The Black Hole by Alan Dean Foster Read Free Book Online Page A

"Miscellaneous supplies, sir. Non-regenerable, some organics."
    "What kind? If it's survey equipment or samples, we can forget it."
    "I'm afraid not, sir. Manifest shows pharmaceuticals among the contents."
    "Damn. We can't risk losing that stuff, and we could do just that if we're jolted hard enough or if the artificial grav goes out. Be just about right for us to break free of this and then die on the way home for lack of the right medicine to treat some otherwise minor infection."
    "I agree, sir." Vincent removed his armature from the console socket and swiveled to depart from the cockpit. "I'll go outside and secure the hatch."
    "I don't like it, but . . . watch yourself. This is more pull than we've ever had to deal with. If you break loose you won't be sucked in much faster than the ship, but your thrusters might not be enough to boost you back to the hull, and there's no way we could maneuver to retrieve you."
    "Yes, sir. I am cognizant of the dangers, sir. Rest assured I will exercise utmost caution." Vincent floated from the cockpit, moving carefully but at high speed back through the corridors.
    Scanning the readouts, Holland's eyes fell again on the still winking lights which reminded him of the damage to their air system. "Alex, Harry," he called into the pickup, "you still okay back there?"
    "Rocky, but no injuries, Dan." Durant sounded tired. "We're still working on the lines that broke here in the lab."
    "Leave those for Kate. She's faster than either of you. Check out the damage farther back, where the initial interruption occurred."
    "Check." Durant started for the doorway. "Let's go, Harry. Good luck here, Kate."
    She was already running a diagnostic pen over the multiple tube fracture. "You fix the first headache, Alex, I'll handle this one." She waved the pen at him and he smiled back, each grin for the other's benefit and not an expression of humor. Not now.
    Apply sealer to the edge of the break , she told herself, trying to see the instruction tape, forcing it to unspool once more inside her head. Place sealant alloy between sealer and far end of break . . . She continued like that, working steadily if slowly, her body tense in expectancy of further jolts and shudders.
    Normally Vincent would not have bothered with a tether. His internal thrusters provided enough power for him to fly with confidence around any ship. But this was not normal space they were spinning through, and Vincent was programmed to be prudent. So he double-checked to make sure the high-strength metalweave cable was attached securely to himself and to the ship. Then he slid back the exterior hatch of the air lock and made his way outside.
    The black hole was a dark nothingness resting in the center of a glowing vortex of radiant gas and larger clumps of matter. It attracted his attention only briefly. He was also programmed to be curious, though less so than humans.
    So he ignored the mesmerizing view of the stellar maelstrom and turned his optics instead on the various projections extruding from the Palomino 's hull. He had to make his way around them so that his extendible magnetic limbs would remain firmly in contact with the ship's skin.
    As he moved slowly across the hull back toward the free-floating hatch to be resecured, he was aware of a steady thunder reverberating around him. It was a thunder no human could have heard, a purely electronic thunder, the wail dying matter generated as it was crushed out of existence. It possessed also a certain poignancy no human could have appreciated, for in many ways Vincent was closer in structure to the meteoric material plunging past him to destruction than he was to the creature known as man.
    Indeed , he mused, I am the same stuff, differently formed and imbued with intelligence. I am cousin both to meteor and to man .
    Then his thoughts turned to more prosaic matters: a loose hatch and the possibility of uncertain footing. I do wonder why I was programmed to think in so many human