Oxygen Series Box Set: A Science Fiction Suspense Box Set

by John Olson

  Lex’s voice came in over the headset. “Guys, I am examining the online schematics for the Solar Power Electrical System. It appears there are no green wires in that system.”

  “What about blue wires? Our visors are plated gold.” Kennedy’s breathing was coming faster, rasping in Bob’s ears.

  “Negative, there are no blue or green wires.” Lex’s reply seemed fainter. Bob’s stomach churned. Cold sweat prickled at his skin.

  “Bob, this is Lex. There should be some plastic shielding covering those red wires.”

  “It’s partly gone,” Bob squinted at the wires, trying to bring them into focus. “I would guess it broke off during deployment of the panels. Some of the wires are heavily abraded.”

  A new voice cut in. “Bob, this is Houston, Jake Hunter here. Great job on the Ku repair. Our engineers have been looking at that video feed, and we are recommending that you not touch that green wire.”

  “Okay, um ... roger that,” Bob said. “Do not touch the green wire.”

  The Capcom continued. “Bob, our engineers are a little concerned about the integrity of the insulation on those abraded red wires. Those are supplying most of the juice for the ship. Recommend you test those to see if they’re hot. Over.”

  “Affirmative on that,” Bob said. Kennedy handed him a multimeter.

  Bob clipped the ground lead to the frame of the solar panel. Was the meter set to Current? He squinted and thumbed it to Voltage.

  The CamBot edged in closer, coming between Bob and the Hab. “I’m going to move around on the other side so I can see better,” Kennedy said. He disappeared beneath the solar panel. A moment later, he said, “Okay, Bob, coming up behind you.”

  Bob reached in with the probe. A bead of sweat rolled down into his left eye. He blinked several times.

  “Kaggo, watch out for that green—”

  A flash of light exploded out from the solar panel deployment bay.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Friday, April 4, Year Three, 5:00 P.M.

  Valkerie

  VALKERIE SPUN THROUGH THE AIR, pressing her hands to her ringing ears. What happened? She ricocheted off a wall, kicking and twisting to get her bearings. A high-pitched beep assaulted her senses. A woman’s voice yelling. Screaming.

  Valkerie grabbed a ceiling strap and the world slowly righted itself. The yelling stopped, but the alarm continued. The beeps were getting closer together—less intense.

  The decompression alarm. What had happened? An explosion? And why were the lights so dim? She could hardly see.

  Valkerie launched herself toward the EVA lockers. With her breath coming in shallow gulps, she flung open her locker and pulled the bubble helmet down over her head. She snapped down the clamps and reached for her gloves. First one glove and then the other. Her lungs were on fire, but she fought the urge to start the oxygen flow. Not until the last glove was ... clamped.

  Valkerie flipped a switch on her chest pack, and the roar of rushing air filled her suit. Cold air blasted into her chest, burning her lungs like a wildfire. Desiccated in the vacuum of space.

  “Lex, do you hear me?” Valkerie adjusted the comm link on her helmet. “Bob?”

  Silence.

  “Kennedy?” Heavy breathing echoed in her helmet—a man’s breathing. She turned the volume down. “Bob? Are you all right?”

  No answer. Just a low, throaty rasp.

  “Lex?” Valkerie screamed into the comm link. Lex had been on console. She hadn’t been wearing a suit. Grabbing a rescue bubble from the EVA station, she pushed her way up through the stairwell, still hearing the labored breathing in her helmet. Then a metallic clank—the sound of the hatch to the airlock?

  “Bob? Kennedy? Get in here quick! Hurry. Lex wasn’t wearing a suit.” Valkerie pushed across the deck to the command station. It was vacant.

  “Lex?” She followed the curve around the stairwell and almost bumped into her crewmate—floating in the corridor, her body limp.

  “Lex!” Valkerie unfolded the rescue bubble while quickly assessing her crewmate’s condition. Lex’s skin was red and blotchy, her mouth open. Valkerie could see the saliva boiling off her tongue. She seemed to be conscious ... barely.

