by E J Frost
me how to do that. Looks like more fun than
I’m having.
Erin’s just a few meters behind me. She’s
not surfing as joyfully as Kez, but she looks
calm and competent.
Focusing again on the entrance to our
refuge, I double-check the angles, count
down the meters in my head, and when I’m
just at the edge of that welcoming darkness,
throw my weight to my right. Kez moves
with me, our boards leaning together into the
yawning hole. We’re sucked up into the void
like a pair of matchsticks.
I expect it to be like the last time.
Darkness and sudden silence. What I don’t
count on is what it will be like without the
skimmer’s protection.
I’m tumbled off the finboard, ass over
ears. I have a moment of weightlessness, of
total disorientation where I’m not sure which
end is up. Then I slam into unyielding metal.
So hard it knocks the breath out of me. Pain
lances through my left shoulder and knee.
The finboard explodes into splinters, razors
of polycarb kissing the bare skin of my head
and hands. A force like a huge hand presses
me against the metal. Roaring fills my ears,
and I’m too stunned to know whether it’s air
or water or just the pounding of my own
blood.
I grope to my left, where Kez was. I’m
blind and deaf from the impact, but I can still
feel and what I need to feel now is my
kitten’s warm, breathing body. I grope across
the pitted metal while I wait for the world to
stop spinning. A breath fills my lungs, and
my fingers find a yielding, rubbery surface.
Shadowsuit. I grasp it with my fingertips.
Tug it closer until I can wrap my hand
around it. An arm. I pull on it until she begins
to move towards me. She shudders and
scoots across the metal, until we’re close
enough to put our heads together, and I’m
still not sure it’s Kez until she shouts into my
ear. “I didn’t think through this part!”
In spite of everything, I chuckle. “Me
neither!”
“We can’t stay here!”
I nod, force my eyes open and lift my
head up off the metal. The crawlspace
between the airjet vents is six meters wide,
just like the other ship, and as black as Tol
Seng’s pit. We’ve been shoved against the
far wall, held there by a g-force stronger than
anything I’ve ever felt, even during
hyperjumps. I can’t see any light, but there
must be an opening at the front of the ship,
because the wind whipping through the
crawlspace is so wild that even in the
darkness, it’s a white sheet, sweeping away
the wreckage of the finboards splinter by
splinter. It fills my ears with its malicious
howl.
Erin’s a shadow, defined only by her
hair, spread-eagled against the metal a few
meters below us. Her equipment bags are
plastered to either side of her like beetle
wings. She’s not moving and I hope she’s
conscious because it’s going to be hard
enough to get out of here if we’re all awake.
Dragging the Überbitch’s unconscious ass to
safety is not on my agenda today.
I hunch over Kez so I can get a view to
my left. There’s not much to see in the
darkness, but I can make out shapes. There’s
only one shape I’m looking for. Finally, I
make it out. Two meters above us and three
meters to Kez’s left. The rectangle of a hatch.
I consider for a moment. It could lead into
the port airjet, in which case this is going to
be a real short trip. But if the bowship’s
designed anything like the other ships I’ve
been on, I’m betting on a service corridor.
I let my head sag back down next to
Kez’s. The knot of pain that’s been building
between my shoulders uncoils fractionally.
Just so my shoulder and knee and head can
throb more fiercely.
“There’s a hatch just to your left. Little
bit up. It’s not far. Think you can make it?”
“I’ll try!” Kez shouts. Slowly, painfully,
she lifts her head and locates the hatch. Then
she gathers herself, drawing her arms and
legs underneath her body. More like a turtle
than a kitten. But I can see what she’s trying
to do. With the g-force pinning us to the
metal, if she stretches her arms out and
pushes herself up with those strong runner’s
legs, she should be able to shinny up the wall
to the hatch.
I follow her example, pulling in my arms
and legs. Something grinds in my left
shoulder. Fuck, that doesn’t feel good.
Presenting my back to the wind and
unrelenting g-force, I rest my forehead
against the metal while I wait for Kez to
move. Feel my veins throb against the cold
metal. Something warm and wet runs from
my nose, drips in long strands over my chin.
With every motion a titanic effort, I don’t
waste the energy to wipe it away. I can feel
my ears bleeding, too: warmth running down
my jaw to cool and clot on my neck. We
need to get out of here before our eyeballs
burst.
Kez wriggles up the wall a slow quarter-
meter at a time. Reach, struggle, push. Reach,
struggle, puuuush. I shove myself along the
wall horizontally once she’s out of my way.
