by Easton Royce
***
In the gun turret, Keats's voice came in loud and clear over the intercom speaker. "Ashby, this is Keats. The captain's dead. We have a class-nine emergency. Report to the engine room now. The reactor's about to melt down."
Ashby didn't need to hear that twice. Without a word to his hostages he put down the gun and climbed the access ladder.
"Maybe later you'll tell us what the heck's going on!" Wang shouted after him.
Ashby hesitated, then turned back to Wang. "Did you ever try to do the right thing, when all you had were bad choices?"
Even Wang had no comeback for that.
After Cooper handed Keats's gun to McQueen on the bridge, he stepped back, trying to become invisible. But McQueen wouldn't let him disappear.
"I've got a reactor melting down," McQueen said to Cooper. "I've got a U3-78 coming in for the kill. We can't fight, we can't run, and your five minutes are up. What do you expect me to do?"
Cooper fought to keep his own reactor from melting down. "Cut power to another section," he said, forcing himself to stay cool.
"If we cut the power to Section 46, two hundred Tanks die. Cut the power to any other section, four hundred humans die. How does the math work out? You tell me."
Finally Cooper blew. "Why are you asking me?" he screamed.
"Because you have to be the one to pull the plug," McQueen said. "Everyone else is already assigned."
Cooper couldn't answer that. Two hundred... four hundred... the numbers swirled in his brain. It was a decision no human—Tank or flesh-born—should be forced to make.
Suddenly the radar began beeping even more frantically than before.
"We're dead center in the gamma pulse," Nathan shouted.
McQueen never took his eyes off Cooper. "We have one advantage, Hawkes. The U3-78 doesn't know we're ready to fight. Are we? Are we ready to fight?"
Cooper couldn't look at him anymore—couldn't look at any of them. He raced from the bridge, just wanting to get away from the entire situation. He knew he had to do something. But no matter what he chose to do, he couldn't imagine himself living with the choice. It would kill him just as surely as the torpedoes of the Chig fighter.
Chapter 15
"We're losing the core," Damphousse shouted to the returning crew as they ran into the engine room.
Ashby, Sorrell, and the others took their seats at the consoles.
"Kick in the emergency core coolant systems," Ashby shouted, "in five... four... three... two... one... now!"
Sorrell threw a switch across the engine room. Two other men manually forced the coolant to flood the chamber. Damphousse tried to balance the flow from her console.
"It's not working," Sorrell shouted.
"Give it a second," Damphousse answered.
The spiking temperature hovered at high-critical. Then slowly, slowly, it began to drop.
Damphousse took a relieved breath. "Reload initiated." She turned to Ashby and Sorrell. "Glad to have you back."
Sorrell picked up the intercom and radioed the bridge. "Reactor cooling," he announced. "But the reactor won't be on-line for another ninety minutes."
He might as well have said ninety years.
The impossibly long corridor between the bridge and the engine room was darker than Cooper remembered. And more lonely. He moved through one section and then another, tearing through the cargo hold. He hoped beyond hope that there was something he could do to change the impossible decision he was being forced to make.
Frost-covered hatchways flashed by either side of him. Sections 43 and 44, 45... and finally 46. If he was going to cut the power, it had to be done from the generator room. The room was still out of sight, far down the dark corridor.
But there was something else he had to do first—something he had to try.
When he reached Section 46, he found cargo container 12. Beside the steel hatch of the container was a small control panel. He slammed his fist into the panel until the cover fell off, revealing a rat's nest of wires.
Cooper quickly studied how the wires were connected, how the energy was routed. Each terminal was numbered. In the dim light, he tried to see how the energy flowed to each of the twenty gestation tanks stored within container 46-12.
Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the crumpled cargo manifest. He scanned it until he found her—his sister. Section 46-12, tank number 16. There it right in front of him—her lifeline. All he needed was a wire long enough—thirty feet, forty at the most.
He could hot-wire her tank into a panel in another section! He could keep her alive!
He remembered seeing a spool of wire in the generator room. All he needed to do was to go and get it. All he needed was—
BOOM! The ship shook violently, throwing Cooper across the corridor.
What was that? A blast from the enemy ship? Were they all about to die?
Cooper looked along the wall for an intercom, but there were none in the cargo bay. McQueen's voice echoed in Cooper's brain. The clock has run out, Hawkes."
"Solar Flare," Nathan said.
The radar screen in front of him was empty. The solar flare wiped everything on it.
Now there was no way to know where the enemy ship was. Or how close it was to blowing them out of the galaxy.
"We'll have to make visual contact," McQueen decided.
Nathan stood up. "Sir, the U3-78 is caught in the same solar flare that we are. The only way they can make contact is visual also."
"Estimated time until his radar retrieval?"
"Two minutes."
"Is that your gut feeling?" McQueen challenged.
"That's a fact, sir," Nathan said.
McQueen accepted Nathan's estimate. He turned to Navigator Harkin. "Lower the blast shield."
Harkin glanced up at McQueen and then hit a button. The heavy four-inch steel panel in front of them slid away. It had protected them from the raging twin suns. Now as it was lowered light and intense heat poured through the clear window onto the bridge.
