was time to quit chattering and get some data on her own account. So she said, "According to standard procedure, we're ready to receive and record your status report. Go ahead, please."
"I'm afraid I don't have one," said the voice from groundside. "Not in official form, anyway."
Delarov leaned forward. "Comm officer here. Then just tell it; I'll boil it down shipshape for the captain." Smiling, she sat back again, and Lisele thought, maybe she hasn't played poker, but I bet she could learn in a hurry!
"You've read our beacon message, I guess," said Maiden. "That disk was recorded about fifty-two Earth years ago; call it sixty-three of ours, here. I suppose we should have kept it updated, but there didn't seem to be much point."
Lisele spoke next. "That was then. How are things now?"
The man's voice held a decidely unpleasant whine. "But it all ties in, you see. We got here, best we could, with forty-three of us alive, Twelve men, thirty-one women: on account of, men got killed more, putting down that dirty mutiny. Names and ranks, dead and living, you can take off a log readout when you get here." For long seconds the channel carried only the hiss of stray electrons; then Maiden said, "Down here we lost some at first, gained none back until the women's contraceptive implants began to wear off. Before that, you might say it was fun but no profit. We-" Whatever he'd intended to say, he didn't finish it.
"Present status, we're asking now." Delarov again.
Signal delay, as March Hare receded from the planet, was increasing. "Population, yes. Two hundred and fifty, at a rough estimate. With infant mortality, and the submissuals coming up soon, it's hard to project a firm total for very long in advance." A pause, and then, "Call it two-fifty. Or come back and count us yourself, why don't you?"
Delarov gestured; in response, Lisele cut the Talk switch. "Submissuals?" the captain said. "What could those be?"
Darwin Pope shrugged. "I don't think this is the time to ask questions."
Digesting what they'd heard from groundside, neither Delarov nor Lisele found a comment, before Maiden said, "If that's all you need, I'll power down. Leave the beacon on for you, so you can find us. If your captain wants to." The whining again.
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Lisele thought of one more thing. "Captain Maiden? Talking about the time of landing here, you keep saying 'we', Do you mean you were-?"
Delay didn╒t soften the man's chuckle. "That's right. Of all us down here, I'm the only one alive, from when the Patton landed. And I've kept the Regs alive, too!"
Abruptly, his signal vanished. Lisele cut the channel. Turning to the others, she said, "That's our basic, born-and-bred Utie, in charge down there. And peace only knows what he's made the rest of them into!"
X
Leaving the planet behind, March Hare continued its sedate deceleration toward rendezvous with Jumbo. Darwin Pope had taken his turn in the galley, preparing a meal and bringing it up to Control. Now he and Captain Delarov and Lisele ate together, no one talking much.
Over coffee, Delarov spoke up. "Lisele? You did very well, I thought, in dealing with groundside. Yet I'm puzzled. Why did you feel it necessary to take over the communication, without prior discussion?"
Because there wasn't time; the skipper should know that much. No point, though, in arguing. Instead, "One thing, captain. Lisele is for when we're being unofficial. When I'm getting chewed out, the name is Moray. Liesel Selene Moray. It's on the ship's roster."
With a nod, Delarov said, "I see. But you're not getting chewed out, Moray. I'm asking for information I need to know. Why did you feel that I couldn't deal with the Patton?"
"Because-" Oh, how to explain it? "Because you said, yourself, Tregare civilized the Slaughterhouse before you'd finished your first year there. You never had to-"
She wasn't saying it right. "I grew up with Rissa and Tregare; they'd fought UET all their lives and they think that way. Sure, when all the big part happened I was too young to know. But all my life I guess it's sunk in, at some level."
Shaking her head, she tried to explain the rest of it.
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"Because when that peace-crapping Utie came on the horn and started talking, it seemed to come naturally, how to deal with him.' She paused. "Maybe I was wrong; if I was, I'm sorry. But I thought you might not know, so I had to try."
Delarov s silence lasted for a time. Then she said, "I see. Perhaps not all of it, but that your motives were good. Very well. You're overdue for sleep. Why don't you go get some?"
Done eating now, Lisele said. "Sure, captain," and left.
Sixty-five hours later, March Hare was nearing Jumbo and was slowed enough to have a good choice of orbits. The main thing was to park well clear of the huge planet's radiation belts-because coasting with the Drive off, the ship would have no protection. Not necessarily outside all the belts; between them would do just as well.
