Master of Shadows, Chapter 5: Free Fall

Jack Rossman awoke with a start, feeling cold and a little bit sore. He opened his eyes and was surprised that he still couldn’t see anything. It took him a moment to realize that the room he was in was pitch black. Jack carefully tried to sit up, but the entire room suddenly shook and he felt himself falling. A moment later he smacked into the tiled floor.

“Ow!” he yelled. “Somebody could have told me I was lying on a table, you know!”

“Is that you, Jack?” a feminine voice called out.

“Lily?” Jack replied.

A moment later the room was flooded with a dim red light. As Jack looked at the machinery that furnished the room he realized where they were. “This is a stasis chamber, Lily! Someone put us in suspended animation.”

“Where are you?” she called out. Jack carefully tried to stand up as the room continued to pitch and shake. He finally spotted his wife, who was lying on a stasis table near the end of the room, clutching the sides of the table for dear life. Jack hurried over to the table and gently helped his wife get up.

“Jack!” she exclaimed, hugging him. The room pitched again and Lily held on to him tighter. “What’s going on?”

“I think we’re on a ship,” Jack said uncertainly. “My guess is that something bad is happening. The ship must have lost power, and when the power went out we were released from stasis.”

“So where are we?” Lily asked.

“Let’s find out,” Jack suggested. With his wife holding onto his arm he carefully made his way toward the only door in the room.

“I have a better idea,” Lily said. “Let’s try to find a way off this ship. I don’t care where we are as long as it’s not here.”

“That works too,” Jack replied.

The two of them made it to the door. Jack carefully opened it and looked around. A long hallway extended to his left and right, but there were no people in sight. Aside from the dim red emergency lights he could see nothing of interest.

“Which way do we go?” Lily whispered.

“I have no idea,” Jack said. “So let’s just pick a direction and see how it turns out.”

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” Lily replied, as the two of them carefully stepped out into the hallway.

“Me too,” Jack answered. “But at least the ship has stopped moving. Maybe our luck is improving.”

“It can’t get much worse,” Lily replied.

As the two walked down the hallway Jack suddenly noticed a dim holoscreen embedded in one of the walls. He walked up to the screen and waved his hand in front of it. The screen feebly came to life. When Jack read the glowing columns of information his eyes widened.

“Look at that,” he whispered. “We’re on board the Raptor!”

“Let’s talk about that later,” Lily said. “How do we get off?”

Jack frowned. “Let me see if I can pull up a map.” He gingerly pressed a button. Immediately the entire ship shook, and they heard a horrible grinding noise coming from somewhere below them. The noise sounded like two massive pieces of metal being forcefully ripped apart. An emergency siren began to sound and a voice spoke over the ship’s intercom system. “There has been a hull breach on decks one and two. Please evacuate the lower decks. There has been a hull breach on decks…”

Jack immediately jumped back from the panel. “I did not do that! I had nothing to do with that. That was totally a coincidence.”

“Sure you didn’t,” Lily replied.

“But it’s impossible! I just pushed the button labeled ‘Schematics’. How could that possibly result in a hull breach?”

“Isn’t a hull breach where the ship starts venting air into space?” Lily asked.

“I think so,” Jack replied.

“Aren’t we on the lower decks?”

“I don’t know,” Jack said thoughtfully. “We might be.”

“Doesn’t that seem bad?” Lily asked.

Jack glanced back at the holoscreen. To his relief it was displaying a map of the starship. He studied it, frowning.

“Well?” his wife asked.

“It doesn’t have a ‘you are here’ flag,” Jack complained. “Do you have any idea how big this ship is? Trying to find our location -”

He was interrupted by the sound of metal forcefully striking metal. The horrible shriek made them both cover their ears.

“- is getting more important by the second!” Lily screamed. “What is happening?”

“I don’t think we want to know,” Jack said nervously. He pointed at the screen. “The stasis chamber is right there, so we must be about here. My guess is we’re on deck three.”

“You mean we’re only one deck up from the two levels that are now a vacuum?” Lily shrieked.

“I think so,” Jack said.

“So the hull breach could spread and we could die at any moment.”

“I don’t think hull breaches are contagious,” Jack replied.

