“That is not good.”
“Nope.” Jake looked away.
“But you, you are not sick?”
“No. Something like this came through when I was a kid. I think I must have been immunized.”
“I feel very hot. Can you get me some water please, Jake?”
Jake got a cup and ran water from the tap. Zeke sucked it down, then started to cough terribly. Jake lifted Zeke up, trying to help him breath.
“I don’t really want to die, Jake,” Zeke said as the coughing abated. “I have so much to do. There is so much fun still to be had.”
“You won’t die. You’ll pull through. You’ll see. You’ll survive long enough to get thrown out the air lock with me,” Jake joked. He thought he caught a small smile cross Zeke’s lips as he closed his eyes.
“Thank you, Jake. You are a good friend.”
“You’re welcome,” Jake said, trying not to let the tears get the better of him. “You have been a good friend too. I’ve had fun. I mean, it’s been difficult. Tiring. Embarrassing. Humiliating. But sometimes fun.”
Jake watched his best friend fall asleep, possibly for the last time. Jake watched for a long time before he was sure he was still breathing. The room was hot, and stank. He was thirsty, tired, and probably dying.
And when he died, Suzanne would say “Good old Jake. He was very nice.”
Zeke didn’t wake up the next morning. He was still breathing, but it was very shallow. Jake tried to give him some water, but he mostly choked on it. Using his fingers and a spoon he eventually got the door controls off the wall, but the door was mechanically locked from outside, so he couldn’t bypass the lock.
When Jake checked on the techs in the evening, one had died. The other died soon after. Zeke still wouldn’t take water.
The next morning, the door opened and three crewmen in locked softsuits stood outside. One had a shotgun pointed at Jake.
“Into the head. Narin, check them out.”
Jake retreated into the bathroom, hands held high.
They checked the two techs and dragged them out into the hall without a word. They checked Zeke for a pulse.
“This one’s still alive.”
“Leave him there. No room in the infirmary.” The men began to walk out of the room
“Wait.” Jake said. “You have to help him,” But the men just backed out and locked them in.
Jake sat with Zeke for the next twenty-four hours. Jake had access to a full selection of RGB trays with a microwave slot, so he had plenty to eat and drink. He tried to feed Zeke, but he could barely swallow water. The techs’ beds stank. Jake tried to clean the couches where they had defecated with water from the tap, but it did little to help the smell.
It was a long night. The power fluctuated twice, and Jake heard a collision alarm sound for a full ten minutes before it turned off. An hour before normal breakfast time he felt the ship fire thrusters with no warning. The comms didn’t work, or no one was answering, and the door remained locked. Jake had no idea what was going on.
But by mid-day Zeke was somewhat better. Weak, but his fever had lessened and he could swallow without choking. He’d fouled himself as well, so Jake dragged him into the shower and helped him hose himself down. They had water rations for four people on the meter, so Jake made the most of it.
They sat there all day. Jake began to sweat. He was getting sick.
Zeke woke up in the afternoon. “Thank you for taking care of me, Jake.”
“Don’t worry about it. You’ll be able to return the favor. I’m getting sick.”
“Are you sure? I thought you were immunized.”
“I’m sweating. I must be getting sick. That’s the first symptom, right?”
“No, coughing and runny eyes. That’s what I had.”
“Huh, different people get different symptoms I guess.”
“It's not a symptom. It’s just hot in here.”
“What?”
“We’re just heating up. It must be 40 Celsius in here. “
“That does not sound right.”
Jake thought about this. He was hot, but he hadn’t begun coughing and he didn’t feel weak. “Uh oh,” Jake walked over to the air vent and stuck his hand next to it. There was no airflow. He put his ear to it for a moment. “No sounds, no air. The vents are closed. Somebody sealed the different parts of the ship off from each other.”
“So, why are we not dead of asphyxiation?” Suzanne asked, fanning herself. She had stripped down to her underwear and was still sweating.
