Kristine Rusch - City of Ruins

I moved away from the door two hours ago and walked under the ship, booking for the hatches that I know are there. I found one, welded closed (or, at least, it looked like it was welded), and another that’s barely within my reach.

As I stand on tiptoe to inspect the top part of the hatch, I brace one hand against the ship itself. I run my hand across the top of the hatch and feel nothing. The hatch should have a latch in the very center, if it follows the same design as the other Dignity Vessels I’ve encountered, but I save the center for last.

I’m not used to standing on my toes for prolonged periods of time and, if truth be told, my legs are still incredibly sore. So I drop down to the flat of my feet and look at the rest of the room.

I’m tempted to go down there and see if there are ladders or stepping stools or even chairs, something that will allow me to stand above that hatch opening.

But I can’t touch anything down there, not yet, and I’m not going to. Every time I think of walking outside of this small area, I force myself to remember that death hole.

The far end of the room curves. There isn’t a platform that I can see, but there are even more consoles and, it looks like, places to hang smaller pieces of equipment. I have a hunch there are doors down there that lead to storage or maybe a place to stay.

I can’t imagine employees coming down here through those corridors every day, not unless there were hovercarts back when this place was in full use.

Something else for my historians to research. But after my encounter with Paplas yesterday, I’m beginning to understand the difficulty.

Either the Vaycehnese don’t want to discuss these caves, the black stuff on the walls, and their technology with outsiders, or the Vaycehnese really don’t know where a lot of the things they live with come from. I’m betting it’s a combination of both.

I rise to my toes again and run my hand along the edge of the hatch, finding little, not even particles, which surprises me. I haven’t found any on the ship, when it was coated two days ago. That very detail unnerves me.

When we started, I asked Kersting and Seager if there were particles still on the equipment. Kersting said no, but Seager said there were still some on the underside of the consoles.

Almost as if someone had wiped them off.

I move my hand from the edge of the hatch toward the middle when DeVries says, “Boss.”

His inflection is so flat that I know he’s not telling me he found something. He’s reminding me our time is up.

I look at my suit’s internal clock. We have a minute to spare. He’s probably been waiting for me to notice.

I suppress a sigh. We’re going to be here a long time.

“All right, gang,” I say. “Let’s go.”

No one complains. No one even gives their work a second glance. We head toward the door. We’re still tired and nervous from our last trip down here.

And this trip was a victory the moment we opened that door to the room and saw the Dignity Vessel.

It’s still here, and someday I’m going to get into it.

Someday, I’m going to make it work.

Before the outsiders left, Coop prepped his team to go into the sector base. But he warned Rossetti to prepare for one more addition to the team: him.

He wasn’t going to sit in the command chair any longer.

After Coop had spoken to Rossetti, Dix had given him a baleful glance, but hadn’t said a word. Instead, Yash had spoken up.

“You said this is a first contact.” She turned to him, arms crossed.

“It is,” Coop said.

“Then the captain doesn’t go near the site until we understand the nature of those outsiders.” She sounded fierce.

“The captain won’t go near the outsiders,” Coop said, although he wanted to. He wanted to more than he would ever admit to anyone. “They won’t be back for hours, if not days.”

“You hope,” Yash said. “You have no idea if they had to leave the site to get those extra two people.”

“I know that they limit their time in the base to six hours. They’ve done it twice, and I think that’s a pattern. So we’ll honor the pattern,” Coop said.

“And it you run into them?” Yash asked.

Coop shrugged. “I’ll say hello.”

She shook her head in exasperation. “We can’t afford to lose you right now.”

He raised his eyebrows and then smiled. “You can afford to lose me at other times?”

“You know what I mean,” she snapped.

And the truth of it was, he did. He did know what she meant. When a captain died within the Fleet, the Fleet command appointed a new captain. Sometimes that captain came from within the ship’s ranks, and sometimes the captain came from another ship. The captain wasn’t always promoted. Sometimes the captain was moved laterally because he or she had skills that particular ship needed.

No one on the Ivoire had lost a captain in the middle of a command—or at least, a command like this one, where there was no Fleet backup at all.

“I’ll be fine,” Coop said, and he firmly believed he would be.

If he didn’t believe it, he wouldn’t be suiting up with Rossetti’s team. They agreed to wear the environmental suits without the face protection, not because they needed their own environment, but just in case the outsiders returned.

The environmental suit would provide protection against attacks from various kinds of weaponry, including that large knife the woman carried.

Coop’s hands shook as he detached the hood from the collar of his suit. He wasn’t nervous about going in; he was excited.

Finally, after two-plus weeks of ordering everyone else to take action, he was taking action, too. Real, physical action.

Lynda replaced him as acting captain. If she ordered him back inside the ship, he would have to listen. He didn’t mind. He saw envy in her eyes when she reported to the bridge.

She knew how he felt about moving around; he had a hunch they all did.

He was the last one into the airlock, and he went by himself. He was last as a concession to Yash, who demanded that he protect himself at all costs.

He listened to the airlock door latch behind him. The required seconds between the latching of the interior door and the opening of the exterior door felt like hours to him.

He would have to pace himself. He wanted to run through the entire base, checking on everything and maybe catching a ride to the surface.

He wasn’t going to, of course. He knew better. But the impulse was strong.

As he stepped out the exterior door, down the small steps that extended whenever the door opened, he glanced at the base’s main door. He wanted the outsiders to come back. He wanted them back the moment the ship’s exterior door closed.

Then he would go talk to that woman, knife be damned.

But no one came in. Just Rossetti’s teams, moving to their assigned places

Rossetti herself walked across the sector base floor and turned on the interior lights, lights the outsiders had thoughtfully turned off before they left.

In addition to gathering information, Coop had instructed everyone to leave the equipment running. He also instructed them to leave a couple small things—a partially eaten apple and a mug of coffee.

He wanted to let the outsiders know that people were inside the Ivoire. Subtle was the best way to do so.

He stepped into the base proper. It smelled different. It had the same some-what sulfuric odor that Sector Base V had always had, but it also had a musty smell of decay. The scent, old and dry, not mildewy like he would have expected from Venice City’s hot climate, made the hair rise on the back of his neck.