Farlost: Arrival
Page 18
“Yeah!” she shouted as the Toad roared around her.
She ignored the stars dancing outside the cockpit in her peripheral vision and goosed thrusters for another minute. Only then did she look up. The stars around here were stable pinpricks of light, no longer a riot of fireflies. She looked back, and there were the silver spots of light that were the Betty and Six…and behind that, the Thorn.
She panted for another minute, as her mind replayed the jockeying she’d just done to get the tram to level out and fly straight. Then she slammed her harness release.
“C&C, am now flying on the arranged vector. Tram still secure. Am ready for EVA.”
Rose Okoro’s voice acknowledged, but another voice joined hers: Commander Montagne. “That was some pretty flying, Rodriguez. Look, you don’t know what you’re heading into any better than we do. Just use your eyes and try to scare up some good sense? And keep this line open.”
No pressure, Dina thought. “Yes, Commander. Line to remain open. I’ll audible anything critical.”
She eyed the atmosphere gauge the cabin: zero pressure. All pumped out and stored for later. She bunched her shoulders, at once tight from fear of the unknown…and excitement.
She grinned, She’d always had the good and the bad messed up in her head, at least that’s what the Doc told her in bed, after. But he said it with a grin on his face so she didn’t care none.
“Disconnecting from Toad life support.”
She unplugged the umbilical from the stiff back of her spacesuit, ignored the flashing amber light on her heads up display and shimmied into the air tanks mounted on the wall beside her pilot’s chair. She found the armored cable and pushed it home, feeling the cool hiss of the air it contained mingling with the warmer stuff inside her suit.
She clipped the safety line at the back top edge of the cockpit onto her suit, reached to the side of her chair and slid the transparent cover away from the big red button.
She swing the cockpit controls down, tugged the screen aside and stepped on the first metal stop leading up to the top of the cockpit. “Perdona nuestras ofensas,” she muttered, more out of habit than faith, and slammed her hand down.
The domed cockpit glass raised itself. No debris flew loose to topple Dina, and she let go of the chair and put her hand on the outside lip of the now open cockpit. “Beginning walk,” she muttered, for the benefit of protocol and the nervous ears back in C&C.
She shook the line at the back of the cockpit free of the chair, snaked it through two metal clips just inside the cockpit near the front and stepped up again.
After placing her other hand on the lip, she dragged her body up and over, tugging with her abs to point her toes back down. She sunk down, down, and then her feet touched the unyielding black alloy skin of the tram.
She took a series of paced breaths as she untied another line from the hip where it had been strapped and clipped it to a ring on the Toad’s left-most metal arm.
A quick test later, she unclipped herself from the line into the cabin and, before she could get the sweats, launched herself up to grab the same rod that the metal arm was locked around.
It held, of course, and she pulled herself end over end towards the bottom of the toad where the rods disappeared around the edge of the tram.
She yawned, cracking her jaw and dispelling the pressure in her ear, then whistled unconsciously as she pulled herself, hand over hand, the few meters it took to get to the end of the heavily dented and impacted surface. There she found a long ladder, complete with D-rings on either side.
She drew a carabiner from a pocket on her left thigh and clipped it around the d-ring, then around the rope.
She realized she was still whistling but had no idea the song, and she was sweating profusely. “C&C, I’m guessing you’re about to tell me my biometrics are through the roof. I’m good, can we skip that?”
Rose answered. “Commander Montagne says she’d be worried if you weren’t pissing yourself.”
Dina laughed, and at that moment she pulled herself over the lip on the ladder.
And jerked to a stop in front of a wide window.
Inside was a lobster, a rich dude’s sculpted shrub, and two wild west tumbleweeds.
They were all shaking extremities toward her through the window.
Waving at her, she realized.
Wriggling antenna on the lobster’s head touched the window when it came close enough to fog the glass, or whatever. After tentacles whipped out from the tumbleweed things and slapped the window, something wet was left behind.
Dina watched the shrub cock its head right at her…even though she could see right through the empty spots where a human being’s eyes should be.
The lobster turned and raised what looked like a smaller claw on a middle arm towards the shrub, which raised a branch that looked just like a man’s arm, splayed five fingers and gave the taller lobster thing a high five.
“Uh, C&C? They look…happy to see me?” She choked out a stunned laugh. “I guess you gotta call this… first contact?”
37
"I'm fine, First!"
Arnel smiled and nodded across the tank at Ron Taggart.
"As fine as any of us, yeah, I think so too," Arnel said. He looked over at Vice President Burkov, where he floated close to another security officer, pulled off emergency repair detail by Montagne herself to escort the man.
They were two tanks down from C&C now, this one last tank, a couple of airlocks and a couple of turns away from the med tank.
Arnel gave an exaggerated shrug. "Well, there's nothing much to do right now, and you are hearing voices." he continued.
Taggart looked away.
"Maybe Doc Sanders can help you find out where those voices are coming from," he murmured again. Ron looked back, his face alive with relief and gratitude.
The smile faltered. "Just wish I didn't feel like I was being locked up."
He looked hurt, Arnel realized.
