Bones Burnt Black: Serial Killer in Space

by Stephen Euin Cobb

  He thought back to the last time he’d been with her: twenty or thirty minutes before the crisis began. Everything had been so normal then. It felt like days ago but it was only a few hours.

  The ship’s engines had not yet gone into auto-shutdown, so the ship was accelerating at full thrust. This produced one-tenth the gravity a person would experience on the surface of the Earth, and was the only form of occasional imitation gravity Corvus was designed to provide for its passengers and crew.

  Kim had been following Mike down the hall. Without warning, he stopped abruptly at the door to the passenger’s lounge and spun around to face her. He slapped her across the left cheek hard enough to turn her head.

  When her face returned her cheek had a lovely reddish glow, exceeded only by the glowing rage in her eyes. With both hands she shoved the center of his red and black plaid shirt. The force against his rib cage was enough to bounce him against the wall behind him. Ship’s gravity was too feeble for him to prevent this by shifting his weight onto his heels.

  When he completed his bounce, and stood vertical again, he planted his feet firmly on the floor and pushed her shoulder to knock her off balance then bent down and grabbed both of her ankles. When he stood up straight, he was holding her upside-down at arm’s length—another task made possible by the weak gravity.

  Kim’s blonde ponytail brushed vigorously across the gray textured floor as she struggled to get loose. Three times she punched Mike in the shins before he finally dropped her on her head.

  “Enough!” She jumped up and stomped—as best she could in the low gravity—into the passenger’s lounge. “Let’s do it!”

  “You got it!” Mike said, and followed close on her heels through the large room decorated with low comfortable furniture. The walls to their right and left and rear displayed brightly colored tapestries done in a Mexican-Indian motif, while the wall directly ahead was all windows and displayed only the black sky and stars that surrounded the ship. The stars—Mike reminded himself—had been stationary then.

  As the two combatants marched through the room no eyes looked up, no heads turned to watch, no conversations faltered in mid-sentence. They were alone. The lounge was deserted.

  Near the center of the room Kim rounded a low white couch and headed for the room’s far left corner. There, flanked by tapestries on one side and a starry sky on the other, was a small sidewalk-style cafe. She plopped herself down at its nearest table, and on the simulated wood-grained surface propped her elbow in the traditional pose. “Come on. Put-up or shut-up!”

  “I’m ready! More than ready!” Mike said as he sat down, took hold of her hand and hooked his calves around two of the table’s simulated wooden legs to anchor himself. He knew from experience that he’d better hang on to something bolted to the floor. In this gravity any unsecured arm-wrestler would get flipped like an oversized pancake.

  “Go!” Kim said.

  Their right arms shook with the force of opposing torques. Various parts of their trembling hands quickly turned various shades of red and yellow as blood was squeezed out of some tissues and concentrated in others.

  For almost a minute the two forearms pointed straight up. Mike couldn’t quite muster the power needed to push Kim’s arm backward. He wasn’t surprised. He’d wrestled her before and knew those little arms were stronger than they looked. But that didn’t mean he understood it. He did not. Nearly a foot taller than her, he out-massed her by fifty pounds, and his arms were at least twice as thick as hers. Exercise couldn’t be the answer: back home in the City of Von Braun, he played several vigorous games of airball every week—a popular version of soccer in which the players fly about freely inside a large zero-g playing sphere using soft plastic wings strapped over their arms. It occurred to him that she might be using some kind of superior technique. Or maybe it was just that his arms were longer than hers and the extra length put him at a disadvantage due to poor leverage. Surely, she couldn’t be stronger than him? Could she?

  He felt the back of his knees sliding slowly up the table legs. They stopped when his thighs were pressed firmly against the table top’s underside. His blood pressure was rising too. He could feel his pulse in his left temple, as though someone were gently tapping on the side of his head with an index finger. Wish I’d worked up more anger before we started, he thought. I’m not sure I’ve released enough adrenaline to outlast her.

