Bones Burnt Black: Serial Killer in Space (24 page)

“What?” Mike looked at Kim strapped to the rear wall,
her arms and legs floating loose, her eyes shut, her face limp. His heart ached
for her. “Then you’re the one I saw running away!”

“Exactly.”

“But then where’s Nikita?”

“Dead. I killed her. Couldn’t have her waltzing back
into the group and spoiling everyone’s notion that she’s the killer.”

Mike frowned. “And you killed Gideon while you were
alone with him.”

“Yes.”

“And Akio by greasing the ladder.”

“Yes.”

“And Val?”

“By handing her a soft drink laced with sodium cyanide.
Yes, that was me too.”

Mike’s frown deepened. Without realizing it, he began
clenching and unclenching his teeth.

“Don’t forget Zahid,” Rebecca scolded. “First Akio fell
asleep, so Zahid woke him. But when Zahid fell asleep, Akio and I decided to
let him rest. Poor fellow was in such pain, what with his swollen ankle and
all. When Akio fell asleep again, I was the only one awake. I was completely
free to kill anyone I wanted. You know, I thought about killing Nikita at that
point, and I probably would have if Zahid hadn’t made a pass at me before
hurting himself.” She shuddered. “Disgusting man!”

“But why did you do all this?”

“Are you kidding? You mean you still don’t know?”

“Well, I understand it’s revenge. But for what exactly?
For spoiling the Apollo smuggling? For putting you in prison? For the deaths of
your sisters and brother?”

“Yes! For all those reasons! And for one more.”

“What?”

“You killed my love!”

“Huh?”

“It’s your fault my love is dead. By not being in that
craft, you killed Richard.”

“Richard never said anything about you to me.”

“I know. He wouldn’t even look at me. It was as though
I didn’t exist! Months before the Apollo job, I followed his movements
constantly. I made a point to be in the places he hung out; I ate at his
favorite eating places; drank at his favorite watering holes; and that stupid
pool hall? I must have wasted a hundred hours sitting in that dump, hoping to
bump into him.”

Mike was speechless. This was absolutely the last thing
he would have expected from a murderer/smuggler/saboteur.

“All during this trip I’d been looking forward to
watching you die a slow painful death, but now I suppose a quick painful death
will have to do.”

The travel case in her lap stirred slightly as she
withdrew her hand from inside. The hand wore no glove and came up holding a
revolver that was bright and shiny, except for blood stains on one side.
“Nikita was kind enough to lend me her weapon—after I bludgeoned her to death.
She put up a nice fight, though. Nearly shot me in the head.”

Struggling to ignore the gun pointing at his chest,
Mike kept his eyes locked on Rebecca’s. He was fighting back fear and, for the
moment, winning; but it was a shaky victory—one he knew he could start losing
at any moment. “What are you going to do?”

“I’ve got five bullets. One for you and one for me and
three spares.”

“Who’ll take care of Kim?”

The mocking tone returned in full. “Yes, what about
poor Kim? With no one to squirt food and water down her throat, I would imagine
she’ll die soon. Maybe even before this little craft runs out of chemicals for
its fuel cells, and hence, the electricity needed to run its lifesupport system,
which keeps the air fresh and breathable. Death by exhaustion or dehydration or
asphyxiation. Just about breaks your heart, doesn’t it?” Moving the gun an inch
closer to Mike’s chest, she spoke in a cruel tone. “Is there anything you’d
like to say before you die?”

“Not that I can think of.”

“No begging for your life?”

“Begging won’t work. And besides, thanks to that rain
of molten glass and metal yesterday, I’m now something I’ve never been before.”

“What’s that?”

“Ready to meet my maker.”

“I’ve never understood that stupid cliché. What does it
actually mean?”

“Prayed-up.”

Rebecca’s eyes grew wide with amazement, but she
recovered quickly and laughed as though genuinely entertained.

Mike shrugged. “Laugh all you want, but shoot me and
I’ll slide into heaven faster than a greased saint.”

“Then you can deliver a message for me: one I’ve been
wanting to send for a long, long time.” Her smile turned into a repugnant sneer
as she raised the pistol and pointed it directly into Mike’s face. “Tell God
that Rebecca Dozier says for Him to go to hell!”

