Zero Limit

by Jeremy K. Brown

  “Looks like God was listening,” he said ruefully.

  “OK,” Caitlin said to him. “It’s OK. Just get in the lander and we’ll get you patched up. Come on . . .”

  “Can’t do it,” Tony said. “Docking clamp was damaged in the fire. It’s got to be released manually.”

  Caitlin knew what he was trying to tell her. “No,” she said. “No, Tony, there’s got to be another way. There’s got to—”

  Another explosion erupted from somewhere on board, and they shifted violently to port. Tony and Caitlin locked eyes.

  “Caitlin,” he said. “Go.”

  There was no more time. Willing herself to turn away, Caitlin floated back down the hatch, trying her best to hold it together. When she got inside the Alley Oop, Vee turned to her.

  “Where’s Tony?” she asked, the panic growing in her voice. “Where is he?”

  “Start the launch cycle,” Caitlin said. “We need to be ready to—”

  “Where is he?”

  “He’s gone, OK?” Caitlin said, probably more harshly than she meant to. “He’s gone. And we will be too unless we get ready to leave now.”

  “Babe?”

  Tony’s voice came over Vee’s headset. She answered immediately.

  “I’m here!” she said, unable to hold back her tears. “I’m here, honey, but we’ve got to go, so come on, OK?”

  “That’s why I’m calling you,” he said. His ragged voice grew faint. “I can’t make it. You have to go without me.”

  “No,” she said. “No, don’t say that! You are going to make it, OK? Just a few more feet.”

  “Babe,” Tony said, “you’ve got to let me go. It’s the only way the rest of you stand any chance.”

  “You can’t do this,” Vee protested. “I need you. All of this doesn’t work without you. It’s always been you and me.”

  “And it always will,” he said. “I love you . . .”

  Tony hit the manual release from inside the Tamarisk, and the Alley Oop separated from the burning ship. As it was jettisoned, Vee screamed.

  “No!” she yelled, and the sound of her voice tore Caitlin down the center. “Tony!”

  Vee bent forward, hysterical. Caitlin was left with no choice but to take over pilot duties.

  “Where are we headed, Shaw?” she asked.

  “I don’t know!” Shaw said. “I still don’t know where we are!”

  Caitlin took a second to gather her thoughts and assess their situation. As she did, it was not long before the inescapable truth hit her like a sixteen-ounce glove to the gut.

  “Buckle in,” she told everyone. “Prepare for landing.”

  “Landing?” asked Diaz. “Where the hell do you think we’re landing?”

  The crew looked out the viewport at the asteroid drawing closer.

  “The only place we can.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  “Caitlin? It’s your father . . .”

  Her eyes snap open, her disorientation compounded by the realization that she’s upside down. She blinks, trying to focus and wipe the fog from her mind when the whine of the rotors forces her back into reality. Air rushes into her lungs, and she clambers out of the fallen helicopter into complete chaos. Gunfire rakes the air from above and around them. The sky above is only a suggestion, concealed by acrid smoke from the ruined copter and discharged weapons as well as particles of sand, dust, and pulverized stone. Some troops, the ones who’ve survived the crash, are already fanning out into the street, cutting down insurgents and tending to the wounded. Of these, there are several. Whether from impact or from the hail of bullets that descended on them immediately following, much of Caitlin’s platoon has been decimated. Men and women alike writhe, bleeding from assorted wounds, some more grave than others. Two things the movies don’t tell you about dying in combat. It’s never quick and it’s never quiet.

  She finds Evers huddled up against the wreckage. The same one who, just moments before, ensured everyone on board the helicopter that he was invincible. Even though he is sitting still, Evers is gasping for air, his face a mask of panic. His eyes dart around frantically, searching for help.

  “I can’t breathe! I can’t breathe!” he shrieks. “Please God, help me!”

  Caitlin scrambles over to him and takes his face in her hands, locking eyes with him.

  “Hey! Hey! You’re OK,” she shouts. “You’re in survival mode! Your body’s trying to draw in more oxygen than you can handle! Happens to everyone on their first engagement. Just breathe slow, you’ll be OK!”

