Xiantha (The Ammonite Galaxy Series, Book 3)

Chapter 16

THE VIDEO CAMERA had been listlessly continuing its examination of the canths, and regretting the necessity of having been left behind, when it first became aware of the commotion amidst the canths. They were jittery, and seemed to be milling around by the ticket office. It was clear that something was very wrong. The Xianthan ticket collector had come out from his cabin, and was unsuccessfully trying to calm them down.

The globe, blended so that the ticket collector wouldn't spot it, went in amongst the canths, and tried to find out exactly what the matter was, but there was no visible cause of their discomfort, yet they were becoming more and more edgy. They were dancing worriedly on their toes and nickering in anxiety.

Back in the small spaceship in orbit about Xiantha, the visitor decided to concentrate his mind. He was telepathic, after all, and that would help to pass the time until the others came down. He was mildly interested in these animals, which, though not particularly intelligent, showed unmistakable signs of being able to utilize quantum non-locality. He tried idly to tune in to them, knowing that if they were upset about something, he would find it much easier, they would be more propense to transmit their distress openly.

What he 'saw' galvanized him into action. There were clear pictures of Grace being held against her will, less clear ones of the orthogel entity having lost his coherence, very clear pictures of what was about to happen to Grace, and where, and a definite need for immediate action if something were to be done in the time he had before it happened. He flashed a message back to the canths to let them know somebody else was aware of the problem, and thought, as fast as he could.

His first thought was to contact Arcan, who could have saved her in a heartbeat — but he could get no response from the orthogel entity on Valhai. Atheron must somehow have managed to infect both the part of Arcan on Xiantha and the main orthogel lake on Valhai. The visitor thought that the antidote they had developed would have saved Arcan's life, but there was no telling how long it would take him to overcome the effects.

No, the only way Grace could be saved was if he himself acted, though how he could do that was not so clear. He could send the video camera up to the next stop, but it would not be able to function in such a strong electrical storm. Which left him only one possible course of action. He would have to go himself. He should be able to reach the area in time. He was in a very low orbit, as usual — it helped to release and recapture the video cameras he used to examine the worlds he traveled to. But, even if he did manage to reach her in time, the chances of saving Grace were remote. The temperature outside would be sufficient to freeze her to death if she were exposed for any long period, and although he might be able to stop her fall, and might be able to shield her from the wind of her fall, there was nothing he could do about the temperature, except take her lower as fast as he could.

He thought some more. She would reach some sort of a terminal velocity very quickly, probably somewhere just short of the speed of sound at that height, and with that strength of atmosphere. Falling lower would actually slow her down, perhaps to even a third of that value. So, if he were going to do something it didn't really matter where he did it, so long as it gave him time to slow her fall with a deceleration her weak body could stand. In fact, the lower the better, because the faster she fell through the sub-zero section, the less likely she was to die.

His calculations positioned him under Lightning Corner fairly comfortably; he was in orbit some 60 miles above that spot, and he could easily cover that distance in the time his informants told him he still had. No, the problem was that his ship would not be able to maintain a thrust of the magnitude necessary to slow such a fall for very long, and that he would be unable to return to space afterwards. His ship had never been designed for planetary landings; he was meant only to maintain fairly energy-saving orbits.