The End

“Becker to LaSalle,” the suit’s communicator blurted. “What’s your status, Jason?”

LaSalle tore his gaze off the prisoner and looked at his wrist. “Sorry to report, sir, but you might be leaving without us.”

The communicator paused.

“We have a few minutes left, Jason,” Becker assured him. “We’ll think of something.”

Becker glanced at his crew, who all stared at him with stoic expressions. They each knew they were doomed and were putting on a brave front. He nodded at them gravely.

“We’ll keep working on our end,” LaSalle replied to the communicator. “But, sir, you need to return to the ship when time’s up!”

“We’re not leaving you,” Becker immediately replied.

LaSalle glanced at his crew again and saw their answer. “I don’t think you’ll have any other choice, sir. The ship comes first.”

The communicator paused, then Becker’s voice sounded grim. “I’m recommending you all for commendation.”

LaSalle took a deep breath. “Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

Oh, for crying out loud! They either sold the act a bit too well, or it wasn’t an act! He glared at the pad in his hand. It was never wrong, he reminded himself. But this time, maybe it wasn’t right, either.

“I was only supposed to repair the nitrogen generator today,” he griped, lifting the pad to eye level again. “Not crash into a sun!

“All right, Bitsy, you say there isn’t a sun in our path,” he growled at the pad. “Fine! How do you know there isn’t one?”

“Please restate the inquiry, the pad replied.

For the love of -! He took a moment to compose himself. “All right. What factors do you look for to indicate that a sun is in the ship’s path?”

“There are several factors that indicate the presence of stellar masses,” the pad recited. “Dramatic increase in gravimetric attraction, increase in the level of electromagnetic radiation in the visible and non-visible spectrum, intense thermal increase, catastrophic coronal-!”

“Okay, okay,” he snapped. “That’s enough! So, do you detect any of those things in the area?”

The pad paused. “Sensors detect intense gravimetric increase. Electromagnetic radiation increasing beyond lifeform tolerance levels. Thermal readings above ship’s recommended tolerance level. Indications of coronal discharge -!”

He could barely resist the urge to strangle it as he hissed through tightly clenched teeth, “Doesn’t that tell you something?”

“Electromagnetic radiation levels increasing beyond -!”

“No!” he shouted at it, startling the aliens. He had everyone’s wide-eyed attention, even orange-head’s, who pointed his weapon with stiff, trembling arms. But he forced himself to ignore them and address the pad instead. “It tells you that we’re crashing into a sun!”

“There are no stellar masses within sensor range.”

“How can that be when you just described one?” he angrily demanded.

The pad paused. “Please restate the -!”

“A sun is a ball of radiation, gravity and light, right?” he demanded.

The pad paused. “Stars are composed of varying percentages of gases, the most common of which are -!”

“Shut up and listen!” He’d had enough of arguing with it. “The readings you sensed outside the ship are from a sun that we are on a collision course with! Now, analyze those readings and tell me where they could have come from!”

The pad paused. “Sensor readings are consistent with those of a type G stellar mass.”

He gritted his teeth and tried to keep his temper. “You mean, a sun?”

“Affirmative,” the pad replied.

“So, if we’re on a collision course with a sun,” he carefully said, doing his best not to snap the pad in half, “Don’t you think you should correct course?”

“There are no stellar masses within sensor range.”

“But you said -!” He immediately clamped his mouth shut. There was no time to argue. He had to outsmart the system, instead. But how?

“Okay,” he said, thinking on the fly, “So there’s some stuff ahead of the ship, right?”

“Please restate -!”

“Never mind!” No time to argue, and no time to waste. “The sensor readings from outside the ship. Do they pose a danger to the ship and its crew?”

“Affirmative,” the pad replied.

“So, don’t you think you should make a course correction away from the danger?” he desperately urged.

The pad paused.

And paused.

It took forever, but it finally said, “Affirmative.”

“Well?” he snapped. “Make the correction!”

“You are not authorized to -!”

“But you are!” he shouted right into its mic. “Make the correction!”

The pad paused.

“Affirmative.”

The deck lurched slightly as drive systems engaged in a sharp maneuver, but the sensation was brief and gravity plating kicked in soon afterward. LaSalle and his crew glanced all around, wide-eyed, then smiles broke out amongst them.

“Becker to LaSalle,” LaSalle’s suit blurted. “I don’t know what you did down there, but it worked! The ship’s steering clear of the gravity well!”

“Yes, sir,” LaSalle said though a broad smile. “But I can’t take any credit for it.”

LaSalle looked at his prisoner, but he wasn’t looking back. He stared at the deck for a while before taking a big breath, then he sauntered over to orange head. He peered curiously at the weapon still gripped tightly in the alien’s trembling hand, trying not to meet those staring, bugged-out eyes. They were pretty alarming.

He held out his hand to orange head, indicating the weapon with a significant glance. “May I?”

Orange head glanced at LaSalle, who shrugged and gave him an encouraging nod, so the alien eased his grip on the weapon and handed it over.

He looked it over carefully. A simple trigger mechanism. Apparently, a standard no matter which planet you came from. He tossed the pad to the deck and in front of their stunned eyes, aimed and pulled the trigger. The pad exploded in a mass of very colorful and very satisfying sparks.

He turned to orange head, handing the weapon back, butt-first. “I’ve been wanting to do that all day.”

“Got it!” the frail young ensign cried in triumph, holding up the pad in her hand like a trophy. Her smile faded significantly when she saw everyone staring at her with a curious expression. Pointing at their prisoner, she feebly added, “We… we can talk to him now.”

He was suddenly very dizzy and trembling all over. His legs were so wobbly that he couldn’t stand up much longer. Stumbling to the bulkhead, he planted his arms against it, but they shook so much that they could barely support him. His stomach knotted, and he leaned forward, head down and mouth open, waiting for the vomit to churn up from his gut, gasping for air because it was just so damned hard to breathe! Because he remembered.

“They’re not here, are they?” he muttered, his voice hoarse from a dry throat.

“Please restate the inquiry.”

He didn’t have to turn around to know what he would see, but he did anyway and immediately stumbled backward against the bulkhead. He was alone on the Drive Deck. There was no LaSalle. No young ensign. Not even orange head. And the pad lay on deck where he’d tossed it, still fully functional.

He slid down the bulkhead to the deck, folding his legs to his chest. “But they were, weren’t they?”

“Please restate the inquiry.”

“They were here,” he muttered, remembering. Finally remembering. “They were just exploring the ship, and you murdered them.”

The pad paused. “Records indicate Security Services assessed a danger to this vessel and eliminated the threat.”

“You killed them,” he muttered, feeling nothing inside. “They were just looking around, and you killed them.”

“Records indicate Security Services assessed a danger to this vessel and eliminated the threat.”

“Why?” he asked, his throat even dryer. “What did they do?”

“Records indicate intruders initiated a cascade malfunction in cryogenic units resulting in the complete loss of all crew,” the pad replied.

His head dropped to his chest. He didn’t have the strength to hold it up anymore. “Except for me.”

“Affirmative.”

He was working on the nitrogen filters back then, too. Seemed like he was always working on the nitrogen filters. Every damn waking cycle.

“How long?” he murmured. He barely had the strength to ask. Maybe, he didn’t want to hear the answer. But in his heart, he knew it had been ages since he spied on them from the ventilation system as they moved about the ship. They were curious things, so much like him and yet so different. He was on maintenance rotation when it happened. That’s why he wasn’t asleep If the aliens had boarded an hour later, he would have died with the rest of the crew. But he’d been lucky, or so he told himself back then.

It must have happened… what? A hundred sleep cycles ago? Maybe more? He’d lost count. But his memory was still coming back. He slept for a long time between wake cycles, too long according to the pad, although he didn’t yet remember for how long. It would explain why he was so dehydrated when he awoke, why he’d forgotten what had happened before, even the mental breakdown that made him imagine that they were still alive, and that the ship was headed for disaster. The pad had once told him that they were symptoms of prolonged cryogenic sleep, just as it had tried to break him from his delusion by playing along. But he’d forgotten about all of that, until just now.

“Please restate the inquiry.”

He paused. Did it matter? Did it matter whether he slept for days, weeks, or centuries? Did anything matter? He was still alone on the ship, no matter how the pad answered.

“Never mind,” he mumbled.

And he sat there, waiting for Security Systems to lift the bulkheads so he could finish his job and go back to sleep. At the next wake cycle, he would forget everything that had happened anyway. His psychotic episode. The aliens. His loneliness. Everything. Erased, like they had never happened.

It was a small mercy, but it was all he had.

Conundrum

“Henricksen?” LaSalle urged. His tension was leaking through his calm exterior. He either believed his own story about a collision course with the sun, or he was the best actor ever.

While LaSalle edged closer to the young ensign to take a peek at her pad, their prisoner shuffled uneasily from one foot to the other. There was a simple way to figure out if they were telling the truth, but he wasn’t sure if he wanted to give away the one advantage he had left. The pad could easily tell him if they were on course or if there was a massive and incredibly energetic obstacle in their way, but it could also potentially give them access to ship’s functions if they managed to force their will on it. They had eluded Security Services, after all. Except… if they could do that, then why couldn’t they access ship’s functions and steer it away from their sun? It wasn’t making any sense.

“Look,” he told the aliens, even though they wouldn’t understand a word, “I don’t know what you want, but if the ship is going to crash into a sun, can’t you do something about it?”

That got LaSalle’s attention. Briefly. “Henricksen?”

She looked up from the pad and directly at their prisoner. “Okay, I need you to tell me who you are and where you came from, and I need you to tell me like I’m only five years old. Got it?”

What a stupid thing to ask! But he sighed heavily, glanced at the weapons still leveled on him, and said, “Look, I’m just a low-level maintenance worker. I specialize in duct work and plumbing. But even I can see that if you’re in a hurry to get off the ship, then asking me these dumb questions isn’t going to get us anywhere. Besides, if you could hide from Security Services, then why can’t you fly the ship to safety? Tell me that, wise guys!”

Okay, probably not a good idea to call his captors names, but at least, according to the fury with which the young ensign tapped her pad, they weren’t able to translate it, yet. But he would have to watch his language once they could.

Their urgency was still troubling, though. They believed what they told him, enough that he was teetering on the edge of believing it, himself. He absently touched the pad, still attached to his belt, making one of the armed aliens twitch.

