Nightmare Ship: Space Exploration Thriller

by Scholes, James

  He started to struggle.

  “No! No! No!” Nolan pushed at the plexi-glass, but it wouldn't budge. There was no way to abort the hyper-sleep process once it had started. He was trapped in here, and if there was one place Nolan didn't want to be, it was here. “No!”

  He started to pound at the lid; the glass bounced against his fists but that was all. He whimpered and lashed out with his foot, but the only thing that changed was he now had a sore foot.

  “No!” he screamed, as though the universe gave a damn about his fears. He thought he could see things in the corner—in the shadows. Nasty things that were staring at him, waiting for him to fall asleep. “No!”

  With a faint hiss of gas, the white cloud of sleep tumbled upwards from beneath his bed. Nolan waved his hand in front of his face so the sleep cloud wouldn't take him. The gas was only white for an instant, and then it was as clear as the air around him. It was treacherous like that.

  “No...” Nolan said, but his efforts grew slack and his voice was slurred, sounded like a drunk. “No.”

  The hissing of gas stopped and so did Nolan's fists—but his mind was still active, still thinking of ways to escape. And the shadows... The shadows were still there, full of every fear imaginable and quite a few that weren't. But they weren't real.

  They weren't real...

  7

  Nolan woke up, groggy as hell. How long? He couldn't remember. It didn't matter. Closer to the end, that was all that mattered. Closer to getting off this ship.

  Closing to losing the dreams.

  Nolan groaned, rubbed his eyes. He stayed in the hyper-sleep pod for a while, too numb to move. There was a tingling around his fingers and toes and he felt feverish. His skin was covered in a layer of dried sweat; unusual for a stint in hyper-sleep. As his brain awoke, he could see that his breath wasn't visible in the air at all—the heat had stayed on, even as he had slept. He could feel the ship slowing closing down around him. It wasn't designed to operate for years on end; things would start to break soon.

  If they weren't broken already.

  “A few more minutes,” Nolan said to himself, and he stared at the ceiling and tried to will his body to move. His feet stirred and the tingle in his toes grew sharper. Another groan, another few minutes in the bed and then he lifted his head off the mattress and closed his eyes, waited for the nausea to fade. Nolan opened his eyes.

  There were bones lying next to the pod.

  Nolan didn't move, not for a long time. He stared at the bones and knew he was still sleeping. No, he wasn't asleep—this wasn't a dream. The bones were real, and they were laid out next to his bed in a deliberate fashion: the hands had been crossed across the chest, and the face had been positioned so it was looking back and upwards, directly towards Nolan. From where Nolan lay, he could see the two empty pits in the skull staring right at him.

  Nolan remembered to breathe, and then he took in the details: a small frame and bones that were slender, not quite formed. A child. A dead child was lying next to Nolan's pod.

  Nolan rolled over and vomited.

  He wiped his mouth, opened his eyes—there was another body a few feet away, this one with a few flecks of flesh still on it. Nolan groaned and vomited again.

  “No, no, no...” he trailed off, but he found his legs and he climbed out of the pod, almost fell amongst the bones. He straightened and his head spun. All around him: bones of the dead. Some were in clothes, some had hair, some were still covered in skin, but Nolan couldn't make out the detail in their faces: his mind refused to take them in. Only the eyes—he could see the eyes. They stared at him, blank and accusing. They blamed him for being dead.

  “No... This... No.” The words escaped his lips as a frantic moan. He grabbed at his dressing gown and missed, knocked the gown to the floor. It fell on a corpse. Nolan left it there, headed for the locker room as the only thing that would save his sanity. He tip-toed around the skeletons, didn't dare look down. There were dozens: fifty or so, there had to be that many around him. Fifty corpses, and some were nothing more than skeletons.

  How long did he sleep?

  He had to be dreaming, there was no other explanation. If this wasn't a dream, then Nolan didn't know what it was—a hallucination, something in the air. Hyper-sleep gas must be pumping throughout the ship. A shower would make him feel better.

