by Mark Lukens
Rolle just nodded. “Yes, I stabbed Ward. I waited up here for him, and guess what I saw when I was up here.”
Cromartie didn’t answer him.
“I saw you walking in your sleep. I saw you writing on the airlock door with a black marker.”
Cromartie met Sanders’ eyes and he saw the shock in them.
“It was you who was writing those messages on the airlock door the whole time,” Rolle said.
“I can explain,” Cromartie said.
“I slit Abraham’s throat!” Rolle yelled at Cromartie, pushing Sanders forward another step. “I cut Butler’s wrists while she was sleeping. And now I’ve killed Ward. All of it was so easy. You two were so convinced it was Ward the whole time. And now I only have one more person to take care of … that’s you, Cromartie.”
“Wait a second, Rolle,” Cromartie said. “You don’t have to do this. None of us has to die. I know a way we can all survive.”
Rolle just chuckled. He had one arm around Sanders’ neck, holding her tight to him, and his other hand was behind her back, holding the knife blade against her. “You’re too late, Cromartie. I’ve already figured out the answer to this game.”
“There’s no game here. There’s a way out for all of us.”
“No. Not for all of us. There has to be a winner. There has to be a survivor. And it’s going to be me. Once you’re all gone, then MAC is going to put me back into cryosleep.”
Cromartie glanced back up at the ceiling. “MAC!”
No answer from MAC.
“He’s not responding now,” Rolle said. “The game’s almost over and MAC knows it. Drop your knife.”
Cromartie took a step back away from the closet doorway. Then he took another step back, then another one, moving backwards closer to the airlock door.
“I said drop the knife now!” Rolle yelled. “I’ll kill her.”
“The answer is back here,” Cromartie said, smiling like a lunatic. He pointed at the airlock door, jabbing his finger in the air towards the door. “The airlock—that’s the way out. That’s always been the way out for us. All you have to do is go inside.”
FORTY-TWO
Cromartie was crazy, Sanders thought. He was just as crazy as Rolle was, just as crazy as any of the others on this ship. Maybe he was suffering from side-effects of the cryosleep.
Maybe they all were.
Sanders felt a sense of hopelessness wash over her. She had a maniac with a knife pointed at her back, and another crazy man wanting to open the airlock door and shoot all of them out into space. Her hands were tied together in front of her, and her ankle was still throbbing—it felt like a useless club she was dragging around.
They were all going to die on this ship. They all had known it the whole time. Maybe all of them had snapped in their own ways. And maybe her mind was snapping in its own way, already giving up. Even if she got away from Rolle, even if she and Cromartie managed to kill Rolle, could she trust Cromartie after that? Would he be the next one standing beside her bed as she slept, holding a knife in his hand, watching her? Would she be the next one lying in bed with her throat cut? Would he eventually drag her to the airlock door and press the button … their way off the ship?
Even with the wave of hopelessness washing over her, Sanders couldn’t completely give up yet. It just wasn’t in her nature—she was a fighter, always had been. She knew she was going to die, but at least she wasn’t going to let the psycho behind her kill her, this psycho who had murdered Butler, Abraham, and Ward. No, she wasn’t going to let Rolle have that victory.
Rolle was yelling at Cromartie to drop the knife and Cromartie was steadily backing up towards the airlock door down the hall, trying to explain to Rolle why they needed to open it. They were both distracted right now by each other and there would never be a better time than this to try to make her escape.
As soon as she felt Rolle’s arm slacken around her neck, Sanders slammed the back of her head into Rolle’s face. The pain in the back of her head was fierce and explosive, but she was sure that Rolle’s pain was far worse. She expected a howl from him, but instead it was more like a grunt of surprise and a liquid-like inhale of breath.
She also expected to feel the blade of Rolle’s knife sink into her back, slipping in easily, parting flesh, piercing vulnerable organs.
