Frank Schätzing - Limit

The silence that followed was almost sacred. A guitar was passed along. The lights had been dimmed further still during Julian’s speech and the Pacific was shimmering as if it had just been polished. Through the oval side window, scattered sugar glowed against a black backdrop.

Looking back later, O’Keefe saw those seconds when David Bowie launched into the opening chords of ‘Space Oddity’ – alternating between Fmaj7 and Em, soft and muted at first, then swelling powerfully, as if one were nearing the bustle of activity around the launch pad from the indifferent silence of space, right up to the moment when ground control and Major Tom enter into their memorable dialogue – as what may have been the last, and perhaps the only really harmonious moment of their journey. In his naïve happiness he forgot what Orley’s venture was really about: catapulting people from the globe into a hostile environment, onto a satellite which, despite having spiritualised its previous visitors, had not yet made a single one of them want to return. He was keenly aware that every search for meaning which involved leaving the Earth would only culminate in his looking round at it at every opportunity, and he suddenly pictured himself getting so far away from it that it was completely out of sight, wretched and flooded with fear.

And the stars look very different today—

And when Tom’s ballad finally came to an end, and the unlucky Major had been lost to the void of his inflated expectations, he felt, instead of the enchantment he had hoped for, a strange kind of disillusionment, almost like homesickness, although they were only 36,000 kilometres away from home. The right-hand side of the planet had begun to darken. He saw Heidrun inhale the moment with her lips half open, her gaze alternating between Bowie and the sea of stars on the other side of the window, while his was drawn over to her as if by magic. He realised that the Swiss woman had arrived in herself a long time ago, that she would happily travel to the very edge of the universe, because she carried her home in and with her, that she had certainly reached a much higher level of freedom than him, and he found himself wishing he were upstairs above some Dublin pub, being held in someone’s arms on a threadbare mattress.

It seems quite a few people had the same idea that night.

Perhaps it was the way Amber had comforted him as he’d cried on her shoulder about Julian’s ignorance that had stimulated Tim physically as well as emotionally; perhaps it was her kisses, the tautness in her arms, the springy elasticity she’d acquired in the gym; perhaps it was because, after so many years of mundane married life, his fantasies still revolved exclusively around his wife to the extent that he wanted to caress no other behind but hers, glide his hand into no other delta but hers – which meant he was about as suited to infidelity as a steam engine was to leaving the tracks – and even in those moments when he was pleasuring himself, he wanted to imagine no one but her; perhaps it was because her divine looks had not been tainted by the passing of the years – praise to the genes! – and because the buoyancy of zero gravity had returned her breasts to that legendary state which, at the beginning of their relationship, had made him feel as though he were grasping ripe melons; perhaps it was the way his attempt to fumble apart the clasps on her bathrobe had resulted in his being propelled into the opposite corner of the module, which had only turned him on all the more, as she lay there laughing amongst the swinging folds of the open robe, like an angel ready to sin – but whatever the reason was, his body was defying all the adversity of zero gravity, the low supply of blood to the lumbar region, the disorientation and light sense of nausea, by producing a true space rocket of an erection.

He paddled over and grasped hold of her shoulders. Peeling her out of her bathrobe was one thing, but Amber’s attempt to free him from his trousers and T-shirt failed as they drifted apart, which they did again and again until he ended up wriggling naked above the bed, heading helplessly for the ceiling. She looked at his galactic erection with visible interest, as helpless as she was amused.

‘So what do we do with that now?’ she laughed.

‘There must be a way.’ He was determined. ‘People must have thought about this.’

‘Hopefully. It’d be a shame if they hadn’t.’

Tim did a handstand and ploughed over to her. This time, he managed to get a grip on her hips and buried his head between her legs, which she spread and then immediately closed again to keep his head in place. As a result, the blood rushed to his ears. Circling his tongue, he pressed ahead, capturing the tiny mound beneath the small forest, the density of which threatened to take his breath away as he pressed his nose inside her out of fear of ending up at the other end of the room again, becoming intoxicated by the blend of their lust and countering her first, blissful sighs – provided that his ears, packed tightly between her thighs, weren’t deceiving him – with muffled agreement. An overdose of oxygen seemed to mingle with the cabin air – or was it the lack of oxygen that suddenly made him feel as high as a schoolboy? Who cared! Joyfully exhilarated, he made his way deeper inside, panting, grunting, the tip of his tongue flying dedicatedly around. At the moment when the tropical dampness of deep-lying realms opened up to him, believing he heard a declaration of love burst forth, he couldn’t hold back and mumbled a ‘Me too, oh, me too’, but got a puzzling response.

‘Ow! Ouch!’

Something had clearly gone wrong. Tim looked up. In doing so, he made the mistake of loosening his grip. Amber flailed around as if she were drowning, kicking him from her. Pushed away, he saw that she was rubbing her head, and that it was in the immediate vicinity of the edge of the desk. Aha. He should have thought of that, that they would drift away in the heat of the moment. Lesson number one: it wasn’t enough to clasp on to each other, they needed to fix themselves within the room too. He couldn’t help but laugh. Amber wrinkled her nose and frowned, then his gaze fell on something that could offer a solution.

‘Look!’

‘What?’ She dug the fingers of her right hand into his hair and tried to bite his nose, which resulted in her doing a somersault. Tim hopped over to the bed like a frog, pulling Amber, still head over heels, along with him.

‘Buckling ourselves in?’ she snorted mockingly. ‘How unerotic. It’d be like doing it in a car. We’ll hardly be able to move—’

‘No, silly, not with the sleeping belt. Look!’

Amber’s expression brightened. Above the bed were some handles, mounted a little distance apart from one another.

‘Wait. I think I saw something that might go with them.’

She hurried over to the cupboard, opened it, rummaged around and unearthed several long bands made from a rubber-like material. They had a red, yellow and green pattern and were adorned with a slogan.

‘ Love Belt ,’ she read.

‘So there you go,’ grinned Tim. ‘People did think about it.’ For the first time since they’d set off on the journey, he felt carefree and playful, a sensation which just an hour ago he had thought was gone for good. Lynn didn’t become entirely insignificant, of course, but just retreated to an insignificant province of his cortex, one that wasn’t attending to Amber’s scent and the throbbing desire to fuck her. ‘It looks like we have to fasten you by the wrists, my darling. No, by the hands and feet. Like in the torture chambers of the Holy Inquisition.’

She started to thread the bands through the handles.