by Beth Reason
Chapter 15
"You are insane." He was an older man, which was good. It meant he was a seasoned pilot and knew for himself what was and was not possible.
"Fine. I'm insane. Now, is it possible?"
Marlon was chugging a coffee from the vendor at the space port. It was approaching two a.m. and we should have been spent. I was, at least emotionally. It was so hard to spend the evening with everyone at Alistair's knowing we had this big secret, especially after Lynette apologized.
"I was worried, Jake. You worried me. I get mad when someone makes me worry, especially when it's about something stupid. You're not just my job, you know." She held my hand. And then we watched the clock and waited. And waited. Everyone seemed unnaturally chatty that evening and the anxiety had built and built. It wasn't until nine thirty that Ralph said he was tired and heading to bed. He told Lynette to do the same. I think he wanted me to chat with Alistair some more. He commented earlier in the evening how much "better" I seemed. I think he gave Alistair's old wisdom the credit. I said goodnight. In my head, I said good bye.
After they went to bed, Alistair sat and stared at his fake fire. He let the painful seconds tick by. He looked up at me then. He knew. He stood and I stood and then he hugged me.
I understand. I think it's foolish. I think you're going to be sorry. And I am terrified for you and what you might find. But above all, I understand. Do you know how badly I wish this old body could join you?
Then he released me before I started to cry and shook Marlon's hand. "When you get out of prison, boy, find your way back here."
Marlon's eyes went wide. "How did..."
"Just do as I said." He winked at me and then said loudly, "This old back of mine needs a nap. Don't stay up too late looking at the stars, boys. And return the Jeep to the garage when you're done."
I smiled. He gave us everything we still needed, an excuse to be out, a valid reason we'd be gone all night, and permission to use his Jeep transport. I wished he could come, too.
Once at the station in Denver, it was easy enough to find my ship. We just went to the private Cosworth terminal and there it was. The old pilot was in the midst of monitoring the bots filling the catalyst drive when we approached.
"You just can't do it, son," he said again after hearing that I wanted to do the run without gas.
"Do you know who he is?" Marlon jumped in on my behalf.
"Don't matter who he is. It can't be done."
I looked to Marlon who gave me an I told you so look. I turned back to the pilot. "So no one has ever done it? How do the pilots fly if they're gassed?"
He gave a raspy chuckle. "The pilots are bots, kid. Haven't been people in the cockpit since X2. Too dangerous."
Aha! A way in. "But X1 and X2 had pilots. They weren't gassed."
"And they cracked up the ships, didn't they? Nope. Can't be done. Hey!" he shouted at the bot filling the catalyst drive. "No top offs! Just the max and leave it at that." He scoffed. "Bloody bots programmed to squeeze every credit out of us. You'd think a bot would be honest. Just goes to show it depends on who's doing the programming."
I didn't care about the bots overcharging me. "Look, Mr..."
"Collins."
"Mr. Collins. I..."
"Bert, to my friends."
"Fine. Bert."
"I didn't say you were a friend."
"He signs your payouts," Marlon said pointedly.
"That so?" Bert's eyes widened and he let out a long whistle. "Oh. Then you're Cosworth himself."
"Yes. And I really want to know why you can't make the trip without gas."
"It'll tear you up, Mr. Cosworth. Just tear you to pieces. We're not made to go that fast." It would not tear you to pieces, and I knew that full well. He was trying to do his job to protect me, whether it was because I was his boss or a kid didn't matter.
"I've jumped. I've made more jumps through wormholes and galactic funnels than you can imagine and I've done the majority of it without gas. It's not going to tear me up and I know that." He looked a little guilty. "Now, tell me what will really happen, because time is running short and this is very important." I was surprised at how authoritative I sounded. Even Marlon stood a little taller after my demands of Bert.
Bert looked almost panicked. "Look, Mr. Cosworth. I don't want to lose my job. Just sit in there and get the gas and have an easy trip."
Marlon sighed heavily. "This is taking forever. Let's cut to the chase. This man can fire you on the spot. Do you have a family?"
I almost jumped in to let Bert know I would not, in fact, fire him on the spot. But damn if it wasn't working.
"Yes, sir," he said almost miserably. "But I'll get fired if I help you. Fired, and maybe get Mr. Cosworth killed."
"I see," said Marlon. He pulled the slider machine out of his bag and grabbed Bert's employee pass key.
"Hey!"
