A Planet For Emily

PART II

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Rods was on his back, half inside an access way in his engine room, doing something with the nuclear reactor’s plumbing. Unfortunately, as he often did when he was in the engine room, he was also singing.

“I polished that knob so carefullllleeeey

That now I’m the ruler of the queen’s navy

He polished that knob so carefully

That now he’s the ruler of the queen’s navy”

Eve shuddered. Rods had relaxed a long-standing rule about the cruise director entering the engine room for Suzanne. Eve was not Suzanne but Rods had not bothered to reimpose the rule. In any case, as Suzanne had pointed out in happier times, no one would willingly listen to his singing.

“As office boy I made such a mark

That they gave me the post of a junior clerk

I served the writs with a smile so bland

And I copied all the letters in a big round hand

He copied all the letters in a big round hand

I copied all the letters in a hand so free

That now I am the ruler of the queen’s navyeeee”

She kicked his foot, the only part of him she could see, and cleared her throat. The singing stopped.

“Whaaat? I’m busy maintaining the ship here, so we don’t all die horribly in space.”

“You’ll want to read this. I printed it out for you.” She held out a bit of paper. Rods slid out from the access way and took it.

“They want more money?” he exclaimed after glancing through it, “to get two people out. But I paid for a basic passage back for three.”

“Everyone is desperate to get out now, so they’re charging heaps more for the places, and not so many ships go there.”

“Bastards,” muttered Rods. “I should be in that trade. So where is the fiancé Richard? Don’t see him here. Just Suzanne and your mum.”

“I just got two words in a personal message from Suzanne ‘Richard dead’.’”

“What! Any idea how it happened?”

“I checked. There was a big shoot out at the port authority between some rebel group and security, I suppose it must have happened then.”

“Richard was with port control? I never knew the man but I’m sorry for Suzanne’s loss.”

Rods meant it. Of course, it had also occurred to him that Suzanne was free but, having finally shaken off the fever and started exercising again, he was now thoroughly ashamed of the way he had acted, both to Suzanne and later. The elder Clark sister had tried to speak to him about Suzanne but too soon and in the wrong way. But for the tactful intervention of Emma, the partner of barman Matt on Lucifer III, both Eve and Suzanne would have been fired. Being almost fired twice would not make Suzanne appreciate The Maxwell or its skipper, Rods had decided, and with Fermat opening up she would have lots of other opportunities.

“What about it?” said Eve, taking the paper back and waving it. The gesture reminded Rods of Suzanne.

“About what?”

“The extra money. There’s not enough in the trading account.”

“No there wouldn’t be.”

The extra costs of the rescue had drained The Maxwell’s account and Eve, unlike Suzanne, had no affinity at all with cruise directing. She much preferred to operate The Maxwell’s sick bay as a clinic which, to Rods’ horror, involved having all sorts of unauthorised people in the crew area. Far worse, the issue of paying for medical treatment and drugs never seemed to arise.

“We’ll have to use some of my reserve. I hate using my reserve; it’s why it’s a reserve.”

Eve had never heard of this reserve but she was relieved there was some money. “Then can we pay the fare?”

Rods thought he was making a total fool of himself over a woman, again. Suzanne would return, declare that she had found a better job elsewhere and leave The Maxwell and its grumpy skipper behind. But he could not leave his cruise director and her mother to their fate. He sighed.

“I suppose we’ll have no peace around here until all the Clarks are together, but you and I will go over the accounts later. They’re in a bad state. Max’ll take over what she can, and prompt on payments for your clinic. Those fees barely cover the cost of the drugs you use. I’m not operating a charity.”

Eve hated her account-keeping duties on the Max. She was a doctor not an accountant, but she nodded.

“Max release the money needed on the paper.”

“Acknowledged.”

“We’ll talk at dinner,” he told Eve. “I get nightmares if the reserve is used. It has to be made up again.”

He pulled himself back inside the hatchway.

Eve fled before the singing could start again.

“He polished that knob so carefully..”

Suzanne slipped in beside her mother on the narrow bunk they shared. She was exhausted but the shared bunk was only theirs for a few more hours. Then they had to give it up to another couple, a husband and wife. Suzanne wanted to tell them about Fermat. Before she left she had heard that design work was well underway for the mass production of comfortable three and even four-bedroom units for one family – just one family! There would be parks, playgrounds, sporting fields, schools, Hospitals, theatres and restaurants - all of the amenities and amusements which previous generations had taken for granted, and even despised as part of the excesses of over-consumption. There would be law and order. During the previous rest period for Suzanne and her mother, someone had been knifed a few metres away, in the next narrow aisle along, over a bed. A bed! thought Suzanne. The ladies had heard the whole thing, from the shouted argument to the sound of the knife blow but had kept quiet.

