Nomad

by Jamie Nash

  Every corner and shadow is a potential hiding place. It’s like one of those “Woods of Evil” the fire stations used to put on at Halloween to benefit UNICEF. My muscles tighten, bracing for someone in a werewolf mask to jump out and yell “Boo!”

  I pass various closed doors and hatches. I’d love to explore them, but now is not the time. The thick air is musty attic dense. Beads of sweat slither down my forehead. The dim service lights arrayed in the ceiling make it hard to read. They’re about as feeble as a child’s night light. The limp glow causes me to hold the map up to my nose just to get a look at where I’m going.

  I’m almost there. According to the map, the chamber is just down this long hall and to the left. But there’s a door just ahead of me to my right. The map calls it the Resource Room.

  Nice. I could use some resources right now.

  I shouldn’t be making side trips, but it’s possible they’re in there. I’ll just have a peek. It’s dark, but from what I can see, it’s some mundane office with file cabinets and a couple of desks and—

  Footsteps startle me. Someone’s coming from the corridor in the direction I’m heading. Probably from the Cryo Chamber. It must be Taylor. She’s done with Shaft and is coming to make me her next victim. It’s too late to retreat, and there’s nothing to hide behind out here. I duck inside and ease into the room. I wedge between two of the tall file cabinets.

  The person closes in. Their feet slap the hollow floor like they’re coming fast and don’t care who hears. I crouch down into a little human ball.

  The person is right outside.

  I hold my breath.

  Then they pass. Their footfalls trail off.

  I relax, lean back, and bump into a large cabinet. It starts to topple. I grab it to pull it back, but it crashes down with a loud metallic boom.

  Suddenly, it’s quiet. Uncomfortably quiet.

  They heard. The footsteps resume, backtracking, coming my way. The door creaks open ominously. A slice of light hits my face. I tuck myself deeper into the shadows and ready my scalpel. Again, a quick ambush is my only hope. I’ll have to navigate the cabinets. It won’t be smooth, but if I wait until they get closer, maybe I can lunge out and go all Michael Myers on ‘em.

  The shaft of light widens, the door opening further. Feet shuffle across the tiled floor. They’re trying to stay quiet now, stalking me. I flatten against a wall of three large file cabinets. A human-shaped shadow unfolds across the wall behind me. They’re moving deeper inside, closing in. My heart hammers my chest. This is going down. My fist tightens on the scalpel. This time I’m not going to run. This time it’s for Tony. For Shaft.

  Instead, the door slams. The sound echoes through the room then fades, replaced by the ever-present rumble of space travel and footsteps fading away. I give it a couple of seconds before I peek out. Light from the corridor snakes beneath the crack in the door. I step toward it. My leg bangs into an open file cabinet at my ankles. I cry out. Then cover my mouth. I’m an idiot. I wait and pray the stalker didn’t hear. Five seconds go by. Then five more.

  No one’s coming.

  I kick the cabinet closed in disgust. It won’t shut. A file folder resting on top is jamming it. There’s a light switch on the wall but I don’t go for it. It’s too much of a giveaway. Instead, I crack the door allowing the corridor’s fluorescents to spill in.

  I return to the folder wedged in the drawer. Its index tab is marked with a printed label— “201.” The packet inside is about as thick as a Cosmopolitan magazine or two, about the size of the one I found upstairs describing Taylor’s history.

  It opens to a jumble of pictures and biographical documents—everything you’d ever want to know about a poor dude named Leonard Spence. Born in North Carolina, died in Alabama. He’s a black kid with a great smile and strong shoulders. He was twenty-one when he ate it in a tragic boating accident. I’m sure he’s lurking around here somewhere.

  I dig through more files. Each of the folders is labeled and filed in sequence. I flip past 201, 205, skip a few more. File 217 is missing. That’s Taylor’s number. Excuse me, Jelena’s. This was her folder’s home before someone took it upstairs for some bedtime reading in the game room.

  The twin cabinet beside this one continues the sequence. Based on the labels on the sliding drawers, there are over three hundred files. Three hundred files means three hundred people.

  Shaft is 177.

