Apollonia breathed hard, straining to bring more air to her burning lungs.

“Heave!” Vakulinchuk ordered.

Apollonia had thought she was already heaving – she felt ready to heave in another way – but she tried to exert herself even more.

“Go on, you almost have it!”

With a cry, Apollonia and those at her sides succeeded in lifting the plate of metal. It was, theoretically, a piece of hull that had had punched into the ship in a mock-attack simulation. Now, as the ship was ostensibly still under attack, she and the others were attempting to clear it from a hall.

Normally, she knew, they’d have some kind of lifting equipment.

But when they’d come in for their volunteer training today, Vakulinchuk, their trainer, had told them that they would have none of it.

“Power is not always available,” he said. “Robotic arms malfunction. Sometimes we must make do with the muscles of our back and with sweat on our brow.”

She’d felt so stirred by the idea. At first.

But now, she was just exhausted.

It didn’t help that they’d been at this for days. Sure, at first the training hadn’t been this difficult. A lot of trust tests, which admittedly she had sucked at. She’d dropped one man, who at least had laughed it off.

Vakulinchuk had taken her aside and talked to her. She’d expected to be chewed out, but his words were reinforcement instead.

“We are all in this together, Ms. Nor,” he had told her. “We must work together – and that means to trust each other, even with our very lives.”

And everyone had done that, it seemed. Only she’d had more trouble trusting than anyone else.

No one had let her fall.

And the more they went through it, the worse she felt. Because she didn’t always catch them, and she knew she was supposed to.

“All right, we have to flip it just one more time to get it into the cart!” Vakulinchuk exhorted.

She really wondered what kind of situation would have them lacking power arms and exo-suits but still have gravity – but she wasn’t going to question the man who’d been in Response probably longer than she’d been alive. He had that ageless look about him.

She had fallen on her rear, and struggled to her feet.

God this sheet was heavy. Bracing herself behind it with the others, they lifted and flipped it onto the wheeled cart.

The others cheered at their success, but she was too tired to do that.

“Fifteen minutes,” Vakulinchuk said. “Then we’re going to practice operating in vacuum.”

Oh, that just sounded awful.

The others in her group didn’t seem nearly as exhausted as she felt.

She’d never had a full-time job before. She’d done odd jobs, stolen, or begged all her life. The former had never lasted long, the second was always risky, and the latter was, well . . .

People who didn’t have a lot still often gave. But not when things got too tough. And it was demeaning.

It was the only good thing she could say about prison; that they gave you food.

On the Craton it was different, of course, and no one had ever even bothered her about paying for stuff. On some level she knew it wasn’t exactly free, but she also kind of thought she was just in a new, slightly more dignified level of begging.

As the others spread out, talking and looking generally so pleased, she found herself loathing her own self-pity.

Vakulinchuk was off to the side, gazing off, clearly busy at work in his own personal system.

She moved towards him, into his line of sight, but waiting.

He didn’t keep her looking wrong. The man had a large mustache and a broad face, but his eyes were kindly.

“What do you need?” he asked.

“Ah, sorry to bother you . . .”

“It’s not a bother,” he said.

“I’m . . . well, are there any kind of . . . strength-enhancing things I can use? I mean, even just a lever, like a crowbar.” She smiled nervously. “We’ll still have those if the power goes out, right?”

“Yes,” he said, looking amused. “But it was more about getting everyone to lift together, than just solving it the best way. We’ll get to that sort of thing. Right now, we need you all to work together under stress.”

“That makes sense. But I feel like I’m a lot weaker than everyone else. And a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, right?”

“We’re not going to be in combat, Ms. Nor, so you don’t need to worry so much. Focus largely on working with the others. They’re counting on you, as you are counting on them.”

More like getting carried by them, she thought.

A frown crossed his face. “Though now that I’m checking your records, have you ever had muscle treatments? I’m not seeing them listed.”

“No,” she replied. “I can’t get anything like that. My body rejects them – when I got one for my bones as a kid it made me sick for months. Still never fully took.”

“Oh!” the man said, shocked. “Well that explains a lot. The artificial fibers meld with your muscles and make them quite a bit stronger, you know.”

“Yeah,” she replied. “But I’m just working with what nature gave me. And I guess generations of genetic tinkering and rad damage.”

Vakulinchuk looked thoughtful. “This would explain your difficulties, Ms. Nor.”

“So . . . does this mean I can use an exosuit?” she asked hopefully.

He chuckled. “It takes years of training to use them. And sub-dermal implants, to be honest . . .”

“I don’t have those, either,” she said, deflating.

“Don’t worry. You volunteered, and we appreciate the help. Each according to their ability, right?”

“Right,” she echoed, not buying it.

The man clapped her on the shoulder and went away, and she checked her tablet. Still five more minutes of their break.