  The private nods, and Caitlin slaps his helmet, moving on. Her head is screaming from the heat and the weight of her gear. Even though she is heavily armored, she feels vulnerable, exposed, mostly because it’s damn hard to move. She tries to process the madness around her, to put what’s happening into ordered, organized columns, but to no avail. More bullets scream overhead, pinging off the downed helicopter as she works her way through the sand.

  The bastards aren’t even aiming, she thinks. Just laying down suppressing fire to keep us from doing anything other than crawling on our bellies.

  As she huddles up behind a mud wall and contemplates her next move, a body lands next to her and she yells out.

  “Hey, Taggart!” Ben says. “You made it!”

  “For whatever that’s worth,” she says.

  “Fix your eyepro, Boss,” Ben says.

  Caitlin adjusts her ballistic glasses, which had somehow gone askew in her journey from the helicopter to the wall. Ben gives her a nod.

  “Much better,” he says. “So what’s the plan?”

  “I don’t know,” she says. “It’s all gone fubar down here. Are we the only helo down?”

  “In this sector, yeah,” Ben says. “Looks like it. But who knows what’s happening elsewhere?”

  “They were waiting for us,” she says.

  “The Enders?” Ben says. “Hell yeah they were. Are you really surprised?”

  “No,” she says. “But I’m pissed as hell!”

  “Then let’s press forward,” Ben says. “Maybe we can use that to our advantage.”

  Caitlin nods and they begin gathering the remains of the platoon, moving forward into the burning hulk of the city.

  “Are you serious?” Diaz asked Caitlin, eyes full of panic as he looked out at the approaching asteroid.

  “I’m completely serious,” she told him. “But now is the time for better options. Don’t be shy.”

  Diaz didn’t answer, either unable or unwilling to present an alternative. He simply sat back in his seat, rocking back and forth, talking to himself. Caitlin reached over and grabbed him. She placed her hand flat on his chest.

  “Hey!” she said. “Hey! Breathe, OK? I need you to breathe.”

  Slowly, as Diaz regained his composure, Caitlin could feel his chest rising and falling in a steady rhythm against her hand.

  “Good,” she said. “That’s good. Keep it up. Shaw! How are we looking?”

  “We’ve got to slow our rate of descent,” he called back. “At our present speed, we’re going to slam right into this thing.”

  Caitlin worked the touch screen controls on the lander, ordering the braking thrusters to fire and slow them down.

  “All right,” Shaw said. “First things first, we want to aim for the night side of this thing. That should give us eighteen days or so before the Sun comes up and cooks us. Secondly, if we stand any shot of landing this thing, then we’ve got to match our velocity to the asteroid’s, and we’ve got to keep it slow or we’re going to bounce right off.”

  The descent to the asteroid was measured and precise, with Shaw talking Caitlin down as she gently worked the thrusters to keep the tiny escape craft from bouncing back up into space. Finally, after what felt like hours, the blue contact light flared on the screen, indicating that the sensor probe on the bottom of the lander had touched the surface of the Thresher.

  “Contact!” said Shaw.

  “Diaz!” Caitlin s
houted. “Fire the pitons.”

  Like the probe and the Tamarisk, the Alley Oop was also equipped with anchors that could be launched from her landing struts to bite into the rock. Diaz deployed them at once, and the ship came to a juddering halt. It was less of a landing and more of an awkward falling to the ground. Caitlin allowed herself a bitter inward chuckle. The Alley Oop wasn’t named without a sense of irony, it seemed. It was not the most graceful lander ever built, and Caitlin questioned whether Lyman Ross knew if it was spaceworthy. In fact, if Caitlin were to think things through, she’d most likely conclude that Ross had put the lander on board solely to ensure the Tamarisk was up to regulation.

  When they hit the surface and the anchoring harpoons fired themselves deep into the rock, all the lights on the ship winked out for a moment and then flickered back on. The team attempted to gather themselves. Diaz was still freaking out.

  “Jesus!” he yelled, his eyes wide and frantic. “Jesus Christ, what the hell just happened up there? He’s gone! He’s gone, man!”

