PAUL was asleep, his head cradled on some filthy material I’d folded into a pillow on my lap. It was sleep, I reassured myself, thoughts heavy and slow, running my gloved fingers lightly across his hair. I wasn’t entirely sure I could wake him up; on the other hand, remaining conscious held little that was attractive.
It was growing harder to hold form. I’d opened the fasteners on the arms, thighs, and front of my Human-fitted space suit to allow some of my heat to escape. My Feneden-self, while a nuisance in many ways, was considerably more tolerant of a raging fever than most.
Under those conditions, I wasn’t surprised to have a hallucination or two. Still, the figure waving at me through the frosted air lock did appear more substantial than I’d been told such things would be.
Paul would know best, I told myself, nudging the sleeping Human. When he didn’t stir, and the figure began pounding on the door with a rock, I reached for the control on Paul’s suit that would pump out another short burst from the little remaining in his reserve tank.
The air—or the banging—did more than my physical approach. “What? Es?” Paul coughed, then drew three deep breaths from the fresher air rising from the neck of his suit. Awareness flooded back into his eyes and he climbed to his feet, pulling me with him.
This seemed to relieve the hallucination, who stopped pounding and began pointing at something behind me. I looked around, but saw nothing but the other door. Then, I understood and, grabbing Paul’s arm, tried to tug him toward the inner air lock control. “They can’t come in, Paul, until we get out of here,” I explained, surprised when my Human resisted my urging, standing like a statue.
“Who are they?” he said, hoarsely, breaking free of my grip and taking my arm instead. Who was holding up whom? I thought, as we both staggered. “I’m not leaving until we know, Es. If they break in—”
“If they break in, you’ll die in the vacuum!” I said in horror. The hallucination had started pounding again.
“If they are willing to break in, they don’t plan to let me live, do they?” Paul looked down at me, eyes sunken and blue-tinged, cheeks almost hollowed, lips already losing the pink tinge provided by the burst of suit air, and smiled faintly. “Sweet Esen. You know what to do then.”
“I won’t leave you.”
He ignored my protest. “I want you to go to any of the faces—there’s contact information in our system. Please, Es. The pass phrase is: ‘Ersh wouldn’t approve.’ It’s also the code to identify yourself to them. Remember that.”
Remember it? In spite of everything, my friend could make me laugh. I must have said that a thousand times, only to him, only in private. As for going to one of my so-called Web? That, I decided, was something I couldn’t promise. Not yet and certainly not in the grip of emotion.
“How do we find out who this is, beyond dying in front of them?” I asked practically. The helmets had our com equipment; the dome appeared to have very little working gear except the venting system and some lighting. Of course, it had only been a warehouse for a planet-destroying work of art, not a shelter.
The question was answered, not by Paul, but by the hallucination outside. The suited figure’s pounding changed to something varied in tempo and force.
It wasn’t click speech, I decided, puzzling a moment. Then I recognized a pattern. “Paul, isn’t that—?”
He didn’t waste time discussing the message, for that’s what it had been, nor bother telling me what it meant. “Hurry, Es!” was all Paul spared breath to say as he urged us both to the inner door. Well, I thought, this was a positive sign.
Paul rested his hand on the control, then put one arm around my slender, Feneden shoulders. “You know—”
“It’s likely almost vacuum in the dome?” I finished, and nodded grimly. If the being who’d tapped in a Commonwealth code was a friend—or a rescuer intending to succeed in that profession—I hoped they knew as well.
There was no point in taking a deep breath; the atmosphere in the air lock was almost poisonous now. We pulled sheets of packaging over our heads against the cold and to keep in what breath we took with us, and plunged through as Paul keyed the door open. He whirled to shut it behind us.
We lay flat, hoping what air remained was cold enough to be dense and settle to the floor I waited as long as I could bear before trying to breathe. When I couldn’t help but gasp, the air seemed to be leaving my lungs rather than entering it. My heart hammered in my ears, ready to burst with effort. I could feel Paul shuddering against me. Shunting my fear and grief to where I would feel them later—and forever—I prepared to cycle, readying myself to wait for the cessation of his life so I could accept Paul’s final gift—and leave this place of death.
Before I could relax my hold on this form and free myself, a large, warm mask covered my face. I hadn’t thought air could seem as thick, rich, and absolutely intoxicating as hot spurl, but this was. I heaved in as much as I could hold, feeling new life circulating throughout this form.
Paul? I clung to the mask, pressing my hand over what felt like someone else’s, and sat up.
My friend was sitting beside me, his face obscured behind another mask, his hand groping in my direction. I caught it with my free one, and only then looked up to see what trouble we’d traded death to meet.
There were four figures, in Commonwealth issue ’rigs, Human from the way those suits molded to their forms. I could see the face of the nearest one through his helmet as he held the mask on Paul. He was looking at me, smiling broadly, and, when he saw I was aware of him, winked.
I hadn’t seen Paul’s friend and former crewmate from the Rigus II in fifty years. What was Tomas doing on the Iftsen’s asteroid?
And why was he winking at me?