by Nora Lane
I didn’t want to die. Not today. Fate had already stolen a lifetime from me. It wasn't fair to ask for more.
“We have to get you to the re-entry capsule,” Noah said. “It has independent air scrubbers and control systems.” He sucked in a breath and convulsed, for the first time showing signs of being oxygen-starved. It was a miracle he wasn't worse off considering he was doing all the carrying and climbing.
The piercing pain stabbed deeper into my forehead. I grit my teeth to keep it from dragging me under.
We went higher.
“Noah, oxygen levels have dropped to eight percent. Well below the level required to maintain consciousness.”
Noah looked into my eyes even as he continued to climb. An unspoken question lingered there. He shook it off and focused on progress. Questions would never get answers if we both died in the next breath.
We emerged into the airlock prep room in which I’d arrived. The re-entry capsule right where I left it, through the airlock, docked and waiting.
Noah held us steady with one hand on the corner of a pipe running along the ceiling.
“Cosmo, open the door.” Noah watched the red light above the airlock. It didn't turn green. “Do it now.”
“Noah, the alien subroutine has blocked control of the airlock’s actuation. I can’t equalize the pressures.”
“Dammit,” Noah said.
It was inhumane for us to make it this far and not be allowed to go one step further. Where was the one shred of justice that everyone deserved?
Noah looked into my eyes and he seemed so far away. “Don't give up on me Cora. Stay with me.”
I think I responded. I think I spoke words of assurance. That I had every intention of staying with him forever. If the words did come out, I couldn’t remember exactly how.
Everything was fading fast.
Noah ripped the single spare suit off the wall and stabilized me in the air. Floating and fading. He worked the legs over mine, the boots over mine, the torso down mine, my arms threaded through. He did these things somewhere else. At a distance.
Something told me I should care more, but I didn’t. How did what he was doing matter to me? Here where I was. So far away.
The rim of a helmet lowered over my face, the visor still up. I drifted toward the ceiling, vaguely interested to understand the situation.
He pushed off the ceiling, spun in mid-air, and landed on his feet. His grace hinted at no imminent disaster, to us or humanity. He removed an access panel next to the airlock entrance. He reached in and yanked out a lever. He locked it between clasped hands and muscled it over ninety degrees.
“Manual override engaged,” Cosmo said.
Noah jerked up the long steel lever that ensured the door sealed properly. It clanked into the open position.
But the door didn’t budge.
Somehow, I didn’t much care.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Noah heaved back on the handle and still it stayed shut. He pushed off and drifted to the far wall. He grabbed an enormous crowbar off the wall, did a tuckrollspinkick and and landed at the stubborn door. He wedged the crowbar into the crack running along the side, braced his feet on the frame, and strained backward on the long end of the bar.
His back rippled and bulged as he struggled to crack it open. His biceps peaked like quaking mountains.
It was no use. The door didn't budge.
He took a shuddering breath and threw himself backward. The muscles in his back spread like the wings of a manta ray, like the hood of a King Cobra. The peaks and valleys of his skin etched in sharp contrast. Like a statue on a sunny day. The movement kept him real. He shook with exertion.
The door gave with a ear-shattering screech.
“Oxygen levels at five percent.”
I knew that voice. It was an old friend, or maybe a new one. One of those friends that was a little too helpful. Like you appreciated their desire to help you out, but it always went a little too far. Always went to that annoying place. You couldn’t fault a friend for enthusiasm, as much as you might want to.
Noah pulled the door open and pushed off the wall and flew to me like an angel. My guardian angel. He gathered me up and glided through the open doorway. He held me close and pulled the door shut.
“Cosmo, activate the capsule’s pressurization sequence.”
“Yes, Noah.”
I noticed something for the first time. His skin had a hint of purple. A ruddier red.
I took a deep breath, and it was like breathing flames. My lungs burned. I stared into his beautiful face and decided I could die. If I had to die in this moment with this angel above me.
I could do it.
There were worse ways to go.
A hiss swooshed through the room.