“What’s that?” the armed alien demanded. He was very pale with orange hair, spots on his face, and wide green eyes that stared unblinkingly. Definitely on high alert, unless that’s what his species always looked like. Security Services would like him, especially the way he stabbed the weapon towards their prisoner like a spear.

“Easy, midshipman,” LaSalle reassured the orange head. “It’s just a compad.”

How did -? Oh. Right. They used them, too.

LaSalle turned to Henricksen. “Any luck?”

She shook her head, biting her lips on the inside, her fingers flying across the pad. She was committed to the bit. A little too committed.

He sighed heavily. It wouldn’t make any difference keeping the pad a secret if they ended up incinerated for it. Besides, they already knew what it was. But before he could take the plunge, LaSalle beat him to it.

“That compad,” he said, pointing at it. “Can it bring up command prompts?”

He didn’t know how else to reply, so he nodded. It was better than dying a fiery death in… what? Fifteen, twenty minutes?

“Could you redirect the ship’s course?” LaSalle asked, trying to keep a lid on his anxiety. “Steer it away from the sun’s gravity well?”

He gave the pad the side-eye. How could he explain that the pad was… problematic at times? Oh, screw it!

“I’ll try,” he replied, pulling the pad from its holder, making the orange head twitch.

“Computer,” he said, eyeing the orange-haired alien warily. “Alter course away from the sun.”

“Command authorization is required for course alteration,” it dutifully replied.

“Henricksen?” LaSalle curtly asked.

“Still working on it, sir,” she said a bit irritably, her eyes glued to her work.

He tried to ignore them. “Even if we’re going to crash into something?”

“Command authorization is required for course alteration,” the pad repeated.

“But we’re going to fly into their sun!” he snapped. A bit too loudly, though, and he took a cautionary glance at orange head to make sure his trigger finger wasn’t getting too itchy.

The pad paused. “Please rephrase the statement.”

“What?” he snapped, directing his full ire on the pad. “I said we’re going to crash into their sun! Can’t you see that?”

The pad paused. “Detecting no stellar mass within sensor range.”

“What?” That couldn’t be! “That can’t be! There must be a sun in our way! The aliens can’t be pretending that well!”

“Detecting no stellar mass within sensor range,” the pad dutifully repeated.

“You’re malfunctioning, then,” he spat. “Take another look and tell me what you see!

“Unless you need command authorization for that, too,” he muttered under his breath.

“Command authorization is not required for access to sensory data,” the pad replied.

“Then show me!” he snapped.

The pad paused. “Please rephrase the inquiry.”

He took a slow, deep breath. It wouldn’t do to throw a temper tantrum in front of armed aliens, especially the orange haired one.

“Scan the surrounding area,” he said in a very controlled tone. “Especially ahead of us, and tell me what you see… uh, detect.”

The pad paused again, and he took another deep breath to maintain his composure. Those pauses were eating up precious time, but there was nothing he could do to prevent them.

“Course clear of all navigational obstacles,” the pad finally reported.

“What?” he demanded, his own anxiety begging him to snap the pad in half. “How? How can that be?”

“Ship’s course was programmed to circumvent all known spatial obstacles,” the pad explained.

“Maybe their sun wasn’t programmed into the system?” he desperately asked. “What then?”

“Navigational controls are programmed to compensate for unknown variables,” the pad replied.

“Then, compensate for that sun!” he ordered.

“No stellar masses detected within sensor range,” the pad replied.

“Henricksen?” LaSalle curtly asked.

“Almost there,” she absently reported, her fingers flying. “… I think…”

“Prove it, Bitsy!” he snapped. “Or do I need ‘command authorization’ to look out the window?”

“Please rephrase the inquiry.”

“Show me what’s out there!” he snapped. “I want to see what’s out there!”

The pad paused, then an image of space popped onto the screen, and he had to swallow the deep melancholy that it invoked. He hated the sight of infinite black space, with no stars or sun. He’d rather have an atmosphere over him and solid ground beneath his feet, but that was pretty much why he was aboard, so he forced his way through his own personal little anxiety to study the screen, and his brows knit together.

“Where is it?” he muttered.

“Please restate -!”

“The sun,” he snapped. “Where’s the sun?”

“There are no stellar masses -!”

“Show me more,” he interrupted. “Show me what’s all around the ship.”

He couldn’t tell if the view shifted or not, until he saw a brief glimpse of the hull pass at the bottom of the screen. The movement made him nauseous, and the external feed took too long to pan left. They were losing precious minutes that way. He had to be smarter about things. “Show me what’s right in our path!”

The image flickered, then showed an image of more endless black. He swallowed hard at the sight. It showed no sun, or any other object, in their path. He glanced at the aliens in confusion. They had been so convincing! Or maybe, he’d been too gullible!

“Are you lying to me?” he demanded. “What did you think you’d get out of me? Command of the ship? I don’t have the authority! I can’t even get this piece of junk to do anything without an argument! So why don’t you tell me what’s really going on and stop lying to me!”

“Henricksen?” LaSalle demanded.

She looked up from her pad and grimly shook her head.

“Lieutenant Woo to LaSalle,” LaSalle’s suit blurted.

LaSalle startled before quickly composing himself. “Go ahead, Woo.”

“Sorry to report, sir,” Woo stiffly said. “All bulkheads are down. We’re sealed in.”

LaSalle momentarily closed his eyes to keep his composure. “Understood. Get back to the group.”

“Aye, sir,” Woo curtly replied.

LaSalle turned to their prisoner. He looked so much like someone in distress that it was impossible to tell if he was lying. “Please, you must help us! Time’s running out!”

Not according to my pad, he wanted to reply. Instead, he swallowed hard. Their act was too convincing. But the pad was never wrong. What was he supposed to do?

“Gods damn it,” he cursed. “Why me? I’m not cut out for this!”

Captured

“You didn’t think it through, did you?” the alien asked smugly.

The execution had been flawless. It took some time to psyche himself up, but once he had unscrewed the grille fasteners, his timing was perfect. The moment the grille hit the deck, alerting the aliens of his presence, he gripped the edge of the opening and slid out headfirst, rolling until his feet were in position for a smooth drop, then a quick glance showed him where the Security Services panel was located. It was next to a door, a dark panel with a big red button right in the middle, the only feature on the entire plate. One of the aliens had shouted a warning to the others, but it was too late. His palm slammed down on the button, and a bulkhead immediately slammed down over the door, sealing it off. The deck vibrated with the distant thudding of more bulkheads pounding into place and it was done. Just like that, the Drive Deck was sealed off from the rest of the ship.

He turned to flee, hoping to get away from the aliens before they realized their predicament, and froze uncertainly. There was nowhere to go. He glanced desperately at the hole through which he’d entered and saw it out of reach in a very high ceiling. How had he even survived the drop without hurting himself? He stared in disbelief, until that alien got his attention with that sarcastic remark.

“Stop where you are!”

The aliens had fanned out to block his escape in every direction, and three of them held weapons on him. That wasn’t good!

“Who are you?” one of them demanded. It was the same voice that had issued the command and the remark. Brown skin. Black hair. Dark eyes. Definitely alien. “How did you get here?”

One thing he knew from the ship’s serialized dramas was that he didn’t have to answer their questions. In fact, it felt like a better idea not to answer them. He wasn’t going to cooperate in their ransacking of the ship, no matter what they did to him.

The speaker waited only a moment for a reply before turning to the others. “Analysis?”

“A member of the crew, maybe?” one replied.

The first alien shook his head. “There are no other life signs aboard ship.”

So, they admit it! They killed the rest of the crew! The bastards!

“A survivor?” a young female with a crude pad in her hand asked uncertainly. She was smaller and frailer than the others, so he had to assume she was younger, too.

“Unlikely,” a male alien with sandy hair and pale skin replied. “He’s definitely alien, though.”

“Could he have come from another ship?” the first one asked.

“We didn’t detect any other vessels in the area,” the sandy-haired male replied. “But I suppose it’s possible.”

“Becker to LaSalle,” the first alien’s suit suddenly blurted. “Come in!”

“LaSalle here, Commander,” the first alien immediately replied.

“Monitors indicate something happening in your location,” the Commander said. “What’s going on down there?”

The one called LaSalle kept his eyes trained on him as he spoke. In fact, all of them did, no matter who they were addressing. It should have made him feel like the most dangerous person in the world. Instead, it made him feel like a specimen under observation, especially the way the young female with the pad looked at him.

“We’ve had an incident here,” LaSalle confirmed. “An alien, possibly an intruder, we aren’t certain, seems to have triggered something that sealed off the section.”

“The entire section?” the Commander demanded.

LaSalle glanced across the deck, the first time he’d looked elsewhere since the capture. “Not sure, sir. Most likely, though.”

“Find out,” the Commander ordered. LaSalle gestured to one of the aliens currently not holding a weapon out, sending her to look, while the Commander added, “You know, this alien complicates things, Jason.”

“Yes, sir,” LaSalle replied.

“Is it a member of the crew?”

“Unknown, sir,” LaSalle replied. “Given previous telemetries of this area, I’d guess that he isn’t from outside the ship.”

The communicator paused. “That… that complicates things a lot.”

“Yes, sir,” LaSalle stiffly replied. After a grim pause, he asked, “What’s our window?”

The communicator was quiet for a moment, then the Commander solemnly said, “We have twenty minutes. Thirty-nine is the critical limit before…”

The Commander didn’t finish the thought. According to LaSalle’s grim expression, he didn’t need to. “Understood, sir.”

The communicator paused momentarily, then the Commander said, “Jason, we’re going to do everything on our end to get you out of there. I need you to do the same.”

“Agreed,” LaSalle gravely replied. He took a deep breath and added, “Sir, in the event that you need to leave us behind….”

“That isn’t going to happen,” the Commander assured him.

LaSalle didn’t look convinced. “In the event that you must leave us behind, don’t hesitate. The safety of the ship takes precedence over us.”

The communicator paused. “We’re going to get you out of there, Jason. If we can, we’ll get everyone out.”

LaSalle nodded but wasn’t convinced. “Yes, sir.”

“Find a way out,” the Commander ordered. “Or undo the seal. We’ll keep working on our end. Twenty minutes should be plenty of time to get it done.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Commander, out.”

LaSalle took a deep breath and turned to the others. “Options?”

“I’ll keep studying the systems,” a male replied. “Maybe I can figure them out in time.”

“Take whoever you need to help,” LaSalle replied.