  Nolan collapsed into the locker room and looked around. The place looked pristine, and there were no bodies in here. Nolan relaxed, and he could almost make himself believe that there were no corpses behind him. It was just part of his dreams. After-effects of such a long sleep. The doctors would be interested in his report, when he landed. They would think it important. They would want notes.

  Nolan headed for the shower, and he grabbed the sides of the stalls to steady himself. With a grunt, he elbowed the button to start the flow of water and screamed as ice-cold water cascaded around him. Frantic, he slapped the button again and the water stopped. He waited for the drying jets to start, but there was nothing except a frantic, metallic groan and then silence. Nolan stood there, dripping wet and freezing and very much awake.

  So... Not a dream.

  Slowly, Nolan turned around. He could see the open door of the locker room, to where the hyper-sleep pod was bathed in darkness and, around it, corpses everywhere. From where? It made no sense—it was impossible. But they were there.

  And he was soaking wet.

  Nolan walked out of the stall, found his clothes. He slid into them, still soaked. He felt better now that he was no longer naked but there was madness there, right at the edge of his mind. It would come soon, if he let it. Soon... But now, Nolan needed a moment to think.

  He let out a deep breath. What he needed was a blaster.

  “Weapons...” He tried to think: there was a weapon's locker in the bridge. There would be blasters there, fully charged. Nolan should go there—that meant walking back through the grave chamber.

  He headed back into the adjoining room. The corpses were no less distressing: all of them were shorter than he was, perhaps five feet in height but some less than that. All were slender and small and unformed. There were faces on some of them, but Nolan looked away so he wouldn't see. Whoever had put these children here had done so with great reverence. Some had scraps of foil around their heads, like a halo. Others had torn napkins littered over their torsos, arranged very much like flower petals. All of them had their heads directed to Nolan's hyper-sleep pod.

  Did they think I was dead? He wondered, but who the hell were they? And were they still on board the ship?

  Get the blaster... Nolan moved faster, headed towards the blast-door. He opened the door without a second thought—too late did he realise that there could be something on the other side. He tensed as the door slid open, but he soon relaxed: there was nothing there except shadows and broken lights. Nolan moved as quietly as he dared. Every shadow could have somebody hiding in it. Every doorway could hold death.

  Nolan reached the observation corridor, where the stars blinked and beckoned but he ignored them. There was nothing out there that interested him, except the waiting embrace of suicide, perhaps. Maybe later, a part of Nolan's brain whispered to him. It was a treacherous thought, but there was a little bit of desire in it. An easier option, in many ways. No, don't think that, Nolan said internally. Not aloud: he didn't want to speak, not now. He didn't want anybody to hear.

  The corridor was deserted, but Nolan moved slowly, anyway. He hugged the wall as he moved, kept to the shadows. He almost smiled as he moved: now the shadows were his.

  The bridge: Nolan shut the door behind him, rested against it and closed his eyes. A deep breath, and then a second. He could feel his hands shaking from fear, and if his hands were shaking then the rest of him would start to shake soon, too. He would fall apart, and he couldn't allow that—he might as well step outside the airlock and be done with it.

  But the shadow—Yes, the shadow. Nolan thought back to before his last sleep, ba
ck to the shadowy vision that had chased him. Was it still there? Had it even been real? Nolan kept his eyes closed, tried to clear his thoughts. The urge to cry almost overwhelmed him.

  He hadn't signed up for this.

  The captain's chair was just as he left it, but Nolan ignored it. Maybe later he would check the diagnostics, but not now: right now, he needed a weapon. He headed straight for the weapon's locker. The code was his fingerprint, and he placed his thumb on the scanner and waited for the red light to flash green and the lock clicked open.