  The drawers are locked. Luckily, I have keys. I try the clump of smaller keys at the bottom, and on my third try I find the right one. I pull open the drawer and flip my way to the folder marked “177.” I hold it out in front of me like it’s some Holy Text.

  If I read this, I’ll cross a threshold. I’ll know more about Shaft than he knows about himself. What if he’s a killer? Or a cannibal? Or a flasher?

  Shaft’s my friend. Bleh. It sounds lame saying it. Okay, I don’t care. We’re space-buds. Survivors. Teammates. Whatever forbidden knowledge lays sandwiched inside this folder won’t change that. Well … the flasher thing might.

  I dive in. A black and white photo of Shaft stares back at me with bleary eyes. He looks roughly the same but wears a scraggly beard and an even scragglier mess of hair. A large, bloody bandage covers the side of his neck. Its mug shot. He’s a felon too. I’m starting to think we all are. It’s the prerequisite for this undesirable club we’re in. Hopefully, he did something cool like getting arrested for partying too hard or urinating in public at a Cure concert.

  His real name is Sanjeev Patel—nowhere near as wicked cool as Shaft. He was born in 1968, arrested for ‘domestic terrorism’ in India in 1986. The handwritten note says he set fire to a police station. Hardcore. He’s got a laundry list of other dirty deeds: assaults, robberies, attempted murder, even manslaughter. At least, there’s nothing about flashing or eating his friends.

  There’s a death date, though—October 12, 1985. The cause of death is listed as strangulation. The guy’s a ghost.

  I close the file. This doesn’t help. I don’t need to peruse his old report cards, or count how many stickers he got for toilet training, or browse his likes and dislikes on a first date. I have one friend left. He’s my guy. Domestic terrorism be damned.

  There’s something else scratching at the corners of brain like a cat trying to get in the back door on a cold rainy night. I have a number—125.

  Which means I have a folder.

  Surely, I’m not a pyromaniac or a flasher?

  I move to the file case labeled “100–150” and open the cabinet with the small key. This one slides open as if somebody WD-40ed the thing, barreling out so hard it almost falls off its tracks. I dive into the middle of the line of manila file folders: 120, 123 and there it is—125. My folder.

  Me.

  I tried to save Hero. I stopped them from hurting Taylor. I never punched Crazytown in the throat. I should have, but I held back. A bad person wouldn’t have held back. My hands shake. Nothing in this file can hurt me. I’m a good egg. I feel it in my bones.

  I open it before I chicken out.

  Like the others, my mug shot greets me. It’s not very glamorous. My right eye is swollen shut. I’m not smiling or frowning. I’m just staring. Emotionless. I’m just some thug who wants to get this over with so they can get on with their evil, degenerate life. The coldness in this stranger’s eyes—my eyes—sends a chill down my spine. It’s the hardened gaze of someone that’s become callous. Something happened to this girl. She’s lived some hideous life that led her to this hopelessness.

  I clap the folder shut, jam it back into the cabinet, and slam it closed.

  My hands shake. The smart play would be to read on. There could be answers in there. Memory joggers. Bits of history that tell me why I’m here.

  But I can’t. I just can’t. Knowing I beat up an old lady or stole Milky Ways from ten-year-olds on Halloween doesn’t help me survive this. What if I’m a coward? What if I’m crook? What if whatever is in there is evidence that I dese
rve every last bit of this?

  No. I’m the good guy. The underdog. I deserve to win.

  I turn to the door. My gaze catches a series of framed photos hanging at eye level. I go to the largest one first. It’s a group picture, like the kind we used to take in grade school—tallest at the top, shorties in front. There are about thirty people, some wear flight suits while others are in Polos or short sleeves. Some have pocket protectors. The wind messes with their long hair and the bright sun makes them squint. Behind them, there’s a hint of something enormous and orange. It’s probably a space rocket. It reminds me of one of those towering boosters that the space shuttle piggybacks on its way to the heavens. They’re on a launch pad.

  I scan the smiling faces. Young, old, a diverse mix of pocket protector types and captains of football teams. It’s a bit of a sausage party, but there are a couple of women too. Probably the ones that did all the work.

  Then I see it.

