Project U.L.F. (34 page)

Suddenly, her world had exploded and the brightness made her wince. She was on her feet now and as her eyes adjusted to the light, everywhere she looked was orange. Her body burnt with an intensity she would never have imagined, and now, looking around, she could see that it was flames that tinted this existence, that caused the monopoly of color. She felt like she were on fire and that the flames would consume her. She thought her skin must blister from exposure to the searing heat, but when she looked at her arms she found no blemishes there. The heat was intolerable. Painful. And she realized she must get out of here.

Logic told her that to remove herself from this harsh environment she should go back the way she came. She turned to go back on herself and found herself inches from a wall of fire. There was no going back. Only forwards. She turned again and took a proper look at what lay ahead. She stood on what she could only assume was the top stair of a narrow spiral staircase. There was no banister either side, just walls of flame that leapt up as far as she could see but did not encroach over the narrow stairway. She started downward, desperate to be out of this environment and now afraid for her life.

She called for the others, shouting each of their names in turn, praying that someone might be here to comfort her, or if not, at least suffer with her. If there was an answer, she did not hear it. Scared, she ran down the stairs as fast as she could, not stopping to think where they led. At one point, she thought she might have made a dreadful mistake, that by moving, her friends would now have no chance of finding her in this peculiar place. She turned to return to her starting point and found herself face-to-face with the wall of flame. Either she was caught up in some kind of paradox or the fire was following her, forcing her on.

She had spiraled downwards for what had seemed like hours and as her spirits fell, so it seemed the heat intensified. Then, abruptly, the staircase had finished and she found herself standing at the end of a clinically straight pathway of the same width as the stairs. The other end was not visible. Still the flames towered over her. It seemed her predicament had only changed, not improved. Indignantly, she entered the corridor of fire.

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“Tomorrow, then.” Wyatt said to no one in particular. The others looked up at him but he was not addressing them, just thinking out loud. He stared into the fire as if hypnotized by the action of the flames, his eyes distant. “Tomorrow we fly.” He brought up his cup and drained it of its contents, not once removing his gaze from the flames and then he seemed to snap out of his trance. He picked himself up off the floor and brushed himself down and without saying a word more, removed himself from the circle of people and away from the glow of the fire. As the others chatted, they could hear him in the darkness preparing to bed down for the night.

“Is he always this moody?” Kate whispered to Byron.

“No, it’s just his way of preparing himself. What you’re planning to do tomorrow is no small thing. He just likes to get his house in order. Remember, you’re not just doing this for yourselves. You’re doing this for all of us. That’s quite a responsibility. If you fail then none of us are going home, and you and Wyatt could be dead.”

Kate shrugged off the suggestion with a nervous laugh. “We’re not going to die.”

But Byron could see that the possibility bothered her. She had almost flinched when he had mentioned it. She was coping with the situation by refusing to admit to herself that failing was a possible outcome. It was a gutsy approach, but not an altogether wise one.

“Still,” he said, “There’s something to be said for getting your house in order.”

She broke his gaze and looked back into the fire, contemplating his words.

As the night grew colder and the wood was consumed by the flames, the remaining members of the small band excused themselves from the small circle of company. Kate was the first to go.

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Craning their necks skyward, the others watched as Wyatt pulled himself up the rope, hand over hand. When he reached the shuttle door he disappeared inside. Kate followed him up, using the same technique but pulling her small, lithe frame quicker over the distance and with a certain grace. As she stepped onto the shuttle runner Wyatt appeared at the door again. “Here,” he threw down two small cylinders. “These are signal flares. When you get about a mile clear of here fire one up so we know you’re a safe distance away.”

“We’ll do that,” Par said, picking them up and packing them away.

“Okay, I suggest you strike out in that direction.” Wyatt pointed beyond the nose of the ship, “Otherwise we’ve got no chance of seeing the signal. Oh, and be careful out there. Just because we aren’t trapping any more doesn’t mean we can lower our guard.”

Par raised his hand to indicate he had understood. “You be careful too, that’s my ride home.” He smirked. Wyatt said nothing, just nodded and slid the door shut. Kate was surprised by the abrupt termination of the exchange and the sudden darkness.

Wyatt moved past her in the gloomy interior and clambered his way through the seats towards the light, which streaked harshly through the cockpit hatch. His silhouetted form filled the doorway for a second, almost obliterating the light, and then he was gone and Kate could hear him moving around in the cockpit as she made her own way to the doorway. She poked her head through to see Wyatt already strapping himself into the chair on her right and caught a glimpse of the others through the window as they disappeared out of view through the trees.

Wyatt looked round at her. “Look familiar?”

She cast a glance over the controls and nodded recognition. “Yeah, I think so.” She lowered herself into the cockpit and then struggled into the other seat, having to support her weight with one hand while fumbling with the straps and buckle with the other. Eventually she managed to bring the buckle and clips together with a click and she slumped forward, the belt being the only thing to prevent her from falling onto the controls in front of her. Beside her Wyatt was motionless and silent. He just sat, staring vacantly out of the window.

