fill of their attention,” Fly- in-Amber said. “Besides, they live in liquid nitrogen, floating like fish in Earth’s water. They don’t care about gravity.”
I’d never thought of that. We didn’t really know what they looked like, so my image was of crystalline or metallic creatures lying almost inert under the cryogenic fluid.
“I want to go to Earth and see the water,” Snowbird said. “I want to wade in the sea.”
“Things go well, you probably will,” I said. “Surely the quarantine can’t last another fifty-some years.”
“For a spy, you’re a hopeless optimist,” Carmen said. “I don’t suppose you’re a betting man as well.”
“If the odds are right.”
“Then I’ll bet you a bottle of whisky—good single-malt Scotch whisky, bottled this year—that the quarantine will still be in place when we return. If we do.”
“A fifty-year-old bottle?” Maybe half a month’s pay. “I’ll accept the wager. Even against the Lucky Chicken— especially against her, so I can lose.”
“You lose, and everybody wins. Quarantined, but alive.”
After a few minutes of walking around, mostly checking plants for damage, all of us probably felt like lying down. I fought the impulse by going to the exercise machines. At least I could sit down on the stationary bicycle. Watch the water splashing into the pool. In a couple of hours, it would be full; I looked forward to cooling off in it.
I wondered whether the Martians would try it. Their underground lakes were shallow and muddy, and I couldn’t remember any reference to their using water recreationally. It was pretty rare stuff.
They didn’t wash for personal hygiene. They used flat scrapers, like ancient Roman athletes, the residue stirred into water that would be used for agriculture.
I got up and went back down the yellow corridor to the pantry, to see what I could put together for our first shipboard meal. (I hadn’t attempted cooking in zero gee.)
It was cold, maintained about ten degrees above freezing in the main area. Forty below in the “freezer,” which of course was heated up to that relatively balmy temperature, from the iceberg’s ambient coldness, about three degrees above absolute zero.
I’d spent hours studying the pantry’s organization and modifying it according to some logic and aesthetic that was arcane even to me. “This is the way I want it” was what it boiled down to. I would be the one spending the most time down here.
I took a basket and collected what I would need for a pasta dish that would resemble spaghetti and meatballs, comfort food, though there was no actual meat, and I assumed the spaghetti would have to be done in a pressure cooker. The air pressure was like Little Mars, about equivalent to nine thousand feet in altitude; boiling water wouldn’t cook fast.
I filled bottles with olive oil and wine concentrate, which I’d keep in the kitchen. No sense in making wine out of it for cooking; the alcohol would just boil off anyhow.
It would be a month before I had any fresh vegetables or herbs. But I did have dehydrated tomatoes, mushrooms, and onions in resealable jars, and flash-frozen green beans and corn for a side dish.
Moonboy came in with two-liter flasks for wine. They had lines marked for 130 ccs of alcohol and 50 ccs of concentrate; he chose Chianti when I told him what we were having. Some bureaucrat had set up the alcohol supply so you had to type in your initials and the quantity dispensed—or you could type in “communal,” as Moonboy did. Mr. Communal might wind up being quite a lush.
Nobody’d said anything about limits. Would you be cut off if the machine decided you were drinking too much for a pilot, or a doctor? For an out-of-work spy?
The wines we’d made in Little Mars that way weren’t too bad. The water has more oxygen dissolved in it than normal air would provide, and the theory was that it gave it a “brighter” taste. Whatever, I could live with it. I enjoy
I’d never thought of that. We didn’t really know what they looked like, so my image was of crystalline or metallic creatures lying almost inert under the cryogenic fluid.
“I want to go to Earth and see the water,” Snowbird said. “I want to wade in the sea.”
“Things go well, you probably will,” I said. “Surely the quarantine can’t last another fifty-some years.”
“For a spy, you’re a hopeless optimist,” Carmen said. “I don’t suppose you’re a betting man as well.”
“If the odds are right.”
“Then I’ll bet you a bottle of whisky—good single-malt Scotch whisky, bottled this year—that the quarantine will still be in place when we return. If we do.”
“A fifty-year-old bottle?” Maybe half a month’s pay. “I’ll accept the wager. Even against the Lucky Chicken— especially against her, so I can lose.”
“You lose, and everybody wins. Quarantined, but alive.”
After a few minutes of walking around, mostly checking plants for damage, all of us probably felt like lying down. I fought the impulse by going to the exercise machines. At least I could sit down on the stationary bicycle. Watch the water splashing into the pool. In a couple of hours, it would be full; I looked forward to cooling off in it.
I wondered whether the Martians would try it. Their underground lakes were shallow and muddy, and I couldn’t remember any reference to their using water recreationally. It was pretty rare stuff.
They didn’t wash for personal hygiene. They used flat scrapers, like ancient Roman athletes, the residue stirred into water that would be used for agriculture.
I got up and went back down the yellow corridor to the pantry, to see what I could put together for our first shipboard meal. (I hadn’t attempted cooking in zero gee.)
It was cold, maintained about ten degrees above freezing in the main area. Forty below in the “freezer,” which of course was heated up to that relatively balmy temperature, from the iceberg’s ambient coldness, about three degrees above absolute zero.
I’d spent hours studying the pantry’s organization and modifying it according to some logic and aesthetic that was arcane even to me. “This is the way I want it” was what it boiled down to. I would be the one spending the most time down here.
I took a basket and collected what I would need for a pasta dish that would resemble spaghetti and meatballs, comfort food, though there was no actual meat, and I assumed the spaghetti would have to be done in a pressure cooker. The air pressure was like Little Mars, about equivalent to nine thousand feet in altitude; boiling water wouldn’t cook fast.
I filled bottles with olive oil and wine concentrate, which I’d keep in the kitchen. No sense in making wine out of it for cooking; the alcohol would just boil off anyhow.
It would be a month before I had any fresh vegetables or herbs. But I did have dehydrated tomatoes, mushrooms, and onions in resealable jars, and flash-frozen green beans and corn for a side dish.
Moonboy came in with two-liter flasks for wine. They had lines marked for 130 ccs of alcohol and 50 ccs of concentrate; he chose Chianti when I told him what we were having. Some bureaucrat had set up the alcohol supply so you had to type in your initials and the quantity dispensed—or you could type in “communal,” as Moonboy did. Mr. Communal might wind up being quite a lush.
Nobody’d said anything about limits. Would you be cut off if the machine decided you were drinking too much for a pilot, or a doctor? For an out-of-work spy?
The wines we’d made in Little Mars that way weren’t too bad. The water has more oxygen dissolved in it than normal air would provide, and the theory was that it gave it a “brighter” taste. Whatever, I could live with it. I enjoy
Similar Books
