Mothership Read online

  Once we’re inside the hangar, our target will be the docking nozzle on the far end—a long, thin accordion-like sleeve that attaches to the shuttlecraft and leads to the ship’s promenade/reception deck. Problem is, the nozzle hangs at least ten meters off the floor as well, and there’s no ladder on that end, so in order to reach it we’re going to have to make our way across the zero grav environment without floating away. Which isn’t going to be a picnic, considering that the hangar is easily the length of three soccer fields. Assuming I have any sense of how long a soccer field is, which, given the number of times I ditched phys ed, is doubtful.

  But I digress.

  It is absolutely frigid in here, and the room is so tight, with all of us stuffed like a package of drugstore undies, that I’m already feeling slightly suffocated, but I know it will be a hundred times worse after Captain Bob wheels open the hatch and all our breathable air is sucked out at once.

  “Okay. Now, we’re only going to get one shot at this,” Captain Bob tells us in his best authoritative-guy-in-charge voice. He is busy fussing with the length of cable we used to climb down here. “Once I open the hatch, it will be one, maybe two minutes before we can take another breath.”

  There is a metallic clang as Bob secures one end of the cable to the turn wheel on the hatch door. He yanks on the knot a few times as he continues to lay out the plan.

  “Remember,” he tells us, “there’s virtually no atmosphere in there. No atmosphere means no maneuverability. You can’t swim in zero atmo. This isn’t water. This isn’t even air. There will be no resistance to push off against. So you must hold tight to this cable. Do you all understand?” We all understand, except for possibly Carrie, who snorts at the notion of holding tight to Captain Bob’s cable. “As soon as the hatch is open,” he goes on, “I’ll jump over to there.” He points to the outer hull door, which seals the entrance to the hangar, to the right of our little hatch. “Then from there I’ll push off across the hangar toward the docking nozzle. At that point I’ll secure the cable, and when I give the signal, you girls will need to pull yourselves across as quickly as possible. Archer will take up the rear.”

  Carrie snorts again.

  “When we’re all across, I’ll seal off the docking nozzle and open the door to the promenade. I cannot open the door until everyone is across, or the pressure will blow us all back to where we started. So we need to do this as quickly and cleanly as possible. Are there any questions before we set off?”

  The severity of our situation must finally be sinking in, because for once no one has anything snarky to add.

  Before he opens the hatch, Captain Bob leads us in a series of quick deep breaths, to expel as much carbon dioxide from our lungs as possible. And I’m just feeling like I might actually be able to relax and do this thing, when Cole cranes his neck across Carrie’s shoulder to whisper into my ear.

  “Remember,” he tells me, his warm breath tingly on my cold skin, “the trick isn’t to hold your breath. It’s just to not breathe.”

  That’s my Cole, helpful to the last.

  “All right. I’m unsealing the dock now,” Bob informs us. “Deep breaths, everyone.” And without another word he begins turning the wheel.

  Here goes nothing, I think, and I suck down a lungful of oxygen, pushing the air into the farthest depths of my chest.

  The instant the seal on the hatch breaks, I can feel all the air whoosh out into the hangar. And cheese on a cracker, if I thought it was cold before, it’s downright arctic now. My ears immediately pop from the pressure change, and the sudden wooziness I feel almost makes me involuntarily take a breath, but I stop myself in time. There’s a low humming in my eardrums, but I try to shake my head clear as Captain Bob inches out the hatch door, holding tight to the cable.

  In an instant Bob has launched himself off the hatch toward the outer hangar door. From where I’m standing I can’t quite gauge the distance, but it’s not too far, maybe fifteen meters or so. Once Bob expertly pivots and pushes off the hangar door, he’s lined up perfectly with the docking nozzle at the other end of the hangar bay. He keeps his body stretched out as straight as a board and his arms in front of him, head down like a diver. The cable trails along behind him as he cuts his way across the length of the room.

