Steph Bennion - Hollow Moon

Upon reaching a brick maintenance shed, the scarlet-clad hero paused by the parked monocycle to take in his surroundings, then slipped through the open doors and out of sight.

“Who is that masked man?” murmured Miss Clymene, wonderingly.

Ravana stopped screaming and opened her eyes, not that it made much difference in the cloying darkness. She swung at the end of the rope, nursing the mother of all headaches but with remarkably few actual injuries other than several bruises from where she had hit the shaft wall as she fell.

“Ravana!” The professor’s cry crackled loud in her helmet. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she hesitantly confirmed. “What happened?”

“You fell,” replied Wak, stating the obvious. “I have no idea how the lower doors managed to close behind you. Regrettably I too find myself trapped.”

“You’re in the airlock?”

“I fell off the truck and somehow got my false hand trapped in the gap between the doors,” he told her, sounding sheepish. “That daft woman closed the doors above me and I’m not sure she has the wit to get us out. I’m afraid my wristpad has also been crushed.”

Ravana tried hard not to panic. Her own wristpad was visible through the clear plastic window on the sleeve of her suit but an on-screen message made it clear that the subterranean shaft was beyond the range of the Dandridge Cole ’s network. There was also a large crack across the screen, no doubt a result of her having crashed into the shaft wall.

“There’s no signal down here,” she told Wak. “What now?”

“Can you reach the airlock control panel?”

Ravana looked into the darkness above. The rope disappeared into a blackness that clung to her like treacle. Reaching out with an exploratory hand, she did at least manage to locate the wall of the shaft, although her bruises had already told her that it could not be far away. She had no idea how far she had fallen.

“Maybe,” she said. Her headache was getting worse. “If I could see it, that is.”

“Try,” came the anxious reply. “Your wristpad screen may give you a bit of light.”

Ravana gripped hold of the rope with both hands and strained to pull herself up. Being skinny did have its advantages, but she was not particularly strong and her weak right arm was starting to throb quite painfully. With a great deal of effort she managed to haul herself high enough to allow her feet to grip the rope dangling below. After that she made better progress, but it took several agonising minutes of climbing before her hand touched the airlock door above her. A faint glimmer of light filtered through the gap between the two halves, for both her rope and Wak’s crushed prosthesis had prevented the airlock doors from closing completely. Miraculously, she saw the control panel was within reach.

“I’ve reached the airlock,” she gasped breathlessly. “And I can see the panel.”

“Excellent! Is it working?”

Swaying gently upon the rope, Ravana extended a hand and tried the keypad.

“It’s still dead,” she told him despondently.

She glared at the control panel, then gave it an impatient slap. Her gloved hand caught the edge of the strange grey box next to it, just as her headache flared again. At the exact same moment, she felt the grey surface yield beneath her fingers like a touch-sensitive switch. A split second later she was staring at the box in disbelief, for it was as if a key had turned inside her head. Incredibly, for the briefest of moments, she had seen the airlock control mechanism laid out in her mind.

“It can’t be,” she murmured.

“What did you say?” asked Wak.

Ravana stared at the grey box. To her amazement the airlock schematic popped back into her head as clear as day; yet this was a picture that could be twisted, prodded and turned. An idea both fantastic and unbelievable came to her. She concentrated upon the image again, this time with the eyes of Ravana the trainee engineer, then flexed the image in her mind.

“Open sesame,” she declared.

Above her, the airlock doors gave a metallic screech and slowly began to slide open. As quick as a flash, Ravana clambered up the rope and hauled herself through the widening gap into the airlock beyond. Without stopping to consider how she was doing it, she threw another mental manipulation at the image in her mind to reverse the opening of the doors. She paused, glanced up and tried the same trick for the airlock entrance above.

She did not know whether to look smug or just relieved when the upper doors promptly squealed into life and began to open. Professor Wak pulled free his mangled hand, staggered back to lean against the hovertruck and regarded Ravana with a look of disbelief.

“How did that happen?” he asked, amazed.

“Positive thinking,” she murmured, somewhat stunned.

Wak began hastily isolating the power supply so that the lower doors could not open again. Ravana made for the ladder, eager to get out of the airlock. Upon reaching the top she was alarmed to find Ostara lying unconscious on the floor near the edge of the shaft. After relieving herself of the safety rope and her helmet, Ravana knelt down beside the crumpled figure to see if her friend was okay. She did not notice the arrival of the masked birdman behind her.

“Ostara!” hissed Ravana. “Wake up!”

Ostara’s eyes flickered open and she frantically shot out a hand to point over the girl’s shoulder. Ravana whirled around and saw a figure in a red birdsuit shuffling hesitantly towards them, who upon seeing her fierce expression cautiously lowered a squirming bundle of fur to the ground and stepped back again. The electric cat thanked him with a vicious hiss and ran towards Ravana and Ostara.

“The devil’s come to get me!” Ostara shrieked.

“It’s just an idiot in a custom birdsuit,” Ravana reassured her.

She gave the cat a stroke as it came to her side, comforted by its gentle purrs. Still shaking from her ordeal, she stood up and gave the birdman a weary look.

“What’s with the mask and the fancy costume?” she asked. The suit bulged with muscles that did not look entirely real. “Are you supposed to be some sort of superhero?”

The figure gave a proud salute. “I am The Flying Fox!” he declared. Ravana smiled at his attempt to project his pre-pubescent voice in a way that fitted the heroic facade. “I have rescued Jones the cat from extreme danger!”

“Where were you when my life was in danger?”

“You were in danger?” exclaimed The Flying Fox, concerned.

“Ostara passed out and accidentally shut me and the professor inside the airlock,” Ravana told him. “I think you may have banged your head,” she added to Ostara.

“You don’t say,” mumbled Ostara, rubbing her head. “Sorry for fainting and all that.”

Behind the birdsuit-clad figure, Ravana saw Endymion, Bellona and Philyra arrive at the door to the maintenance shed, followed moments later by an out-of-breath Miss Clymene. The sheer energy of Endymion’s excited burst through the doorway was enough to make the masked hero jump in alarm.

“Who are you?” Endymion asked him, ignoring Ravana and Ostara. “We saw you flying above the palace! That is such a cool birdsuit.”

“This is The Flying Squirrel,” Ostara declared, smirking. “Sorry, Fox.”

“Saviour of electric cats,” added Ravana.

“At your service,” The Flying Fox announced. He bowed gracefully to Ravana, not noticing that her cat was now licking a wall power socket. “I am here to both serve and protect you, wherever and whenever danger threatens. Do not fear, for The Flying Fox will always be near!”

“What’s going on up there?” Wak suddenly cried, calling up from inside the airlock chamber. Finding he could not fly the hovertruck one-handed, he had tried to climb the ladder to see what all the fuss was about but found his attempt frustrated by his flattened hand’s inability to grip the rungs. “This is a restricted area!”