The pain was a fishhook. It caught her drifting mind and reeled it in to land and consciousness. She hazily remembered Amber injecting her with something after she'd collapsed over Will's box. The agony had melted away, and she'd fallen into soft feathers. But now she was awake, and the burning around her wrist was back.
She rolled onto her side. There was a bedside table with a glass of water on it and two white pills. Another single bed stood against the cabin's far wall. Above her, stars shone in the darkness of a porthole window.
She reached for the pills and caught sight of the metal band that had caused her to pass out. What was it? Some kind of locator? Was it sending out her whereabouts to the nearest police receptors?
She tried to dig under it, but it pulled at her skin. She would need surgery to remove it. She picked up the pills, threw them into her mouth and downed them with the water. The pills were preferable to passing out again.
Pushing hair from her eyes, Day sat up. Her heart squeezed when she saw Will. He sat cross-legged on the carpet, facing the door. She gazed at his back for a minute. There was an anxious fluttering in her chest. She wasn't just attracted to Will. It was more than that. The connection went deeper. Something she couldn't grasp and certainly couldn't put into words. But what would he think of her now he knew Monday had been an act to gain his confidence and betray him to the Veda?
She tidied back her hair and swung her legs around to the floor. She was about to clear her throat, say his name, when he spoke.
"You're awake." He turned. Their eyes met, and his face broke into a smile. It felt like sunshine after a long, frosty winter.
"I'm awake."
He sprung to his feet and moved to perch on the opposite bed. He bounced up and down to test the mattress. He was so easygoing. His positivity leeched across the space and soaked into her. And she needed it.
She cleared her throat. "I'm not Monday."
"I heard."
"Monday was a false identity to gain your trust."
He shrugged.
"The Veda wanted to capture you, Will. I'm sorry."
"You're forgetting one thing. None of this is really happening. Would you feel bad about something you did in a dream?"
"This isn't a dream, Will."
"You won't know until you wake up."
Day picked up her glass. The water's surface trembled. It was far more sensitive to the speed they were travelling at than her body. She took a sip, thinking her agitated mind was like the trembling liquid. She was afraid at some point it would all be too much and she'd break apart. As much as she liked Will, part of her thought he was crazy. And she was going crazy with him.
"Why were the Veda prepared to go to such lengths to capture you?" she asked.
"I threaten what they value most."
"What's that?"
"Preserving this world."
Day's head spun. In her mind it was twirling on her neck like a cartoon character that had just been whacked. Preserving this world. Will didn't want to preserve it? She thought of the shopping center bombing right after she'd been to Janus. She'd seen a black van. Just like Will's.
"Shouldn't the world be preserved?"
"Not if you value truth."
"The day I got a personality implant—the day before you picked me up running from the police—did you bomb the Boulder shopping mall?"
Will folded his legs beneath him on the bed. "When you understand that this world is a projection of your mind, and that your body does not live here, you will be free of fear. But not free to harm—free from harm. They're not the same thing."
Frustration frothed inside her. She wanted a straight answer, not a mystic declaration.
"Did you do it?"
"No."
"And the woman who gave me the implant? Alexia? Do you know what happened to her?"
Will gazed at her. No signs of guilt or defiance in his eyes. Only simplicity. He neither knew anything, nor did he think it was important.
She scooted back on her bed and pulled her legs up to her chest. Why had the Veda left her alone with Will, anyway? Were they spying on them? Maybe now they knew she cared, they were using her to lead him into another trap.
"They're probably watching us," she said, leaning her head back against the wall and closing her eyes.
Will didn't answer.
"I don't even know whose side I'm on," she said. "I have no idea who I am."
Will moved from his bed and came to sit on hers. Her eyes flicked open, the closeness of him setting her body on high alert.
"Someone who knows who they are, is stuck being that person. Much better not to know. Then you can be anyone you want."
Her body leaned, as though magnetically drawn to him. "When we get to Mars," she said, "They'll take away my implant and give me back my memories."
He tilted around so their faces were inches apart and whispered into her ear. "Then you're running out of time."
A tingle ran up her spine. A bubble of energy burst in her brain, obliterating her awareness of everything but the two of them. She put her hand around the back of his head and smoothed the bottom of his ruffled hair. He watched her like there was no one else alive.
A hard banging on the door made her jump. Will pulled back. The banging was insistent.
"I'll go," Will said, getting up.