  At the edge of the team, a pair of the blackest saucer-sized eyes stare back at me. It’s like one of those creepy Jesus posters that follow your every move. They swim on the surface of the palest skin, stretched across its oblong skull. A face. Its mouth is stretched into an almost rictus grin. But I can’t tell if it’s smiling.

  Because it’s not human.

  Goosebumps rise on my arms. I laugh. It’s not funny, it’s a release, a tension killer. This must be some joke photo. The kind you buy on vacation where they use some computer wizardry to tack Darth Vader or Jon Bon Jovi into the background.

  This is impossible.

  The strange being is straight out of In Search Of. He’s more Close Encounters than E.T. It’s one of those things they describe from UFO abductions or Roswell. A Gray, I think they call them, though this little creep is more powder white.

  It’s the thing from upstairs. The skull in the freezer.

  It was part of the team. It was one of them. The creature’s position in the photo speaks volumes. It’s that spot in class or team photos where the teacher or coach stands. The leader spot. He’s the architect of this rust bucket. It must have led the project, shown them how to turn a heap of spare NASA parts and some Commodore 64s into the Starship Enterprise. Maybe he used some telepathic mind control on all of them.

  I browse a series of smaller framed photos on the adjacent wall. These give a better view of little monster. It’s posing with dignitaries and celebrities, politicians I recognize but don’t remember famous astronauts, and the bearded guy who directed The Shining.

  A loud gonging sound booms out from down the hall. Perhaps a bulkhead closing. Taylor might be coming back. I slink into the corridor and rejoin the hunt for the Crew Cryos. I’m not far. After a couple more twists and turns, I arrive at a fork in the corridor. I follow the map and turn left, then head straight to the bulkhead entrance. It’s already open. This is the place.

  A metallic crash rings out from inside the chamber. I shove the map back inside my suit, ready my scalpel, and step inside.

  The cryopods gurgle like an aquarium superstore. There’s a row of three pods on each side, six in total, with a sort of catwalk running down the middle. The murk and bubbles obscure their inhabitants. I can still make out shapes, almost ghosts drifting lifelessly in a womb of blood. It’s impossible to tell if one of them is Shaft.

  The chamber isn’t small, but it's cramped, over packed with cryos and the clunky tech that powers them, cables and hoses drooping from the ceiling. The space just feels claustrophobic. I hunch as I wander ahead. Against the far wall, there’s something different.

  It’s a sealed metal bucket that extends to the ceiling of the chamber and wide enough that it masks every inch of the chamber’s back wall. It reminds me of the towering steel vats they show on the Busch Gardens brewery tour. The jerry-rigged eyesore is cobbled together from scavenged panels, tangles of wire, and lots of duct tape. There’s no glass on this one, so I have no idea what’s inside. I seriously doubt it is Bud Light.

  I scan the empty spaces between the cryos. Taylor could be crouched behind one of the pods or hidden in the shadows behind the hanging tendrils of exposed cable. The sounds of her movements could be cloaked by the throbbing machinery. It’s the perfect place for an ambush. In front of the second pod on the left, I find a ball of material.

  A pink robe.

  This is the one.

  The base of the cryopod cycles through a series of green and red lights. It hums like a vacuum that needs to be empty. Steam hisses from it like a cauldron. The other cryopods are more dormant, in cruise control, their indicators projecting a steady red glow. Mine’s revving up. Somebody just started this baby. It must be the one.

  I press my forehead against the pod’s glass. Through the bubbling curtain of chemicals, I make out Shaft. His eyes are closed. A thick tube runs across his lip and into his mouth. Smaller ones pierce his suit and skin. I pound on the glass. “Hey! Hey!” His limp body doesn’t even twitch as it floats in its deathly peace. I’m pretty sure he’s alive. This was probably once Taylor’s resting place. Here, among her crewmates. There was a vacancy and Shaft has filled it.

  Phantom was right, Taylor would rather have him back in this prison than dead. And maybe he’s better off.

  Tony would’ve been.

  Maybe we all would be. This nightmare didn’t start until we were yanked out. I wish I could close my eyes and fade back into sweet blissful nothingness for another one hundred or one thousand years.

