Earth Unaware

by Orson Scott Card

  Chepe removed the emergency lid from the center of the hatch to access the manual wheel lock. Then he gripped the wheel and turned. At first he strained, but the wheel suddenly loosened, and it spun quickly thereafter. Finally he felt the lock snap free, then slowly lifted the hatch. He felt no rush of air as the vacuum of the bubble was filled from air inside. He checked his sensors on his wrist and confirmed what he already suspected. “There’s no air beyond the hatch. There must be a leak inside.”

  “Then we don’t need the bubble,” said Bahzím. “Take it off so you have more mobility to look around.”

  Chepe found the release valve on the bubble and pulled it. The bubble deflated, and Chepe returned his normal lifeline to his back. The room beyond was dark and cluttered with floating debris. Chepe floated through the entrance, intensified his helmet lights, and saw—

  A dead man’s face just inches from his own. Chepe recoiled. The face was gaunt and white in the bright lights, eyes closed, mouth slack, a man in his fifties, an apron around his waist. No mask.

  “Push him to the side,” said Pitoso, coming in through the hatch. “There’s bound to be more like him.”

  Chepe set his feet against the wall and reluctantly reached out and pushed the man in the chest, sending him back into the darkness to the right.

  Pitoso came forward, pushing other debris away. “Looks like a kitchen,” he said.

  Chepe took in their new surroundings. The room had once been a large kitchen, maybe twenty meters square. But now it barely resembled one. The walls were all slightly bent, twisted to one side in the attack, creating awkward angles and shadows, with the floor sloping up slightly in one place and dipping down in another. Debris was everywhere. Pots, food, appliances, all scattered throughout as if everything had broken free and banged around in the explosion. Structural material stuck out from the walls: conduit, pipes, support beams. They would need to tread carefully in here.

  “Come on,” said Pitoso. “Let’s find another way to the survivors.”

  They advanced slowly, lightly tapping their propulsion triggers to push themselves forward, brushing aside debris as they went: cutlery, tubs of dry goods, boxes. Another body floated to their right. A woman, wearing an apron.

  “I see a hatch,” said Pitoso.

  Chepe looked where Pitoso was pointing, and his heart sank. A hatch was indeed ahead, but there was no way of reaching it. Not easily anyway. The whole floor had broken upward right at the hatch, as if pulled apart, bending deck plating and support beams up and onto the bottom half of the hatch. The hatch itself looked undamaged, but getting to it and clearing a path wide enough to open it would take hours at least, even a day maybe. The bigger problem, though, was the wall around the hatch. It was bent and pinched in places.

  “We can’t get to those people this way,” said Chepe. “There’s no way we’ll get a bubble seal over that hatch, even if we cut all this debris away. Look at the wall.”

  Pitoso shined his light around the edges of the hatch. “Then we need to find another way.”

  But there wasn’t one. They circled the entire room. They found storage rooms and another hatch, but this led to a corridor where the walls pinched completely closed, and beyond it was space anyway.

  “We got nothing,” said Chepe. “The only way to reach the survivors is through the blocked corridor where Vico and Segundo are cutting.”

  “Then we’re in trouble,” said Pitoso. “Because even if they get air in there, there’s no way to get those people out.”

  * * *

  “Back up,” said Victor. “We’re cutting the last pieces free.”

  Nando and Toron backed away from the opening, while Victor and Father cut the last of the girder framework away, clearing the entrance of debris. Their work wasn’t done, however. The entrance was still too narrow for anyone to pass through and reach the hatch; the walls had been pinched close together when it tore away from the ship.

  “Get those spreaders in there,” said Bahzím. “Make that entrance as wide as possible.”

  Victor and Father stepped aside for those with the hydraulic spreaders. The men placed the two ends of the spreader on opposite walls of the entrance and then started the hydraulics. The spreader bars expanded, pushing the walls father apart, making an opening. Finally, after several minutes that felt like an eternity, the walls were wide again. Victor didn’t even wait for the miners to remove the spreaders. He ducked under the machine and flew down to the hatch.

