Post by heatheranne on Jul 15, 2022 15:08:18 GMT -5
A scratch mars the airlock window, coarse, jagged, ending abruptly like a fingernail had snapped.
It makes me think of Ruby.
The last time I saw Ruby she looked strange. Not because the mortician didn’t do her make up right at all and not because her mother chose to dress her in that awful pencil skirt she hated. But because she was so still.
Ruby was never still, not even in sleep.
That night, I dreamed she clawed her way out of the coffin, flithy, skirt torn, fingernails jagged and bleeding from the effort. She was so mad at me for letting them bury her like that.
But Ruby’s not here to claw her way in or out of anything, so what could have caused it, that angry flaw? Something trying to get in?
Beyond the window’s scar, the Earth’s oceans look confined in an aquarium. Turquoise blue and swirls of white churn against the window. The terrible pressure of a vast ocean appears to press against the edges of that bit of glass. A glass weakened with a scratch.
With the turn of the habitat ring, inky black space bleeds across the window, replacing the Earth, isolating the blemish. Kneeling on the floor over the airlock window, I can almost feel the fragility of the five millimeter hull protecting my knees from the unforgiving vacuum.
The comm system crackles. “Elliette?”
I stand from kneeling over the door in the floor and tap the comm panel. I have to tap it three times before it lights up. “Yes, Dr. Chawla?”
“Come down to the dining area in twenty minutes. Crew meeting.”
“Sure.”
I step around the door toward the spacesuits on the wall. Six. More than we need for our crew of five. The suits look like the newest things on this old ship. Probably because they get so little use. I half-heartedly do a quick pressure test. This has all been done by the ship technicians before we boarded. They don’t completely trust a crew of teenagers to adequately complete safety tests. Not that we’ll use them. Despite some rudimentary training, they don’t trust teenagers with space walks either.
Leaving the airlock, I seal the door behind me. Walking through the habitat ring, I pass one of the entrances to the Jefferies tube. Alison is just emerging from the ceiling access, clinging to the ladder as her feet meet the floor, meet gravity. Her black hair is cut in a sharp angle at her jaw, her face in a scowl I’m beginning to suspect is permanent. She looks a little white in the face.
“You okay?” I ask.
“Yeah, just, you know…”
I nod. The Jefferies tube is the stationary hub of the Kelvin. Since it doesn’t rotate with the habitat ring, it has no gravity. It actually isn’t really called the Jefferies tube. The plaque next to the ladder identifies it as Engineering Access, but, years ago, some Trekkie student nicknamed these hubs Jefferies tubes and it stuck.
It makes me think of Ruby.
The last time I saw Ruby she looked strange. Not because the mortician didn’t do her make up right at all and not because her mother chose to dress her in that awful pencil skirt she hated. But because she was so still.
Ruby was never still, not even in sleep.
That night, I dreamed she clawed her way out of the coffin, flithy, skirt torn, fingernails jagged and bleeding from the effort. She was so mad at me for letting them bury her like that.
But Ruby’s not here to claw her way in or out of anything, so what could have caused it, that angry flaw? Something trying to get in?
Beyond the window’s scar, the Earth’s oceans look confined in an aquarium. Turquoise blue and swirls of white churn against the window. The terrible pressure of a vast ocean appears to press against the edges of that bit of glass. A glass weakened with a scratch.
With the turn of the habitat ring, inky black space bleeds across the window, replacing the Earth, isolating the blemish. Kneeling on the floor over the airlock window, I can almost feel the fragility of the five millimeter hull protecting my knees from the unforgiving vacuum.
The comm system crackles. “Elliette?”
I stand from kneeling over the door in the floor and tap the comm panel. I have to tap it three times before it lights up. “Yes, Dr. Chawla?”
“Come down to the dining area in twenty minutes. Crew meeting.”
“Sure.”
I step around the door toward the spacesuits on the wall. Six. More than we need for our crew of five. The suits look like the newest things on this old ship. Probably because they get so little use. I half-heartedly do a quick pressure test. This has all been done by the ship technicians before we boarded. They don’t completely trust a crew of teenagers to adequately complete safety tests. Not that we’ll use them. Despite some rudimentary training, they don’t trust teenagers with space walks either.
Leaving the airlock, I seal the door behind me. Walking through the habitat ring, I pass one of the entrances to the Jefferies tube. Alison is just emerging from the ceiling access, clinging to the ladder as her feet meet the floor, meet gravity. Her black hair is cut in a sharp angle at her jaw, her face in a scowl I’m beginning to suspect is permanent. She looks a little white in the face.
“You okay?” I ask.
“Yeah, just, you know…”
I nod. The Jefferies tube is the stationary hub of the Kelvin. Since it doesn’t rotate with the habitat ring, it has no gravity. It actually isn’t really called the Jefferies tube. The plaque next to the ladder identifies it as Engineering Access, but, years ago, some Trekkie student nicknamed these hubs Jefferies tubes and it stuck.