As conditions became worse, people had forgotten their humanity. Anyone who collapsed through sheer exhaustion, an increasingly common occurrence, was trampled on, robbed and left to die. In these conditions, the mere hint of a habitable planet was likely to trigger hysteria. Suzanne had not even told her mother where they would go, only that they were getting out to a promise of a cabin on the Max – she hoped that were true – and that had to be soon. Up until a few months ago, Joselyn Clark could have passed as an older sister. Now she was grey and tired and willing to simply stop struggling and give up.

Suzanne was so concerned over her mother and anxious about getting out that she had no time to think about Richard, to mourn him properly as a fiancé should be mourned. When she arrived at Earth Station, her mother had been waiting in a massive crush of people hoping to get out, with a last message from Richard on her PA. It said that he loved her, then there was a single letter ‘g’ and nothing else. He had been executed, her mother said, along with almost 200 others, and just pushed out of an airlock. Part of Suzanne’s world fell away. But conditions were so bad that she had to push his loss out of her mind. She would have felt obliged to do something about Richard’s parents, her parents-in-law to be, but they had been killed in one of the many gang battles now occurring throughout Earth Station, for their bed space and rations. Richard’s brother was still alive but Suzanne made no attempt to contact him. She had to face facts. She had to admit to herself that the death of her parents-in-law to be had simplified matters. She and her mother were all she could manage, and that would be a stretch.

Passages had been reserved out for three people, but prices kept on going up. With Richard’s fare no longer needed she had traded that in, but the shipping lines wanted still more. That had prompted the message to Eve, and it had to be fast, or they would put the prices up again. Suzanne dozed off, sleeping fitfully, dreaming that she was back playing cards in the wardroom of The Max. She had played cards with Rods, with the robots making up the table and had mostly won, much to Rods disgust. In her dream the beds did not have a stale, unwashed smell. She was jolted awake by a buzz from her PA.

“Yes!” Rods had come through. She couldn’t be too fired. She would beg forgiveness when she got back to the Max, but they had to go now, or the price would go up again. She shook her mother.

“C’mon up, we’re leaving.”

“Little time yet,” muttered Joselyn.

“I meant leaving Earth Station,” whispered Suzanne.

“Huh!”

“Ssssh! Pack up now. Don’t say anything. Just get dressed, pack and go.”

They had little to pack. Just sports bags slung over their shoulders

“Exhausted!” said her mother, as they set off.

“You can sleep on the ship,” whispered Suzanne. “There won’t be much else to do. Trust me!”

But first they had to get onto the ships waiting for them.

“What about my friends?” asked the older women as they squeezed between the endless rows of bunks. “What about the Jenners?” That was the couple that was to take the next shift on their bunk

“You can message them from the ship – until we are out of range.”

Suzanne became aware of a rhythmic thumping and shouting from the great hall, where they were heading. They had to go through the hall to get to the spaceship docks, and the port authority where Richard had worked.

They squeezed down a long corridor full of people, Suzanne keeping an eye out for the thieves that were now a constant problem on the station. She could now hear the words of the chant. “This must end! This must end! This must end!” Over and over again, and everyone chanting was thumping one foot or another on the ground at every word. The authorities had been working miracles in feeding and finding beds for everyone, Suzanne knew, but they had been overwhelmed by the enormous numbers of refugees being pushed into the station by the Zards in clear violation of their treaty obligation. She had heard that some academics had justified the Zards’ actions on the grounds that the Zard race had a different cultural view of legal conventions. She hoped the academics were the ones without beds.

“This must end! This must end!”

They squeezed through a crush of people at the entrance to the main hall, Joselyn clinging to Suzanne’s jacket, the same one that Rods had involuntarily bought for her when they first met on Lucifer III. This was a danger area. People had lost their lives here. She felt in her pocket for the composite material knife taken from the petty officer who tried to jack the Maxwell. She had carried it through several check points without difficulty and gripping it inside her pocket, was reassuring. It was as if Rods was watching over them, and that too she felt reassuring.

No one paid any attention to them, absorbed with listening to the drama unfolding at the far end of the gigantic, dome-topped hall. The Clarks were not going that way, fortunately, but they still had to weave their way across the hall. Suzanne wedged through small gaps, dragging her mother along behind her with her free hand. The noise was deafening.

“This must end! This must end!” The residents chanted over and over again, as if by shouting and stamping their feet, they could change reality. Dimly, Suzanne was aware of someone at the far end of the hall, on a platform behind a fence and a row of guards, speaking through a public address system. She could barely hear the words.

