In the USS Sam Shore’s Sea Lounge, Matt Springer stood at a lectern beside an empty, dimly lit stage.
The room itself was extraordinary, Falcon thought, as he rolled in and discreetly took a place at the back. The Sea Lounge was probably the single most famous, or notorious, feature of the cruise ship this huge carrier had become. It was a place of curves and tangles and sweeping panels, no straight lines, all in the colours of the sea: green and blue and with a mother-of-pearl sheen. The stage itself stood under an apex where sweeping ribs joined, and the audience before Springer was cupped in a shallow basin. Captain Embleton—there in the front row alongside the President—had told Falcon this was experimental architecture. The same technology they used to filter-mine sea water had been put to work sculpting this room, layer by layer—the room had been grown, like a sea mollusc’s shell, rather than built in the traditional fashion. Even the hidden service elements, the ducts and pipes and vents and cabling, had been planned into the carefully computer-controlled process.
The decor meanwhile looked high Victorian to Falcon, with polished tables, high chairs and divans. The tables were set with expensive-looking glasses, cutlery and porcelain crockery. But Falcon noticed the details—each item of cutlery marked with the motto MOBILIS IN MOBILI, the small flags on each table, black with a golden “N”—that gave away the true inspiration behind this place. Falcon allowed himself a smile. More than two centuries since its launch in the pages of Verne’s great novel, Captain Nemo’s Nautilus still sailed seas of imagination. Falcon murmured, “You’d have enjoyed this, Jules.”
And in this elaborate setting, dressed in a crisp civilian suit, smiling at the passengers as they filed into their seats, Matt Springer looked at ease, welcoming, in control. Falcon envied the man for his human grace in this very human company, while Falcon himself skulked in the shadows.
But he was not alone for long. Webster soon found him.
Falcon murmured, “Buddy, if you’re looking for the water fountain, he’s the good-looking fellow in the other corner.”
“Very funny.”
“You showed up in the end, then?”
“Turns out I have some residual good manners. So what do you think of the Sea Lounge? Quite something, isn’t it?”
Falcon grunted. “It’s like a huge oyster shell. And Matt Springer is the big fat pearl in the middle of it.”
That made Webster laugh.
With a gracious smile, Springer settled his hands on the lectern and, speaking without notes, began the show.
* * * *
“Madam President, Captain Embleton, friends. Good evening. Thanks for coming. I’m here to tell you the story of Grandpa Seth—who is the reason my family came by its notoriety in the first place, and the reason I had to go all the way to Pluto to carve out a little piece of history of my own.”
Sympathetic laughter: immediately he had them eating out of his hand. Falcon seethed.
“I do need to dispel a couple of myths about him. First of all, although my family always referred to him as ‘Grandpa,’ Seth was in fact my great-great-great-great-grandfather, and he never got to meet even his own grandchildren. But his fame extended far beyond his own lifetime, and he was always a kind of presence for the family, so ‘Grandpa’ he will always be.
“And second, no, Sean Connery didn’t play him in the 1970s movie.” More laughter. “Connery was in the picture, but in another role. A professor from MIT. Sometimes I watch that old drama over again. Shame the science got left on the cutting room floor, but it is fun! And it was the first attempt to dramatise those extraordinary events.
“What I’m going to show you tonight is the latest attempt to tell that story. Of course, the whole drama was recorded and heavily scrutinised at the time, and later there was a slew of books, autobiographies, technical studies. So with modern processing of the contemporary imagery, and armed with the screeds of psychological analysis of the principals that followed, we can do a pretty good job of reconstruction—we can see how it was to live through those dramatic days, and even get some sense of what the principals must have been thinking and feeling at the time.
“Tonight we’ll see a selection of scenes, key incidents. Just sit back and relax; the 3D should be easy on the eye. Those of you with neural jacks are welcome to try out the immersive options, though they are all restricted to passive mode.” Another smile. “Don’t try pressing any buttons in Grandpa’s Apollo Command Module. And maybe you’ll have some insight into how it felt, on Sunday 9th April 1967, when Seth Springer was given the bad news that he wasn’t going to the Moon . . .”
