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"Less than a turn," said the Comm Officer.<br />
"If only we had a vehicle that didn't depend on a ground launcher for the energy to get up and down,"<br />
said the admiral.<br />
"We do," Far-Ranger interrupted. "My interstellar scout ship is designed to operate around neutron<br />
stars. It can't land and take off, but I should be able to drop down, match orbits with that jumpcraft, then<br />
make it back out to synchronous orbit on my drives."<br />
"That will save at least three of them. Maybe more if we can crowd them in."<br />
"If we empty the food lockers and cargo hold, I can probably carry a whole jumpcraft load," said<br />
Far-Ranger. "I'm sure the passengers wouldn't mind a dothturn or two in the freezer."<br />
"First Officer!" roared Hohmann-Transfer. "Get a crew and empty that scout ship! Navigator! Prepare a<br />
trajectory and dump it in the scout ship computer!"<br />
"I'll have plenty of time for calculating my trajectory myself while my ship is being off-loaded,"<br />
Far-Ranger politely reminded her.<br />
"Of course," said Admiral Hohmann-Transfer. "My apologies."<br />
06:58:07.1 GMT TUESDAY 21 JUNE2050<br />
A half-turn later Far-Ranger threw her scout ship at the horizon of Egg. Pushing her inertia drive to its<br />
limits, she matched orbits with the slowly sinking jumpcraft.<br />
"If I didn't need my last four eyes to watch my instruments," Pilot Light-Streak said over the<br />
communications link. "I'd say, 'It's good to see you.' Any ideas on how to transfer the passengers?"<br />
"Your artificial gravity is planar, while my black hole grav-<br />
ity is spherical," Far-Ranger said. "An osculating tangent is the only solution."<br />
Far-Ranger slowly lowered her orbit until her spherical scout ship was above the orbiting jumpcraft. The<br />
copilot Slippery-Wing and two of the passengers had removed a section of the magnetic shielding that<br />
covered the passenger section of the jumpcraft, and Far-Ranger put her scout ship just above the hole.<br />
One by one, the passengers were hoisted, prodded, or pushed up from the flat deck of the jumpcraft to<br />
land, upside down, on the curved deck of the scout ship.<br />
"Up you go!" said Admiral Steel-Slicer, who had been tossing his fellow passengers up to<br />
Slippery-Wing above. He reached for the next available body and found he had the pilot of the<br />
jumpcraft.<br />
"Thank you for your help, Admiral," said Light-Streak. "But you are next."
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