  Valkerie shoved Lex into the bubble and zipped it shut. She pulled out the release pin, and the bag slowly inflated. Lex floated inside the plastic bubble, still not moving. She had oxygen, but Valkerie didn’t remember how long it was supposed to last. The rescue bubbles were a holdover from the early shuttle days. They were designed for emergencies—not long-term survival. Nowadays NASA mainly used them to test ASCANs for symptoms of claustrophobia.

  Valkerie let go of the bubble and pulled herself to the main cabin.

  “Bob? Kennedy? Are you there?” she shouted into her comm link. “If you can hear me, Lex is still alive. I put her in a rescue bubble. We don’t have much time.”

  Valkerie turned up the volume on her helmet again. The breathing hadn’t quit. If anything, it was even heavier. Whoever it was could be going into shock. Tetany? No matter how serious it was, she couldn’t do a thing to help until she got the cabin repressurized.

  “Guys? I’m guessing that the explosion occurred near Solar Panel B, so I’m checking there first for the hull breach.” Valkerie paused and visualized the layout of the Hab. If she was right, then the explosion occurred somewhere at the base of the main cabin wall. Great. The whole wall was lined with racks of white stowage bins. Spotting the leak wasn’t going to be easy.

  Valkerie yanked on the stowage bins, sending them and their contents flying into the cabin. Soon the whole room was a swirling mass of food packets, empty bins, and equipment.

  “I sure could use some help in here!” Valkerie swiped at the volume dial and got an earful of breathing. It sounded bad, but at least ... somebody ... was still alive. Why wasn’t the other one answering? She pushed the thought aside. One thing at a time.

  Valkerie tore at another set of bins and shined her flashlight back through the metal scaffolding. There were so many floaties in the room that she almost didn’t see it. A long half-inch-wide gap in a welded seam.

  “Found it!” She shouted so loud, it hurt her own ears.

  Valkerie dove through the swirling stew, pushing the bins aside with the sweeping strokes of a swimmer. She was in the lower deck shop in an instant, digging franticly through the supplies. Surely they thought to pack a metal plate!

  Forget it. There isn’t time! Valkerie grabbed the oxyacetylene torch and pushed away from the shop, pounding on the walls as she floated by. Plastic. Plastic. Curse NASA! Everything was made of plastic. Plastic or Nomex.

  Valkerie paused at the hatch to the stairwell. This was going to have to do. She lit the torch and adjusted it so that its flame was an almost invisible cone of blue. Shielding her eyes with her arm, she cut through the metal of the heavy hatch door, guiding the torch slowly in the shape of a warped rectangular plate.

  “Got it!” She jumped back to keep the hot metal plate from floating into her. It was hot enough to melt right through an EVA suit.

  Picking the plate out of the air with a pair of pliers, Valkerie leaped up the stairwell and pushed her way through the cluttered main cabin to the empty racks that lined the wall. She wedged the hot metal plate between a rack and the floor to hold it and tried to pry the rack from the wall. No use. It was bolted solid. But somehow she had to get back there to fix the breach.

  Valkerie flipped on the torch and started cutting her way through the scaffolding, one bar at a time. “Guys? Are you still there?” She jammed a hot bar into an empty bin and started on another one. One more and she’d be able to get to the wall.

  Valkerie turned up the volume another notch as she worked, listening for the breathing. Still there. A pang stabbed through her. What if Lex died? What if she were left alone with Kennedy?

  The last bar came free, and she pushed aside the thought. She couldn’t allow herself to panic. One thing at a time, and her first job was to repair the breac
h in the hull. Valkerie retrieved the metal plate and pushed herself through the opening in the rack. The gash in the hull was longer than she had first thought. It ran almost eight inches along a welded metal seam. The plate she had cut was barely long enough.

  She placed the metal plate over the seam and laid down four beads with an aluminum feeder rod, then checked her watch. They were running out of time. It would take a while for the cabin to repressurize.

  “Okay, guys. Hold tight. I’m coming to get you.”

  Valkerie wriggled out of what remained of the rack and pulled herself to the stairs. The pressurized suit fought her every move.

  She headed straight for the oxygen tanks. Terrific. The tanks that fed the fuel cells were almost full. They had better be enough. It was a big ship.

  Valkerie screwed open the valve and jumped back as a liquid oxygen geyser filled the room with a white cloud.

