Becoming Chosen

Closed door,

Child take care, the Breath Sucker can be anywhere.

Never open if you see red,

Else you and your mates may be dead!

-Mnemonic Device for Tech Children

Ronan’s father had once told him that leadership was the ability to worry about everything, but never showing it to those you lead. He had nodded along, filing it away, like all the other things he was told. But it wasn’t until he had stepped on to the Surface with Miri that he had understood it in his bones.

Leading a surface-party was usually the responsibility of a middling senior officer. He hadn’t thought he would do it for years yet, if ever. But here he was leading a total amateur. She wasn’t doing too badly, all things considered. The quick moving panorama of stars had not made her dizzy, she hadn’t shown any signs of panic being surrounded by the Breath Sucker, unlike many first-time walkers.

It was a good thing Miri was doing well, because Ronan had a bigger worry. Low in his chin display there was a growing bar of light, the reading from his radiation monitor. It was already starting to shade into amber, on its way to red, then the death sentence of black.

At a third of the speed of light, there was a considerable amount of radiation as higher energy particles got a boost from the relative velocity of the ship. But that was nothing compared to the high intensity bursts from the antimatter jets.

To provide a standard gravity inside the Tech areas of the ship, the huge vessel spun on its axis three times every minute. During half of each revolution, actinic bars would burst sequentially from the reaction bells of the jets. Starting exactly at the horizon they would seem to rotate in an arc as each jet came into firing position.

Each time a jet fired, the warning bar would grow by a small but noticeable amount. Every ten seconds, there was a set of eight jets, firing one after the next, then ten seconds of glorious darkness as the bulk of the ship blocked the firing of the other jets.

Ronan knew exactly what the look Chief Anderson had given him meant. Forty minutes in this kind of radiation environment was dangerously close to the line where the suits protection would fail. After that happened, the next burst of blinding light would be the one that killed them both.

It was a burden of leadership he couldn’t share with Miri. Ronan shook his head and made a quick check of the trams instruments. The open sided train car ran along a cage of supports. Above the cage was the hull of ship stretching off to a sharp-edged horizon, the curve just barely discernable.

One of the things new Surface Crew often had trouble with was way the hull spread out overhead.. Failure to qualify ran as high as fifteen percent. Some people could not accept that the vast bulk wouldn’t fall on them. Miri didn’t have that problem either.

“I wish the stars weren’t under my feet,” she complained over the comm link. “It’s hard to see them over the bulges in the suit.”

“It’s a tradeoff. If you want gravity inside the hull, you have to put up with the inconvenience of always working over your head on the surface. Besides, we usually don’t have much time for watching the stars spin by. Any instructor would tell you not to look at them, it might make you dizzy.”

“People get dizzy looking at them? How is that possible?”

As worried as he was, Ronan had to grin. It was so Miri. She just assumed if she could do something, why then everyone must be able to do it. He wasn’t sure who put that kind of low regard for her talents in her head. But if he ever met them, he’d planned to give them a sharp kick in the ass.

“I’m told it’s an inner-ear issue. Some people have either too many of the little rocks that provide balance or too few, I can never remember which.”

“Well, I’m glad I’m not one of them.”

Ronan silently agreed with her. Things would be much harder if she were dizzy or worse throwing up. The tram began decelerating. They were reaching the end of the line.

“Okay, heads up, Miri,” Ronan said. “As soon as the tram stops, we’re going to leave it and walk over the surface. We need to do this as quickly as we can, but safely. Understand?”

“Sure.”

It was far too glib an answer for Ronan.

“Listen, this is the dangerous part. We have to thread our way through a cooling farm, and past resource storage. Usually it’s completely dark, but right now the way will be dark, then light. It will be easy to lose your footing and your way.”

“Yes, Boss,” Miri said. Anger flared in Ronan, he wanted to yell at her, to make her take their situation seriously. Thing was, she felt like everything was okay because he had kept the dangers from her. Instead he fell back on how he was taught.

“No lip, say the rhyme.”

“Breath calm, feet firm, tether tight, walkers will reach their destination right.”