Amber stood in the corridor, one arm over her head, leaning against the doorframe.
"Good morning Mr. Van de Berg." She peered around him to see inside the cabin. "Sleeping beauty has woken then," she drawled. "Did the prince finally kiss her?"
If Day had hackles, there'd be standing upright on her back. "What do you want?" she said.
"We're about to enter Mars' atmosphere and the PD Squad have caught up with us. You two need to come and strap in."
Mars' atmosphere? But Mars was two days away. Day swiveled to the window. There was nothing out there. Stars, space. Wait... On the far right she glimpsed a red crescent that filled the whole window.
"You were asleep for two days," Will said.
Not asleep, she thought. Drugged.
"Come on lovebirds." Amber gave them a smug smile, then retreated.
Day looked at Will. She felt lost. Her gut told her to stick with him. But logic turned her against him. He didn't care about surviving.
"Will—" He read the anxiety in her eyes and raised a hand to her face. The soft pads of his fingers roused the skin cells, heightening her awareness. "I don't know how to pretend none of this is happening. Part of me thinks trying to do that is crazy."
"Did you worry about what was happening while you were asleep?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"I wasn't aware of it."
"But you didn't stop existing."
"No."
"Then how real can all this be?"
"No, Will I—" He took her hand in his and she fell silent at once.
"We need to get strapped in," he said. He drew her out into the corridor, and she followed behind him up the stairs.
She'd just reached the top of the spiral staircase when there was an explosion. The ship juddered and threw her to the ground.
"There on us!" Ed shouted, pushing his head out of the cockpit.
"Everyone strap in."
Will helped Day to her feet. As they hurried to their seats, there was another explosion. Bigger than the first. Instinctively, Day covered her head with her arm. At the same moment a torrent of fire blew out from the cockpit. As it retreated, she saw Ed. Fear jumped through her, but Ed strode forwards, untouched by the fire. She realized the black all-in-one he wore was a high-protective element suit which could shelter him from high and low temperatures. Amber, Ferdinando—all the crew, except her and Will, were wearing the same suits.
Ferdinando received a holo-message from the ship's computer. The virtual captain projected from his wrist monitor.
"The PD squad have damaged our guidance system. I cannot contain the fire in the engine room. You have six minutes to evacuate."
A holo screen emerged in the middle of the lounge, counting down six minutes.
5:59
5:58
Six minutes to evacuate the ship? Day gazed at the green numbers, trying to gather her courage. Did the Veda have another smaller vessel?
Flaps in the walls popped open and compartments sprung out. The crew climbed into the narrow containers. Day and Will did likewise. As soon as the back of Day's head touched the base of the container, straps flung out and wrapped around her stomach, her legs, and her chest. So tight she could barely breathe.
Then more of the same material covered her head, leaving a neat line around the frame of her face.
"Five minutes," the computer announced. The ship shuddered with another impact. It set off a siren. "I am about to release the lower deck."
Fabric covered Day's ears, muffling her hearing. But the whirr and clank of the lower deck coming off was so great, it sounded as though the ship was breaking in half. In response, the carrier lurched. Bars dropped over Day's container. Simultaneously, she was flung upright, so she could see out of the porthole. The lower part of the ship spun away.
A machine with a dozen arms worked continuously to wrap up her body in layers and layers of bio-space suit. It pulled boots along her feet and up her legs. One arm pressed the tops of the boots against her shins, sewing two hundred stitches in less than a second.
"Four-minutes," the captain announced. "Please proceed to the compression chamber so we may equip you with helmets and life-packs. Oxygen levels are falling."
On Day's right, the container released Amber. A white bio-suit now covered Amber's black all-in-one temperature suit. The rest of the crew, except for Day and Will, all became mobile. Their protective black temperature suits had bypassed the bio-suit under-layers that Day and Will were given.
Amber vanished from sight. Presumably headed for the compression chamber. Day knew the number of layers and materials necessary for a bio-suit were high, but the seconds dragged out. And then what? Once she finally got to the compression chamber, what would happen? The bio-suits suggested the plan was to drop them out into space.
The holo-captain announced another minute closer to the utter destruction of the ship. At least the police had stopped firing. Perhaps they were having problems keeping up. After all, the Veda ship was dropping through the vacuum like a boat falling off the side of the world.
"Two minutes."
Sweat trickled from Day's forehead into her eyes. She clenched her gloved hands. The material was so tight it pressed against the police tracking bracelet, sending flares of heat through her arm.
