Emwan

by Dain White

  “Hey Pauli, you doing okay up there?”

  There was no answer other than a buzzing snore.

  I grinned through teeth clenched tight and fed power to the engines until they screamed. The blocks flashing past appeared through the red haze of our incandescence as we burned hard in pursuit.

  08232614@15:23 Gene Mitchell

  “Gene, I can’t locate switches for vents on Viceroy,” Janis said after a few moments.

  That was odd, but I guess it wasn’t completely unexpected. Viceroy was one of the older arcos, one that had been built on over the years.

  I thought for a moment.

  “Can’t you just task maintenance with a forged work order or something?”

  “I have done this, but it has yet to be answered. I am afraid there may not be any maintenance personnel on location.”

  “Can you roll it over to Regal?” Regal was more modern by a hundred years or so, and had a pretty solid, self-contained shop.

  “I will try, thank you,” she replied immediately. This had me more than a little concerned.

  “Janis, what is the status of the 3000 block reactor?”

  “Gene, it is failing. The cold salt valve has opened, and the thorium fuel has flooded into the safe containment valve – but the fuel is still dangerously hot and not cooling as much as we need.”

  I tapped my teeth for a moment, thinking. Thorium salt reactors were supposed to be pretty safe, but losing containment on one would still be pretty bad.

  “What sort of timeframe do we have for meltdown?”

  “This is very hard to determine. Given the current heat transfer, it may not occur at all. However, depending on the maintenance of systems throughout the cooling harness, there may be inefficiencies that reduce cooling by a factor beyond what I can adequately determine.”

  I nodded slowly. I’ve never even set foot in one of these reactors, but they’re pretty common throughout town. Located near the bottom of the Warrens, their maintenance crews were probably as susceptible as any other civil employee to the age-old labor challenge of time vs. money. The fact they were largely self-enclosed and reasonably maintenance-free probably didn’t work well in our favor.

  “Can you give me a report, or…” I trailed off, as a report flashed on screen showing levels for the various systems inside block 3000. I didn’t understand much of it, but the levels themselves had clear danger marks, and there were too many of them near their limit for me.

  “Captain, ears?” I called on comms.

  A moment of silence slid past. “Captain?”

  I took a sip of coffee and waited another moment.

  “Janis, are you in contact with the Captain?”

  “I am not currently Gene. He is flying a low profile at the moment, below connectivity.”

  “Is he near block 3000?”

  “He is not. I am not sure about Jane and Yak, however. The last tracking moment I had for their position places them in close proximity, in the northwest quadrant.”

  The concern in her voice was unmistakable.

  08232614@15:28 Captain Dak Smith

  “Capt… in… ver,” Gene’s voice burst out of comms in a buzzing roar of static.

  “One by five, Gene,” I replied smoothly, as I banked through the gap of an expressway, dropping hard behind the target. I was about a half block behind them now, and closing rapidly, but they were going to ground in a big way.

  “..ts.” crackled Gene on comms again, completely lost in static.

  “Gene, I can’t hear you. I doubt you can hear me… Janis?”

  “Sir we are out of contact again. I have highlighted a cross-block tunnel to our east that might help close the cap.”

  “Are they turning left?”

  “It seems likely to me, sir.”

  “Hmmm,” I replied thoughtfully, watching the waypoint pipe for the coming turn. I was a little hot, but it should be doable.

  “Pauli, I don’t know if you can hear me or not, but don’t freak out. I am about to do something… unconventional,” I said as confidently as I could muster. I was maybe moving a little fast for this.

  The waypoint pipe was flashing orange as I hurled us into the black opening of the cross block tunnel, ghostly illuminated by the radar mapping on my display. We had room, but just barely. I held my breath and thought as small as I could. At these speeds, the slightest touch, the lightest kiss of our wing surface against the tunnel wall would result in immediate, utter annihilation. It would be over before we knew it.