  This thought was interrupted not by a word or sound but by an abrupt reduction in the background noise. The soft and distant rumbling that had filled every corner of the big ship during the last few hours had suddenly disappeared, and with it the feeling of one-tenth gravity. The rumbling was replaced by silence; the one-tenth gravity by zero-g.

  That’s when the crisis must have begun.

  At the time it had seemed only a little strange. He’d known the engines were supposed to run continuously for nearly three days and that they had started just a few hours earlier. But strange as he’d known it to be, he’d had no intention of letting a little distraction weaken his enthusiasm for personal victory. It certainly didn’t seem to interfere with the amount of force Kim was exerting against him.

  From inside the breast pocket of Kim’s sky-blue flight uniform the deeply resonant masculine voice of her pocketsize said, “Pardon the interruption, but the captain is calling.”

  Kim grunted through clenched teeth: “Put him through.”

  The captain said, “Kim, there’s a problem with one of the main engines. Engine two is working normally but engine one has failed to maintain fusion so both went into auto-shutdown. I’ve attempted a re-start but engine one fails in the hydrogen line purge cycle.”

  Kim squeezed out another string of grunted words. “Sounds like it’s not getting any fuel.”

  “Yeah,” the captain said. “That’s what the diagnostics say.”

  “Could be the primary fuel pump,” Kim grunted.

  “Or a clogged fuel filter,” the captain offered.

  “I’d suspect the pump,” Kim said. “The liquid hydrogen is filtered twice before it gets into the tanks so you can figure it’s pretty clean. But the pump— Well, it’s got moving parts that can break or wear or stick.”

  “Are you all right?” the captain asked. “You sound— I don’t know. Constipated.”

  She made a clear effort to soften her grunting into a more natural voice but since every muscle in her body was tightened to its limit she failed miserably. “I’m fine,” she said, grinding her teeth together. “Really, I’m fine.”

  The captain hesitated for a moment, then—as though it were some kind of verbal shrug—said, “OK.” He didn’t sound convinced but apparently had decided not to pursue what might be a decidedly personal matter and instead returned to the subject at hand. “I want you to go out and take a look at engine number one.” He paused as if to verify something. “We’re approaching the Moon at 177 miles per second. If we have to cancel the twin-engine synchronous burn and finish our deceleration with only one engine we’ll not only overshoot our docking window at Von Braun but we’ll pass right through the Earth/Moon system altogether. We’ll end up wasting four extra days slowing the ship to a dead stop in the middle of nowhere—probably halfway to the orbit of Venus—and then have to waste another month or more limping back to Von Braun on our puny auxiliary fuel reserves. If that happens the company’s gonna’ have to answer to a lot of angry people, some of them powerful. The handful on board now are nothing compared to the hundred and forty-six who’ve already bought tickets for us to take them out to Huygens Colony.”

  Mike—now winning the match by nearly fifteen degrees thanks to the captain distracting Kim—strained to speak without losing any of his hard-won angle. His voice was less grunt-like than Kim’s but still carried a heavy load of physical tension. “Larry, how much downtime can we make up by running both engines hot?”

  “Officially, only four hours, but the engines are guaranteed to 110% of their standard thrust. That would let us ar
rive on time even after a delay of 7.2 hours, which— Wait a minute! Wait just a damn minute! Are you two arm-wrestling again?”

  “Arm-wrestling?” grunted Kim. “What makes you think—”

  “What the hell is wrong with you two? If you’re not racing in the hallways you’re playing soccer in the hangar deck. I’ve a good mind to separate you for your own safety.”

  “Save the lecture,” grunted Mike. “We’re immune, remember? Besides, it’s your fault. You introduced us.”

  “Don’t remind me. I just wish you two would learn to make-out like everybody else. Love isn’t supposed to be a competition or a tournament. It’s supposed to be tender and supportive and— and—”

  “Captain,” Kim said in a voice of exaggerated surprise, “I had no idea you were such a romantic.”

  “Oh, shut-up. Just get out there and check that engine. That is, if you can tear yourself away from the latest grudge-match.”