“Say it again.” There was a beat of silence, then Miri complied. When he made her do it a third time, it was followed by a sigh. “Yeah, I know, it seems dumb. But those are the things you need to do to be safe.” Miri didn’t answer, which Ronan hoped was a good sign.

The tram came to a stop where the tracks ended, locking into place. Ronan stepped over the gate that closed the little train and opened it. Directly ahead of him a metal grate path stretched off into the darkness between a radiator fin farm.

Glowing a dull red, the panels seemed to grow down from the bulk of the ship overhead. The faint light from the panels did nothing to dispel the darkness between them. Ronan double-tapped his left index finger with his thumb. The two high-intensity lights on his helmet flashed into operation.

He reached out and clipped his tether line to the bar running above the grated path.

“Miri, turn on your helmet lights,” he said as he stepped out. Turning back, he saw that she had done it. “Good, now unhook your tether and re-hook it on this bar.” He waited while his companion did as he asked. He then watched, horrified, as Miri jumped down from the tram.

She landed hard, her knees flexing to the point where he could hear the hiss of the air pressure balance valves over the comm.

“Ugh!” Miri said. “Why is everything so heavy?”

“Because we are further away from the center of the ship than just about anything. That makes the spin-gravity more intense. Never do that again. Step, don’t jump, ever.”

“Yes, Dad,” came the witheringly sarcastic reply.

Ronan stepped quickly in until his helmet nearly touched Miri’s, he wanted to be sure she could see his face. “Listen! This is not a game, this is life and death! There is no room for sass on a surface walk!”

The light from his helmet caused some glare on her face plate but he could see well enough to see Miri’s eyes widening. “One mistake, just one and the Breath Sucker can take you. The minute you fail to respect that, the Sucker will kill you, are we clear?”

“I, I,… I didn’t. I’m sorry Ronan,” Miri sputtered.

Ronan wanted to kick himself. Now she was going to be tentative and afraid. But what choice did he have? If she didn’t pay attention she really could be killed in an instant. It was a sign of his own focus issues that he couldn’t decide which was the better state of mind for her to be in, too casual or too scared.

“Don’t be sorry. That is what we need to avoid. I am going to tell you a lot of things that seem simple, but I’m saying them for a reason; I don’t have time to teach you everything you need to know to be safe making your own judgments. Like never jumping down while on the surface. If things had gone bad, you could have slipped through the rails and been flung out into the Void.”

He hated himself for putting that image in Miri’s head, but it was too late now.

“I didn’t know.”

“Right, that’s the point. You don’t know and I do. So, do what I tell you, and only what I tell you. That will keep you safe. Okay?”

Miri nodded to him. He could hear her fast breathing over the comms. That wouldn’t do. Fast breath led to over excitement, which could lead to disaster.

“What’s the first rule?”

“Um, breath calm?”

“Correct, breath calm. So, slow deep breaths, yes?” He watched as the piercing light of the jets moving around the hull flashed on and off. Miri took a few calming breaths, he could see her heart rate falling in his telemetry read-out.

“Good, what’s the next thing?”

“Feet firm,” Miri answered immediately.

“Good, so no jumping. What else?”

“Tether tight.”

“Spot on. So, we’re going to follow this path for a while. We need to move at a steady pace. If anything changes, I’ll tell you, but for now, step when I step.”

Getting a confirming nod from Miri, Ronan turned away. He put his hands on the bars on either side of the narrow path and began walking at a determined pace. He hadn’t lost sight of the radiation gage, and it was now completely amber. Was that a faint tint of red, or was he just imagining it? No matter, they needed to get inside as soon as possible.

They were making good time, moving past the vast fins that dumped the huge amount of waste heat from the fusions generators and the other systems of the ship into the frigid Void when Miri spoke up.

“Why is it so hot?”

“Hot? Oh, you mean the radiators. Vacuum is an exceptionally good insulator, and all our systems produce some heat. If we didn’t dump it out into space, the whole ship would be too hot to live in.”

“No,” Miri said her voice stressed, “I mean why is it so hot in my suit? I’m burning up here.”

“Just turn up your cooling unit. Walking around makes you generate more heat too.”

“Um, it’s up all the way.”