  “Okay, guys!” She pulled herself to the hatch of the airlock. Good, the outer door was secure. Valkerie overrode the fail-safe and threw open the hatch. Her heart double-thumped. There was only one man inside.

  “Bob?” Valkerie’s voice was a shriek. “Kennedy?”

  The man didn’t move.

  Valkerie grabbed a leg and hauled the suited figure into the ship.

  He kicked out and caught her square in the chest.

  She lurched backward and slammed against the wall.

  He kicked his feet and thrashed his arms wildly to right himself.

  “Hey. Calm down!” Valkerie worked herself above the man and shined her flashlight into his faceplate.

  Wild, terror-filled eyes stared back at her. It was Kennedy.

  “Kennedy! Where’s Bob?” Valkerie held their faceplates together, trying to stare some sense into him.

  Kennedy clamped his eyes shut, squeezing out twin pools of tears.

  “What happened to Bob?” Valkerie shook Kennedy to make the words sink in.

  Kennedy’s eyes went wide with recognition and surprise. He opened his mouth to speak but clamped it shut again with a grimace. His eyes rolled to the side, then closed in concentration. “I don’t ...” His breathing was getting heavier.

  “What happened to Bob?”

  “I ... think ... dead,” he said between hoarse pants. “Killed ... in the explosion.” He turned his head, twisting his face in an expression of agony.

  “No!” Valkerie pushed Kennedy away from her and scrambled into the airlock. No! It couldn’t be. She sealed the hatch and hit the pumps to evacuate the chamber. He was lying. She’d seen it in his eyes. He had to be lying.

  The pressure gauge needle moved to zero, and Valkerie threw the outer hatch open. Space opened up around her like a dizzying black pool. She attached her tether and pulled herself along the side of the ship, sweeping its length with her eyes.

  “Come on, Bob. You can do it. Hold on a little while longer.”

  Valkerie pulled herself to the point of the explosion—a crater in a twisted mass of metal, foam, and plastic. She scanned the area with her flashlight, taking in the scene with terrifying clarity. The solar panel was gone. And so was Bob.

  Valkerie gulped hard and blinked against the tears that welled in her eyes. Too late! She should have come out right away.

  She closed her eyes. Think! Lex needed her. She had to get back into the ship.

  Valkerie pulled herself back to the hatch. She knew she should maintain contact with Kennedy, but she was too sick to talk. To him anyway. Her right hand snagged on a line, and she had to pause to untangle herself.

  What was Kennedy hiding? What hadn’t he ... ? Valkerie yanked on the other line. A tether! Something was attached to it—she could feel its weight moving toward her from the other side of the ship. She tugged at the line, reeling it in as fast as she could move her sore, trembling hands. A white blob moved toward her through the shadow of the ship.

  “Bob?” Valkerie went rigid, stunned by the still white specter that floated ominously toward her. “Bob?”

  The body struck her a glancing blow, wrenching her hands free of the ship.

  She tumbled backward into the void, her mind frozen in a gut-wrenching scream. Grappling with the body, fighting against the waves of revulsion that pounded against her, she floated out into an inky black sea.

  Valkerie clung to a lifeless leg. It was real. Solid. A stay against the overwhelming grip of oblivion. She took a deep breath and felt her reason returning. She and Bob were still attached to the ship. As long as their tethers didn’t break, they would be okay.

  Valkerie reached out with one hand and felt for her safety line. One gentle tug propelled them back to the ship. She clipped Bob’s secondary tether to her own EVA belt and pulled herself toward the hatch, dragging Bob behind her like a giant helium balloon.

  She opened the hatch and pulled Bob into the airlock with her.

  He was stiff, lifeless.

  She sealed the hatch and flipped the pressure equalization switch. It took only five seconds for the pressure gauge needle to stop moving. Apparently the cabin didn’t have much pressure.

  Valkerie threw open the hatch and pushed Bob into the dim interior of the ship. She searched his suit for punctures. The arms and chest were blackened, and a few shiny specks of metal were embedded in the suit, but on the whole the damage didn’t look too bad. She swallowed hard and shined her flashlight into his facemask. Bob’s features were frozen in a deathlike pall.

  She pulled the helmet to her, hugging the glass dome to her chest. She couldn’t know for sure. Not until the cabin pressure was high enough. But if Bob wasn’t already dead, he was getting there. Fast.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Friday, April 4, Year Three, 6:00 P.M.