“It’s a big ship. They sealed the different decks from each other, but there is still air circulating around. Normally you don’t die from lack of oxygen but rather an excess of carbon monoxide. But if there aren’t a lot of people here, then we won’t breath out much. We can live for a long time in this big a deck, particularly if there are only a few of us,” Nadine said. She was also nearly nude and still sweating.
“But why the heat?”
“They turned off the air circulation, and there are all sorts of electrical equipment, microwaves, comm units, computers, and people. We all produce heat and there’s nowhere for it to go.”
“So, we will bake to death?”
“Not quickly. Some of the heat will radiate out to space. What’s that?”
There was a clacking sound outside the door.
Nadine and Suzanne jumped up and stood in front of the door. It slowly ground open, revealing a very thin, very pale-faced man staring at them. He stopped when he realized he was facing two sweaty girls in their underwear.
Nadine smiled at him. “You’re here! Thank god. We were so worried.” She leaned forward and kissed him on the lips, pulling his head toward her.
He stepped back, confused.
“Mmmph. Oh, baby, are you as hot as I am?” Nadine said. She carefully put one foot behind his leg, then leaned down forward and pushed.
The man tripped over her foot and hit his head—bump—on the floor. His eyes closed.
Nadine smiled. “Hormones. Gets them every time.” She grabbed the man and began to drag him into the cabin. “Get some clothes on, and we’ll go get your brother and rule-book boy and get out of here.”
Chapter 15
Jake and Zeke were sitting playing cards with a pack they had found in one of the engineering tech’s bag when the door opened. Suzanne stood there.
“Zeke! Jake! Are you okay?”
“Yes. I was sick, but I’m much better. Jake got me through. What about you?” Zeke asked as he got up and embraced his sister.
“Nadine and I did not get sick,” Suzanne said. “I guess we were lucky.”
Nadine walked in behind Suzanne and flashed a smile at Zeke, then she winked at Jake.
“Hello, Nadine,” Jake said.
“Hello, Jakey boy.”
“You two know each other?” Zeke asked.
“Oh, we’ve met. She shot me, kidnapped me with her starship, chained me to a bunk, and made me help her steal a cache of old empire weapons.”
Nadine smiled at Zeke. “And that was just our first date. It gets even better after that.”
“Brother, Nadine has offered me a job,” Suzanne said, turning back to Zeke.
“Doing what?” Zeke said.
“Being a pirate. Sorry, being a corporate operative,” she said, nodding to Nadine.
Nadine shrugged. “They are very similar. It’s kind of a situational difference really. Your sister said she burned down a bar. That sounds like the kind of person I need working with me. She also said that you beat up a guy so that you would get arrested and put in the Militia, and that you like to do exciting things. If that’s true, I might be able to offer you employment as well. That is, provided we get off this disease-infested hell hole.”
“And how do you propose we do that?” Jake asked.
“It’s simple. The captain told me that he had ‘arrested’ both of our ships, and put the crews on the Onion. He also arrested all of our PGM’s. He d
idn’t have enough trained crew to pilot the two captured ones, so he was going to tow them alongside. There are two other ships out there. Probably no measles ridden corpses on them, either.”
“How can you know that?”
“Well, thinking back, Sue was coughing and seating before we ever got caught by the Onion. So, I think she brought it onboard, not you. I say we get my ship and fly our butts as far away as possible,” Nadine said. “But first, we’re going to get my PMGs.”
“What about the crew on board the Bountiful Onion?” Jake said. “We need to get these people to a station before they all die.”
“Jake, not to put too fine a point on it, unless you are a doctor with a bunch of pills or something, the ones who are sickest will all die anyways. At least, the ones who aren’t already dead. And besides, forty-eight hours ago they promised to heave you out an airlock without a suit.”
“You convinced the captain I was a pirate.”
“I may have embellished it a bit, but I figured he’d just lock you up and let me go. I didn’t think he’d order you dead.”