"Don't think of it like that, Ron. We're not sending you to Sanders because we're afraid you'll, well..." Arnel cast a look back at Burkov. "We're worried about you."
Taggart set his jaw and nodded.
Arnel gauged the approaching airlock and tried to resist his next question.
Taggart snorted. "Don't have to be psychic to read your mind. Nah, I don't know who's comin'. They're not wearing people we knew to talk to me like the lights did. I think they meant well too? But they were ass hats. The people comin' now?. I like 'em. I know they're comin' to help."
Arnel didn't have to ask anything else, as they neared the airlock. He was relieved Ron couldn't read his mind all the time, like he had when he'd tuned in to his memories of his Ina.
As for the rest? Who was coming to help? He'd have to wait.
He trusted Ron Taggart. The man had proven himself, as far as Arnel was concerned. Crazy and weird were relative terms out here. He was starting to come to grips with that.
He looked over his shoulder to where the other security officer, Jon Pruett -impossibly young, blond haired and serious looking all at once- hovered, just a few feet behind Burkov. Pruett was watching Burkov with hard eyes.
Arnel felt sure the diligence was driven by more than Commander's orders: Burkov looked unhinged, with pale skin, red eyes and a visual tremble.
"Hope he's not hearing any voices," Taggart said, low.
Arnel bit back his agreement. This was still a Haskam Vice President they were talking about.
He couldn't wipe off the grin that followed, as he thought again about how much his attitudes had shifted, in light of the calamity that had struck his crew.
Surviving sure changed your world view. He looked back on all his run-ins with the Commander, both Commanders -Ed Dwyer, rest his soul, and Commander Montagne. He'd never really trusted Montagne when Dwyer brought her on board.
Before serving with Dwyer, Villanueva hadn't gotten on with any of the servicemen who'd left the military for the top tier posts Haskam offer
ed. He'd never been able to get rid of his suspicion they'd rather shoot at a problem than resolve it.
Then the shit hit the fan. Hit Dwyer too, and left the crew in Montagne's hands. And she'd stayed calm, made the decisions she needed to fast enough to get Beacham's light show up and running, and save most of the souls on board during unimaginable chaos.
And, much to his surprise, he found he liked the chaos, too.
A little voice in the back of his head warned him writing tickets for corporate infractions wasn't going to feel quite right after he put all this behind him.
Another little voice wondered how the hell they could ever put all this behind them.
He played whack-a-mole with the little voices as they closed on the airlock. He grabbed a hand-hold and quickly turned himself, bleeding off speed.
He felt the vibrations of the engines through his grip, surprised for a moment by their strength.
The ship was still gaining speed, lending a little weight to his body, on top of the little that the Thorn far below was lashing at them. Just enough that if he stood still he'd slowly sink back down towards the airlock -towards what was now 'down' again.
It reminded him of the airplanes Haskam still used to simulate zero g for the new recruits. The 'vomit comets' that would climb high in the sky, then fall fast, negating much of the effects of gravity.
Near the bottom of that fall, gravity would creep back. That was the most dangerous time, when he and the other seasoned spacers would watch out for raw recruits who'd forgotten gravity had only been temporarily suspended, lest they end up with bruised body parts and bruised egos when the plane landed again.
he thought back to what Beacham and the Betty's engineer, Gruber, had said, about how the Thorn was siccing more and more gravity on them to draw them down.
He shuddered, squeezing the handgrip tight and willing the engines, never designed to escape orbit, to do more than their jobs, to get Six and her crew to The Betty McKenna before...
Burkov made an involuntary sound of surprise and Arnel looked back.
"Need a hand, Mister Vice Pres-" he called out to the flailing man, but he managed to stop himself at another hand-hold with a minimum of self injury. Burkov's eyes darted over to him, then to Pruett.
"I can stop myself thank you very much. And I don't need to see a doctor!"
Taggart had the airlock open, and another crewman was flying through, back the way'd they'd come. He wore elbow-length gloves and a tank of emergency pressure sealant on his back.
Arnel traded nods with the man.
"Feels weird, seeing other folks in the halls again, now," Taggart said, and moved tot he side to let the others pass through.
Arnel's nose wrinkled, Ron's words reminding him of the smell of burnt rubber the air scrubbers hadn't managed to remove yet.
It's true, he thought, as he waved Burkov and Pruett through the airlock.
"I'm sorry for the inconvenience, Mr. Vice President," Arnel began again, speaking quietly as the man passed. "Command Montagne and I-"
Burkov's white knuckles grabbed onto the frame of the airlock, and he glared up at Arnel, muscles bulging in his neck with the strain.
"Montagne and you are deciding my fate, and I get no say! People like me and Goss, we built Haskam! Now some ancient law says you get to be in charge, because people like us picked you and paid you?"
Arnel kept the sternness from his face. There it was, the arrogance of the rich. He felt something stir in his gut.
He remembered the squalor of his village in the Philippines as a child, and his determination to remake himself, become someone who had the money and power to care for his loved ones. Remembered his promise to use that power to put an end to the rampant, unchecked abuses and corruption of the public officials selling of his people's heritage -- to people just like Burkov.