Marlon swiped it and handed it back before Bert could say anything else. He began tapping on his holo.
"Now see here. I don't care who you are, there's things you don't do and..." He stopped talking. Marlon was holding his holo in front of Bert's face. I watched as Bert's eyes widened.
"With one push of a button, I will add a zero to that amount. And if you do not help us I will take them all away. Do we understand each other?"
"But...but...I don't want to get jailed."
"You will not be jailed," I said quickly. "You have my word."
"They'll trace that credit balance..."
"And see that it is from a contest you entered through a radio station last week. Come on, Bert. We both know I'm better than that." It was Marlon's shining moment and he was enjoying every minute. "Now, do we add a zero or do we start taking them away?" It was amazing.
Bert rubbed his mouth for just a second and looked around. No one was on the platform this late, just him and us, and the deaf drone bots preparing the X3. "Before I tell you anything else you have to know that this insane. It's absolutely unheard of. It's...it's..."
"Suicide, I know. But there's a way, isn't there?"
He sighed heavily. "If I kill the Jacob Cosworth..."
"And I'm taking away a zero..." Marlon hovered his finger over the key dramatically.
"No! Hell. Fine. Look, the reason the X1 and X2 crashed wasn't because of the pilots, not really. They lived through the mission. But the speed, it wrecked them at the end. They couldn't land on their own. They could take off, take a little Luna trip just fine, even at those speeds. I've...I've done it myself. Part of the X2 testing."
I knew it. I knew it! "So it's possible."
"Yeah, but even a short Luna trip did things. It screws with your perception, with your thinking." I knew exactly what he was talking about. The rubber band feeling, when your brain said you should, by all rights, be in one place and your eyes were saying that you were somehow in another. Nothing would make sense. It would be like when the Condor would jump or tunnel, only worse. Alone. Like jumping through the fah'ti.
Marlon pushed a button. "One zero added. Now tell us how he does it and lives and I'll add another."
"You can't get past the gas anywhere in the passenger compartments, but it will be much less in the cockpit. Law mandates we have two jump seats in the pit for humans in case intervention is necessary."
"Has it ever been?"
"No. Not on the X3. Sixty two reliable flights with no problems."
"Won't the bots notice him?"
"They're drones. They fly. They can't talk, can't hear. They have environ sensors, of course, but only set to mark critical changes."
"Is it breathable in there?"
"Yes. It's unnecessarily expensive and pointless to seal it off. Plus, like I said, it has to be inhabitable by humans by law, just in case. It'll be cold, though. No point in heating it. And some gas will get through."
"How much?"
He gave an almost manic little laugh. "How should I know? Like I said, it hasn't been done. It's not a vac in there
. It would stand to reason that some gas..." he waved a hand in a helpless little gesture as his voice trailed off.
"Are there masks?"
His eyes went a little wider, as if he never thought of that. "Yes! Emergency ones. In the passenger compartment they only release in emergencies, but the pit has two secured to the walls."
"Does the gas flow the whole trip?" Marlon asked. It was an excellent question.
"No. That would kill a man. The sprayers start two minutes after take off. The gas only sprays through the system for three minutes, but I'd give it a good ten minutes with the mask on to make sure the gas has been cleared from the filters. It'll go off again ten hours and fifty eight minutes after it stops spraying."
Marlon snorted. "That seems really specific."
"It has to be. It's a fine line between too little and too much. We've been using the gas on the three day transports for years. Completely different set up, since it has human pilots and a sealed pit, but same idea. If you're really hellbent on this plan, then you gotta remember that. Ten hours and fifty eight minutes after it stops the first time, you get juiced again."
"So if I breathe in the mask for, say, twenty minutes at the beginning, then set my holo to warn me..."
"Unless you're being tortured." He put his hand on my arm. "I'm giving this warning to you man to man. If something goes wrong, or if you can't take it, or if you're just blitzed out of your mind by then...that second gas, just let it happen. Let it take you away." I could see it meant a lot for him to think I had that back up plan. He didn't look like a man getting paid for secret info in that moment. He looked like a friend, or a father. "Will you at least promise me you'll use it if you need it?" Then he swore before I could answer. "I shouldn't be doing this!" He looked like he was in legitimate pain.
"Keep your eyes on the prize," Marlon said coldly.
I shot him a frown. "Bert, I promise you this is absolutely necessary. It's a matter of life and death." He quirked an eyebrow. "There is someone on the end of the line that needs me." Or I need her. "And I have to get to her quick and quiet and if I don't...well I can't even think about what's going to happen if I don't. I'm not paying you to help me die. I'm paying you to help her live."