“We are doing.. best.. no choice... Zards”

The crowd stopped chanting and started howling, reminding Suzanne of proto-Zards in the mound, after they had lost the queen. That was not good. The Clarks were now about half way across the hall and making a little better time. She tripped on a body and almost fell but kept going. There was no time to look at the body and no way to help. A few metres on she tripped on another body and almost panicked when a surge in the crowd kept her off her feet for a moment. If she had fallen among the others that would have been the end of her, but she clutched at the back of someone’s collar and, by pulling the man’s shirt down, managed to keep herself upright.

“Hey!” The man turned around with some difficulty in the jostling crowd. “Watch it!”

“Sorry,” said Suzanne.

The man’s eyes widened at the sight of her. His hair was long and unkempt and he was unshaven, as most of the men at Earth Station now were, but with heavy jowls that made being unshaven most unfortunate. He was also heavily built and thought Suzanne might be an easy mark.

“You owe me,” he said, grabbing Suzanne’s left arm, the same arm which Joselyn Clark was now holding onto. She was angled away from him, her hand in her pocket, clutching the knife.

“I said I was sorry,” said Suzanne, her voice barely making an impression against the howling. At the same time, she flicked off the knife’s scabbard with her thumb, as it was designed to let her do. Rods had taught her a few things in the occasional session on combat aboard the Max and she was now trying to remember all of it. Act fast, he had said. Act hard and fast.

The crowd started chanting again.

“This must end! This must end!”

“Whaaat! Just don’t go yet, darling, until we’ve talked about this.”

No one was paying attention to them. Suzanne abruptly jerked her knife upwards into the man’s forearm, then whipped it back into her pocket. The man yelled and let go grabbing at his suddenly bloodied arm. Everybody started yelling “what’s the matter”. Suzanne pushed her way into the crowd, dragging her mother. By the time her assailant looked again she was gone.

“She had a knife,” Suzanne heard him yell over the din. She took her hand out of her pocket.

“A knife? Who?”

“That girl..”

She heard no more and, after another minute of hard trudging, it ceased to matter. Suzanne almost lost her feet again when the crowd surged. This time Joselyn, not yet a spent force, saved the day by leaning against another man, who did not object, and wrapping one hand around Suzanne’s waist. They battled on. If they could get to the space port entry they only needed to present their PAs for scanning and they would be in.

Ahead of her, Suzanne became aware of yelling, quite different from the chanting they were retreating from, then she saw a wire barrier above the heads of the crowd. The semi-circle of reinforced wire mesh had been added since she had been there just yesterday. She battled on against the thickening crowd to the barrier. People were pleading with guards wearing crash helmets and armed with batons, to be let in.

“But we’ll die out here,” she heard one shout above the din. “You have to let us in”.

Suzanne didn’t hear the response, as she struggled on, but she heard the pleader say, “I don’t want to die here”.

She saw that the crowd was simply too thick around the gate. She left her mother wedged between two men who looked too big to be moved easily and pulled her way forward so that she could just reach the wire to one side. She opened her PA, set it to show the tickets they had been sent and pushed it against the wire. The guards were standing with their eyes downcast, so as not to look at the pleading crowd around them. Suzanne banged on the wire a couple of times, but they were used to people banging on the wire. She set her screen to flash. One of the guards, a woman, finally looked up, meaning to yell at her to stop then paused, and strode forward.

“Stop that!” she yelled, but it was a cover for a furtive glance at the PA’s screen. She looked at Suzanne, mouthed “gate” and stepped back. They could nothing for the thousands pleading to get in, but Suzanne had tickets. The guard backed away, yelled “stop that” again, and turned to walk as casually as she could to her supervisor.

The chant continued to roll in from the main hall. “This must end! This must end!” But now it was mixed with the occasional bangs and screams.

Struggling to get her mother and get as close as she could to the gate, Suzanne had little time for the bigger picture, but she could just hear the distant echo of someone trying to make themselves heard over the din through a PA system. The crowd heaved and jostled. Then she heard “the fence is to be electrified. The fence is to be electrified.” Warning beeps followed.

Goodness!

With the strength of desperation, Suzanne grabbed her mother and wormed her way through the crowd, just as everyone was trying to back away from the wire. Red lights were flashing.

“Owww!” someone had been caught on the wire. It wasn’t designed to kill, just to discourage. Port officials, all armed with the cattle prods Rods had used, opened the gate just in front of Suzanne. She put her PA in front of her and set it to flash.