  Through the window he could see people inside. Those that were moving looked on the verge of falling asleep.

  “Do you see other people?” asked Father, coming up behind Victor.

  “Do you see Alejandra?” asked Toron.

  “No,” said Victor. “But I can’t see everyone. Some of them are alive. Barely.” He turned to Father. “We need to get air in there immediately.”

  “How?”

  Behind Father, running parallel along the corridor wall, were a series of pipes. Victor moved to them, identifying them by their shape and type. Fresh water. Sewer water. Electrical. Air. The air pipe disappeared through the wall near the hatch. Victor knew there would be a valve on the wall on the other side. As soon as the corridor decompressed, the emergency system would have sealed the valve automatically so that no air from the room escaped through the severed pipe in the corridor.

  “If we can get someone inside to open the air valve,” said Victor, “we can attach one of our lifelines to the pipe and feed them fresh air.”

  “Disconnect someone’s line?” said Father.

  “Either that or they die,” said Victor. “I’ve been watching Chepe’s vid as we were cutting. There’s no reaching them any other way.”

  “He’s right,” said Bahzím. “If you don’t get air to them here, they die. I’m not too keen on cutting someone’s line, though.”

  “If you got a better idea, let’s hear it,” said Victor.

  “I don’t,” said Bahzím.

  Victor looked at Father. “Decision time.”

  Father hesitated. “All right. But we use my line.”

  Toron was at the hatch window, looking through.

  “Move over, Toron,” Victor pushed him aside and looked through the window. “There. Across the room. On the right side. There’s another valve. That means there’s another air pipe over there. We need to flood this room. Two lines pumping in a hundred times what the lines are feeding us now. Take Nando and see if you can find the pipe that feeds to that valve. Leave the light board. Toron and I will do this pipe.”

  Father looked through the window of the hatch, spotting the valve, judging where the corresponding pipe would be on the other side of the wreckage. He turned back to Victor. “I don’t like this.”

  “Me neither. But we don’t have time to discuss it, do we?”

  Father sighed. “Be careful.”

  Father went. Nando followed. Victor looked at Toron and handed him a wrench from his tool belt. “Bang on the hatch. Get someone’s attention. They need to open that valve.”

  Toron began banging on the hatch. Victor took the saw, fired it up, and cut easily through the pipe. Then he killed the saw, set it aside, and used another tool to pry the pipe that led to the room away from the wall.

  “He’s coming back,” said Toron. “The guy from before. He’s back. But he looks half asleep.”

  “Anoxia. Lack of oxygen. Mental confusion. Impaired thinking. Write on the board. Tell him he needs to open the valve. Keep knocking so he stays with us.”

  “I can’t knock and write at the same time.”

  Victor took the wrench and banged. Toron wrote then held up the sign. “Open the valve,” Toron said.

  The man inside read the sign and furrowed his brow.

  “He doesn’t understand,” said Toron.

  “Point to it,” said Victor. “Show him where the valve is.”

  “I can’t see it,” said Toron.

  “It’s probably to the right of the door
. Our right. His left. Flush against the wall.”

  “There,” said Toron, pointing. “Look there. That valve, can you see it?”

  The man’s eyes followed Toron’s finger, but then he blinked and wavered, confused, as if the last string of understanding had been cut. He tried to look but his eyes wouldn’t focus. He was drifting, seemingly unaware of his surroundings.

  Toron banged on the hatch with his fist. “Open the damn valve!”

  The man shook his head, getting his bearings, and blinked again. Then he came to himself, as if a switch had flicked on in his mind, and he saw the valve. Comprehension registered on his face. He reached for something out of sight. “He’s going for it,” said Toron.

  “Put your hand over the end of this pipe,” said Victor. “So that none of their air escapes if he opens the valve before we’re ready.”

  Toron pressed his hand against the pipe’s end.

  “Bahzím,” said Victor. “As soon as Toron tells you to, increase my lifeline air supply to maximum, as much oxygen as you can pump in.”

  “We’re ready,” said Bahzím. “But you realize you’re cutting off your own air.”