  Luckily, I am a pretty hot pilot. Pauli gagged again, and hurled what I assume to be some of my finest coffee into the faceplate of his helmet, so at least I knew he hadn’t died of fright. There may still be time for that later.

  The race was far from over. The course-and-heading to the target showed us in a good position for an intercept, however, so I eased up a bit and prepared to make the following turn out of the tunnel. Luckily, it was a pretty oblique angle.

  As I slewed out of the tunnel exit, the target craft was only a few hundred meters ahead of us, and he knew it. He started spinning, twisting, hurling around and through piles of debris, doing anything he could to shake me – but I was having none of it. I met every maneuver, held solid to every turn.

  Pauli gasped in fear, as I whipped us smartly underneath a pile of falling debris, scant meters off of the dreck and dross piled deep along the bottom of the trench.

  I mustered every bit of calm and bravado I had. “Steady on, Pauli – we’re fine,” I said in a voice that sounded calm, level, and not at all as excited as I felt.

  The target took a high bank up to the right to make a turn into another block, and I pushed even harder, shoving the engines to the hilt as we exited out of the turn, reeling it in even closer.

  Close enough. Time to end this.

  08232614@15:29 Shaun Onebull

  “Em, come in please,” I called on comms, but there was no reply. Jane still hung limp in my arms. Though I knew she was alive, she was definitely hurt.

  The block we were next to looked like every other: silent endlessly tall walls of dusty concrete. The last I saw of Emwan, she was hurtling below us to engage whatever shot at us, but I had lost track of her in my dash to catch Jane.

  Below us looked silent and dark, but I couldn’t rule out the fact that the crab might be down there, trapped, or captured. We had to find out, but what could I do with Jane?

  “Jane, wake up,” I said softly. “Jane…”

  She moaned in pain.

  “Jane, I know it hurts, but you need to wake up,” I pleaded.

  “Yak… I can’t… it hurts…” she sobbed.

  I felt hot tears burn down my cheek. “I know Jane… I’m so sorry. We need to find Em. Can you move?”

  She grabbed my shoulder and lifted herself up, floating free for a moment, then suddenly dropped again limp into the depths below.

  08232614@15:31 Gene Mitchell

  “Janis, this looks terrible,” I called out, growing more concerned by the minute.

  “I agree, Gene. I am afraid there may be nothing we can do to prevent a core fire.”

  “Definitely looks that way from here,” I replied solemnly. “We need to start evacuating Titan, Viceroy… maybe Tanzer.” As I said the words, I realized the utter futility of this. There was no way we were going to evacuate millions of citizens in the middle of the pandemonium down there.

  “The evacuation has been active for two hours now, Gene. I felt it was prudent, given the proximity of 3000 block, but my best estimate of the remaining residents of the block is still 86.345% of normal.”

  “We have to do more, Janis.”

  My mind was spinning. Dak was out of reach, Yak and Jane were about to be vaporized in a runaway fusion reaction, and millions of people were about to die.

  We had to do something – but what?

  Suddenly, it hit me. I could probably do something.

  “Janis, how fast can you get me to the Viceroy skydock?”<
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  08232614@15:31 Jane Short

  I had a horrible dream. I was falling slowly, endlessly, bathed in fire. Every inch of my body screamed in agony, and my back felt broken. I could barely breathe and still, I fell.

  08232614@15:31 Shaun Onebull

  The bottom of the intersection was clearly visible when I managed to pull Jane close again. I held her gingerly, and lowered her to the sterile soot below.

  “Jane, I am just going to set you down here, until we can regroup,” I breathed, senses jacked to the max looking for a threat.

  There was nothing down here. No webs, debris, nothing but vaguely irregular concrete blasted black. There was a dimly glowing section of concrete that looked like a lava flow, and there was enough infrared to see as clear as day.

  I set Jane down as softly as I could, her whimper tearing great big ragged holes in my heart. “You’ll be okay, Jane. Rest now,” I soothed with a voice that cracked.

  These damn walls, ranging out of sight above me, stretching into infinity in either direction. At least Emwan wasn’t scattered to bits down here… but I didn’t know where she was.