But would Rolle kill her? He’d had his chance to kill her earlier when they were together in her room. But he chose to tie her hands in front of her instead. And the chilling answer why was immediate. He wanted her. Even with Rolle’s delusions that this was all a game constructed by MAC, a test to see who could survive, she suspected that Rolle was still saving her for last so he could have some fun with her.
But she wasn’t going to let that happen; she would die first.
She didn’t waste any time after head-butting Rolle. She ran forward, her bound hands throwing her off balance a little and her injured ankle screeching in agony. But the adrenaline was helping her put more weight on her ankle than she thought she could have, and actually the compression from the bandage that Rolle had wrapped her ankle with and the painkillers he had given her were helping some. In a strange and unintended way, he had helped her with her escape.
“You bitch!” she heard Rolle scream from behind her.
Cromartie was waiting for Sanders. He hadn’t dropped his knife like Rolle had ordered. His eyes were wide with shock, but he reacted quickly.
The next few seconds seemed like a blur to Sanders. She felt Cromartie’s strong arms holding on to her and she let herself collapse into them, letting him hold her weight up off of her ankle. Rolle was still yelling and rushing towards them. Her back was still towards Rolle, still vulnerable to him. She was sure that she would feel that piercing pain somewhere in her back any second now from his knife, maybe she would feel the air deflating from one of her lungs as he punctured it.
Cromartie reached out to the wall and flipped up the clear plastic housing that covered the green button for the airlock door. He punched the big green button with the palm of his hand. There was a whooshing sound as the heavy metal door slid open. A blast of stale air rushed out of the dark room inside and washed over her and Cromartie.
She glanced at the airlock—it was a room about the size of a large elevator. Lights on the walls hidden behind plastic panels flickered into life, illuminating the empty metal room.
Before she could react, Sanders felt herself pushed into the airlock. She stumbled across the floor, her bound arms out in front of her as she tried to catch her balance. She spun around in the middle of the room as her ankle finally gave out and she fell over and hit the far wall with her shoulder and then her head. Her head slammed hard into the metal wall and the world felt like it was going dark for a moment.
Just let go, her mind whispered. It’s all over now. Everything’s over now.
She heard the collision between Rolle and Cromartie outside the open door of the airlock. She heard them yelling, she heard their battle. And as her consciousness slipped away, the last thing she remembered before she closed her eyes was Cromartie’s knife skittering across the airlock floor towards her.
FORTY-THREE
Cromartie tried to fight back as Rolle collided with him, but he was too late. He had been distracted before the impact from Rolle as he looked into the airlock at Sanders after pushing her inside. He hadn’t meant to push her so hard. He’d watched her stumble across the floor as she tried her best to favor her injured leg. But she had lost her balance from both her bound arms and her injured ankle, and she had twisted around before falling. And then she had hit the far wall—hard. It looked like she might have slammed the back of her head against the wall. She crumpled to the floor immediately and then her eyes closed.
Was she out? Had she knocked herself out?
“Sanders!”
That brief moment, those few seconds of distraction, left Cromartie unprepared when Rolle attacked, leaving him open to the edge of Rolle’s fist that came down on
his forearm, jarring his knife from his hand. His fingers went numb for a moment and the knife slipped from his hand and dropped to the floor, bouncing inside the airlock.
Now that Cromartie was defenseless, Rolle was attacking like a wild animal. Rolle still had his knife, and he brought his weapon high up into the air, ready to slice it down into Cromartie.
For Cromartie, time seemed to slow down for a moment. It was like he was seeing what was happening as a spectator, but he was still too slow to react to it. He saw Rolle’s knife up in the air above him, the blade winking for a second in the fluorescent light, almost like it was hanging there suspended in the air for a moment. Then Rolle stabbed the knife down and Cromartie swore he saw a trail of light lingering behind the knife’s blade as it rushed towards him.
Everything seemed so slow, like time was dragging out … just like it had done in his dreams.