Her sneer disappeared as a gloved hand grabbed her
wrist and shoved it—along with the gun—toward the front window.

The gun discharged.

Its sound was deafening in the pod’s tiny cabin, and
was followed immediately by a high squealing hiss, as breathing air rushed
through the bullet hole and out into the vacuum beyond.

Rebecca’s eyes displayed only fear as she stared at the
half-inch cone-shaped hole in the shatterproof glass, and at the nine-feet-long
jet of escaping gas that was visible outside.

Having resigned himself to his fate, Mike had been as
shocked and confused as Rebecca at the source of the gloved hand. But the
momentary mystery was a mystery no more: Rebecca and Kim were now locked in a
frenzied struggle over control of the revolver. Wrestling shoulder to shoulder
and knee to knee, they drifted upward and bumped into the ceiling above
Rebecca’s seat.

One of them—Mike couldn’t tell which—kicked out an
interior light. Pieces of white translucent plastic and clear glass tumbled
away in several directions; and the cabin’s ambient light level dropped by one
sixth, as the filament, exposed to air, fizzled and died.

Unstrapping himself from his seat, he looked for a
place to jump in and help, but had trouble deciding exactly which of the
various flailing body parts to grab. Then, as the air pressure continued to
fall, the rising pain in his ears reminded him that neither he, nor anyone
else, was wearing a helmet.

Overly excited, he fumbled clumsily with the contents
of his thigh pocket, suddenly unable to perform the elementary act of removing
the suit patch-kit.

His ears popped.

Abandoning the idea of removing only the patch-kit, he
simply yanked everything out in one move. Eight items went flying: four
batteries, a flashlight, a pocketknife, a pair of folding scissors and the
all-important patch-kit. He grabbed it out of the air.

His ears popped again.

As he dug through the patch-kit’s contents, a woman’s
scream rose to a level where it would have been easy to believe she was being
run-through with a sword. There was no time to check who it was.

He found and removed the hypodermic.
Almost empty!
Might not be enough!
He placed the tip next to the hole in the window and
squeezed the handle anyway. A small amount of white fluid came out, clung to
the window, and began to bubble and expand. It grew and touched the hole. Some
of it was sucked through. But it didn’t grow large enough to completely engulf
the hole. It congealed into a spongy white half-doughnut without sealing the
leak. Air continued to hiss out into the vacuum.

His ears popped again.

Rummaging through the patch-kit for a fresh cartridge
of self-hardening plastic foam, he found one and began loading it into the
hypodermic just as the two women—still battling over possession of the almighty
revolver—banged two or three of their knees against the side of his head. He
raised both arms to protect himself, and in the process, pushed the combatants
slowly back toward Rebecca’s seat. He wasted several seconds throwing them a
worried glance.

Kim gritted her teeth in unspeakable rage. Rebecca
shook her head like a dog trying to wrest a rag from a tormenter’s fist. It was
Rebecca’s mouth that was open; and it was Rebecca’s ongoing scream that rung in
Mike’s head. Mike saw why: a small trickle of blood emanated from one of her
ears.

Her ears haven’t popped!

Shaking her head vigorously caused the blood to trace a
line from her ear canal out to the ear’s farthest edge. In the few seconds Mike
paused to watch, she slung off two drops: one hit the wall, the other splashed
across Kim’s cheek.

He was about to turn back to his work when he noticed
there were now four hands squeezing the revolver’s grip; swinging it back and
forth; pointing it this way, then that. He jerked his head down to duck under
its potential line of fire.
Don’t let them shoot me while I’m fixing the
hole!

His ears popped again.

Rebecca’s long scream stopped abruptly, then returned
as a series of short screams of even greater volume. The pain must have become
too much: she let go of the gun, pressed her palms over her ears and tried to
curl herself into a tiny ball.

In the suddenness of Rebecca’s surrender, Kim lost
control of the weapon. It bounced off the ceiling and into the pod’s rear. Kim
dove after it, then rose to look over the seat backs and point the revolver in
Rebecca’s face.

Rebecca didn’t seem to notice. Curled into fetal
position, she writhed in pain. Her eyes were closed, her hands were over her
ears, and blood that almost matched the color of her nails showed between her
bare fingers.