“What?” Ronan asked, then scanned her telemetry on the display low on his helmet. She was hot, her core temp was already over one hundred degrees. Not good. “Let’s stop for a sec, and let me take a look,” Ronan said in as calm a voice as he could manage. There were a very small number of reasons other than user error that the cooling wouldn’t be keeping up, and none of them were good.

Ronan turned back to Miri. The bright flashes like a rip in the universe made the path below their feet flash bars of darkness over them. The light strobed on and off, giving him flashes of her face. It was red and sweat was running down her cheeks.

It only took a few seconds to verify what he feared, both her primary and secondary cooling systems were off line. A few more frustrating seconds passed as Ronan tried to get either of them to restart.

This was not an unknown emergency. There was even a procedure for it in basic surface training. Unfortunately, it was to abort the walk and return to the nearest airlock at once. Going back was not an option. Even if it didn’t mean they would be walking back into Nesbit’s hands, the trip back to the tram and then the airlock was so long, he doubted Miri would make it. And that was before he factored in the radiation their suits would have to defend against.

Ronan’s mind raced as he tried to figure out what to do. His own breathing was getting fast, and he could feel a bead of sweat roll down his back. Just as indecision was about to paralyze him, it seemed like Chief Andersons voice was there in his head.

“Emergencies are only made worse by flailing. Never do it. Observe, decide, then act. There is not one of these steps that you can skip.”

Taking a deep breath, and pasting a shaky smile on his face Ronan looked in Miri’s eyes. She was going to have to trust him. By the Builders he hoped she did.

“Okay,” he started, his tone light, “It looks like your cooling system is going out.”

“Can you fix it?” Miri asked with worry painting her voice.

“No, not out here. So, what we need to do is get you to an airlock, soonest. It’s going to get really hot in there. You’ve got the same problem the ship has; the Breath Sucker is an excellent insulator.”

“Is it dangerous?”

Ronan spared a second to decide what to tell her. There was no time to nurse a lie into believability, it would have to be the truth.

“Eventually, yes. But we’ve got time, so we need to get moving. Here is what we are going to do. You are going to walk first. Don’t worry, I’ll tell you where to go. That way if you have a problem you are in front of me where I’ll see it right away.”

“Okay,” Miri said doubtfully. They did a very slow and careful dance in the narrow walkway. Ronan begrudged every second, but rushing now might cause a mistake that took even more time. And time was not their friend at this point.

Finally, after what seemed like hours, they started off. Ronan watched as Miri took the longest step she could, then followed it with another. There was no hope of running in their heavy and constricting suits.

As they moved along, Ronan was as busy as he’d ever been on a surface walk. He quickly reorganized his display so that three things were primary, Miri’s telemetry, the radiation monitor and a timer.

They had been on this walk for thirty-eight minutes, with at least another fifteen to reach the service airlock. A quick calculation based on the amount of radiation they had been exposed to showed they had very nearly no margin.

Miri was not doing very well either. He could hear her muttering the Walkers phrase over and over, but her breath was starting to sound ragged. Worse she was slowing down.

“Let’s keep that pace going, okay?” Ronan asked.

“I’m tryin’,” Miri said, annoyance creeping into her voice.

“Just keep going, I promise when we get inside we can take a long break.”

“I’m tryin’.”

There was nothing to say to that, so Ronan kept silent. They came to the crossroad Ronan had been expecting and turned left. This took them out of the shadow of the radiator fins. The flash of the jets made the white grating they walked on seem to glow, and left after images in his vision.

On either side of the path, stretching out and up away from them were bunker like structures. The sides and top were plated in perfect mirror finish. They reflected the brutal light of the jets everywhere, making their helmets darken even more in protective response.

Ronan desperately needed to get them inside. But constantly harping on Miri to move faster wouldn’t really help. He needed to say something, but was stuck for a topic. Finally, he used the bunkers.

“You might find this interesting,” he said, again using the lightest tone he could manage through a throat constricted with worry. “The ones to our right hold oxygen.”

“’s it cool in there?” Miri asked her voice breathy and tired.

“Sort of. It’s frozen solid, so it’s well below minus two hundred.”

“Sounds nice, can we go in?” Miri asked plaintively.

