“They want to take us away!”
“Look around you. They’ll keep shooting as long as we’re here. You’ve got to come up!”
“Waverly!” It was Kieran, running toward her with Harvard Stapleton. “Get off the shuttle!” he screamed. His face was red, and spit flew from his mouth. “Get off now!”
“The longer you stay here, the more people will get shot.” The voice was right above her, and she looked up to see the man with the scar standing over her. To prove his point, he fired his gun into the onrushing crowd.
“He means it, Waverly,” Felicity said.
“Let’s get out of here!” the man with the scar yelled ferociously, then he knelt at the bottom of the ramp while his comrades boarded the shuttle. When he saw Waverly’s eyes on him, he aimed his gun at Kieran. “Do I shoot him or not?”
There was no decision to make. She had one choice only.
Waverly leaned on Felicity as she limped up the ramp.
“No, Waverly!” she heard someone bellow, not Kieran, someone else. She turned for one last look at her home and saw Seth. He stood next to a OneMan, all elbows and knees, his hands in his hair, head bleeding, yelling at the top of his lungs, “Don’t do this, Waverly!”
She shook her head, tried to yell, “I’m sorry,” but she could only make herself whisper.
She dragged herself up the ramp with Felicity, and it closed behind her with a hollow report.
LEFT BEHIND
One moment Kieran had been staring at Waverly’s slender back, imploring silently, Don’t go. Get off the shuttle. She’d turned, she’d looked at Seth Ardvale, she’d shaken her head at him, and then she’d limped up the ramp, and the ramp closed, and she was gone.
A woman wailed as the shuttle engines hummed to life. They coughed orange fire, then burned blue, their photon exhaust casting a sickly glow over the bodies of those who had been shot. People backed away from the craft, staring. Kieran looked at the faces nearest him, desperate for someone to do something, but everyone seemed paralyzed. Mrs. Anderson’s mouth hung open. Mr. Bernstein dropped to his knees as the shuttle rose from the floor and made the slow turn toward the air lock doors.
“Override the air lock!” Seth yelled. He started for the controls himself, but his hands went up to his head and he fell to his knees.
Suddenly the room was full of action again. A dozen people ran for the control panel near the huge doors. Harvard got there first and punched at the keypad, but the panel lights were dead. He slammed it with his fists and cried, “They fixed the doors to respond only to commands from inside the shuttle!”
“Go through Central Command,” Kieran shouted at Harvard. “They can lock the doors from there.”
Harvard yelled into the intercom, “Sammy! Do you hear me?”
Nothing but silence.
Harvard clicked the transmission button several times. “Central?… Hello?” He looked at Kieran in horror. “No one’s there.”
They’d all run to save their kids. Everyone had abandoned their posts. Forty-two years of peaceful isolation had made them totally incompetent in the face of attack.
“I’ll go,” Kieran said, and ran back the way he’d come, past Seth, who was on his hands and knees, dazed, staring at a pool of vomit.
“Everyone into a shuttle!” he heard Harvard scream.
When Kieran made it to the corridor, he closed the shuttle bay doors as a precaution, and then he turned and sped down the abandoned gangway. The ship felt empty. Corridors that had once been crowded with farmers and engineers, teachers and trainees, families and friends, were now deserted.
How many had died already? How many more?
Where was his dad?
Kieran shut out those thoughts and ran at top speed up four flights of stairs until he burst into the administrative level of the ship, where he hooked a left and pelted down the corridor into the Captain’s office. He was hoping that Captain Jones would somehow be there, sitting at his desk like always, calmly in control. But of course the Captain wasn’t there. He probably wasn’t even alive.
Kieran ran to Central Command, where the officers controlled the various systems aboard ship. Usually this room was full of people, all of them talking through intercoms, communicating with various parts of the ship, dealing with maintenance issues. But now no one was here. The room seemed very small.
