by Kaz Morran
“Maybe we should round up some more crates,” Taiyo suggested. “We could bring them onboard to use as a stepladder.”
“Go for it hafu,” Ronin lamented. “If you’re done spooning.”
Nel and Taiyo both sighed the same tired sigh.
They set off to gather stray crates. Walter and Kristen hand-paddled over the left of the raft, Nel and Taiyo leaned over the right.
As if the raft were his chariot, from the deck Ronin told them, “We’re going in circles. Right side, ease up a bit.” Nel wondered why Ronin didn’t tell Walter and Kristen to paddle harder instead.
While out for more crates, they searched the walls and ceiling with the two working lights for any hidden way out but only confirmed their confinement.
Back by the waterfall, after a few comical, painful, and failed attempts to climb reach the chimney by stacking crates on the raft, Walter offered his own encouragement: “Everybody’s doing great,” he said. “Just hang in there.” But with each reiteration, he sounded less convincing, like Tony Robbins coming off Adderall and onto GHB.
After Nel and Walter reached down to help Kristen back onto the raft from an especially hard tumble off the top of the three-crate stack, Taiyo said, “Maybe that’s enough.”
“Maybe?” said Nel. The crass tone surprised herself, but she continued, “There’s no maybe about it.” She knew they were all staring at her now, even if she couldn’t see them and they couldn’t see her.
“Oxygen is a bit low,” Kristen said. Her voice was like a kitten putting a paw in the water.
“How low?” said Nel. They didn’t Kristen’s opinion. They needed data.
“Eighteen-point-five,” Kristen answered.
Seeing the faint profile of Kristen’s face in the glow of the phone screen made Nel take a breath and calm the tension she hadn’t realized had been rising inside her. Perhaps, subconsciously, Nel had been conflating the faceless voices with malfunctioning virtual assistants.
“Eighteen-five is fine,” said Ronin.
“And CO2?” Taiyo asked, apparently unfazed by Nel’s critique.
Now that the thought had been planted, Nel noticed how much her head hurt—a cluster of pain behind both eyes. At least she finally had something other than her own BO to focus on.
“It’s saying point-one-six,” Kristen said of the CO2.
“Hm.”
“Kind of high.”
“I can stand it,” said Ronin.
“Until you can’t,” said Nel. She knew she sounded cranky and reminded herself to be nice for the sake of the group.
They floated in slow circles around the base of the pouring water. Nel tried to put things in perspective, to assess how they were holding up as a group: They were enduring individually, but not as a crew. As so-called elite astronaut candidates, they should have found a way out by now, and they shouldn’t have lost Anton. On the other hand, they didn’t yet resemble the Franklin Expedition. Not yet. Give it time, she thought, and a grim smile crossed her face.
***
When the raft reached high enough, Taiyo volunteered to inspect the opening in the ceiling. He stood atop a stack of two crates, with Ronin and Kristen holding his legs, and Nel and Walter leaning over the edge of the deck and hand paddling to keep the raft stable. With the waterfall still plunging, there was no way to position Taiyo underneath without him getting doused and the raft getting pushed out of position.
By the time they managed to stabilize everything enough that the raft didn’t get pushed away or Taiyo didn’t get washed off the crate, the water level had risen so closely to the ceiling they had to take the top crate down.
“Should’ve waited longer,” said Ronin.
No one replied.
And no one said it, but Nel knew—they all knew—that if the chimney shaft turned out to be blocked, they’d have less than an hour before the Asylum filled to capacity and the raft got crushed against the saw-tooth ceiling.
“Keep it straight,” Taiyo called from his precarious stance atop the slippery crate.
“Paddle right,” yelled Ronin. He shone a light up at the opening. “A little more.”
Water drummed off the hollow crates each time the raft floated under the waterfall, and the splash soaked the deck and the crew.
“Hold my ankles,” Nel told Walter.
Nel felt him step on the cuffs of her pant legs. It would have to do. Stomach on the deck, she leaned as far as she could out over the water and paddled with both hands.