White-hot pain shoots through my left
shoulder with every movement. Something’s
really wrong there. I ignore it the way I was
taught in S.A.W.L. Work through it. Get cold.
Stay focused. My arms and legs are longer
than Kez’s, so I line up below the hatch in
only three reach-struggle-pushes. Then it’s
one long stretch and the bottom lip of the
hatch is under my fingertips. I use the
radiating ribs on the hatch as purchase as I
pull myself up. Reach out to my right and
throw an arm over Kez’s hunched back.
Grasp her backpack and drag her across the
rough metal until she’s tight against my side.
“Now what?” she shouts.
Now I hotwire the hatch, since it
probably only opens from the inside. Good
thing I’ve got an advanced degree in
breaking and entering. The hatch looks like
standard U.D.P. Modified military design.
The bowships are probably part of the
original Colony kit, over a hundred years old
now and still going strong. G.D.F. built to
last, I’ll give those corporate fuckers that.
I reach up and feel along the ribs until I
reach the center of the hatch. There’s no
wheel to turn, even Colony equipment isn’t
that antiquated, but there’s a thick square
plate that tells me where the pressure
controls are on the other side. T
here’ll be an
emergency release on this side, if I can find
it. I feel around the plate, carefully tickling
my fingertips along the edge. Hyperfocus on
the sensations under my hand to block out the
pain in my head, my ears, the pressure that’s
crushing my motherfucking bones to jelly.
Feels like forever before I find a long ridge.
I press it and the lever pops out into my
palm. I clutch it in my fist and crank it
downwards.
The pressure seal pops like the
universe’s biggest cork. I pull Kez down a
half-meter to avoid being decapitated by the
hatch as it swings open. Moment of truth. I
reach-struggle-push just enough to get my
head over the edge of the hatch.
Mercifully, there’s nothing but a dark
tunnel beyond the hatch. A couple of slips of
flimsy slap my face on their transit from the
tunnel to oblivion. I reach over to Kez again
and help push her up through the hatch before
I follow her through.
Lying on the tunnel floor, with the brutal
pressure in my head easing, there’s nothing I
want to do more than close that hatch and
leave the Überbitch behind. Maybe she’ll
wake up before her brain implodes.
“You get a good look at your sister?” I
finally ask Kez.
She snuffles and stirs, a whisper of skin
and hair over metal. “No, did you?”
“Yeah. Looked like she’d been knocked
out.”
Kez snuffles again. She’ll be snuffling
blood, just like me. “That means we’re going
to have to go back in there and get her,
doesn’t it?”
“Could leave her.”
“God, don’t tempt me.” Kez gives a weak
chuckle. “It wouldn’t make Tyng very
happy.”
“Probably not.”
Kez sighs heavily. “I told him she
wouldn’t be able to keep up.” She rolls onto
her side and begins to sit up, stiffly and
painfully. Her pale skin glimmers in my night
vision, marked with thick, dark smears of
blood.
“You look like hell, kitten.” I don’t move.
Not yet. I’ll go back for the Überbitch if Kez
wants me to, but I’ll do it in my own time.
“Mirrormen’d turn tail and run if they saw
you now.”
She shifts so she’s beside me and leans
over until we’re nose to nose. “You can
talk,” she says, her warm breath feathering
my cheeks. She’s got tiger breath again. Not
surprising, I guess.
I pull her to me and give her a kiss.
Despite her tiger breath. And the blood all
over both of us. The taste of blood’s never
bothered me. I’m not crazy about raw meat,
but I’ve eaten it before and I probably will
again. I suck the blood off her lips, swallow
the copperish taste, and then it’s just the
warm sweetness of Kez’s mouth against
mine. We’ve survived. Again. Against the
odds. That calls for a little celebration.
Before I want to, I let her go. Push her
bangs away from her face with a sticky hand
and smile into her hugely dilated eyes.
“Better get your sister before she’s nothin’
more than a red smear.”
“Ugh.” She climbs slowly to her feet.
Shucks off her backpack. I think through what
I saw in her pack. There’s enough snake
chain to wrap Erin up like a sausage. But I’d
have to go down and get the line on her.
Might as well push her up while I’m there.
This is too fucking much effort for the
Überbitch.
I sit up, wait for my head to stop
spinning, then roll to my feet. Fuck, I hurt.
There’s a deep grinding in my left shoulder.
Hauling up Erin’s dead weight is definitely
out. The pain in my shoulder’s echoed by
smaller aches and pains all over, and a not-
so-small pain in my left knee, which took a
hell of a crack when I hit the wall. I roll my
shoulders and gauge the pain. Something’s
torn on that left side, but nothing’s broken,
and even if it were, I’ve walked and run and
fought with broken bones before. Time to get
moving.
