He nodded. He waited. She was thinking. At least she was not screaming bloody murder. Her hand again reached out, this time brushing his real hair.

  “Your hair is as black and mysterious as deep space. Is that where you are from?”

  He nodded.

  She smiled. “That is good.”

  His warm relief was a sensation worth remembering for future reference when things might go bad.

  They led her to the bridge, to a seat at the main console where both their languages could be immediately translated. The control room, particularly the holographic cube that held a three-dimensional transparent image of her home ship, had Vani enthralled. Sammy adjusted a microphone for her benefit, then leaned over and whispered in Eric’s ear, “The Guard is holding them in a room, not questioning them. Strem has the impression they are about to be transferred.”

  “To where?” he whispered back.