Citadel: First Colony (13 page)

“This is bad,” Thomas said again. He couldn’t feel the network of branches beneath him, but he was relatively certain they couldn’t be much. His weight was currently distributed among many, but the balance was delicate. Any tiny shift in his body weight, or even a stiff breeze jostling the tree slightly, could be enough to send him to a hard landing below. At this point, he must have been twenty feet or so from the base. But the ground sloped away at a steep angle, and it was covered in jagged, very solid rocks. He might survive the fall, but he would almost surely be injured.

Alan was slowly and carefully adjusting his position on the branch above. He sat up and began removing his pack. He then leaned forward again and lowered the pack by one of the shoulder straps, allowing the other strap to dangle close to Thomas’s hand.

“Take the strap,” he said.

Thomas risked moving enough to grasp the shoulder strap.

“ok, I’m going to brace myself on the limb. When I say go, you need to hold tight to the strap and try to reach upward. There’s a limb below you, slightly to your left, that should be able to hold your weight. Get your feet to that, ok?”

Thomas nodded.

“ok,” Alan said, “Go!”

Thomas gripped the shoulder strap hard and moved his upper body as if he were trying to sit up. The limbs below him immediately gave way, and his lower body fell downward. He managed to snag his left foot on the branch Alan had described and to reach his free hand up to the base of the limb where Alan was straddled. The young man’s face was contorted with the strain of holding Thomas up.

Thomas struggled to get his weight onto the lower limb, and finally after a few random kicks, managed to make solid contact. He placed both feet on the limb and was now leaning with one hand on the limb above. Slowly and cautiously, he let go of the pack strap and put both hands on the limb Alan was on. The young man scrambled back now and got into a position near the trunk of the tree, reaching down to help Thomas right himself and move in closer.

In moments, the two of them were safe, huffing from the exertion and clinging to the tree like infants to a mother.

“You ok?” Mitch called from the ground.

“Scratched but functional,” Thomas said.

“Me, too,” Alan said, breathing heavily.

“Good. Now stop slacking off and get down here so we can get back to work.” He was smiling, but Thomas could see that he had been genuinely worried.

“Aye, sir,” Alan said.

Thomas looked up at him, and for the first time he could recall, the young man was actually smiling.

“Oh, now you develop a sense of humor,” Thomas said, punching him lightly in the leg.

The
pod was damaged. Bad.
Mitch looked it over before letting the others come closer. If there had been a leak in the stasis system, it would have put them down, unconscious or worse. Uncontrolled stasis was very dangerous.

But most of the safety systems seemed to be in place. The problem was that the pod’s life support had taken a hit. Whoever was in there had very little time left.

The others approached. “We’re going to have to open it,” Mitch said when Thomas and Alan were near.

Thomas paused. “They’re in danger?”

“Yes,” Mitch said. “Life support was blown to hell in the crash. The casing protected most of the other systems, though. This puncture,” he pointed to a jagged hole in the pod’s housing, “it nicked the control system for the life support. The redundant systems kicked in, but they’re limited. They kept her alive this long, but there’s no way of knowing how much time she has left.”

“ok,” Thomas said. “Let’s get her out of there.”

Mitch nodded and tried the control pad. No good. There must have been more damage than he’d thought. “Alan, get on the other side, we’ll have to work the manual release.”

Alan moved to the opposite side, and the two of them turned the levers that would manually open the pod. A hiss came from within as the inner atmosphere was expelled. They lifted the lid and folded it back, looking into the pod to see the young woman inside.

She was pretty and obviously wealthy, judging by her clothes. Mitch had seen thousands of girls like her in his years ferrying colonists from one world to another. Most of the colony worlds were established by the very rich, along with their paid help. It had become a status symbol of sorts for the elite rich to own property on an alien world, returning to the homes and shops and crowds of Earth by lightrail whenever the allure of “roughing it” in the colonies had worn off.

Mitch had always felt a kind of contempt for these people, but at the moment, he would have to fight past it. This girl, rich or not, was in danger. He’d help her. And when everything returned to normal, she’d probably sue him and everyone else present because that’s just what spoiled, rich girls do when they’re inconvenienced.

The girl’s eyes blinked open. She looked up into their faces and suddenly her expression became haughty, perturbed.

