Amie Kaufman - These Broken Stars

The major palms the pad by the door, sending it hissing closed behind him. Then he punches the auto-eject launch button, starting a countdown that gives us enough time to strap in. A trio of lights goes on overhead, blinding me. His boots clomp across the metal floor to a chair opposite mine, and he starts clipping himself in. With a jerk, I wrench my heels out of the grid floor and turn so I can sit in the chair.

I take a full breath for the first time since the alarms started blaring. Safe. For now. I’m trying not to think of the fact that there’s no way the screaming crowd can all be safely inside escape pods.

The ship’s autolaunch will send us speeding away from the Icarus , and in no more than an hour or two a rescue ship will pick us up. I just have to get through the next few hours, with only Major Merendsen for company.

His face is blank, locked down. Why did he even bother to save my life if he hates me so much? I wish I could apologize to him for what I said on the promenade deck. Tell him that what I say and what I mean are never the same, because they can’t be. My throat feels tight, my mouth dry. I never should have given him another glance in the salon.

“How much would we have to pay you to not spread this story around once they pick us up?” I fumble with the harness. It’s not the elegant and comfortable lap belts of the passenger pod—this is a five-point harness that chafes at my bare shoulders.

The major snorts, turning his head toward the tiny viewport, which shows only a scattering of stars that blur and lurch as the ship does. “Why do you assume I’d ever want to tell anyone about this?”

I decide to bury the major in icy silence until this is over, for both our sakes. If we don’t speak, he’ll have nothing to report.

The countdown to ejection continues, blood roaring in my ears out of annoyance with the major. Forty-five seconds. Forty. Thirty-five. I watch the numbers over the door click down one by one, trying to make my stomach settle. A LaRoux doesn’t show weakness.

Without warning, we’re slammed down into our seats as the entire pod jerks. A ripple of white-hot energy shoots through its metal frame. I taste copper, and then the universe goes black with a sound like a thunderclap in my ears. All the lights, the countdown, even the emergency lighting…gone. We’re left in utter blackness but for the stars outside the viewport.

Stars that are no longer stretched thin. The Icarus has been torn out of hyperspace.

For a few moments there’s no sound. Even the background hum of the engines and life support are gone, leaving us in the depths of the most crushing silence either of us has known since we came aboard.

The major starts cursing, and I can hear him fumbling with his straps. I understand his haste. Without power, we’re going to run out of oxygen before anyone out there even realizes the Icarus has had a problem. But that’s not our most immediate problem.

“Don’t!” I manage, the words tearing out of a throat gone dry and hoarse. “There could be another surge.”

“Surge?” I can hear the confusion in his voice.

“There are huge amounts of energy involved in interdimensional travel, Major. If there was another surge and you were standing on the metal floor, it could kill you.”

That makes him pause. “How do you know—”

“It doesn’t matter.” I close my eyes, trying to concentrate on breathing. And then, the emergency lighting comes back online. It’s not much, but it’s enough to see by. And it means the emergency life support has engaged.

The major’s face is drawn, tense. He looks back at me, and for a moment neither of us speaks.

And then a scream of metal tears through the ship, making the pod shudder; it’s still attached to the Icarus . We both look up at the countdown clock—still blank. We’re stuck. I look across at the major, then down at the metal grid floor. If there’s another surge while I’m standing on it, I’ll die—but if there’s another surge while we’re attached to the ship, it could destroy the pod anyway.

Just do it. Don’t think.

I jerk my straps open and drop to the floor. The major protests but I ignore him and make for the control panel by the door. I don’t know what’s happening to the Icarus , but I know that the last thing we want is to be attached to the ship if another surge goes through it like the last one. I just have to get the separation and ignition sequence going using the emergency power, buckle myself back in, and we’ll be safe until the rescue ships show up.

You can do this. Just imagine Simon, and his tools, and everything he showed you before .… I take a deep breath, and open up the panel.

So much for not giving him a story to take back to the tabloids. They’d go crazy for a month with just one picture of me up to my elbows in circuits. No man, woman, or child of my class would own up to something like this.

But none of them would know what they were doing. Not like I do.

I reach in for the bundle of rainbow-colored wires behind the panel, pulling them out and inspecting them. No doubt they’re coded in some way, but lacking knowledge of this particular system, I have to trace them out manually, deciphering amid the tangle which are the two I want.

“Need any help?” The question is tense but civil, revealing nothing.

I jump, jolted out of my concentration. “Not unless you were an electrician out there on the frontier, and given I’ve heard they don’t even have lightbulbs, I doubt it.”

A faint noise behind me, a muffled exhalation. Is he laughing at me?

I glance over my shoulder, and he’s quick to avert his eyes toward the ceiling. No wire cutters, so I use my fingernails. One advantage Simon never had—he couldn’t strip wires bare-handed. And he never would’ve dared use his teeth on live circuits.

The major is silent behind me, and when I sneak a second peek over my shoulder, his eyes are still on the ceiling. A little of my annoyance fades. He did save my life, with no guarantee he’d have time afterward to make it to an escape pod.

I shouldn’t say anything to him. I should make sure there’s nothing for either of us to tell when we return. I should make sure he continues thinking I’m the worst person he’s ever met. But for some reason, when I’ve got a section of the green and white wires stripped, I find conversation fighting its way out of me. I mean to be conciliatory, but despite my best intentions, it comes out as acidic as ever.

“On the frontier, isn’t this how they hot-wire a hover—”

I brush the two wires together, and instantly the rockets ignite, catapulting the pod away from the ship. I have only the briefest glimpse of the wall in front of me careening at my face before the universe goes utterly black.

“What did you think was happening at that point?”

“I didn’t know. There was no communication equipment in the pod.”

“You didn’t try to guess?”

“We’re trained to work with solid information.”

“But you had none?”

“No.”

“What was your plan?”

“Sit tight and hope. There was nothing to do except wait.”

“And see what happened next?”

“And see what happened next.”

TARVER

THE POD’S STILL WOBBLING AND STABILIZING as it shoots away from the ship, but we’re not spinning, so I risk unclipping my harness. The gravity’s fading out to half strength already and I know it will go completely soon, so I hook a foot under one of the grab straps on the floor as I kneel beside Miss LaRoux. She’s on the ground, stirring and groaning, already complaining before she’s fully conscious. Somehow, not surprising.