As it turned out, an actual lack of gravity was nothing like the freefall zero-g exercises Cai had been subjected to during his training at the academy. Perhaps it had something to do with how permanent the experience was: Simply knowing that the Striker Nebula would be on the float for at least a few more hours made his brain treat the feeling differently than it did when he only got a brief, twelve minute taste of it.
That wasn’t to say that Cai disliked being without weight. The novelty of effortlessly launching himself through the ship’s corridors hadn’t worn off yet, and his training had prepared him enough to shrug off the disorienting dizziness and upset stomach which came with being weightless.
The final few seals of his null suit clicked shut and the mechanical arms of the armoring station retreated back into their niches. Cai pushed himself out of the alcove set into the outer wall of his bunk, now fully geared up.
His armored gauntlets closed around metal bars set into what could either be perceived as the ceiling or floor of his chamber, depending on which end of the ship was providing thrust.
Currently, neither of them was, so Cai supposed that all he really had was six different walls, two of which followed the rounded curve of the ship’s hull. To call his bunk a chamber at all was a gross overstatement: The entire space was only about as large as two public bathroom stalls stitched together, providing him with the bare necessities of private space and sleeping accommodation.
Even then, his bunk was considered to be on the spacious side. Ships of the Vigilance class could also ferry along a total of sixteen passengers if need be. The bunks meant for them were located on the opposite side of the ship, sixteen potential passengers sharing the same amount of ship volume as six officers did. Cai did not mind the tight confines; they weren’t too different from Svartheim, where he’d grown up. Some of the other cadets, especially those with a more luxurious upbringing, had more trouble adjusting to the claustrophobic interior of warstructs. Cai considered himself lucky on that front.
He hoisted himself to the airtight hatch set into the inner wall and caught his momentum reasonably well, only leaving him with a slight drift once he let go. That was one of the skills he was still working to improve on, though he doubted he’d ever get as good as Loten or Maxin, who had practically been raised in zero-g.
Using both legs and one arm, Cai anchored himself against the surfaces he could call up and down with his current orientation, then opened the hatches’ mechanical lock and pulled it inwards.
Beyond his bunk laid the ship’s spine: A hollow passageway leading from one end of the ship to the other. The five hatches leading to his crewmates’ bunks were set into the walls at an equal distance to one another. Only Veriss, the ship’s commander, didn’t sleep here. Her chamber was located closer to the ship’s core.
She and Loten were currently in their sleep cycles, and Harlan had the watch. Cai launched himself to the middle of the spine, then grabbed onto the ladder and flipped himself ninety degrees, like going from a front crawl to standing in the water, if he had been in a pool.
Cai kicked himself up towards the ship’s center, using the bars of the ladder only as guidance as he let his gauntlets slide alongside them, the hatches in his way opening automatically as they sensed his approach. Ships in the Runoran navy were often built as skyscrapers, their decks lined up horizontally so that when the engines provided thrust, the linear acceleration of the ship gave the illusion of gravity. As such, even relatively small ships like the Striker Nebula counted fifteen decks. Cai passed several of them on his way up, viewing different sections of the ship as if he was moving through a cross-section.
Finally, Cai reached the crew’s common area. He didn’t have a real reason -or rather, no desire- to go there, but Captain Aduï’s words lingered at the top of his mind. He decided that he should at least try the approach the old crone had suggested.
He pushed the spinal hatch open and pulled himself gracefully into the common area. The smell of a creamy hot pot, based on something loosely reminiscent of tomato, hung in the air. Cai had discovered that his stomach couldn’t really tell whether it was full or not without gravity, so he had started to rely on other ways to tell if he was hungry. The watering of his mouth told him that he should probably have something to eat as well before he went outside.
Jörda, Pian and Maxin hovered around a magnetically suspended table together, playing what looked like a game of cards. They wore their off-white flight skins, but had foregone the armored panels of the null suit which were designed to cover it. Jörda and Pian each had a valve bowl of what Cai assumed to be the food he smelled hovering next to them. Judging by their cycles, it would likely be their dinner. Cai himself had not had lunch yet. Nor did Maxin, he assumed.
