[Black Fleet Crisis] - 02(12)

We work right out of the gear bay, because all we have to do is take a core.

Our equipment ought to be able to handle that.”

“You want to drill a core?” Josala said in horror.

“That’ll mangle the remains.”

“Yes,” Stopa said. “I know it violates the usual protocols.

But we weren’t sent here to recover bodies. We were sent here to recover biological material. When our reinforcements arrive, they can go down and excavate the other sites. But in the meantime, we’ll have something we can analyze and report back on.”

Josala shook her head. “I’d really rather wait for the people who know what they’re doing.”

“But we know how to take a core,” Stopa said.

“Krenn, a first-year apprentice knows how to take a core. We’ll be out of there in thirty minutes. Twenty.”

Josala’s reluctance still showed on her face.

Kroddok drew closer and dropped his voice. “The bonus from the NRI would be enough to fund the expedition to Stovax,” he said. “But if we wait until Penga Rift arrives, we’ll have to share the bonus. We might even end up being cut out completely.”

He waited to see if that would sway her, then added, “I give you my word that we’ll withdraw at the first sign of any trouble. No, better, I’m making you expedition boss. You say ‘That’s it,’ and that’s it.”

Josala looked up at him with a frown, then past him to the pilot.

“What Dr. Stopa said. We’re going to want our rover.”

The archaeologists’ little Mark II World Rover skimmed across the top of snow-covered southwest range and began its descent into the glacier valley.

“You’re on the beam, eight hundred fifty meters out,” said the voice of IX-26’s pilot, continuing to talk Stopa and Krenn down to their destination. The navigation and sensor arrays of the rover were no match for those of the ferret.

“Copy,” said Stopa, who was at the controls. “I’m going from glide to hover mode now.”

“Seven hundred. Six hundred. Five fifty—” Several small shield doors on the rover’s fuselage and delta wings slid open, revealing vector nozzles for the thrustjets. With the rover’s nose stall-high and the nozzles perpendicular to the wings, the little ship quickly lost its forward velocity and began to settle.

Josala was peering out the starboard cockpit viewpane, studying the ground below them. The steep inner slope of the southwest range wore a smooth blanket of snow, but the surface of the glacier itself was a field of jagged ice blocks, some as large as the rover itself.

“It looked a lot smoother on the SSR display,” Josala said.

“The rover can cope with a forty-degree terrain tilt.

We’ll be all right.”

“It’s going to be like drilling thlough rock.”

“But ice won’t wear the bits like rock does,” said Stopa. “We’ll get through.”

“Two hundred twenty,” the pilot was saying into Stopa’s headset. “Ease her a hair to port.”

“Copy,” Stopa said. “Krenn, we have to at least give it a try—” Just then a cloud of swirling white particles billowed up around the rover from below, closing in around the cockpit viewpanes and cutting visibility nearly to zero.

“It’s our downblast,” Stopa said quickly. He raised

Shield of Lies 35

the control handle, and the rover climbed nimbly out of the cloud, which immediately began to dissipate beneath them. “Not a problem.”

“One fifty.”

“You can’t land us in a whiteout,” said Josala. “If you set us down on the edge of one of those ice boulders, we’ll flip over before the strut levelers can do anything.”

“Ninety-five.”

“I’ll just hover at ten meters until the thrusters blow the site clear of loose material,” Stopa said confidently, “If I can’t get definition on the findercarriage holo, I won’t try to land. All right?”

“All right,” Josala said with a sigh.

“Sixty,” the pilot said. “Ease off, or you’re going to overrun the site.”

Stopa tapped the air brakes lightly and pulled back on the control handle slightly. As the rover settled toward the glacier, it was once again engulfed in a billow of jet-driven snow. But before long, the swirling cloud began to thin, and the horizon returned.

“Twenty-five.”

Josala peered forward. “I can’t judge distances without a referent.

That big slab of ice—” He patted her arm. “It’s bigger and farther away than you think.”

“Ten. Eight. Five. Easy—” “Take me to plus-sixteen. I want to put the rover’s tail right down on top of it.”