“Sir,” the young female with the pad said, keeping a curious gaze on their captive. “The alien triggered the seal. Maybe he can undo it?”

“Maybe,” LaSalle skeptically agreed. He eyed the captive warily, then asked the female, “Henricksen, can you extrapolate a linguistic base for a translation program?”

“Maybe,” the female replied, beginning to tap commands onto her pad. “But I’ll need a sample of his language first.”

His brows knit at a brand-new idea. Play dumb. They couldn’t force information out of someone that couldn’t understand a word they were saying. He just had to keep them from finding out, so he put on his best dumb guy face and hoped it was enough to fool them.

“Basic concepts first, then,” LaSalle told himself, contemplating his prisoner. After some thought, he pointed at himself and said very slowly and distinctly, “My name is Jason LaSalle. Jason. Jason.”

He wanted to roll his eyes, but his dumb guy persona wouldn’t do it, so he refrained from it himself. Every time LaSalle said his own name, he pointed at himself, which, when one thought about it, was the dumbest thing anyone could do when trying to communicate with someone that doesn’t speak one’s language. For all the dumb guy knew, Jason LaSalle could be the name of his species, or the brand of his environmental suit. So, he just watched Jason LaSalle’s attempt at communication and tried not to laugh.

“That’s not working,” LaSalle told himself when he failed to get a response. He glanced at Henricksen. “Any ideas?”

Henricksen shook her head, but she studied the prisoner with more intense curiosity than earlier, and he scowled at her. Why was she looking at him like that? Did she suspect his ruse? Or was it something else?

LaSalle sighed, then bowed his head in thought. Finally, he looked the prisoner square in the eye and said, “Look, I’ll be honest with you. I don’t know who you are or where you came from, but this ship is in terrible danger. It’s on a collision course with our sun, and in less than thirty-nine minutes it’s going to be trapped in the gravity well and pulled in without any chance of escape, and if we’re still here, then it’s going to take us with it. So, I need your help. I need you to lift the seal on this section so we can get back to our ship in time. Now, I know you don’t understand a word I’m saying but -!”

“Sir,” Henricksen interrupted.

“Henricksen?” LaSalle replied, turning towards her.

“Sir,” she said, indicating the prisoner with her chin. “He can understand what you’re saying.”

Damn it! How did she find out?

“What do you mean?” LaSalle demanded.

“He’s responding to what you’re saying, sir,” Henricksen replied.

LaSalle studied him critically. “Maybe he’s just responding to the tone of my voice?”

“No, sir,” Henricksen replied. “Micro-expressions indicate that he’s fully aware of what you’re saying.”

LaSalle studied him warily. “You can understand me?”

He tried to maintain the dumb guy persona, but something told him it was useless in Henricksen’s presence, so he nodded warily. It was better to confess than have it forced out of him.

LaSalle surprised him. “So, you understand the danger we’re all in? Us, you, and any other crew members still alive?” His brow knit together and he asked, “Is there anyone else aboard ship?”

He couldn’t help it. He growled, “I thought you already killed them!”

LaSalle quickly turned to Henricksen. “What did he say?”

Henricksen shrugged, furiously pounding on her pad. “I don’t know. Keep him talking!

“…sir!” she hastily added, looking at LaSalle in alarm.

“It’s all right, ensign,” LaSalle assured her. “Just keep up the good work.”

Henricksen flushed. “Yes, sir.”

LaSalle turned to him. “Why don’t you talk to us in our language? It’ll make communications much smoother.”

He scowled at LaSalle. Didn’t he already know? Oh! Right! Aliens! But should he answer the question? It wasn’t really a secret. In fact, it was fairly common practice in the Service.

“I have a biometric implant in the language center of my brain,” he told them, pointing to the place where the doctors had when they were trying to explain the procedure to him. It was years ago, but he still remembered the exact spot. It still itched sometimes. “It translates foreign languages instantly and lets me understand them. Doesn’t let me speak them, though.”

He shrugged. “Don’t know why.”

LaSalle glanced at Henricksen, but she was too busy scowling at the pad to notice. Her fingers tapped furiously, sometimes sliding one way or another, her face locked in deep concentration. Probably fighting with the AI, if it was anything like what he had to put up with on a daily basis.

What was he doing? Sympathizing with the enemy? What next? Laughing over some brews? He had to get it together!

“I won’t cooperate with you,” he told LaSalle. It was probably a stupid thing to say, but it sure sounded brave. “And I don’t believe your story. So, since you’re going to kill me anyway, just tell me what you’re really after.”

Yeah. That was definitely stupider than it was brave. Great job! He screwed himself for certain.

“Henricksen?” LaSalle demanded, glancing at her.

She shook her head, her hands squeezing the edges of her pad as if she wanted to snap it in half. Yeah, he knew how she felt.

“Problem?” LaSalle asked.

“The linguistics program is having trouble translating the language,” she snapped, then quickly composed herself.

LaSalle waited for her to elaborate, but when she instead tapped on her pad some more, he prompted, “And?”

“I don’t understand what’s wrong,” she said, tearing her eyes off the screen and hastily adding, “Sir.”

“One step at a time, ensign,” LaSalle calmly replied. “What do you have?”

She shook her head, her frightened expression clearly showing that she was aware of their situation. “A bunch of gibberish. I don’t know! Maybe the syntax doesn’t have any similar context…?”

“Meaning…?” LaSalle prompted.

She pursed her lips and fiercely studied the pad. “Let me try something…”

“”You can do this, ensign,” LaSalle assured her. “That’s why you’re here.”

Their distress and their commitment to the story made him reassess the situation. Was the one named LaSalle telling the truth? Was the ship headed for their sun? There was no reason for pirates to create such an elaborate ruse just to trick him into cooperating with them. Right? So, maybe they hadn’t murdered the crew, after all? Maybe they weren’t pirates either? There was still no way to know for sure, not without being able to communicate with them. But even so, why hadn’t Security Services detected them? They were still alien intruders no matter their motive. That was going to bug him for a while.

That and the fact that he was stuck on the Drive Deck with a bunch of chipless morons!

Aliens

“What am I doing?” he demanded, coming to an abrupt halt in the middle of the duct. He’d had the brilliant idea to head for the drive deck, figuring that one of those aliens would be easier to capture and interrogate, since the captain or commander, or whatever they called the one in charge, was likely to have better security than the others, thus making the drive deck the better option, so he once again took to the ductwork to move through the ship undetected. There was just one problem with his plan. “I don’t know how to capture anyone!”

“Please restate the inquiry,” the pad blared, echoing against the metal walls and scaring the life out of him. He almost yelled at it to shut up but kept himself under control and hastily lowered the volume instead.

“I didn’t ask you,” he grumbled at it. He was about to continue his slide when the idea struck him. “On second thought, how do I capture one of them aliens?”

“Please restate the inquiry,” the pad dutifully replied, but very quietly.

He had to think about it a bit. The aliens had somehow overridden Security Services and moved freely about the ship undetected. The computer didn’t even acknowledge their presence on the Bridge or the Drive Deck even though he plainly saw them on the monitors. He had to phrase his question in a way that gave him answers, not arguments, if he was going to do anything about them.

“How could I report or contain any intruders onboard ship?” he finally asked.

“Security Services activation centers are located on every deck and in every corridor of this vessel,” the pad replied.

That took a moment to sink in. “What?”

“Security Services activation centers are located on -!”

“I heard you,” he snapped, cutting off the pad’s narration. But he was more irritated at himself than at the pad. He needed a moment to cool down before he grumbled, “Are you telling me that I could have just gone to one of those activation centers and set off a ship wide alert?”

“Affirmative,” the pad replied.

“Why didn’t you tell me that before?” he growled.

The pad paused. “You did not make the inquiry.”

He squeezed the bezel, uselessly trying to choke it, before regaining control of himself and taking a deep breath. It wasn’t the computer’s fault, he told himself. It couldn’t detect the intruders.

“What happens if I trigger Security Services?” he asked after another deep breath.

“Security protocols engage to trap or incapacitate intruders,” the pad replied.

He grunted cynically. “And if you can’t detect the intruders?”

The pad paused.

And paused.

And paused.

He was about to rap it against the walls, not caring who heard the noise, when it said, “Please restate the inquiry.”

“That’s what I thought,” he grumbled, clicking it back on his belt before pulling himself through the ducts again. Useless thing! He was right back where he was before, trying to figure it out for himself!

He had a good view of the Drive Deck, or at least the square cubit of it directly below the vent where he finally halted. He heard the aliens chatting. They were out of his extremely narrow field of sight, but it sounded like they were spread out over a wide section of the Deck. That was good for him, since it made it easier to tackle them one at a time, but bad too, because he had no idea where any of them were, or how he was going to use their positions to his advantage. He listened for a while, but they weren’t talking about anything important, just what they had planned to do after leaving the ship, which was an oddly innocuous conversation to have under the circumstances. Raiding ships must have been just another part of their normal routine. Disgusted with their cavalier attitude, he quietly slid himself far enough away from the grille to have his own private conversation with the pad.

“You said earlier that you could incapacitate or trap intruders,” he quietly addressed the pad. “What did you mean by that?”

“Security Services incorporates multiple options for incapacitating intruders,” the pad quietly replied. “Shall I list them for you?”

He pondered it, but the pad’s phrasing suggested a long list, so he set that option aside and said, “No. How would you trap them?”

“In the event of an emergency, Security Systems is authorized to override any access point within this vessel,” the pad replied.

He scowled. Now, it was the pad’s turn to know how it felt. “Please clarify the answer.”

The pad paused momentarily. “In the event of intruder alert or environmental hazard, Security Services is authorized to lock down or secure any hatch, door, or bulkhead to separate affected sections of this vessel from unaffected areas.”

His brow lifted hopefully. “Any section? Including the Bridge or the Drive Deck?”

“Affirmative.”

“Even if no intruder is detected?”

“Activation of localized Security Services is at the discretion of authorized crew members,” it replied.

“What does that mean?” he grumbled. “Can I just activate it without any intruders being detected?”

“Affirmative,” it replied, then snapped, “Warning, unwarranted use of Security Services is a violation of Section Seven, Code Nineteen of Shipboard protocol, punishable by up to three months in the Incarceration Center.”

“I’ll take my chances,” he grumbled. “How do I activate Security Services to seal off the Drive Deck?”

“There are eight Security Services activation panels on the Drive Deck,” the pad replied.

