Severance (52 page)

“No, not the primary purpose. Our tertiary purpose: shooting
Helot in the face,” Griese said, his voice growing more cheerful with every
minute. “Well, no time like the present.” After attaching himself to a tether
secured inside the airlock, he jumped out into the void and swung around to
Stein’s left, following the ship’s rotation.

“That was the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen,” Stein said,
eyes wide. “
Fuck.
” She took a deep breath and followed him.

Vertigo. The stars pitched and wheeled around her, as she
fell into the bottomless expanse of space. A yank on her harness and she spun
around, facing the bulk of the ship, moving rapidly beneath her feet. She
impacted the side of the ship, bracing the fall only partially with one hand
and foot. “Oof.”

Beside her, Griese had landed on his feet and already fired
one of his piton guns into the rock face. He gave it a sharp tug. Stein
clumsily clambered around into the same position, then grabbed a hold of one of
the piton guns tethered to her waist. According to Bruce, these pitons could
hold “some amount of weight” in standard gravity. At no point did they intend
to rely solely on that needlessly broad claim, which is why they each had two
other identical piton guns. By using them in concert, they planned to have
multiple pitons secure in the side of the ship at all times.

Beside her, Bruce thumped into place, landing gracefully on
his feet. She glared at him, annoyed at his unlikely agility. “Tell me you’ve
done this before?” she asked.

“Come on. It’s not too hard,” he said. She could practically
hear him grinning through the commlink. She raised her gun and fired its piton
into the rock at his feet, watching it bury itself. She gave it a sharp tug. It
seemed to hold, and with a glance at the controls, she saw it flash green. She
did the same with the second gun, then sat back, taking a deep breath. She
looked around. Bruce had already disconnected from the airlock tether, and had
started descending. Griese was himself already several meters away, dangling
beneath her.

“Hey, wait up, guys,” she said to herself, not triggering
the e–suit’s communications. After another deep breath, she disconnected herself
from the tether. She fell down, tumbling backwards, onto her ass, then her
side. Her legs swung around until they pointed down. The pitons held tight.

“Careful,” Griese said. She looked down to watch him, her headlamp
casting long shadows of him down the length of the ship. He had all three
pitons in place now. He shifted down, putting all his weight on his pair of
lower pitons, slackening the uppermost, then detaching it.

Stein grimaced and climbed back on to her feet. Best not to
put these suits under too much abuse, she decided, looking at the rock, glad it
wasn’t as jagged as they had worried. She pointed the third piton gun at the
rock face, and fired it. Then, moving between the three guns, she allowed all
three cables to unwind. She swung downwards in a semi–controlled fashion.

The first few transitions were slow, with much double and
triple–checking of the pitons before proceeding. But within a few minutes, she
had gotten the hang of it and was soon making fairly rapid progress. The bow of
the ship curved substantially, so within a few minutes of their descent, they
had to begin firing their climbing guns upwards at the wall rather than
straight ahead. There had been no way to practice this inside, the ship’s
interior, lacking massively tall, curving walls. Bruce claimed that he had
heard of someone doing this on a habitat orbiting Earth, small comfort, when he
announced that he couldn’t remember whether the fellow had survived the
experience or not.

Passing the observation lounge was a little tricky,
involving a gap to clear the window larger than they had been working with. But
it was otherwise uneventful, and incredibly, unwitnessed. “I can’t believe no one’s
here to see this!” Bruce said. Stein watched as he aimed a kick at the
observation lounge window, only just missing.

The transition from descent to horizontal travel was
gradual, due to the ship’s rounded cigar shape. But about a half hour after
they started, Stein decided that they were definitely traveling in an entirely
horizontal direction. From the perspective of an outside observer, they would
look like three lumps, swinging around in an orbit of the ship, balls twirling
on a string. Crazy balls, the outside observer would probably think, balls with
little instinct for self–preservation. From their perspective, it was only
marginally less crazy and now resembled little more than a three kilometer–long
exercise in vine swinging, like something a monkey would do if he was trying to
prove something. If the pitons weren’t secured directly to their harnesses,
this would be completely impossible, their arms would have given out meters
from the door. With the harnesses, it was merely improbable.