  As I watch him glide, I feel a chilly sweat form on my brow. Maybe it’s just a trick of perspective, but it seems like Bob’s momentum is slowing and, remembering what he said about the lack of resistance to push off in zero atmo, the length of the hangar in front of him seems to stretch out like that famous retrograde zoom shot from Vertigo. I can’t help but wonder if he’ll make it to the other side or not. I close my eyes and try to follow Cole’s advice about not breathing versus holding my breath. But the more I try to focus, the more that low humming fills my ears.

  I open my eyes in time to see Bob land right on the nozzle, a perfect bull’s-eye. The flexible frame jiggles beneath him. Without wasting a second he attaches his end of the cable to one of the locking mechanisms meant to latch on to a shuttle’s cabin door. Fortunately, the cable has a lot of give to it, and it stretches tautly but adequately across the long distance of the hangar bay.

  Britta scoots out into the hangar first, gripping the cable tightly as she pulls herself toward Captain Bob, hand over hand. It’s probably only been about thirty seconds since Captain Bob unsealed the hatch door, but already this whole not breathing thing is getting to be a real pain in the ass. My lungs feel like they’re contracting inside my chest, and my cheeks are beginning to tingle and sting. The urge to take a breath is almost overwhelming, but I focus instead on the line of girls crawling out onto the cable. Other Cheerleader follows Britta, then Heather.

  Natty’s next, but she’s hesitating. Her eyes are as big as saucers, taking up her entire face, and for a moment I’m worried that she’s going to panic completely. But then Ramona, behind her, reaches out a hand in Natty’s direction, and I can tell from the look on Nat’s face that she thinks Ramona’s going to slap her just like she did on the basketball courts. But she doesn’t. Instead Ramona gives Natty’s arm a good squeeze, and Natty nods, presses her lips together, and takes hold of the cable. I smile as she monkeys across it quickly, like a real pro. The end of the cable jangles against the turn wheel on the hatch door as she goes, the sound of metal on metal echoing in the empty chamber. Ramona shimmies out behind her, and one by one the other girls follow. In a matter of seconds it’s down to just Danielle, Carrie, Cole, and me. My chest is pumping, aching for air, and my limbs are almost numb with cold. But I know I can do it. Just a few dozen seconds more, and we’ll all be safely on the other side.

  Danielle has just climbed out onto the cable when it happens. The cable pops loose from the turn wheel. Danielle, holding tight to her end of the cable, begins to float out into the hangar bay. The girls in front of her, noticing the sudden slack on the cable, scramble forward more quickly than before, and land on the docking nozzle easily, but Danielle is having trouble reeling herself in. She looks like she’s tugging on a string of clown handkerchiefs.

  But at least Danielle has something to hang on to. As Carrie, Cole, and I stand, untethered, teetering on the edge of the hatch door, peering out into the void of the hangar bay in front of us, I’m sure we are all thinking the same thing.

  Shit balls.

  At least, that’s what I’m thinking.

  Carrie tries to close the hatch door, so we can take a breath and form a plan, I guess, but Cole stops her, tugging tight on her arm. Her eyebrows are knitted together, confused and angry, but I understand Cole’s reasoning. There’s no more air left in this room anyway, and there’s no time to reseal the hatch door and get back to the corridor before we run out of oxygen. We have no choice. We have to cross without the cable.

  This notion is just starting to sink its way into my brainpan, when I notice the low humming again. As my ears have adjusted to the depressurization, the humming has only grown louder. And that’s, well, a little unne
rving.

  As I watch Danielle waft closer and closer to the electromagnetic plating on the ceiling, it hits me like a jolt. The ceiling is humming. The electromagnetic plates are turned on.

  I gesture wildly toward Danielle, and Cole, bless him, catches on immediately. Together we push past Carrie to the front of the hatch door and try to get Bob’s attention, waving our arms and pointing at the ceiling. The tingling in my cheeks is growing more intense, whether from lack of oxygen or fear, I’m not sure. Bob’s eyes go wide when he realizes what Cole and I have been trying to tell him, and he frantically redoubles his efforts to reel in the cable—but there’s too much slack, and he can’t pull it in in time. Looking up at Danielle, then back to the girls behind him, he squares his jaw. Then, mind made up, he unfastens the cable from the locking mechanism. As he tosses it clear of the docking nozzle, Danielle’s head begins to shake frantically, and she continues to waft up, up, up toward the ceiling—unaware, I hope, of the impending danger. I turn away so I don’t have to watch, but hearing it might be worse. The low buzz is steady, terrifying, until suddenly it becomes a buzzzzzzFWIT! that can only be Danielle being zapped like a fly.