“Oh, here comes he!” Maxin said triumphantly, turning towards the entrance. “How’s Cai been, ka?” He asked, waving his stack of thick, magnetic cards at him. Hardly a winning hand, from what Cai could tell.
“Fancy seeing you here.” Said Pian indifferently as he placed down two cards and took one out of Jörda’s hand. “Are you playing?”
“Puh, as if he even knows the rules.” Jörda said with a hunt of venom, then took her own turn. She discarded two of her cards before pulling three more from the deck in the center. She cursed under her breath as she saw them, then waved to pass the turn to Maxin.
“I don’t, to be honest.” Cai admitted. “Though I’m willing to learn, if you’ll have me.”
“Well, with how this game’s going we should be done in ten, you can join after.” Pian said. “If Maxin’s gonna learn to take his turn within a reasonable timespan, that is.” He impatiently rapped his knuckles on the table to spur the exo on, though the motion sent him spiraling backwards ever so slightly, and Pian had to awkwardly grab onto the surface above him to steady and reorient himself. Much like Cai, Pian was planetborn and not yet fully accustomed to the zero-g environment of the void. At least that gave them something to have in common, even if the rest of their lives had been radically different.
“Well, I don’t have the time right now unfortunately.” Cai said, then sheepishly put his fist to the chestplate of his null suit to make it clear he was wearing it, as if anyone could have missed that. “I’m going out, gun four needs a checkup. I’d rather have it done before we do our braking burn.”
Jörda threw her arms up in frustration, then flung her hand down to the table to resign the game.
“Every day the same shit!” She seethed as the thin metal playing cards clattered against the table. One of them failed to latch onto the magnetic surface and bounced off to Cai, who caught it between two fingers.
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For a moment, he wasn’t sure if she was talking about the game or about him. Luckily, she was kind enough to clear that up right after.
“There’s more to life than work, y’know.” She said. “If you even care about the work in the first place. What has a mole to do digging through machines he’s hardly had the time to learn about? You’re just pretending to be such a good boy to make us look bad in comparison, while in actuality you’re not doing anything special.”
A snarky reply had formed on Cai’s lips before he could even properly think about it. The briefest moment of hesitation tried to bite the words back, hold the peace, but it was like a wet paper towel trying to stop a cannon shot.
“Guess that’s what happens when someone’s chosen based on talent and dedication rather than nepotism.” He said, then turned and pulled himself back through the hatch he had come from before Jörda could respond. “You guys go ahead and play without me.” He said, closing the hatch with a slam.
Cai angrily kicked off and went back down the way he came, though he was oriented to make it seem like he was going up again.
His stomach growled at him, and he momentarily regretted not getting a bowl of the hot pot, but then decided the hunger wasn’t worth showing his face a second time.
He headed for the nearest airlock and collected a helmet off of the rack set into the wall, placing it over his head in a swift and practiced movement. His temper had risen far enough for him to nearly ignore the safety checks, but he still went through them.
Having confirmed that his suit was free of mechanical faults and leaks, and that his oxygen supply was topped off, Cai stepped into the airlock and closed the inner door behind him.
“This is Dodger to bridge. Dodger to bridge. Please respond.” He impatiently said into his helmet mic.
“Bridge here. This is Bulwark speaking. What do you want?” Answered Harlan with a crackle of static. Cai could’ve sworn to detect hints of a snarl in the question, but he chose to ignore it. His anger was fading already, and his mind had cleared enough for him to recognize that he would see hostility where there was none. Harlan was many things, a professional being among them. Cai doubted he’d try to start something while he was on watch.
“Could you authorize airlock 12B for me? I’ve got some outership maintenance.”
“The magna-gun, right?” Harlan asked, more for the sake of completion than actual verification. A moment of consideration followed
“You’re authorized.” He said eventually. “Cycle at will. Stay safe out there, Dodger.”
“Thanks.” Was what a part of Cai wanted to say, yet he chose not to. He pressed his hand to the wall panel and drained the airlock of atmosphere, then opened the outer doors and hauled himself through, leaving the artificial environment of the ship behind as he entered the void proper.
