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surviving a week without either was possible. Barely. And the da Vinci would have no trouble finding the pod. Even if its beacon had been fried on the way down, her combadge would guide them in with little trouble.
    Reattaching her combadge, she keyed it on for the first time in half an hour.
    â€œBlue to Corsi. Commander? This is Pattie. Do you read me?”
    Nothing. Just like last time. And the time before.
    Pattie shut out the image of Corsi falling—in an EVA suit, not a pod—toward the planet below.
    I might survive a week at the bottom of a hole, but Corsi could be injured .
    Strapping herself back into the Nasat-supporting acceleration couch, Pattie reviewed the status boards. Main thrusters and all the attitude thrusters she could angle to point directly back had been burned out in her braking maneuver. That left her with four, which should be enough, and a choice.
    Her inclination was to make several spaced micro burns, allowing the surrounding peat to cool away from combustion temperatures between gentle thrusts. However, the rate at which the tunnel was collapsing suggested she didn’t have the time to spare on caution.
    Pattie unhooked her safety straps. If she was going to do this, she was going to need to move fast. She’d worry about the hundred and ninety meter drop if and when she felt herself falling. First priority was reaching the hatch.
    With that in mind, she triggered the hatch release. Hopefully, when it faced the empty tunnel it would pop open of its own accord, saving her precious seconds.
    It was possible all of this was unnecessary, that the EVA pod would simply turn in place and she’d be able to exit at her leisure. But one thing she had learned was to never count on things going well.
    A section of the tunnel sagged.
    Pattie couldn’t preprogram the attitude thrusters—there was no formula for plowing through peat. She adjusted their angles and triggered the all-fire, holding the contact down as the pod shuddered and began to turn.
    Thirty, forty degrees, then it seemed to hang up. Something more solid than the rest of the peat had snagged one of the pod’s few projections. Or perhaps the material had started to collapse, holding it more firmly.
    Pattie was already giving the thrusters full burn. There was nothing she could do but keep them firing, the chance of conflagration increasing with every second.
    With an abrupt lurch that almost threw Pattie from the couch, the pod came loose. The viewport became a mirror as it turned away from the tunnel.
    Pattie released the thruster control as the hatch popped open. A cloud of smoke and a rotting vegetable stench filled the tiny cabin as she dropped to all eights and scurried through the opening.
    The pod shifted beneath her as she leapt from the metal sill. There was a sucking, crackling sound and another billow of smoke and stench washed over her as she scrambled up the crumbling tunnel.
    The peat was not completely dry, she realized, then as quickly realized her pod wouldn’t have dug a tunnel if it had been. Perhaps in moist peat the danger of fire wasn’t as great as she’d supposed.
    She almost slackened her pace at the thought. Then a section of ceiling twice as broad as she dropped, nearly blocking her way.
    â€œI’m arboreal, not burrowing,” she reminded no one in particular as she frantically dug her way over the obstacle.
    Past the mound of fallen ceiling was another and a third. But beyond that the last thirty meters looked clear. The ceiling bowed but had not yet broken loose.
    She was going to make it.
    Then from behind her came a sullen fwump as though someone were dumping a massive load of pillows. Or dirt. A cold gust of escaping air washed up from behind. The tunnel was collapsing.
    She wasn’t going to make it.

Chapter
3
    â€œI should have gone with her,” Fabian Stevens said for perhaps the hundredth time.
    â€œWhat?” Bart Faulwell asked, pulling his