Suddenly the bars released. She smacked to the floor. Her knees buckled beneath her.
Thank God!
Will was released at the same time. Together, they ran to the compression chamber. The ship had lost oxygen. Already she could feel it in her lungs. Running made her breathless. She took deeper breaths.
"We have lost the gravitational circuit," the captain announced.
Day had barely heard the words when her feet floated off the floor. She paddled the air with her legs, but couldn't get anywhere.
Will reached for one of the lounge chairs and pulled himself forward. Day drifted to the couch on her side of the aisle, then used her legs to catapult herself toward the compression chamber.
Amber stood in the chamber doorway, signaling them to hurry. Her mouth moved inside her space helmet, but with the siren and the ship wrenching apart, it was impossible to hear what she was saying. Besides, it didn't matter. Day didn't need encouragement to hurry the hell up.
She pulled herself forwards by the stem of a table lamp and drew up her legs as she drifted past the head panel of another seat. She waited, timing the moment to kick out her legs for maximum thrust. Amber reached for her. Their gloves touched. Her sister extended her arm enough for them to grip each other's wrists. She pulled hard. Day landed in the compression chamber just as the ship's captain announced in sixty seconds they would lose all oxygen.
Ed caught Day and pulled her further in. What about Will? She turned back to see how far Will was from the chamber door. Ed yanked her around.
"You've got fifty seconds to get your survival pack and helmet on!" His voice was muffled from inside his space helmet. She stopped struggling and let him push her to a wall. He pressed a button. Two arms extended from the wall and locked her shoulders into place. A helmet came down over her head. The machine sewing it to her suit moved around her in a blur. She tried to see Will from the corner of her eye, but she was sideways up. She could only see Ferdinando near the opposite door on one side, and the trouser leg of Amber's space suit on the other.
When the helmet was on, something hard pressed against her spine—the survival pack. Lights blinked on in the screen of her helmet.
Life support established in 5...4... 3...
While her bio-suit counted, Day strained to hear the ship's countdown.
"Ten, nine, eight..."
Was Will in the compression chamber? Did he have his helmet on? Her bio-suit reached zero. The metal arms pinning her shoulders released. Day pushed herself around, and saw Will held against the opposite wall.
"Five, four, three..."
He wasn't going to make it. The machine hadn't put his survival pack on yet; it was still sewing up his helmet. She grabbed a rail and pulled herself towards him. Ed lurched sideways, blocking her path. She tried to push him aside, but he was stronger, more practiced holding his own in zero gravity.
"You have twenty minutes' life support in your pack," he shouted at her. "Panicking and talking will use the air up faster. Ferdinando—"
The ship jerked, shaking the compression chamber.
The pitch and rhythm of the siren went into overdrive. They were out of time. Day's heart contracted. The external doors of the chamber opened. Dom, Caesar, and the bodyguard were sucked out. Ferdinando jumped. Day clung to the rail.
Amber's face loomed before her.
"The gravity of Mars," she shouted, "will pull you towards it. Kick off the shuttle in that direction." Then Amber let go of Day's shoulders and the rails and drifted out into space, turning slowly until Day could no longer see her.
"Ed?" Ed was facing the other way, into the ship. Day struggled to turn herself around and saw Ed was waiting for Will, who was still being fitted with the life-support. Will's eyes met hers. He looked like he was holding his breath underwater. There was no air in his space helmet, not until the life-support pack switched on.
The ship rocked. Metal panels ripped off the sides and spun out into space. Something thumped her in the neck, shooting electric pain through her nervous system. Her hand let go of the rail.
Within a second she was sucked out into space. She flailed her arms but couldn't catch hold of anything. The noise in her head reached bursting point. She thought she was going to pass out.
Then suddenly there was silence. Only the gentle hiss of her survival-pack. She fell away from the ship, floating in the dark. She craned her head around, hoping to catch sight of the vessel door. Behind her, another figure fell out of the doorway, but she was already too far to see who it was. And then, though she waved her arms and twisted around, the ship was no bigger than a silver button.
The momentum of her pivoting body slowed. Mars filled the frame of her helmet. Enormous, beautiful, its reddish glow more spectacular than she'd ever imagined. And she, a speck of life in the infinite vastness of space.
Hello lovely readers. So glad you could be here :) Thank you for reading this story. Please don't hesitate to let me know what I could improve, or what you like. Hugs, C xox