  “Aye aye, Captain,” she grunted. “I’m on my way.”

  “Good. Captain: out and clear.”

  In the seconds following the captain’s call, however, neither competitor relaxed their right arm. Neither wanted to be the first to give-up. Their arms quivered with growing fatigue, but the match stretched on.

  A layer of sweat an eighth of an inch deep coated Kim’s forehead. In zero-g it could not drip or flow or run down her face. It just accumulated: clinging to her skin in the exact location it had been secreted. “I really should go now,” she grunted. And as if to emphasize her words, shook her head and slung huge drops of sweat at her opponent. Drops so large they undulated as they traveled slowly through the air.

  Mike felt the drops strike his equally sweat covered face. Their impacts produced tiny splashes on his cheek, forehead and chin. One drop touched his lips. It seeped slowly into the gap between them and spread over his teeth and tongue. He tasted its saltiness. He liked it. It tasted like her.

  “Yes, you really should go.”

  But neither eased their grip.

  “The captain will be expecting me.”

  “Yes, I imagine he will.” Mike wiped his forehead with his free hand. “Maybe you should just go ahead and give-up.”

  “Me give-up? Why don’t you give-up?”

  “Because you won the arm-wrestling match before breakfast this morning,” he said. “That way we’ll be even for the day.”

  “Yeah, but you won both matches yesterday. That would put you ahead by—”

  The captain’s voice barked from Kim’s shirt pocket. “Let go of his hand and go check-out that engine!”

  Kim yanked her hand away from Mike’s and jumped for the door. “Aye aye!”

  Mike watched her coast through the room, traveling a perfectly straight line over sofas and easy chairs and various low tables until she grabbed the door frame with one hand and used it to swing through a ninety degree turn like an ape. This maneuver changed her path enough to allow her to coast the length of the hallway without slowing. It also removed her from Mike’s view.

  Alone in the passenger’s lounge, Mike sat at the little round table with its smears of fresh sweat and thought about how much he liked her and how much he didn’t want this flight to end and how much he wanted to spend more time with her. Again, he thought of asking her. But suddenly he found himself yanked back into the Kim-less reality of deck ten by a high pitched squeal of disgust.

  Tina bore the expression of someone who had been chewing on lemons. Sitting on her ventilation duct, she had ripped open a plastic envelope of cold chicken soup and—since no one had possessed the foresight to gather spoons or bowls—had lifted it to her mouth and drank.

  Apparently, it had not been to her liking, for she now attempted to brush her teeth with her fingers. When she noticed everyone staring at her she exclaimed, fingers still in her mouth, “Globs of grease are sticking to my teeth!”

  Paying too little attention to her food envelope, she spilled half of it across her bare thighs. “Aaaaa!” She jumped up and wiped the cold liquid and gelatin-like lumps of congealed fat from her legs, dropping the food envelope in the process. When it hit the ceiling near her feet it splashed large greasy droplets onto her pure white zero-g shoes.

  She stomped her feet. “Damn!” Then stomped them in time with her curses. “Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn!” She turned and pointed at Mike. “If you hadn’t dropped that last load I’d be eating hot food right now!”

  “It wasn’t his fault,” said Nikita “It was the idiot Zahid who stumbled.”

  “Now, now,” Gideon said. “I’m sure it was an honest mistake. We should all forgive and forget.”

  Mike stood and walked past the rows of stainless steel I-beams hung with coils of yellow rope to a far section of deck ten’s curved wall. He wanted to put some distance between himself and the others. He also felt a need to look out one of the cargo deck’s small round windows.

  The stars outside were running around in a big circle as though the entire sky had been mounted on some kind of huge antique record player. Mike searched for several seconds before giving up. “Pocketsize,” he whispered. “Where is Earth?”

  The tiny computer’s softly feminine voice whispered back, “It should appear about twenty degrees from the sun. It was silhouetted against the sun’s surface until about an hour ago.”