As she moved back towards the others, she heard them talking.

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“. . . ship was fired upon – by the Tul Hev.”

“But we’re here to help them,” a woman said. Apollonia thought her name might have been Knowles.

“They did it anyway. It seems they got out, but only just. I don’t know what we’re even doing here if the people we’re trying to help are shooting at us.”

“It seems like a big warning sign,” Knowles agreed. “And this Maig clan – have you heard much about them?”

“I’ve heard enough to know I don’t want to have to fight them. They say they torture prisoners . . .”

“Hell, I’ve heard they eat them. I never really believed that one sapient being would eat another, but . . . there are a lot of stories.”

Apollonia was not enjoying eavesdropping on that conversation, and she moved away.

It seemed all too soon when Vakulinchuk sent out his alert for them all to return.

“Suit up!” he called. “We’re going in hard vacuum!”

They’d already had lessons on the suits – were wearing most of the pieces, just lacking a proper helmet.

Every uniform, including hers, had a pop-up head cover that would activate in the event of pressure loss – giving even those caught unawares by a hull breach a chance to survive. It was no substitute for a proper spacesuit helmet, though.

As they buddied up, she got Knowles, who seemed more nervous now, though she smiled.

“First time in a vacsuit?” Apollonia asked.

“Ah . . . no. I’ve done hull welding in a shipyard. Supervising drones, mostly, but when there’s nothing to do but watch, you go out and do it yourself a few times, right? Helps pass the time and gets extra work done.”

“Oh, yeah. Naturally.” Apollonia had never done that. Hell, she’d never been outside a station in a suit before.

Her throat felt dry.

She pulled on her helmet and clamped it, hearing the click of a good seal. The faceplate was a screen, and she got to see a nice proper HUD for once.

Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad! There were some errors due to her lacking the subdermals for the suit to interface with, but she closed those warnings. They weren’t a huge deal, the suit was telling her.

“Check your partner’s seals. You don’t want to be out there and then find out you’re leaking air,” Vakulinchuk said through their radios.

Knowles checked her, and then gave her a thumbs-up. Apollonia went to check hers, and immediately forgot everything she’d been told.

No, she knew this, she thought. She just had to focus. But it felt so stuffy in this helmet. Air was circulating, and it was cool, but she still was feeling hot.

Everyone else was done with their checks. She fumbled through the rest of her check on Knowles as best she could, then patted her to tell her she was good. She honestly wasn’t sure.

“All right, everyone,” Vakulinchuk said. “Activate magnetic boots and stiffeners.”

She clicked that on. Her feet stuck to the floor, but almost more importantly, the suit went partially rigid. If not for that, then walking in zero-g even with magboots was a nightmare; you could put a leg forward, but your torso would want to stay behind, and you’d just end up bending backwards as your feet moved on without you. Unless you were quite strong, it was extremely difficult. With the suit stiffening at strategic times and places, it was manageable.

“Connect your umbilicals and activate your beacons.”

She turned on the latter first – never, never wanted to be without that! If you drifted off without a beacon, no one would ever be able to find you. The nightmare, just drifting off into the Dark, with the demons and ghosts and spirits . . .

She swallowed through a dry throat as she connected her umbilical to the ship.

They went into an airlock. It was a small, claustrophobic room, and she could hear the sound of air hissing out – fading into silence as it thinned too much to even carry noise.

The doors opened, and she saw endless stars.

“March!” she heard. Knowles started, and she began after her, but her throat felt like it was closing up.

“Nor, are you all right?” she heard.

She tried to speak, but she couldn’t. Her stomach was rebelling, her throat was spasming – and then she threw up.

Some part of her suit broke, flopping down into her face, and she flailed, reaching for her helmet even as she began to choke. Without gravity, it was impossible to even get the vomit out of her throat, and she began to gag, threatening to get even sicker.

“Help!” she cried – or at least tried to cry, but she couldn’t talk.

Excited voices were saying something, and Vakulinchuk was there, calling for the air to be brought back.

“And gravity, for star’s sake!” he cried.

It was back in a moment, and suddenly Apollonia was able to spit, though she was still choking. The air was coming back, and it took an awful long time before Vakulinchuk was able to take off her helmet.

He put something on her face. “Just let it work,” he said, though through instinct all she could do was fight and flail.

The device sucked the vomit out of her, and then gave her a gulp of air, and she gasped loudly.

She was on the floor now, stars swimming in front of her eyes, the whole rest of the team clustered around, looking at her.

“Spread out, spread out,” Vakulinchuk said. “You’re all sitting ducks just standing here like this!”

She appreciated it, but it seemed like her humiliation was already complete.

“I think,” she said, then coughed. “I don’t like vacsuits.”

