Lifeline by Kevin J. Anderson Page B

breathing on the comm-links; he couldn’t see any expressions behind the gold-mirrored faceplates. Something was definitely wrong if his people weren’t ribbing each other. “Teamwork communication,” he always called it—the informal, friendly attitude that turned them into a real team instead of a bunch of workers with the same job assignments.
    He had thought that giving the crew a chance to go outside and get away from the base might let them work off some steam. Clancy himself wanted to see space again, even if it was only overhead and not the full 4 pi.
    He could take only five out of the two hundred construction engineers transferred down from the L-4 site. But it gave at least some of his people a chance to do something worthwhile. And the salvage operation would provide a new story for the daily ConComm broadcast. The rest of the crew could watch and stop twiddling their thumbs for a while. After all, they were a construction team—not a bunch of “Lunatics” like the other Moon colonists.
    Clancy began a low whistle into the comm-link, a tune his grandfather used to sing to him. After a faltering start, the others picked it up over the communication channels. Hi ho, hi ho! It’s off to work we go! They even seemed to march along with the tune. Clancy allowed himself a grin. Silence broken. Mission accomplished.
    Outside the base, Clancy led his salvage crew out onto the pressed gravel walkway. They followed the path to the two six-pack vehicles sitting on the fused-rock parking area. Stars wheeled overhead, burning with a brilliance that seemed enhanced against the heavy lunar shadows. Still nothing like the awesome drowning sensation of open space, though—here, the ground gave him a frame of reference.
    Two weeks ago, they had been up sealing the framework of the second industrial colony, floating by themselves, watching blueprints turn into reality. And then they had all been ordered to return to Clavius Base , to cool their heels while Orbitechnologies Corporation and its consortium of European investors worked out the details to shuttle the crew home. With world tensions heating up, the main contractors thought it best to back away, to hold their breath and wait a few weeks. Clancy hated to see the big project brought to a standstill. He had kept everything close to schedule up until then. What did Earth politics have to do with the peace and silence of L-4?
    He’d had a very narrow view of things before the War. Now Orbitech 2 was going to be on hold for a lot longer than a few weeks.
    Clancy sniffed inside his helmet. Dirty socks. Why does this suit always smell like dirty socks? No matter how much he cleaned, rubbed, and soaked the tape-wrapped phenolic, he couldn’t get rid of the smell. It had never bothered him out in the “open air” at L-4, working and living in the suit eighteen hours every day of the week. A person could get used to nearly anything after that much time. But once he’d been stranded at Clavius Base with the rest of the engineers, he began to notice it.
    At first he ignored the smell, trying to convince himself that it wasn’t there, that he’d get used to it if he wore his suit more often. But it didn’t work. Probably psychosomatic. And if he didn’t watch out, somebody would send him to a shrink. Psychiatrists! He didn’t trust scientists who couldn’t give hard answers.
    The gravel path swung hard to the right, bringing them out of the curtain of shadow and into sunlight. His visor darkened instantly, reflecting half of the unpolarized light away from his eyes. Suddenly, the shadows all around them looked like a bottomless black maw. He could read the fluorescent letters of the crew members’ names across their chests.
    “Homann and Wooster, come with me. The rest of you take the other six-pack and follow. Shen, you drive today.”
    “Right, boss man,” she answered.
    “There you go, Cliff, making points with the ladies again.” Homann’s Arabic accent was