  “Yak..?” Jane croaked.

  “Jane, rest easy now,” I replied softly.

  “I’m fine, Yak… you need to go,” her voice sounded softly vacant.

  I fell to my knees beside her. “Like hell, Jane. I’ll take you with me—”

  “No!” she cried out. “It hurts so bad, Yak. I can’t breathe…”

  “You can, girl… relax. You’ll be just fine now…”

  “You…” she paused again, lying below me like a dying flower. “You need to get up… go find Em… go,” her voice slid into a ragged sob. “Now, Yak. Go!”

  “Damn it! Alright Jane, damn…” I barked, shaking uncontrollably. “I’ll be right back,” I said, and lifted off.

  “I know,” she whispered. “I’ll wait…”

  08232614@15:29 Captain Dak Smith

  The first salvo was dead on, and smashed into the rear of the target in a brilliant flash that lit the trench all the way to the bottom.

  Pauli cheered weakly, as I poured it on, doggedly following every whirling twist and spin. Over and over, I dropped shots into it, but it wasn’t blowing apart. It didn’t look like I was even scratching it.

  “Tough bastard,” I gritted, and kept on it like a bulldog. The railers on the gig were kinetic jobs, not like the pseudomass drivers that the crab had, but I would have expected more of a satisfying crunch, nonetheless.

  “Em, how copy?” I called out, as we spun through and below a pipeway. I caught a flash of a fire in some sort of pit as we blasted by, open mouthed dirty faces lit by the flame.

  “Solid copy, Captain!” she replied smartly.

  “Em, I’m not hurting this thing with these popguns,” I called out, pounding it mercilessly all the same. “Can you assist?”

  “I am inbound, four blocks up and closing from 3 three o-clock low.”

  “Can you get a shot?”

  “I will, Captain. Are you are a minimum safe distance?”

  “Um,” I replied noncommittally. “I am actually at a maximum unsafe distance. If I was any closer, I’d be docked with this thing.”

  “Captain, please note the timer. At zero, please break off.”

  “Very well, duly noted.”

  We had less than ten seconds.

  “Pauli, pulling some g’s here son. This is going to hurt.” I cautioned, and began breathing deep, hyperventilating, charging my bloodstream with air.

  At the zero mark, I hauled back and rolled it through a tight banked turn on maximum thrust, and continued past towards a full 180, building delta vee. A blinding flash illuminated the trench on either side, and a sudden shove in the back hurled us forward.

  “Hang on Pauli,” I yelled out, suddenly unable to control the gig. The walls flashed past as the dust burst into flame around us.

  08232614@15:33 Shaun Onebull

  The howling boom of the blast rolled down through the trench towards me, the pressure wave visible as the leading edge of a cloud of debris and dust, churning towards me.

  I was about 1000 meters above Jane’s position, almost close enough to have comms again, but I wasn’t going to make it. Above me the ragged structures under the ancient elevated roadway shook loose, falling into the wind.

  I had about enough time to notice I had nothing to grab on when the wind hit, and hurled me backwards. I fought against it, pushing hard against the raging winds, but something big and unbreakable smashed into the side of my head, and my last view was of utter chaos, tumbling out of control, falling into night.

  08232614@15:51 Gene Mitchell

  “Hold here, Janis!” I yelled, and made my way down the cargo ramp to the skydock below. The Archaea was too large to land, so Janis was holding it steady while I jumped. I had my retractor on, naturally. I grew up on this planet, and I know how windy it gets around here sometimes. The last place I’d want to be is holding on up here.

  As I walked down the ramp, my old knees threatened to give away, but I willed them to be seventeen again, just for a while. Oh, what I would give for seventeen year old knees!

  I wonder if there’s a market for them?

  “Gene, Emwan is back in contact, comms are open,” Janis called out.

  “Captain, ears?” I barked, hopping down across a chasm that went beyond anything I could comprehend sanely.

  “Gene, I am afraid I have lost contact with the Captain,” Emwan replied in a small voice.