That wasn’t good. “Can I seal off the Drive Deck from an outside panel?”

“Localized compartment containment must be initiated within the compartment in question,” the pad replied.

“Nowhere else?” he asked hopefully.

“Section separation may be initiated on the Bridge, within Auxiliary Control, on the Drive Deck, and from Command panels,” it replied. “Warning, authorized Command codes are required to access Command panels!”

“Never mind,” he grumbled. Bad luck. But what else did he expect?

“What authority do I need to use the Security Services activation panels?” he growled.

“All authorized crewmembers have full access to Security Services activation panels.”

He scowled, preparing himself for the bad news. “Even me?”

The pad paused briefly. “You are an authorized member of the crew.”

Well, that was a relief! Now for the hard part. “Where on the Drive Deck is the Security Services panel located?”

“There are eight activation panels on the Drive Deck,” it dutifully responded.

Of course! “Where is the nearest one?”

“Thirteen cubits from present location.”

Within running distance, if he dropped to the Deck. “How do I activate it?”

“To activate Security Services, simply depress the red button.”

What? “The red button?”

“Each Security Services activation panel is equipped with a single red button for easy access,” it replied.

It couldn’t be that easy. “It can’t be that easy.”

“Each Security Services activation panel is equipped with a single red button for easy access,” it repeated.

Maybe it was that easy, after all.

Spoiler alert: it wasn’t.

Dust

“Why do I have to do everything around here?” he complained as he slid quietly through the duct, kicking up clouds of dust that shouldn’t be there. Where were the maintenance bots that were supposed to prevent this kind of thing? He would need to reprimand the computer for it later, after he took care of more pressing matters. Pirates had invaded the ship, and no alarms had gone off.

He hadn’t thought of it until just then. Where were the claxons? They should have gone off the instant the computer detected intruders… unless they had somehow eluded the system?

“Hey, Bitsy,” he grumbled quietly so his voice wouldn’t travel through the ductwork, “Give me a location on the intruders.”

The computer hesitated to respond. Hell of a time to get confused over a nickname, he silently grumbled.

“There are no intruders detected within this vessel,” the computer responded at a normal volume, blaring down the narrow passage. He scrambled to cover the speaker on his pad, but it was already too late. The pirates must have heard it, if only from afar, and he doubted they would think it was a freak malfunction. Kicking himself for being careless, he lowered the pad’s volume to almost mute and continued on his way. There was nothing else he could do.

So, he was right. The pirates had disabled the system somehow, or were able to escape detection, maybe with some strange device, but there was nothing he could do about it yet. His priority lay in keeping them from seizing the ship. They had sent one group to the bridge and the other to the drive deck, so he had to go one of those places, too. Right? The question was which one?

He really wished that the intruder systems had gone off. He wasn’t security. He had no idea where to go or what to do, but like confronting a backed-up toilet, he knew he mustn’t panic, even if excrement was flowing everywhere. He just had to figure out which place to go and what to do once he got there.

He paused to stifle a sneeze, then waited for the dust to settle. Okay, the priority was preventing the pirates from taking the ship. He already established that. So, how to do that? Disable navigational controls? Disable the engines? Either way, he needed to go to separate sections of the ship to do it, and they were exactly where the pirates were headed. Damn it! Was there another option? Disable power to the ship? Would that take care of both at once?

“Hey, Bitsy,” he quietly mumbled into the pad’s mic, “How do I disable power to the ship?”

“Warning!” the pad snapped, and fortunately it didn’t carry past the hand he’d cupped over the speaker. “Disabling power will cause catastrophic shutdown of life support services! Warning! Disabling power will cause catastrophic -!”

“All right! Fine!” he urgently hissed into the mic. “Stop!”

The computer immediately obliged and when he was certain that it wasn’t going to resume its tirade, he thought for a bit. He couldn’t cut power. What were the other options, again?

“What about navigational control?” he muttered. “Can I cut that?”

“Warning!” the pad blurted. “Disabling of navigational control is not advised! Warning! Disabling -!”

“Okay! That’s enough!” he hissed, and the pad went silent. So much for that, but it wasn’t a catastrophic warning, so he kept it in mind as he formulated his next question.

“What about drive systems?” he quietly asked. “Can I disable those?”

“Warning!” the pad blurted. “Disabling drive systems will cause catastrophic power loss that will affect the following systems: Life Services, Navigational Control, Food Service, CryoSystems, Damage Control Systems, Security Services, Gravitational -!”

“Okay! That’s enough!” The pad went silent and he cursed under his breath. It sounded like everything was tied to the drive system. If he fooled around with it, he might just kill them all. But…

“How long would it take to reactivate Drive Systems if I disabled them?”

“Unknown,” the pad dutifully replied.

That was no help! “Can Drive Systems be reactivated if disabled?”

“Unknown,” the pad replied.

You little -! “Alright, if you helped me disable them, could we do it in a way that systems can be restored again?”

“Unknown.”

“What the hell do you know, then?”

“This system has access to two hundred and thirty-seven quadribytes of library material, four thousand eight hundred fifty-two quintibytes of schematic detail regarding ship’s functions -!”

“Okay! Fine! Shut up!” He sighed heavily. Things were hard enough without the stupid computer making it even harder. It was obvious that he was alone in figuring out how to protect the ship. But he needed one more piece of advice, and unfortunately, the computer was the only one that could give it to him.

“Of all the options given,” he carefully said, “Which one poses the least danger to the ship and the lifeforms on it?”

The computer paused, and he waited, but it took the pad a long time to answer.

“Unknown.”

He wanted to throw it against the wall, but knowing that he’d need it later, he restrained himself.

Fine! He would need to figure it out for himself, then. Which one was the one that didn’t lead to catastrophic failure? Was that navigation?

“What happens if I disable navigation?”

“Ship’s course may deviate without periodic correction,” the pad replied.

“How badly?”

“Unknown.”

“Why don’t you know?” he grumbled irritably.

“Probability of course deviation is dependent upon unknown variables upon which navigational systems are programmed to compensate,” the pad replied. “Without consistent course correction, probability of completing projected mission decreases exponentially.”

“Fine,” he grumbled. It looked like there were no good options, just less catastrophic ones. Unless he suddenly became a genius and figured out a solution that bypassed those options, he was forced to choose disabling navigation. At least it left them alive, unless the ship was sucked into a blackhole that wandered into its path.

“Where are navigational controls?” he asked, wiping a sudden burst of sweat from his face. His hand came away covered in grime.

“Navigation is located on the Bridge,” the pad replied.

That wouldn’t do unless he could beat the pirates to the Bridge. “Is there a shortcut to the Bridge?”

“I do not understand the inquiry,” the pad replied.

He wiped his runny nose irritably. Damn dust! “Is there an alternate route to the Bridge that would get me there ahead of anyone using the normal corridors?”

The pad paused in thought, then said, “Considering the average walking pace of bipedal and quadrupedal lifeforms, in comparison to the crawling pace of equal lifeforms, the probability of reaching the Bridge via alternate avenues versus conventional corridors is exceptionally low, approximately two hundred fifty-five million, three hundred sixty-seven thousand, four hundred eighty-three to one.

“Lovely!” he grumbled. And he’d wasted too much time arguing with the pad already. “Is there anywhere else that I can disable navigational control?”

“There are three nodes where navigational control may be affected,” the pad replied. “The Drive Deck, the Bridge, and Auxiliary Control.”

“Auxiliary Control?” He didn’t know there was one. “Where’s that?”

The pad showed him a schematic of the ship, with a blinking red spot to indicate Auxiliary Control. As far as he could tell, it was halfway between the Bridge and the Drive Deck.

“Which is closest?” he demanded, finding hope in Auxiliary Control. Maybe he wouldn’t need to go anywhere near the pirates to thwart them.

The pad showed him where he was on the schematic, and he shook his head dismally. They all looked about equidistant to him. Still, if it came to not getting caught in the act…

“Show me a route to Auxiliary Control,” he ordered, and a jagged red line appeared on the pad between his position and his target. Unfortunately, the line crossed a few corridors where he knew he would need to leave the ducts momentarily.

“Any way to keep to the ducts?” he asked.

As the computer processed the request, he realized that the AI was trying to figure out what he meant. He was getting too tired of thinking make his requests any clearer to the stupid thing.

“No,” the pad replied. “Ventilation in that area is too narrow for occupation.”

He shook his head, not liking the idea of using the corridors, but if the pirates confined themselves to the Bridge and the Drive Deck, he might be fine, so he took a deep breath, and coughed from inhaled dust. Damn maintenance bots!

Still coughing, but not as much as he had initially, he slid along the ducts, periodically consulting the pad for any turns he might need to make. He would worry about what to do next once he got to Auxiliary Control. That is, if he got there.

Spaceship

The cryotube hissed open, releasing a gout of steam, and he sat up, blinking groggily. Fortunately, the same computer that had so rudely woken him up was considerate enough to keep the lights dim to give his eyes a chance to adjust, but still, it had interrupted a marvelous dream that now swiftly faded away, and for that he wasn’t sure he could forgive it.

“What’s on the agenda, Dolly?” he croaked, his throat rough from dehydration. He coughed to relieve it. Dehydration only happened after prolonged periods of hibernation, so he had to wonder if the computer had allowed him to sleep in, or if he hadn’t met his hydration requirements yesterday.

The computer paused before answering, and he smiled to himself. He’d confused it again. After decades of AI, it still couldn’t grasp the concept of nicknames.

“Oxygen level decreasing,” it finally replied. ” Nitrogen level has risen point zero five percent. The fault has been traced to oxygen generator designated Alpha Seven.”

“Where’s that?” he asked, sliding carefully off the bed, just in case there was prolonged hibernation that induced some muscular atrophy.

“I will provide guidance,” the computer replied as he sighed, relieved to see that his legs worked and could support his own weight.

“Send the schematics to that section panel, too,” he said, carefully walking to the closet. He picked out one of the many identical jumpsuits hanging inside and paused thoughtfully. He couldn’t remember ever having to recalibrate the atmospheric systems. They were built to operate for centuries without maintenance, to eliminate the potential of human error disrupting their carefully balanced systems. But then, he shrugged. Nothing was built to last forever, he supposed. Not even life support.

Grabbing his tool kit, he stepped up to the door and scowled to discover that he had to wait a whole second for it to register his presence before opening. But that was a minor inconvenience that he could address later. It wasn’t as if a sticky door was as life-threatening as a faulty air system.