Lily shook her head and looked at the map. “There. Do you see that? The third door down the hall from us is a stairwell. We can take it up two flights and then down this hallway to a shuttle bay. The map claims there’s a shuttlecraft there.”

Jack snapped his fingers. “You’re right! Now that you mention it I do remember seeing a shuttle. That could work!”

As the two started running down the hallway Lily turned to Jack. “How could you possibly have seen the shuttlecraft? And how did you get here, anyway? And how did I get here?”

“Can we talk about that later?” Jack puffed. He yanked open the stairwell door and the two began running upstairs.

“I want answers now,” Lily replied. “You can talk and run at the same time.”

“Ok,” Jack shouted. The intercom system overhead was still blaring a warning about a hull breach. “Here’s what happened. The black shadow thing kidnapped you and told me that it would kill you if I didn’t help it steal the Third Treasure from the museum. However, after I did what it asked the shadow thing disappeared with the Treasure and didn’t give you back to me. So I followed it here and was knocked out the moment I got here. I woke up when you did. That’s all I know.”

“You stole the Third Treasure?” Lily shrieked. “Are you totally out of your mind? Do you know what they’re going to do to you when we get back home?”

Jack yanked open the stairwell door and the two ran out onto the fifth floor. “Everything that goes on in that room is recorded, Lily. I’m sure the authorities will review the tapes and realize that I had no choice. Surely they won’t press charges.”

“You hope,” Lily replied.

“Which door was it again?” Jack asked.

“Follow me,” Lily said. She took Jack’s hand and the two ran down one hallway and then another. Lily stopped in front of a door with a sign on it that read ‘Shuttle Bay Two’.

“Very nice,” Jack replied. He looked at the door and frowned. “Hmmm. I don’t see a doorknob anywhere. This looks like some sort of electric airlock door.” He tried pressing the airlock controls beside the door but nothing happened.

“Figures,” Jack said. “With no power I guess the ship can’t open doors.”

“Let’s be thankful that it’s protecting us from our own stupidity,” Lily replied. She was standing a few feet away from Jack, looking out a window. “Come take a look at this.”

Jack walked over to his wife and peered out. The window offered a beautiful view into the shuttle bay, and Jack gasped when he saw what was on the other side of that door. Half of the room was simply not there anymore. The entire rear wall and most of the floor was now open to the vacuum of space. Jack could even see part of a planet in the distance. The room was empty.

“Oh boy,” Jack said weakly. “This is so not good.”

“I’d call that a hull breach on deck five,” Lily said.

A moment later the hallway filled with light! The holoscreens embedded in the walls all came to life at once, and a gentle hum could be heard in the distance. The ship’s intercom changed its message. “Normal power has been restored. The ship’s computer is now online.”

“Well that’s good,” Jack replied.

“This ship is under attack,” the voice continued. “Damage reports are being assessed. An emergency alert is still in progress. Please stay in your cabins while I continue to engage the enemy.”

“Ok, so maybe that’s not good,” Jack said weakly.

Lily grabbed his arm. “Look!” she hissed.

Out the window Jack saw that the scene was starting to change. The planet that they could see through the enormous gashes in the hull was starting to move out of sight. “The ship must be turning,” he said.

“I know that, you lunkhead,” Lily replied. His wife pointed to the far right and Jack saw that there was another ship in space. He immediately recognized it. “Isn’t that the Molly?”

“Looks like it,” Lily replied. “That must be the ship that we’re fighting.”

“Oh boy,” Jack said. “That’s terrible! The news guy said that the Molly was an unarmed bean freighter. This ship is going to tear it apart! The Starman doesn’t stand a chance.”

“You mean there’s actually somebody piloting the ship out there that is trying to kill us?”

“Alice probably has no idea we’re on board,” Jack said quickly. “I bet she thinks she’s only fighting the evil shadow of doom.”

“So who am I supposed to root for?” Lily asked. “Do I want her ship to get blown up, or ours?”

Jack swallowed nervously. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and the shadow will surrender. That’s always a possibility.”

As they watched they suddenly noticed that a small projectile from the Molly was rapidly approaching them. Jack was horrified. “Missiles! That’s not fair. Where did she get missiles? Bean freighters don’t come equipped with missiles!”

“We could have been in stasis for weeks or months,” Lily pointed out. “We have no idea what’s been going on.”