Cut to twenty years later, and he'd forgotten those hopes, and moved to the USA, leaving the corruption behind. Leaving the village and all the people who'd raised him as a boy, behind.
Amazing what a near-death experience reminded you of, he thought sourly.
"Move along, Mr. Vice President," Arnel said coldly.
Burkov's face paled again, and he looked away, immediately cowed. Arnel wasn't sorry.
Pruett had stopped on the other side of the lock, watching the VP and his first officer. So fresh-faced and lean in his black work suit with the security department icon on the shoulder, except Arnel could see the twin tensions in his face.
Who do you side with when a command officer who'd been grooming and training you for months was suddenly on the other side of an argument from one of the minor deities of the corporation that controlled your future?
It's always hard, when mommy and daddy fight, Arnel thought and it brought a chuckle to his throat.
"Don't worry, Pruett. Just do your job, and forget about who your escorting." He gently clapped the man on the security-badged shoulder. "Just do what's right. The senior officers will be here to take any heat when we get back home."
Pruett's forehead lines eased. "Yes, sir," he said, expelling a breath, then immediately looked stricken, ducked and hurried through.
Arnel followed, chuckling, and cycled the airlock closed behind him. He stared at the amber flashing light on the panel beside the airlock.
They weren't out of this yet. They didn't even understand what it was they were trying to escape from, yet.
And then there was the matter of getting home, as he had just promised the green officer they would.
He followed the others along the curve of the airlock assemblies connecting the stacked tanks.
He wondered why the life and death struggle was coming so easy to him.
And why the return to the way things were, to the corporate track, filled him with far more dread.
He shook his head to clear it, filing the concern away, knowing they weren't there yet. They were far from normal.
He smiled. "You're fine, Arnel," he told himself. "As fine as any of us." He kicked off to catch up with Taggart and the others.
38
The Betty lurched through space, burning chemical thrusters and reserve engines down to empty tanks. It’s wide, triangular shape, rough-edged with massive red scales along the nose, turned slowly, well in advance of opening its massive cargo doors to HHL-6.
Beneath the massive crystalline dome retrofitted into the bridge of the craft, two men stood stock still, listening intently to a staticky comm line.
Then came a series of tones, and then a cocky woman’s voice: “Betty, this is Rodriguez on the Toad. I’m docked with the tram, I’ve killed its spin and am preparing for controlled burn. If that smart tree of yours and that egg-head of ours can steer straight, you’ll have your crew back in three and a half hours. I’ll bill you later, boys.” Another series of tones, then more static.
Sam’s eyes widened as he watched Gruber’s white teeth emerge from his beard. They cheered and pounded each other on the back.
“They’re comin’ home!” Gruber roared in Sam’s ear as he lifted him off the ground.
She did it! Sam thought, as his engineer slammed him back down onto the deck platings and turned for the console in front of Sam’s captain’s chair.
Sam craned his neck around to stare into the massive holo pit in the centre of his bridge. There, Daisy had projected a representation of The Betty and HHL-6, both following an intersecting path of green chevrons.
Another massive shape was following the same chevron path, rising from below.
The Eternal.
The ships were all shown larger than scale in the holo, for the ease of flesh and blood eyes, and Sam stared, struck by the beauty of the thing.
His body trembled with pressures. They had to get the crew on the tram back, successfully dock the Betty (and her functioning engines) with HHL-6 (and its functioning reactors) and, oh yes, avoid the ship coming in from far above, represented in the holo only by a circular insignia: a gold-bronze shield, bearing
a sun in the middle, surrounded by sixteen stretched teardrop shaped rays.
In the face of all of it, still he took time to stare down in wonder.
The ship was even bigger than the ancient sky cities - a work of art in its own right, and a mystery of the ages, had come miraculously alive, and was now boosting out of its prison of gravity, deep down close to the Thorn.
His eyes trailed along its arches, down one of its massive wings. “What are you doing? Why now?” he murmured. “Daisy, is the Eternal on course for us?” What he wanted to ask was, was this a conscious decision, was something on that ship trying to boost free while the Thorn was distracted by us?
Gruber grunted over his display. “Helluva long time to play possum,” he growled.
Daisy’s disembodied voice answered, projected all around him. “Tracking data is not yet complete, however an intercept course is still a possibility.”
Gruber slammed a meaty palm on the console. “Could you maybe focus on the other blip, the one up there?” He pointed at the sigil within a circle. “We’ve got eighty hours before that ship’s close enough to hug us or kill us. Care to guess which?”
Sam actually laughed. “Plenty of time for Betty and her dancing partner to slingshot around the Thorn, pick up speed and shoot off.”
Gruber’s shoulders heaved as he drew a deep breath. “At least people haven’t gotten lazy about throwing rocks at Guard surveillance platforms. Nothing around this Thorn but junk. Guess someone somewhere’s having a little rebellion, if they haven’t fixed ‘em yet.” The engineer stabbed a finger at the insignia. “If that is the guard, they’re gonna be blind on the backside of this Thorn.” He nodded, but still didn’t look happy. “A lotta if’s, but yeah. We might get away yet.”
Sam looked away from the angelic silver sculpture and breathed deep, making himself ignore it.