“That’s her,” said the guard Suzanne had seen before, “with the flashing unit”.

“Quick,” said someone.

A burly guard reached in, grabbed Suzanne’s arm, and hauled. She wiggled. Her mother grasped what was going on and pushed and suddenly they were through. The gate was slammed and barred behind them and Suzanne and her mother were on their knees.

“Thank you! Thank you!” she gasped.

“What’s this? Who are these people?” It was the port overseer, three layers above Richard in the hierarchy, but he remembered Suzanne the moment he saw her.

“Oh right,” he said more kindly. “Richard Bright’s partner, umm…”

“Suzanne,” said Suzanne, “this is my mother, Joslyn, and we’ve got tickets.” She held up her PA. The older man, round-faced and grey haired, glanced at it and nodded.

“Very well, get them in quick. Tell their ship to hold. No clearance until those two are on board.”

“Thank you,” said Suzanne.

“Sorry about Richard. It was a tragedy.”

She was about to reply that it was all a tragedy, but the overseer abruptly turned back to the guard supervisor. “Anyone else to come?”

“’ Bout five more,” said the supervisor. Suzanne, still clutching her mother’s arm started walking towards the oversized hatch way entrance “But we had enough trouble getting those two in.”

“We’re going to have to call it soon. There’s just nothing we can do.”

“Poor people,” muttered the guard who had first checked Suzanne's ticket and was now walking with them.

In the main hall, there was a deafening bang and a flash. The deck trembled beneath their feet. From her time in the mound Suzanne knew what an explosion felt like, and that a really good response was to run in the opposite direction, which she did, dragging her mother toward the port authority entrance. The crowd had the same idea but, with nowhere to run, became a panic-stricken, seething mass of immense power that surged away from the bomb blast, crushing those nearest the wire barrier. The barrier began to crumble, the supports tearing away from their anchors in the floor. Suzanne started to run. It was only a few metres but her mother stumbled over someone knocked down as the guards rushed about.

“Now we go,” yelled the port overseer. “Everyone inside, now!”

Suzanne pulled her mother along by main force as the older lady tried to regain her feet. A guard grabbed Joselyn’s other arm and they took the last two metres in flying steps.

“We have to turn off the generator,” Suzanne heard on guard scream above the din.

“Forget the generator, Lisa,” screamed another. “Get in.”

There was a mad rush through the port entrance and Suzanne fell headlong onto the carpet. The supervisor pulled the hatch shut and pulled the lock across, just as what remained of the wire barrier, and a wall of bodies, propelled by a massive crowd behind them, hit the wall with a whump, that shook the whole lounge.

“Lock down all windows and doors to the port,” said the port overseer into his communicator.

Suzanne heard several distinct clicks, then a tremor and the lights went out.

“What happened,” exclaimed someone in the darkness.

The blue emergency lights came on.

“Whoever is behind this,” said the guard supervisor, “must have blown the main reactor transmission lines – maybe one of the reactors.”

“The idiots,” said the man who had helped Joselyn through. “It’ll take too long to repair. A lot of people will die.”

“Did everyone get in,” asked the supervisor, looking around.

“Lisa isn’t in,” said the guard who had spotted Suzanne’s tickets. “She went to turn off the generator.”

“Idiot,” said the guard that had pulled Suzanne through the gate.

“A dead idiot now,” said the supervisor.

Outside the vast crowd started baying as if they were wolves howling at the moon. Then the banging started. At first it was just rapping, up high as if the people outside were standing on the bodies of those crushed to get at the wall. Then it became louder. Two more explosions could be felt through the station’s decks. The howling increased in intensity and the tapping became a rhythmic thumping.

“I don’t like this at all,” said one of the guards.

“That’s it,” said the port overseer. “I’m calling it. We have no choice. General evacuation. Everyone to the ships. You all have places. We’ll have to up and go.”

The guards sighed.

“Yes but go where?” said someone.

“Beg mercy from the Zards,” said another.

“Precious good that’ll do us,” said the guard who had helped the Clarks.

“We’ll decide when we get aboard,” said the overseer, “for now it’s all out and hold those ships for our passengers. They will be there in a few minutes.”

The unmistakable sound and vibration of a drill started up on the outside wall.

“We really need to go,” said the overseer in alarm. “Everybody go, go!”

They all headed off, the same guard who had helped the Clarks through supporting Joselyn. They went through a second hatchway which the overseer slammed shut and locked. Suzanne looked around. The other guards were out of ear shot. She tugged on the overseer’s sleeve.

“Nowhere to go, right,” she whispered.

“No, nowhere,” said the official. “No space on any of the colonies and the Zards are likely to just blast us out of space.”