“Oh, we have some idea,” Jack replied. “My guess is the evil shadow being is somewhere on board this ship and Alice is engaging it in battle so she can recover the Third Treasure.”

Lily grabbed her husband. “We’re about to be blown to pieces by a warhead, Jack. Can’t you think of anything better to ponder over in the last few moments of your life?”

“Maybe she’ll miss,” Jack said weakly.

As it became clear that they had only seconds left Jack suddenly saw something out of the corner of his eye. “Look!” In an instant something crashed into the Molly, causing it to violently explode. They heard no sound but saw a brief flash of fire and then the vessel simply wasn’t there. Pieces of debris were scattered in all directions and began drifting apart in the expanse of space.

Jack freaked out. “Alice was on board that ship! Did you see what just happened?”

At that moment the missile struck the Raptor. There was a thunderous explosion and the couple was knocked off their feet. Metal could be heard tearing apart and the entire ship shook from the blast. Within seconds the hallway went dark and the red emergency lights came back on.

When the explosion had subsided Jack looked at his wife. “At least we’re still alive,” he said.

He was interrupted by a voice over the intercom system. “There have been critical system failures on all decks. Evacuate the ship immediately. Free fall to Lemura is imminent. The ship must be evacuated. There have been critical systems failures…”

“We’re alive for now, you mean,” Lily said. “Where’s Lemura? I’ve never heard of it.”

“My guess is it’s a planet we’re about to become very familiar with,” her husband replied.

Jack ran over to the holoscreen and waved his hand in front of it. When the screen weakly glowed to life he brought up the map again. “Maybe we can stay alive for a bit longer. Look. This is shuttle bay two, right? So surely there’s a shuttle bay one somewhere.”

“There sure is!” Lily said. “It’s right there, on deck one. Or what used to be deck one, before there was a hull breach.”

Jack grimaced. “Ok, let’s switch to plan B. Do you see the emergency escape pods there on deck five? Maybe they’re still intact, and maybe we can take them to the surface.”

Lily nodded. “It looks like they’re right down the hall from us. Let’s go!”

The couple raced down the hall toward the escape pods. “Jack?” Lily said.

“Yes?” her husband replied. He was panting heavily as he tried to keep up with his wife.

“Do you think that evil shadow thing is still on board the ship?”

“I sure hope not,” Jack said fervently.

“But if he is, wouldn’t he be going to these same escape pods?”

“There are pods on other levels, dear.”

“But the bridge is on this level,” Lily pointed out. “If I was an evil space being in battle with a Starman that’s where I would be headed.”

“We’ll cross the evil space being bridge when we come to it,” Jack replied. They quickly whipped around a corner. “The pods are just down there.”

Jack and Lily raced to the spot the map had indicated. To their immense relief they saw five two-man escape pods embedded in the wall. Jack relaxed a bit. “Looks like they’re all intact.”

Lily opened the door to the first pod and the couple rushed in. After Lily closed the door behind them Jack powered up the pod. Without hesitating he pressed the Launch button.

With a quick jolt the pod was blasted away from the ship. Through the window Jack could suddenly see a planet loom far below them. He felt the pod begin to turn.

“This is awfully cramped,” Lily complained. “I’ve seen closets bigger than this.”

“It’s not meant to be a luxury cruiser,” Jack said. “All it needs to do is get us from the ship to that planet down there.”

“What?” Lily screamed. “You didn’t tell me anything about landing on an alien planet! Are you out of your mind?”

“It can’t be helped,” Jack protested. “These pods don’t have a big life support system. There’s only enough air in here for a couple hours. We’ve got to land on the planet. There isn’t anything else we can do.”

“Look at that thing! Are you sure you want to land on Lemura, or whatever it’s called?”

Jack looked on the planet. A horrible feeling crept over him. The planet looked like something out of a nightmare. Deep gray clouds obscured part of the surface, but the part that was exposed was chilling. The ground appeared to be solid black, with patches that glowed an evil blue hue. It was the least inviting world Jack had ever seen. Even looking at Lemura from orbit gave him a bad feeling – and the planet was rapidly drawing closer.

“How do we know we can breathe in that atmosphere?” Lily demanded.

“We don’t,” Jack said.

