Space Hostages Read online

  “Put down my sister,” Lena said in a low whisper.

  The Krakkiluk soldiers did put us down, or rather dropped us again, but I landed on top of the trapdoor of the airlock. I looked down at the faint glow of stars washed out in the sunlight under my hands and scrambled back as if I’d been stung. Up on their platform, the horrified adults already looked very far away.

  “Please, I’m trying to explain!” said Dr. Muldoon. “We had no way of knowing you had a claim to the planet. We did not know you even existed.”

  “You are now relieved of the burden of ignorance,” said Sklat-kli-Sklak.

  “Yes,” said Dr. Muldoon, and you had to say this for the Krakkiluks’ methods: Dr. Muldoon was getting a lot better at sounding earnest and humble. “Yes, we’re, uh . . . grateful for that. But there’s an entire population on Aush—I mean, on the moon of Quattitak. I was . . . involved in the process of terraforming, I admit, but I could hardly have done it without resources from . . .” She stopped, and I could see her wondering how much the Krakkiluks already knew about Earth.

  “From Earth,” said Sklat-kli-Sklak impatiently. “Are our translators not loaded with your languages? We know about Earth. Its seas are warm.”

  There was a pause while Dr. Muldoon tried to work out what to make of that remark; then she soldiered on.

  “Well, then, you understand. I don’t have the resources to do what you’re asking. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t promise anything on behalf of either of our planets.”

  “We have thought of that,” said Sklat-kli-Sklak. One of the other Krakkiluk crew—a smaller lobster person decorated with modest black polka dots—did something at a workstation, and the deck filled with the most unsettlingly familiar, human, ordinary noise. A phone ringing.

  And then, even stranger, someone answered it. “Hello?” said a friendly female American voice, impossible trillions of miles away. “Darla’s Dog-Grooming Dream Palace, how can I help you?”

  “I am Lady Sklat-kli-Sklak of the Grand Expanse and I carry demands from the Emperor and Empress of the Krakkiluk nations!” barked our captor.

  I had an instant to think what a wonderful place Darla’s Dog-Grooming Dream Palace undoubtedly was and how much I wished I was there, before Darla sensibly hung up the phone.

  The Krakkiluk officer did whatever they’d done before again, except this time it wasn’t one phone ringing but two, ten, hundreds—thousands—swelling to a droning purr. And then the alien chamber began to flood with human voices: “Moshi moshi.” “Pronto.” “¿Sí?” “Wèi?” “All our operators are busy. Please stay on the line.” Until that too became an incomprehensible chaos of sound.

  “Are you . . . phoning everyone on Earth?” whispered Noel.

  Sklat-kli-Sklak ignored him, of course. She resumed, in various languages, telling the world that she was very angry and wanted, on behalf of the Grand Expanse, to talk to someone about the moon of Quattitak.

  “That shouldn’t be possible,” said Josephine. She was tight-lipped and round-eyed behind her helmet, but there was a pucker between her eyebrows that meant she was curious. “How are you sending the signal through hyperspace?”

  “They’re not going to answer you,” I said through gritted teeth. It was the first thing I’d said to her since the fight on the Helen.

  Josephine met my eyes, then quickly looked away. “Rhetorical question,” she said to the floor.

  “I’m putting rhetorical questions on the list of prohibited modes of self-expression,” said Lena.

  The chorus of increasingly frightened human voices was gradually fading; you could hear distinct voices again as they vanished. “What is this? What’s happ—?” “Vi prego, non far male ai bambini.”

  Meanwhile we’re all crouched there on the ground, waiting for the next dreadful thing to happen.

  “You know what—I gave ’em a fair chance, but I’ve decided I don’t like these guys,” said Carl, drumming his fingers on the glossy red floor.

  “It’s going to be fine, Carl,” said Noel.

  Carl looked vaguely affronted. “Yeah, I know,” he said. “I’m not worried.”

  “Can you . . . think of anything?” Thsaaa whispered to Josephine.

  Josephine shook her head. I knew she was trying, though—her eyes were skimming busily over everything within sight, every surface, every button and panel and weapon and claw.

  But I didn’t see there was much she could do about the fact that we were massively outnumbered and impossibly far from help.

  “You want to kick seven million Morrors off the planet, and you don’t even want to live on it yourselves? What is Takwuk, anyway?” asked Carl recklessly. “Hey. Hey, hey, I’m down here. Spawn with a question.”