Rolle seemed so much stronger than he should have been, so much faster, more ruthless, a savage with a mindless determination to kill. Cromartie pushed back at Rolle, trying to shove him back off balance, but Rolle’s body seemed to be made of iron now and it barely moved. Rolle’s mouth was open in a scream that came out like the hiss of a reptile, his eyes bulging with fury.
Cromartie managed to twist to the side at the last second as Rolle’s knife tore through the sleeve of his white shirt. He didn’t really feel the pain, but somehow he knew that the blade had cut into his flesh, slicing it open.
And then Rolle was attacking again.
Cromartie didn’t have much time. This was his only chance and it had to work. He grabbed Rolle’s wrist while his knife hand was down at its lowest point and his body was pitched slightly forward from the momentum of his swing. Cromartie then exploded forward as fast and as hard as he could, ramming his shoulder into Rolle like a football player hitting a tackling sled. Rolle seemed so strong right now, but Cromartie was the bigger man and his force should throw the already slightly off-balance Rolle off of his feet.
Thrusting forward with all of his power, Cromartie crashed into Rolle and he heard a grunt escaping the man’s throat like he’d been punched in the stomach. They collided into the wall beside the green button and Cromartie was up close to Rolle’s face and he saw the man’s wide eyes staring back at him in shock. Rolle opened his mouth, then closed it, and then opened it again, like he was trying to talk.
Where was the knife?
Cromartie backed up a few steps and looked at Rolle as he stood against the wall, his hands at his gut, clutching the knife handle sticking out of his stomach. Somehow in their struggle Cromartie had shoved the knife into Rolle.
Rolle looked down at his own torso, at the knife handle sticking out of it. He had become very still, like he was trying to understand what he was looking at, like what he was seeing wasn’t making much sense to him right now.
“I didn’t mean it,” Cromartie breathed out.
But had he? He couldn’t really remember what had just happened. Everything seemed to be a blur to him. Had he grabbed Rolle’s knife in their struggle? Had he stabbed him in the gut with it?
Rolle looked up at Cromartie like he’d just noticed that he was in the hallway with him. His shocked expression turned into rage, his mouth a twisted line of fury. He grabbed at the blood-stained handle of the knife sticking out of him and yanked it free.
“No,” Cromartie told him. “Don’t do that.”
Blood seeped out of the wound in Rolle’s stomach now that the knife was free. Rolle’s blood stained the front of his white shirt and pants, turning the cloth dark red as it saturated the fabric. Drops of blood dripped down from his shirt, puddling on the metal floor underneath him.
“There’s still a way,” Cromartie told Rolle. “We have to go into the airlock. We have to press the button.”
But Rolle didn’t seem to be listening anymore.
Rolle rushed forward, raising the bloody knife up as he yelled in rage.
Cromartie took a few steps aback and slipped inside the airlock. He slapped the big red button just inside the open doorway and the door swished shut.
A red warning light began swirling inside the closed airlock now from high up on the wall. A female voice spoke to them from hidden speakers: “Initiating airlock. Warning. Initiating airlock.”
Rolle’s face appeared in the little rectangle window of the airlock door. He was yelling something at Cromartie, but he couldn’t hear him through the glass and over the sirens.
FORTY-FOUR
The warning sirens wailed up and down the hallway. The fluorescent lights flickered from power surges. A red alarm light was spinning from somewhere down the hall, casting crazy shadows that raced up and down the walls.
Rolle stood in front of the closed airlock door. He had one hand on his stomach, trying to stop the flow of blood leaking out of his gut. His other hand still clenched the knife, its handle already slippery with blood. He had hit the green button beside the airlock door over and over again to open the door back up, but it wouldn’t work. He tried to pry the door open with the tip of his knife blade. And then he finally beat on the metal door with his blood-slicked fists.
Nothing worked.
“MAC, open this door back up!” Rolle screamed up at the ceiling.