“Who are you?” she demanded.

Thomas smiled and held out a hand, “Let me help you up. My name is Thomas. This is Mitch Garrison and Alan Angelou. Careful,” he said as she struggled to sit up, still a bit weak and woozy from stasis.

“Where am I?” She looked around at the ravine. Mitch noted for the first time that the rocky, steep walls of the place might give the impression of complete isolation.

“There was a problem with the landing,” Thomas said, still smiling.

Mitch knew from the look on her face that this girl was about to become trouble.

“Miss,” Mitch said, “you’re alright. We had to bring you out of stasis because your pod was damaged.”

She was looking around wildly. “Daddy!” she called. “Mother!”

“We haven’t found them yet,” Thomas offered.

“Stay away from me!” she screamed. “Daddy! Oliver!”

Thomas looked at Mitch, “Who’s Oliver?”

“Probably a butler,” Mitch said.

“Who are you people!” the girl shouted.

“I told you, my name is Thomas ... ”

“I don’t care about your stupid name! I demand you tell me why you have kidnapped me!”

The three men looked at each other, a bit confused by this turn of events.

“Oh,” the girl said quietly. She pushed against the pod and managed to crawl out onto the ground. A bit unsteady, she stood and crossed her arms over her chest, moving slowly away from the three of them. “I see,” she said. “You want ... you’re ... I know what you want.” She backed herself up until she hit the wall of the ravine and could go no further. She looked truly frightened, and Mitch wasn’t sure why.

“She thinks we’re trying to rape her,” Alan said bluntly.

Thomas nearly choked, sputtering.

“Ma’am,” Mitch said to the girl, “we’re here to rescue you, not rape you.”

The girl was still pressing against the rocks. She turned and looked down the length of the ravine. “Help!” she cried. “Someone, please help!”

“What do we do?” Mitch asked.

Thomas shrugged. “This is my first rescue.”

“Please,” Mitch said to the girl, “Miss, we’re telling you the truth. We’re here to help. We’re not going to hurt you.”

She looked at them with panic in her eyes, still struggling as if she could somehow push through the stone of the wall.

It was Alan who finally got through to her. “We’re going to take you to your parents,” he said quietly.

She stopped. “Daddy and Mother?” she asked.

“Yes. As soon as we can find them, we’ll take you there.”

She visibly relaxed. “Good. And Oliver?”

“Him, too,” Alan offered.

She nodded slightly, then her eyes rolled back into her head, and she fainted to the ground.

The three men rushed forward to help her. “Is she ok?” Thomas asked.

“Sleep sickness,” Alan said.

Mitch cursed himself for a fool. “It’s not common, but since her pod was damaged, she’s experiencing something a little like altitude sickness,” he explained. “She’ll be fine. But this explains why she was so irrational.”

“Maybe,” Thomas said. “I think some of that may just be personality.”

“Maybe,” Mitch smiled.

They helped her up into a sitting position, moving her to a small boulder where she could sit off of the ground. Mitch gave her some water. After a while, she began to come around.

“You’re ok,” Mitch said. “A little sleep sickness. You’re going to be fine.”

“Oliver?” she said weakly. “Are Mummy and Daddy awake yet?”

Mitch looked at Thomas, who shrugged. Alan knelt beside the girl, and in a gesture that surprised Mitch, the young man smoothed her slightly sweat-matted hair out of her face. “They’re still asleep, but we’ll wake them soon. Just rest,” he said.

Mitch and Thomas exchanged glances again. It seemed their young friend had a bit of a crush.

––––––––

“
A
re
you out of your mind?”
the girl shouted. “I’m not climbing that!”

Her name, she had informed them, was Penny. Short for Penelope Daunder, daughter of Elizabeth and Miguel Daunder and heir to the Daunder fortune. That last part Thomas had simply assumed, but he was certain it was on the mark.

Penny was currently lording it over poor Alan, who quietly took her abuse as she explained to him that he was, in fact, a brainless cretin who should somehow perform the miracle of magically transporting her back to Earth with the wave of his hand. To be fair, she’d said no such thing, but to Thomas her demands were just as lofty and unreasonable.

“What do you think? Should we knock her out and put her back in stasis?” he said to Mitch, only half joking.

