Island in a Sea of Stars (5 page)

Pannebaker cheerfully interrupted him over the comm. “Just had a surprise, Chief. The
Voracious Curiosity
came a day early. Captain Kett says she wanted to catch you sleeping.”

“I rarely sleep,” Iswander said. “Good thing we're ready with our shipment.”

“And best of all—a fourth lava geyser just erupted! Our sensors picked up the heat spike, and it's jetting high, definitely visible from the landing platform.”

“Why is that good news?”

“Because it's spectacular. Captain Kett will see it as she comes in. She's brought Tasia Tamblyn and Robb Brindle with her to handle the business details.”

Iswander nodded to himself. With the erupting geysers, maybe it was a good thing the
Curiosity
had arrived at Sheol a day early. With luck, Captain Kett's ship could fly off to Newstation with the cargo before anything dangerous or embarrassing happened here.

7

TASIA TAMBLYN

Tasia Tamblyn flew the
Voracious Curiosity
on its final approach to the Iswander landing structure. Although Rlinda Kett had wanted to pilot her famous old vessel for the meeting with Lee Iswander, after hitting the severe thermal storms in the atmosphere, the trader had handed over the piloting chores.

“This has ceased to be fun, Tamblyn,” Rlinda said. “I'll bow out in favor of a better pilot.”

“What do you mean a better pilot? I'm the
best
pilot.” As Tasia white-knuckled the ship down, she secretly allowed a bit of buffeting—just to give them a good ride.

Robb Brindle saw what his wife was doing and muttered, “You don't need to impress Rlinda.”

She blinked her eyes innocently. “Who, me?”

Rlinda was neither frightened nor impressed. “I know damn well what Tamblyn's capable of, and I've flown through rougher conditions than this myself. Let's stick to business. We've already caused plenty of consternation by showing up a day early.”

“I thought that was the intended effect,” Robb said.

“Exactly.”

Rlinda still owned Kett Shipping, although the big woman rarely involved herself in the day-to-day operations now. Tasia and Robb were well-suited to running the successful shipping company. Tasia came from the prominent Tamblyn clan, Roamers who had operated the water mines on Plumas for generations. And Robb Brindle was the son of the former military commander of the Earth Defense Forces.

As Tasia brought the ship down, the second half of the binary planet loomed in the sky overhead. Fissured and cratered, it looked ready to fall on top of them. The molten sea below churned and swirled. A cascade of lava spewed upward, ejecting globules high enough that they cooled and hardened in the air. Tasia gave the scarlet spray a wide berth.

“My first visit here.” Rlinda looked around. “This is for anyone who ever told me to go to hell. They can't say I didn't listen.”

Tasia couldn't help but admire the fact that Iswander had actually built a thriving industrial operation here. In the past, the clans had been forced to eke out an existence in ferociously inhospitable environments, but that had not been necessary for the past twenty years. “Roamers don't do such risky, cutting-edge work anymore,” she said. “Looks like Iswander made it a viable operation.” She settled the
Curiosity
down on the landing deck, where workers in thermal-armor would load the ship with cargo.

When the shielded heat tube connected to the
Curiosity
's hatch, Rlinda and Robb went into Tower One to take care of the paperwork with Lee Iswander. Meanwhile, inside the insulated shack at the corner of the landing deck, Tasia found an appropriate thermal suit from the locker, inspected it carefully, and prepared to supervise the loading of the
Curiosity
.

Through the shack's observation port, Tasia scanned the large, roving foundries outside. To her astonishment she spotted a pair of armored workers riding lava sleds, skimming over the sluggish waves to inspect the pumping and hardening apparatus.

Deputy Alec Pannebaker entered the shack and saw Tasia's interest. “I can take you out on one if you like. It's a lot of fun.”

“Looks dangerous.”

Pannebaker shrugged and repeated, “It's a lot of fun.”

She smiled. “No thanks. The view is spectacular enough.”