  The soldier was trying to ignore Carl but eventually had to give up. “Spawn should be silent,” he, or maybe she, said shortly.

  “Why?” asked Carl.

  “Krakkiluk spawn cannot speak,” said the soldier.

  “Really? Well, fine, but we can, so what’s Takwuk?”

  “Not Takwuk. Takwuk,” insisted the soldier unhappily. “Takwuk is . . . it is a substance derived from a plant.”

  “Is it drugs?” said Carl. “Okay, if you need an entire planet to grow your drugs on, that’s a sign you have a problem.”

  “Maybe they’re lifesaving drugs,” suggested Noel charitably. “Medicine.”

  “Is it medicine?” pressed Carl.

  “Tsshk-lu-krrt-prruck,” Sklat-kli-Sklak quacked, which went untranslated but probably meant “Tell the spawn to shut up,” so we did.

  We could hear Morror voices on the speaker system now. “It’s the Council of Lonthaa-Ra-Moraaa,” whispered Thsaaa.

  Then a new human voice spoke. It was very familiar; it was on television every day. And I’d been on Mars with its owner’s nephew. “My name is President Chakrabarty of the Emergency Earth Coalition. I believe you wanted to speak to me.”

  “Are you widowed or unwed?” said Sklat-kli-Sklak indignantly.

  “Err,” said President Chakrabarty. “No?”

  “Then where is your wife? We will not be insulted! Your wife will enter the discussion at once!” said Sklat-kli-Sklak.

  President Chakrabarty coped pretty well. “All right. My wife is happy to . . . er, talk. A moment, please.”

  Sklat-kli-Sklak relaxed. “I had begun to worry we would encounter no married pairs today,” she said jovially, which the crew seemed to find very amusing.

  “Hi!” said the First Lady, her voice shiny with panic, and having started talking, she had some trouble stopping. “Hi, how are you, I hope you’re having a good day.”

  “Yes, it is going well so far, thank you,” said Sklat-kli-Sklak courteously.

  “We are delighted to make the acquaintance of a fellow spacefaring civilization,” said President Chakrabarty very carefully. “But you can’t expect us to negotiate while you’re threatening the lives of children.”

  Again, Sklat-kli-Sklak seemed confused. “Why would we stop threatening the lives of your spawn until our demands are met? That is the whole point of this conversation.”

  “I understand the problem concerns something called Takwuk,” said President Chakrabarty.

  “Au-leee neth, ele vilamaaa poru!” cried a voice from the Council of Lonthaa-Ra-Moraaa. Which I was pretty sure was “Don’t you have children of your own?”

  “Eth-hraaa vilamaaa au-thraal ruu,” said Sklat-kli-Sklak through her translator box.

  “Thsaaa,” I whispered. “Did she say she has thousands of children?”

  “Yes,” said Thsaaa, who was already sickly shades of green and yellow.

  “Aulereth-laa puul lashowuu,” pleaded one of the Council of Lonthaa-Ra-Moraaa. This time I understood: “You cannot do this . . . !”

  “. . . for the sake of a crop!” supplied Thsaaa, shuddering through translucent grays and reds.

  “What is Takwuk?” asked President Chakrabarty.

  “Takwuk stimulates the senses, invigo
rates the body and mind,” said Krnk-ni-Plik. “Takwuk is the lifeblood of civilization.”

  “It’s drugs,” said Carl flatly. “You guys officially need help.”

  I know why he said it. He was scared. So he wanted to act like he wasn’t scared. Especially in front of Noel.

  Sklat-kli-Sklak looked at Carl—it was the first time she’d looked at any of us. She said something the boxes didn’t translate.

  Then Tlag-li-Glig picked up Carl and threw him out of the airlock.

  It happened so quickly, and yet I saw every layer of every second of it. The effortlessness with which Tlag-li-Glig plucked Carl into the air. My arms, slow and useless, swinging up to grab at him; Carl’s legs kicking as he dangled from Tlag-li-Glig’s diamond-crusted arm. Tlag-li-Glig yanked the oxygen tank off his back as easily as pulling the wrapper off a bar of chocolate, slammed Carl down onto the trapdoor, and slapped a button on a plinth. The trapdoor opened like a mouth and swallowed him into the chamber below, sealing up again before I could finish shouting his name. Then I was on top of the door, banging against it, but the surface was as seamless as stone, and for an instant he was still there; I could see his eyes, wide and terrified. Then the chamber opened to the void outside, and Carl was gone.