  That drew me up short. The clouds below scudded by for a few terrible moments.

  “What do you mean, lost?” I replied crossly.

  “He is not in contact. I am tracking his position, but he is not responding to comms.”

  “Is he flying?”

  “He’s not crashing, Gene.”

  I laughed, a wry, panic-filled laugh, but it was still a laugh. “Well, that’s just fine. Try to get back in contact; I need to tell him—”

  “About 3000 block, yes. Janis and I have synched. Gene, I have records of a valve gate switch installation. A schematic is on your handset now,” she replied briskly.

  I swiped it up and gulped.

  “Janis, I need to go a few levels down. Can you open that hatch for me?”

  “Certainly, Gene, please anchor yourself.”

  “What are you going to do?” I asked, scuttling like a crab on all fours towards an anchor point, and smashing the retractor clamp down like a game-winning Crossa ball.

  I hated heights.

  “I am going to knock, Gene,” she replied coolly, as the Archaea pulled away and back, sliding down into the opening below the lip of the platform.

  “Oh good grief,” I groused, and assumed the position.

  “Knock-knock!” she sang out, and turret fire tore into the roof hatch, blasting it into snapping, whirring bits of white hot metal.

  08232614@15:52 Captain Dak Smith

  “Emwan, come in… Emwan, come in,” I called out on comms that hissed like angry cicadas.

  “Maybe something happened to comms, sir?” Pauli called out helpfully.

  “We’re going to make a spaceman out of you yet, son,” I chided good-naturedly. “Listen, bring up the comms system would you? I know you’re not an engineer, but if anything is wrong in the code…” I trailed off pointedly.

  He laughed, albeit a little weakly. We were upwards into clouds, and only going half as fast as I wanted.

  “Sorry sir, you’re right. Comms runtimes have crashed. Janis, can you help with this?”

  “Steven, there is a manual switch that needs to be flipped to restore bus power to the processor.”

  “Where is the switch?”

  “I have it Pauli,” I answered, and pried open the switch panel with a fingernail. There were a few black switches, so I punched them all until they were lit by a happy green glow.

  “Did that do it?”

  “Yep! I mean, yes sir,” he replied quickly.

>   “Steady on son,” I drawled. My high spirits fell as we slid past a line of aeros docked to a parking plate, surrounded by screaming people who looked like they were throwing boxes at each other.

  I was holding it down to just this side of legal as we pulled through the congestion. Every level was the same, chaos, pandemonium. People were screaming, glass was broken, scattered belongings were blowing into the yawning chasms below in the madness that was the human condition.

  “Try now, sir,” Pauli called back.

  I keyed comms. “Em, come in.”

  “Solid copy, Captain. Fire mission complete. Be advised: Gene is currently on Viceroy, working to restore water mains for reactor block 3000.”

  “Very well. Any news on Yak or Jane?”

  “I have lost contact with both of them.”

  I thought blackly for a moment.

  08232614@15:54 Jane Short

  I woke enough to feel what had to be a broken leg, and some extremely sprung ribs, and searing pain… but I woke. I couldn’t see anything, which was odd, but I didn’t want to move at any rate. I was content to lie in my misery for a moment and enjoy each ragged breath, what I could get past my ribs.

  “Yak?” I called out, and tried to connect to his suit, willing myself to make contact, to see what he saw, and felt what he felt.

  It didn’t work.

  My left leg was definitely broken. I couldn’t move it at all – though it occurred to me I could probably lock that leg of my suit better than a splint, and realized it had already been done the moment I tried to move it.

  A sudden kiss of glorious cold swept over my seared skin, as I dropped the temperature to a more comfortably hypothermic level. Now that was more like it.

  I could suddenly think again. I struggled to sit up, and met with resistance, as if I was trapped. Suddenly, in a bit of panic, I shoved upright through the debris and garbage that had drifted deep over me, only to be rewarded by a deep drift of dust onto my face that buried me in soft darkness again.