Kieran jogged around the semicircle of computer displays, looking for the one that controlled the shuttle bay doors. But none of the workstations were labeled. Kieran groaned in despair. He caught his reflection in the porthole and stared at it as though it could tell him what to do.
“The Captain’s computer ought to be able to do anything,” Kieran said to his reflection. He sat down at the Captain’s chair. A computer display attached to a flexible arm slid in front of him. Along the right-hand edge of the screen was a row of buttons, and Kieran tapped the one marked “Port Shuttle Bay” from a scrolling list. An inserted video image of the bay blinked to life, and Kieran saw a shuttle in launch sequence moving toward the air lock doors, which were still closed. He tapped the button for the door controls that said, “Lock.” There was no way the enemy shuttle would be able to leave now.
He leaned back in his chair and sighed in relief. He’d done it.
But the video flashed to Harvard’s panicked face. “Unlock the door!” he screamed. “They’re already gone!”
“But they’re still in launch sequence!”
“That’s us!” Harvard screamed. “Open the air lock doors!”
Kieran fumbled to enter the unlock command, and a video display popped up showing the air lock doors creeping open. They were so slow.
How much time had he cost them?
Harvard was back on-screen. “Where are they, Kieran? Can you see them on the outer vid displays?”
Kieran’s fingers had never felt so clumsy as he scrolled through the video images outside the ship from cameras that monitored the engines, the communication antennae, telescopes, and radar. Each display showed only the static cold of the outer hull, until Kieran found the aft view, where a tiny speck caught his eye.
He magnified and saw a shuttle craft edging past the engines, heading toward the starboard side. It looked like a tiny ant crawling past the enormous exhaust tunnels.
Kieran patched the display through to Harvard’s shuttle. “They’re back near the engines,” he said.
“Why back there?” Harvard asked.
Kieran magnified further and saw a second, smaller speck hovering next to the rogue shuttle. He could barely make out the humanoid shape of a OneMan.
“Is that OneMan ours?” Kieran asked.
“That OneMan is moving toward the coolant system!” Harvard cried. “Kieran, get all the boys to the central bunker!”
Could they really intend to sabotage the reactors?
Kieran clicked onto the vid display in the auditorium and saw that the boys were still there, huddled in groups on the floor. He saw Sealy Arndt in the crowd, still nursing his torn ear. Kieran didn’t like Sealy, but the boy would be able to motivate the rest of them to move. Kieran turned on the intercom to the auditorium and spoke into the Captain’s mouthpiece. “Sealy, gather up all those boys and bring them to the central bunker right now! The reactors could blow any second!” Sealy looked into the camera, confused, until Kieran added, “Move your ass!”
Sealy grabbed a couple of boys by the shoulder and shoved them forward. He was rough with the stragglers, but it was what they needed to wake up. Soon all the boys were marching out of the auditorium.
Now that he had a moment, Kieran wanted to check on his mother.
Kieran looked at the video display of the starboard shuttle bay, ghostly and empty, the air lock doors closed. No one was there. He magnified the image to look for some sign, any sign, of his mother. What he saw startled him. The shuttle she’d entered was gone. It wasn’t in the bay anymore. They must have left during the skirmish.
Where had they gone?
Kieran flipped to a view of the port side bay, hoping to find his mother’s shuttle there. Instead he saw dozens of sprawled bodies lying in awkward positions, looking broken and wrong. He could see only a few faces, but he recognized them all. Anthony Shaw, who had taught Kieran how to shuck corn; Meryl Braun, who made popcorn for the kids on movie nights; Mira Khoury, who had a beautiful singing voice; Dominic Fellini, who welded metal sculptures out of worn spare parts. All of them gone. Snuffed out. Finished.
The people who did this had Waverly.
Kieran flipped back to the aft display and saw that the enemy OneMan was hovering over the starboard coolant system. He wished he could see what he was doing, but he could guess. They were trying to disable the engines, the only source of power on board. If they succeeded, every plant aboard the Empyrean would be dead in a few days. Every person would be dead in a week, of cold or asphyxiation.