Voidwalks were yet another thing Cai had no prior experience in outside of simulated exercises, but he moved with purpose nonetheless, launching himself off the outer edge of the airlock to move up the ship, his suit’s supply of supercompressed gas now the only thing keeping him from drifting off into the endless dark of the void.
The null-suit’s thrusters fired intermittently, keeping him close to the Nebula’s skin. The drifting was graceful, serene, with only the soft humming of the machinery within his suit and the calm sound of Cai’s trained breathing to accompany him. He looked up to the direction he was traveling in, past the two enormous radiator sails which boxed him in.
The radiators, of which the ship possessed twelve, were only deployed when the Striker Nebula was on the float. Cai thought they strongly resembled sets of enormous, leathery fins, making the ship look like a leviathan of the deep seas on Selem, one of Sindrion Tertus’ moons.
The fins stretched on nearly as far as Cai’s destination at the ship’s current prow, only tapering down to anchor themselves to the hull about three meters before the ship’s superstructure reached a sudden end.
Cai was still fired up. He was angry. He wanted to race across the surface of the ship as fast as his limited propellant supply would allow. If he did that, even the smallest mistake or technical defect could put his life –or worse; his dignity– at stake.
With the worst case scenario of Harlan having to perform a slight course change to come rescue him in mind, Cai took his trip up painstakingly slowly, only ascending by about half a meter per second.
His thrusters pivoted and kicked out clouds of rapidly expanding reaction mass, sending Cai into a spin. When his back was turned to the ship, they fired again in opposite directions to halt him, allowing Cai to gaze out into the stars. His mother star was not visible from here. He had tactically positioned himself, staying in the shadow cast by the Nebula to avoid her scorching radiation as much as possible.
The sight was breathtaking. So many stars, so many worlds. The scale of the void truly boggled the mind. Cai needed no technological aid to recognize that the constellations he now witnessed laid beyond the Veil, beyond the sphere of Runoran influence.
These worlds were their promised lands, and normally the sight of them would calm Cai without fail. Today, they did little to alleviate the broiling turmoil that plagued him. He wondered why that was. Surely he was better than to get this worked up over a little friction with his teammates? He’d spent two years with them, he should have been used to their words by now.
He sighed. His team was not the reason why he was so agitated. He knew what the real reason was. The call he’d gotten from his mother before departure still stabbed through his soul and filled him with anxiety. The message she had given him raised a terrible question. He decided to face it now.
What had happened to Noah? Would his little brother be found by now? There were a million possible reasons why he’d take longer to come home, not all of which spelt immediate disaster for a lone twelve-year old in Svartheim’s underbelly.
He could have been accidentally diverted to another shift, he could be eating dinner at a friend’s without telling their parents, or he could have lost track of time while visiting Nicki. None of those scenarios were particularly likely, but they weren’t impossible, either.
At the same time, Cai also knew it was neither likely nor impossible that something bad had happened to his younger brother. He could have been wounded during his shift, or become separated from his group during a cave-in. He could have been caught up in a riot, or a gang war, fallen victim to the slavers that stalked the dark.
For all Cai knew, Noah could be crying for help at this very moment. He could be buried under tonnes of rock, sedated on an unregistered transport out of the system, or dead in a gutter. His remaining sibling might be in serious trouble, and Cai had no way of knowing what had happened to him for three weeks at least. As far as he was concerned, he had every right to be on edge.
Cai took a deep, shuddering breath, trying to put Noah’s predicament out of his head. He again looked to the stars, hoping that the sight of them might console him.
Only the stars were looking back.
Cai blinked in confusion, trying to wipe the illusion from his sight. The stars were still looking, casting their penetrating gaze down at him. Cai curiously realized that the black canvas of the void wasn’t filled by stars anymore: A million eyeballs had taken their place. Some twitched. Some lolled aimlessly. Most stared directly at him. Cai screamed, shielding his eyes in horror. It didn’t help: He could still see them, even with his own eyes closed.
The eyes grew. They no longer dotted his sight; they started to fill it. They squeezed against one another and smothered him. Everywhere he looked, the eyes looked back. Every thought he had, the eyes could see. They filled his memories,Cai knew they had always been there. He had only just noticed them. Helplessly, he thrashed.
“This one will do.” A formless voice said.