“What’s the time?” Dan asked.
At least he could talk with Pancho. Even if the radio link broke down completely, they were close enough to scrunch through the dirt and touch helmets so that they could talk through sound conduction.
“More’n thirteen hours to go, boss.”
“You mean we’ve been down here for less than an hour?”
“Forty-nine minutes, to be exact.”
“Shit,” Dan said, with feeling.
“Take a nap. Best way to spend the time.”
Dan nodded inside his helmet. “Nothing else to do.”
He heard Pancho giggle softly.
“What’s funny?”
“Mandy and Lars. I bet they’re tryin’ to figger out how to get the two of them into one suit.”
Dan laughed, too. “Maybe you and I ought to try that.”
“Boss!” Pancho cried in mock shock. “That’s sexual harassment!”
“Nothing else to do,” he repeated. “I can’t even jerk off inside this double-damned suit.”
“I can,” Pancho teased.
“Now that’s sexual harassment,” Dan grumbled.
“Nope. Just better design.”
Dan licked his lips. He felt thirsty, chilled, yet he was sweating. His stomach was queasy.
“How do you feel, Pancho?”
“Bored. Tired. Too jumpy to sleep. How ’bout you?”
“The same, I guess. Every part of me aches.”
“How’s your blood pressure?”
“How in hell would I know?”
“You hear your pulse in your ears?”
“No.”
“Then you’re okay, I guess.”
“Thank you, Dr. Pancho.”
“Go to sleep, boss. That’s what I’m gonna try to do.”
“I thought you said you were too jumpy.”
“Yeah, but I’m gonna give it a try. Close my eyes and think pleasant thoughts.”
“Good luck.”
“You try it, too.”
“Sure.”
Dan closed his eyes, but his thoughts were far from pleasant. Opening them again, he fumbled with his wrist keyboard until he got the suit’s radiation sensor displayed on his helmet. The graph was distorted by the curve of his helmet, and blurry. He tried to focus his eyes on it. Looks okay, he said to himself. Curve’s going up, but the slope is low and it’s a far distance from the red zone.
Try to sleep. He was certainly tired enough for it. Relax! Think about what you’re going to do when you get back to Selene. I’d like to personally punch out Humphries’s lights. Dan pictured Humphries’s surprise when he broke his nose with a good straight right.
Somewhere in his mind an old adage sounded: Revenge is a dish best taken cold.
Punching in Humphries’s face would be fun, but what would really hurt the bastard? He’s tried to kill me. He may succeed yet; we’re not out of this. If I die he’ll move in and take over Astro. How can I prevent him from doing that? How can I stop him, even from the grave?
Dan chuckled bitterly to himself. I’m already in my grave, he realized. I’m already buried.
NANOTECHNOLOGY LABORATORY
Charley Engles looked worried, upset. He nervously brushed his sandy hair back away from his forehead as he said, “Kris, I’m not supposed to let you in here.” It was well past midnight. Cardenas was surprised that anyone was still working in the lab complex. Selene’s security people hadn’t bothered to change the entry code on the main door; she had just tapped it out and the door had obligingly slid open. But Engles had been working his in cubicle, and as soon as he saw Cardenas striding determinedly past the empty work stations toward her own office, he popped out of his cubbyhole and stopped her.
“We got notified by security,” he said, looking shamefaced. “You’re not allowed in here until further notice.”
“I know, Charley,” she said. “I just want to clear out my desk.” Charles Engles was a young grad student from New York whose parents had sent him to Selene after he’d been crippled in a car crash. Even knowing that he could never return to them once he’d taken nanotherapy, his parents wanted their son’s legs repaired so he could walk again. “The cameras…” Engles pointed to the tiny unwinking red lights in the corners of the ceiling. “Security will send somebody here once they see you.”
“It’s all right,” she said, trying to mask her inner tension. “I’ll only be here a few minutes. You can go back to your work.”