“And what happens if it is as toxic as it looks?” she asked.

“Then we die, I guess,” he replied.

“This is the worst date night ever,” she complained. “You are not ever going to work late again.”

“I think we’ve got other things to worry about right now,” Jack commented.

As the pod continued to fall toward the planet below Jack suddenly caught sight of the Raptor. The giant red starship was plummeting toward the planet, but at a much faster rate than their pod. As it passed by they both got a good look at it.

Jack whistled. “Please don’t tell me we were on that ship.”

“I’m pretty sure we were,” Lily replied.

“I asked you not to tell me!”

The Raptor was badly damaged. Much of the hull plating for the lower decks was simply gone, and the plates that were still there had large gashes in them. The ship’s wings were mauled and had long scars and gaping holes. I can’t believe we got out of that alive, Jack thought. It’s a complete ruin now. The insurance company is definitely going to declare that vessel a total loss.

“What do we do now?” Lily said, interrupting his thoughts.

“Wait, I guess,” Jack replied. “Just wait and see what happens next.”

“If our luck doesn’t start improving I don’t want to know what happens next.”

Jack sighed. “It could be worse, dear. At least we’re still alive! And we haven’t seen that evil shadow being. That’s something.”

“I guess you’re right,” Lily replied. “I just wasn’t planning on spending the evening dying on an alien planet.”

“Let’s just see what happens,” Jack said. “One crisis at a time.”

For the next hour the couple sat in silence, exchanging only an occasional word. Lemura continued to grow larger. When they at last entered the gray atmosphere and began their landing approach Jack suddenly pointed to a tiny object far below them. “Look at that – and that!”

“What?” Lily asked, squinting.

“The Raptor just moved! I mean, it shifted its position. It’s falling, but it’s controlling its fall. I think it might be trying to land!”

“Do we care?” his wife asked.

“You bet we do. That ship has got all kinds of long-range communications equipment on board. If it lands intact we might be able to call for help.”

Lily was aghast. “You mean to tell me that we can’t call for help using this pod?”

“Well, sure, but only to other people on the planet. The pod doesn’t support long-distance calls. It’s just a last-ditch we’re-all-going-to-die escape pod. But the Raptor is different.”

“So where is our last, best hope landing?” Lily asked.

“It looks like it’s headed for that city over there,” Jack said.

“What city?”

“That one,” Jack said, pointing to a small area on the planet’s surface.

Lily frowned. “That’s a ruin, Jack. It hasn’t been a city since before time began – if then.”

“Fine. But that’s where it’s going.”

The conversation was interrupted when the pod started shaking. Lily grabbed Jack’s arm. “What’s that?”

“Atmospheric turbulence,” Jack replied. “It’s ok. It’s all part of the plan.”

“Then let’s find a new plan,” Lily said.

Jack glanced down at the control panel. “It’s almost over, dear. Just another ten minutes and we’ll touch down.”

By now the Raptor had disappeared, lost in the thick atmosphere of the planet. The city was out of sight as well.

“We’re not landing near the Raptor, are we?” Lily asked.

Jack shook his head. “I’m afraid not. I’ve tried to change the course but the computer won’t let me. I must be doing something wrong.”

Lily sighed but said nothing.

As they got closer to the ground the shaking slowly stopped. Jack closely monitored their fall and was pleased to see that the pod was gently breaking their descent. A few minutes later the pod touched down onto the surface.

Jack breathed an enormous sigh of relief. “I can’t believe it! Look at that, dear. We made it! And check out these readings – the atmosphere isn’t toxic!”

Lily squinted out the window. The rough, black surface of the rocky planet extended in all directions as far as she could see. Veins of some blue mineral glowed eerily among an endless stretch of gray, gritty sand. A white fog clung to pits in the alien surface. Overhead gray clouds slowly drifted through the sky, occasionally blocking the light from a small, weak sun.

“Do you really mean to tell me that it’s safe out there?” Lily asked.

“It looks ok to me,” Jack said. “We’ve got oxygen, carbon dioxide – all the good stuff we need. And the gravity is more or less what we’re used to.”

“So what do we do now?” Lily asked.

“Hike to the Raptor, I guess.”

Lily’s eyes widened. “You mean leave the pod? And go out there? Are you out of your mind?”