In The Orbit (Part I)

36. Khan

Karma, Fifi, and Harold's ship went way off course. Azalea is in constant contact with the officers. They autopilot them towards the unidentified satellite. They sit there for twenty minutes, and then Khan can just see the satellite in the distance. Then Azalea tenses.

"What?" Khan asks.

She doesn't answer. She hits about sixteen buttons and then the autopilot gets us zooming at top speed away.

Fifteen seconds later, Azalea hits more buttons and screams, "BRACE YOURSELF!"
Khan grabs the edge of his seat. Their oxygen masks fall down and Khan pulls it on, along with the suit that is stored in the chair. The suits are stored to be immediately put on. Khan is buckling the oxygen mask to the suit when something hits the back of the ship.

Everything jolts and Khan's head snaps against the headrest. Azalea screams and she sounds like a 50-year-old man. The ship stops moving and then stuff starts getting sucked towards the back of the ship.

Azalea is yelling stuff about what is going on to the officers. Her voice is gravelly and rough. Then she gets out of her seat and is immediately sucked towards the back.

"There is a plate-sized hole, and the thing that hit is nowhere to be found. Everything is getting sucked out, and I think the extra air supply might have been destroyed," Azalea explains to the officers.

As she says this, Khan can feel himself starting to pant. The air supply really is running out.

Azalea is short of breath as well, but she says, "Good, get here fast."

The rescue ships arrive just as Khan passes out.

Khan comes to on a hospital bed. He can feel the crinkly paper under him. His legs feel breezy and he remembers that he is wearing a dress. Addison's dress, to be specific.

Azalea is sitting with her head in her hands on the floor next to Khan.

"Hey," he whispers. His voice is breathy and he feels utterly weak.

"We're back at the school. We're in the hospital. I didn't want to leave you."

"Oh," Khan replies. "Hey... was it this bad when your cord got disconnected that first time we went out?"

"Worse. I was almost dead for five minutes. It was thirty seconds this time."

Khan feels bad for suggesting to leave her out there the first time. He can't imagine himself doing that now. He can't imagine the satellite program without any of them, even Karma, who pisses him off. She has beaten him in all of the physical fights.

"What happened anyway?" he asks Azalea.

"So while we were just sitting there, Karma, Fifi, and Harold were inside the unidentified satellite. But Harold got trapped in there, and the other two left him there. His camera footage showed him motionless inside the satellite, and the other two left him, and they went back and got him. And I was trying to figure out what was going on, but then I saw that we were getting shot at, but since I couldn't manually drive, I couldn't avoid us getting shot."

Kela walks in at that moment. "Hey... how are you two?"

"Not great," Khan grunts.

"You just need to sleep it off, but get some food in your belly first. I brought some crackers."

She hands Azalea and Khan each four crackers. They are crunchy and a bunch of crumbs fall onto Khan's dress. She grabs Azalea's hand and pulls her up. She helps Khan up too.

Kela leads them both out into the hall and into the elevator. She helps them both to their rooms.

Khan sinks down onto his bed and peels off his dress and shoes. He tosses them on the floor as usual, and digs around on his nightstand for the remote. He tries to watch his and Harold's show, but it isn't the same without him there. He ends up just rolling onto his belly and falling asleep to a documentary about whales or something.