Maxwell Lester’s voice came over the intercom. “Kieran, we’re suiting up right now to go after that OneMan. Go to the maintenance screen and find the reactor management system. Tell us the readings.”
By the time Kieran found the right screen, several of the boys had come into Central Command and were watching over Kieran’s shoulder. Kieran could hear the rest of the boys across the hallway in the central bunker, many of them crying or talking in hushed voices. Unlike the adults who were panicked, the boys seemed shocked into solemn quiet.
“Any of you know how to find the coolant readings?” Kieran asked the room at large.
“I’ll look,” said a weary voice. It was Seth, who limped to a vid display and flipped through the screens, cradling his head in his hand.
“You probably have a concussion,” Kieran told him.
“No kidding,” Seth muttered as he squinted at the schematics in front of him. Kieran wondered how he could be so familiar with the computing system, but he knew Seth spent a lot of time in Central Command with his father, the ship’s head pilot.
“The coolant looks normal,” Seth said to Kieran, who relayed the message over the com system.
“That’s good,” Maxwell said over the intercom. “Now I want you to do a head count of the boys. Once you know they’re all there, I want you to seal off the central bunker.”
“I can’t do that!” Kieran protested. “What about everyone else on the ship?”
“Once we get the reactor sealed off, you can let us in. It’s just a precaution.”
Kieran saw that he was right. “Seth, will you do the head count?” he asked.
Seth made an announcement for all the boys to report to him in the corridor outside Central Command, then struggled to his feet to do the count. Kieran flicked to the vid display outside the ship.
The enemy OneMan was still over the coolant tanks, its thrusters glowing as it kept its acceleration even with the Empyrean’s. The shuttle from the New Horizon was nearby. The Empyrean’s shuttle was speeding toward the enemy craft, and from the other end, three OneMen were traveling along the length of the ship, toward the enemy. He had no idea what they intended to do. There wasn’t much they could do. There were no weapons on board the shuttles or on OneMen.
“All the boys are here,” Seth said. He’d come back without Kieran noticing. “Arthur Dietrich is sealing off the central bunker right now.”
“See if we can pick up the transmission between those two shuttles,” Kieran barked.
“Don’t yell—” Seth’s voice broke, but he mastered himself and sat in front of his father’s monitor. His fingers flew over the display in front of him, and Kieran could hear Harvard’s quietly enraged voice.
“… we could have shared our knowledge. You didn’t have to—”
“We had all the knowledge you had.” It was a man’s voice, someone Kieran didn’t recognize. He sounded as though he was pleading. “It was too late for us.”
“We would have helped you, if you’d been honest.”
“What’re they talking about?” Seth whispered, but Kieran shushed him.
“We tried!” the man insisted. “We begged your Captain to rendezvous with us, but he refused!”
“I’m sure Captain Jones was only trying to protect our ship,” Harvard said.
“That’s what we’re doing! We can’t let ourselves go extinct!”
Kieran watched as the enemy OneMan detached from the hull of the Empyrean and sped toward the rogue shuttle craft.
“What did he do?” Seth asked ominously.
Suddenly the Empyrean rocked with an explosion. Kieran’s vid screen flashed a brilliant light, and he shielded his eyes. A deep rumble moved through the ship.
“Oh God,” Seth cried as he flipped through screens to assess damage.
The enemy sped off toward the New Horizon. Harvard’s shuttle joined in pursuit, along with the three OneMen from the Empyrean.
“Where are they going?” Seth asked, his usual guarded manner completely unraveled.
“I don’t know,” Kieran said.
Kieran watched his com console, unable to breathe until a text message flashed to life on the Central Command computer: “On blkout. Stay on crse. Will rndzvous.”
“They’re going to try to catch up to the New Horizon. They’re trying to rescue the girls,” Kieran said.
“On blackout?” Seth read pensively.
“Their only chance is to surprise the other crew,” Kieran explained. “To do that, they have to cease all communication with us.”