McQueen squinted. Even with the ship facing away from the suns, the glare was blinding—too bright to peer into directly.
"She's out there somewhere," McQueen said. He grabbed the intercom. "Hawkes! Where are you, Hawkes? We need that power now!"
Chapter 16
The emergency lights were fading. Cooper stumbled over thresholds and down catwalks, finally tumbling into the generator room, still hot from the fire just hours before.
The only light in the room came from the power console. The grid of the cargo sections glowed red in the darkness. So many sections, all kept at full power.
It was visual proof of the incredible drain on the generator.
In the corner sat the spool of wire Cooper had come for. The only thing that could save his sister's life.
"Mr. Hawkes." McQueen's voice came over the intercom. "Cooper." His voice sounded more desperate than Cooper had ever heard it. "We need power now, or we're all dead."
How long had it taken him to get here from Section 46? Thirty seconds? Forty-five? How long would it take him to hot-wire that single gestation tank? And then how long to get back here to turn off the power? The coil of wire was just a few feet away, but he knew they didn't have time. McQueen was right. There was no time for any plan now. He cursed himself for not having thought of it sooner—for not having done what was necessary to save his unborn sister.
The glow of the many numbered sections loomed before him. He lifted his hand above the console. How easy, he thought. A single finger could wipe out so many lives. Hit any button, and four hundred sleeping humans would never wake up.
Any button, that is, except for Section 46.
Two hundred Tanks. Four hundred humans.
He wanted to press the button of one of the other sections. But he couldn't bring himself to do it.
His finger reached the button marked 46. He pushed it down. He heard it click.
One light on the console went out...
...
and the generator came back to life with the new supply of power. In the rumbling vibration of the generator room Cooper could swear he felt them dying.
Felt her dying.
In the gun turret, the fire light went from red to green. The weapons were on-line again.
On the bridge, the navigation and control consoles powered up, whirring back to life.
And deep in the hold, one by one, the lights went out in the cargo containers of Section 46—plunging two hundred unborn souls into silence and darkness.
Chapter 17
"We have power, sir."
It was the most wonderful announcement Colonel McQueen had ever heard. He stood beside Nathan on the bridge, waiting for a visual sighting of the enemy.
"Let's play a little hide-and-seek," McQueen said. "Hard left rudder."
As the ship turned, a dark mass appeared, looming in the swirling hydrogen clouds.
"Wang! Vansen!" McQueen ordered over the intercom. "Prepare to initiate fire on my order! Repeat—on my order!"
"Our targeting system is scrambled, sir! The solar flare knocked it out."
"Just listen to me," McQueen said. "Bogey bears three-three-niner, one-point-five clicks. Azimuth ninety degrees. Weapons hold."
McQueen turned to the navigator. "Fire perigee kick motor, Mr. Harkin."
"Sir, I can't do that, we'll break up."
"FIRE PERIGEE KICK MOTOR," McQueen insisted.
Harkin bit his lip and fired the motor. The MacArthur vibrated violently but held together.
McQueen had set them on a collision course with the enemy ship. When the enemy caught visual sight of them, it let loose a barrage of laser pulses.
BOOM! The lasers tore through space and hit the MacArthur mid-ship. The vessel rattled and shook as the enemy destroyed its ship-to-shore shuttle, tearing open several empty cargo containers.
"Weapons hold!" McQueen insisted.
"What are we waiting for, sir?" Wang asked.
"Hold fire!" was all McQueen said.
The U3-78 was massive and sleek, easily twice the size of the MacArthur. It came down above them, assuming they were dead. The Chigs were arrogant fighters. They didn't think a mere human freighter would have anything left after that attack.
McQueen watched as its immense belly passed by, directly above the MacArthur. Then he gave the order.
"Now! Fire! Fire!"
Wang and Vansen blasted away. Even without their targeting computers, the Alien ship was so big and so close, there was no way to miss it.
BOOM! There was a massive explosion. Then a second and third. Aboard the MacArthur, pipes broke and steel bulkheads buckled loudly. The crew was sure that in a moment there would be no MacArthur.
But when the shaking and rattling stopped, they were still there.
The solar flare had subsided. Radar had returned. And all that could be seen on the radar screen of the Alien vessel was chunks of spinning debris, more refuse for the furnace of Blood Alley.
Damphousse had been thrown across the engine room by the blast. She crawled back to her chair to assess damages, fearing the worst. But the coolant pressure was at eighteen point five and climbing. The core temperature was still cooling. For once there was good news.
"Colonel," said Damphousse over the intercom, "were we hit?"
"Negative," came the answer from McQueen. "Just shock waves. The enemy's been destroyed. How's the reactor?"
Damphousse checked her readings again. "The reactor's stabilized. Ninety mikes until we're online."
"Good work, Damphousse."
Damphousse smiled and looked at Ashby and Sorrell. "I had a little help from my friends, sir." Only now, with the danger behind them, could the truth of the day's events sink in. Keats stood staring at the reactor. But it wasn't the reactor he was looking at. It was clear his mind was elsewhere. He had been spared, but his life felt worthless now, destroyed in the heat of the moment. Destroyed by a mutiny that he had had no choice but to wage.