  Victor grabbed the saw and fired up the blade. “I’ll be fine. I’ve done this before.” Which was only partially true. He had lost power to his line when the corporates attacked, but he had never lost his line entirely. No one had. No one that lived to tell about it later, anyway.

  “Here. Use my line instead,” said Toron. He reached back to detach it, but Victor was faster; his hand was already on the release latch of his own suit. Victor squeezed the mechanism, and the line came free. The power in Victor’s suit went off. His HUD winked out. The chatter of communication went silent. Now all he heard was the sound of his own breathing. The safety valve on the back of his suit had sealed the hole where the lifeline connected, preventing Victor’s suit from deflating like a balloon. He brought the detached line forward and pressed it down over the saw blade, slicing through it easily. He tossed the severed head of the line aside, then got a firm grasp with both hands on the longer portion of the line that extended back to the ship. There were several hoses and wires inside the lifeline, held together by the protective outer tubing. Victor took out his knife and cut down the side of the lifeline, slicing through the outer tubing but being careful not to cut the air hose inside. Then he pulled the outer tubing down, freeing the air hose from the other hoses that supplied heat and electricity and communication. He took two wire clamps from his pouch that were wider than the air hose and slid them onto it. Then he nodded to Toron to remove his hand and Victor shoved the air hose onto the pipe. The air hose was bigger, but not by much. Victor quickly tightened the wire clamps, so the air hose clung tightly to the pipe and wouldn’t shoot off when more air came through. Then he gave Toron a thumbs-up and watched as Toron relayed the order.

  The air hose stiffened as oxygen surged into the pipe. The question was: Was the air getting through or was it blocked by the valve? Had the man opened it, and if so, had he opened it all the way? Victor looked inside the hatch window but couldn’t see the man. Several people inside were stirring, as if hearing the rush of air.

  “I think it’s working,” said Victor. But of course no one heard him.

  He noticed then that his fingers and feet were cold. His visor was fogging up. The air in his suit was stale. He felt pressure applied to his back, and his suit came to life. Air poured in. Heat. His HUD flickered on. Only it wasn’t his HUD. All the data boxes were positioned in all the wrong places. He turned. Toron was behind him; he had given Victor his lifeline. Bahzím’s voice said, “The air’s going through, Victor. He opened the valve. Good work.”

  “Victor, your father has the other pipe ready,” said Nando. “Send someone over here to open this valve.”

  Victor turned back to the window. Several people had mustered the strength to gather at the hatch, breathing the fresh air. Victor grabbed the board and wrote, then banged on the hatch. A young but haggard woman came to the window, read Victor’s note, and nodded, comprehending. She looked to where Victor was pointing, saw the valve on the far wall, and nodded again. She seemed weak, drained of life, but somehow she pushed off the floor and drifted over to the valve. She put her hand on it then turned. At first Victor didn’t think she had the strength to turn it, but she persisted, and the valve opened wide. Air rushed through the valve, blowing the woman’s hair to the side. She inhaled deep, eyes closed a moment, then burst into sobs, burying her face in her hands—whether from relief at having survived or from grief for those who hadn’t, Victor could only guess.

  “Toron will share his line with you until you’re both back on the ship,” said Bahzím. “I want you back in the airlock. No one outside without a lifeline.”

  “How are we getting these people out?” Victor asked.

  “We’ve been discussing that. The docking tube is too wide to get down that corridor and seal around the hatch. Do you think we could get a bubble over that hatch? Maybe we could fill a bubble with suits. Then they open the hatch, suit up, and quickly fly up to us.”

  Victor inspected the wall around the hatch. “It’s too narrow in here. And even if we get the spreaders down in here, the wall is too damaged to hold a seal. What if we pull the wreckage into the airlock? Then we fill the space with air and they open the hatch and walk out.”

  “The wreck’s way too big,” said Bahzím.

  “Then we cut it down with one of the PKs, slice away all the rooms that are compromised and keep only the room with survivors. If we shave enough away, it might be small enough to squeeze inside.”

  “Laser cutting around these people?” said Concepción. “That’s extremely dangerous.”

