Six Days (21 page)

Once I’m safely on the sleeper side, I rip off the suit and pull Maleeva clear. She looks terrible, but she’s still alive – I can see the ribs of her frame gently working each breath. I fumble with her dead battery. Out with the old, in with the new. It snaps home perfect.

“Maleeva! Can you hear me?”

Nothing. Her wasted body nudges against the tethers of the frame. Her eyes are open, but there ain’t no one home …

“Maleeva?”

I reach out to touch her face.

And then the stalks on her head-frame blink for her. Her fingers flex …

“Jeepers creepers, you had me squitting it there. You OK? Can you hear me? Maleeva?”

She seems to gaze at me for a moment, except maybe it’s just the way her head’s angled, cos it’s hard to tell if there’s any life in them eyes.

Her voice box crackles into life. “You saved me, Cass …” The words are so flat, she almost sounds disappointed.

“Yeah, good job that Okhotnik was floating about, eh? Reckon you shouldn’t go nowhere without a spare.”

“What?”

“Your battery pack – it was running low. I swapped in a new one from the warrior – he ain’t gonna need it any time soon …”

“He was dead?”

“As a dodo. Just spinning about near the hull breach without a suit on … which was pretty handy when you think about it …” My words trail off as it dawns on me how that’s just too good to be true. Like it was planned.

“Oh, Cass …”

And I’m looking right into her eyes when the ship strikes. A tentacle shoots past my shoulder and slams into Maleeva’s forehead. It pulses as it latches on to her, spreading its skin over hers.

“No! Maleeva!”

I try to pull her clear of the tentacle, but it’s stuck firm. Then her chest heaves and I can hear air rushing into her lungs.

“I can feel it, Cass. The ship – its spirit. It’s coming for me …”

“Hold it back! Fight it!”

But I remember the way the ship rummaged through my thoughts, the way it peered out my eyes, like it was looking out the windows of a house. I know its spirit can
move
. From one shell to another … I tear at the tentacle, but it grows between my fingers, sending out blue veins that race across her cheeks, into and under her skin. It spreads so fast, snaking round and round her head, under her ears, over her lips, into her nostrils. And all the while the tentacle pulses and pumps and glows with a dim blue light.

“Maleeva! Hold on! I’m gonna get you free!” But even as I say it, I feel the ghost of the ship rippling past my fingertips, ancient and
hungry
.

She looks at me then, and for the first time, I see life in her face.
Proper
real life. Cos her eyes
move
in their sockets to find mine.

“Remember me, Cass,” goes the voice box. “When I’m gone.”

A great spasm shoots through the frame, and all the little motors in her joints whir at once. Then everything goes loose in my arms. Like she’s dead.

“Maleeva!”

I stroke her cheek. It’s all scaly and cold where the tentacle skin has spread across her face. Two tears of blood leak out of her eyes. The red runs round her eyelids and off the ends of her lashes.

And then her lips move. The words of her true voice call out, lost after all this time. Except it sure ain’t Maleeva doing the speaking.

“I am reborn – the
Aeolus
, ninth pioneer ship of the Homefleet. Maleeva is mine until the forty-nine are complete.”

I’m too stunned to move. I watch as the tentacle stretches, then snaps, leaving two little horns glued to Maleeva’s head, twisting and writhing.

“Where’s Maleeva?” I gasp. “What have you done with her?”

“She is … with me still.” The eyes gaze at the steel-clad fingers as if for the first time, as they reach up to stroke Maleeva’s forehead. “In here. Inside this vessel of bone.”

“You’ve stolen her body?”

“Borrowed, not stolen.”

It flexes Maleeva’s fingers like it’s testing their strength.

“Forgive me,” it goes.

“What?”

“You leave me no choice. It is just a small hurt. But I must …”

Then it brings the armor-plated fists together and swipes upward. The attack is slow, like it’s deliberately taken the pace off. But even though I see it coming, there ain’t no way to dodge it. Cos I’m just floating there – a sitting duck. The punch lands. Straight into my chops …

Crunch!

Spinning … over and over … the lights streak past … no sound … no pain …

No, wait. Here comes the pain. In jagged waves.

Then nothing.

Black ‘n’ gray ‘n’ buzzy.

Like a hornet swarm gathering in the summer. Man, how long ago was summer? When things was just normal …

As my eyesight comes back, it’s like I’m looking through a wodge of frogspawn. But slowly it clears.