Taiyo called down to them, “We’re drifting.”
“We’re trying,” Walter, called back. He sounded weak. He'd barely spoken in what seemed like all day.
A cannonball of a splash startled Nel, but it was only Ronin jumping into the water so he could grab hold of the raft and kick. She heard another splash from Kristen, and Walter soon left Nel to join them.
Taiyo said, “Back to the right. I’m way too far. Can’t reach.”
Nel paddle hard from the deck with her hands, but the raft kept drifting away from the waterfall because of the uneven paddling.
“Which way is right?” said Kristen.
“Portside,” answered Walter.
“Where the fuck is that?”
A rapid thumping came from Taiyo. He’d slapped the side the crate under his feet. “This side,” he yelled. “Move it hard this way.”
Nel dug into the water, stroking with everything she had.
Taiyo’s headlamp beam jumped randomly then landed on Nel like a spotlight. “Harder!” he yelled. He knew it was her fault.
She bent a leg for balance and leaned farther over the edge for more leverage. Her leg slipped loose.
“Get the fuck in the water and kick,” Ronin screamed at Nel as she tumbled overboard.
“Kick!”
Nel did as she was told. She pushed the wet hair from her face, held the rope that encircled the raft, and kicked hard until Taiyo called for them to stop.
“Walter, I need you on the deck with a light,” Taiyo ordered the weakest of their crew. “The rest of you stay in the water. Kristen, right side. Nel, left. Ronin, take aft delta-v.”
“It’s called a propeller,” said Ronin.
Walter lit the opening above Taiyo’s head with the flashlight. The halo around the headlamp faded in and out as Taiyo poked his head up inside. He reached to pull himself up. Just as the glow of his light and his upper body disappeared, a rush of debris shoved him down into a crouch, arms protecting his head. Rocks and sticks pelted his back, and a shower of mud and mangled foliage slopped over him and down onto the raft. Nel turned away from the splatter but couldn’t avoid the deluge of water. Through the turmoil, Walter held his post, and Nel stole a look over her shoulder and saw Taiyo on his stomach bear-hugging the crate.
He lifted his head to rinse his face in the shower, spit and shouted for the AsCans to keep the raft beneath the target. When Nel next looked up, she saw Taiyo back on his feet, with the side stance of a surfer, and his arms up to the elbows in the slurry of overhead muck. He pulled a palm frond down out of his way, then fistful after fistful of mud, branches, and roots. Several wordless minutes went by before he climbed back down, covered in thick black sludge.
Nel was first out of the water to help Taiyo clean off.
“No way,” he told her, shaking his head along with the cloudy light cone of the headlamp. “Not through fifteen meters of this.” He held up a clump of moss and roots and then chucked it in the water.
Nel took the headlamp and pushed the extra crates overboard. It hadn’t been hard, but the exertion took her breath. Taiyo was having trouble, too. After a quick dip to rinse off, he’d taken a seat near the edge of the raft, and Nel could hear him panting. Each inhalation felt thicker than the last. The air was getting heavier and hotter as the rising water compressed it against the ceiling.
She heard a subtle plunk and turned on her knees to find Taiyo with his feet over the edge.
“What are you doing?”
“Your done washing. You’re just sitting there dangling bait in the water.”
“So?”
“So it maybe it’d be better to keep your legs on the raft.”
“Maybe?” he repeated. “I thought you didn’t like m—”
“Did you hear that?”
***
Though the bug jar was no longer being shaken, the kid had left it out in the rain. The bugs had taken refuge on a floating leaf, rising closer to the lid as the jar slowly filled. The sweet scent of freedom wafted down over their faces. With all their might, they stretched out and grasped the rim of an air hole … only to find the opening blocked.
They were about to be crushed against the ceiling.
Reminiscent of a tepid summer ashiyu—a hot spring foot-bath—the water stroked Taiyo’s legs as if licking his wounds. He focused on the oscillations of the raft, synching the gentle rises and falls with his breathing. The sensation led him to half drift asleep while sitting, feet overboard.