“Come on, come on.”
It sounded like Noah’s voice. I was pretty sure it was his voice. I wasn't totally sure of anything.
The airlock whistled as the chamber equalized with the pressure inside the capsule.
“Come on!”
The world lingered at the end of a long, dark tunnel. The blackness promised peace from the struggling body. My chest convulsed as it struggled for air. The searing agony threatened to consume me.
Then something changed.
The collapsing tunnel paused, then slowly opened wider. Revealing more of the world. A ragged, burning breath felt somehow smoother.
“Stay with me, Cora. Please stay with me. I can't lose you.”
Noah hugged me to his chest. A tear welled in his eye. The surface tension broke and it warbled in the air as it floated away.
I sucked in another breath and remembered where we were, remembered how I felt about the man embracing me. Another few breaths and the world was somewhat solid again. Or I was, like I wasn't about to leave at any second.
Any week maybe, but not in the next second.
“Thank God,” Noah said. He squeezed me tight with a comforting pressure. I fit perfectly in his arms. Like we were made for each other.
“Cosmo, open the hatch and prepare the vehicle for launch. When when ready.”
Bolts popped and the door to the capsule swung open.
“Yes Noah, initializing systems for launch.”
Noah squeezed me to him and kicked off the wall behind us. We sailed through the smooth air, together, as one. My body molded to his as we ducked and flipped and landed feet first on the far wall of the cockpit cabin. He squeezed me one last time and then pulled apart. I had the horrible sensation of pulling apart forever.
That was just fear. We we were leaving together. We’d make our escape and figure out what to do next. At least I’d have him. Losing him would crush what little hope remained in my heart.
He fastened restraining belts across my chest and tightened them down. I glanced at the dizzying array of gauges, knobs, and blinking lights on the wall in front of me. It didn't seem possible that I had been here less than twenty-four hours ago. It made everything about the experience unreal. Everything but one.
Him.
He was real. I’d never felt more real. Whatever happened, at least we would be together. If we had to die today, at least we would be in each other's arms.
Noah knelt before me and cupped my cheeks in his large hands. The smoldering sunlight in his eyes touched the deepest parts of my soul. He kissed me. Not the kiss of one lover to another. More the kiss of sunlight at dawn. The kiss of the first golden ray as it hits sparkling water below. The kiss of the first drop of rain as it nourishes a parched plant.
He nourished me.
His tongue captured mine. Our souls fused through the contact of our mouths. Heat, pressure, ecstasy.
His lips broke from mine even as they broke my heart.
“Live for both of us, Cora.”
The harsh reality of his intentions crashed over me like a tsunami on a low-lying island. The force swamped my ability to think. He couldn't leave me!
“What.. What are you doing, Noah?”
He paused at the hatch, one had anchored to a pipe.
“I can’t go with you, Cora.”
“Don't be insane! We just found each other! I can't lose you now! Don't do this!”
“I’ve been lost my whole life, Cora. Until you found me.”
“Then why are you staying? Is this thing between us not real for you?”
“It's more real than anything I've ever felt before.” He dropped his head and chewed his lips. His gorgeous lips that I was about to lose forever. He looked back up with tears brimming in his eyes. “I can’t go with you.”
“Don't say that! We have everything to live for, together.”
“I’d do anything for you, Cora. Anything but put the entire human race in jeopardy. Don't you see?”
“I see that you're leaving me! I see you’re pushing me away.”
“It's not you, Cora. It's me. This alien being inside me. It can control me. It's growing stronger. It wanted to use you to birth more of its kind. Don't you see?”
None of his words made sense. They meant nothing because they weren't saying that he and I would be together forever.
“If I go back, I put the future of the human race in jeopardy. My life is not worth the future of humanity.” He pushed through the open hatch and into the airlock beyond. “I won't let it do that. Cosmo, seal the hatch.”
“Yes, Noah.”
The hatch swung closed and sealed with a sharp hiss.
I scrambled at the restraints across my chest. I wasn't going to leave without him. If he wasn't leaving, I wasn't either. I unclipped one of the belts, scrambling to release the others.