  Everyone on the bridge who wasn’t Krakkiluk was screaming.

  “Carl!” howled Noel.

  “The oxygen tanks—for god’s sake, you took his oxygen—” Dr. Muldoon babbled.

  “Of course. Far kinder,” replied Lady Sklat-kli-Sklak. “We have thrown one of your spawn, the older male one, out of the airlock,” she announced loudly, though I think President Chakrabarty had already understood what had happened, from all the noise.

  “Get him back!” Noel was shouting. And so was I, I realized. “Get him back, he’s still alive, he must be—you have to . . .”

  “We will continue this discussion shortly,” said Sklat-kli-Sklak to President Chakrabarty, while Noel reached up and grabbed desperately at the soldier who’d ejected Carl. Tlag-li-Glig flicked him to the floor, and that did something to me, I guess. Though I only realized I was in the process of charging at Tlag-li-Glig with raised fists when someone tackled me to the floor.

  “Alice,” Josephine’s voice hissed. She was lying across me, gripping my arm with painful force, her helmet pressed against mine. “Shut up. You hear me? You have to shut up.”

  “Carl . . . ,” I said, my voice cracking.

  “I know. I know. If we have any chance at all, it’s not that, okay?”

  I stared past her at a picture of Krakkiluks fording a mighty river on the wall.

  “Say okay,” she said ruthlessly.

  “Okay,” said my voice, apparently by itself.

  She crawled off me as I sat up. “How long has he got?” I asked, staring at Carl’s oxygen canisters on the floor. “The air in his suit—do you know how long he’ll last out there?”

  “Yes,” she said, drawing her knees close to her chest, not looking at me. “I know how long.”

  She didn’t elaborate and I ran out of things to say.

  Noel was still howling. “Get him back! Please, he must be alive, you have to get him back!”

  “Silence that spawn,” said Sklat-kli-Sklak.

  “NO!” I screamed, and “Au-laaa!” wailed Thsaaa, dragging Noel into their tentacles and clutching him tight.

  Noel sobbed into Thsaaa’s cloaked shoulder, while Thsaaa flickered dizzyingly through black and violet and fiery orange.

  “Christ, all right!” Dr. Muldoon was shouting. “All right, I’ll do it, I’ll engineer you the best crop of Takwuk ever, if you like—somehow we’ll do it—just, stop, get him back, please—”

  “You said you could not do it without help,” said Sklat-kli-Sklak.

  “Earth will help—I’m sure Earth will help. You have to give us time—time for the Morrors to migrate—”

  “Hal ra’thruu arth-Shal, ushoor uha-porshelel,” keened a Morror voice. “Where can we go? We have already traveled so far.”

  “Have you really thrown a child out into space?” asked President Chakrabarty in a winded voice.

  “Of course,” said Sklat-kli-Sklak easily.

  “Can . . . can one of the humans you have with you answer?”

  “They have,” said Dr. Muldoon. “Mr. President. They have. It has to be possible to get him back on board—”

  “The scientist says she will restore the moon to its proper state. Does she have the assistance of Earth and the Mo-raaa uhu-raaa?”

  “Aulereth-laa. Ath-thraal Shasuu,” cried one of the Council of Lonthaa-Ra-Moraaa. “Seven million of us,” I heard. “You can’t . . .”

  “You do realize,” said President Chakrabarty softly, “that this amounts to an act of war?”

  Sklat-kli-Sklak rattled amusement. “War would be a far greater misfortune to your peoples than the loss of a handful of spawn. If you meet us in war, it will never be by your choice. You will by now have tried to locate the source of our transmission. You will never find it. And if you could, you have nothing that could threaten the Grand Expanse.”

  “Perhaps not yet,” said President Chakrabarty.

  “Is that a refusal?” asked Sklat-kli-Sklak.

  “We need time,” said President Chakrabarty, the steely note in his voice giving out.

  “We were under the impression that humans and the Mo-raaa uha-raaa placed disproportionate value on lives of spawn,” grumbled Sklat-kli-Sklak. “Were we misinformed?”