“It would certainly make things quieter.”

Just then the radio came on. “Search, this is Shuttle.”

“Go ahead, Shuttle,” Thomas said over the transmitter.

“The engines have been cool for a couple of hours now. Are you guys ok? I figured you would have called in for pick-up by now.”

“We’ve found the first pod, but we had to wake up its occupant.”

“Good,” Reilly said. “You can probably use all the help you can get to bring that pod out of the ravine.”

Thomas looked at Mitch, who was busy hiding his grin and shaking his head.

“Yeah, I don’t think she’s up to that kind of help.”

“Well, when do you want me to rendezvous?” Reilly asked.

“We’ll call you when we get top-side,” Thomas said.

Mitch pulled the communicator from his shoulder strap. “Reilly, you getting impatient up there?” He meant it as a joke, some friendly banter, but he wasn’t expecting her response.

“It’s ... a little creepy here, Mitch. I keep hearing something outside. And there’s this ... smell.”

“What kind of smell? Fuel?”

“No, nothing like that. More like ozone. Like a lightning strike. And the lights have dimmed a few times.”

“Maybe there’s a short somewhere. Do a visual on the electrical systems and get back to me, ok? Be careful. Wear one of the EVA suits, they’re grounded internally.”

There was a pause. “Roger, Search. Call me when you need me. Shuttle out.”

They re-clipped their comms. “She seemed tense,” Thomas said.

“I think all of this open atmosphere is getting to her. She’s spent most of her life in space. Kind of a shift in gears to be planet-side for so long.”

Thomas nodded. He couldn’t imagine what it must be like to go from being constantly surrounded by the walls of a spacecraft to being surrounded by an infinite-seeming expanse of open sky. At least she was in the shuttle, where she could pretend to be back out in space if need be. No wonder she seemed tense when Mitch told her to go outside and inspect the electrical system.

Something occurred to him. “You knew she’d be more comfortable staying with the shuttle, didn’t you?” he asked Mitch.

“Sure,” Mitch shrugged. “But someone would have had to stay anyway. She’s the pilot. It was a logical choice.”

But it seemed there was more to it than logic, Thomas thought. Still, he let it drop.

He turned his attention to the little princess, Penny, and her new favorite punching bag, Alan.

“Why can’t the shuttle fly down here and pick me up?” she asked, exasperated.

“The ravine is too narrow,” Alan explained patiently.

Thomas marveled at the boy’s ability to simply take the abuse, never seeming to get angry or impatient. He wished he had that skill himself. What would cause someone to develop that kind of trait? Had passion once burned Alan so badly that he now felt the need to void himself of it entirely?

“Lady and gentlemen,” Thomas said, “it’s time we were going. The pod is loaded into the rigging, and we have a tree to climb.”

“I’m not climbing that thing,” Penny said.

Thomas shrugged. “Suit yourself. I don’t blame you; I nearly fell out of it earlier trying to get down here to rescue you. But it’s a long walk to the end of this ravine, and there’s no food or water along the way that I’m aware of. We have other pods to rescue, so we can’t waste any time. If you’d like, I’ll give you a radio and some food, and we’ll come pick you up in a few days, once you’ve made your way out of the ravine.”

Penny’s eyes went wide for a moment, though whether from shock, fury, or fear Thomas wasn’t sure. Finally, she seemed to huff and resolve herself to her fate. “Fine,” she said. “I’ll climb the stupid tree.”

“Good,” Thomas said. They began the slow and cautious climb to the top.

“
R
oger
, Search,”
Reilly said, trying not to sound too angry. “Call me when you need me. Shuttle out.”

She slammed the transmitter onto the console before her and spun in her chair, standing and walking away from the pilot’s station in a fury. She wasn’t entirely sure why she was angry—she just knew it had something to do with Mitch.

Actually, to be fair, it had a lot to do with the waiting, too. But it was Mitch’s attitude about her waiting that bugged her most. It was the fact that he was out rescuing the pod while she was stuck here. It was the fact that when she had told him about the sounds and the weird ozone smell, he’d been a little too dismissive. Check the electrical system? What, did he think she was an idiot?  The first thing she’d done was run a full diagnostic and check all of the internal breakers and junctions. She’d found nothing.