"You want me for local coloring, gal. It'll look nice on the featurepage and all that. But clear this--If anyone gets you an Ikky, it'll be me.I promise."

I stood in the empty Square. The foggy towers of Lifeline shared theirmists.

Shoreline a couple eras ago, the western slope above Lifeline stretchesas far as forty miles inland in some places. Its angle of rising is not agreat one, but it achieves an elevation of several thousand feet before itmeets the mountain range which separates us from the Highlands. About fourmiles inland and five hundred feet higher than Lifeline are set most of thesurface airstrips and privately owned hangars. Hangar Sixteen houses Cal'sContract Cab, hop service, shore to ship. I do not like Cal, but he wasn'taround when I climbed from the bus and waved to a mechanic.

Two of the hoppers tugged at the concrete, impatient beneath flywinghaloes. The one on which Steve was working belched deep within its barrelcarburetor and shuttered spasmodically.

"Bellyache?" I inquired.

"Yeah, gas pains and heartburn."

He twisted setscrews until it settled into an even keening, and turnedto me.

"You're for out?"

I nodded.

"Tensquare. Cosmetics. Monsters. Stuff like that."

He blinked into the beacons and wiped his freckles. The temperature wasabout twenty, but the big overhead spots served a double purpose.

"Luharich," he muttered. "Then you _are_ the one. There's some peoplewant to see you."

"What about?"

"Cameras. Microphones. Stuff like that."

"I'd better stow my gear. Which one am I riding?"

He poked the screwdriver at the other hopper.

"That one. You're on video tape now, by the way. They wanted to get youarriving."

He turned to the hangar, turned back.

"Say 'cheese.' They'll shoot the close-ups later."

I said something other than "cheese." They must have been usingtelelens and been able to read my lips, because that part of the tape wasnever shown.

I threw my junk in the back, climbed into a passenger seat, and lit acigarette. Five minutes later, Cal himself emerged from the office Quonset,looking cold. He came over and pounded on the side of the hopper. He jerkeda thumb back at the hangar.

"They want you in there!" he called through cupped hands. "Interview!"

"The show's over!" I yelled back. "Either that, or they can getthemselves another baitman!"

His rustbrown eyes became nailheads under blond brows and his glare aspike before he jerked about and stalked off. I wondered how much they hadpaid him to be able to squat in his hangar and suck juice from hisgenerator.

Enough, I guess, knowing Cal. I never liked the guy, anyway.

Venus at night is a field of sable waters. On the coasts, you can nevertell where the sea ends and the sky begins. Dawn is like dumping milk intoan inkwell. First, there are erratic curdles of white, then streamers. Shadethe bottle for a gray colloid, then watch it whiten a little more. All of asudden you've got day. Then start heating the mixture.

I had to shed my jacket as we flashed out over the bay. To our rear,the skyline could have been under water for the way it waved and rippled inthe heatfall. A hopper can accommodate four people (five, if you want tobend Regs and underestimate weight), or three passengers with the sort ofgear a baitman uses. I was the only fare, though, and the pilot was like hismachine. He hummed and made no unnecessary noises. Lifeline turned asomersault and evaporated in the rear mirror at about the same timeTensquare broke the fore-horizon. The pilot stopped humming and shook hishead.

I leaned forward. Feelings played flopdoodle in my guts. I knew everybloody inch of the big raft, but the feelings you once took for grantedchange when their source is out of reach. Truthfully, I'd had my doubts I'dever board the hulk again. But now, now I could almost believe inpredestination. There it was!

A tensquare football field of a ship. A-powered. Flat as a pancake,except for the plastic blisters in the middle and the "Rooks" fore and aft,port and starboard.

The Rook towers were named for their corner positions--and any two canwork together to hoist, co-powering the graffles between them. Thegraffles--half gaff, half grapple--can raise enormous weights to near waterlevel; their designer had only one thing in mind, though, which accounts forthe gaff half. At water level, the Slider has to implement elevation for sixto eight feet before the graffles are in a position to push upward, ratherthan pulling.

The Slider, essentially, is a mobile room--a big box capable of movingin any of Tensquare's crisscross groovings and "anchoring" on the strikeside by means of a powerful electromagnetic bond. Its winches could hoist abattleship the necessary distance, and the whole craft would tilt, ratherthan the Slider come loose, if you want any idea of the strength of thatbond.

The Slider houses a section operated control indicator which is themost sophisticated "reel" ever designed. Drawing broadcast power from thegenerator beside the center blister, it is connected by shortwave with thesonar room, where the movements of the quarry are recorded and repeated tothe angler seated before the section control.

The fisherman might play his "lines" for hours, days even, withoutseeing any more than metal and an outline on the screen. Only when the beastis graffled and the extensor shelf, located twelve feet below waterline,slides out for support and begins to aid the winches, only then does thefisherman see his catch rising before him like a fallen Seraph. Then, asDavits learned, one looks into the Abyss itself and is required to act. Hedidn't, and a hundred meters of unimaginable tonnage, undernarcotized andhurting, broke the cables of the winch, snapped a graffle, and took ahalf-minute walk across Tensquare.

We circled till the mechanical flag took notice and waved us on down.We touched beside the personnel hatch and I jettisoned my gear and jumped tothe deck.

"Luck," called the pilot as the door was sliding shut. Then he dancedinto the air and the flag clicked blank.

I shouldered my stuff and went below.

Signing in with Malvern, the de facto captain, I learned that most ofthe others wouldn't arrive for a good eight hours. They had wanted me aloneat Cal's so they could pattern the pub footage along twentieth-centurycinema lines.

Open: landing strip, dark. One mechanic prodding a contrary hopper.Stark-o-vision shot of slow bus pulling in. Heavily dressed baitmandescends, looks about, limps across field. Close-up: he grins. Move in forwords: "Do you think this is the time? The time he _will_ be landed?"Embarrassment, taciturnity, a shrug. Dub something-"I see. And why do youthink Miss Luharich has a better chance than any of the others? Is itbecause she's better equipped? [Grin.] Because more is known now about thecreature's habits than when you were out before? Or is it because of herwill to win, to be a champion? Is it any one of these things, or is it allof them?" Reply: "Yeah, all of them." "--Is that why you signed on with her?Because your instincts say, 'This one will be it'?" Answer: "She pays unionrates. I couldn't rent that damned thing myself. And I want in." Erase. Dubsomething else. Fade-out as he moves toward hopper, etcetera.

"Cheese," I said, or something like that, and took a walk aroundTensquare, by myself.

I mounted each Rook, checking out the controls and the underwater videoeyes. Then I raised the main lift.