THE TRUTH
Grant let Halleck slide slowly to the floor.
Trudy looked from her unconscious body to Oberman, still sprawled across the bunk, and then stared into Grant’s darkly frightening face.
“Grant … you’ll kill her!”
He scowled down at Halleck’s body, then said to Trudy, “Help me out of this suit.”
He peeled off his gloves and Trudy helped lift the hard shell of the suit’s torso over his head. Halleck remained on the floor, her eyes shut. Oberman groaned and tried to sit up. He slid off the bunk and onto the floor.
“Throw some water on her,” Grant said to Trudy.
Halleck’s eyes snapped open.
With a glance at Oberman, who sat at the foot of the bunk rubbing his bruised jaw, Grant slid his arms under Halleck’s shoulders and hauled her to her feet. Trudy rushed to the desk chair, righted it, and rolled it toward them.
Grant pushed Halleck roughly onto the chair. She glared up at him.
“You were going to tell me about the nanomachines,” Grant said.
Halleck tried to stare Grant down, but failed. She dropped her chin and muttered, “No one was supposed to get hurt.”
“Three people have been killed,” Grant said.
Nodding, Halleck said, “That’s not my fault. It wasn’t supposed to happen that way.”
“What kind of nanomachines are they?”
“Gobblers, of a sort. All they’re supposed to do is to attack vanadium atoms. They told me that would cause only very minor damage, not enough to hurt anyone.”
Grant shook his head wearily. “We’re living on the edge of vacuum out here. Don’t you realize that normal conditions on the Moon are only a centimeter away from sudden death?”
Halleck tried to look defiant, but instead her expression melted into a guilty downcast.
“Why?” Trudy blurted. “Why would you want to hurt us?”
Halleck made a bleak smile. “You don’t understand any of this, do you? You don’t understand a thing.”
“Enlighten us,” said Trudy.
Before Halleck could reply, though, Grant interrupted. “I need to know what the nanos are programmed to do, how long they’ll remain active, how to deactivate them.”
“As I told you, they’re programmed to attack vanadium atoms. That’s all. The people at the laboratory I used told me that the quantity they gave me could cause pinhole leaks in titanium alloys, produce air leaks. Nothing catastrophic, just enough to cause panic at Farside.”
“How long will they be active?”
With an almost careless shrug, Halleck said, “A few weeks, if I remember correctly.”
“And they’re not deactivated by ultraviolet light, are they?”
“Of course not. There’s no built-in way to deactivate them, from what they told me. You have to wait until their programmed lifespan ends.”
“That means we’ll have to abandon Farside,” Grant muttered. “Temporarily, at least.”
“I didn’t mean for them to cause so much damage,” Halleck said, as if apologizing for spilling milk. “I only wanted to slow Professor Uhlrich’s work.”
“But why?” Trudy repeated.
Halleck answered, “Morgan McClintock humiliated me. I decided that turnabout is fair play.”
“Morgan…?”
“Carter’s father. He’s pouring money into Uhlrich’s program so that Farside can be the first to obtain imagery of New Earth. And why? To hurt me. To make me look bad in the eyes of the IAA, of the whole world!”
“That’s why McClintock’s at Farside?” Grant asked.
“Why else? Carter has no interest in astronomy. He’s there to look after his father’s interests. Well, I thought it would be poetic justice if Farside failed. Failed miserably.”
“For your own personal satisfaction?” Trudy was aghast.
“What better reason could there be?” Halleck replied.
But Grant said, “There’s big money tied up in the IAA’s program. If Farside can do the job the IAA would drop its program.”
“And leave me looking ridiculous,” said Halleck.
“And the corporations that’re working on your program would have their contracts canceled,” Grant added. “They wouldn’t like you for that.”
Halleck glared at him, but said nothing.
Across the tiny room, Oberman pushed himself to his feet and tottered to the lavatory, still rubbing his jaw.
Grant said, “I have to contact Farside and tell the professor what’s going on. They’ll have to abandon the site for a couple of weeks.”
“And go where?” Trudy asked. “Selene won’t take us.”
“Yes they will. Now that we know what we’re up against, Selene’s safety people can screen each one of us to make sure we’re not carrying the gobblers.”
“Dr. Cardenas is still at Farside,” Trudy recalled. “Maybe she can run the screening operation.”
“Good,” said Grant. “I’ll call the Ulcer and tell him that—”
He got no further. Oberman dashed out of the lavatory, a heavy wrench in his hand, and smashed Grant across the back of his head. Grant fell facedown to the floor, unconscious, his scalp bleeding heavily.