Molly Fyde and the Parsona Rescue

quivering and she’d only gone a fraction of the distance.

Her knees were doing very little work, their grip on the trunk of cables too feeble. Molly let one of them go, pressing the toe of her boot into the series of zero-G hand-holds on the floor.

Much better.

She twisted her right arm around the cable, already growing more taut under the extra gravities, and found a toe hold with her other foot. Now she was rappelling down a pock-marked cliff instead of trying to slide down a slick rope. Molly locked her legs into the weight of her torso and let her boots do a lot of the work.

She could do this.

By the time she reached the bottom of the cargo bay, Parsona had to be doing 5 Gs. The engine room was another six meters away, and her ankles felt like they might snap under the strain. She balanced swiftness and safety—for every second she delayed, the task became that much more brutal. Looking up to secure her arm a bit better, Molly could see up the shaft of the ship, through the cockpit, and out to the green planet beyond. It completely filled the windshield.

She needed to focus.

Working her way down a few more steps, she entered the hallway leading back to the engine room and crew quarters. She was about two meters from the end of the cable when one of her boots slipped out of its hold. The arm she had wrapped around the cable was wrenched violently before coming loose. Her other hand remained around the cord, sliding painfully as she crashed into the remote docking panel.

She landed with a grunt, straddling the device like a rope swing. Catching her breath, her heart racing, she clutched the cables with both hands and pressed her head to the wire. That could’ve been bad, she thought. But she was level with the engine room door, at least.

Struggling to her feet, Molly felt as if she had a hundred kilos of extra weight strapped to her body. She wasn’t sure how much the cord could take; she peered down at the twelve meters of space between her and the metal door below.

Not wasting time, Molly kicked off from the airlock door beside her to see how much play there was left in the cable. It barely moved. She kicked harder and swung slightly toward the engine room. Catching the jamb and stepping off, she pulled herself into the thick doorway and was immediately pressed back against it. The forces on her body were incredible, but at least she was on her back, standing sideways in the engine room passage.

Her arms and feet felt numb; she wasn’t sure if she’d be able to reach the fuel lines. There were more objects to grasp in the engine room, but much of it was scalding hot. She wasn’t even sure she had the strength to leave the door jamb. She contemplated her next move, and then saw that it wouldn’t matter. Nothing would. The thruster relays across the mechanical room were firing. On and off. Just as they would be if someone were piloting the ship.

Parsona wasn’t out of control or in a runaway state.

Activating the helmet’s radio, Molly shouted for Cole.

“Molly? Are you okay? Where are you? We’re pulling seven Gs right now. You need to get that flight suit plugged in!”

“I’m by the engine room. You’re not touching the controls, are you?” She took some deep breaths, her chest feeling like three men stood on it.

“No, I’m trying to shut down all subsystems from here. Now get that suit plugged in, we’re gonna hit atmosphere in a few minutes!”

Oh, no. If the ship went into turns at this speed, she’d be thrown all over the place. Then she thought of something and would’ve kicked herself if her leg didn’t weigh a ton. She thumbed the mic again. “Do you have life support controls?”

There was a pause. “Yeah. I think I do.”

“Route everything you can to the grav panels forward of the engine room and turn off the panels aft of here.”

“Doing it now. But we’re closing in on eight Gs. I don’t know if the panels will take away half that. You need to get your suit plugged in!”

Across the hall from Molly, the door to the airlock slid open. She grimaced a smile at Cole’s thoughtfulness.

Grunting, she pulled herself up as the effects of the grav systems kicked in. She hoped Cole’s and Walter’s flightsuits were absorbing the extra weight; it was unpleasant to think of them suffering just to give her a little boost, and not even one that made her feel stronger—just less weak. She didn’t have much time before the Gs crept back up or they hit atmosphere. She looked to the hallway; the panel was still swinging slightly. The strain on the cable made it more like a steel cable under tension and less like a dangling rope.

Unable to reach it, Molly took a chance by kicking a foot at the hanging remote panel. It struck, but the weight of her leg out in the void nearly sent her over the edge and down to the lazarette, twelve meters below. She pulled herself back into the jamb, her knuckles white, and watched the panel swing away from her on a slow arc. She would only have one shot at this.

The panel was little more than half a meter square, its hydraulic cables never meant for such stress. It swung toward Molly—she crouched in the intense pull of acceleration, her muscles tense. It was impossible to know how hard to jump. Her vision told her body to exert a certain amount of effort, but under these gravities, it would’ve barely gotten her feet off the door jamb. She decided to give it everything, even though the distance would be less than a meter.

Just before the panel got as close as it would, Molly leapt, her legs uncoiling like springs. Heavy arms came up and scrambled for the cord. One foot landed on the small target. But she had jumped too far, her weight carrying past the small platform as it began swinging toward the airlock. She was over a meter from the door when she lost her grip. Her hands came free, one foot still on the slow swing. She pushed off, hoping the momentum would get her to the thick jamb of the airlock door.

Again: too much. Molly grabbed for the doorway as she sailed through, her feet tripping over the edge as she hurtled through the passage and crashed into the rear wall of the airlock. Reflexively, she brought her right arm up to protect her body, and heard it snap. Heard it before she even felt the pain, like the sound of a thick branch being popped into two pieces. Her torso crunched down on top of it, grinding the fragmented bones together.

Molly gargled with pain and nearly blacked out.

Pressing down with her left hand, she forced her body up and over to her back. She was lying on the wall beside two of the space suits—her arm at her side, her wrist at a funny angle. Molly felt sick seeing it like that. The limb must belong to someone else. Her brain couldn’t process this new shape—it made her stomach churn.

Lifting her head, she could see the airlock life support panel not far away. She used her feet and good arm to kick and drag herself across the wall, every centimeter a minor victory.

Pulling the panel open, she grabbed the cord inside and plugged it into the receptacle near her armpit. The relief was immediate. Pockets of anti-grav fluid raced around the chambers of her flight suit, countering the Gs as if she were still buckled into her seat.

Molly fumbled with the mounting straps on one of the spacesuits and dragged it out of the way. She buckled herself in its place, wrapping the webbing across her chest and thighs while she fought back the waves of pain emanating from her useless arm. She wasn’t satisfied with her one-handed knots, but she couldn’t take any more.

She lay her head back on the wall, her helmet forming a cushion for her skull, and smiled, reflecting on how odd she must look strapped between two empty suits, her arm twisted like one of their folded sleeves.

Parsona shuddered, probably entering the green planet’s atmosphere. Molly gasped as the vibrations sent shivers of agony though her arm. It jounced into a new shape and blackness pressed in around her vision, a sensation she was beginning to recognize. Molly summoned the last of her energy, using it to scold herself for passing out in moments of crisis.

Just in time to do it once more.

17