Read The Wind From a Burning Woman: Six Stories of Science Fiction for Free Online Page B

hissed from the crack, making the work doubly difficult. The Moon was rising above the Janacki pole.
    Deep below her, seven prebalanced charges, mounted on massive fittings in their chambers, began to whir. Four processors checked the timings, concurred, and released safety shields.
    Six of the charges went off at once. The seventh was late by ten thousandths of a second, its blast muted as the casing melted prematurely. The particle shock waves streamed out through the boreholes, now pressure release valves, and formed a long neck and tail of flame and ionized particles that grew steadily for a thousand kilometers, then faded. The tail from the Vlasseg pole was thinner and shorter, but no less spectacular. The asteroid shuddered, vibrations rising from deep inside to pull the ground away from Turcos boots, then swing it back to kick her away from the bubble and hatch. She floated in space, disoriented, ripped free of the guide wires, her back to the asteroid, faceplate aimed at peaceful stars, turning slowly as she reached the top of her arc.
    Her leisurely descent gave her plenty of time to see the secondary plume of purple and white and red forming around the Janacki pole. The stars were blanked out by its brilliance. She closed her eyes. When she opened them again, she was nearer the ground, and her faceplate had polarized against the sudden brightness. She saw the bubble still intact, and the hatch wide open now. It had been jarred free. Everything was vibrating ... and with shock she realized the asteroid was slowly moving out from beneath her. Her fall became a drawn-out curve, taking her away from the bubble toward a ridge of lead-grey rock, without guide wires, where she would bounce and continue on unchecked. To her left, one dome ruptured and sent a feathery wisp of debris into space. Pieces of rock and dust floated past her, shaken from Psyches weak surface grip. Then her hand was only a few meters from a guide wire torn free and swinging outward. It came closer like a dancing snake, hesitated, rippled again, and came within reach. She grabbed it and pulled herself down.
    * * * *
    Porter, this is Lunar Guidance. Earth says the charges werent enough. Something went wrong.
    She held together, LG, Porter said in disbelief. She didnt break up. Ive got a fireworks show like youve never seen before.
    Porter, listen. She isnt moving fast enough. Shell still impact.
    I heard you, LG, Porter shouted. I heard! Leave me alone to get things done. Nothing more was said between them.
    * * * *
    Turco reached the hatch and crawled into the airlock, exhausted. She closed the outer door and waited for equalization before opening the inner. Her helmet was off and floated behind as she walked and bounced and guided herself into the control room. If the motors were still functional, shed fire them. She had no second thoughts now. Something had gone wrong, and the situation was completely different.
    In the middle of the kilometers-wide crater at the Janacki pole, the borehole was still spewing debris and ionized particles. But around the perimeter, other forces were at work. Canisters of reaction mass were flying to a point three kilometers above the crater floor. The Beckmann drive engines rotated on their mountings, aiming their nodes at the canisters rendezvous point.
    Porters ship was following the tail of debris down to the crater floor. He could make out geometric patterns of insulating material. His computers told him something was approaching a few hundred meters below. There wasnt time for any second guessing. He primed his main cargo and sat back in the seat, lips moving, not in prayer, but repeating some stray, elegant line from the Burgess novel, a final piece of pleasure.
    One of the canisters struck the side of the cargo ship just as the blast began. A brilliant flare spread out above the crater, merging with and twisting the tail of the internal charges. Four canisters were knocked from their course and sent plummeting