Scene 15: Small Miracles

Ross is mummified.  His dried blood stains the front of his shirt and the back is burned through.  The stars in the black of his eyes (where a human's is normally white) are out and so too the blue nebula of his iris.  That nebula is now a faded stone grey to match the tone of his skin.

Tulia's red hair drapes his face and several of Rune's tears fall off onto Ross' cheeks.

Sweets has been huddled with them, but now quietly rises, takes up his rifle and stands guard at the base of the shuttle's ramp.  Esben removes his arm from Valory and assumes the same posting to keep him company.  After a moment, Valory holds the pistol on loan to her against her shoulder and joins the other two giants over their silent vigil.

That leaves Aaron and the hobbled robot to look upon the ever-dwindling crewmates.  There is a nagging sensation at the back of his mind.  It would not take very much to reach inside and take out the contents concealed by the harmless machine.  Yet, despite himself, Aaron could not help but detect a desire from this mechanical being.  It did not wish to yield up the vial that it itself had stolen from the vault.  And while on that thought, Aaron had to confess his suspicion that the robot had acted independently of anyone controlling it.  Perhaps the first example in all of the natural world of a machine expressing independent thought and it turns out to be a glorified trash can.

Whatever its motivations (now suspected to have them) Aaron's was to attempt to see the vision again.  In this period of calm that amounts to the whole of his desire.  But there are the extenuating circumstances to consider.

Tulia would likely fly into a rage at the first provocation and examining the prize that her friend just died for is likely to count.  Then there is the machine that beeps rhythmically in his hands.  If there is a mind contained within then it is no more than a child's.  What then would it mean to force it to hand over the vial?  How are children best handled in such dangerous undertakings?

Suddenly, Aaron's bones shake violently.  Metal bends and groans in the distance.  Fire flashes and breaks the windows of the airlock leading out of the hanger bay.  Rune and Tulia are roused from their mourning and everyone rushes to investigate what has happened within the station.

Esben forces open the broken airlock doors.  He can only open them just enough so that they can each pass into the station single file as the doors have been badly warped.

Immediately inside, the walls are charred black, support beams are exposed and torn, and it is hard to breathe due to the emergency decompression employed to suppress the explosion.  The crew proceeds through the rubble on the floor with gingerly steps.  Rune incidentally kicks one wall-slag and it goes flying off like a frisbee before crashing back down at the other end of the corridor.

AARON:  Artificial gravity's been damaged.  

Who's had formal zero-g training?

Sweets steps forward.

SWEETS:  It looks like it's just you and me.  

AARON:  We'll probe ahead for bad grav-plating.  

Everybody else hang back.

Given Rune's kick off down the right side of the corridor, Aaron takes up the left wall and Sweets goes down the middle of the hallway.  Sweets notices some dust caught in a beam of light that floats fixed in place.  He reaches down for a larger piece of rubble and marks the place by having the fragment float in mid-air.  He then proceeds to round the place he has marked, pivoting on the bridge of his snout, and then turns to continue on.

Aaron is down at the other end of the corridor and is confronted with a couple of guards falling all over each other, desperate to be able to stand.  Sweets can see their weapons are drawn and risks rushing the remaining distance to catch up with Aaron.

AARON:  No, no, wait.  

He keeps a hand raised to Sweets even as he crouches down
to get closer to eye level with the guards.

AARON:  It's okay.  Just take a minute.  

An explosion is bad enough to shake anybody up.  

Add to that it happening in a confined space 

and an emergency fire decompression will 

screw with your head real bad.  I should know.  

You got time.  No one's going to hurt you.  

Just relax.  Can you tell me what happened?  Do you know?

GUARD:  (Struggling to catch his breath) There were drones.

AARON:  Yeah, we saw some of them.  Where are they know?

GUARD:  They... they... self...d-e-s-t-r-u-c-t-e-d?  

Yeah.  They self-destructed.  I think they all did it at once.

AARON:  All of them?

GUARD:  I... really hope so.  They took out the 

whole compartment they were in.  

I think engineering is gone.

AARON:  I want you to stay calm now.  

Focus on your breathing.  My friends are going 

to come up the hall.  And we're all 

going to the infirmary together.  

Both guards pass out.

AARON:  Or... that will have to do.  

Rune, break out some emergency respirators.

The next moment the crew is carrying the two men into the infirmary.

NURSE:  Who the hell are you?

Tulia takes her aside and attempts

a low soothing tone.

TULIA:  Look, we didn't bomb your station.  

Beyond that, you don't really need to know.

She looks from Tulia to Valory's friendly smile

who is flanked by Esben's tall demeanor.

NURSE:  Then you can start by
lending me a hand on Bed 3.

RUNE:  Here we go again.

TULIA:  This is nothing like old times.

I must be going soft.

SWEETS:  You said it, not me.

VALORY:  I guess the best thing we can do 

is just get out of the way, huh, buddy.

Esben stands with a slight sway and then leans
one shoulder against the nearest wall and starts
to crumble down into a ball.

NURSE:  Hey, hey, it's not safe for anyone 

to go to sleep right now big guy.