An area of the wall behind Matt Springer’s lectern became a glowing rectangle, filling with the deep, limitless blue of a cloudless sky. The angle panned down, taking in an expanse of blocky white buildings laid out campus-like amid neat areas of lawn and roadway. For a moment or two it could have passed as a contemporary scene, the buildings’ utilitarian architecture revealing little. But as the point of view zoomed in, so vehicles and figures quickly gave the game away. Squared-off cars, men in suits and hats and ties, despite the obvious heat. And few women to be seen at all. This was a scene from a hundred and thirty years in the past—from the first faltering days of the space age.
The point of view narrowed to one building, then one window of that building. And then, with one dizzying swoop, through the glass, into an air-conditioned office. Contemporary fittings, polished wood and leather. Lots of photographs and flags, cabinets and framed documents, a desk with a calendar and a briefcase, but nothing that Falcon recognised as a computer or visual display device . . .
“The Apollo Moon programme is cancelled. But the good news is,” the man behind that desk was saying, “you two good old boys are gonna get the chance to save the world.”
“In five minutes there won’t be a dry eye in the house,” Webster said.
“Save mine, of course.”
“Come on, let’s duck out of here. There’s only so much Springer either of us can take. Also there’s someone who wants to talk to you.”
“Let me guess. Nurse Hope.”
“Wise guy. And I need a bathroom break. You coming, or not?”
* * * *
A short walk under a roof of ribbed bulkhead led to another of the Shore’s advertised features, the Observation Lounge, a cafeteria-bar. Falcon estimated a quarter-acre of carpet was scattered with tables and floor cushions and even a kids’ play pen, over which loomed an immense blister, a window of toughened Plexiglas. At this time of night, an hour before midnight, nothing was visible beyond the window save pitch-dark ocean.
Hope Dhoni sat alone at a table before the window. She had some kind of equipment on the table, an open case. As Webster and Falcon approached she looked around and smiled warily.
The little robot Conseil—presuming it was the same one—rolled over towards them. “May I serve you?”
“No,” Falcon said curtly.
“He’ll have iced tea with me,” Hope said firmly. “Thank you, Conseil. You always liked iced tea, Howard.”
Webster grinned and sat down. “And a bourbon for me. On my tab—”
“You are all guests of the President on this voyage, Administrator Webster.” Conseil had a mellifluous, almost Bostonian accent, Falcon thought. It was certainly a lot more humanlike than the buzzing monotone of Adam, that treasured toy from his childhood. The robot trundled away to a softly lit bar area at the back of the room.
And Falcon rolled away on his own balloon tyres towards that big window. It curved over his head. Cautiously he touched it with one fingertip. He thought of cottage windows, frosted by snow on a winter’s morning—sensations that had been relayed to his brain through skin and nerves, rather than a network of prosthetics and implanted neural receivers.
A light swam by in the dark, a perfectly smooth, horizontal motion. One of those sea sprites, he assumed. Again, he felt uneasy about how close the automated critters came to the boat. That pilot light was all that was visible beyond the window.
Hope Dhoni came over and stood at his side. “One of the ship’s most famous features,” she murmured. “The window itself, I mean. An engineering marvel. Rather like you, Commander Falcon.”
“Look,” he said. “I’m sorry. The way I reacted when we met. Those days under the surgeons were difficult for me. Even remembering them—”
She slipped her hand into his. He could sense the pressure of her fingers, measure the moisture and warmth of her palm—he even had a vivid, unwelcome impression of the bone structure. He could not feel her hand in his, though, not by any meaningful definition of the word.
Suddenly uncomfortable, he pulled away. Too many memories. Too much pain.
For both of them.
“Come,” Hope said gently. “Sit with us.”