  But peace isn’t the same as safe.

  There’s a madman lurking around sabotaging things, setting fires, and murdering people. Shaft’s a sitting duck in there. And besides, I can’t do this alone. Misery loves company. He’s coming out. Like it or not.

  On the back of the cryopod, there’s a control panel. It looks like someone went to the Radio Shack and hot glued every cool looking doodad to a piece of metal. Of course, bringing him back is risky. Maybe stupid. I can barely work a microwave. How the hell am I going to work this thing without turning Shaft into a bubbling puddle of boiled flesh? I should have learned my lesson the last time I yanked someone out of one of these things without an instruction manual.

  And yet …

  Near my foot is a large glowing red button marked “Emergency.” I remember the spot from the Spanish language schematic up in the room with the pool table. The glowing button practically says “Press Me.”

  Or maybe it’s saying. “Don’t do this, idiot.”

  My foot kicks it. Presses.

  There’s a sudden lull in the growling machinery, followed by a surging hum. But it’s not just Shaft’s cryo. All of them roar like demonic laundry machines revving up to spin cycle. A monitor flickers awake beside me. Greenish words cascade down its screen in a computer shorthand.

  RUN FULLDF > ALL –r –s:6 –a:h –dump:dumpfile108

  LOAD: C:systempdpddef_rev.com

  LOAD: C:systempdvital_rev.dll

  LOAD: C:systempdsw_ars.exe

  LOAD: C:systempdLSUP.dll

  LOAD: C:systempdRESUS.exe –h -a

  Total nerd stuff. It must be doing something.

  Overhead, motors, gears, and hydraulics come to life, sputter, and grind. Bubbles erupt in Shaft’s tank. Lights flicker around and inside the pod. Shaft lurches. His foot kicks the glass making a muted bong sound. It’s working. Easier than nuking a burrito.

  Similar sounds and lights are happening all around me. It’s not just Shaft’s cryopod, it’s the other five, too. I’ve hit the reset button on all of them. Each cycle through an identical process. Computers flashing on. Bubbles rippling through their chemical gels.

  The crew is being hatched.

  Wisps of dread spire through me. I might puke. Sure, this could be the cavalry coming to save us, but what if I’ve just unleashed our real enemies—the jerks who locked us away in the first place. They might want to stuff us back into our wet, mechanical prison. Or maybe now that we know too much, they’d just want us dead.

  Ther
e’s also the oversized Frankenstein contraption at the front of the room. Its drum rumbles. It runs on a different cycle, barking its own series of growls and whistles. Large clouds of steam belch from its vents. Its vibrations fill the room.

  There might be more people inside the large thing, but I have my doubts. The shape is completely different than the other pods and not just taller and wider. It’s a mystery. A dark mystery.

  A fist slams on the cryo beside me. A muffled scream from another. Body parts thud glass. Cries burgle in the water. Six different scenes of agony play out. Lucky for me, the clanking and churning of the machinery overwhelms most of the sounds. But not all of them. I glance back at the main doors. If Taylor is around, she’s definitely heard this entire racket. She’s probably loading up a fistful of syringes to knock us all out again.

  “Hurry.” My fingers drum the glass of Shaft’s tank as if that helps.

  Shaft’s eyes flash open. He screams but the respiration tube chokes it off.

  “No. No. It’s okay.” I practically hug the pod. “I’m getting you out.”

  He’s too busy clawing at the wires and tubes to notice me. The lid blocks my voice. I pound on it. His groggy eyes find me. He’s on the border of terrified and relieved. My eyes well with the tears. The kind that pool at the bottom eyelid, blurring everything. I need a filter right now. Even if it’s tears.

  Shaft touches the glass. His fingers feel for mine. I return the gesture. It’s ridiculous, like a lonely wife visiting her locked-up husband in prison. White trash romantic. “It’s okay. It’s okay,” I whisper, not that he can hear, or that any of this is okay. Maybe I’m reassuring myself.

  The cryos pitch backward. They level out and lay flat on their backs, rotating into a sleeping position as if it’s some ride coming into station at Disney Land. It’s time to unbuckle the seatbelts and find some Mickey Mouse shaped ice cream bars.