After he checked Tasia's fittings, he donned his own armor to accompany her onto the loading deck. She put down the glare shield on her helmet and exited. The storm of heat and fire around them seemed to be the natural state of Sheol. Exposed, the
Curiosity
sat on the raised landing deck, connected by the safe access tube. Worker compies and suited crewmen used anti-grav clamps to bring load after load of packaged metals aboard into the hold.

As tons of metal product were loaded aboard the cargo ship, Pannebaker kept up a running commentary and explained the operations in the three towers. Abruptly his voice faltered. He paused to look down at his feet.

Tasia realized that the deck felt uncertain beneath her boots. She stomped down, saw that her heel left a clear impression in the metal. “Is it supposed to be this soft?” Then, as she watched, amazed, the
Curiosity
slid several inches. “Shizz, the landing deck is tilting!”

“We're off-level, that's for sure.” Pannebaker clicked his general-comm signal. “I guess we're closer to material tolerances than I thought.”

Nearby, another lava geyser spurted up—bright yellow with a core of white. The startled workers had stopped loading the
Curiosity
, but the robotic compies kept carrying their cargo.

“You sure this is safe?” Tasia asked.

In his bulky thermal armor, Pannebaker lumbered to the shielded control shack, and she followed, tilting her helmet for a last glance at the half-planet that loomed above like a boot about to smash them.

Once the shack door was sealed and coolant jets dropped the temperature of their thermal armor down to acceptable temperatures, Pannebaker slipped open his face shield, disengaged his thick gloves. Curls of steam drifted around them. Pannebaker called up a summary on his screens. “There's a massive thermal plume upwelling from below—much hotter than we've seen before. Damn, I don't think we can take
that
much!”

“We've got heat shielding, don't we?”

“Shielding, yes—but these peak temperature readings might alter the structural integrity of our bedrock support struts. These three towers were built with high tolerances, but a plume this hot could make them soften and bend.”

The workers scrambled for shelter on the raised landing deck. The
Curiosity
slid another few inches.

Out on the molten sea, one of the five enormous smelter barges began to founder. The crew boss yelled over the open comm so all employees could hear, “This is an emergency. Thermal breach in our lower hull!”

8

ELISA REEVES

She found Garrison's ship surrounded by the mysterious nodules that drifted in the emptiness of space. The vessel's running lights were on, but he had not detected her yet.

Elisa did not find it surprising that he had let his guard down. Why would anyone look for a ship out here, so far from the nearest star system? He must have thought he'd found a perfect hiding place.

Noticing carbonization on the hull, burned-out station lights, and other indicators of damage, she wondered what sort of trouble he had gotten into. It looked as if Garrison had been in a fight.

Elisa narrowed her eyes as she ran scans. He better not have let any harm come to Seth.

She activated the comm, not bothering to think through her words. “Garrison, I tracked you down. Don't make this harder on yourself.”

Seth's image appeared, looking surprised and confused. “Mother!” The boy looked different, but she wasn't sure how. Elisa tried to remember the last time she had really looked at him. “You found the bloaters, too!”

Bloaters? Did Garrison know about these things ahead of time? What were they?

When he came on the screen, he didn't look angry or frightened, just resolute. “I thought you might be following us. When I found your magnetic tracker, I couldn't believe you would do that, but after all these years of knowing you, I don't know why I was surprised.”

“Apparently, I know you better than you know me—which is why I guessed what you'd do.”

“I had to get Seth away from Sheol. You and Iswander kept ignoring the warnings.”

“You stole my son!”

“
Our
son,” he corrected in a maddeningly calm voice. “You could have left with us. We could have stayed together as a family, but you made your choice—and I made mine.”

“I'm taking him back with me.” Having studied the specs en route, she knew that the weapons on her ship were much better than those on the vessel he had stolen from the Iswander operations. Elisa intended to do whatever she needed to do to cripple his ship. Garrison wouldn't have a chance. “You proved you're an unfit father by kidnapping him.”

She tried to bait him, make him lose his temper in front of Seth, but he wouldn't rise to it. “We can work out a resolution, provided Seth doesn't go back to that place. My priority is keeping him safe.”