A lightbee greeted him just outside his door and immediately set off at his pace, leading the way. As he followed it through the ship, he greeted everyone around him but as usual, there was no reply, so he just shrugged and kept going. The bee led him into the heart of the ship, a place that he hadn’t yet needed to visit, and the moment the bulkhead slid aside, he hesitated. The area beyond was unexpectedly dim, to the point of needing a flashlight to see, and threw him momentarily off guard. He was used to the other sections of the ship being brightly lit but after only a second, he recovered from the alienness of the gloom and pulled his flashlight from the kit.

The bee’s glow was hardly enough to even show on the complex network of pipes, cables, control boxes and valves cramming the tightly packed walls, but it still confidently led him forward, knowing where it was going even in the dark. After only a few steps, he wished he could float along just like it did, instead of needing to step over the cables, pipes, junction boxes and valves cluttering the floor, and after a few more giant strides to step over things in a passage never meant to be walked through by humans, he grumbled, “Can we get some more light in here?”

“Illumination in this section is currently at maximum level,” the computer replied through the lightbee, causing it to pulse with each syllable.

He grunted dismally. “Well, there had better be a systems panel in here, otherwise you’re going to have to feed me verbal instructions. This isn’t exactly my expertise, you know.”

“I am aware of your technical training and skill levels,” the computer replied, the pulses barely registering on the equipment.

“All right,” he grumbled, not expecting the computer to elaborate. “Just keep me from tripping.”

“Your continued wellbeing is vital to the success of the mission,” the computer replied.

“I didn’t need an answer,” he complained, carefully watching his step.

The systems panel was deep within what turned out to be a labyrinth of narrow passages between, and often through, complex machinery, situated in a slight, rectangular widening that might have reminded him of a coffin if it wasn’t composed of the same machinery that he’d been squeezing himself through for the past ten minutes. The moment he slipped into the area, the panel light up, immediately displaying the schematics he’d earlier requested. It took a moment to translate the information into things that he understood better, then he called up the diagnostic program to pinpoint the location of the fault, and grunted in disappointment.

“That’s in the aft section,” he muttered. “Where are we now?”

“Current location is Midship, Deck 17, Sector Seven G.”

“Great,” he glumly replied. “So, nowhere close to the fault.”

“This is the only operations panel within the atmospheric apparatus,” the computer told him.

He puffed in exasperation. “You could have mentioned that earlier.”

“The information was irrelevant,” the computer replied.

“Right,” he sighed. “Stupid me for not asking.”

Thankfully, the computer didn’t reply, leaving him in peaceful silence as he studied what he needed to know. Before he tapped out of the panel, he spent a moment regretting not bringing a pad with him to download the information for later use, and mulled over a few times all that he’d learned, to seat it in memory, before saying, “Take me to the precise location of the fault.”

The bee led him off and it was a long, excruciating journey of twists, turns, and sidling along most of the way before it halted, indicating that they had arrived. Outwardly, nothing looked wrong. Identical to every other section that he’d squeezed through, there were no visible leaks, no signs of damage, and even his meter registered no difference in atmospheric mix outside the machinery, which left him no choice except to dig in and inspect every single square inch of the area for anomalies, no matter how minute, a task that he knew, with much trepidation, was going to take hours.

And he proved to be right. It was awkward holding the flashlight at weird angles just to see behind the tightly crammed equipment, but he couldn’t allow anything to go unchecked. After a long, tedious search, it finally occurred to him that he didn’t know if he could do anything once he located the fault, so he asked, “Can you replicate the parts I might need, or are they already in stores?”

“You take the bridge,” came a faint reply. “We get the drive section.”

He froze. That tiny voice echoing through the crevices wasn’t that of the computer. It was faint with distance, and its metallic quality came from careening off the pipes around him. And it wasn’t supposed to be there. He was certain of that.

“You think anyone’s around?” another voice said. This one sounded anxious.

“We’ll soon find out,” a third voice replied. He sounded self-assured. Competent.

“Let’s go,” the first said. Commanding, but not belligerent. The leader? “We don’t have much time. Let’s just get what we came for and get out before that thing hits.”

Get what they came for? Get out? It sounded like they weren’t part of the crew, which meant only one thing. Pirates. There to loot the ship of its resources. He kept still and listened for more, but nothing else came. He didn’t even hear them moving off. But he’d heard enough. Pirates had boarded the colony ship, and he had to repel them.

Fan Fiction (unedited)

The Doctor swooned in the middle of spinning the spinny gizmo as his entire life flashed in front of him. As he fell, his companion swooped in and caught him under the arm.

“Doctor?” she demanded. “What’s wrong?”

The Doctor shook his head to clear the cobwebs. “There was… a disturbance… as if… a dozen lifetimes were simply… extinguished!”

His companion wrinkled her nose. “What’s that supposed to -?”

The Doctor interrupted her question by leaping out of her grip and furiously flipping switches and turning dials in a mad dance around the TARDIS console.

“- mean?” she finished, goggling at the Timelord’s wild scurry. Shaking her head, she mumbled, “I suppose this means another weird adventure.”

The Doctor didn’t answer. He suddenly threw the toggle and the TARDIS boomed, throwing them both off their feet and signaling another landing. Recovering quickly, the Doctor grabbed an umbrella from the stand and bolted through the door.

He ran like a madman through the fluffy white grass, easily outpacing his companion, who was already at a disadvantage in that race. His feet hardly hit the ground as he sprinted and leapt across the meadow, spotting his quarry in the distance.

It was hard to believe that the man lying in the grass was in distress. His beaten felt hat was tipped over his eyes, blocking out the green sunshine, and his long coat open to the breeze. His arms were comfortably nestled behind his head, and his ridiculously lengthy rainbow scarf was gathered beneath his neck to serve as a pillow. But the closer the Doctor got to him, the more he felt it. Something dark. Something hungry. Something voraciously gobbling at the man’s personality. And the Doctor knew that if he didn’t act fast, the man would die!

“Ah!” the Timelord said, spotting the low-hanging powerline directly over the endangered man. “I love convenience!”

He leapt, using all his strength and momentum to propel himself towards the line. The low gravity helped, but not enough to reach the entire distance. Fortunately, the Doctor thought to bring his brolly. He hooked the handle over the line, and on his descent took hold of the other end, aiming his feet right at the prone man’s chest. The instant of contact, thousands of volts shot through both, kicking the prone man into sitting bolt upright.

“What was that?” the man demanded, his hat flying off and exposing a wild mop of curly brown hair.

“Sorry,” the Doctor told the man, looking up ruefully at his umbrella, now hooked and half melted to the powerline far above. “It was the first thing I could think of.”

“Ah!” the man grunted, then he cried out in pain, clutching his head as if it was going to explode.

“Doctor!” a woman cried out from nearby.

The Doctor turned to the sound of his name and his jaw dropped. Hardly able to articulate the word, he gasped, “Romana!”

Romanadvaratralunda raced across the puffy meadow with a fierce, determined glare, her eyes burning into the Doctor as she rapidly approached. She held him in her glare until she dropped to one knee next to the man and put her arms around him. “Doctor, what did he do to you?”

“I didn’t do anything,” the Doctor told him. Then, glancing at the powerline above, he added, “Well, nothing that wasn’t necessary.”

“It’s in my mind, Romana,” the other Doctor hissed, pressing his temples as hard as he could. “Something’s eating away at me from inside!”

“And if we don’t stop it,” the Doctor interjected, “Then I won’t exist!”

Romana looked up in shock. “You?”

The Doctor offered her a crooked smile.

“But that’s forbidden by the Laws of Rassilon!” she scolded.

The Doctor hesitated, then quietly said, “Much has changed since then.”

Romana studied him warily for a moment before turning back to her Doctor. That incarnation was in such intense pain that he was effectively out of the conversation, though, so she turned back to the other.

“What do we do?” she demanded.

“Whatever it is, it’s eating his personality, his will,” the Doctor told her. “I can feel it myself, like an echo of a memory that I’ll never have. We need to drive it out of him before it’s too late.”

Romana thought for a bit, then said, “You could link your wills!”

“Too… powerful…” The earlier incarnation could barely get the words out. “Two… not… strong enough…”

The Doctor glanced back in the direction of his distant TARDIS. “I’d never make it in time to get the others.”

Romana scowled in deep concentration, then thrust herself to her feet. “Be right back!”

With that, she bolted back along the path she’d flattened in the puffy grass. As the Doctor watched her go, full of memories of similar runs with her, he heard his current companion shout, “Doctor! Where are you?”

Before the Doctor could answer, Romana reappeared carrying a strange weapon. It looked like a 1940’s serial ray gun complete with concentric discs along the barrel and chrome trim. As she approached, she checked its settings, and then she stopped a few paces away from them. The Doctor scowled suspiciously at her, then threw up his hands when she leveled the gun at him.

“Wait!” the Doctor pleaded. “Romana!”

“Relax, Doctor!” she admonished. “This isn’t what you think! It’ll put your mind in touch with your other incarnations across space and time, so you don’t have to fetch them here!”

The Doctor scowled even more suspiciously. “How long have you had that?”

She rolled her eyes. “Just something I cobbled together recently. Now, hold still!”

“Wait!” the Doctor cried. “How do you know it -!”

She pulled the trigger and a weird pulsing ray shot from the ball at the barrel’s end, enveloping both Doctors in a shimmering silver aura.

“Works?” the Doctor finished before realizing that he was somewhere else. The place was dark and seemed to extend forever in all directions. A strange gray mist clung to the ground, dampening the cuffs of his trousers. He looked down, then around, and muttered, “Well, then!”

“I’d say it worked quite well, wouldn’t you?” his younger self said as he settled his big floppy hat over his curly locks.

“Did you know about that?” the Doctor demanded, scowling at himself.

“Not a clue,” he told himself. “But then, Romana is something of a tinkerer, like me!”

“How are you feeling?” the Doctor asked himself.

“Well,” his younger self hummed sagely. “It’s still eating away at my will, but otherwise…”

“What’s is this all about?” a crotchety old Doctor demanded, hobbling into view.

“Yes,” a flamboyantly dressed Doctor said airily, striding out of the dimness. “I should like an answer to that, too!”

A tall, stout woman appeared, looking ready to take charge. “Isn’t this a fine reunion!”