  There was a silence as everyone realized she expected an answer to the question. Her eyes swiveled toward Dr. Muldoon.

  “I don’t have sp—I mean, children, myself,” Dr. Muldoon said.

  “That is not what I asked.”

  Dr. Muldoon hesitated. I could see her trying to decide which of the possible answers was the least dangerous. “No,” she said.

  “Well, then,” said Sklat-kli-Sklak.

  “No,” said Dr. Muldoon again, but this time it meant something different.

  Krnk-ni-Plik was advancing toward us. And we shouted and clung together, and I could only think, No no no no, and which of us—which of us was it going to be this time?

  Pincers closed around my arm.

  My turn.

  Krnk-ni-Plik hoisted me up from the ground. I felt hands and tentacles clutching at me, but how do you fight back against someone covered in spikes? My body seemed to have shut down—I couldn’t make it do anything. There was no time, anyway.

  Krnk-ni-Plik gave me a dizzying little shake to disentangle me from the others. I’d seen every detail of every moment when this was happening to Carl, but now that it was happening to me, I couldn’t keep up with it. I barely felt the oxygen canisters pulled from my back, or felt myself drop through the trapdoor into the chamber beneath. I heard screaming, but I couldn’t single out words, and then the airlock snapped closed. I heard the roar of escaping air as the hatch underneath opened.

  And then just the rasp of my own breath. And all around me silence. It dragged me spinning into its depths and bore me away like a gnat in a torrent of water.

  Silence that was going to last for the rest of my life.

  PART 2

  9

  There was a light, where there hadn’t been a light before.

  I couldn’t get a good look at it. My eyes were still plugged with tears, and I was spinning headfirst through the bright and dark, tasting a hot dried-up emptiness on every breath. Josephine hadn’t told me how long the oxygen would last, and every now and then I would come back to myself to notice how I seemed to be blurring out at the edges and to wonder whether that was the spinning or the onset of suffocation. And then I would wonder whether my mum was happily shooting Vshomu at the moment, or whether she’d been on Earth to hear all those ringing phones, and I’d think, Sklat-kli-Slkak must have told President Chakrabarty that they’d thrown one of the human female children out of the airlock. Would my dad know yet that it was me? And then I would start fading away again, and
my eyes would drift closed behind the bandaging of tears.

  But whenever I opened them, each time my tumbling brought me around to face the ship again, the little orange pip of light was there, and each time, it was bigger, which should have been impossible.

  Something was coming.

  A pulsing orange light, with two bright blue eyes . . .

  The Goldfish was powering through space toward me. And it wasn’t alone. Someone was clinging to its tail fin, body extended like a diver’s behind it.

  I sucked in a big reckless gasp of air, and my head cleared a little. Someone was coming for me, soaring through space in the Goldfish’s wake, silhouetted against the stars. Somebody human, and too big to be Noel, and too small to be Lena or Dr. Muldoon, and I knew who it was.

  Josephine let go of the Goldfish and flew free. I tumbled over again and lost sight of her, but she was there. I no longer felt as if it might be a wishful trick of my oxygen-starved brain; I could feel her there, now.

  How did she have the Goldfish with her? Krnk-ni-Plik wouldn’t have thrown it into the airlock with her.

  But somehow I didn’t think the Krakkiluks had slammed her through that trapdoor. It was something about the purposeful way she was moving. She came closer, and I could see she still had her oxygen canister. She hadn’t been thrown out. She had jumped.

  Of course she had, I thought. It was the sort of lunatic thing she would do.

  Josephine crashed into me. She gripped me by both shoulders, and at last I wasn’t spinning anymore. We glided on above the golden planet, still traveling at enormous speed, and yet I was lying still, like a shipwreck victim on a raft, Josephine beside me.

  She leaned forward and put her helmet against mine.

  “Hello,” she said, and through the contact between the layers of transparent ceramic, through the air that filled our helmets, I could hear her.

  “Josephine,” I croaked. “What—?” I shouldn’t be glad, I thought, I shouldn’t be hopeful—what could she do, out here, even with the Goldfish?

  “Be ready to grab Carl,” she said. She took my hand. The Goldfish swooped back toward us, Josephine reached out with her free hand and grabbed its tail again, and we were swimming through the airless sky toward the tiny, flailing figure in the starry distance.