Scream All You Want

"Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say," Major Thomas McPherson sneered at the figure gesturing wildly outside the airlock's operator station window. He waggled his head and continued his monologue. "At the very least, I can't, because I've muted the intercom. But I can watch you scream, and that's very satisfying. Scream all you want, you worthless dreg, you irredeemable excrement, because no one can hear you."

Navigator Brody Jamison glared at McPherson through his tinted face shield, huffing. A hundred meters beyond Jamison, light from the distant sun glinted off the space-barge's high-yield radio array as it rotated lazily like a twig caught in an eddy along Cuthbert Creek. Maintaining his grip on the airlock's outer handle, he twisted to look at the slowly receding tangle of metal and cables. Then he returned his attention to the man inside. His eyes blazed, and the scar on his left cheek glowed red. He appeared to let loose another stream of invective at his pilot before he resumed pounding on the impact-resistant glass with his carbon fiber wrench.

"That's not going to accomplish anything, and you know it," McPherson remarked coolly with a glance at his wristwatch. "But, go ahead, use up your oxygen faster. I've been looking forward to watching you die ever since I figured out you were the guy."

* * *

The day before, only a few hours after retiring for their scheduled rest, the two had been jolted to wakefulness by a violent shudder that passed through their craft. The muted squeal of metal tearing and drumroll of cables snapping echoed through its bones. In an instant, each had untethered himself from his bunk and hung an emergency oxygen mask around his neck.

"What was that?" asked Jamison.

McPherson shook his head in bewilderment, yawning and stroking a not-quite-smooth jawline. "Nothing I've heard before. Let's check it out."

The pair rubbed sleep from their eyes and pulled themselves down the narrow passageway from the sleeping quarters to the control room.

The pilot surveyed his instrument panel for flashing lights. "It felt like our load came loose."

"Impossible—that hunk of asteroid is so well anchored that Haley's Comet wouldn't knock it off, Tom," said the navigator.

"I know. That's just what it felt like." McPherson pressed buttons and read numbers on his display. "The crew environment appears to be intact. Pressure, oxygen, and CO2 levels are good. Nothing is amiss per the sensors, so I'm going to commence a physical check. I'll be back shortly. Check Navigation and see if whatever-it-was knocked us off course."

"Anything different is good," Jamison recited, adding, "I suppose that's most applicable to waking up and discovering a pretty lady in your bed. A potential crisis on a spacecraft, not so much." He read aloud navigation coordinates and rocket burns.

Releasing himself from the pilot's seat, McPherson scowled at the back of Jamison's head for a moment before launching himself out of the control room. He sailed down narrow passages past vacant bunk rooms, the crew mess, and the exercise bay. Along the way, he cast a practiced eye at each emergency hatch. All were secure, un-triggered. Likewise, the compact nuclear plant was unbreached, and its local display confirmed that it continued to function normally with no radiation leakage. The aroma of last night's lasagna and garlic bread lingered in the galley, and McPherson made a mental note to torch the garbage in the incinerator. Outside the tableside porthole, Mars glowed like a red beacon in the distance, where it stood out from the diamond-strewn black carpet of space. But the shadow cast by the mountainous asteroid fragment they pushed obscured the exterior features of his own craft when he peered out of the bubble.

The ship's PA system chirped, and the navigator reported, "Trajectory good, Tom. Checking ship's exterior and load-monitor cameras now."

McPherson tapped the wall intercom. "Everything checks out aces, Brody. Want some coffee while I'm in the galley?"

"I'm still pumping adrenaline, but I'll probably need caffeine shortly. Thanks."

The pilot scanned the contents of several of the lower storage compartments. He pulled out a bright red bottle and read the label. Hazardous—not for internal consumption. Clean residue with warm, soapy water. He put the cleanser back in its place with a scoff-click of his lips. "Might just give him stomach cramps, and certainly wouldn't look like an accident," he muttered. "Besides, now is probably not the time. I might need his help figuring out what crashed—and fixing it." The options he had ruled out flashed through his mind. Employing one of the rarely-used paring knives and claiming self-defense would probably just make a disgusting mess he would have to clean up, whereas strangling the navigator while he slept would still leave McPherson looking for the easiest way to dispose of the body. He retrieved a pair of coffee-with-creamer pouches and injected them with hot water from the dispenser nozzle. Then he grabbed a couple of the nut-and-date bars and floated himself back to the control room less hurriedly than when he had left.

As the pilot entered, Jamison let loose a groan like he'd been gut punched. "Oh, daaamn."