My tongue’s all warm and it feels
wrong
. Bits of broken glass in my gob. I cough. And out comes a tooth – in pieces – together with a whole wad of blood ‘n’ spit. The hole at the back of my jaw feels hot and slushy.

And then I remember Maleeva. Except it ain’t Maleeva no more, is it? It’s the
Aeolus
. And it’s gone. But gone where?

I just float in a haze, staring as the chamber walls pass me by, all speckled and veiny. I’m trying to think, but I’m as slow as a slug race. And the blood on my cheeks is all dry and flaky … Dry? That means …

God, how long have I been out cold? I look at the countdown cuff – the marks are all gone now. So less than an hour left. It’s just minutes now, but how many?

Slowly, bit by bit, my poor battered bonce puts it together. And the pieces of my shattered plan fall down around me. Cos if the ship’s got a body now, then there’s only one place it’s gone. The bridge. I twist round in search of Halina’s suit. It’s nowhere to be seen.

That’s it. I’ve lost.

If it’s gone to the bridge, then it can use Maleeva’s hands to reset the shuttle. Which means the shuttle’s going back for Erin – and the last flinder.

For a moment, I gaze at the living walls around me – only empty flesh now that the ship’s soul has escaped into Maleeva. It just waited for us to come.

At last my elbow nudges against something solid. And as I turn, I see Wilbur’s face – peaceful and waxy white – buried deep inside Halina’s old pod.

A
shiver runs through me. I steel myself. There’s still two spare suits – I stashed them in the slots when I was last here with Wilbur. That means I can get to the bridge. I picture the
Aeolus
inside Maleeva’s body, resetting the shuttle, climbing through the hatch, hightailing it to Earth … But maybe there’s still time. Maybe I can reach the bridge first …

I thrust against the wall, and its surface feels hot … A stink of cooked flesh hangs in the air. We must be close to burning up in the Earth’s atmosphere. I push toward the airlock and seal myself into one of the suits. I’m about to hinge down the helmet, when there’s a sharp noise overhead. Something has docked sleeper-side. Then a hole punches through the dock wall, and three figures appear.

First Erin, then Peyto, and, lastly, Maleeva’s hijacked body.

I know it ain’t Maleeva, cos it still has them two horns stuck to her head, curling round and round, like they’re
sniffing the air for something. The sharp joints of the frame poke the suit into odd bulges at the knees and elbows, like swellings.

Erin and Peyto stare at me silently. They seem horribly shaken by something.

“Do what it says,” urges Peyto. “Please, Cass. There’s no time. The ship will burn up any minute now!”

I think of all the Vlad troops pouring across the field toward the stones of Arbor Low, surrounding Erin and Peyto.

“How come you got away from the Vlads?” I whisper.

“Serov was there,” breathes Erin. She glances at the
Aeolus
, at the body it’s stolen.

“I threatened to end Maleeva’s life,” says the
Aeolus
. “Serov had no choice.”

I feel the
bite
in them words. It’s testing me, sowing doubt. And it knows now what I’m relying on, the secret I’ve figured out, it
has
to.

Smoke rises out the ridges in the ship’s walls.

“Don’t fight it anymore,” pleads Peyto. “You can’t win.”

The
Aeolus
speaks again. “Erin, take your place as a sleeper.”

“Erin,” I whisper. “Don’t do it – you don’t have to. Listen, it can’t force you.”

She looks at me and shakes her head. “I’m sorry, Cass. I must. It’s the only way.”

She kicks toward the last two empty pods. And I ain’t got
the heart to try and stop her. Cos right now, for her, even if she’s too late to save her family, sleep is the bliss of not even knowing. Sleep is a desperate hope. She’ll either go to ash without feeling it, or she’ll wake up in some future heaven on Earth with her family beside her. I stare at the grid of sleeper pods and wonder then, for the first time, which of them hold her loved ones. She looks at me just once before climbing inside her pod. She’s utterly wrecked – covered in mud, and trembling. But she fixes me with a curious stare, all her anger and fear gone.

“Good-bye, Cass,” she says simply.

I nod at her. And when her pod is sealed shut, I feel my body sag like the fight’s gone out of it. Cos there’s only one pod left. And that means it’s either me or Peyto.

