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Minutes crept by.
A sharp report, and a hissing, came from the rear of the cabin. Miles's heart
lurched and began to pound violently, in spite of his anticipation. He swung
around and took it in at a glance, as when a strobe-flash of lightning betrays
the secrets of the dark.
Kostolitz swore violently. Miles breathed, "Ha!"
A jagged hole in the paneling on the starboard side of the shuttle was pouring
out a thick green gas; a coolant line had snapped, as from a meteor hit. The
"meteor" was undoubtedly plastic explosive, since the stuff was streaming into
and not out of the cabin. Besides, the instructor was still seated, watching
them. Kostolitz leaped for the case of emergency breath masks.
Miles dove instead for the controls. He snapped the atmosphere circuit from
recycle to exterior venting, and in one pauseless motion fired the shuttle's
attitude verniers at maximum boost. After a groaning moment, the shuttle began
to turn, then spin, around an axis through the center of the cabin. Miles, the
instructor, and Kostolitz were thrown forward. The coolant gas, heavier than
their atmosphere mix, began to pile up against the back wall of the cabin in
noxious billows under the influence of this simplest of artificial gravities.
"You crazy bastard!" screamed Kostolitz, scrabbling at a breath mask. "What
are you doing?"
The instructor's expression was first an echo of Kostolitz's, then suddenly
enlightened. He eased back into the seat he had begun to shoot out of, hanging
on tightly and observing, his eyes crinkling with interest.
Miles was too busy to reply. Kostolitz would figure it out shortly, he was
sure. Kostolitz donned a breath mask, attempted to inhale. He snatched it off
his face and threw it aside, and grabbed up the second of the three he'd
brought forward. Miles climbed up the wall toward the first aid kit.
The second breath mask curved past him. Empty reservoirs, no doubt. Kostolitz
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had counted the breath masks without checking their working condition. Miles
levered the first aid kit open and pulled out IV tubing and two Y-connectors.
Kostolitz threw aside the third breath mask and began climbing back up the
starboard wall toward the case of breath masks. The coolant gas made an acrid,
burning stench in Miles's nostrils, but its harmful concentrations remained in
the other end of the cabin, for now.
A cry of rage and fear, interrupted by coughing, came from Kostolitz as he
began pawing through breath masks, checking their condition readouts at last.
Miles's lips drew back in a wicked grin. He pulled his grandfather's dagger
from its sheath, cut the IV
tubing into four pieces, inserted the Y-connectors, sealed them with blobs of
plastic bandage, jammed the hookah-like apparatus into the single outlet of
the emergency medical oxygen canister, and skidded back to the instructor.
"Air, sir?" He offered a hissing end of IV tubing to the officer. "I suggest
you breathe in through your mouth and out through your nose."
"Thank you, Cadet Vorkosigan," said the instructor in a fascinated tone,
taking it. Kostolitz, coughing, eyes rolling desperately, fell back toward
them, barely managing not to put his feet through the control panel. Miles
blandly handed him a tube. He sucked on it, eyes wide and watering, not, Miles
thought, only from the effects of the coolant gas.
Clenching his air-tube between his teeth, Miles began to climb the starboard
wall. Kostolitz started after him, then discovered that both he and the
instructor had been issued short tethers. Miles uncoiled tubing behind him;
yes, it would reach, although just barely. Kostolitz and the instructor could
only watch, breathing in yogalike cadence.
Miles reversed his hold as he passed the midpoint of the cabin and centrifugal
force began to pull him toward the pooling green gas slowly filling the
shuttle from the back wall. He counted down wall panels, 4a, 4b, 4c-that
should be it. He popped it open, and found the manual shut-off valves. That
one? No, that one. He turned it. It slipped in his sweating hand.
The panel door on which he rested his weight gave way with a sudden crack, and
he swung out over the evilly heaving green gas. The oxygen tube ripped from
his mouth and flapped around wildly. He was saved from yelping only by the
fact that he was holding his breath. The instructor, forward, lurched
futilely, tied to his air supply. But by the time he'd fumbled his pocket
open, Miles had swallowed, achieved a more secure grip on the wall, and
recovered his tube in a heart-stopping grab. Try again. He turned the valve,
hard, and the hissing from the hole in the wall a meter astern of him faded to
an elfin moan, then stopped.
The tide of green gas began to recede and thin at last, as the cabin
ventilators labored. Miles, shaking only slightly, climbed back to the front
end of the shuttle and strapped himself into his co-pilot's seat without
comment. Comment would have been awkward around his oxygen tube anyway.
Cadet Kostolitz, in his role as pilot, returned to his controls. The
atmosphere cleared at last. He stopped the spin and aimed the damaged shuttle
slowly back toward dock, paying strict and subdued attention to engine
temperature readouts. The instructor looked extremely thoughtful, and only
little pale.
The chief instructor himself was waiting in the shuttle hatch corridor of the
orbital station when they docked, along with a repairs tech. He smiled
cheerily, turning two yellow armbands absently in his hands.
Their own instructor sighed, and shook his head dolefully at the armbands.
"No."
"No?" queried the chief instructor. Miles was not sure if it was with
amazement or disappointment.
"No."
"This I've got to see." The two instructors ducked into the shuttle, leaving
Miles and Kostolitz alone a moment.
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Kostolitz cleared his throat. "That, ah-blade of yours came in pretty handy
after all."
"Yes, there are times when a plasma arc beam isn't nearly as suitable for
cutting," Miles agreed. "Like when you're in a chamber full of inflammable
gas."
"Oh, hell," Kostolitz seemed suddenly struck. "That stuff will go off, mixed
with oxygen. I almost .. ." He cut himself off, cleared his throat again. "You
don't miss much, do you?" A sudden suspicion filled his face. "Did you know
about this set up in advance?"
"Not exactly. But I figured something must be up when I counted the three
breath masks in the instructor's pocket."
"You-" Kostolitz paused, turned. "Did you really lose track of your
light-pen?"
"No."
"Hell," Kostolitz muttered again. He scuffed around the corridor a moment,
hunched, red, dismally recalcitrant.
Now, thought Miles. "I know a place you can buy good blades, in Vorbarr [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]