Sorrell went over to stand by the chief petty officer's side. As tall as Sorrell was, he seemed hobbled in the face of all this tragedy. "There's gonna be trouble," he said.
"It was my call. I'll take the responsibility," Keats said. Even in the face of all that happened, he was honor bound to do what he felt was right. He would even take the fall for everyone.
If they let him.
Ashby spoke up. "We stood together before. We'll stand together now."
Keats turned and looked at his fellow In-Vitro crewmen. He wondered what Potter might have said about all of this, if he were still alive. No doubt he would have said they were clinging together like a pack of wild animals. But the truth was, they were standing together as men. Humans. And they had a dignity no one could take away from them.
Chapter 18
With the bodies of the dead taken off the bridge, the remaining crew returned to their positions. They worked together, guiding the battered MacArthur through the last stretch of Blood Alley.
McQueen spied Nathan quietly leaving the bridge, his services no longer needed.
"West!" he called.
Nathan turned around. Was it McQueen's imagination, or had the boy aged in this brief trip? He never noticed before, but Nathan's eyes looked older. They were eyes that had known more pain than most.
"Launching the cargo haulers... that was a great countermeasure," McQueen said softly.
Nathan took the compliment with a simple nod, then turned again to go.
McQueen reached into his pocket and pulled out the phototag he had taken from Nathan earlier. Nathan gently took it.
"I thought I had to make a point," McQueen said.
"You were right to do it," Nathan said. "Going after Kylen the way I did—putting everyone in danger back on Tellus. It was selfish." He looked McQueen in the eyes. "It won't happen again."
"I know that, West," McQueen said. And he did know it, as sure as he could know anything.
Vansen and Wang powered down the systems in the gun turret, preparing to leave that hot, claustrophobic cell for good. But even in this tight, uncomfortable place of cold metal and tension, there was room for tenderness and surprise.
As Wang stood to go, Shane stopped him—not with her hand, but with her voice. A voice he'd never heard her use—soft, like a caress.
"How many loved your moments of glad grace, and loved your beauty with love, false or true? But one man loved the pilgrim's soul in you, and loved the sorrows of your changing face."
Wang was dumbfounded—captivated by her words. The spell was broken only when Shane smiled out of the corner of her mouth. Then she quipped, in the old, familiar Shane Vansen way, "Try sending that over SpaceNet."
Wang laughed. "The way I figure it, if you've made it through bad times and joy with someone you love, then you've lived."
Shane shook her head. "The way I see it, you only end up with a broken heart. And I don't have the time."
Paul Wang reached out and gently touched Shane Vansen's hand. Their eyes met for a moment of warmth, a moment of friendship. Then Shane pulled away and got back to the business of shutting down the guns.
The airlock into Section 46 had automatically closed when the power was shut down. Without life support pumping into it, the air in the access corridor there had gone thin and cold.
Cooper, flashlight in hand, opened the airlock. A rush of air met him and he stepped inside. Ignoring the cold, he shone his light at the doorways around him. Condensation no longer covered the small circular windows in the doors. No light came from behind them. They were just dark circles.
Cooper slowly approached container 12. The cargo manifest still lay on the floor where he had dropped it, crumpled and tattered. The nest of wires stuck out of the open hole of the electrical box. Everything was just as he had left it before he had killed the power.
Before he had killed them.
"You did the right thing."
Cooper spun around. McQueen was standing at the threshold of Section 46. He too
k a single step, keeping his distance from Cooper.
"We're soldiers, Cooper. Not Tanks."
Cooper couldn't look at him. "What'll happen to Keats?" he asked.
"Keats and Ashby will stand trial for mutiny," McQueen answered. "Sorrell for murder."
Cooper shone his flashlight at the number on the door: 46-12. He knew it would be a number he would see in his nightmares for the rest of his life.
"I'm sorry," McQueen offered. But hearing those words only made Cooper more angry.
"What would you know about sorrow?"
"I know this much," McQueen said. "I never had the courage to look for my family. Not because I was afraid of what I might find... but because I was afraid of what I might feel."
McQueen turned and walked away. Cooper stood there for a moment, listening to McQueen's fading footsteps. When he was sure McQueen was gone, Cooper reached out and manually cranked open the hatch to cargo container 46-12.
Chapter 19
Twenty-four bodies in glass tubes floated in amnio-synth fluid. The floor-to-ceiling cylinders hanging like stalactites made the dim room feel like a cave.
Cooper took a step forward on the wet floor. His terror was almost as great as his need to know... his need to see.
One step after another. He forced himself on into this place of death. He knew the number of her container, but he didn't bother to look at the numbers. Instead, he looked at their faces as he passed by. Faces paled by the years of artificial gestation. Faces of people who would never be born. Never know the many pains and scarce pleasures of In-Vitro life.
He passed one male, and then another, then a female.
Then he saw her.
Her long black hair floated in the crystal-clear amnio-synth fluid. Her eyes were closed, and she seemed at peace. The face he saw was so clearly a reflection of his own that he suddenly felt faint. He had to grip on to something to keep from sliding to the wet floor.