VALORY:  He wasn't anywhere near 

the explosion.  This is just like...

She holds his mask to his face with his own paw.
She watches a moment and his eyes begin to flutter.

VALORY:  You watch him.  Okay?  I'll be right back.

Aaron follows her out to a corridor interface.

AARON:  What are you thinking?

VALORY:  I think Esben's home planet is more 

oxygen rich than most places.  I learned he got faint if 

we went too far down in the lower levels on Orelius.  

I knew he didn't feel well here, but he was doing okay.  

This shouldn't be happening that fast.  There it is.

AARON:  What?

She brings up an atmosphere gauge on the monitor.

VALORY:  The station's not sealed off someplace.  

We're venting atmosphere.

AARON:  Mr. Starling, we need that 

sensor drone of yours or we're all dead.

He walks out already pressing buttons on his gauntlet controller.

RUNE:  Alright.  So no pressure then.

His face loses color.

AARON:  What is it?

RUNE:  The sensor drone's gone.

VALORY:  You lost it?

RUNE:  I don't know what to tell you.  It's not there.  

Even if it's just not accepting my commands it 

should at least show up as a ping on my scan for it.

AARON:  Could it have been caught in the 

explosion when the station went up?

RUNE:  I couldn't say.  

All I know is it's not there anymore.

AARON:  How do we go about finding 

the section that needs sealing off?

The custodial drone rolls up to them while
it's tread catches badly on its bad foot.

RUNE and VALORY:  Not it.

Aaron lets out an exasperated sigh.

Aaron carries the small robot under his arm as it chirps happily with each pivot of its head, which is accompanied by a blink of green in the eye.  This section of corridor happens to show no sign of damage and Aaron walks quite casually with his precocious hull breach detector.

It abruptly becomes animated and agitates in his arms so as to be allowed to scan a section of wall he has missed.  Aaron momentarily figures out where it wants to be pointed and extends it out with both hands.  It makes one pass with the scanner.  Another happy chirp and he tucks it under his arm once more.

AARON:  What am I supposed to call you?

He lifts it over his head to see if there is any name or serial labeled on the bottom.  This opiniated canister squeals its displeasure with a solid red light glowing in the eye.  Aaron tucks it back under the arm again.  It resumes scanning as if nothing happened.

AARON:  You are a fussy little safecracker.  

It produces a rude beep.

He stops walking and untucks the thing and holds it out in front of himself.  Aaron attempts to turn the robot's body once, but the head pivots to match this motion and continues scanning the floor.

AARON:  Hey.

The head stops with just looking at him in its periphery.

AARON:  Look at me.

The head turns up to face him.

AARON:  I might be crazy, but I'm starting 

to think that there might be something to you.  

You sure are temperamental enough to make me wonder.  

You got something you're keeping safe for me.  

I don't know where this job will end.  

I don't know if what all we already suffered 

through is going to lead to anything good.  

But you keep that vial safe for me.  

And from now on I'll call you Safe.

Aaron stares into the soulless lens for a heart beat and then Safe scans a slow, green, grid-pattern across his face.  It chirps with another green blinking light and turns its head away to continue scanning the hallway.  Aaron tucks it back under his arm.

They come to an elevator, which Aaron considers using.  Safe interrupts his thoughts with another rude chirp and pivots its head in an attempt to indicate a stairwell.

AARON:  Right.  Like that's any 

better under the circumstances.  

Safe extends an arm to plug into the wall.
A maintenance door slides way to indicate
a ladder.  Safe blinks its green light chirp.

AARON:  You're going to regret this.  

I'll end up dropping you.

Safe answers with another rude tone.

AARON:  You asked for it.

Listen to me.  I asked for.

I'm talking to myself and

using a trashcan as 

my star chart.

Aaron steps out onto the ladder.  He descends and eventually Safe turns to him with a solid yellow light in its eye.  Aaron looks down and sees a maintenance hatch that as far as he can tell is closed, but as he draws closer he feels the slight rush of air.

Once they are standing over this floor hatch then Safe projects a light on the wall, which shows a schematic of a section in red that indicates the portion of the station that is gone and then also how there are a series of these same hatches which have failed to seal, but are mitigating the decompression.

AARON:  You got a repair kit?

Safe replaces the original projection with a question mark.

AARON:  What if I just use the sealant on 

this hatch and close the others behind us 

and we call that good until we get 

everyone evacuated?

Safe deactivates the projection and chirps a green light.

Aaron shifts to balance Safe on his knee while his feet are braced against the walls and unclips a small sealant gun that he had intended for a minor hull breach.  The sealant does not appear to be curing perfectly along the lip of the hatch and Aaron has already used up the spray gun.  He dabs a foot, not wanting to risk his fingers, and both parties hear the hatch creak.

The hatch shears away beneath them and both plummet down and then sucked off to the side.  Aaron tumbles violently as a rag doll and will not need to suffer the vacuum of space to die.  He is caught up by an exposed support beam along the wall and breaks his back against it.  His last breath is nocked out of him by the impact.