  Carrie looks like she wants to ralph, but we have neither the time nor the oxygen that ralphing would require. We must have hit the two-minute mark by now, and my lungs feel ready to burst in my chest. My mouth is dry, and my head is dizzy. I can spot at least two crumpled floating girls in the docking nozzle at the far end of the hangar bay, probably passed out from lack of air. We need to move, and we need to move now.

  With a quick yank Cole pulls Carrie forward and motions toward the main hangar door, instructing her to dive freestyle, just as Captain Bob did with the cable. And, to her credit, Carrie doesn’t hesitate for an instant. She leaps, boobs first, toward the door, and pivots, pushing off for the nozzle. I feel Cole’s surprisingly warm, reassuring hand on my shoulder as he pushes me forward, and then I, too, dive from the hatch door.

  It’s an exhilarating feeling, being weightless, especially after lugging around the Goober these past several months. Every piece of me wants to float away in a different direction. I can’t remember a moment in recent history when my feet have felt so relieved. The floating is awesome, like some sort of crazy dream you don’t want to wake up from, but I can’t afford to revel in it. I need to stay focused.

  When I reach the hangar door, I’m surprised at its iciness, so cold it burns. For one terrifying moment my fingertips stick to the metal, and I worry that I will be trapped there forever, that people will find my dead, suffocated body hanging from a hangar door by my finger pads. But I manage to wrench the skin free, tugging my fingers away with ten tiny, excruciating pinches, and then I pivot, resting my ruined yellow flats against the door. I gaze straight ahead, across the long hangar bay, to the nozzle at the far end, where Captain Bob and the other girls are waiting for me. I do not pay attention to Danielle’s lifeless body floating above me, or the strong smell of burned flesh that is filling my nostrils. With all my might I kick against the hangar door and launch toward the nozzle, my body as straight as a board. I pray that my aim is good. I pray that I won’t miss my mark and crash into the back wall. I’m flying straight and true so far as I can tell, but as I watch the floor fly by beneath me, a noise grabs my attention, and I look up.

  In front of me Carrie is having trouble. Apparently she pushed off at a bad angle, because she’s definitely not headed for the nozzle, where Bob is waiting to grab us. If she stays on course, she’s going to hit the ceiling just like Danielle, with a similarly fried-chicken fate awaiting her. And I guess she’s just noticed this, because she’s trying to turn in midair, grunting slightly with the effort. But without much in the way of an atmosphere to push through, there’s very little to help her change direction. Her arms are flailing, trying to right herself, but even as she manages to stop her upward trajectory and straighten herself out, she can’t seem to do anything for her momentum but spin uselessly like a mag sphere on ice. She’s moving so slowly now, in fact, that I’m not only catching up to her, I’m about to pass her. As I float by, I turn my head and watch her struggle uselessly, kicking and clawing at the air desperately. My first instinct is to reach out and grab her, but I force myself to keep my arms steady. If I lose momentum, we’ll both bite it. And in another moment it’s a moot point, because I’ve passed her by several meters. I crane my neck, unable to look away as she struggles frantically, panic all over her face, and then she tries to breathe, and that’s that.

  By the time I turn around, I realize that by watching Carrie suffocate I’ve changed my own heading, and I’m going to miss the nozzle. Now I’m the one who’s panicked, and it’s all I can do not to cry out and choke to death. I’m off target by less than a meter, but “almost” won’t cut it. If I try to change direction, I risk the same fate I just witnessed for Carrie. I squeeze my eyes shut, stretch my left arm out as far as I can, and pray that Bob can reach me.

  There’s a strong grip on my hand, and with great force I am yanked to the side. I crumple into the nozzle, and as I blink my eyes open and try to gain my bearings, I hear the flap behind me being sealed. Concentrated air rushes into the walkway, and my vision—which I hadn’t realized had gone fuzzy—begins to focus. There’s still no gravity, but I feel strong, warm arms wrapped around me.