  “Pull it together, Diaz!” Caitlin shouted.

  He quieted down but continued breathing heavily, trying to collect himself. Caitlin turned to look over at Vee, who had unlatched her helmet and was rubbing her eyes. Her face was stony, although the torrent of emotions swirling underneath was visible. Gently, Caitlin touched her arm. Vee’s head swiveled toward her sharply. Instinctively, Caitlin retracted her hand, and Vee looked away.

  “Stings like hell, doesn’t it?” Caitlin said, trying to bridge the gap between them. “Your eyes? It’s because there’s very low gravity. The tears can’t run down your face, so they just collect in your eyes. Just keep rubbing them. It’ll pass.”

  Vee didn’t answer, continuing to look down. Caitlin decided to try a different tactic.

  “I know,” she said. “OK? I know. But right now, we’ve got big problems in front of us and not a lot of time to deal with them. I need you at your best right now. Or as close as you can come. Can I count on you?”

  Tears formed again in Vee’s eyes, and she wiped them away angrily, almost defiantly, before they could attempt to lodge themselves there. She turned to face Caitlin again, this time ready to address the elephant in the room.

  “You let him go,” she said, simply.

  “I made a call,” Caitlin said. “He made a call. The ship was burning. It was him or us. He knew it too. Remember, Vee, he was the one who released the docking clamp. It’s not like he was pounding on the hatch to be let in. He sacrificed himself so that we could have a chance at getting out of this alive. And believe me when I tell you that I wish it had been me instead of him.”

  “Right now, so do I,” Vee said.

  “I get it,” Caitlin told her, regaining her composure. “I’ve been here before. It’s one of the perks of being in charge. You sometimes have to make decisions that get some people killed and other people upset. And you can hate me for it, you can wish me dead, whatever you’ve got to do to push through this. But I need you. Shaw and Diaz need you. So stow your hate until we get off this rock. Because right now, I’m counting on you. Can I count on you?”

  Vee looked as if she would say more, but then turned away, casting her eyes down at the controls. “Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, I got this.”

  Caitlin gave her arm a squeeze. This time, Vee didn’t recoil.

  “I’m sorry about Tony.”

  Vee said nothing. Caitlin turned her attention to Diaz and Shaw.

  “OK, here’s the situation,” she said. “First, we’ve got to assess what we have to work with on the lander. I want us to go through this bucket both inside and out. Fuel, electrical, supplies, everything that works, and everything that doesn’t. Does she have enough fuel to get us back to the Moon? And if not, what then?”

  “Why are we even discussing this?” said Diaz. “Why don’t we just take off right now? Head back home? Hell, let’s try and book it to Earth if we can.”

  “I already said that’s my plan, Diaz,” Caitlin noted. “I’m hoping that we can get back to the Moon. We need to know what we’re dealing with in terms of fuel. But Earth? Right now, that’s out of the question.”

  “Why?” Vee asked.

  “Because,” said Caitlin, “in Lyman Ross’s eyes, we’ve failed. Which means we’re on our own. No clearance, no travel pass, no visas. We try to get to Earth, and they’ll shoot us down before we can even begin reentry.”

  “So we’re stuck here,” Shaw said.

  “Just for now,” said Caitlin. “Just until we know what we’re up against.”

  Shaw looked at Caitlin, his initial bewilderment giving way to anger. “What we’re up against?” he asked. “What we’re up against? Tony’s dead, our ship is destroyed, and in case you haven’t taken a peek out the window recently, we happen to be stuck on a goddamn asteroid! I don’t think you need to be Stephen Hawking to figure out what we’re up against!”

  “Are we going to have a problem now?” Caitlin asked him. Shaw turned away, kicking the console. Caitlin let it pass, then turned and faced everyone.

  “We knew there were risks when we agreed to take this job,” she told them. “But I think we can all agree that things went worse than expected. We can’t change what happened. All we can do now is try and find a way to survive. But the only way we’re going to do that is if we keep our heads together and stay cool. So, anyone who feels like taking a walk outside with me, let’s suit up and get moving. Anyone who needs some time to process everything we’ve been through, this is when you take it. After that, you keep your emotions in check until we’re back home, got it?”