  Bob

  BOB DRIFTED LAZILY UPWARD IN a sea of pain. He could sense the surface as he floated higher, higher, higher. Finally, his face broke the surface.

  His eyes fluttered open.

  “Bob! Can you hear me?” Valkerie’s voice battered his ears.

  He blinked, winced. His skull felt as if somebody had buried an ax in it. The whole right side of his rib cage throbbed.

  “Kaggo! Are you alive?” Kennedy asked. “Talk to us, buddy!”

  “Where am I?” Bob tried to raise his head.

  “Relax,” Valkerie ordered. “You’ll find it hard to move in your EVA suit anyway.”

  “Help me ... take it off.” He motioned feebly with his hands.

  “Not yet,” Kennedy said. “We lost pressure in the Hab. We’re repressurizing from the reserves, but it’s not coming up very fast.”

  “What about Lex?” Bob asked. “She’s not in a suit!”

  “We put her in a rescue bubble,” Valkerie said. “There was no time after the explosion to put her in a suit.”

  “What explosion?” Bob closed his eyes and reopened them. Nothing made sense. Why were the lights so dim? Why did his head ache? What was with his ribs?

  “Bob, do you remember testing the wires on the solar panel?” Valkerie asked. “There was an explosion and we lost pressure in the Hab.”

  It was starting to come back now. The wires. The multimeter. The flash before blackness. Bob stared vacantly. “Bomb ... that was a bomb, wasn’t it?”

  “We don’t know that,” Kennedy said. “Blast this stupid pressure indicator! What’s going on? We’re only up to three hundred millibars!”

  “Lex doesn’t have much air in that bubble,” Valkerie said. “Can we pop it open and give her a breather?”

  “Not yet,” Kennedy insisted. “We need four-fifty, at least.”

  “What’s taking so long?” Valkerie asked.

  “I told you, I don’t know,” Kennedy said. “Aren’t you listening? It’s not coming up. That’s all I know. Kaggo, can you take a look at this?”

  Bob raised his hand in the air and waved it. “Help me up. I’ll try.”

  “Stay still,” Valkerie ordered. “You’ve got a concussion, probably some bruised ribs.”

  Bob waved f
eebly at Kennedy. “Get the pressure up. We can’t leave Lex in that bubble very long.”

  “I’m working on it.” Kennedy slammed his palm on the computer. “I don’t get it. Something’s wrong here. We’re pumping Nitrox out, but the pressure’s coming up too slow.”

  “We’ve got a leak, then,” Bob said.

  “We had a leak,” Valkerie said. “I patched it.”

  “Try releasing some of the helium reserves,” Bob suggested. “That’ll speed things up.”

  “We’re gonna be singing like sopranos.” Kennedy tapped some keys and waited a minute. “Okay, we’re up to four hundred. Valkerie, head upstairs and get ready to check on Lex.”

  Valkerie disappeared up the stairwell. “Let me know the second it’s okay to open her bubble.”

  “Here it comes, here it comes,” Kennedy said through clenched teeth. “Four-thirty. Come on baby, move!”

  Bob pushed against the floor and slowly rotated up and forward.

  “Four-forty, let’s go, let’s go,” Kennedy ordered. “Four-fifty. Valkerie, you are go to open Lex’s bubble, but get her on a breather quick.”

  “Roger that.” Valkerie’s voice sounded clipped and cold.

  “Say, Hampster,” Bob said. “Are we clear to take off these helmets?”

  “You can, but I’d like to get the pressure up higher.”

  Bob’s pulse pounded in his skull. Valkerie had said he probably had a concussion. Because of the explosion. Because of the bomb.

  And a bomb implied a bomber. Which meant what? Sabotage? Bob felt sick to his marrow. The bomb had depressurized the hull. Somebody had tried to kill them. Who? Asian terrorists? European nationalists? An inside job?

  Whoever did it had access to space-rated explosives. Not easy to get. But once upon a time ... two pyros went missing from Energy Sytems. They’d never been recovered. Was it possible? Were two pyros enough?

  “Five hundred millibars,” Kennedy said. “Valkerie, report on Lex.”