  When the face in front of me finally becomes clear, it is Cole. He must have shot past me while I was focused on Carrie. We are intertwined, his blue-green eyes staring into mine, and we are floating.

  “Nice aim,” he says.

  I allow myself my first real breath, then immediately choke on the over-oxygenated air.

  “Nice catch,” I reply, coughing.

  Captain Bob opens the hatch to the promenade, and the more-natural atmosphere breezes in. We all glide through into the large reception area and are greeted immediately by the pull of the artificial gravity. Hello, old friend. With a thump we all land on the ground at once, some of us more gracefully than others.

  Heather, who was one of the girls who fainted from oxygen loss, wakes up when she thumps to the ground. She rubs her eyes clear and gags a little on the air. She seems thrilled at first to be awake again and breathing. And then her face falls. She turns toward the now-sealed hatch. “Where’s Danielle?” she asks.

  When no one has the courage to answer, Heather figures it out. And at the sight of her choking back silent tears, even Britta has a glazed look in her eyes. I guess too much death in one day will hollow anyone out.

  Cole meanwhile attempts to turn lemon powder into lemonade. “Good thing you saw that the mag locks were still online,” he tells me, rubbing my shoulder.

  “Yeah, good thing,” I mutter. I pull back, trying to blink away the image of Danielle’s lifeless floating body. But it’s only replaced with Carrie’s. “Otherwise someone might have gotten hurt.”

  Captain Bob turns then, and looks me straight in the eye. His look is so stern, at first I think he’s going to shout at me. But he doesn’t.

  “If you hadn’t warned us,” he says, “then these girls here”—he sweeps his arms out to Chewie, Heather, Britta, Other Cheerleader, Natty, Ramona, and the others—“would all be dead. As would I. Now is no time for self-pity. Let’s move it!” He claps his hands together loudly, which seems to snap most of the girls out of their slump. Following Bob’s lead, we all head into one of the party rooms off the main promenade. We’re walking a little more slowly than before, but hey, at least we’re walking.

  Back in the ship’s cruise days, the party rooms probably made up a casino, with slot machines and a roulette wheel. Now the rooms are home to more student-friendly video games and several of those god-awful motion-tracking dance machines. There’s not much damage to this part of the ship, so we should be able to pass through quickly. From there we can make our way to the fitness gym, and then hopefully it will be smooth sailing to the captain’s quarters.

  “Which isn’t to say,” Bob says as we walk, apparently conti
nuing on a thought that’s been running silently through his head for the past few minutes, “that we should gloss over the fact that the mag locks were turned on.”

  “It could have been a malfunction after the blast,” Cole puts in.

  Bob nods slightly. “True, but it could just as likely have been—” He halts suddenly, and holds up his hand to stop us. We all obey, looking around to see what disaster is awaiting us now. But there’s nothing.

  “Why . . .,” I start, but Captain Bob cuts me off by slicing his hand sideways through the air. Walking slowly across the carpet, he advances on a closed closet door situated behind a row of karaoke machines. The rest of us all tiptoe in around him, as quiet as mice.

  We’re a meter from the closet door, and Bob has his neck craned, using his supersonic alien ears to listen for something, I guess, when Natty suddenly feels the need to pipe up. “What’s in the closet?” she asks at the top of her shrill little voice.

  It’s too bad looks can’t kill, because Bob could have single-handedly taken out every single teacher on the ship with the gaze he lays on Natty.

  “Gnat, you are such a space case!” Britta starts up, and soon a few of the other girls are chastising Natty too. Ramona is cracking her knuckles, probably getting ready to punch all their lights out in Nat’s defense. Bob pulls out his gun, and I’d bet dollars to doughnuts that he’s entertaining the notion of just gunning us all down and informing Mr. James Dean that the mission was an unavoidable failure. But then there’s a clang from inside the closet, followed by a series of shuffling and rustling noises. The girls stop squabbling. Bob trains his gun on the door and motions to Cole, who whips out his ray gun too.