Miles, Mutants and Microbes - Lois McMaster Bujold [89]
Information. It had been almost a full day since they had been evicted from the Cay Habitat. He must have information. He boarded a slide tube and headed for Shuttleport Three's administration building, with its communications center. Dr. Yei pattered after him, wimping about something; he paid little attention.
He caught sight of his own wavering reflection in the plexiplastic walls of the tube as he was carried along above the shuttleport tarmac. Haggard. He straightened and sucked in his gut. It would not do to appear before other administrators looking beaten or weak. The weak went under.
He gazed through his pale image and across the shuttleport laid out below. On the far side of the tarmac at the monorail terminal cargo pods were already starting to pile up. Ah, yes: the damned quaddies were a link in that chain, too. A weak link, a broken link, soon to be replaced.
He arrived at the communications center at the same moment as Shuttleport Three's chief administrator, Chalopin. She was trailed by her security captain, what's-his-name, oh, yes, that idiot Bannerji.
"What the hell is going on here?" Chalopin snapped without preamble. "An accident? Why haven't you requested assistance? They told us to hold all flights—we've got a major production run backed up halfway to the refinery."
"Keep holding it, then. Or call the transfer station. Moving your cargo is not my department."
"Oh, yes it is! Orbital cargo marshaling has been under Cay Project aegis for a year."
"Ex-perimentally." He frowned, stung. "It may be my department, but it's not my biggest worry right now. Look, lady, I got a full-scale crisis here." He turned to one of the com controllers. "Can you punch me through to the Cay Habitat at all?"
"They're not answering our calls," said the com controller doubtfully. "Almost all of the regular telemetry has been cut off."
"Anything. Telescopic sighting, anything."
"I might be able to get a visual off one of the comsats," said the controller. He turned to his panel, muttering. In a few minutes his screen coughed up a distant flat view of the Cay Habitat as seen from synchronous orbit. He stepped up the magnification.
"What are they doing?" asked Chalopin, staring.
Van Atta stared too. What insane vandalism was this? The Habitat resembled a complex three-dimensional puzzle pulled apart by an idle child. Detached modules seemed spilled carelessly, floating at all angles in space. Tiny silver figures jetted among them. The solar power panels had mysteriously shrunk to a quarter of their normal area. Was Graf embarked on some nutty scheme for fortifying the Habitat against counterattack, perhaps? Well, it would do him no good, Van Atta swore silently.
"Are they . . . preparing for a siege or something?" Dr. Yei asked aloud, evidently following a similar line of thought. "Surely they must realize how futile it would be."
"Who knows what that damn fool Graf thinks?" Van Atta growled. "The man's run mad. There are a dozen ways we can stand off at a distance and knock that installation to bits even without military supplies. Or just wait and starve them out. They've trapped themselves. He's not just crazy, he's stupid."
"Maybe," said Yei doubtfully, "they mean to just go on quietly living up there, in orbit. Why not?"
"The hell you say. I'm going to hook them out of there, and double-quick, too. Somehow . . . No bunch of miserable mutants are going to get away with sabotage on this scale. Sabotage—theft—terrorism . . ."
"They are not mutants," began Yei, "they are genetically-engineered childr—"
"Mr. Van Atta, sir?" piped up another com controller. "I have an urgent memo