  Nolan opened the door so fast that he almost pulled it free from its hinges. Inside were a handful of blasters and extra charge packs. There was more equipment, but Nolan didn't care about any of that: he grabbed a blaster and inserted a charge pack. He had only handled a weapon once, during training. He had been a decent shot, but that had been against a paper target.

  “They're only children,” Nolan said to himself, and he wasn't sure if the words were directed at the weapon or at his fear. Children had parents, he reminded himself—and they were aboard his ship, for reasons unknown. Why? Nolan would find them, and ask them that very question.

  “And if you don't like the answer?” Nolan asked, but he didn't have an answer for that.

  But the blaster did.

  8

  Blaster in hand, Nolan headed down the empty corridors. He was heading towards the galley. God, he hoped there was coffee—he needed something to keep him awake, perhaps forever.

  There were broken lights up ahead. Nolan inspected them, but it was a delaying tactic. It did confirm that parts of the ship were breaking down. That alone was worrying: Nolan had years left aboard this vessel; if it broke before he reached his destination, then he would be dead, and even hyper-sleep wouldn't save him. Nothing would save him. There were no options.

  Nolan slowed: the galley was directly ahead. There was another door in front of him, and it was closed. This door wasn't a blast-door, but it was still solid enough to stop anything from getting through, including sound. Nolan hesitated before he reached it. He double-checked the blaster and was reassured by the dull green light that indicated a full charge. He let out another deep breath before he approached the door.

  The door opened and he stepped inside.

  “What the hell?” he breathed. There was chaos everywhere: tables had been thrown in all directions, and so had the chairs. The coffee machine and ovens and freezers were all destroyed. The giant fridges had been thrown on their sides and were lined up end-on-end across the room, like a barricade. The walls and ceiling were stained with soot, and there was ash blowing in the air. Nolan entered the room, saw pools of blood spread across the floor. There were footprints in the blood, small and child-like just the same as the bodies that had been around his pod. There were other stains on the floor, too: yellow and green and grey pools, like mucous but on a grand scale.

  Nolan moved through the carnage, his coffee forgotten. Whatever had come through here had been devastating. Panels had been torn from the walls and ceiling, and the door at the far end had been barricaded with strips of metal and steel. That barricade lay in pieces, and beyond the doorway there was darkness.

  He hesitated in the door frame and wished he had grabbed a flashlight. There were no lights in front of him, and the complete darkness of space awaited him.

  Nolan hefted the blaster in both hands and advanced. The walls and floor was scratched and torn apart. It was hard to move without risking a twisted ankle. Nolan was careful using his free hand to support himself: he didn't want to cut himself.

  The faint light of the galley was his only guide, and it was a dull light that faded rapidly. Nolan could hardly see anything, even as his eyes adjusted to the gloom. If there was someone lying in wait, he wouldn't have a chance.

  Someone... Or something... Nolan shivered, and he looked at the broken floor plates, wondered what could cause such damage to his ship. He couldn't imagine any reason a person would do this—there was nothing gained by breaking apart the floor. Once more, his thoughts returned to the shadowy vision he had seen before. Could that have done this? Nolan wasn't even sure what that had been—if it had been anything at all.

  Forward. Ever forward. And for what? So he didn't have to climb back into the hyper-sleep pod. So he didn't have to walk through the chamber of the dead. It was either forward or the airlock, and he didn't want to go back there, either. There was nowhere else, really. Just a single direction: forward.

  The corridor ended with another door. There was no scarring here, and the red light on the door was enough to light up this section of the corridor. Nolan inspected the area out of morbid curiosity. He tried to piece together what had happened: the door must have been open at one point, and there had been people back in the galley that had been taken by surprise. So surprised that they could build a barricade? No, they had planned it: the door had been opened on purpose, and the barricade hadn't worked and there had been a battle. Chaos, violence, blood and pus and mucous everywhere. And then what? This part of the ship was empty, and the door was closed.

  The battle had been victorious—except for the dead.