“He's coming with me.” She eased her ship closer. The bloaters were all around them. “No negotiation beyond that.”

She thought of how she would strengthen her relationship with her son, make life better for him on Sheol, make him love her more. First of all, Elisa would arrange to have many more images of the two of them, build up a library of mother-son portraits. Alec Pannebaker fancied himself a photographer; maybe she would ask him to help.

On the screen, Garrison regarded her, and for a moment his features looked just like the image of Seth that she'd put on display. “He's not a trophy you can claim in order to prove you've won something, and I'm not going to make him choose.” His stolen vessel drifted in among the bloated nodules, trying to hide. One of the nuclei flashed, and the sudden flare of light distracted her.

“I didn't ask him to choose—he's going home with me! I warn you, I can damage your engines with a single shot and then take him—to safety.”

Garrison maneuvered his ship through the mysterious bubbles, dodging out of sight, and Elisa accelerated after him. He was trying to lose himself among the hundreds of floating globular islands and slip away from her again.

Sounding disappointed, he said, “I can't believe you'd hunt us all the way out here, but at least you're safe from Sheol now—whatever it takes.” Another one of the nodules sparkled, then faded.

“You think anyone is better off
here?
In the middle of nowhere?” She tried to lock in on his engines for a disabling strike.

“We could find a neutral place. Seth is old enough to go to one of the Roamer schools. It would do him good to be among other kids his age.”

“You can shirk your responsibilities, but he's staying with me. I'm his mother.”

Garrison sighed. “I thought that's what you'd say, but I wanted to make sure I tried everything. We ditched your tracker—you can't follow us.” He powered up his engines and began to move, flitting among the island-sized nodules, gaining speed.

“Damn you, Garrison!” She activated her weapons and plunged after him, looking for a good shot. At the moment she didn't care if she cracked open his hull and Garrison went flying out into space from explosive decompression. But that would cause too much damage and might harm Seth, which wouldn't look good for her at all.

Garrison kept dodging the bloaters, flying away from the cluster. She raised her voice. “I'm warning you!”

He sent a parting message, which enraged her: “I've had plenty of warnings, and I know which ones to listen to.”

He didn't take her seriously! Damn him. He was forcing her to do this. She tracked ahead and fired a warning shot across his bow. The high-energy beams lanced out like searing javelins.

When the beam struck one of the bobbing globules, the sphere erupted. The explosion was more than an outpouring of fire and energy: it was like a supernova. The detonating bloater ignited an adjacent bloater, then another one, like firecrackers in a chain-reaction inferno. The shock wave engulfed her ship.

9

LEE ISWANDER

Heat plumes continued to rise, turning Sheol's ocean of red magma into an angry yellow-white storm. Iswander could only stare at the horrific beauty from his tower windows. The harpy song of alarms shrieked from dozens of systems as if his entire facility had gone insane.

Rlinda Kett put her hands on wide hips. “I know shit hitting the fan when I see it. You have an evacuation protocol?”

Iswander forced calm resolve as he dove into the problem. He hadn't been able to study the cautionary report Pannebaker had prepared, and he needed more time to develop an emergency response plan. “Captain Kett, we may need your assistance—and your ship. The situation might be beyond the scenarios we modeled.”

Robb spun, looking at him in astonishment. “You live in …
this
and you aren't ready to evacuate on a moment's notice?”

Iswander was scanning the reports on the screens, the stranded smelter barge with the imperfect hull allowing magma to leak inside. He forced down panic. “Let's not go overboard. Everything here was built to withstand the heat.”

The structure of Tower One began to groan. As the ceramic-metal pilings were heated beyond their tolerance levels, the structure softened, bent. The deck shifted, which forced him to grab his desk as he activated the comm and broadcast over the full-facility loudspeakers. “This is Lee Iswander, activating emergency protocols. Team leaders, get your crews to safety. Take emergency shelter precautions. Go into your bolt-holes if necessary. I want structural integrity reports for Towers One, Two, and Three. We'll have evacuation ships on standby if this gets worse.”