“Noah, the capsule’s systems are initialized and prepared for launch.”
Noah retreated through the airlock door and shut it. The lever on the near side swung down as he locked it into place. His face was no more than twenty feet away and yet two panes of thick glass made it greater than the distance of the known universe.
The straps weren't coming off fast enough. I reached for him. He blew a kiss that I knew would never cross the gap.
The ships comms crackled to life. “Cosmo, initiate launch sequence.”
“Yes Noah, initiating capsule launch sequence.”
A long, horrible moment later, a change in inertia pushed me over in the chair. The blackness of space cut into the circular window as Noah and the docking bay grew smaller.
“Noah, Orbital One’s oxygen levels have dropped to 1%. The probability of your death is high. You need oxygen.”
“I know.” His whisper barely registered over comms.
I worked the last restraint free and kicked for the window. My head cracked into the pipe above it and blood seeped into my eye, blurring my vision.
“Noah!”
I wasn’t going to let him go without a fight. I'd sooner die than be without him. What did it matter anyway? Death was coming for me anyway. It didn't matter if it was today or a few weeks away.
I had to get back to him. He needed my help.
“Cosmo, get us back on that station!”
“I am unable to comply with your request, Ms. Gabarro. Noah has instructed me to assure your safety and facilitate your return to the surface.”
I wasn’t sure why I ever considered Cosmo a friend. He was way past getting on my nerves now. If he had an ass, I’d put a boot in it.
I looked wildly around for something, anything. And found the emergency hatch release.
“Cosmo, if you don't turn the capsule around, I'll blow the hatch. Freeze to death in an instant. I'm not bluffing.”
“Please return to your seat Ms. Gabarro. Our orbital window for re-entry is approaching.”
I gripped the emergency release hatch and readied myself to yank it free. “Take us back.”
“Please Ms. Gabarro—“
A frozen death would be better than another day without Noah.
“Three, two, one —“
“Stop, Ms. Gabarro. I'm returning the capsule to the station.”
Rockets fired and I sailed back into the far wall with a crash.
A quiet voice crackled over comms. “Cora, don't do it. There's nothing you can do. I won't have you waste your life on mine.”
“That's not your decision to make, Noah.”
The docking bay grew larger as the capsule drifted nearer.
“It is my decision, Cora.” A clanging metal sound rang out over comms.
“Ms. Gabarro, Noah has jammed the airlock shut from the inside. I have no way of opening it.”
That bastard!
He thought he could make the call for me. Decide my fate. Only I could do that. I'd waste my life on who the hell I wanted. But docking the capsule only to be locked inside wasn’t going to help.
The unpressurized docking bay in service corridor two!
“Cosmo, can you get us to the docking bay in service corridor two?”
“Yes, Ms. Gabarro.”
“Take us there now.”
“I must inform you that docking bay two is unsuitable for human use.”
“Now, Cosmo!”
Rockets fired and I crashed into the side wall. I anchored myself on a chair and watched as unfamiliar sections of Orbital One slid across the window. The station rotated in a dizzying spin and the capsule stabilized.
There! Below. That must be it.
I sucked in as much breath as I could get, trying to oxygenate my blood. Once I sealed my visor shut, I had no idea how long the air in the suit would last.
I also had no idea how long it would take to get inside the station.
The glowing blue Earth spun below. Such beauty. Such terrible beauty.
I wondered if my first space walk ever would end in my falling to the surface. Screaming through thick atmosphere. Scorching toward the certain death of the planet’s embrace.
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About the Author
Nora Lane dreams of exploring beyond the wonderful home we call Earth. For now she lives on our planet, and shares a home with her wonderful husband, children, and two dogs that act more like alien overlords than obedient mutts.
She writes science fiction romance about what could, and likely will, happen as humanity continues to push beyond the confines of our ancestral home. If she's not writing, she can usually be found reading or dreaming of other worlds, usually ones with hot alien races that love human women!
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