“I’m sorry, Rolle,” MAC answered over the wailing siren, his voice clearly heard. “Once the airlock has been initiated, the door has to remain locked. It’s a safety precaution.”
“I want you to … to override it!”
“I’m sorry, Rolle, I can’t do that.”
Rolle looked back at the small rectangle of glass in the thick metal door. The interior of the airlock was lit up with the fluorescent lights and there were red lights flashing from somewhere inside the airlock. Cromartie’s face was calm as he stared back at Rolle through the glass, the red lights shining on his face like a strobe light. Rolle saw Sanders behind Cromartie. She was huddled up against the far wall. She was awake now and her eyes were wide with terror.
Good riddance, Rolle thought.
Cromartie smiled at Rolle through the window. He actually smiled at him. He and Sanders were about to be shot out into space and he was smiling. Who was the crazy one now?
“I win!” Rolle shouted at the little window. “You two hear me in there?! I win!!”
The knife slipped out of Rolle’s hand and dropped down to the metal floor with a clattering noise. That noise sounded so far away to Rolle right now. His pounding fists on the metal doors had sounded so far away. Even his own voice sounded so far away.
He backed away from the airlock door. He was so light-headed and dizzy now, and then he lost his balance. He was on the floor, flat on his back, before he even realized what had happened.
How did I get down here on the floor? he wondered.
He held his hand over his stomach, still trying to stop the flow of blood. It didn’t hurt, but there was so much blood. He needed to stop the flow of blood, but he didn’t seem to have the energy to get up from the floor.
But he needed to get up. He needed to get down the hall to the cryo-room so MAC could start the cryochambers back up. That was his prize. He was the winner and he wanted to go back to sleep inside the chamber.
“MAC!” he screamed up at the ceiling, but his voice sounded so weak and low to him now. He was amazed that MAC could hear him.
“Yes, Rolle.” Even MAC’s voice seemed so far away now.
“MAC, I won. I’m the winner. I know what the game was now. Put me back into the cryochamber. I’m ready to go back to sleep. I’m ready to go to Eden.”
“I’m sorry, Rolle. I can’t do that.”
“But I won. I’m the survivor …”
MAC didn’t answer.
“Survival of the fittest. I’m the … the survivor …”
MAC didn’t answer.
“I won, didn’t I, MAC?” Rolle’s voice was just a whisper now and it felt like it was getting hard to breathe. He felt so cold and he thought he might be losing the feeling
in his fingers and toes.
“MAC?”
MAC still didn’t answer.
Rolle closed his eyes. He inhaled. He exhaled. And he didn’t inhale again.
FORTY-FIVE
Sanders opened her eyes as consciousness came back to her. She stared at the closed airlock door in disbelief. Her vision was slightly blurry and she had to close her eyes again for a moment. She opened them again.
What was she doing inside the airlock?
A red light was spinning from high up on the wall and it was making her feel dizzy. Or was the hit to her head making her feel dizzy? She tried to remember what had happened but her mind felt fuzzy. She was in the airlock and she had hit her head on the wall. And before that she had smashed the back of her head into Rolle’s face when she got away from him. And then Cromartie had pushed her inside the airlock … he had pushed her in here on purpose!
Cromartie stood at the metal door, staring at the small rectangle of thick glass. He was only eight feet away from her.
She had to get up, get to her feet. She had to get out of this room before they were shot out into space.
With a grunt of pain, she got up to her feet. It was a little difficult with her wrists tied together in front of her, and her legs were still a little shaky. She stood there for a second, wobbling a bit as she waited for another wave of dizziness to pass, still favoring her good leg. Then she stumbled forward to the door, right beside Cromartie.
He moved to the side a little so she could see out through the little rectangle window. Rolle was out there in the corridor lying on his back, the front of his clothes soaked with blood. His eyes were wide open, his mouth slack.
“He’s dying,” Sanders said and looked at Rolle. “He’s dying now. Open the door back up.”
Cromartie just stood there with a small smile on his face.