“Nadine, we can’t just let everybody die. We need to see if anybody needs help.”
“You first, Jakey,” Nadine said.
“Fine,” Jake said. He shoved his way past Nadine and marched out into the hallway. He began searching the corridors and other rooms, Nadine followed, arguing. Suzanne helped support Zeke as they followed close behind. They found eight corpses in four different cabins just in the first corridor.
Vidal was the second one.
“Well, shit,” Jake said.
“Friend of yours?” Nadine asked.
“He was our boss. He was an ass. Wanted to space me.”
“Why didn’t you kill him first?”
“What?”
“If he was going to kill you, why not get him first?”
“I don’t do that, Nadine.”
“I know. Big character flaw on your part, Jakey. Say, do you like that girl?” Nadine nodded her head to the corridor where Suzanne was sitting with Zeke as he rested.
“What?”
“Suzanne. She kind of likes you, but she thinks you’re a bit boring.”
“Boring?”
“Anytime I talk to you for a long period of time, Jake, you end up just repeating what I say.”
“Thanks.”
“Are you sorry he’s dead?” Nadine said, indicating Vidal’s body in front of them.
Jake looked at Vidal’s body. He thought a long time before saying anything.
“A little. But he would have killed me, I think, if he could have gotten away with it.”
“Well, that’s progress of a sort, I guess. You still should have killed him, Jake.”
“You know I couldn’t do that.”
Jake stepped out to break the news to Suzanne. She took it surprisingly well, considering how close Jake thought they had come during their time on the Petrel.
They kept searching the cabins, looking for somebody alive. None of the cabins were locked and they all had working comms, but they couldn’t get anyone to answer on board and they couldn’t get a line out to the other two ships.
They found the rest of Nadine’s crew, Big D, in one of the cabins. He lay on his back, eyes open and staring at the ceiling.
“Poor bastard,” Nadine said. “He once told me he was planning on getting killed in a shootout in a bar over a girl.”
“A shootout over a girl?”
“Ideally two girls, he said,” Nadine stepped forward and carefully closed his eyes. “Free trades, Big D. You weren’t very smart, but you were useful.” She sighed. “What an epitaph, huh, Jake. Not very smart, but useful.”
“I guess mine would be ‘Nice, but boring,’” Jake said.
“Ha! That’s true,” Nadine agreed. “Wow, who would have thought you could crack a joke at a time like this. You should work on that, Jake.”
They tried to climb to the deck above, but the hatch wouldn’t open. It appeared to be mechanically jammed. They turned and tried to go back down the ship and were able to make it into the cargo decks and the connector tunnel before the lights went out. The emergency power came on.
“This is not good,” Jake said.
“No, it’s not,” Nadine said.
They climbed back up to the cargo deck, collected the others, and found a working computer with access to the ship’s logs.
“There are a number of general notices on the ship bulletin board,” Jake said as he typed into the system. “The first officer has sent several. He says it’s definitely measles. Crewmen who do not have ‘Inoculation 73’ will probably catch it. They were shaping course for the Roundhouse station at best acceleration—.5G—for medical assistance.”
“That’s good news.”
“That lasted for two more shifts. The first officer seemed in control of the situation.”
“That’s good. Then what,” Nadine urged, looking over Jake’s shoulder.
“Then he’s dead. And a bunch of others.”
“Crap.”
“The captain took over. He cut power to everywhere except the bridge and engineering and ordered each section of the ship to isolate themselves from the others.”
“That’s what happened last night. That is why it was so hot,” Suzanne said. Zeke was sitting with his back against a wall next to her. He looked pale still, but better then he’d looked a day ago.
“He also cut off external communication for some reason,” Jake continued. “So, we can’t call anyone else.”
“What an idiot,” Nadine said.
“He’s afraid of getting sick, I think. He sent out an emergency transmission, though. But…looks like he sent it the wrong direction. No one is going to receive that message for a long time.”