"What'd you find?"

The navigator unstrapped to face him and pointed at one of the video feeds on his display. "Camera Seventeen. Portside aft, forward-facing. Something sheared off our antennas near the base, Tom. It looks like I've got to suit up, as quickly as is feasible. And I thought we were going to have another hundred uneventful days of playing chess and re-watching movies we've already seen twenty times."

"Fifty times," said the pilot, staring at the mess of rods and cables swirling alongside his craft. "Are you not entertained?"

Jamison accepted the energy bar and pouch-holder cup McPherson proffered and re-pierced the pouch of brew with the attached straw. "There is no spoon."

"That's because it's shaken, not stirred." McPherson nodded toward the display. "Did you check our signal?"

"What signal? We are officially incommunicado."

"I figured as much. And you're going to suit up and reattach that mangled erector set in order to put us back in radio contact with Earth?"

"Unless you want to, Major. You outrank me, so you can take this Extravehicular Activity, for sure."

The pilot chewed thoughtfully. "No, this is your job, Navigator. The pilot stays in the vehicle. Otherwise, this is just another piece of space junk, bigger than all the rest out there."

"This is where it would've been nice if they had given you a full crew, with an EVA Specialist and a Payload Master. A cook would've been nice, too. And maybe some dancing girls."

"Well, this was supposed to be a routine run with a big rock to push and a mostly empty hold. So, it's just you and me, courtesy of cutbacks." McPherson clacked the magnetic base of his cup onto a metal plate and drew close to the monitor. "That looks like it's close enough to the bay doors—"

Jamison leaned in. "Do you think you can grab part of it with the cargo arm?"

The pilot nodded slowly. "Maybe. Then if I can stabilize it that way and you can reattach one of the cables, maybe we can get out a distress signal. Otherwise, we're going to be riding along in silence until we get close enough to try a communications Hail Mary play. Once we're approaching Earth orbit, it might be worthwhile to try with infrared. Or we could try boosting power to the docking antenna. Either way, Control probably already knows we've lost radio contact. So we should devise a way to let them know we're still alive and on our way back, at the very least.

"Maybe we'll encounter an outbound barge and be able to hail them."

"This isn't the Atlantic Ocean, Brody. This is space. We're not likely to cross paths with anyone we know around here."

Jamison crumpled his empty coffee pouch together with the energy bar wrapper and dropped both into the refuse bag tethered at the end of the desk. "So my first assumption was correct. I'm going outside to deal with—all that."

"You won't be alone. You'll have a robot arm to keep you company, plus me in your helmet." McPherson took his attention from the video feed just long enough to select a binder from the procedures shelf. He spun it once in the zero-gravity before opening it. "The good thing is that the antennas appear to be drifting away slowly enough that we have time to address this methodically and by the book. We won't skip anything on the EVA checklist. Including the twenty-four hours it takes to prepare for a spacewalk."

"I can do it in half that, even allowing time to shave."

"You'll get the bends from decompressing that fast."

"Okay, eighteen hours, tops. We've got to try to retrieve that array, right?"

* * *

Twenty-one hours later, the pair finished inspecting Jamison's spacesuit and haggling over which safety procedures could be dispensed with. McPherson stood by the airlock controls as Jamison prepared to enter. He slapped the navigator's helmet and jerked on the spacesuit's utility belt. Then he turned a page in his binder. "Oxygen on?"

Jamison's voice sounded tinny and distant through McPherson' headset. "Yeah, I don't think I'd forget that one. Check."

"Must've happened. It's in here."

"You know, I didn't plan on passing through any more airlocks until we got closer to home. I'd much rather be going through the dockside door of the Lagrange Point Waterfront Bar and Grill. Maybe I'd run into that hot brunette again. Did I tell you about her? She was sultry and ready to—"

"Sultry? You're going to use that word in conversation?"

"Why not? It's a perfectly good word."

"Yeah, you've told me about her several times. You got her drunk and practically had to carry her to your car." McPherson' eyes narrowed and his jaw tightened.

"Well, not carry—"

"Focus on the task at hand, Navigator," the pilot said with a hint of a growl.

"Yes, sir, Major."

McPherson sealed the airlock behind his navigator and read aloud each of the steps from the procedure book as he evacuated the air from the chamber and opened the outer door.