A look of understanding crossed his face. "She worth dying for, then, is she?"
Yes. "No, it's not...it's complicated. I'm not going to die," I insisted quickly. "I promise, if I can't hack it, I'll keep the mask on for the second gassing."
He looked at me for a minute. Marlon went to hit the button to add another zero to the long line of credits we added to Bert's account, but he held his hand up. "That's enough. I'm not a greedy man, Mr. Cosworth."
I shrugged. "It's just money."
He gave a snort. Marlon added some anyway. "Nah, the space monkey means it," he assured Bert. "You should see what he's paying me!"
"Are you going, too?"
Marlon nodded, putting his holo away.
"So you're both insane?"
Marlon put his hands up. "No way. I'm getting good and gassed. I want to make sure to be around to spend all his credits."
Bert pointed at him. "You should listen to your friend."
Two and a half hours later, after we took off, strapped in the emergency seat in the cold cockpit with my panicked mind trying hard to ignore the enormous physical and mental pressure, his words drifted through my head over and over. I should have listened to my friend.
No! I needed to get there, and I needed to get there sane. The constant pressure on my body was just that. It was just the g-force of traveling so quickly. It wasn't enough to kill me. My mind only thought so because of the feeling of leaving something, leaving part of myself behind. It wasn't real. It was a trick, and one I knew. My brain just had to remember.
Concentrate, I told myself. Concentrate on one thing, one small thing. A piece of me. I just needed to picture myself. I was in a ship. I was traveling from point A to point B. I was moving very quickly. It was real. It was happening. I left nothing behind. It was all there, all with me.
Time blurred, as it will at those speeds. Everything blurred, as it will at those speeds. The clicking sounds of the drone bots going about their endless list of flight checks and course corrections and accelerations and decelerations around the known and unknown asteroids sounded slow and hollow. Their movements seemed to be suspended, or sped up according to the accelerations and decelerations the ship made. I looked out the window. Or what they called a window. Of course in a craft this fast it couldn't be a real window made of glass, or plastic, or one of the newer translucent alloys. It was solid, as solid as the rest of the fuselage. What we saw was the live feed of minute cameras on the ship. A movie, only a real one. I focused on that. There was a dot in the center that slowly grew. So slowly. Almost too slowly to notice unless some debris or asteroid or random illuminated dust mote flashed by. Then the very stillness of the dot contrasted and made it seem bigger.
Mars. Utopia. Her.
I willed myself to focus on it. I convinced myself the sounds I was hearing were on the Condor. I told myself I was strapped in my jump seat with Dad at my side and Mother strapped in the labs to make sure her experiments lived. Not that she could have done a thing about them if something went wrong. Even if she could have unstrapped, the g-force alone would keep her riveted in place. But I suppose it made her jumps through the holes and chutes easier. The knowledge of Dad being right beside me, that's what eased mine.
He was there with me on the X3. In my mind, at least. Isn't that all that really matters?
I could even hear his voice. "This one's a baddy, eh kiddo?" He'd joke. He'd laugh. His voice would reach me in distorted waves that were more silly than scary as a kid. "Hang on. I mean, it can't last forever, right? Or maybe it can. Do you suppose we'll be in this flushing toilet for the rest of our lives? Boy, wouldn't that be something!" Dad has a weird sense of humor. It must have rubbed off on me because I always laughed at his odd and usually inappropriate jokes.
I laughed out loud on the X3 and the sound of my own voice was both startling and somehow securing. It didn't sound like me. Of course not, not at those speeds. But it did sound like someone. Anyone. Dad, right with me.
"I miss you Dad," I said out loud. The twisted voice came back to me and the hollowness added to my pain. I couldn't do that. Not there, not then. I couldn't think about Dad, Mother.
Ralph. I thought about Ralph. I thought long and hard about him, the thinking taking more effort than usual because of the amount of concentration required to hold a single clear thought. He was probably going to be livid with me. I didn't have it in me, bare, exposed and raw like I was, to even pretend to be angry at him. I was confused and hurt. I didn't understand how he could pick StarTech over me. I shed tears that were instantly pushed behind me. The feeling of them wrapping around my face, pushing past my ears was fascinating and my tired mind concentrated on that instead.