“So, why is the power out now?” Zeke asked. “And where are the rest of the crew? Are they all dead?”
“I don’t know. Circuit breaker blew maybe? There’s nothing here,” Jake said. “There’s no more posts after that.”
“How are the computers working then?”
“Different circuit. They are tied into the bridge.”
“Well, at least it is not as hot as before,” Suzanne said.
Jake and Nadine looked at each other.
“What?” Suzanne asked.
“That’s bad,” Jake said. “Each deck has heaters. That’s what was keeping all of us warm. Them and all the electrical equipment, pumps, screens, stuff like that on each deck. But with the power to the deck shut off, we’re cooling down.
“How cold will it get?” Suzanne asked.
“Eventually, two hundred degrees below zero maybe?”
“What should we do, then?”
“Well, we cannot stay here,” Zeke said. “I do not want to survive measles only to freeze to death. We need to go somewhere. We need a ship.”
“Mine has a great autopilot, and we can get out of here in a hurry,” Nadine offered.
“You are forgetting that your engines got shot to pieces,” Jake said.
“Just the nozzles.”
“Can’t steer without them, they direct the particle stream,”
“Spoilsport. You can fix them.”
“No I can’t, and even if I could it will take time. Lots of time. We should take the Petrel. It’s bigger. More fuel capacity.”
“Takes a bigger crew to run. There are only four of us. Can you pilot it?”
“Not really,” Jake admitted. “But you can.”
“Maybe. What’s in it for me?”
“Not dying?”
“It’s you they are going to space, buddy. I’m just along for the ride, and I’m willing to get off this death ship, but really, why do I need to leave? Far as I can tell, I’m immune to this disease. I could just stay here and wait till everybody gets better. Or somebody, or nobody. Then take my complaint about being pirated by a TGI ship coreward.”
“Nobody will believe you. And if they do check the records, they’ll find out you fired
first. ”
“Could be. But maybe they won’t. Either way I don’t get spaced.”
“Jake, come over here please,” Suzanne called from another screen.
“Yes, what?”
“I found a navigation screen. What does this mean, this red thing here on our course vector.”
“That’s the collision notification. It says…it says we’re gonna hit something if we continue on this course.”
“Is that not bad?”
“Yes, but we won’t hit for another two hours. We’ll worry about that in a minute. Nadine.”
Nadine folded her arms across her chest. “What?”
“If Zeke, Suzanne and I stay, when everyone gets better, they’ll space us. We need to get away from here, far enough away that we can send a message for help and not get caught. The Petrel is our best bet. I can fix the broken control runs on the Petrel, but I can’t fix the busted drive nozzle on your ship.”
“So?”
“You can take a chance on freezing if you want, but we’re taking our ship and going. We need to get somewhere to send help for everyone on this ship. If anyone’s still alive, we need to try and help them. The Petrel is the best way to do that. If you pilot us away from here, we’ll drop you off somewhere safe.”
“You’d trust me to do that?”
“Nope. But I can navigate. I’ll know where you are driving us.”
“Excuse me,” interrupted Zeke. “But I have a question about this collusion thing. We will hit something, correct?”
“Collision. Yes, but not for hours, and we’ll just steer around it,” Nadine said.
“But we have no power, which means no engines, correct? How will we steer around it? And who will steer around it—you say most of the crew are dead. And how will we engage the steering? Who is on the bridge to issue the commands.”
“Crap,” Nadine and Jake said together.
It took ten minutes to find the emergency access tunnel Vidal had shown them, and another thirty minutes to crawl down the tunnel to the engineering section, where the backup engine controls would be. They needed to open three different hatches but the central computer had locked them all shut when the captain disconnected the sections. Jake had to pry the control panels off and open them manually. Finally, they made it to the last hatch in front of engineering.
Orbital Claims Adjuster: Adventures of a Jump Space Accountant Book 2 Page 18