“Excuse me?” a short Doctor with a bowl cut demanded, lurching into the group and pointing at the woman. “Who are you?”

“Who are any of us?” the woman demanded, then spread her hands to indicate dozens of Doctors emerging from the shadows.

The Doctor gazed in wonder. “I didn’t know there were so many!”

“Past, present, and future,” one of the new arrivals stated, her long coat seemingly in homage to the afflicted Doctor. “Every one of us is here to answer the call! That’s what family is all about!”

The brown-coated Doctor grimaced, then swayed weakly. The Doctor caught him just in time.

“He’s fading!” he told the rest of him. “If we’re going to do this, we must do it now!”

“All right, everyone,” the tall woman told the rest. “Link our minds!”

“Now!” The flamboyant one gave the cue, and dozens, scores of Doctors linked minds. The feedback was blinding.

The Doctor looked around. He was back in the meadow, and Romana was hastily tossing aside a crackling ray gun. The instant it hit the ground, it burst into a million brilliant sparks, then simply ceased to be.

Romana stared ruefully at the burnt circle of bare ground amidst the fluffy grass. “It didn’t work!”

“What?” the afflicted Doctor loudly demanded, brushing himself off with his hat. “Nonsense! It worked perfectly!”

“Doctor! You’re all right!” Romana chirped cheerfully.

“What do you mean, all right?” the Doctor grumpily returned. “I’m perfect!”

Then he hemmed a bit before adding, “Thanks to you, of course.”

She shook her head wryly, then asked, “What was it, Doctor? What happened?”

“Well,” the Doctor hedged uncertainly. “The details are fuzzy, but I believe your little invention worked.”

“It put us in touch with our other incarnations,” the Doctor added. Then, scratching his head, unsure how to put it without revealing any of the future, he added, “It might have worked a bit too well.”

Romana scowled. “The point being?”

“The point being that we defeated this little fellow,” her Doctor said, holding up something bright pinched delicately between thumb and forefinger. All three peered at it intently.

“What is it?” Romana asked breathlessly, intrigued by the thing.

The older Doctor recognized it. “It’s a Willgrim.” He scowled thoughtfully.

“I’ve never heard of them,” Romana confessed.

“They usually go by unnoticed,” the Doctor told her and his younger self. “They just take a sip of a person’s will and move on to another. And they’re usually harmless.” He peered even closer at the tiny alien. “I wonder why this one is different?”

“They only eat willpower, you say?” Romana asked.

“Yes,” the Doctor confirmed.

“Well, it’s obvious, then,” she airily replied. “It took one sip of the Doctor’s enormous ego and got drunk on it! It just couldn’t help itself!”

“And who can blame it?” her Doctor shot back indignantly. Then he smiled with enormous teeth. “No one can resist my sweet disposition!”

Romana frowned at the sparkly dot the Doctor held so gingerly. “Well, what do we do with it, now?”

“We let it go, of course,” her Doctor said. “It can’t help it if I go down so well!”

“It won’t hurt anyone else,” the older Doctor told them. “Besides, I think it’s learned its lesson about over-indulging!”

Romana made a wry face. “If you think so, Doctor.”

His younger self opened his fingers and the spark zipped away.

“Doctor?” the older Timelord’s companion called in the distance. “Where did you go?”

“I should go,” he excused himself. “I’ve polluted the timeline enough for one day.”

His younger self tipped his hat to the Doctor and Romana gave him a nod, and the Doctor rushed off to rejoin his companion. On the way, he couldn’t help glancing upward and regretting the loss of the umbrella.

Blocked

He stared at the screen for a long time, deliberately thinking of nothing, and not even its brilliant glow sparked anything good. It wasn’t writer’s block. There were plenty of ideas pouring into his mind, but all of them were dark and morbid and had no place in either his head or in the book. He wanted brighter things to write about, not the stuff that currently muddied his thoughts. And he only had the in-laws to blame for it.

It was bad enough before, when it was just his own low self-esteem trying to drag him down, and it got worse after their visit. But it wasn’t their fault. Not really. They were unimaginative people, and it wasn’t meant as an insult. They simply didn’t understand what drove him to decide to retire early, or why after thirty years in the workforce, working sixty hours and more a week for a scant salary, he would forsake that existence to follow a life-long dream. He knew they meant well, at least in their minds. They simply believed that if you weren’t making the biggest paycheck possible every other week no matter how many hours of the day you needed to sacrifice to the god of money, then you weren’t really working, and that if you weren’t commuting daily to a workplace, you were unemployed. They were the sort who considered homelessness and poverty as choices that people make and were terrified that their daughter would become one or the other because he was causing an “untenable financial drain.” They didn’t understand that he had already built a nice cushion that would sustain them until and if he sold a book, or until his retirement kicked in, whichever came first, although he was so late in life that the latter was most probable. And they wouldn’t understand the loathing he had developed for working those ten to fifteen hours a day for poverty wages for people that were ungrateful for his dedication and yet had come to expect it of him. And they certainly wouldn’t understand the contempt he held for anything short of his immediate family if it took him away from the one thing keeping him sane.

Still, their little talk was both juvenile and condescending. The mother-in-law had already coerced her husband well before their arrival to give him the “When I was younger, I worked ten jobs” speech, and she launched into the “unsustainable” lecture, both completely forgetting the decades of dedication he’d put into their version of the work ethic and dismissing any feelings he had for the subject. And forgetting that they were speaking to a grown-up who had already done a lot of soul-searching before making his decision. But he’d been polite, had bitten his tongue, had listened to them, and then civilly told them that he would consider their advice before reminding them that any decision made was his and his alone. And it had worked to maintain any remaining goodwill between them although he could tell they didn’t appreciate his answer.

He knew what would happen after they left, and sure enough he was right. Their own daughter, a victim to their expectations since birth, fell into her usual after-visit spiral, and he had to endure days of complaints about her mother’s meddling. As usual, his wife internalized it all, considered it her fault that they didn’t trust her with her own finances, and it took everything he had to stabilize her again. In concentrating on his wife’s needs, he wrote little to nothing that was good or acceptable while he worried about her state of mind when she was at work. Luckily, her mother had refrained from the usual harassing phone calls that only served to prolong her struggle.

But this time there was an aftereffect of their visit that had nothing to do with his wife. The mother-in-law’s words had become lodged in his head and there was no one to help him deal with them, no one he could talk to about it. He already knew what would happen if he said anything to his wife or even mentioned a hint of his own discontent with her parents. It would send her into a deeper, darker spiral that would take him days to settle, so once more, he bit his tongue and kept everything to himself. It was better to deal with the demons alone. He’d done it before, and he would do it again.

But ever since that day, the dark thoughts that he’d managed to keep at bay had moved out of the shadows and into the open. They invaded his usual writing, his usual thoughts, and had twisted the book into something dark and unrecognizable. He had to delete pages of writing and hours of work to purge them from his book, and in the end, it left him empty of any ideas other than the unsavory kind.

It was mostly his mother-in-law’s fault. His father-in-law was more laid back and accepting, and the mother more controlling. She had poisoned his mind like she had her daughter’s and nurtured the nagging doubts and self-sabotage that were always present, always making him second-guess himself, telling him that nothing he did would ever be good enough for publication or for anyone to see. He’d had those same awful doubts way before her visit, and he would have them well after she was gone, and they didn’t need her help in any way. In short, he resented her for it. He didn’t need any help tearing himself down. He’d gotten quite good at it already.

But he couldn’t really blame them. They were unimaginative people that couldn’t believe anyone could live any way other than their own. Theirs was a good life. They had money and had friends with money, and still wanted to put in a couple of hours at their fun jobs every week despite their age. But they didn’t have a creative bone in their collective bodies. They didn’t understand the need to create anything other than wealth, or the need for creativity for creativity’s sake, and they wouldn’t understand his need to leave a mark on the world that lasted after he had passed. They wouldn’t understand that leaving the legacy of his children wasn’t quite enough for him, nor would they understand the decades-long sacrifice he had already made of his dreams or that now, before he died, he wanted to author that novel, even if it were already too late for him.

So, he told her that he would consider her advice, and later his wife told him to not listen to her mother and just keep doing what he was doing, but the damage was done. The negative feelings were in full bloom, and their aroma tainted everything he wrote. So, after erasing his third or fourth attempt that night, he found himself staring at a bright screen that did nothing to lighten his mood. If anything, it made things worse. With all that potential right in front of him, with the ability to make of the words anything that he imagined, knowing how he wanted to take the story but blocking himself from writing because of the maelstrom of bad feelings that his mother-in-law had stirred up, he was afraid to type anything at all lest it come out dismally and unpalatable, so he just sat on his kitchen table chair at the desk he’d bought for his wife decades ago, which she had rejected, by the way, and stared at the flashing line, trying to not think at all.

But it was useless and only encouraged the darkness, so eventually he closed the document and sighed heavily. Writing wasn’t just a dream or a calling. It was therapy, the place where he could express everything that was bothering him through his characters and their exploits. Without it, like on days when he was unable to write for one reason or another, he grew edgy, tense, touchy. He knew it, of course, but he couldn’t help it. And his wife understood it in that unsaid way that spouses have and gave him the space that he needed until a bout of writing cheered him up again. Now, he couldn’t have any much-needed therapy until he exorcised his demons, but he couldn’t exorcise his demons without writing about them.

And he couldn’t sully the book with them. He didn’t dare. But then, he realized he hadn’t written for the website in a while. It was a place where he could allow his creativity to roam freely, even though most of the stuff he posted wasn’t of the greatest quality. Mostly, the stories there were quick thoughts or half-baked ones, but they were always fun to do, and it had been a long time since he’d posted anything. It was time to correct that neglect.

He opened the browser and logged onto the site, and by the time he’d clicked the button to create added content, he knew what he wanted to write about. But it took a while to figure out where to begin, and then he started typing.

“He stared at the screen for a long time, deliberately thinking of nothing, and not even its brilliant glow sparked anything good. It wasn’t writer’s block. There were plenty of ideas pouring into his mind, but all of them were dark and morbid…”

The End

To Our Last Breath

She successfully got around the rioting crowds and the insanity and finally made it! It wasn’t easy, but she was used to slipping past angry liberals and violent protestors, and it was only a matter of time before she reached safety. That’s what she kept telling herself, and she was right, as usual. She made it, and everything was going to be all right.

