Kenmuir and, stiffly, Eythil nodded. They hadn’t heard of the object, but that was natural. Beneficiated pieces of comet stuff were, as a rule, set on trajectories that took them from the Kuiper Belt into Lunar orbit, there to be refined and sent down. Robotic, utterly routine, the operation hadn’t been conducted much in recent decades, but no doubt the work was starting up on a larger scale. The influx of settlers after the Habitat was ready would want more water and air than the Moon currently recycled.
“Fragments are flying about,” the machine continued. “None are expected to crash, but that is as yet not perfectly certain. Until every track is known, Traffic Control is interdicting civilian movement above ground, especially in this vicinity. For about an hour, is the estimate. You landed barely in time.”
Eythil scowled. Kenmuir shrugged, although his impatience was probably sharper.
“Administration apologizes for any inconvenience,” the machine said. “You are invited to spend the time in the executive lounge, with complimentary refreshments.”
Eythil and Kenmuir exchanged a glance. Smiles quirked wry. “Never have I been there,” the Lunarian admitted. “You, Captain?”
“No,” Kenmuir replied. “Why not?” Satisfy a slight curiosity. Besides, the public bar and restaurant, big, well-nigh forsaken, would be spooky surroundings.
The room to which the machine led them was of a more intimate size. Its furniture, massive Earth-style, seemed somehow faded. Flat pictures of space pioneers hung on the walls. The air held a faint simulation of leather and woodsmofce odors. Kenmuir wondered why this retreat was maintained. How often had it seen use since the spaceport was completely cyberneticized? Well, it couldn’t be much trouble to keep, and occasions like this doubtless arose once in a while. The system provided for improbabilities.
He and Eythil took chairs. The machine went to a dispenser. “What is your desire, senores?” it asked. Eythil wanted a Lunarian white wine—the vineyards under Copernicus still produced biologically—and Kenmuir chose ale. The machine touched the panel, the containers arrived, the machine poured into suitable goblets from off a shelf and brought them over. “If you wish anything more, call me, por favor,” it said, indicating the nearest intercom input. “I trust you soon may be on your way.”
“Thanks,” Kenmuir answered. After all, either it or its controller was sentient. It departed. Kenmuir sipped. A goodly brew, yes. Never mind that molecular machineries had assembled it; the formula was tangy, the liquid cold. “Hadn’t you better phone to say we’ll be delayed?” he asked Eythil.
“Nay, not if the wait stretches no longer,” the other man said. They both stayed with Anglo. Odd, Kenmuir reflected, what a relaxed attitude to schedules most Lunarians had, when survival might depend on precision. Well, with them timing was practically instinctive, as fast as recovery from a stumble was to an Earthman in his high-gravity home. You got to know your competences andftheir safe boundaries.
“I wonder what exactly went wrong,” he remarked. “It sounded like the kind of accident that shouldn’t ever happen these days.”
“Thus the cybercosm tells us,” Eythil growled.
“M-m, nothing is guaranteed, you know. The planning may be total, but—I simply wonder if this blowup was due to an oversight, or a runaway chaos, or a quantum fluctuation that got amplified … I really don’t know how these operations are conducted. In a few daycycles, if I have a free hour or two, I’d like to retrieve a full account.”
“You will get one,” Eythil said cynically. “Whether or nay it relates what truly happened—if aught happened at all—will be for you to guess.”
He was right, Kenmuir thought. The system could feed pretty much anything it chose into the database, complete with images, numbers, and mathematical analysis. It wouldn’t be hard to bypass the human functionaries who were supposed to be in the loop. “Why should the mind lie,” he protested, “especially when the story isn’t to its credit?”
Eythil finger-shrugged. “Who knows? Incidentally to some broad design, maychance. Let us assume this happening will help make plausible the diversion of yet more resources to the Habitat project, and thereby hasten the destruction of Lunarian lifeways. Thus might the sociotechnic program esoterically calculate.”
Kenmuir took a long, heartening draught. “Farfetched. You are bitter, aren’t you?”