Seth nodded, sullen. He didn’t like having things explained to him, Kieran could see. Usually Seth was the one who did the explaining.
An alarm suddenly screamed through the ship. Kieran jumped in his seat.
Huge red letters showed up on Kieran’s monitor, flashing urgently: “MELTDOWN.”
Radiation was flooding the engine room. And there was nothing Kieran could do about it.
PART TWO
CAPTIVES
The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.
—William Shakespeare
ON THE SHUTTLE
The shuttle lurched as it left the Empyrean, then settled into a smooth flight. To Waverly, used to the immense farming bays of her home, the shuttle felt asphyxiating and small. Passenger seats lined the walls, and the one hundred and thirty girls sat facing the center of the room, staring out the portholes and looking fearfully at one another.
Waverly felt sick to her stomach from the zero gravity. She was strapped in, but she couldn’t feel the weight of her body, and with her palm she kept touching the seat underneath her, making sure it was still there. She had a strange feeling of nonexistence, as if she’d left her body behind and were floating above these frightening people.
She should have listened to Seth. She should have run away.
“I’m still alive,” Waverly told herself. She knew it because she could feel Felicity’s leg next to her own. She wanted to reach out and touch her friend, hold her hand the way they’d done as little girls. That wasn’t so long ago, but Felicity seemed very far from her now, so Waverly kept to herself. She didn’t want to be this scared, so she didn’t want to act scared.
The red-faced woman who had started the shooting floated at the head of the cabin, strapped into a harness that hooked to the wall, holding her weapon to her chest. She kept her smallish eyes trained on the girls, but something about her was unsteady, and every so often she sniffed. Waverly thought she might be crying, but such a monster should not be capable of tears.
Waverly nudged Felicity. Even that small motion sent an ache radiating through her core. She was very weak.
“What?” Felicity whispered, barely audibly.
“We outnumber them,” Waverly said softly. The single sentence used up all her breath, and she was panting before she could finish. “Maybe we can take over the shuttle.”
“They have guns.”
“If they get us aboard the New Horizon, we’ll never get away.”
“But we’ll be alive.”
Waverly tried to think
of a response, but spasms seized the muscles between her ribs, and she bent over, wincing. She felt Felicity’s hand on her back, and the girl whispered through her hair, “Shut up and be still. You’re too sick to do anything.”
Waverly’s entire being cried out against this. There had to be something they could do, something to stop this terrible thing from happening. But the more upset she felt, the weaker her limbs, the more frantic her heartbeat, the less clear her head. She slumped against Felicity, who put an arm around her, and she concentrated on the other girl’s heartbeat, listening to its steadiness, willing her own heart to slow its wild pace.
The door to the cockpit slid open. The girls shrank from it.
Into the room stepped a plump woman of middle years, her gray hair swept into a bun on top of her head. The woman had kind gray eyes and a serene smile. She held out her hands as if to embrace all the girls in the room. For a moment, Waverly wondered how the woman was able to stand on the floor in zero gravity, but then she saw she was wearing magnetic grav boots. Everyone else aboard the shuttle seemed discomfited by the zero gravity, but this woman’s feet were planted firmly on the ground.
“Girls, I’m Anne Mather, and I’m here to help you. You’ve been through a great deal, and I’m so sorry for what happened.”
“You’re sorry?” Samantha Stapleton yelled. “You killed people!”
“Killed? Oh, my my my!” cried the woman. She lifted Samantha’s chin until the girl glared up at her. “No, dear. I’m so sorry you misunderstood! No one was killed in our rescue mission! Some people were stunned with our tranquilizers, but I assure you, they’ll wake up safe and sound.”
Many of the girls straightened in their seats, hopeful eyes fastened on this comforting, motherly woman. “My mom’s going to be okay?” Melissa Dickinson asked from beneath frayed mousy hair.
“I assure you, she is fine, dear.”
Melissa collapsed against the girl next to her, crying with relief.