He imagined, or maybe dreamed, of floating inside a contraption he’d seen sold in hardware stores a couple years after the tsunami. The New Arc Survival Capsule was basically a hamster ball the size of a merry-go-round; big, yellow, and windowless. Inside was a stripper pole, presumably for a family of four to cling to while getting hurled about by thirty-meter waves.
Light fell upon Taiyo from behind. “What are you doing?” said Nel.
The abruptness of her words startled him. “Washing,” he replied, equally curt.
“Your done washing. You’re just sitting there dangling bait in the water.”
“So?”
“So it maybe it’d be better to keep your legs on the raft.”
“Maybe?” he repeated. “I thought you didn’t like m—”
“Did you hear that?”
Nel scooted farther from the edge of the raft, bumping and briefly waking Walter then apologizing.
Taiyo looked over his shoulder and got her light in his eyes. She was breathing fast. Scared. He supposed that was normal, given the circumstances.
“Can I ask you something?” he said. Maybe he could distract her.
A minute passed without the sound in the water returning before she responded. “Of course,” she said, sounding distant and distracted.
“If you take a hamster ball and put four hamsters inside it and chuck it against some rocks over and over again, do you think when you opened it you’d find four healthy hamsters?”
“I’d be a little hesitant to open it.”
He told her about the New Arc. “And there’s an upgraded version for the family who prefers their survival ball to include three days worth of air and supplies.”
“What kind of supplies?”
He shrugged. “A bag of sleeping pills, if the maker has any mercy.” He told her it also had an optional audio system with six pre-programmed tracks.
“Kenny G on repeat?”
“Something to soothe you while your family fills your gyrating confines with vomit and feces.”
“No onboard toilet?”
“More of a coffee can with some kitty litter, really,” he said.
“I don’t think the lid is staying on.”
After a bit more lighthearted banter, she asked him again to take his feet out of the water, adding, “You seriously didn’t hear anything?”
“I don’t know.”
“Please, Taiyo.” Her voice had turned shaky.
The others were up moving around and rocking the raft, also chattering about noises they may or may not have heard.
“I don’t think the sounds are coming from the water,” Taiyo told Nel.
She crouched down closer but still behind him and whispered, “From the walls?”
“I’ve decided not to let the noises in my head bother me.”
“Because you know we’ll die before we lose our sanity.”
“Could be a close finish.”
“That’s the spirit.”
Some of the noises had probably been the crates of the raft rubbing together, or the other AsCans snoring, peeing, or softly crying into their arms. But not everything Taiyo had heard could be easily dismissed. Not the churning water and quiet bubbling. Not the long, low-frequency growl. He’d only heard those noises a handful of times, and they’d always come from a different spot, but never far, as if encircling the raft.
“It has to be seismic,” said Kristen, the one with the most geological knowledge, in attempt to explained away the noises. “This place isn’t stable.” Her words might have confirmed Taiyo’s hopes and suspicion if she didn’t sounded so unconvinced herself.
His legs still stubbornly in the water, Taiyo told the others that with such little input to their senses, auditory—and even visual—hallucinations were to be expected.
And then something brushed the bottoms of his feet. He hurtled his legs up onto the raft and scrambled back, jarring his crewmates in the dark. He laughed at his reaction and assured everyone it had only been a piece of stray debris. He didn’t mention that the object had slinked along the bottoms of his feet, and come and gone with a wake that lifted and settled the raft the way a passing boat perturbs a dock.
Tactile sensations were a lot harder for the mind to counterfeit. And harder to ignore.
“The whole raft just moved,” said Walter.
It was still bobbing softly up and down as the wake dissipated.
Taiyo chuckled again. “Yeah, I leaped back pretty fast, eh? Sorry to startle everyone.”
And what if it hadn’t been a hallucination? What then? Wouldn’t that explain how Anton seemed to get pulled under? Taiyo wasn’t thinking clearly. Not rationally.