Jamison responded with, "Check. Check. Ready. Roger that. Check. Egressing." He floated out beyond the shadow of the valuable asteroid the cargo vessel propelled toward Earth. His white spacesuit gleamed in the sunlight. "Great view out here," he exclaimed. "Your second assessment was right. I don't think you could've grabbed anything even with the cargo arm fully extended. The video wasn't giving us a true perspective. I'm not even sure I can reach it without unhooking my tether."

McPherson tilted his head to one side and gazed out the portal thoughtfully.

"Tom, you there? I said—"

"Roger. Don't detach your tether. And don't get close enough to get tangled up if a long cable snakes out. The mass is rotating slowly, but it's heavy enough that it has momentum. It could carry you out of intercom range, then I'd be left wondering how long you took to asphyxiate."

"Wow. That's dark. Even for a steely-eyed missile man."

Silence reigned for several minutes.

"Major? What do you want me to do now? Do we have something I can throw out there like a grappling hook, try to fish that back in?"

McPherson shook his head. "No, I guess just enjoy the view. And let's talk about that sultry brunette."

"Oh, yeah—she was a brown-eyed devil. With dimples. Dimples always get me. And her figure—man, was she fit!"

"Shut up. You're talking about my baby sister. You raped my baby sister, you bastard!"

"What? Cassidy? I never—!"

"No, Tiffany," McPherson snarled. "It took me a while, but I finally figured out the timeline. You practically orbited the Lagrange Point Bar. My beautiful baby sister visited the L-Point because she knew astronauts hung out there between missions. For some reason, she thought she'd run into me there, and she wanted to meet my friends. And you're the one who slipped something into her drink and then assaulted her and abandoned her in a cheap motel room."

Jamison moved surprisingly fast for a man in a bulky spacesuit, ascending his tether hand over hand while yelling, "No, you're wrong! I don't know any Tiffany, and I've never abandoned—"

As the navigator drew close enough to see inside, McPherson regarded him with a stony expression. Then, with a dramatically exaggerated arm movement, he flicked off the intercom.

* * *

Major Thomas McPherson scratched his beard and eyeballed the water dispenser. "Want some coffee while I'm in the galley?" he scoffed into the empty room. He injected hot water into his coffee-with-creamer pouch and then floated down the passageway with the pouch-holder cup in hand. Stopping at the airlock control panel, he pierced the pouch with the straw.

Outside the portal hung the figure of a man frozen in time. Jamison's eyes stared without seeing, his mouth hung agape, and a patina of frost obscured the red scar on his cheek.

The pilot raised his cup in salute. "You died in abject terror, and the world is a better place for it. And women everywhere are safer now. Long may you burn in Hell." He took a sip of his coffee and glanced at his watch. "Mission Control is assembling an EVA team to come collect you, then I get an extended paid furlough. Because I'm traumatized over losing a crewmate," he added with a chuckle. "You'll be eulogized for your bravery and initiative, but, as soon as I reminded Control that you had a tendency to be headstrong, they didn't question my narrative that you rushed through safety procedures—in spite of my admonitions—precipitating your untimely demise."

A ping sounded from the communications console, and the pilot faced the camera before accepting the incoming call. "McPherson here."

"Good afternoon Major McPherson," a blonde intern said cheerily. "I have a call from your sister Cassidy. May I put her through?"

"Yes, please do."

The screen pixilated, then Cassidy's face resolved. "Tom! Oh God, what a relief it is to see you. I about died when Control said they had lost communication with you, but then they told me your ship made some course changes that had to be intentional, so at least we knew you were alive."

"Yeah, our antenna got sheared off, so I figured I had to find a way to let them know I was still at the helm. I'm glad they kept watching the telemetry after we lost radio contact."

"You look handsome with a beard, big brother. Are you going to keep it?"

"Regs allow beards that are well maintained, but I'm already tired of it. I'll probably shave soon."

"Oh," Cassidy pouted. "Well, anyway, I've got some really good news—excellent news—about Tiffy's case. They finally caught the guy that—that … You know. That animal is finally behind bars, and he's going to stay there a long time."

"What do you mean they caught the guy? The guy with the red scar on his cheek?"

"No, the tattoo on his cheek. Of a racecar. They identified him from surveillance footage. He confessed once they confronted him with DNA evidence. The District Attorney says it's an open and shut case."

McPherson stared at his sister, steeling himself against turning toward the unrelenting gaze of the man outside the portal.

"Tom? That's wonderful, right? Tiff can finally get some closure. Anyway, how is your friend Brody? Are you guys still on speaking terms after being cooped up together for a hundred and seventy-five days?"