Frank Schätzing - Limit

‘So we’ll use the ventilation shafts,’ resumed Funaki, struggling to stay composed.

‘Not the western shaft,’ said Lynn’s image on the monitor. ‘It’s too close to E2, and besides, the sensors there are reporting increasing smoke development. Try the other side – everything seems to be okay there.’

‘And what—’ Funaki swallowed. ‘What about the others? Are they at least—’

Lynn fell silent. She looked away. O’Keefe noticed how awful she looked, just a Lynn-like shell with something staring out from it. Something he had no desire to get to know.

‘They’re fine,’ she said tonelessly.

Funaki nodded in self-reproach. ‘Then we’ll open up the eastern shaft now.’

‘See you in the lobby, Michio. You know the way out.’

As it happened, there was nothing left that could be burned.

The second oxygen tank had been drained to the last dregs, and all that remained of the three corpses was caked ashes. Whatever could have gone up in flames was already consumed, but it still continued to flicker and glow. After the partial fall of E2, the smoke in the shaft of the staff elevator had risen and become trapped, prevented from circulating by the shutdown of the ventilators, which would have distributed it everywhere. The temperature difference had created its own circulation system, however, and more and more clouds of smoke were emerging from the deformed materials. This meant that the elevator shaft which Eva and the others had crossed through barely fifteen minutes before now didn’t even offer a breath of air or a centimetre of vision. At the height of the cabin’s smouldering remains, the sealed trapdoors had melted to the west ventilation shaft, and this too was now full of smoke, although the shields of the east shaft were holding out for the time being. In the neck of Gaia, the temperature still resembled that of a solar furnace, dramatically increasing the viscosity of the steel beam which was supporting the head of the figure. Once again, Gaia’s chin tilted a little, and this time—

—it was noticeable.

‘The floor just moved,’ whispered Olympiada Rogacheva, grabbing on to Miranda, whose flood of tears ran dry at that very moment.

‘I’m sure it’s built to be elastic,’ she sniffed, patting Olympiada’s hand. ‘Don’t worry, sweetheart. Skyscrapers on Earth shake too, you know, when there’s an earthquake.’

‘ You may well be built elastically.’ O’Keefe stared outside, his mouth dry. ‘But Gaia certainly isn’t.’

‘How would you know? Hey, Michio, what—’

‘There’s no time!’ Funaki stood on the landing, waving wildly with both arms. ‘Come on. Quickly!’

‘Maybe we’re just suffering from mass hysteria,’ said Miranda to the distraught Olympiada as she followed Funaki into the Luna Bar and from there down into Selene. Again, the floor gave way beneath them.

‘ Chikusho! ’ hissed Funaki.

O’Keefe’s knowledge of Japanese was practically nonexistent, but after several days in the company of Momoka Omura he had become sufficiently familiar with swearwords.

‘That bad?’ he asked.

‘Very. We can’t afford to lose a single second.’ Funaki opened a cabinet, took out four oxygen masks and hurried to one of the two free-standing columns, which O’Keefe had until now assumed to be decorative, clad with holographs of constellations. Now, as the Japanese man pushed one of their surfaces to the side, a man-size bulkhead came into view behind it.

‘The ventilation shaft!’

‘Yes.’ Funaki nodded. ‘It starts up here. Let’s all cross our fingers. The control centre said it’s smoke-free inside, no loss of pressure.’ He handed out the masks. ‘But regardless. Let’s put them on until we know for sure. Just slip them on so they’re snug and the eyes are protected behind the visor. No, the other way around, Miss Olympiada, the other way around!’ His hands flapped. ‘Miss Miranda, could you help her? Thank you. Mr O’Keefe, may I see? Yes, just like that. Very good.’

In no time at all, he had pulled his own mask on, checked it and carried on talking, his voice muffled now. ‘As soon as the bulkhead is open, I’ll go in. Wait until I give you the signal, then follow me one after the other, first Miss Olympiada, then Miss Miranda, then Mr O’Keefe bringing up the rear. The ladder leads directly into the lobby. Stay close to me. Any questions?’

The women shook their heads.

‘No,’ said Finn.

Funaki tapped the sensor, stepped back and waited. The bulkhead swung open and warm air came out. O’Keefe stepped next to the Japanese man and looked down. They peered into a dimly lit shaft which dropped down into the depths.

‘Visibility seems clear.’

Funaki nodded. ‘Wait until I give the green light.’

He climbed in, put both feet on the rungs, put his hands on the side struts and began to clamber down. His chest, shoulders and head disappeared beneath the ledge. O’Keefe peered in after him. Funaki looked around and gazed appraisingly down below. After about five metres, he stopped his descent and tipped his face up towards them.

‘Everything’s okay so far. Come on.’

‘Olympiada, darling!’ Miranda took the Russian woman in her arms, held her close and kissed her on the forehead. ‘We’re almost there, my sweet.’ She sank her voice to a whisper: ‘And after that you leave him. Do you hear me? You have to. Leave him. No woman has to put up with that.’

The molecular bonds were starting to break.

It would have taken higher temperatures to melt the steel like butter, but the heat was still enough to transform some of the braces into a kind of glutinous rubber, which slowly deformed under the pressure of the tonnes of weight they bore. Gaia’s head visibly compacted the weakened materials together and, in the process, created tensions which the stressed glass façade and mooncrete plates weren’t able to withstand. The water between the panes of the double glazing, evaporating, forced the structures apart – and, suddenly, one of the concrete modules simply broke right across, the full width of it.

Gaia’s lower jaw dropped heavily onto the glass façade.

One after another, the inner and outer panes shattered. Splinters and water vapour swirled into the vacuum; rendered unstable, structural elements, tattered components of the life-support systems and ashes were carried away in a chain reaction. The artificial atmosphere spread out around Gaia’s neck like a cloud and evaporated in the heat of the sun’s rays. But the major part was in the shade, with the result that the air crystallised as the coldness of outer space forced its way inside, extinguishing all flames in a second and cooling down the glowing steel so quickly that it wasn’t able to solidify slowly, but instead froze in brittle fragility.

The support beams held out for a few more seconds.

Then they gave way.

This time, Gaia’s head sank forward much more, held only by the main cord of the massive steel spine, which so far had not been so badly affected. The last remains of the neck front splintered, the chin tilted further, the layers of insulation above the shoulders cracked, the concrete modules ruptured and a gaping hole opened up in the ventilation shaft.

O’Keefe stumbled backwards over a table. Olympiada, who was just about to clamber into the shaft, was hurled against Miranda, knocking her down to the floor.

We’re falling, he thought. The head is falling!

Filled with horror, he pulled himself up, trying to get a grip on something. His right hand grasped hold of the edge of the airlock.

‘Into the shaft,’ he cried out. ‘Quickly!’