His eyes wander down my body, then he launches off the doorframe so hard that he bounces off the other side. “Oh! Sorry. Yes. I’ll be over there, um, over somewhere.” He staggers out of the room.
I chuckle to myself as I get dressed. This wasn’t that unusual a situation back in the Cusk Academy. But I gather that the group barracks in Dimokratía were a different sort of place. I wonder what Kodiak would do with the information that it was him I’d been thinking about.
I find him before the yellow portal, tapping the wall around it. “Hi,” he says without looking at me. His face is still flushed. “So this is unusual, right, this discoloration?”
“The ship could have launched with a repaired portal. And missing two spacesuits.”
“And with an off-grid blind room,” Kodiak finishes. “Sure it could have. It could also be powered by a pod of narwhals.”
“Did you just make ajoke, Spacefarer Kodiak Celius?” I ask.
He jumps into the zero g, floating before the portal while he taps the wall. “It even sounds different,” he reports. “Softer and thinner.” He presses his fingertips into the surface. They leave dents that slowly plump back out.
I jump up to float beside him. “I think you’re right.”
“OS, open the yellow portal,” Kodiak calls.
“There is no need for you to access the engine room right now. For your safety, I will not allow you in.”
Suddenly Kodiak reaches back and punches the wall. The impact is great enough to send him shooting across the open space. He kicks off the orange portal and returns to the yellow.
“Spacefarer Celius, I cannot allow you to damage the ship,” OS says. Rover has appeared, arms outstretched, waving in invisible currents.
“Noted,” Kodiak says. He rears back and punches again.
“Holy shit!” I say, wisely.
“Spacefarer Celius,” OS warns.
Rover zips nearer, flailing its arms.
“Keep Rover away,” Kodiak barks at me as he floats back to the yellow portal and again slams his fist into the surrounding wall. This time it shatters, polymers tinkling to the ground. While Rover zips in his direction, Kodiak lifts himself up into the opening, avoiding the yellow portal entirely by shimmying one shoulder and then the other into the organs of the ship.
“What are you doing?” I cry as Kodiak disappears to the waist. Rover continues its approach. I move to block it, holding on to the handle of the yellow portal so my body is in the robot’s way. “Stop,” I say.
But Rover does not stop. It skirts right up to me and reaches out an arm. Before I know what’s happening, an arc of blue light zaps me.
The jolt hits me right on the forehead. My mind is all noise and ferocious, prying light. I lose track of the next seconds, then come to in gravity, on the ground. Rover is midway up the wall, like a demon in some exorcism reel, one arm toward me and the other in the direction of the broken wall. Kodiak has disappeared into the ship’s interior.
“OS,” I call, “disengage Rover.”
“For your own safety, I cannot allow you to compromise the ship’s integrity.”
“You justshockedme!”
“I did.”
“Kodiak, stay up there, Rover’s right below,” I warn.
“Not a problem,” Kodiak calls down, his voice echoing tinnily. He’s far off inside the ship. “Are you coming?”
“I don’t think Rover is a fan of that idea.” As if to emphasize my words, it taps its little robot claws. I wonder how many volts it can channel into those shocks, if what I received was just a warning.
“I’m heading toward the engine,” Kodiak says. “I might not be able to get my shoulders through some of these spaces. Hold on, I’m going to find a route around.”
“Be careful!” I call after him, before leveling my focus on Rover. “OS, is there some reason that you needed to print a new frame for the yellow portal?”
“The ship mechanicals aren’t designed for human habitation. Only in the very center of the engine is there sufficient radiation shielding. Kodiak is endangering himself needlessly by exploring in there. You should convince him to return.”