She pulled the control stick up between her legs, grasping the arrowhead-shaped top with both hands, like she would the handlebars of her two-wheeler back home. She felt the eight familiar buttons, one under each of her fingertips – attitude adjuster controls. These controlled the roll, pitch and yaw of the shuttle in flight. Four at the front and four at the back, but she had no idea which button controlled which unless she fired one. She gave a squeeze with her left index finger and there was a sound, somewhere between a hiss and a bark above and left of her head as highly compressed air was released. The shuttle bucked slightly in the tree.

“What the hell are you doing?” Wyatt turned on her, angry and at the same time shocked.

“Checking the attitude adjusters,” she replied, and then realized that was probably completely obvious to him. “Look, I’ve got to figure out which of these controls corresponds to which adjuster or we can’t realistically fly this thing.”

“Well isn’t there a better way to figure it out than simply firing the thing off while we’re dangling in a tree? I mean, can’t you consult a manual or something? Anyway, I thought you said you could fly this thing.”

“I can,” she protested, “But this is a pretty modern ship and I haven’t seen one like this before. There are minor discrepancies between models and classes of ship you know. Besides, you saw the way Par was climbing about in this thing. Despite our reservations, it’s pretty stable.”

“Well, have you got it figured out yet?”

“I think so.”

“So you don’t need to fire any more of those things off?”

“No.”

“Well, good.”

There was a moment’s pause as Wyatt collected himself and then Kate said, “But I can if you want me to.”

For an awful second she thought that he had missed the joke but then he chuckled. “No, that’s okay. I’d really rather you didn’t.”

For the remainder of their time they sat in relative silence, performing whatever preliminary checks they could or thought appropriate, pointing out dials and controls to the other. When the time came they would be as prepared as they could hope to be.

The flare appeared sooner than they had expected or hoped, a red star which burst through the trees and sailed gracefully into the air before fading and falling slowly back to earth, trailing a plume of gray smoke in its wake. Wyatt watched it fall below the tree line.

“I guess that’s it,” Kate said.

“I guess it is.” He turned to her. “Are you ready?”

“Yes”

He turned away from her once more and began flicking switches on the panel above his head.

“Wyatt…” She hesitated. “If things don’t go according to plan…well, what I mean is…if things don’t work out…” He looked at her with a puzzled expression on his face. “I just want you to know…” she blurted.

“Save it.” He cut her off. “You can tell me when we’re on the ground.”

She felt a sense of relief come over her, relief that Wyatt’s commitment to the task in hand had prevented her from expressing the way she felt about him; but she also felt frustration, frustration that bordered on anger because he had not been perceptive or receptive enough to realize what it had been that she was going to say. That alone troubled her. Maybe he did not feel the same way about her. She thought about persisting but the moment had passed, and reluctantly she turned her attention to the controls in front of her.

One by one, bulbs and panels became illuminated as the pair of them restored power to the stricken vessel’s cockpit until finally all of the controls hummed with electrical activity and needles and dials jumped and danced with newfound life to the sound. Wyatt pulled his control stick up between his legs and Kate watched as hers mimicked his, as if pulled by an invisible pair of hands. She grasped hold of it once again, just as Wyatt coupled the hyperdrive engine to the power, and felt the stick come alive in her hands, resonating with the same frequency as a new, deeper sound which came from the back of the ship. She looked over at Wyatt and he gave her a reassuring nod. She felt him pull back on the stick and let her hands move with it.

At first there was nothing, no sense of motion at all, but then she felt the characteristic gut sensation she always got with lift-offs, like her body was rising but her stomach had stayed exactly where it had been before. Wyatt pulled back further on the control and the metal side of the shuttle screamed as it wrestled against the giant trunk. The ship bucked awkwardly and Kate began to play the buttons on her control like a musical instrument, releasing jets of compressed air at the front and rear of the ship to keep it on an even keel as it struggled to lift itself out of the cradling, yet at the same time grasping, branches of the tree.

Wyatt pulled back further still on the control stick and the previously deep throb of the hyperdrive increased to a roar. It sounded unhealthy to Kate, like the hyperdrive was being asked to do too much. Again the metal screeched with protest but then the sound ceased and they felt a sudden, awful sensation as the tree released its grip on the shuttle and the ship rose rapidly. At that same instant a warning light lit up above their heads and a klaxon sounded. Before they could respond to it one of the panels in front of them exploded in a shower of sparks. Almost as fast as they had climbed, they fell, hitting the branches below them with an impact that made them breathless. The roar of the hyperdrive became a whine and then died. Wyatt’s eyes jumped from console to console, dial to dial, but almost as fast as he looked the readouts went blank or the needles dropped back to zero. As rapidly as they had lit the cockpit up, the lights were now blinking out again.

“Shit!” Wyatt shouted. “Shit! Shit! Shit! I can’t believe I was so stupid!”

“What? What is it?” The concern and panic was clear in Kate’s voice.

“The hyperdrive. We’ve lost the hyperdrive.”