Kate Day - In the Quick

I held on to a handrail and forced my eyes to stay open.

Rachel eyed me. Maybe you should head to your bunk, she said.

Don’t you need me? My voice was hoarse.

Take thirty minutes.

They’re only giving us three hours to unload. Amelia tapped my cheeks with her two hands. Wake up! You’ll be fine.

The empty hold was huge in comparison to the station’s tight modules and airlocks, and even more dimly lit. It was a different sensation being weightless in such a large space. There was no equipment in here, no wires and tubes waving. Nothing to bump into. Just scraped-up gray walls marked with faint yellow text—indicating loading zones in three different languages, English, Russian, and Japanese—and cargo restraints secured flat.

Simon moved ahead to the exterior door and began checking the seals, and Rachel handed me a pair of gloves.

Amelia swam toward us with two crowbars tucked under her arm.

Damn, Simon said from the other end of the hold. He’d opened the exterior door, but the supply capsule’s hold was so packed you could barely see inside. Runner lights glowed dimly from the deck, but a huge crate, wider than the exterior hold door, blocked our view.

They do this every time, Amelia said. They forget we unload back to front.

Simon prodded the giant crate with a crowbar and it creaked but didn’t budge. Someone’s going to have to crawl through, he said.

The crate was secured to the deck with restraints and there was only a narrow space between its top and the hold door.

June will do it, Amelia said. Won’t you—

Are you sure? Rachel frowned at me.

I’m okay. I swam to the top of the crate and my mind focused and my limbs woke up. I can do it.

Good, Amelia said.

Once you get on the other side, watch your feet, Simon said. Don’t step on any of the restraints.

I pulled on my gloves, hovered for a second, and then began inching through the dark opening.

I felt the heat of my breath in the narrow space as I crawled my hands along the top of the crate. I smelled glue and metal and foam rubber. Eventually my fingers reached an edge and open air. Another crate was secured to the deck just beyond and I tried to judge the width of the gap between them, from my middle finger to my elbow.

You can shift it forward, I called. I looked over the side of the crate. And to the left. There’s enough room to angle it out I think. It’s wider than it is long—

You’ve got to undo the restraint, Amelia called. We can’t get to it—

I was going to have to dive between the two crates. Would I fit?

I’ve got it secured on our end, Simon called. It’s not going anywhere.

I put my arms in front of me, tucked my head, and wriggled into the gap. The sound of my breath and the creak of the boxes surrounded me. I groped for the restraints, the runner lights bright in my eyes. My hand found the cold metal of the release. A single dried bean floated past my face. Then another.

What’s happening? Amelia called.

I loosened the release, and the crate wobbled in the air and bumped against my back.

June, stop moving, Simon called. I heard his crowbar. The crate moved away from me, and then back. All the air seemed to rush out of my lungs as it pinned me flat. I reached to protect my head.

Through a crack I could see Simon struggling. His crowbar crunched between the crate and the hold door. A space opened up by my head and I took a breath. But the crate was only halfway out. It tipped toward my legs and pinned me by my calves.

Simon’s face was pink. Our eyes met. The crate squeezed my legs hard. I got you, he said. He torqued the crowbar sideways and yelled, Now!

The pressure on my legs loosened; I scrambled my body backward through the gap.

Things went more smoothly once we got that first crate out. Amelia had a manifest that said what parts of the shipment needed to be opened and their contents organized by final destination: the moon, Mars, or the Pink Planet; which should be moved as is; and which few were for us, containing food and other supplies to maintain the Sundew itself. Each crate, box, and container was marked with a zone (one through four) and a location (deck, starboard, port, and overhead).

Amelia and Simon and Rachel used crowbars to wrench the crates open. Bolts flew through the air and they didn’t bother to catch them. They had a sort of shorthand that involved yelling Left! Right! Got it! and Hell no! at one another over the tops of crates and boxes. They worked fast and I tried to help despite my aching calves.

Mostly I seemed to get in the way until I figured out I should stay in the hold and direct where they placed the cargo. They were strapping it into any open spot in each zone without being strategic. But doing it that way created awkward configurations that would make it harder when we had to reload the cargo in a few days. So instead of getting in between them as they yanked off the lids of crates and broke down boxes, I floated up and through the middle of the hold to look into the gaps in each stowage zone.

At first when I started calling out directions—Flip that crate! Rotate that container! Turn those bins!—Amelia argued with me. But she quickly saw I was right. We were done faster than anyone expected, with fifteen minutes to spare.

In the sleeping module the bunks were arranged in a cloverleaf, with one each on the deck, port, starboard, and overhead. When I got there Rachel and Simon were already in bed, their eyes closed. Simon’s long legs were tucked to his chest and his buzzed head turned to the wall. Rachel’s sleeping bag was pulled to her chin but her hair floated free. I pulled myself into my bunk, which was long and narrow, with just enough room for me to stretch out, and zipped my sleeping bag around me. Rachel and Simon were very close. I could reach out and touch either of them without any effort at all.

I heard them breathing. I smelled toothpaste and dirty socks. I wanted to close my eyes, but they felt huge. My body hummed. The backs of my calves ached. My scalp itched where my helmet had pressed against my head, and when I reached to touch my face it was full of fluid and squishy under my fingers. I shifted left and then right in my sleeping bag. My thoughts roamed through the empty station, into all its modules and compartments and holds. Images shuttled through my mind—of water droplets spinning through the air, of massive crates creaking against their restraints.

Sleep didn’t come. And didn’t come. The thought that it might never come again entered my mind and my throat tightened. I felt a twist of panic low in my stomach. I shifted to my side, my back. I thought of my first night at Peter Reed, how impossible it felt to sleep in that big room full of other girls. How it seemed like I’d stay awake forever under my icy sheets listening to everyone around me breathe and cough and sneeze.

Amelia came into the module and I watched her through half-closed eyes. I heard the rrrrp of her sleeping bag, a cough, and then silence. I closed my eyes. I would be all right; I wouldn’t be awake forever. Sleep would come.

And then—a low, guttural snore. And another. And another.

I pulled my sleeping bag to my chin, and then over my ears; I pressed my face to its slippery fabric and squeezed my eyes shut. Amelia’s snores seemed to lengthen and amplify, to fill every inch of the small room.

I unzipped my bag and swam out of the sleeping module and the twist in my stomach loosened. I pulled myself into the next module and the sound of the snores faded and the twist disappeared.

I floated to Storage and Systems and checked the water reclaimer. It was running fine. On the intercom was the empty SM, its panel of monitors blank. I pressed a button and the image changed to the sleeping module I’d just left. Simon was still turned toward the wall. His long legs were tucked into his body making him appear small. Amelia and Rachel faced each other, and one of Rachel’s arms was loose. It reached toward Amelia, as if they’d been holding hands and had just let go. I pressed the button again and looked into each empty module, into each of the three holds, including Cargo 2, the one we’d just loaded, which was full of dark and irregular shapes.