Not With A Whimper: Survivors

by D. A. Boulter

  A couple of faces turned towards her, others turned away. The ones that turned away had seen. She knew it, but she could not prove it.

  “He was your co-worker, your compatriot. How could you just let him walk out the airlock? What kind of people are you, anyway?”

  “Let it go, Sharon.” Jill pulled her to a corner of the room. “They no longer care about anything.”

  Sharon fought to get her breathing under control, the air rasping in and out of her lungs.

  “They let him die. We let him die.” And the horrible truth of the matter. “I let him die.”

  “No, no you didn’t,” Jill soothed her. “You did your best. But you can’t stop someone who won’t be stopped. If it hadn’t been last night, it would have been tonight. It might have happened when one of us used the washroom, and the other got distracted by a disturbance. It might have taken him one minute. Sixty seconds. Could we watch him sixty seconds every minute, sixty minutes every hour, twenty-four hours every day? Just you and me?”

  Though she recognized the truth of it, it didn’t stop the feeling of guilt. While she slept, Gordie had walked into the darkness.

  “I tried the radio again,” Jill told her. “Nothing. No one replies to our calls. We hear nothing from Earth or other stations or even life-pods.” She indicated the others. “They know it. They know that no one is coming for us.”

  “They believe, not know,” Sharon countered.

  “This is Day Eight. At least one of our ships should have dropped yesterday to make the rendezvous. They know that. I’ll bet you my last dollar that at least half of them think that Gordie is lucky; I’ll bet that some are now thinking of following him.”

  “You can’t,” Sharon told her.

  Jill blinked. “Can’t what?”

  “Can’t bet your last dollar. It’s mine. I’m up twenty grand.”

  Jill started to laugh. “Not fair. That’s today. Yesterday you were down thirty grand. Tomorrow ... who knows?”

  Sharon chuckled, then sobered. “Let’s try the radio again.”

  “It’s no use.”

  “He said he’d come; I believe in him.”

  * * *

  Venture

  “I promised her I’d come for her,” Owen said.

  He’d come storming into his office, and Johannes had immediately known why.

  “And she told me to get you out of the system,” Johannes retorted. “I failed her in that, but I won’t let you die on a suicide mission.” He indicated the screen – a repeater of the detector screen on the bridge. He had also sent it to the lounges, so that all could see what they were up against. “No shuttle or workboat can survive that.”

  Owen, unfortunately, would not be denied. “A lifeboat has meteor shields.”

  “Minimal ones. And I’m not risking one of our boats in that maelstrom; it wouldn’t survive.”

  Please, please let him see the logic of it.

  “Scout-1 has shields.”

  “Captain Yrden?”

  The voice startled the both of them. Johannes hadn’t realized that Owen had failed to shut the door after entering.

  “Yes, Pilot Carson?”

  “I’m ready to take your malcontents back to Earth. Twenty-seven, I believe.”

  Johannes shook his head. “Not any longer. They’ve been watching – I repeated the detector screen ... and the vids. Eight of them no longer like their chances.”

  “Which leaves nineteen.”

  Johannes couldn’t let the man just commit suicide like that. “Wen, we’re going to need you.”

  “You said you owed. I’m collecting. I put in rescue shifts. There’s no one left to rescue here.”

  “Yes, there is,” Owen said. “We’re getting a signal from FTL-1’s Catastrophe Core.”

  Damn it!

  Carson raised an eyebrow, then looked to him. “This true, Captain?”

  “Yes. But look at where they are.” He pointed it out on the detector.

  Wen winced. “Looks bad.”

  “Sharon’s there.”

  “Your girl?”

  “Yes.”

  The pilot spent almost a minute looking at Owen, with Johannes tight inside. Surely the man wouldn’t—

  “Get your gear. I’ll take you. My lifeboat; mine to risk.”

  Owen left at a run.

  Johannes turned on Carson. “That’s my son, Carson. I’ll not let you take him into that. Look at it, damn you!” And how would he explain it to Jaswinder?