“Sorry, its sealed. But here is the interesting thing. Those bunkers are not open to vacuum. They are pressurized, so when we need to get some of it, we let the vacuum in. The change in pressure means it turns back into a liquid, even as it stays the same temperature.”

“I wish I could do that. Can I open my helmet? I just want get some air.”

“NO!” Ronan shouted, moving up to Miri’s back. “Miri, we’re outside, there is no air to be had. Keep your hands off your helmet.” Ronan had heard of walkers wanting to take their helmet off, but he never thought it was real. That Miri had just suggested it scared him down to his soul.

“We’re almost there, Miri. Just another six hundred yards or so. If you look close you can see the outline of the lock.”

It was true, he could just make out the welcoming square of the airlock door in the flashes of radiation that were turning the vast ship.

“That’s nice,” Miri said, as she stopped moving forward. “I can’t see it…” she trailed off and began to fall forward.

“Miri!” Ronan shouted, but there was no response. She fell full length on the path and did not move. Her tether kept her chest just slightly elevated.

A quick glance at the telemetry showed she was in a bad way. Core temp was over one hundred five. As fast as he dared Ronan moved up to her. He turned her over so he could look at her face. It was bright red and running with sweat. Her breath seemed to be coming in gasps.

Try as he might he could not get her to respond to him. Then his suit spoke.

“Warning! Radiation levels reaching critical. Move to an airlock immediately.” The warning began to repeat itself. It was a warning he’d only ever heard in training. At the time it had been amusing, now it was terrifying.

They had to get inside and soon or this all would be for nothing. Up to now the suit had stopped all the deadly radiation flooding the area. It hadn’t failed yet, but at the point the warning went off it was starting to let some through.

Ronan bent down and pulled Miri’s unresponsive form more up right. She weighed the better part of two hundred fifty pound in her suit.

Suddenly Ronan’s mind felt crystal clear. All the fear, the worry, vanished, leaving him in a state of forced calm. A plan suddenly burst into his head. It felt as if there was a standard check list to follow. He didn’t take any time to wonder at this, but went straight to work.

Reaching into a wide pocket on his thigh, Ronan pulled out a spare tether. He clicked it into the ring on Miri shoulder, opposite of her first one. Then it was a long hard pull to manhandle his friend into a standing position.

Bracing his hip against hers to keep her standing he shortened both tethers. He clicked the new one on to the safety rail on the far side of the path. Gingerly he stepped away from Miri. She hung like a sack of laundry, suspended by her shoulders, her feet limp on the grating.

The radiation warning warbled through his helmet again. Ronan angrily shut it down. It did him no good to know how close they were to dying. At this point they would either make it to the airlock or they wouldn’t.

Moving carefully, he got side by side with Miri. Putting her limp arm over his shoulder, and one of his around her waist. Leaning forward, he took a step. He had to push hard to get them moving, but it could be done.

Ronan fastened his eyes on the airlock door and grimly took another step.

Six hundred yards isn’t far. A short walk from quarters to a dining hall. It was just a couple of times around the exercise track. Hell, it was shorter than the height of the levels the Tech lived in.

Over and over Ronan told this to himself. But he had been a fool to think this distance short. After a minute or two it seemed like it was a far as the ship had traveled from distant Earth. Obviously, his eyes and map were lying.

He wanted so badly to stop, to take a rest. If he could just rest, a minute, it would all be better. But if he did, Miri would die. That kept him going.

Step by step, he pushed the two of them forward. His breath hissed through clinched teeth, as his thighs and calves started to burn. Sweat dripped from his forehead, smearing his vision.

The last part of the walk was a blur. The flashing of the jets was so bright it seemed to pulse behind his eyes. Then for ten seconds it was dark. He was sure there had never been a dark like it before. Still he pushed on.

Ronan was in a haze of effort when he suddenly found he couldn’t go forward anymore. In a panic, he summoned one last effort. It failed. It was only then as he was ready to weep in despair that he realized he couldn’t go forward because he was up against the airlock door.

With a sob of relief, he cycled the door open, unclipped Miri and fell inside. He had barely enough presence of mind to cycle it closed.