Vax roared, “Belay that! Pick up the Captain first!”
“Go!” I gasped for breath, racing to the cabin I’d first entered. Wait. I skidded to a stop. If one of the beings was emerging from a tear in the hull, it must be in one of these cabins. I couldn’t get out the way I’d come.
“We’re clear of the hull! Captain, come on out, we’ll try to reach you!”
Vax. “Man the lasers! Seal all compartments!”
! keyed my caller. “Mr. Howard, back to the ship!” I raced to the ladder to Level 3. “I’ll come out below!”
“We’re thirty meters distant, sir! Where are you?”
“Engine room!” I swung my light wildly around the darkened compartment. Stars glinted through a breach in the hull.
I clambered toward it, squeezed myself through. In a moment I stood onthe hull, trying to spot the gig against the black of interstellar space.
There, about fifty meters aft.
“Here!” I waved my light.
“Right, sir.” Seaman Brant maneuvered the gig closer.
“That... thing is halfway out of the hull, behind you.” I spun around; an alien form quivered in a gap in Telstar’shull, over one of the cabins. My skin crawled.
I remembered my jets, touched the nozzle control at my side. I lifted off. Clear of the infested ship, separated from whatever scampered in its corridors, I felt weak with relief.
Still, I floated alone in space, with no protection but a suit. I
hadn’t even thought to go into Telstararmed.
Hiberniashrank perceptibly. I shuddered. Vax was moving the ship clear to Fuse. To abandon us. Helpless, I calculated distances. My panic ebbed. He was only turning the ship to bring her lasers to bear. “Darla, record!” I shouted. “Full visuals!”
“I have been, sir.” Her voice was calm. “Ever since you took the gig.”
I keyed my thrusters, propelled myself toward the gig’s silhouette.
Someone moaned.
A voice; a sailor in the gig.”Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name; thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on Earth as it is in heaven... “
With a squirt of my side jets, I rotated to face Telstar.A plump oval shape drifted from behind the dead ship. It looked, Lord God help me, like a huge goldfish with a stubby tail. It was almost half as large as Telstar.It pulsed. A mist spurted from an opening near the tail. It glided past the hull toward us. Colors flowed on its surface.
Rough-surfaced globs projected from its sides.
I found my voice. “Gig, back to Hibernia!Flank!” I slammed on my thrusters, veered away from the gig, spun toward my ship.
The creature I’d found within Telstarrecoiled against the hull, launched itself at the fish as it floated by. It touched the being’s side and clung there for a moment, growing smaller.
The surface of the huge creature seemed to flow. The being outside of it disappeared, absorbed within.
One of the rough globs on the goldfish lengthened, began to spin in a slow, widening circle. It gained momentum.
Abruptly it detached and flew directly at the gig.
“Look out!” My cry came too late. The projectile splattered on the gig’s hull, oozed along its side. The gig’s alumalloy frame sputtered and melted beneath the glob.
A choked scream, suddenly cut off. The gig’s engine flared and died. The glob ate away at the gig’s hull. Frantic motion, in the cockpit. Metal dripped onto a suit and pierced it. There was a visible rush of air. Blood, a wild kick, then nothing.
I looked back at the goldfish. Another, much larger projectile began to wave.
“Vax!”
“Yessir, I’m coming!”
“Fuse the ship!”
“Jet this way, sir! Hurry!”
“Fuse! Go to Hope Nation! Save the ship!”
“You’re almost aboard, Captain!” Hibernia’sbow drifted around.
An icy calm slowed my slamming heart. “Mr. Holser, Fuse the ship at once! Acknowledge my order!”
“Captain, move! Jet over here!”
The fishlike being released its projectile. The mass whipped toward Hibernia.It struck the gossamer laser shields protruding from the nose ports. They disintegrated in rivulets of metal.
Vax shouted, “Fire!” The tracking beam of Hibernia’slaser centered on the goldfish, just now drifting clear of Tel-star.A spot in its side glowed red. The skin colors swirled.
The goldfish jerked as if in convulsion.
The creature’s skin swirled and opened to form half a dozen tiny holes. Droplets of fluid burst from them. The goldfish slid away toward the protection of Telstar’shull. The laser followed, centered again on the side of the fish. More holes spouted protoplasm. Abruptly, it was behind Telstar.In slow motion I drifted across the void. Hiberniahad to be saved, regardless of my fate. “Fuse! For God’s sake, Vax! Obey orders!” I was frantic.
“Hurry, sir! Use the forward airlock! Alexi, cycle the lock!”
I was too far from the ship. The enemy might come out at any moment. I sobbed with rage and frustration. “Vax, Fuse!”
“Hurry, Captain!”
I was beside myself. “VAX, FUSE THE FUCKINGSHIP!”His soft response came clear in my speaker. “No, sir. Not until I have you aboard.”
Cursing, I accelerated until I was almost upon the ship, then flipped over and decelerated full blast as Sarge had taught us years before, at Academy.
I’d waited too long. I sailed into the airlock feet first, still decelerating. My feet smashed into the inner hatch just as I snapped off my jets. I crashed to the deck.
The outer hatch slid closed. I scrambled to my feet, in a frenzy for the chamber to pressurize. Alexi’s anxious face stared through the transplex. The hatch slid open. I stumbled aboard.
“Captain’s on board!” Alexi slammed shut the hatch.
Vax roared, “Engine room, Fuse!” I felt the engines whine. Alexi lifted the jets from my back while I unsnapped my helmet stays. Rafe Treadwell, white-faced, helped a sailor pull me out of my suit.
My wet pants clung to my legs. “Are we Fused?”
Alexi grabbed the caller. “Mr. Holser, Captain asks if we’re Fused.”
“Yes, sir. Energy readings are normal. Fusion is ignited.”
I trembled with rage. “All officers to the bridge. Everyone! I’ll be along in a minute.” Yanking my other arm free of the T-suit I pushed past Rafe and half ran up the ladder to my cabin.
Inside, I stripped off my pants and shorts with mindless haste and threw on a dry pair of slacks. I stumbled out of the cabin, buttoning my pants as I ran toward the bridge. I slapped the control; the bridge hatch slid open.
Derek, Alexi, Vax, and the Pilot stood by the console.
Behind them were the Chief and Mr. Crossburn. Philip Tyre waited uncertainly by the hatch.
I crossed to my chair. For a moment I stood holding to the back of it. Mr. Chantir came in, pale, breathing hard. Dr.
Uburu followed.
Vax came close. “Are you all right, sir?”
“Get away from me!” I shoved him.
“Lord God.” We all turned to Dr. Uburu. She bowed her head. “Almighty Lord God, we thank you for our deliverance from evil. We ask you to bless us, to bless our voyage, and to bring health and well-being to all aboard.”
“Amen.” I murmured the soothing word with the others, feeling the Doctor’s calm and strength flow into me. “Good heavens.” My voice was quieter. I sank into my chair.
“Darla, did you get that?”
“Every bit of it.” Her tone was grim.
“Play it back.”
“Aye aye, sir.” Thank Lord God she knew not to be flippant.
Her screen flickered. Mesmerized, we watched her recording of Telstar’storn hull while our past conversation flowed from the speaker. “I’ll go up to Level 1 and try to get onto the bridge.”