Nel turned off her light. “The battery’s half dead,” she explained.
They huddled, not quite shivering, but not shy about seeking the comfort of friends. Together, in silence and darkness, they listened.
“The brain is a funny thing,” said Taiyo. He slid his ass back over the edge of the raft and dropped his bare feet into the water. The skeptic and the scientist in him wanted confirmation. Results had to be reproducible. He focused on his wriggling toes, eyeing them even though he couldn’t tell the difference between a hand in front of his face and the insides of his eyelids.
“Shut up and listen,” Ronin yelled.
Taiyo tuned his ears. Now it sounded like something in the walls. “Probably another tremor.”
“Or a rescue squad,” Walter said. “That rumble could be them trying to drill down and open up a shaft.”
“They’d better hurry,” Nel said. “I bet you can just about reach up and touch the ceiling now.”
No one tried.
Ronin suggested, not seriously, that maybe the Asylum was haunted. Something like 80 percent of people in Japan believed in ghosts, and, according to Nel, a lot of people in the Arctic did, too. She added that the mold in old houses released an airborne chemical that had been shown to induce the same kind of visions often reported by people in “haunted” houses, and old pipes sometimes shuddered at a frequency that produced the same effect.
Maybe there was something in the water in the Asylum, and maybe there wasn’t. Taiyo couldn’t trust his mind to interpret its environment, but was it really so crazy an idea that some living creature had fallen in during the storm with them? He remembered the bones they’d found on the ground beneath the chimney. If they’d had water to break the fall …
He heard something.
It was subtle. A slow, guttural rumble barely audible over the streaming waterfall, followed by a sound like a submarine going under.
The other AsCans shouted at each other to be quiet.
Taiyo refused to give up thinking beyond immediate survival, and so he had to keep up appearances. He couldn’t afford to be scared; an astronaut did not have that luxury. And so, his legs remained in the water, but he kept them very still.
“You can’t tell me you didn’t hear that,” N
el said.
“Something,” said Taiyo.
“Kristen? You heard it, didn’t you?”
“Yeah,” she whispered.
“Big deal,” said Ronin. “So, some mud fell out of the chimney.”
“That’s not correct,” Walter said. “We’re under the chimney. The noise came from farther out.”
“A piece of the roof then,” Ronin said. “Go back to sleep.”
“Yessir.”
It was hard to tell how far away it had been. Thirty meters or so, Taiyo guessed. Maybe less.
Nel whispered, “It didn’t sound like something falling.”
Taiyo said, “But it probably was. Or a log bobbing up to the surface. Or some kind of reaction because of the compressing atmosphere. Or a methane bubble.”
“But you took your legs out of the water,” she said.
He hadn’t noticed. “They were getting cold.”
They waited. For now, the sounds were of drips and the echoes of their voices off the approaching ceiling.
“Hey, Taiyo?” It was Walter. He scooted along the deck, his wet clothes squeaking against the laminate. “Bro …” His subdued tone made Taiyo picture him as a cocky class clown, maybe even a bit of a bully; popular, but dealing with the same self-esteem and home-life issues as every other kid.
“Hey, Commander.”
It took a minute before Walter got around to the thing he’d come to discuss. “You really don’t believe in God, do you?” There was desperation in Walter’s voice as if his deity would only spare him if he found a consensus of faith.
Taiyo opted for a dodge. “It must feel like touching heaven when you’re up there flying a plane, eh?”
“It really does, you know.” Walter had a lump in his throat. “A step closer, anyway. Seems I’m on my way there now, huh? You’d think I’d be happier to go.”
“I bet you’ve flown some impressive machines.”
“Sure have, bro.” The crate beneath Walter made an awkward noise when he adjusted himself. “The F-18, the F-35, the X-26A glider. And of course the MV-22B Osprey.”
Talking military could get as touchy as talking religion, so Taiyo steered things a different way. He said, “Ever heard of a scramjet being dropped-launched from a jet?”
