CHAPTER 20

"Rocky's body has heated up the whole room. He hasn't moved."

"Nnnn!" Every centimetre costs everything he has.

"I've got one chance at this." Finger on the screen-select button.

Inverse square of radius. 20m → 75m. Force becomes one-fourteenth.

"My inner ears and my eyes are not enjoying the discrepancy." He turns and vomits on the wall.

"I stand on the consoles. The control panels are 'down' now." He positions himself over Rocky's body.

"Good. God." He puts Rocky back down. Cannot move him like this.

"Burns my arms in several places during the process. I'll deal with that later."

"My shoulders scream in pain. Two hundred pounds of alien held up by two thin straps digging into my collarbones."

"The lab is a disaster. Everything is in piles all over the ceiling. Only the bolted-down things remain."

"The force is less up here. I'm closer to the centre of the centrifuge. The higher I get, the easier things will be."

"My little section barely fits us both. Rocky's workbench wasn't bolted in place. It's on the ceiling now."

"The airlock door sits open on my side. He used it to come save me." The weight of that settles.

"I see the destroyed box that was once the airlock-control panel." Smashed by debris.

"I coil my muscles and mentally count to three."

"I pull the lever and leap toward my compartment." Blazing-hot ammonia floods the airlock.

"My eyes burn like they're on fire. My lungs feel like a hundred knives are having a dance-off."

"Multiple injuries. Intubate." The mechanical arms grab him. Something shoved down his throat. Then darkness.

"I wake up covered in medical equipment and pain." Blood oxygen: 91%.

"Rocky is right where I left him in the airlock." How do you tell if an Eridian is dead?

"I order the crew compartment to rotate. Very, very slowly. Three minutes to turn around."

"Analog dial indicators in Eridian base-six numerology. I've seen enough to translate."

"A drum-shaped glass cylinder, about a foot in diameter. I patch the crack with epoxy."

"I smear Astrophage along the inner wall and drop the cotton swab next to the sample probe."

"The cotton swab has changed. Just a little bit. It's… fluffier." Ryland hunkers down and stares.

"If something is changing unexpectedly, document it." One frame per second time-lapse.

"Two fuel bays remaining. The Astrophage in those bays must not see Adrian again."

"I only spot it because there's a small frosty buildup around the edges. Air escaping into vacuum gets cold fast."

"Epoxy takes a long time to set when it's cold. I just hold the patch for longer. Fifteen minutes."

"I use all my strength to try to pull them apart. I can't." He nods. This might work.

"Human hands are better clamps than any tool I might have in the lab." He stands there, pressing.

"Yes, it's ridiculously dangerous. But I just don't know if Rocky will survive without help."

"It takes so long for that drill to get through the xenonite, I actually calm down out of boredom."

"The bit is immediately launched back into the box by the pressure. A whump. Eridian air rushes in."

"Webcams aren't designed to work at 210°C and 29 atmospheres. The solid steel box is an excellent heat conductor."

"All of a sudden, Rocky's carapace vents belch out black smoke. Like blasting an air duster into an old computer."

"I sweep back and forth, trying to hit each vent one by one. The latter vents don't cause nearly the commotion."

"I shut off the pump." He looks at Rocky through the xenonite wall. Waits.

"I spend the rest of the day building containment. Eridian air will have to breach three seals to get in."

"Well, buddy. I've done everything I can. Now it's up to you."

"One of his arms moves. I'm not imagining it this time. I'm not imagining it."

"Then a sound through the xenonite wall. One word. Faint as a whisper. 'Question?'"

"You're alive! I don't think I've ever been happier to hear a single word in my entire life."

"He's upright. That's progress. He's moving. Slowly. But he's moving."

"Need warm. Very cold now." He spent all his heat on me. Now he's too cold.

"His body generates heat, but he burned through his reserves. He needs warmth from outside."

"I can run a wire through one of the xenonite tube joints. Heating element on his side. Power on mine."

"I help." Rocky's arm snakes through the tube joint and guides the wire from the other side.

"Warm is good. More warm please." Best three words I've ever heard.

"You came into my partition. You breathed my air. You almost died because of me."

"You are friend. Friend do that. Is simple." The most Rocky sentence ever spoken.

"Seven of nine tanks are gone. I have two left. That's not enough to get home."

"Two tanks. Not enough to go home. Not enough to finish anything. I have to rethink everything."

"Human air very bad. Like acid." His carapace didn't fully protect him. Internal damage unknown.

"Unknown. Maybe weeks. Maybe never full." The most frightening thing Rocky has ever said.

"Safe zone is 40 to 120. Ideal is 96. The heater can manage that. This will work."

"Temp now 82. Rising. Is good. Much better." The heater is working. Rocky is warming.

"The sampler. It's still in the airlock. I forgot about it entirely in all the chaos."

"The sampler! Did we get Astrophage from Adrian? That's what all of this was for."

"ASTROPHAGE DETECTED. The sample worked. We got what we came for."

Two survivors. One sample. The data Rocky almost died for is in hand. What does the Astrophage tell them?