  “Yeah, Boss,” said Diaz. “I’m with you.”

  Caitlin walked over to him and put out her hand, pulling him up and looking him in the eye.

  “We did everything we could up there,” she said to him. “You know that.”

  “But Tony . . .” His voice broke as he looked away. “Tony, he—

  “Tony made his choice,” said Caitlin. “And it was the right call. He saved us because of it. Now the best thing we can do is try and make sure he didn’t die in vain.”

  Diaz composed himself, staving off the tears, and nodded. Caitlin nodded with him.

  “There you go,” she said. “Now let’s figure out how we’re going to get home.”

  Shaw, Diaz, and Caitlin suited up and prepared to head out onto the surface of the asteroid. Vee opted to stay behind to see what was working internally on the Alley Oop. After depressurizing the cabin, Caitlin knelt and pulled open the hatch, preparing to walk outside.

  “Man,” said Diaz, looking down at the stony cratered surface of the Thresher. “This is not how I thought this day was gonna go.”

  “Tell that to Tony,” said Shaw.

  “Easy, you two,” said Caitlin. “Let’s keep our eye on the ball.”

  The three miners turned astronauts stepped out of the lander and onto the surface. Almost immediately, they found themselves disoriented in an alien landscape unlike any they’d witnessed before. Time spent on the surface of the Moon had done very little to prepare them for the experience of navigating this new terrain. The topography was jagged and uneven, with ridges and craters dotting the landscape in chaotic, irregular patterns. The ground was covered in a light carpet of ejecta, the effect of centuries of impacts from smaller objects from throughout the cosmos. The light was minimal, as the Sun was presently on the other side of the asteroid awaiting its rising in eighteen days, so everything was cast in a caul of half-light that made them think of a graveyard under a gibbous moon.

  As they began to move, they quickly found that walking on the surface of the Thresher was next to impossible. The low gravity made them feel as though every step was going to send them careening into space. To Caitlin, the experience felt more like swimming than walking. A simple push with a fingertip was enough to propel them forward or slow them down. Still, the mini RCS inside their suits helped to combat the effects somewhat, keeping them relatively grounded.

>   “Watch your thrusters,” Shaw warned the group. “Too much force and you could kick up dust and contaminate the RCS.”

  “Got it,” said Caitlin. Diaz, who looked a stone’s throw away from vomiting, merely nodded.

  Slowly, they learned to walk, using a combination of small hops countered by thruster fire from their suits, an unpleasant and nerve-racking experience. On one occasion, Diaz lost his bearings completely and would have gone tumbling into space were it not for Shaw’s quick reflexes.

  “Maybe you should check on the lander,” said Shaw. “Give yourself something to hold on to.”

  “Yeah.” Diaz nodded, breathing heavily. “Probably a good idea.”

  Now working more gingerly than ever, Diaz hop-walked around the outside of the Alley Oop, holding on to the hull and examining the craft carefully, checking for anything that looked out of place.

  “She’s a reentry vehicle,” he said. “Not just an excursion module. If we decided to make the trip back to Earth, she could get there, except . . .”

  “I don’t like the sound of that word,” Caitlin said.

  “Well, you’re gonna like this even less,” said Diaz. “The heat shield’s cracked. It might last long enough to slow our orbital velocity, but after that, we’re gonna be charbroiled.”

  “OK,” Caitlin said. “Do we have anything on the ship that can repair it?”

  “We might have some non-oxide adhesive in the supply locker,” Diaz said. “I can check when we get back inside.”

  “So the heat shield is cracked,” Caitlin said, taking stock. “But can we get close enough to Earth to dock with another ship maybe?”

  “Sure, I guess,” said Diaz. “But I thought you just said Earth was out of the question. Remember? We’re four illegals coming from the Moon. The only ships that are going to come and meet us are either attack skiffs or a prison barge.”

  “Yeah, I know what I said,” said Caitlin. “But I’m rethinking my position. Sitting in a prison barge would still be better than sweating it out on this rock.”