Starfish by Peter Watts Read Free Book Online Page B

"Thanks for your concern. But I don't have to stay. I can leave any time I want to."
    "You go out there now and you'll give everything away, they're watching us! Haven't you figured it out yet ?" Ballard's voice is rising. "Listen, they knew about you! They were looking for someone like you! They've been testing us, they don't know yet what kind of person works out better down here, so they're watching and waiting to see who cracks first! This whole program is still experimental, can't you see that? Everyone they've sent down — you, me, Ken Lubin and Lana Cheung, it's all part of some cold-blooded test—"
    "And you're failing it," Clarke says softly. "I see."
    "They're using us, Lenie— don't go out there! "
    Ballard's fingers grasp at Clarke like the suckers of an octopus. Clarke pushes them away. She undogs the hatch and pushes it open. She hears Ballard rising behind her.
    " You're sick! " Ballard screams. Something smashes into the back of Clarke's head. She goes sprawling out into the corridor. One arm smacks painfully against a cluster of pipes as she falls.
    She rolls to one side and raises her arms to protect herself. But Ballard just steps over her and stalks into the lounge.
    I'm not afraid, Clarke notes, getting to her feet. She hit me, and I'm not afraid. Isn't that odd—
    From somewhere nearby, the sound of shattering glass.
    Ballard's shouting in the lounge. "The experiment's over! Come on out, you fucking ghouls!"
    Clarke follows the corridor, steps out of it. Pieces of the lounge mirror hang like great jagged stalactites in their frame. Splashes of glass litter the floor.
    On the wall, behind the broken mirror, a fisheye lens takes in every corner of the room.
    Ballard is staring into it. "Did you hear me? I'm not playing your stupid games any more! I'm through performing!"
    The quartzite lens stares back impassively.
    So you were right , Clarke muses. She remembers the sheet in Ballard's cubby. You figured it out, you found the pickups in your own cubby, and Ballard, my dear friend, you didn't tell me.
    How long have you known?
    Ballard looks around, sees Clarke. "You've got her fooled, all right," she snarls at the fisheye, "but she's a goddamned basket case! She's not even sane! Your little tests don't impress me one fucking bit!"
    Clarke steps toward her.
    "Don't call me a basket case," she says, her voice absolutely level.
    "That's what you are !" Ballard shouts. "You're sick! That's why you're down here! They need you sick, they depend on it, and you're so far gone you can't see it! You hide everything behind that — that mask of yours, and you sit there like some masochistic jellyfish and just take anything anyone dishes out—you ask for it—"
    That used to be true , Clarke realizes as her hands ball into fists. That's the strange thing. Ballard begins to back away; Clarke advances, step by step. It wasn't until I came down here that I learned that I could fight back . That I could win . The rift taught me that, and now Ballard has too—
    "Thank you," Clarke whispers, and hits Ballard hard in the face.
    Ballard goes over backwards, collides with a table. Clarke calmly steps forward. She catches a glimpse of herself in a glass icicle; her capped eyes seem almost luminous.
    "Oh Jesus," Ballard whimpers. "Lenie, I'm sorry ."
    Clarke stands over her. "Don't be," she says. She sees herself as some sort of exploding schematic, each piece neatly labeled. So much anger in here , she thinks. So much hate . So much to take out on someone.
    She looks at Ballard, cowering on the floor.
    "I think," Clarke says, "I'll start with you."
    But her therapy ends before she can even get properly warmed up. A sudden noise fills the lounge, shrill, periodic, vaguely familiar. It takes a moment for Clarke to remember what it is. She lowers her foot.
    Over in the Communications cubby, the telephone is ringing.
    * * *
    Jeanette Ballard is going home today.
    For half an hour the 'scaphe has been dropping deeper into