Kez is going through the same careful
self-assessment that I am. She looks up at me
when she’s done. She’s frowning, but there’s
no shadow in her eyes. She’ll be battered
and sore, just like I am, but she can keep
going. “You pushin’ or pullin’, kitten?” I ask.
She scratches at her dreads with blood-
caked fingers. “Pulling? I’m not sure I can
get her moving on my own.”
I nod. Kez might outweigh her sister by a
kilo or two, but there’s not much difference
between them, and in the tug-of-war against
that brutal g-force, it’s going to be all about
relative mass.
We both turn and look at the hatch. It’s
empty, save for the howling wind. I think
we’re both hoping that Erin will suddenly
appear out of that maelstrom. But she
doesn’t. The hatch remains stubbornly empty
until I put my right hand on the rim and climb
through.
Crawling down to Erin would be easiest,
but I’d be upside-down, and that’s more than
I can take. The pressure’s already returned,
every capillary pounding, the skin of my
cheeks and chin rippling against my bones
like fucking laundry flapping in the wind.
Blood spreads slowly over my upper lip,
down my neck. When I blink, my vision
washes red. My gut’s fighting its way up into
my throat. Puking here is going to be really
fucking messy. I force the nausea down as I
crawl down the wall. It’s slower going than
shinnying up, but at least I’m right-side up,
and my slow progress gives me time to
observe Erin. She’s breathing, unfortunately,
but she’s not moving. Definitely unconscious.
Blood’s spread in a wide smear around her,
and the fastest way down will have me
crawling right through it. Hope she doesn’t
have anything communicable. If she gives me
something nasty I’m going to program the
Marie to fly her right into the Twins.
When I’m close enough, and before I
have to crawl through her blood, I give her a
couple of love-taps with my right boot.
Nothing. Her face, pressed tight against the
ceramsteel, is a mask of blood. Better get her
out of here.
I wriggle down the wall, through her
blood. It gums my hands. Coats the back of
my head. I’m gonna look like I’ve been
dipped in the shit before I’m done. I get
below her and roll carefully over her leg.
She’s spread-eagled, and the reach-struggle-
push method is not going to work with her
unconscious. On the way down, I’ve
figured
the easiest way is to get her on my shoulders
and push us both up using my back and legs.
And the easiest way to get her on my
shoulders is to shove my head up between
her thighs.
I pull her calves under my arms, loop my
injured left arm around her thigh, and wedge
my head up into her groin. She doesn’t stir,
despite the indignity of what I’m doing to
her. Lifting my head against the brutal g-
force pulls that knot between my shoulders
tight again. Turns the spear of pain in my left
shoulder into a cutting laser. The blood
oozing from my nose and ears becomes a
stream. Fuck, she owes me for this. I’m
taking my ship back as soon as I get her
through that hatch.
The rough, pitted wall provides a little
purchase for my feet. I shove and shove and
shove until the laws of physics finally tilt in
my favor and Erin’s dead weight slides up
the wall.
It feels like I’ve pushed forever before
she moves a meter. She doesn’t rise straight.
Whatever’s in her left bag is heavier and it
drags her down to the side, fighting against
my upward momentum. She’s going to look
like she’s been hauled over a klick of rough
road by the time I get her up this fucking
wall. Hope Tyng values her for more than
her pretty face.
Another meter, and another, measured by
thumping, cutting pain. How much fucking
further can the hatch be? I can’t lift my head
to gauge the distance. Just have to keep
going. Then suddenly the weight across my
neck and shoulders lessens. I give another
hard push and there’s no weight. Erin slides
up the wall and disappears over the edge of
the hatch. I grab the edge of the hatch and
pull myself over. Lie panting on the gridded
floor while the hatch clangs shut behind me
and the roaring in my head falls blessedly,
mercifully silent.
I hear movement, the susurrus of hair and
fabric and the squeak of Kez’s shadowsuit.
But I don’t open my eyes until something
cool and wet touches my cheek.
I crack open one blood-caked eye and
peer up into Kez’s anxious face, framed by
the glowing halo of her hair. “Hey, kitten.” It
comes out a croak.
“Shh. Give it a minute. You’ll feel
better.” She wipes my face with that soft,
wet thing again. Discards it into a heap of
other bloody cloths and applies a fresh wipe
to the stiff clot under my nose. I close my
eyes and let her work.
