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contaminating Saturn,” said Chastity, hooking up her backpack. “I’m sure some planet-hugger is going to object to that.”
     
    “They already have,” said Rod, closing his suit. “But Art just told the earth-huggers that they had a choice. Either convince the planet-huggers to shut up, or he was going to back out of the deal—and all that plutonium would be left on Earth. He got his way. The planet-huggers got something, however; they got to name the biologist for the crew.”
     
    “We have a greenie on the crew?” said Chastity, reaching for her helmet.
     
    “Yep. Sandra Green. Apt name for her. She’s a card-carrying member of the Peaceful Planet Protectors. Although there’s a violent fringe group in the organization that has triggered off a number of ‘peaceful’ bombs, most of the members of the organization are reasonable people.” Rod’s voice now came over the suit-to-suit radio link.
     
    “Ready,” said Chastity through the link, not turning around.
     
    “Me too,” said Rod. They turned and headed for the controls to the outer airlock door. Chastity watched as the door lowered in front of them like a drawbridge. After the ship had landed on the surface of Luna or Mars, the open airlock door served as a useful platform when raising and lowering equipment. The cable supports to the top of the door acted as railings as they floated outside. They clipped their second safety lines to the cable and unclipped their first lines from the inside safety rings.
     
    “Up we go,” said Rod, pulling on the handholds up the side of the capsule. Chastity followed. At the top, Rod undid some latches and tipped over the nosecone portion of the ship on its hinge. The cone was a meter high and a meter in diameter at the base. A parachute was packed inside the cone. The shrouds of the parachute exited near the hinge into a channel that ran down the outside of the capsule. The one-meter-diameter hole revealed by removing the cone looked down onto a large reel of cable and a winding mechanism. One of Jeeves’s mechbots was visible inside, its six paws clamped securely to a support post, waiting patiently for a command. The six-legged housecat-sized mechbot had the name MOUSER painted on its back.
     
    “The reel and tether,” said Rod. “Soon you’ll be an expert in using it. Think of it as a reusable retrorocket with an unlimited supply of fuel.”
     
    Chastity commanded her suit to turn on her helmet light. Using the bright beam to illuminate the mechanisms below, she looked down.
     
    “That tether looks mighty puny. Not even as thick as a clothesline.”
     
    “Isn’t,” said Rod. “Only a half-centimeter in diameter when collapsed, but it’s made of the new hextube carbon polymer. Nothing but carbon-carbon bonds. It’s also using the latest design in failsafe multiline Hoytether structures. It’s so failsafe that it’ll never need repair during its lifetime—which is a hundred years’ worth of hits from micrometeorites and space junk. To prevent snags, the mechbot will clip off any cut strands each time the tether winds in. The first few kilometers are coated, to reduce chemical reactions with Saturn’s atmosphere. We’ll use that portion to hang the capsule under the balloon. The rest of the two hundred kilometers is bare, to cut down its weight. We’ll use that part to climb down Saturn’s rings.”
     
    “What are those long metal spikes racked up around the wall?” asked Chastity.
     
    “Meta-propelled penetrators,” said Rod. “When you want to make a temporary tether anchor to a passing rock or iceball.”
     
    Chastity commanded off her light and Rod tilted the nosecone back over the hatch and latched it. They returned to their Jet-Do and flew back to the Boeing-Mitsubishi Assembly Station.
     
    “Using the tether is going to require some close teamwork between the capsule pilot and the tether operator,” said Rod. “You and I are scheduled for a week or so on the tether