No one had touched the building. No one had set it on fire or hung out in front of it, and there were no squatters around when she went inside, either. No one had taken any notice of the place, thanks to an expensive army of psychologists and engineers that made it invisible to everyone’s perception. In saner times people passed it every day without so much as a glance, and they had told her that no one could even describe the place if asked. The higher ups in the Party had paid too much for it to fail, but they couldn’t help bragging about it at their parties, and she’d been shrewd enough to listen in on the right conversations.

It was an exclusive place. Only the mega wealthy and the top ranks of the party knew about it, and you only learned about it if they liked you. And once she heard about it, she made sure she was one of those they liked. She always voted in the right way on the Floor, said things in public that helped their agenda, and used her followers to build the America they wanted, the way it was always supposed to be. And she’d been lucky enough to make a little on the side and boost her following, which she carefully invested to help her rise in the ranks. She’d shown them that she had what it took to be one of them, and they in turn had invited her in on the secret, little realizing that she already knew.

They were down there, now, waiting for her. They had to wait. Now that the world was going to hell in a handbasket, they would need go-getters like her to lead the way into a bright new future, a strong, bold future free of limp-wristed liberals and their whining about the environment and the dispensable. They were going to make a nation based on strong Christian values like the Bible intended. No more abortions! No more homosexuals! Simply good old-fashioned marriage between a man and a woman, under the One True God! No more heathens or idolators! And best of all, she was going to be one of those in charge of it all!

The bunker was seated deep beneath the building. First was an airlock, strong enough to resist a nuclear blast, then an elevator that was locked off at the bottom once everyone was inside. Then, as far as she knew, there were years and years of fresh air, food, and water for the occupants, as well as every luxury imaginable. She guessed there were some things they would have to go without, like new episodes of Chamber of Gods, and new movies, and she supposed there wouldn’t be any shopping at Tracy’s for a while, but in these times, you just had to make sacrifices.

She had sacrificed much already. It was a long, grueling series of horrible parties and abominable acts that managed to wrangle her onto The List, but she was certain it was worth it to survive the impending disaster. Keeping that in mind helped her through the more disgusting moments.

She found the airlock just where they said it was, and it looked exactly as described. The small room in the rear of the place was dark, the only lights being the dim LEDs on the control panel, and a pulsing light beneath the intercom. The airlock looked like it would survive a nuke, but the controls wouldn’t, not that she had to worry about a nuclear attack. That wasn’t going to happen. Everyone on the planet was going to suffocate before they could even consider a nuclear war.

She paused over the panel trying to remember the combination. The constant fear of discovery as she made her way to the building had crammed the sequence far back in her head somewhere and it was going to take a moment to retrieve it. Her brain wasn’t made for that kind of nonsense. She was a higher thinker and couldn’t be bothered to remember numbers. But she had to. They told her they couldn’t afford to let the code get into the wrong hands, so they made her memorize it, and then repeat it back to them, and luckily, there was nothing wrong with her short-term memory, and she was able to trick them into thinking she had it. After staring at the panel for a little while, she pulled out her insurance policy and punched in the numbers written on the little scrap of paper. What they didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them. Right?

The panel buzzed nastily and turned a bloody red before resuming its normal look, but that was all that happened. There was no ding of the elevator door, no car waiting to take her downward. The airlock remained shut and sealed. Scowling, she tapped the numbers in again, wondering if she’d made a mis-punch, but as soon as she touched the last number, the panel blazed and buzzed again before resetting itself. She tried a third time, frantic now, stabbing the numbers so hard that she could have cracked the glass, only to have it razz her again.

This time, she stabbed the intercom button. There was a tiny beep afterward, then it answered in a staticky voice.

“What?” The man on the other end was chuckling, and she wondered if he was laughing at her or at something else.

“It’s me! Representative Delphine Etiquette. This stupid panel isn’t working, so you have to let me in!”

“Representative…who?” There was a slight pause, which peeved her. How dare he? ‘Representative who?‘ Everyone knew who she was! Anyone with a phone and a Chirper account knew who she was! People living on the bottom of the ocean knew who she was! He had to be some ignorant moron, some little person that the Party kept around to do their grunt work, and who had just enough cranial capacity to punch a button or two! It was the only explanation! But before she could let him have it, he said, “Oh! Is that you, Della?”

“Of course, it’s me!” She refrained from adding, “You idiot!” She didn’t know who she was talking to, now, but it might be someone that she couldn’t afford to insult. And if it was some idiot, then they would pay for the affront after she got inside. “Let me in!”

“Where were you?” the man demanded. “We looked all over for you!”

She doubted that. None of them dared wait for her at the airlock, so she doubted they risked going out amongst those rabid commie liberals. No, they stayed in the relative safety of the airlock room and as soon as the rest of them were there, they hustled down to the bunker. They didn’t have to put up with the things she had to. They weren’t as brave as she was.

“I’m here now!” she snapped, trying her best to control her temper. But the sounds of rioting and the angry shouting were getting louder, and she could feel the crowds getting closer. Time was running out. Fast. “Let me in!”

“Oh…Della…” The man sounded nervous. Suddenly she wanted to vomit, and she wasn’t sure why. Then, he said, “I can’t!”

“What?” she demanded. Then, desperately, she snapped, “Just send the car up! Let me in!”

“I can’t, Della,” he told her, and he didn’t sound sorry. “It’s already locked down!”

“What?” she desperately demanded. She pounded helplessly on the control panel, but it just razzed her again, so she shouted into the intercom, “Let me in!”

“I can’t!” he replied, and he didn’t sound as frantic as she was. “Once it’s down, it stays down! I thought you knew that! Besides, we thought you were going somewhere else!”

“Somewhere else?” she yelled. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Where else was I supposed to go?”

“Well, we didn’t know!” the man defensively replied. “We thought you maybe got a better offer somewhere else!”

Somewhere else? She wouldn’t dignify that with a reply. How many people did he think owned their own environmentally sealed shelter stocked with rations and luxuries to last for years, or at least until the earth was livable again? Who had the money? Well, at least who had the money that she had access to? Although the idea was flattering that she could fit in anywhere, she couldn’t believe the man was stupid enough to think there was anywhere else to go.

“Send the elevator up!” she loudly demanded, pounding frantically on the control panel.

“Can’t!” the man replied, his voice telling her he was losing all interest in the conversation. “Besides, what if this is a trick? What if there’s an ugly mob up there waiting to get access?”

“What?” She couldn’t believe it. Still, she glanced around into the empty darkness and shouted into the intercom, “I’m the only one here! Now let me in!”

“Look, Della, I can’t do that,” he wearily replied. “That’s not the way it works! You see -!”

“I don’t care about that!” She yelled at the top of her lungs. “I’m on the list! I’m supposed to be down there! Now send up the elevator!”

The man didn’t reply, not for a long time and she panicked. What if he’d just cut the intercom? He obviously didn’t care if she lived or died. Desperate, she shouted, “Hey! Hey, down there! Did you hear me? Let me in!”

“I heard you,” the man replied. His voice was quiet and unemotional. “And so, did Mr. Dumphy. And he told me to thank you for all you did for him over the years. Without you, he wouldn’t be where he is today.”

“Mr. Dumphy?” He was down there, too? Of course, he was! Where else would he be? He was the man! He oversaw the Party! Heck, he was the Party! After the disaster, he was going to shape the future of the nation, remake everything in his own glorious image. Now, she had to get down there! He would need her in that brave new world, and if she was able to garner some of his power and influence for herself, then all the better.

“Then, he knows how helpful I can be to him,” she told the man. “He might need my help!” Then she had a flash of inspiration and she asked, “Is he there right now? Is he next to you?”

The man didn’t reply right away, and once more, she worried that he had simply cut off communication. That was the last thing she wanted. Without it, she couldn’t convince Mr. Dumphy to send up the elevator. She couldn’t convince him to save her life! But then the man came back and said, “Mr. Dumphy appreciates your contribution and wishes you good luck in future endeavors.”

Then, there was a tiny beep, and the ready light went out. At the same time, the control panel went dark, and no amount of pounding would turn it on again. She knew because she slammed her fists against it for a long time trying to change its mind.

Exhausted, panic overwhelming her, she sank to the floor beneath the control panel and began to cry. She couldn’t stop it, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to. She was screwed, but unlike the other times when the tears flowed, there was no one around to comfort her, and no one to manipulate with them. She was alone, and like the angry little people outside, she was going to suffocate to death as the last wisps of breathable air disappeared just like the trees.

She didn’t know which was worse, the betrayal at the hands of her own people or dying like a commoner on the threshold of safety and comfort. As she wept, anger mingling with her tears, she vowed revenge. Who did they think they were screwing with? She was Representative Delphine Charlotte Etiquette, for god’s sake! How dare they treat her like that? She had over a million followers on Chirper! How dare they?

“Not invited to the party?”

The strange voice scared the life out of her. Scrambling to her feet, she desperately glanced around for the source and found a man leaning in the doorway to the room. She pressed herself against the elevator doors, wishing they would pop open and let her escape the scary man. But then, a tiny hope kindled in her. What if he was on the list, too, and he was simply arriving late, like she had? And what if he could somehow get her inside, where she belonged?

“Who are you?” she asked suspiciously. Something about the way he slouched against the doorframe told her he wasn’t who she thought he was. Or rather, who she hoped he was. “What are you doing here?”

He moved his arm, and she flinched, but he wasn’t pointing a gun at her or throwing something at her, or even yelling. All he did was point at the elevator and say, “They kick you out, then?”

“No!” She was offended that he would even think that! Didn’t he know who she was? Then, she wondered if that might be a good thing. Deciding to feel him out, she explained, “I was late, like you. I don’t suppose you know another way inside?”

He looked at her steadily, as if studying her, then he shrugged. “There is no other way in.” Gesturing at the elevator, he added, “That’s it.”

“No!” she protested, then turned and pounded on the doors. “No! There must be another way in! There must be!”

“Don’t waste your breath,” he advised, but she ignored him and continued her assault. He wasn’t going to tell her what to do! She dug her nails in between the doors and tried to pry them apart, but it bent her nails painfully and she had to stop. It wasn’t doing any good, anyway. The doors remained tightly shut.

She slammed her fists against them and sagged hopelessly, gasping for air. She’d never felt so winded before, and she was big on cardio. Her lungs rasped like she had hay fever, and while she gasped for breath, the man remarked, “Feeling a little under the weather?”