Mike’s ears popped again, but the pressure was now so
low that popping no longer solved anything. The pain in his head grew
second-by-second and would soon become unbearable. Both he and Kim produced
scream-like sounds: high and loud and long.

The pain and fear of the moment dumped adrenaline into
his bloodstream, making him exceptionally strong. There was a strange, and
somewhat frightening, feeling of power in his hands and arms. It was all he
could do to fumble the new foam cartridge into the hypodermic, jiggle the tip
of the hypodermic close to the hole, and squeeze the trigger.

The thick white fluid shot out of the hypodermic,
hitting the window in wavy lines and crazy spirals. None of it landed near the
hole. His muscles were all trying too hard. He had no control.

Then he broke the trigger.

Throwing the hypo away, he raked some of the lines of
white fluid toward the hole with his hands and fingers, producing several broad
white smears across the glass. All the fluid started bubbling and expanding. He
had no idea if he’d done any good. Then the long thin jet of escaping gas,
still visible through portions of the window, shrank to nothing—as did the
hissing sound. The bubbles congealed and made the seal permanent, the cabin’s
air pressure began climbing back to normal levels, and the pain in Mike’s head
began to weaken.

Rebecca calmed herself. After she had regained most of
her composure—and noticed there was a gun pointed in her face—she asked, “What
do you intend to do with me?”

Though she was looking at the gun, which was in Kim’s
hands, the question seemed directed to Mike. He ignored it, however, and stared
at Kim unable to decide which question to ask first.
Are you OK? Are you in
pain? Can I get you anything? Are you hungry? Thirsty? Do you remember me? Do
you remember that you love me?

Kim, staring at Rebecca, had no problem expressing her
feelings. “We ought to kill her! All the people she’s murdered? She deserves to
die!” Baring her teeth, Kim shook the gun at Rebecca. “Let’s kill her, Mike!
Just say it! Say you agree and it’s done!”

Mike sucked in a deep breath through his nose.
Later.
There’ll be time for personal questions later.

Kim glanced at him, refusing to remove her eyes from
her prisoner for more than a split second. “Well?”

“I’m hoping that killing her won’t be necessary.” Mike
turned to Rebecca. “Clasp your hands together and hold them out in front of
you.”

Rebecca didn’t move.

Kim waved the gun closer to Rebecca’s face to emphasize
it as a threat. “That’s right, give me an excuse!”

Rebecca scowled at Kim, then reluctantly did as Mike
instructed.

Reaching behind his seat, Mike grabbed a yellow nylon
rope hanging on the pod’s side wall. Uncoiling it, he used one end of its six
foot length to tie Rebecca’s wrists together.
Make it tight,
he thought.
Tight enough that she can’t get loose, but not so tight that she’ll need to
get her hands amputated if we ever get out of this.

He used a similar rope to tie her ankles together.

Kim lowered the gun.

Rebecca used this opportunity to kick both of her bound
feet against the front window, obviously trying to kill them all by shattering
it and creating a huge unpatchable hole. The window did not yield to her force,
but shoved her backward against her seat. Screaming in rage, she began to
thrash wildly: bouncing off the ceiling, her seat and the window.

Kim waved the gun, looking for a clear shot at the
woman.

Mike tried to grab Rebecca so he could throw her into
the rear, but failed because he was too scared Kim might accidentally shoot him
in the process.
Kim’s so crazy with hate she might actually be stupid enough
to fire a pistol inside a pressurized spacecraft.

Squirming herself into position, Rebecca kicked the
window even harder but still it did not shatter.

Kim screamed and fired. The shot missed Rebecca’s
bobbing head by several inches. Mike cringed and listened for the expected
hiss, but a hiss did not ensue.

Again, Kim took aim.

Rebecca kicked the window still harder. And still it
held.

“Don’t shoot!” Mike yelled, as he grabbed the flailing
rope that bound Rebecca’s ankles. He yanked her around so that her head was
near the window. Her feet bounced off the top of her seat and up against the
ceiling. Kim dove out of the way when Mike jumped past her into the rear and
pulled Rebecca along by the ankles.

As Rebecca’s chest and hips thumped against the rear
hatch, Mike threaded her ankle rope through a stainless steel ring on a side
wall and tied it off. He then grabbed and threaded her wrist rope through a
similar ring on the opposite wall and pulled it tight before tying it too.