  Nolan hesitated by the red light. If this door was closed, then that meant that the children were on his side of the door. Whatever had attacked them was on the other side. But there was nobody here, that much was obvious. Whatever had happened could have been years ago. That meant the children were all dead, or they had moved on.

  But did it matter? Whatever had happened, it was clear that whatever was beyond this door wasn't something Nolan wanted to mess with. The light was red because—unlike the blast-doors—this door was locked. Nolan had never locked it, so the children had locked the door on purpose. Nolan should leave it well alone.

  Instead, he unlocked the door. The corridor glowed green and the door slid open.

  There was light on the other side of the door, faint and dull. Nolan stepped through and looked around. There was more damage to the floor and ceiling, but less than there was behind him. Most of the lights were broken, but there were a few that still glowed. There was a mist in the air, too. It was like a fog and it smelled organic and musty. It was an unfamiliar smell on the ship and reminded Nolan of his grandparents basement, back when he was a child.

  Nolan kept moving, not sure why. He had seen enough, surely. There was nothing to be gained by heading down through this corridor. He should return to the bridge and lock himself in. He could make a distress call and wait for rescue. Somebody would come. He wasn't the only ship heading in this direction. He could fire the engines and come to a stop and wait for the next vessel to come and rescue him. It wouldn't be more than a few years before he was rescued. He could lie in the hyper-sleep pod that long.

  But what would greet the rescuers? No, Nolan had to face this on his own. This was his job.

  “Bullshit,” he said to himself. His job was to keep the ship from falling apart, not fighting off an invasion. This was something else.

  And yet, here he was.

  Nolan paused. Had he heard something, or was it just his imagination getting to him? He waited, his ears straining. He held his blaster at chest height, aimed straight down the darkened, murky corridor. No, there was nothing. Just blackness.

  He continued. Slower, this time. Every shadow had an edge to it, and every footstep masked other sounds in front of him. Nolan paused again, still listening. He was jumping at shadows. He would find another door soon, probably a blast-door that he would need to open. He could rest until then, and after that he would make a decision about his next move. He only had to check this section until he reached the blast-door. That was a barrier.

  In front of him, something went click.

  Nolan froze.

  Click, click, click. Something coming towards him, but he couldn't see through the black fog. He raised his blaster, saw that it was shaking in his grip.

  Click, click, click.

  Nolan fired the blaster, high into the ceiling. The blast of red
light lit up everything, but blinded him at the same time. He winced from the sharpness of the light and once the blast was gone his eyes were littered with purple blotches that danced across his vision.

  Silence.

  He waited, unconsciously took a step backwards. His foot found a hole and he stumbled and fell, crashed into the broken metal deck. He groaned.

  Click-click-click-click-click.

  The sound was racing towards him, and it was coming fast. Nolan pulled on his feet, stood on a painful ankle. He grabbed his blaster, started blasting down the corridor. He saw... Something. It was coming towards him: a million eyes, a black and shadowy shape. The fog hid its bulk, but Nolan knew it was big.

  Big and fast.

  Nolan ran backwards, as fast as he could. Behind him, the dreadful clicking, and it was gaining. There was a smell, too—dead skin and dried blood and bodily fluids exposed to the air. Nolan ran faster. He aimed the blaster behind him and fired blind. Something screamed, an inhuman scream. It filled the corridor but was soon replaced by the frantic scrambling of sharp feet on metal.

  Up ahead of him: the faint green light of the door he had unlocked. The door was open, and beyond there was a flickering light. It was salvation: his only hope. Too far to reach—he would never make it.

  He had to.

  Nolan screamed as he ran. His foot found another pothole and he stumbled, almost fell. He didn't dare slow, and he kept running. His legs were aching, his back was screaming. Every muscle in his body was in pain. His lungs burned.

  The door didn't seem any closer, but it had to be—it had to be.

  He felt a breath of wind on his back, foul and twisted and inhuman. Nolan's blood ran cold, but there was the door: it was right there, so close he could touch it.