“Shut up!” She growled at him before she realized that she was alone with him and that anything could happen. She had to remain civil, at least until she could figure out who and what he was and how she could manipulate the situation. “Sorry. It’s just so annoying, you know?”

“The air, or your friends?” he asked. She didn’t dignify the question with an answer, but she couldn’t help gasping and wheezing, and she didn’t want to think about why. After a moment he said, “I know you, don’t I?”

She tensed. His reaction would depend upon whether he was one of the Party, or not. But instead of telling him who she was, she waited for him to stumble onto it. It was usually better that way. It gave her the chance to figure out the enemy, to find the advantage in the situation and either attack first or play the victim, depending on whichever was best for her.

“Yeah, I do,” he said, and she tensed, readying herself. “You’re Delphine Charlotte Etiquette, aren’t you?”

He sounded neither hateful nor enthusiastic, so she couldn’t figure him out yet. Some people just held themselves in check until they suddenly exploded, and others ended up fawning all over her, and both ways could get annoying. But she really hated it when they forgot her title.

“Representative Delphine Charlotte Etiquette!”

“Sorry, your highness,” he quipped, joking. “I meant no offense!”

For some reason, the joke annoyed her more than the terrible things those commie liberals yelled in her face. But she wasn’t going to give him that satisfaction. Pulling herself upright with all her dignity, she turned and faced him proudly. “Who are you supposed to be?”

“I’m supposed to be working,” he told her, his voice grinning. “But the riots put a stop to that. Put a stop to everything, for that matter. And since there didn’t seem to be any point in working while the world crashed down around me, I decided to take a little walk, and heard some shouting. So, I came in to have a look, see if I could help.”

“Really,” she sarcastically replied, amazed at how stupid the man sounded. She wouldn’t have guessed it, though, just looking at him. He seemed normal. But she could still use stupid. Stupid was easily manipulated. “What’s your name?”

“Ah!” It sounded like he was taken off-guard. “Well, you can call me Bob”

“That’s it? Just Bob?” This might be easier than she thought.

“Just Bob,” he happily confirmed. “I like to keep it simple.”

She nodded. “What are you doing here, Bob?”

“Like I said, I came to see what all the shouting was about,” he said. “Sounded like someone was in trouble.”

She decided to take a risk. “I am in trouble, Bob.” she decided to include him in her troubles. That always worked on men like him. “We both are! My friends locked us out, and now we have nowhere to go. Unless you know of any safe places to stay?”

“Safe from the death of all the trees?” the man asked. “Safe from slow suffocation? I don’t think there’s anywhere like that left.”

She wanted to cry again but somehow managed to pull herself together. There had to be somewhere left that was safe, somewhere where there was enough air to last a long time. Somewhere where she would be safe from all those infidels that wanted to tear her to pieces.

“There has to be somewhere,” she insisted, trying to jog his memory. If he knew of a safe place, then she would make him take her there. If not, then she could at least use him for protection. Either way, he had a use. “Anywhere at all.”

“I don’t think so,” he said, and there was an edge to his tone now. “Not now. Not after everything you did to make this happen.”

Her heart leapt into overdrive. He was one of them! One of those godless liberals! And he knew who she was and what she did. But it wasn’t all her fault! There were others to blame, others that were more to blame than her! She was only doing her job! She was only doing what she knew was best for everyone!

“I did nothing wrong,” she protested with conviction.

He leaned against the doorframe again, and she finally noticed that he blocked the only way out of there other than the sealed elevator. She would have to get him away from it if she had a chance to escape. Then, all those hours of cardio would once more be put to the test, but first, she had to lure him out of the doorway. But then, she reconsidered. Where would she escape to? The riots in the streets? The murderous hordes of liberals more than willing to tear her to pieces just for who she was and what she stood for? She was safer in the room, away from all of that, at least until she could figure some things out.

“Name one thing you did right,” he challenged her.

That raised her hackles. How dare he question her honor like that? It was true that she hardly paid any attention to the names or the contents of the bills she voted on, but she voted according to the Party’s agenda, and they only had the best interests of the American people in mind. Granted, the only American people that counted were the wealthy donors, but what was good for the goose was good for the gander, right?

The man patiently waited, like he had all the time in the world. But she didn’t know what to say. It wasn’t fair! In all her years in the House, no one had ever treated her so poorly. Well, the fake news networks had, but no one watched them anymore. Real Americans watched ORN and Vole News, where they knew how to treat an elected official.

“The Save Our Skies Act!” she blurted, suddenly remembering it but only because it had such a weird name. She would have called it something better, like the Etiquette Initiative, or something. “That was a great piece of legislation!”

“The bill that completely de-regulated carbon emissions for factories and made sure the EPA was no longer allowed to enforce restrictions, past or present, on offenders?” the man asked.

She didn’t like his tone, or the insinuation, but she remembered the talking point. It had worked then to shut them up, and it would work now. “That bill lowered prices at the store and brought back American jobs!”

“That bill only allowed factories to pour as much filth into the environment as they wanted to,” the man replied. “They pocketed the money they saved and put it into stock buy-backs and increased dividends for their investors. And it didn’t lower any prices in the stores. In fact, it didn’t even bring back any jobs. Instead, industry cut the staff monitoring their pollution and put thousands of people out of a job through down-sizing.”

“That bill helped people!” she insisted. She’d heard that chestnut before, but they didn’t have any proof to back it up.

“Rich people,” he smugly replied. “And your bill helped widen the gap between the very rich and the very poor and helped eliminate the middle class. It threw thousands out on the street when they could no longer afford housing and raised the child mortality rate from hunger and environmental poisoning.”

Now she was sure that he was one of them! He thought he had all the answers! Well, she wasn’t going to lose to him! If he wanted a fight, then he was getting one!

“It lowered prices for the little people!” That would get him. His type always whined about the little people. And what else was there? Oh, yes! “And fought inflation, which is more than your president did!”

“How can you believe that?” he asked, sounding hurt. “What is the cost of breathing? Of drinking clean water? Of being able to find land that wasn’t poisoned so you could grow crops or raise livestock? Your bill did more than pollute the air. It ruined the soil and made the water undrinkable.”

Maybe it was the air, or maybe he was getting all emotional, like liberals do, but he choked on his own words. Maybe, she thought, the lefty lies were finally getting to him, and maybe he finally saw the light. There was no way that she was responsible for anything bad happening to the Earth. It was the factories’ fault, not hers. She was just trying to help her donors get what they paid for, that’s all. The rest was their responsibility!

He kicked away from the doorframe and spread his arms wide. “Well, I guess you can see the cost, can’t you? Did you think this happened for no reason at all? Or that your legislation had nothing to do with it?”

“It didn’t!” she shot back. “Leading experts said -!”

“Said that this was a natural progression of the Earth,” he interrupted, sounding as if he was reciting by rote. “Said that there was nothing to fear, that the Earth would naturally absorb excess carbon and that it would take hundreds of years before the world became unlivable. Plenty of time to fix it, they said. Nothing we needed to worry about. Nothing to be concerned with!”

He gestured again. “Do you call this nothing to be concerned with?”

She really hated him. “It’s a phase -!”

“That the world needs to get through,” he finished for her. “Give it a few years for the Earth to get used to it. Then everything will be all right!” He took a step towards her and asked, “How long can you hold your breath?”

She really, really hated him, and she was so peeved that she couldn’t speak. Not that he would listen anyway. All he would do was interrupt her again. Typical liberal attitude!

“Anyway,” he said, getting control of himself again, “There’s nothing we can do about it now. The damage is done, and so is humanity.”

Suddenly, she panicked and slammed her fists against the elevator doors. And when that didn’t work, she darted for the intercom and stabbed repeatedly at the button, desperately muttering, “Come on! Come on! Answer the phone!”

“Do you really think it’s better down there?” he asked, and he was deliberately keeping his voice calm just to spite her. “They have -what?- three, four years of food and water down there, and maybe a few more years of air before it runs out? And then what? They emerge into a world purified of all toxins to start a new conservative world of their own, free of all outside influences?” He softly scoffed. “How long do you think it’ll really take before the damage is repaired on its own? Decades? Millenia? Never? And what happens when the people down there finally come up and see that the world is still a mess? What do you think they’re going to do without any provisions from below or any means to find them above?” He stepped towards her again. “Do you really think any of them have the slightest chance of surviving?”

She really, really, really hated him, and wouldn’t dignify his remarks with an answer. She was sure Mr. Dumphy had thought it all out and planned for every contingency. It was how he did business, not the legitimate ones that everyone razzed him about, but the other, extra-lawful stuff that everyone did if they wanted to stay on top. He’d gone decades without getting caught, and that was only because of those busy bodies in the liberal media and all those whistleblowers and leftist judges. So, he had to have seen this coming and had to have planned for it. But she wasn’t going to live long enough to find out, and suddenly, she wanted to cry again.

He didn’t come to comfort her, like weak men always did, and for a second she wished that he had. Instead, he maintained his distance, and said, “We’re probably better off dying quick.”

Sobbing, she sank to the floor, her back against the control housing. She didn’t know why, but words just poured out of her along with her tears. “I don’t want to die! Not like this! Not like this!”

This time, he sat next to her and put his arm over her shoulders. Without knowing why, she put her head against his neck, tears searing in her eyes. She hoped they burned his skin the same way.

“At least you won’t die alone,” he gently told her. “I’m right here.”

And they just sat there. He didn’t attack her. He didn’t call her names. He wasn’t angry at her, although he had every right to be. All he did was sit and hold her gently, without saying a word. And she couldn’t help thinking that it might be her fault, at least partly, for the way things turned out. She could have voted against the bill, gone against the Party, been the maverick that her idol claimed to be. But she’d toed the line, and reaped the rewards, at the cost of the world. But if she had gone the other way, had voted against the bill, it wouldn’t have done any good, anyway. The vote was assured with or without her, so she might as well have reaped the benefits of following orders. And now, it was all gone. Everything she had ever done was meaningless, and someone she didn’t like and who didn’t even like her was giving her comfort in their final days. Staying with her until their final breath.

“You know, this doesn’t change anything,” she told him in a quivering voice. “I still don’t like you.”

“I know,” he replied, giving her a friendly squeeze. They sat in silence for a while, then he said, “If we’re still breathing when the shouting is over, do you want to find something to eat? I’m starving.”

She settled into his shoulder. Typical liberal. Always thinking with their stomach!