Safe similarly bounces like a beach ball and finally is impaled on the jagged end of a ceiling pipe and cracks open like an egg.  There, his mysterious cargo slowly leaks out.  The substance cannot miraculously procure more volume than what was in the vial, but what it does do is inch across the pipe.  Each individual droplet resists the onslaught of air escaping into the vacuum of space.  Simultaneously, it does not inch as a worm does but maintains a natural flow toward the breach while not being ripped away from the surface of the mangled corridor.

Finally the droplets coalesce on what used to be the ceiling at the very mouth of the gaping breach in the station.  In gathering they grow noticeably brighter and become as impossible to stare into as the sun.  In this state they slide down and warp the hull of the station with them to seal the breach.

Their light fades once on the floor and what remains of the hallway has been restored.  In a pool of liquid now it flows patiently over to Aaron who floats freely in the zero gravity.  The pool then climbs the support beam that might turn out to be his salvation.  It comes parallel to his upper back and arches the distance between Aaron and the support beam and infuses through his clothes and skin.

First they glow orange between his vertebral column and repair the damage there.  Then they migrate, some to his heart and others to the brain to perform internal compressions or incite neural activity.

On the cusp of consciousness, Aaron now sees his sought-after vision more clearly.  He sees a young woman near to him whose voice heralds from a distant place and the distance has imparted an echo to it.  At first he can only hear the voice.  There are no discernible words.

AARON:  Wh- what did you say?

In a brief culmination of many gentle
voices the echoes are overcome.

VOICE:  Save your friend.

Aaron's eyes burst open.  Amidst the weightlessness, he feels something pooling in the palm of his hand.  And whereas the substance merely glints instead of continuing to glow it seems as if now it would fall away like water if he were to un-cup his hand.

He looks up to see Safe miserably impaled.  Aaron kicks off from the wall and soars on up to the ceiling.  Carefully removing Safe, the small creature droops with no will behind the motors.  As an experiment, he attempts to dab his liquid-filled hand beneath the unfortunate device, but nothing happens.  Aaron goes in search of the ladder shaft and ascends carefully with both weary companions in company.

Aaron passes by the infirmary and drops Safe in Esben's lap at the door.

VALORY:  Hey, where you going?

Tulia hears Valory and sticks her head out the door.

TULIA:  Aaron's back.

Rune and Sweets follow suit and pursue Aaron out the door.

The entire crew find themselves returning to the hanger bay.  They all stand around and watch from just in front of the airlock as Aaron marches into the shuttle with one raised hand.  Tulia charges up to the shuttle first when she sees Aaron dragging Ross out onto the shuttle ramp.

TULIA:  What the hell do you think you're doing?

I'm not leaving him behind!

AARON:  (Gasping for breath) 

I'm hoping you won't have to.

He pours the water into Ross' mouth.  Tulia rushes up and shoves Aaron aside to study Ross' face.  The others quietly gather at the bottom of the ramp.

TULIA:  (Angrily) What was supposed to happen?

AARON:  (Distant) They told me he could be saved.

RUNE:  Who did?

Ross begins to change.  He does not glow, but his paling skin turns to a light shade of blue.  Then his eyes blink closed and stare open again.  The stars in the black of his eyes begin to illuminate.  The blue nebula therein is restored to a brilliant deep sea blue.  His body begins to absorb the various wounds.  Ross blinks his eyes closed once more.  Everyone recoils back when he sits up, Aaron included, but apart from Tulia.

TULIA:  Take it easy.

He opens his mouth and there lies a bright white glow that Tulia stares into.  A ghostly moan comes forth and Ross closes his mouth again.  He rises and walks stiffly toward the airlock to exit the hanger bay.

Ross suffers traversing the rubble and the crew commences clearing a path for him.  He eventually reaches the infirmary and the medical staff take notice of the stranger, but the nurse from before has given up on surprises.

NURSE:  So who might you be?

She does take notice of his lack of response and
stretches out a probing hand as he passes.
Aaron slowly grasps her wrist and pulls her hand away.

AARON:  Don't touch him.

NURSE:  What's happening now?

AARON:  I'd tell you if I knew.

Ross proceeds to go to each head-wrapped guard and lays a hand on their face.  When he lifts his hand and moves on to the next each one rises in bed and removes the gauze themselves.  And they each test their eyesight with their hands and look over at their fellow companion who has also been restored.

Finally the last of them have been healed.  Ross begins to convulse and he collapses in the middle of the ward.  The crew clamor around him and the recently healed jump to their feet.  Tulia cradles Ross' head and a thick black sludge pours from his ear and Aaron catches this in his hand.

NURSE:  Now we have to put 

you through decontamination.

RUNE:  If you have any airlocks left.

Esben gleefully strikes his 

appreciation on Rune's back.

ROSS:  Hey...

TULIA:  Ross... welcome back.

ROSS:  Did I go somewhere?

SWEETS:  We were hoping you could tell us.  

I didn't get as far as you did.

ROSS:  I'll try not to make you jealous.

VALORY:  What is that stuff?

Aaron examines the smooth stone that has solidified in his hands.

AARON:  I don't know.  I think it just wanted 

to take back some of the trouble it caused.

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