“That seems obvious,” Vakulinchuk replied dryly. “Let’s get you back up. We have some meds that might help with that. Just let me get a pharmacy drone over . . .”

He stepped away, but she didn’t want to wait. She struggled to her feet, feeling bitterly annoyed that now when she actually needed help to stand, no one was offering a hand.

She wasn’t sure she could have made herself take one right now, anyway.

The airlock was opened back into the main room, and she went through. Before Vakulinchuk returned, she moved towards the door.

She’d had enough training for today.

“Nor!” she heard Vakulinchuk call as he noticed her. She waved him away and went out, tearing off the vacsuit as she went.

She wanted to curse, scream, or cry. God this was pathetic.

She couldn’t do this. Why did she ever think she could?

As she stalked down the hall, she expected to get a message from Vakulinchuk, throwing her out of the Volunteers, or threatening her with dire consequences if she didn’t come back. But that message didn’t come; she only got one saying that she could take the rest of the day off, but to report again tomorrow morning.

Fuck! Couldn’t they at least be properly mad?

She turned a corner, holding one of her gloves, wanting to hurl it down the hall, when she walked into Squats on Sand.

“Oh!” she cried, her leg hitting his shin and bouncing off.

She stumbled back, but one of the weird tentacles around the top of his head shot out and grabbed her shoulder.

“Oh, Apollonia! It’s good to see you. I was not lurking in the area – just . . . I was working,” he said.

That was a very odd thing for him to say. And as he stumped around, she realized he could hardly lurk even if he tried. She was shocked she hadn’t even registered that low-tide smell that seemed to follow him around – he practically reeked, though for her at least it still brought to mind positive memories of Earth.

“Okay,” she said. “I . . . I was just leaving training. I failed. Miserably.”

“Really?” Squats on Sand asked. “That’s terribly distressing – what’s wrong? Are they being . . . unjust? I’ve heard sometimes humans are that way to other humans! Abmon do not have that issue, there’s so few of us we all know each other.”

“I didn’t know that,” she replied dully.

“Well . . . it was a joke. There are tens of billions of us, despite our populations being relatively small.”

“All right,” she replied. “Look, I’m sorry, I’m just . . . I threw up in my vacsuit, and here I’m from a colony! Everyone expects us to take to space like it’s second nature, but I never went outside to play with the micrometeors. I just . . . stayed in my corner.”

Squats on Sand went silent, his body sections rotating so three of his eyes could view her at once.

“You’re quite upset,” he said, as if just realizing it. “I am sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize. I’m just being a whiner,” she said. An attempt at a smile tried to come to her face. “Do Abmon ever do that?”

“Hah, never! Well, sometimes. If one of us eats all the grack!”

She had no idea what that was, but forced a smile. It was easier with Squats on Sand than most people.

Dark, how strange was it she got along so much better with aliens than other humans?

“Is there anything Abmon don’t do better than us?” she asked, getting that this was some sort of joke of his.

“Ducking,” he said without hesitation. “I’m afraid we’re in full squat all the time, and- Dr. Y, hello! I was not lurking here, I am in this area in an official capacity!”

Hearing Y’s name got her attention. She turned and saw the AI – or his tall, mechanical body, at least – standing behind them.

“By all means,” he said genially. “Do not let me interrupt your important work of conversing.”

“Y! What are you doing here?”

“Conveniently,” he said, “I was coming to see you, Nor.”

“Why me?” she asked. Not that she minded, but it seemed . . . well, convenient, as he had said.

“Trainer Vakulinchuk informed me you were having an issue with nausea, and I thought it would be a nice break from my own work to come myself. I could have sent a drone, but they are very impersonal. Along that topic, Armorer He That Squats on Yellow Sand – haven’t you left a drone in charge of the armory for a period of time greater than is allowed in protocol?”

The Abmon did an odd sort of hop in place that achieved no air. It seemed impossible to think they could jump at all.

“Ah, well,” he said. “That is a valid point. I should perhaps be on my way. I am sure that all is well there, but I should check.”

“Farewell,” Y said happily, as Squats on Sand ambled away.

“I think he was actually lurking here,” she said to Y.

“Yes, that is an appropriate word,” Y replied, his voice brimming with amusement. “Though he is actually quite dedicated to his work when he is actually doing it.”

He turned to her. “Now, this is a good chance to give you a medical check-up. If you will come with me, Nor, there is a medical suite not far from here!” He began to walk away.

“Wait,” she said, not following him. “Didn’t I just get a checkup recently?”

“Yes,” Y said, turning back to her. “But it is always good to get another. The march of entropy is inevitable, after all!”

Apollonia took a deep breath. At least she could be around the one being who she didn’t actually fear would judge her as useless.

“Okay,” she said. “Lead the way.”