Just right then, there’s a massive shudder in the walls. It ripples down one whole side of the ship, and a column of fire bursts into the chamber. The
Aeolus
pulls Maleeva’s helmet down over her head, and Peyto charges clear of the docking hatch toward where the last suit is stashed …

The hole seems tiny at first. But then anything not tied down funnels toward it in a great rush. And a thin scream of air cuts through the chamber. I slam my helmet shut and snatch out for a handhold, cos I can feel my legs being dragged back toward the hole. But I’m floating free and there ain’t nothing nearby to cling to. Only as I start to slide back do I think of the cable gun on the suit’s forearm.
No aim. I just fire, and jerk to a stop with the storm all around me.

Just beyond my flailing legs, I see Peyto struggling his way into a suit, but then I lose sight of him. The last puff of air squeals out the hole, and everything drops slack. In an instant the chamber is silent, apart from my heaving breaths. I unclip the cable and throw myself into a spin to see if I can spot Peyto. The hole in the ship wall yawns huge and white-hot. The edges buckle apart without a murmur. Arcs of light break past me, eating up the inside surface now – cracks tearing through the hull. As I stare at the hole, trying to take in the fact that there ain’t no air left, something nudges against me. And Peyto is there, safely inside his suit, just a faceplate away.
Thank God …

He takes me by the shoulders.

His voice crackles through the helmet speakers. “Cass! Can you hear me? You can still save the ship!”

“What?” I look at him in a daze.

And then I cotton on to what he’s saying. The cold truth sinks in, and the dread of it makes me lose all hope. Peyto couldn’t be the last sleeper now even if he wanted to be. Cos the final flinder is with me, inside my suit, and there ain’t no air left. Either I go into the last pod alone. Or I stay here with him till the ship catches fire.

“Cass, you know there’s no other way. You have to be a sleeper. If you climb into that pod, you can repair the ship.
You can save yourself, you can save Wilbur. There’s still time!”

“What, go to sleep forever and leave you behind? I can’t. No way.”

Then the ship speaks in its stolen voice – the voice of Maleeva. And, even now, with human lips and human breath, there ain’t a speck of emotion in its words.

“Cass Westerby, this is your final chance. Take your place as the last sleeper.”

I gaze at Peyto and I start to cry. I can’t help it, though it makes me mad, and I can’t even wipe away the tears as they sprinkle free. It’s too much, to leave him, after everything I’ve been through.

But then it’s like the tatters of my plan come together. Cos there ain’t no forest of tentacles springing out to drag me into that last pod, is there? The
Aeolus
was only telling half the truth when it said a sleeper can’t be forced. The whole truth is that
it can’t do the forcing
. Even when it took Wilbur from me, it didn’t harm him, it didn’t make him become a sleeper. It couldn’t. And it’s desperate to complete the forty-nine now. But it can’t without me …

“You will not let every soul on this vessel perish,” goes the
Aeolus
. “
You will not.
”

And that’s when I know for certain what’s going to happen. I’ve wondered over and over, when push comes to shove, if I’ll have the guts to do it. To let myself die, and Peyto, and the forty-eight people who now sleep on
this ship. My own brother. Erin and her family. Maleeva, too – though God only knows whether she can see or hear any of this now. I’ve always figured the ship would back down rather than lose its precious flinders. And now I’m sure. Cos it’s got no choice.

For a moment I waver. What if all the sleepers together can hold back wars on Earth? I’ve always figured that was a lie to keep them up here with their flinders. But what if I’m wrong? Maybe the Earth will end unless forty-nine sleepers are allowed to sleep and sleep. Except I can’t possibly know, can I …?

Never trust it.

The truth is, I just want my brother back.

And the only way I’ll ever get him back is to risk it all.

So I do.

“No,” I whisper. “I ain’t giving in. Let the sleepers go. You have to, or they’ll die.”

“They must not wake. Without them watching over the Earth, wars will rage.”

“They’ll have to find a different way, a new way to protect the world. I
know
you can let them go. If you can snatch Maleeva’s body from her, if you can sprout tentacles whenever you want, then you can set them people free. Do it.”

The ship’s walls blur and shudder.

At first Peyto just gapes at me, not believing what I’ve said. But then he reaches out and holds me, squeezing
me tight. Cos he knows I ain’t gonna budge, not now. And the fire’s gonna take us any moment.

The
Aeolus
don’t say a word. But then, just when I figure it’s too late, as soft as dandelion heads lifting into the breeze, the first pods lift away from the walls.