At some point, my holo warned me about the gases. The suddenness of the noise made me jump and it took me a few seconds to remember what the noise meant. Had it really been that long? Of course, what did time mean? It took all my strength to pick up muscles that thought they were thousands and thousands of miles behind me and get the mask. I somehow got it in place and felt the cold oxygen flood around my face. With the mask on, I felt less vulnerable. More in control. There was something real pressing on me, around me. Something I could see. My anchor. I decided to leave it on the rest of the trip.
Or maybe I just decided not to take it off. I can't be sure. I can't actually be sure of too much after the halfway point. Bert was right. Going that long that fast did things to me. I began to see people in the cabin with me. Looking back, I can call them hallucinations. I can even rest assured that's the only logical explanation. But were they? I still can't say for certain. Lena appeared. I hadn't seen her after my first few weeks on Utopia. I don't think I'd thought of her once in all the months between then and the flight, so I don't know why it was he
r I conjured. Maybe I wasn't the one that did the conjuring.
"Here now. You'll get in so much trouble when they find out, you know. Can I at least check your vitals?" I answered and thought I held out my hand. "You're going to set yourself back a long way with this little stunt." She gave me that conspiratorial wink I'd seen from her a time or two when I'd whine about the conditioning. I couldn't even walk on my own when she met me. Had it really been only six months since then?
Maybe. Maybe not. Was there time at all?
"So you're running back to save your green people, are you?"
It's her, isn't it?
She shrugged. "What do I know? I'm just a nurse on this ward. I don't know what they do on the upper levels. But that's what you're up to, isn't it?"
Yes.
She did not look like she understood. "You were doing pretty well for yourself on Earth. You know you screwed all that up, don't you?" Didn't she know I wanted to screw it all up? "And getting Marlon involved. That wasn't very fair for a friend to do."
He wasn't my friend.
"He's not, hm? So you turned to your worst enemy in your hour of need, did you? That's weird. Must be a Qitani trait, because we humans certainly don't trust our enemies that much."
The Qitani are our enemies.
"Bitterness does not suit you Jake, it really doesn't. Where's the boy who talked about a new race of people with such love and devotion?"
I thought the idea of them scared you.
"Of course it did! At first. Everything new is scary at first, Jake. So why the change, kiddo?" She changed to Ralph, just like that. He was there with me then.
You of all people know why.
"I know you feel like they betrayed you. They didn't. They were always honest. It was us that kept things from you. If it was up to them, you would have known from the get go, too."
That's a mean thing to do to a kid.
"Us? Or them? No, neither. We all do what we think is best. Sometimes it turns out not to be. I don't think that's the case here. You can't hate us. And even if you think you can, I know you better...you can't hate them, either. And you shouldn't."
I don't.
"I know."
I want to.
He laughed. "I know."
Especially you.
"Yeah. I know that, too. But we all can't think and act like you'd like, Jakey." It was Mother's voice I heard. "And you'd be foolish to believe life works that way."
Can you inspeak?
"Now why would you ask me such an impossible to answer question? I've spent the last five years working on the fah'ti and Qitani technology. There was simply no time for any type of experiment and a hypothesis is not the same as an answer. Why, at best, I could possibly advance a theory, but what's that? Hm?"
Nothing.
"Exactly! Now, about this mission you are on. I can't say I'm disappointed, because perhaps the data that is collected will be valuable. But there is a reason why the gas exists, Jakey, and as your mother, I'm very disappointed to see that you've bucked a tried and true system."
Said the lady who had a baby in space.
"Touche. Please, for once in your life, would you listen to what someone who knows a little more than you has to say?" Mother was replaced by Xavier. "You little brat. We risk our asses for you..."
"Don't be mean," said Daniel, taking over. "He's always been a pushy, no good jackass. You hang in there, Jake."
I miss your food.
He laughed. "You do not. You miss learning how to butter people up, that's what you miss! No one can stand my cooking. Not my fault I'm working with protein mash. You might want to check yourself." It was Stephan now. "You're vitals are showing bad."
And on and on. Or maybe it all happened in a flash. It felt like everyone I ever knew popped in to check on me. It had to be my subconscious keeping me sane, keeping me sane by making me insane in a way my brain could accept. Who knows? All I'm sure of is that one minute I was talking with Lynette, trying to apologize and explain, and the next the clicking of the bot drones raised in pitch and got faster. My body felt lighter by slow increments. The scene on the screen showed the burning blue and white flames of entry.