  “Not your choice, Captain,” Carson said calmly. “It’s his. And mine.”

  “I’ll have security stop you,” Johannes threatened.

  “And thereby kill your son.”

  “What?”

  “Reason it out, Captain. If I don’t take him, and you won’t authorize anyone else to, he’ll steal a workboat, and make the attempt. He loves this Sharon woman; he’ll do it. I would have done the same for Lil. Tell me that you wouldn’t do it for Jaswinder. Tell me she wouldn’t do it for you. Tell me convincingly enough to make me believe, and I’ll withdraw my offer.”

  Johannes couldn’t. He would risk that for Jaswinder.

  “Do you think he can fly a workboat well enough to avoid that mess – the mess you just pointed out to me?”

  “What do you suggest I tell Jaswinder when you fail, and I have to report that I allowed her son to be killed?”

  Carson offered a sad smile. “The same thing you’d have to tell her after he stole a workboat, failed, and died.”

  Johannes felt his insides go hollow.

  “Captain, I’m not taking your son on a suicide mission. I’m the best Amalgamated had: First Pilot. If it becomes too much for ship and shields, I’ll back out, return your son to you. And he’ll know he tried, know that he did his best to keep his word – yes, I heard the whole conversation – and he’ll be able to sleep nights.” He looked utterly miserable. “I wish I could sleep nights.”

  Johannes held his hands open, helplessly.

  “I’ll have him on detectors – passed second in his class, I hear. And I’ll have Venture on detectors as well, above us, watching the middle distance. And perhaps her beam might help, too. We’ll keep a comm link open. I promise you: it gets too much, and I’ll back out.” He barked a harsh laugh. “And I’ll send you my datastream, too. You can play the comm and the vid and the detector screens – both mine and yours – for your malcontents. See how many of them want to go through the same thing.”

  Owen came back to see them staring at each other.

  “I’m ready,” he said.

  Carson looked at him, then back at Johannes. “Well, Captain?”

  “Go.”

  * * *

  Spitzbergen: The Vault

  Monday 06 September

  Pierre Fontaine lay back on the divan with Kiera West against him. He idly twirled a finger around a lock of her hair, feeling vastly content, if a little sad. She had met his every expectation. Warm, loving, intelligent, kind. And passionate.

  “You should have gone up, Pierre,” she said.

  “And missed this last week, the best week of my life?” he asked.

  He could feel her smile. “Best week of my life, too.” She then pointed out the window to the rolling northern ocean breakers. “Except for that, of course.”

  Except for that, of course. The radiation gauge ticked a little higher – not so high as to be dangerous, not yet, but a warning of what was to come.

  “I can see people killing each other; people aren’t very nice. But they murdered all the animals, too. Cats, dogs, birds, deer. Why would they do that? The poor things never asked for that, never did anything to deserve that.”

  No, people in their rapacious lust for wealth and power rarely considered the vulnerable. Kiera did. He caressed her neck, felt her lean slightly into the caress.

  “Humans are not very nice,” he agreed. Then he corrected himself. “Most humans.”

  She gave his leg a little rub for the compliment
.

  “It never seems to get dark up here,” Kiera said as if it were a magic place. It felt to him like a magic place.

  “Ah, oui. And what shall we do with the rest of this rather long day?” he asked, lips close to her ear.

  “You will pack, mes amis!” came Jacques’ voice, interrupting the tender moment.

  “Pardon?” Pierre turned his head to regard his engineer, a man who had not spent much time in the building, but now came bulling in.

  “I have found it, the fault! I can repair it.” He had reverted to French.

  Excitement rose in Pierre. “You have? You can?”

  Jacques calmed a little. “Mais oui. It only took time and diligence. We may yet live out our natural span of years back in our home – space.”

  “But that’s wonderful. When can we leave?”

  Jacques calmed down. “I found the fault, yes. I can repair it, yes. However, it will take a few hours to do so.”

  “A few hours?”