Coming out from Earth, Lisele had seen gas giants at fairly close range: Jupiter and one of its neighbors-she couldn't remember which one, now. According to Tinhead, Jumbo had some size on Big Jupe, but it looked much the same; oblate, ruddy-banded, with obvious surface storms. Watching the planet grown vast in the forward screens, Lisele felt the fascination of the spectacle it made, but right now, other things were more important.
"Our orbit needs to tilt," Delarov said, "toward Sitdown. Or toward Coal Star if you like; from out here it's the same thing. So that when we re behind Jumbo with respect to Sitdown, we'll be clear of the ecliptic, riot blocked from communication with the scoutship. I'd hoped to synchronize with Sitdown s day or a multiple of it, but those slots are either loaded with debris or too near the hotbelts."
Yes; Sitdown s own rotation would limit talk-time more than anyone liked; they didn't need extra blockage from Jumbo. Lisele considered the other parameter: time delay. At roughly a billion kilos, one-way transmission time was almost an hour. Even using tape, sending everything by the fast-burst method so that transmission time was negligible.. . Well, let's see now. Sitdown s basic day was roughly thirty hours; half of that was fifteen, but of course you couldn't expect to punch offworld signals through-or receive them-at angles too close to the horizon.
How close? She wasn't certain, and Delarov looked too busy to be bothered with non-urgent questions. So Lisele's best guess was that during one of Sitdown's thirty-hour days,
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communication between ship and scout could be no more than six two-way exchanges. Maybe seven, with precise scheduling and good luck-but she wouldn╒t bet any real money on that seventh.
Delarov was guiding Hare in toward orbit. Lisele was the hot pilot when it came to emergency tactics she d picked up from Tregare's recorded logs, things that Delarov had had no reason or opportunity to learn. But in this delicate matter of balancing velocity against gravity to achieve an "at rest" state, she had theoretical background but no practice at all.
So she sat, watching and making mental notes, while Katmai Delarov curved March Hares, path in, toward and then around their chosen primary. She got her orbital tilt by approaching on a path slightly below the ecliptic, then making a slight upward course change. And how the woman chose the exact moment to initiate that change, Lisele hadn't the faintest idea!
But not much later, the captain hit the intercom switch and called down to Darwin Pope in the Drive room. "On count, cut Drive. Five, four, three, two, one-CUT!"
As the great engine's hum dropped to almost-subliminal levels, gravity dwindled, also. Somehow, even knowing beforehand that being in orbit would be like a constant state of weightless Turnover, Lisele was caught by surprise.
She adjusted quickly enough; zero-gee had never affected her adversely. But she wondered how it might be for the crew members, wakened to go through radiation sickness with no gravs! If we'd been thinking, we could have got them through all that, one or two at a time, before we got here.
Darwin Pope, when he came upship to Control, voiced similar concerns. "Which of the crew do you plan to rouse, captain? To return to that planet, I mean. And how large a group, in any one batch, can we nurse through the sickness?"
Delarov scratched her head. "Besides the three of us, Mei and Houk have been through the ordeal. That leaves ten to go. I haven't made up my mind yet, who goes on the scout and who doesn't, but one thing I have decided." And when nobody asked, she said, "While I'm making those choices, we'll see everyone through the sickness and out of it. So that later, when we might not have time for such measures, we won't need it."
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Next ship's day the captain still wasn't certain who should ride the scout back to Sitdown. "I'm thinking about it,' she told Lisele. "If you have any advice, I'd like to hear it."
What Katmai Delarov did know, was who would not leave March Hare to reconnoiter the situation with UET's leftovers. "So they're the first we'll rouse. Get them up, get them well, put them back in freeze. Then we can consider the rest of the lot."
So Lisele found herself, along with Pope and Delarov, tending overlapping relays of radiation victims: on the average, five days each, with only two days in the middle being bad enough to need a great deal of care. There'd be two people not yet really sick, two in bad shape, and two mostly recovered.
"For the duration" the skipper put on point-two gee. It widened the ship's orbit, but not excessively
Lisele had never really come to know Theotis Fredericks or Eldros Hassan; she didn't now, either. She took her turns nursing them through the nausea and convulsions; then they were gone again. Up and sick and well and down: right you are, skipper.