We were there. We were landing. I felt my tears of relief falling, rolling straight down my cheeks as they should. I unstrapped the oxygen mask and tried to get the pulling and spinning feeling in me to go away. We landed smoothly. The lack of motion sent my head spinning for a minute and I closed my eyes and drew deep breaths. I unlocked the straps of my seat and immediately pitched forward, my legs and arms failing to understand that the Jake on Mars was the same Jake that had just been on Earth and that we were whole and complete and we all needed to work as one unit and get moving.
The cabin door opened. Marlon was there, groggy, a zombie himself. "Out. Here. Walk." He worked his mouth as if trying to say more but finding it impossible. He held out a hand. I forced my arm to lift. I closed my hand around Marlon's and made myself stand. I nearly pulled us both over with the action, but after a second our wobbling stopped. Marlon let out what could have been a laugh and we stumbled forward to the door.
Christophe was there. I didn't even know he was on Utopia. He wasn't supposed to be. He was supposed to be in Washington at another stupid IOC hearing. I had a fleeting thought that he wasn't really there, that he was like the others who kept me company on the journey. He was just a figment of my overworked imagination.
"Mr. Donnely, I believe if I speak to you right now one of us would end up dead." He made a motion for one of the StarTech guards behind him to take Marlon. "Infirmary seven. Sedate him. I want everything on his person to be confiscated and brought to my office."
"Yes, sir!" they snapped out.
I still thought it was a hallucination, a very complicated one, until I felt Marlon's hand being ripped from mine. "Wait," I managed to make my mouth say.
"S'right, Jakey," Marlon slurred. "I...nap..." He was almost passed out and the guard moved him to a wheelchair. They rolled him away. I stood holding the doorway of the X3 and watched them until they were too far for me to see.
I felt Christophe's hands on me. He was pushing, poking, checking me over. "Dear god, Jake! What in the hell were you thinking?" He grabbed my face and looked in my eyes. "Can you understand me?"
I nodded as best as I could with his hands on me. He looked worried, not angry. He turned and snapped. I was in a wheelchair in seconds. "Leave us," he commanded his guards.
"But sir..."
"Leave!" he bellowed. He didn't lose his cool. He was Christophe, after all. But he was on the edge, I could feel it. He took off in the opposite direction, steering us towards an elevator. He pushed me in and instead of using the number pad, he slipped his pass key into the reader and then pressed a red button. We started down. He didn't say anything. I couldn't think of anything to say. After an eternity, the elevator slowed and stopped and the door opened into a squeaky white hall. A hospital. They are the same, no matter where you go. His shoes squealed as we walked down the corridor. He stopped at the doors and ran his pass key through. The doors swung open and immediately two guards were there. They looked at him, then down at me, then stepped away.
He pushed me into the next hallway. On one side was a wall of windows, on the other rows of stations and equipment. He wheeled me past the first window and then turned me suddenly to face the next.
"She hasn't woken since we found her. It's impossible to say how long she was...trapped. We know the connection was lost on her side once she jumped, we just don't know the math we need to determine how long that would have been. We've got her vitals. She's alive. But..." He cleared his throat and tried to sound angry. "I shouldn't let you see her, you know. Reginald demanded that I lock you right up with Marlon, and I can't say I completely disagree with him. After what you pulled..." He stopped speaking. He took a deep, calming breath. "There's time for that later. And I'm here, not Reginald. It's my call. And I'm sure it's the right one. You may go to her, Jacob,"
he added softly.
I pushed up from my wheelchair and leaned against the glass. Ashnahta. So small in the big bed. So pale. So foreign and out of place and...
She was there.
I lurched forward and fumbled for the doorknob. Christophe reached around and opened it for me, then stepped back. I stumbled, but not as much as I should have. I had a focus. I had her. I pulled a chair and almost fell into it beside her bed. And then I did what I wanted to do for years. I took her hand in mine. Not in a suit. Not covered in protective layers. I took her soft hand in mine. She had a pulse. I could feel it strong, even though she looked so weak. I almost cried. I almost laughed. I was so overwhelmed and relieved and scared and worried and ridiculously happy all at once that all I could do was sit there and stare and hope against hope that it wasn't still part of the delirium, that I wasn't just imagining the moment to get through the trip.
It wasn't until much later, after I had my own IV of fluids and my own stats analyzed, after the floor beneath me started to actually feel like it was beneath me and not miles away that I truly believed it was all happening. It was real. I had her. My friend.