The process they established beforehand worked well. From a
point hanging from two pitons, they would fire the third piton upwards and
forwards, securing it into the hull. They would then adjust the lengths of all
three guns, until they had swung forward and their weight was held entirely by
the forward two pitons. From this point, they could release the rearmost piton
and start the process again. This upside down caterpillar movement would ensure
that they would always be supported by at least two pitons at any time and
would hopefully minimize any swinging back and forth.

An hour into their journey, Stein marveled at how
astoundingly smooth things were proceeding. By that point, they had managed to
get their transition time down to about twenty seconds per step. Stein ran some
calculations in her head. At that rate they were going, the whole three
kilometers would take about six hours — a figure that sounded reassuringly
achievable. Their biggest risk seemed to be a slip in concentration. The piton
release buttons had warnings and fail–safes, but she knew it would still be
possible to screw that up if they weren’t paying close attention.

§

They took breaks every twenty minutes or so, hanging,
letting their arms rest. Although the harness held her entire weight, Stein
found it exhausting work, requiring her to hold her arms over her head for
extended periods.

“Try shooting from the hip,” Bruce suggested. “It looks way
cooler.”

She ignored him, spinning around a bit to look at Griese,
who had been lagging behind. “How you doing, Griese?” she called out.

“Not bad, all things considered,” Griese replied. Stein
could hear him breathing harder than normal.

“This isn’t nearly as stupid as I’d hoped,” Bruce said.

“I think you’re selling yourself short, buddy,” Stein said. “This
is cretinous.” She looked past Griese. “How far do you think we’ve come?”

“Maybe a third of the way?” Griese suggested. “Ship looks a
lot bigger from out here.”

“Well, hang in there,” Bruce said.

Stein laughed. “Ass.”

§

It was Stein who had the first mishap. As she was reeling in
her foremost piton, it slipped out of the ship’s hull, taking a chunk of rock
with it. “Oh, balls,” she called out, a lump forming in her throat. Her other
two pitons held tight, and she swung backwards, arms and legs flailing.

Griese, who was in front of her at the time, turned to
watch. “What happened?”

“Piton slipped. Scared the fuck out of me.”

Stein waited for the swinging to die down. She reeled in her
misfired piton gun, and fired again, aiming at a different part of the ship’s
hull. The piton smacked into the rock and held.

After a short, unscheduled break for Stein to “change her
pants” as Bruce put it, they continued on their way. They traveled a bit slower
from that point, everyone a little more wary with each step. The section of the
hull they were passing through seemed to be less stable, and slips of that
nature began happening more and more frequently.

§

They were about two–thirds of the way through the trip when
Griese fell. They had changed tactics and were now traveling one in front of
the other, swinging in each other’s footsteps, minimizing their exposure to any
unstable rock. Stein was behind Griese at the time and saw the whole thing
happen.

 After releasing his rear piton, Griese swung forward too
quickly, having not adjusted his other pitons to split the load evenly, putting
almost all his weight on to his frontmost anchor. The rock gave way, and he
fell hard on his sole remaining piton. Stein’s heart caught in her throat as
she watched him bounce once, hang motionless for a second, then fall away, the
jolt having loosened the piton from the ship’s hull.

“Ohhhhh, crap!” Griese screamed out over the commlink. “Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap! Fuuuuuuuuuuck!” Stein watched in
horror as he fell, curving to the left rapidly out of her view.

“Griese!” Stein called out, but her cry was drowned out by
Griese’s continuing wave of exclamations.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck…”

“What happened?” Bruce asked. In the front of the group, he
twisted around to get a better look.

“Griese fell,” Stein replied, raising her voice to be heard
over the stream of cusses.

“Oh, no…”

“…fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.” The sounds grew
fainter and fainter.

“Griese?” Stein called out nervously after a few seconds.
Nothing. “Griese?” she tried again.

“Is he out of range?” Bruce asked.