  Risking the sun’s glare—since it too was running around in the big circle—he looked through the window and off to his right. He found it: a bright blue dot no larger than a pinhead when viewed from across a room. It imitated the stars: tracing out a circle in the sky once every five seconds or so. He followed its motion with his eyes and tried to spot the Moon. There were several dim stars near the blue dot, the Moon would be one of those, though exactly which one was unclear.

  Earth, it occurred to him, was growing progressively closer. At this distance, however, the change would be too gradual to observe with the unaided eye: like trying to perceive the movement of a clock’s hour hand.

  “Pocketsize,” he whispered again. “How far are we from Earth?”

  “Approximately five million miles.”

  “How close will we come to it as we pass?”

  “Within two million.”

  “When?”

  “About six hours from now.”

  It felt strange watching the Earth and Moon go by; knowing you can’t stop; knowing you may never see them again; knowing many of the people there are watching you, or talking about you, or thinking about you; and knowing that no one there—or anywhere else—can do anything to save you.

  How many news programs will we be on tonight? How many strangers will learn my name and my face but have no idea what kind of person I am? How many experts will give interviews explaining the details of why it’s impossible for me to survive?

  And what if they’re right? What if this is it? What if we all burn up? Is this all my life has been leading up to? Is this all I was ever going to do? It makes my life seem such a waste. All the things I’ve learned; all the experiences I’ve accumulated; is all that just going to be thrown away? Tossed out like old garbage? I don’t think I’m ready to die.

  This last thought struck him as singularly odd.

  How can anyone be ready to die? Wouldn’t that be the same as being ready to give-up? As being ready to quit; to surrender; to fail? How can you be ready to fail?

  He stood a little taller.

  Well, I am not ready to fail! He looked at the blue dot. I’ll make a fool out of every expert on Earth if I have to. I’m gonna survive this. I’m coming back. I’m gonna walk on the Earth and dance on the Moon.

  His pocketsize interrupted this reverie. “The ship is calling.”

  “Put it through. Mike here. What’s up?”

  “Michael McCormack, it is my unfortunate duty to inform you that the captain has succumbed to his internal injuries.”

  “What?”

  “Your stint as commander of the spaceship Corvus will apparently be extended until the concl
usion of this flight.”

  Mike’s voice shook. “Larry’s dead?”

  “I’m afraid so. I understand you knew him.”

  Mike responded with, “Yeah,” but the word was weak and its ending seemed to fade off into silence. Even to himself he sounded lost, or dazed, or both. He noticed a growing tightness in his chest and throat.

  The ship said, “Please accept my condolences.”

  Mike stared at the distant blue speck and said very slowly. “Um. Yeah. Thanks.”

  Chapter Seven

  Homecoming

  When they were finished eating and all sitting in one large, almost relaxed, conversational group, some on ventilation ducts, some on the ceiling, Mike informed everyone that the captain was dead. They took the news better than he had, which was hardly surprising, they hadn’t known Larry as long or as well. Only Akio showed fear at the loss of the captain. Presumably the young engineer had not written the old man off as already dead while simply unconscious, bleeding internally and trapped—beyond reach of help—under five crushing gees of centrifugal force. The announcement was followed by questions, all of which seemed directed at Mike. Apparently, he really was the leader. Now all he had to do was figure out all the answers.

  Nikita asked calmly, as though lives did not depend on it, “Just how bad will solar passage be?”

  “Well, the only human-made objects that have ever passed closer to the sun than we will,” Mike said, “were the unmanned Star-Fire probes. And the only reason they survived the experience was because they were completely mirrored against sunlight and heavily shielded against radiation.”

  “But this ship is covered with mirrors,” Tina said, her eyes suddenly wide with hope. “Won’t that protect us?”

  Mike shook his head. “The mirrors on Corvus only reflect 94% of the light that strikes them. That means they absorb 6%. At closest approach, 6% will be enough to heat them above their melting point.”

  Tina’s face turned angry. “Who’s stupid idea was it to let the extension of our trajectory pass so close to the sun?”