  “Perhaps four. Perhaps a little less or a little more. I must cannibalize one piece of equipment to transplant in another. But fear not, Pierre, we shall leave within the day. So, my friend, I suggest you pack. We have a light load, as the other three shuttles took much of ours. So, look around. If you see anything you like, take it.”

  Jacques turned, and almost ran from the room.

  “What is it? What’s happening?” Kiera asked.

  “Pardon, cheri,” Pierre apologized. “We should have spoken in English. Jacques tells me that he can fix the shuttle. We take off today for space – for your new home.”

  Her mouth opened in a silent oh.

  “Truly?”

  “Truly, cheri. Jacques says that he needs but a few hours. He tells us to seek out treasures to take with us. Perhaps we might raid the bar. If we do not drink it ourselves, surely we might sell it to others.”

  “And Mouser. We can’t leave Mouser behind like they did.”

  During their search of the Institute, they had come upon a cat in one of the rooms. Had they not searched, it would have died of starvation.

  “And Mouser,” he agreed. “And all of his food that we can manage.”

  “And the extra luggage the others left behind,” Kiera said. “They’ll want it.”

  Trust her to think always of others. The pain of others became her pain.

  * * *

  Haida Gwaii

  Jaswinder rubbed at her temples, trying to massage away the pain. She wished Johannes had stayed on Haida Gwaii. Bill Tannon could run a station, but he had a soft spot where they could afford none. She wouldn’t ask Johannes to handle it all, but they could have shared the burden.

  “I’m sorry, but you must remain in your ships. We have to know that you aren’t carrying diseases,” she said to a woman who had begged to have her life-pod taken aboard Haida Gwaii. The life-pod had come from the Moon.

  “You don’t understand,” Melissa Deaver said. “We need a doctor. People are sick, dying.”

  “Sick or injured?” Jaswinder asked.

  “What does it matter? They are dying!”

  Jaswinder felt a pang go through her. Sick, then. And sick from what? From a biological attack? From something for which humans had no resistance? And if she allowed this ship aboard, if she allowed its survivors to come out, would she doom every man, woman, and child on Haida Gwaii?

  “I regret,” Jaswinder said, “that we must follow quarantine protocols. You must wait in your life-pod a little while longer.”

  “How little a while?” Deaver’s voice almost reached a hysterical pitch.

  “A little while,” Jaswinder repeated. She smiled for the woman. “Be brave.” She cut the connection.

  “How much longer will you make them wait?” Bill asked.

  Until they all have died, Jaswinder thought. She did not say that to Bill, however. “A day or two. I don’t know. We must use extreme caution.”

  “We have another call, Jaswinder,” Lorrie reported.

  And she would tell another lie, to keep those who would infect the station calm, so they would not rush forward, and perhaps get in. So that the fighters that she now had patrolling the space around Haida Gwaii would not have to fire on defenceless people. To keep them calm until they died.

  She looked down at her hands. And would she become like Lady MacBeth, continually washing her hands to get the blood off?

  She looked up to Lorrie. “Put them through.”

  * * *

  Lifeboat-3

  “We can’t get through, here,” Owen’s voice rose in pitch. “Use starboard manoeuvring thrusters.”

  Wen sent them jolting to port. He had eyes on the navigation tank, on the screens that showed his shield strength, on just about everything he could lay them on.

  “Something big coming your way, twenty seconds out,” came Jordan Yrden’s voice over the comm.

  “Roger that, Venture.” Wen replied. He prepared for another evasive manoeuvre. A quick glance at the chrono showed they had entered the debris field three hours ago. An eternity. He feared that Captain Yrden had called it; they had no chance of getting through to FTL-1 and the survivors locked in its Catastrophe Core.

  “Forward thrusters!” Owen cried out.

  He punched them, allowing a big hunk of something to slide past, mere metres away.

  Wen used a rag to wipe sweat from his eyes. A fool’s errand. He wished he had a co-pilot to take over, but Venture could afford none for such a mission. Despite his best efforts, he could lose both ship and life – and take Owen with him in the process.

