“I forgive you, buddy. For everything. Goodbye.”
I thrust the sharp end of the pipe through the edge of my ball. Air hissed out through the pipe—I’d just given the vacuum a straw to suck on. The pipe grew cold in my hands. I pushed harder and wedged the pipe into the valve handle’s spokes.
My hamster ball stretched and ripped near the puncture site. I had a fraction of a second left, at best.
With all my strength, I shoved the pipe to the side and felt the handle give.
Then physics showed up with a vengeance.
The ball ripped itself to shreds. One second I was pushing on the pipe, the next I was flying through the void.
All noise stopped immediately. Blinding sunlight assaulted my eyes—I squinted in pain. The air fled from my lungs. I gasped for more—I could expand my chest but nothing came in. Weird feeling.
I landed faceup on the ground. My hands and neck burned while the rest of my body, protected by clothing, roasted more slowly. My face ached from the onslaught of burning light. My mouth and eyes bubbled—the fluids boiling off in the vacuum.
The world went black and consciousness slipped away. The pain stopped.
Dear Jazz,
According to the news, something’s very wrong with Artemis. They say the whole city went offline. There’s been no contact at all. I don’t know why my email would be the exception but I have to try.
Are you there? Are you okay? What happened?
I awoke to darkness.
Wait a minute. I awoke?
“How am I not dead?” I tried to say.
“Huu m uh nn’ d’d?” I actually said.
“Daughter?!” It was Dad’s voice. “Can you hear me?”
“Mmf.”
He took my hand. It didn’t feel right, though. The sensation was dulled.
“C…can not…see…”
“You have bandages over your eyes.”
I tried to hold his hand, but it hurt.
“No. Don’t use your hands,” he said. “They’re also injured.”
“She shouldn’t be awake,” said a woman’s voice. It was Doc Roussel. “Jazz? Can you hear me?”
“How bad is it?” I asked her.
“You’re speaking Arabic,” she said. “I can’t understand you.”
“She asked how bad it is,” Dad said.
“It’s going to be a painful recovery, but you’ll survive.”
“N…not me…the city. How bad is it?”
I felt a pinprick on my arm.
“What are you doing?” Dad asked.
“She shouldn’t be awake,” Roussel said.
And then I wasn’t.
—
I drifted in and out of consciousness for a full day. I remember snippets here and there. Reflex tests, someone changing my bandages, injections, and so on. But I was only semi-alert until they stopped groping me, then I’d return to the void.
“Jazz?”
“Huh?”
“Jazz, are you awake?” It was Doc Roussel.
“…yes?”
“I’m going to take the bandages off your eyes.”
“Okay.”
I felt her hands on my head. The padding on my face unwrapped and I could finally see. I winced at the light. As my eyes adjusted, I saw more of the room.
I was in a small hospital-like room. I say “hospital-like” because Artemis doesn’t have a hospital. Just Doc Roussel’s sick bay. This was a room in the back somewhere.
My hands were still bandaged. They felt awful. They hurt, but not too bad.
The doc, a sixtysomething woman with gray hair, shined a flashlight in each of my eyes. Then she held up three fingers. “How many fingers?”
“Is the city okay?”
She wiggled her hand. “One thing at a time. How many fingers.”
“Three?”
“Okay. What do you remember?”
I looked down at my body. Everything seemed to be there. I wore a hospital smock and I’d been tucked into the bed. My hands were still bandaged. “I remember popping a hamster ball. I expected to die.”
“By all rights, you should have,” she said. “But Dale Shapiro and Loretta Sanchez saved you. From what I hear, he threw your body over the Armstrong–Shepard Connector. Sanchez was on the other side. She dragged you into a rover and pressurized it. You were in vacuum for a total of three minutes.”
I looked at my gauze mittens. “And that didn’t kill me?”
“The human body can survive a few minutes of vacuum. Artemis’s air pressure is low enough that you didn’t get decompression sickness. The main threat is oxygen starvation—same as drowning. They saved you just in time. Another minute and you’d be dead.”
She put her fingers on my throat and watched a clock on the wall. “You have second-degree burns on your hands and the back of your neck. I’m assuming they directly contacted the lunar surface. And you have a pretty bad sunburn on your face. We’ll have to check you for skin cancer once a month for a while, but you’ll be all right.”
“What about the city?” I asked.
“You should talk to Rudy about that. He’s right outside—I’ll get him.”
I grabbed her sleeve. “But—”
“Jazz, I’m your doctor, so I’ll take good care of you. But we’re not friends. Let go of me.”
I released her. She opened the door and stepped out.
I caught a glimpse of Svoboda in the room beyond. He craned his neck to look in. Then Rudy’s impressive build blocked the view.
“Hello, Jazz,” Rudy said. “How do you feel?”
“Did anyone die?”
He closed the door behind him. “No. No one died.”
I gasped in relief and my head fell to the pillow. Only then did I realize how clenched up I’d been. “Thank fucking God.”
“You’re still in enormous trouble.”
“I figured.”
“If this had happened anywhere else, there would have been deaths.” He clasped his arms behind him. “As it is, everything worked in our favor. We don’t have cars, so no one was operating vehicles at the time. Thanks to our low gravity, no one got hurt falling to the ground. A few scrapes and bruises is all.”
“No harm, no foul.”
He shot me a glare. “Three people went into cardiac arrest from chloroform poisoning. All three were elderly with preexisting lung conditions.”
“But they’re okay now, right?”
“Yes, but only through luck. Once people woke up they checked on their neighbors. If it weren’t for our tight-knit community, that wouldn’t have happened. Plus, it’s easy to carry an unconscious person in our gravity. And no part of town is far away from Dr. Roussel.” He cocked his head toward the doorway. “She’s not thrilled with you, by the way.”
“I noticed.”
“She takes public health seriously.”
“Yeah.”
He stood quietly for a moment. “Care to tell me who was in on this with you?”
“Nope.”
“I know Dale Shapiro was involved.”
“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said. “Dale just happened to be out on a drive at the time.”
“In Bob Lewis’s rover?”
“They’re buddies. They lend each other stuff.”
“With Loretta Sanchez?”
“Maybe they’re dating,” I said.
“Shapiro’s gay.”
“Maybe he’s not very good at it.”
“I see,” Rudy said. “Can you explain why Lene Landvik transferred a million slugs to your account this morning?”
Good to know! But I kept a poker face. “Small business loan. She’s investing in my EVA tour company.”
“You failed the EVA exam.”
“Long-term investment.”
“That’s definitely a lie.”
“Whatever. I’m tired.”
“I’ll let you rest.” He walked back to the door. “The administrator wants to see you as soon as you’re up and about. You might want to pack some light clothes—it’s summer in Saudi Arabia right now.”
Svoboda slipped in through the door as Rudy left.
“Hey, Jazz!” Svoboda pulled up a chair and sat beside the bed. “Doc says you’re doing great!”
“Hey, Svobo. Sorry about the chloroform.”
“Eh, no big.” He shrugged.
“I’m guessing the rest of town isn’t as forgiving?”
“People don’t seem that mad. Well, some are. But most aren’t.”