“I don’t think so,” Stein said. “Maybe he’s behind the bulk
of the ship.” She waited, calling his name every few seconds, hearing the panic
in her voice.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. Fuck.” Griese’s voice poured
through the commlink again a minute later. She looked around frantically,
trying to pick him out, not knowing how far he had traveled. He stopped
swearing. “Ahhhhh, crap.”

Despite having some time to think about it, Stein realized
she didn’t have anything to say. “I’m so sorry, man. I’m so, so sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.” A pause. “It’s not your fault, is it?”

“Uhhh. I don’t think so.”

“Okay, then.”

“Dammit, Griese,” Bruce said. “I’m sorry, too.” Silence. “Griese?”
More silence, Griese having swung over the horizon again. Stein hung from the
bottom of the ship, her eyes closed, listening to Bruce call out their friend’s
name.

“Ship doesn’t look so big from here,” Griese said his next
time around. Some more soggy apologies from Stein and Bruce, which he cut through
simply, saying, “Shut up, guys. Just go on. There’s nothing you can do. Don’t
worry about me. I’ll keep myself busy.”

“Griese…” Stein said, the word coming out more as a moan.

“How will you keep yourself busy?” Bruce asked, a banterer
to the bitter end.

“You’ll see.”

Stein watched Bruce hanging in front of her. He seemed to
shake his head. Just as she was about to say something, the sound of Griese’s
voice jumped into her ears: “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,
fuck…”

Stein choked. Tears welled into her eyes, at least some of
them from laughter.

“What if we made it to the aft and got one of the landing
crafts?” Bruce asked.

“Yeah. We could try.” Stein had already considered it and
found too many problems with the plan to count. Didn’t know how to fly a
landing craft. Didn’t know if they actually worked. Didn’t know where Griese
was. Didn’t know where he was heading. He could survive out there for another
few hours in the suit, but at the speed he was traveling, she didn’t know how
they would ever find him. But she didn’t want to shoot the idea down. “Yeah,
could work,” she said.

“Don’t waste your time,” Griese said, evidently having heard
Bruce’s suggestion. “Just,” he said, then stopped, making a choking sound. “Just
don’t. I’m gonna turn this thing off in a second. That will be it.”

“Griese!” Stein shouted.

“What?” he shouted back. “You’d do the fucking same,” he
said. “Dammit. You’d do the same. I’m sorry, guys. Goodbye, Laura. Goodbye,
Bruce.”

“Griese,” she began, not knowing what else to say.

“Goddammit,” Bruce said. They hung together in silence,
watching the universe pass beneath their feet.

§

“I just realized something,” Stein said. They had reached
the aft edge of the ship and were resting there before the climb back up.

“What’s that?” Bruce replied. He was using his best feigning
interest voice.

“That big bright star there…”

“Which one?”

“The bright one. By your feet.” Stein waved her hand in the
general direction she was looking at.

“What about it?”

“That must be Tau Prius.”

“It’s so small! How were we ever going to all fit on that?”

“I think it gets bigger as you get closer.”

“Oh,” he said. “Like everything.”

“Yes, Bruce. Like everything.” There was a grim
deliberateness to their banter now, but by some unspoken agreement, they kept
at it.

Their plan for turning the corner of the ship was a little
fussy. The aft surface curved up rapidly from the plane they had been traveling
on, quickly receding out of sight, preventing them from getting a good angle to
shoot a piton into it. Eventually, Bruce came up with a plan, where by
manipulating the length of his two anchored pitons, he would swing out past the
rear plane of the ship, from where he could plant a piton into its flank. Stein
watched, feeling a mixture of awe and annoyance as the big doofus got it on his
first try. It took her three increasingly desperate attempts before she was
able to duplicate the feat, but she eventually managed to get a hold in the
rear surface of the ship, and slowly reeled herself up. For the first time in
hours, her legs were in contact with the wall. Astoundingly, they felt tired. “Stupid
lazy legs,” she said, reaching down and thumping them with her fist, trying to
get the blood flowing.