“I’ll say this once. Don’t put it in any digital system. Don’t tell anyone else. Just tell the other ships to follow you.”

“Go on.” Her conspiratorial tone caught his attention. She was aware that her mother was also listening.

“Head for Lucifer III,” she whispered. “Ask for Matt the barman or Justin a law man there. Say Suzanne Clark of The Maxwell sent you and say Emily.”

“Emily?”

“Yes, Emily. Don’t try and search for it. There is a child Emily but it’s just a code word.”

“What happens then?”

“Don’t ask. Don’t tell anyone. Mum, this conversation seriously didn’t happen. Write it down but don’t, above all, put it in any sort of digital system. Don’t even go directly to Lucifer III. Don’t tell the other ships anything at all if you can help it.”

“Matt the barman or Justin the law man,” said the overseer, also lowering his voice. He repeated it twice.

“Write it down. Nothing digital.”

“Nothing digital. Got it.”

A whump and the shudder of another explosion, this time close at hand made them all jump.

“They must’ve blown a hole in the other bulkhead,” said the overseer. “Let’s go people, let’s go.”

They jogged down the corridor to the ship lounges, Joselyn having recovered enough to keep up. With a brief thanks and “we’ve only got minutes”, the supervisor and guards went down one exit and Suzanne, after glancing at her ticket details, down another with her mother trailing behind.

There were two groups of two men in front of different, microscopic departure lounges, packing up their equipment. One group on the left leered at her, while the other group just seemed sad to see the two women. Suzanne was relieved to note that she was to go with the sad group, but then she saw one of the leering group, a man so fat that he seemed to be about to burst out of his space freighter uniform, sidle over to whisper to one of the sad group, eyeing Suzanne as he did so. The second sad man continued to look at the screen he was holding, and tapping on it.

Another explosion rocked the station. Suzanne thought there was a draught then it was cut off.

“All hatches are being sealed now,” said the sad man who took Suzanne’s PAs to check her ticket. “Life support has been shut off. “That’s the end. The final, stone cold end. You two are the last.”

“Okay, Madam,” he said to Joselyn, go through.”

“Just a moment,” said the other man in the sad group. “There’s been a change of plans.”

“What?” said Suzanne.

The man with Suzanne’s PA looked around in surprise.

“What change?”

“Ms Clark, here,” said the first man reading her details on the screen, “will have to go with the other ship, The Paris.”

“George, what are you doing?”

Suzanne was aware of the two officials from the other ship staring at her hungrily.

“Sorry, we’re full. We can take your mother, but Ms Clark will have to go with these two gentlemen.”

“I can’t be separated from my daughter,” said Joselyn.

“Our tickets are for this ship,” said Suzanne.

“Can’t be helped,” said George firmly. He was a balding man with a receding chin who would not look at “We’re full up.”

“We are?” said the other man.

“Normally only one could go, but as it happens the other ship has a vacancy for an assistant cruise director, and I see you’re listed as a cruise director.”

“Well sure, but..” Suzanne had changed her job description thinking it might help her get passage.

“So that’s settled,” he said, backing away, “The Paris is going in much the same direction and has similar ports of call. Geoff, they’re screaming for us to get on. Mrs Clark, you have seconds to get on board.”

“Sorry,” said Geoff, also backing away. No one wanted to be left on Earth Station. “Your mother will be well taken care of.” He turned. “If you want to get on, Mrs Clark, you must come.” George and Jeff headed for the door.

Suzanne had a pretty good idea what was happening but thought of the knife in her pocket and that there would be plenty of people on board the ship, and she could hear banging on the hatch to the departure lounge area.

“Mum, you must go.”

Geoff stayed by the airlock hatch, but there were shouts telling him to close it and come.

“Not without you,” she protested. “I just can’t without you.”

Suzanne pushed her towards the hatch.

“I’ll be alright, just remember Rods and The Maxwell. Eve is on The Maxwell.”

“I understand, The Maxwell but we can’t be separated.”

“I’ll take care of her,” said Geoff, who seemed upset at this turn of events.

“Please drag her in,” she said to Geoff. “She won’t go, otherwise”

“Okay,” said Geoff, relieved that he could end this scene.

“Tell Rods what’s happened, and that I’ve gone on The Paris.”

“The Paris,” said her mother, But..” Geoff pulled her through the airlock hatch which shut behind them.

Suzanne turned back to the other two men.

“C’mon darling,” said the fat man, “we’ve gotta go too, and now.”

Suzanne went, thinking that the scanners had been turned off, so that they would not detect the still bloodied knife.