  “Down, down. One thousand metres!”

  The shields flashed as something small hit them. And then again and again. Wen winced. Sooner or later something just a little too big or a little too fast would punch its way through and skewer them.

  * * *

  Venture

  “Signal from Carnival, Captain.”

  Johannes tore himself away from the spectacle. “Yes?”

  “They’ve found more survivors. They want our help. They desire another workboat.”

  “Send it.”

  The Paxton ship had arrived shortly before Kobe Maru had left for Liberty. Captain Grant Paxton had tears in his eyes when he, Johannes, had finished briefing him. No one had truly prepared themselves for what all-out war meant.

  “And Jill?” he had asked.

  And what could Johannes tell the father of the woman Johannes had come to respect? Nothing definite. Now, at least, he knew that they were making an attempt. Johannes – in the interests of peace between the two Families – had sent a data stream their way, and the Paxtons could see for themselves the effort that the Yrdens made.

  “Johannes, InShip for you. Fulton.” Anton reported.

  “Yes, Angela?”

  “Thought you’d like to know. Two more withdrew their request to be returned to Earth. Fourteen left.”

  “That’s good, Angela. Thank you.” A little bit of good news never hurt.

  “Captain? How’s Wen? It looks bad from here, but none of us knows how bad.”

  And what could he say to that? Lie? “Bad enough, Angela. I think they’ll have to give up soon.”

  He returned his attention to the NavTank. He pointed out a hazardous bit of flotsam that headed for the shuttle. “Vapourize it!”

  Venture’s beam hit it full force.

  * * *

  Lifeboat-3

  Owen had passed his detector tests with flying colours. None of them, not even the most stringent, had remotely prepared him for this real-life one.

  “Starboard, one second burst,” he recommended.

  The lifeboat slid right into the path of a small bit of debris. The shields flared. However, a much larger piece whipped by to port.

  Failure on this test might mean Sharon’s death, might mean his death and that of Pilot Carson, who had volunteered for what Owen now knew as a mad mission. But Carson had not flinched once, had not even given the barest hint that he wish
ed to give up.

  “Dorsal, half second.”

  They sank further into the debris field, meaning they had that much farther to go to escape it, but that much less to go to reach FTL-1. The shields flared again and again. Madness to continue.

  From Venture, they heard, “Coming up in twenty seconds a break. Get two hundred metres to port, then prepare to drop one thousand metres.”

  Wen cursed, then ran them through several small bits that had shields flaring alarmingly. Owen found he couldn’t breathe.

  “Now!”

  And down they dropped, a kilometre closer to FTL-1. Owen noticed that Wen kept edging further to the west, then realized that most of the debris – though not nearly all of it – travelled in an east-to-west direction. If they could drop into FTL-1’s shadow, it would protect them from the majority of the maelstrom. But, to do that, they would have to brave what looked like the worst thus far.

  “We’re going in,” Wen warned him.

  Owen swallowed.

  * * *

  Haida Gwaii

  “It’s not fair,” Conroy Fairbanks said, through a coughing fit. “You’re allowing those other pods on, actually towing them on. Why not us?”

  “They come from the Earth Stations, Mr Fairbanks,” Jaswinder replied.

  “You hate Lunars?”

  “No. But we’ve had no reports of biological attacks on the stations. All damage occurred from missiles and debris. The Lunar colonies all reported chemical and biological attacks. We must quarantine you until we are certain you bring no man-made disease on board. I’m sorry.”

  “He’s making a run for it,” Colonel Jacoby reported.

  Jaswinder rushed to the navigation tank. Sure enough the life-pod had begun accelerating directly towards Haida Gwaii.

  In a cold, flat voice that she didn’t even recognize as her own, she said, “Destroy it.”

  Ten seconds later, the icon went dark.

  “Target destroyed,” Jacoby reported. “Best get a workboat to push it out, or it’ll still impact with the station.”