“Just stay clear, stay back, it’s all right. Patch it, patch! dammit, he’s losing air—”
“Got it, got it. It’s just his finger. “
“What’s our time?” somebody else asked, and Christian answered, “Just do it, dammit. Keep your damn hands clear, we’re one row to go. “
Almost through. They could make it. Suddenly he couldn’t get enough air, touched the air-flow regulator—but cans came in, bumped a slower can, set it in motion. Careful, careful, he wished Saby, don’t lose it, don’t lose it—he ignored his shortened breath, shoved as cans passed, to the limit of his strength and his grip on the hand-hold bar.
Bumping in the line had started another oscillation, cans endangering workers along the walls—he flattened, had enough room until the effect dissipated down the line. Cans bumped one another, threatened another jam, and then didn’t—Saby was controlling the feed back there, finessing it, best she could…
“Captain. Sprite’s moving this way. “
Sprite’s…
Moving.
“Oh… shit!” Tink said.
He didn’t know he’d moved, but he had, he didn’t realize Tink had made a grab for him, but he’d slung Tink’s hand off—didn’t know where he was going, but he shoved with his foot on a can and shot forward, the walls a blur in his vision as he richocheted off cans, off the wall, grabbed for a handhold where the railing climbed to the release zone. Brain caught up to body, then—he wanted escape, wanted forward, where ship’s officers were, where Austin was, where the truth was, as much as they hadn’t told to him, who that ship was, that was coming at them.
Bright lights now, vacant stretch of hand-rail, at the top of the cans now, the cargo-lock mate-up area, cans bumping in the guide rails, where the line started a process to shunt the cans on Corinthians rails off into the mated rail in the other hold—both cargo locks standing wide open, all the way into the hulk they were dealing with.
Com D light was blinking. Saby wanted him. Maybe Tink did. Breath was ragged. The suit regulator wouldn’t give him more oxygen.
Betrayal, then, Tink’s voice, on Universal: “All hands, Hawkins is in Michaels’ rig.—Tom, you got to get back here. “
Save the ship. He knew that. He understood. Tink had to get him.
“Tom!” Saby’s voice. Saby couldn’t leave her post. Wouldn’t. Too many lives… “Tom, come back, Tom, I need you! I need you, dammit!”
“Tom! “Tink’s voice, again, anguished. “—Captain, he’s coming your way! I can’t catch him…”
The whole ship wanted to stop him. In front of him, glaring light, Corinthian’s cargo-lock console, as he hand-over-handed toward the officers there.
“Hawkins!”
Christian.
He had no direction with the com. He scanned the 360° of helmet display, looking, but had no warning as someone snagged the back-pack, spun him around to rebound against the wall. “Son-of-a-bitch! What are you doing?”
He fended off the hold, but it wasn’t only Christian, it was two, three of them, grabbing hold, starting an inertial tumble. They bumped cans, richocheted off to the wall of the chute, back again. A section of tractor-chain ground against his helmet, bump, bump, bump, until somebody hauled them out of it and anchored their collective mass along the rail.
“Cut his regulator!” somebody shouted, C. BOWE was the name on the helmet closest, the one with his hand on his oxygen supply.
He panicked, swung to free himself, claustrophobic as if the oxygen had already stopped.
“You lied to me,” he panted, and struggled to get a hold on the rail. “You all fucking lied to me, you son of a bitch—what ship, what’s going on out there?”
Someone else was yelling—he couldn’t hear it; then “Hold it!”
Austin’s voice. “Hold it, dammit, that’s high mass—brake on, damn you, cut it—”
Something happened. “Shit!” somebody yelled, but he was still fighting for air, found an arm free and got a hold on the rail, as a jackstraw debris of metal rods flew everywhere.
“Brake! Brake! Can’s ruptured—”
Crewmen were yelling, rods were flying everywhere, into the line, into the moving cans, rebounding. A piece slammed him side-on, knocked him against the wall with no surety his arm wasn’t broken, but he got his glove to his regulator, tried to get the air-flow up.