  “Bulo’s a good cutter,” said Victor. “He could sign his name on a pebble if he wanted to.”

  “I could do it,” said Bulo, who was listening on the line. “If the ship is holding steady, if we anchor the wreckage so it doesn’t move. I can slice off the deadweight easy.”

  Concepción asked, “Segundo, what do you think?”

  “I don’t know of a better option,” said Father. “The downside is time. Anchoring and cutting and moving them inside. That all will take a lot of time. I’m guessing five or six hours at the least. And there might be more survivors out there who need immediate help. We’d be essentially ending the search.”

  Victor was watching Toron, who was at the hatch window with a light board. He wrote something that Victor couldn’t see and showed it to the man on the other side of the glass. The man read the board then shook his head. Toron released the board and turned away from the hatch. The board drifted away and Victor saw the single-word question written there: “Alejandra?”

  CHAPTER 11

  Quickship

  Victor plugged the lifeline back into Toron before the two of them left the wreckage. Toron didn’t object or play hero. He understood that if they were both going to arrive safely back at the airlock, they needed to share the line. Toron nodded his thanks to Victor, but Victor could tell Toron’s mind was elsewhere. All hope of finding Janda alive here had shattered, and Toron’s face showed only despair.

  It almost relieved Victor that he and Toron couldn’t communicate since they were sharing a line. What would Victor say? It’s my fault that Janda’s here? It’s my fault she may be dead? It wouldn’t be untrue. If not for Victor, the Council would never have sent Janda away. She’d be on El Cavador. Safe and alive.

  He flew up out of the corridor of the wreckage, leading the way, with Toron behind him. Since Victor couldn’t call for help if he needed it, it made sense for him to be up front where Toron could see him. Most of the jagged protrusions around the entrance to the corridor had been cut away, but it surprised Victor to see that many still remained. It had been dangerous and reckless of him to fly down here as quickly as he had. But he had been thinking of Janda then. He had been clinging to the hope that she was here, inside, alive, ready for rescue. Now he knew she wasn’t.

>   A hand grabbed Victor’s shoulder. It was Toron, already plugging the lifeline into Victor’s back. Toron seemed agitated. He flew forward in a rush toward the ship, and Victor followed. The chatter in Victor’s helmet continued.

  “We don’t have a choice, Toron,” said Bahzím.

  “It’s not Toron anymore,” said Victor. “It’s Victor. He just gave me the line. What’s going on?”

  “He objects to suspending the search for more survivors to rescue the people trapped inside,” said Father. “He says there might be a hundred people out there who need rescuing.”

  “He’s right,” said Victor. “There might be.”

  “Unlikely,” said Bahzím.

  “But possible,” said Father.

  Toron landed back in the airlock. Victor was right behind him. Father and Nando were coming in as well, the two of them sharing a lifeline also. The airlock was busy with activity. A team of miners was working the big winches, pulling in the mooring cables they had already anchored to the wreckage. The intent was to bring the wreck close to a PK to be extremely precise with the cuts.

  There was a limited supply of the longer lifelines, but there were several short lines for working here in the airlock. Toron grabbed one from the wall, plugged it into his back, and approached Bahzím.

  “I want to go back out there,” he said. “I’m not staying here while we cut these people free. I want to keep looking. Even if I go alone.”

  “You can’t, Toron,” said Bahzím. “You can’t leave the ship without a lifeline.”

  “I can plug the emergency regulator into my lifeline jack and connect air canisters. It’s been done before. That will give me all the air I need.”

  “And what about heat? You’ll freeze to death.”

  “I’ll carry one of the battery packs. That’ll give me enough heat and power for a few hours, at least.”

  Bahzím shook his head. “I can’t let you do that, Toron.”

  “My daughter is out there, Bahzím. Dead probably, but maybe alive. And as long as there is a chance of me finding her alive, as long as that is the slimmest of possibilities, I will not sit here and do nothing. If you want to stay and help these people, fine. That’s your choice. If it were up to me, we’d cut them loose now and look for Alejandra.”