The Girl They Sold to the Moon (14 page)

Tilly had no way to judge the distance they had traveled. She estimated they had covered at least a half mile of passage. They approached a third pressure door that sat partially open. Above it, a placard read EMERGENCY SHELTER 009. Pulling open the door revealed a large gymnasium-sized room, filled to capacity with sleeping cots, bedding, counters, shelves and wardrobe closets. The same orange lights, set in the ceiling ten feet overhead, illuminated the room. Huge ventilation grates gawked from the roof; thick pipes ran from one end of the ceiling to the other. Tilly felt an unearthly still and dampness in the room as she walked down the aisle with the others. It looked like it had never been used. Looking back, she saw the outline impressions of their shoes in a fine layer of dust. What most amazed her was the paint scheme of the interior; the walls, ceiling, and floor were bright pink. The cots stood out with a coat of olive green.
Stress reliever
? It brought back visions of the FTALC induction center.

Dorothy walked toward an alcove and threw some drapes back. “There's a full kitchen in here,” she said, her words echoing. “Looks like a full stockroom beyond it, with what looks like water tanks.”

Tilly investigated the area toward the other end of the main room and found an anteroom that served as a shower and toilet facility. Whoever had built the structure had thought of everything. Nearly housing all the comforts of a modern home, it looked large enough to sustain at least 300 people for a limited amount of time. The way it was laid out with a basic design and fashion, it resembled one of the ward dormitories. She joined the others.

Fia stepped up to the wall opposite the kitchen and reached out to touch it. Curious, Tilly stepped up behind her and looked at a square section of the wall that appeared wrinkled. They touched it at the same time and it tore. Fia stripped off a huge square of paper, revealing a 2-D flat screen underneath. Dials and buttons lined the bottom row of the screen. Dorothy joined them.

“It must be connected to the emergency broadcast system,” said Tilly. “It wouldn't be for entertainment.”

“You're right about that,” said Fia, and twisted some dials, pushed a few buttons. The screen blinked on, showing a test pattern. She tried different channels. All of them showed the monotonous test pattern. It issued a white static noise when she turned up the volume.

“Nobody's broadcasting,” said Dorothy. “At least, not yet. It must be mass confusion up there.”

“It could be mass
deaths
up there,” said Tilly, and trotted to the kitchen alcove. All of the appliances were made of stainless steel, including the bottom cupboards. She flung them open, finding utensils, pots, skillets, dinnerware and cups. The last cupboard held four large plastic containers, all of them white and stenciled with a large red cross. She opened one up to reveal a large supply of medical supplies, including morphine and other painkillers. The kit included a portable cardiac defibrillator and a couple dozen oxygen masks, with small canisters. She closed the case and picked it up by the handle. She called out to Dorothy and Fia, “You two stay here. I have feeling we're going to be busy in a few minutes. Get everybody settled when they come through the hatch. Treat the wounded. I'm going as far as I can topside to help direct the traffic down here.”

“You be careful, Tilly!” Fia warned. “We don't know what's happened up there.”

Tilly ran through the entrance hatch, closing it behind her. She started down the corridor at a steady trot. She had no wish to wear herself out or lose her breath by overexertion. She had oxygen in the emergency case if she needed it. When she made it to the next pressure hatch, she had to catch her breath and rest for a moment. She heard a commotion up ahead—a rabble of voices--feet tramping over the floor. She swung the door open. A crowd of people filled the corridor a dozen yards down, some stumbling and some limping.

Tilly waved her hand. “Everybody this way!” She ran up to a miner who had a teenage boy in his arms. The miner's forehead was bleeding. “There's a lot of civvies and wards still up there,” he huffed. “Couldn't get them all.”

Tilly took the boy's limp arm and checked for a pulse. Negative. She saw that the boy's head was caved in. The miner was unaware of it and might have been in shock. Rather than raise a panic, she jabbed her finger at the open hatch. “Get him to the emergency shelter as fast as you can.”

The miner refastened his embrace on the boy and trotted off. Tilly gave the people cursory checks as they moved up the corridor, offering first aid to anyone who needed it. More people, overcome by shock and injuries, crawled and stumbled through the passage, some of them screaming for help. Tilly's eyes filled with tears, and her hands shook. She pushed her way through the oncoming crowd, seeing more horrific injuries. She thought of Sue Lin and what might have happened to her.

Tilly saw confirmation of her worst nightmare once she exited the bank and stepped out into the open under the dome. The dome atmosphere swirled with trash and debris; the giant glass panels had iced over, dripping with condensation. Finding it impossible to breathe, she donned one of the oxygen masks and stepped out on the street. Frantic, she rushed to the first prone body she saw. She recognized the uniform as belonging to one of the guards. She checked for vital signs, finding none. Several other people lay in the street. Some people were on their feet and staggering down the perimeter road. All of them gasped for breath. She broke open the first aid kit and gathered up the oxygen masks. She ran to those on their feet, strapping the appliances on them. She told each one to get to the bank and follow the shaft to the emergency shelter.

Tilly couldn't believe how many people had collapsed on the perimeter road. She dashed to each sprawled body, only to find them deceased. Their eyes protruded from their sockets; most of the faces were blue and puffy, obvious signs of suffocation. She found one of the more gruesome sights after lifting the canopy of a cart. Five people were crammed inside. All were dead. Tilly felt her stomach purging, sewage-like bile rising in her throat. Her legs felt like paper under her as she sucked extra hard for breath from the mask. She snapped on another replacement mask, having realized she'd used up the 30-minute supply.

Retracing her steps, she found one person alive on the way back, someone she had overlooked. The young female ward lay over a scooter with her hand raised. Tilly pulled the girl into her lap and slipped a mask over her face. The girl's chest rose with a full breath. “You've got to get on your feet,” said Tilly. “I can't carry you!”

They both rose, a swirling mass of trash and sand, pummeling them. More than half of the dome lights were out, casting them in an eerie twilight. The atmosphere felt like thick soup. Tilly plodded on, dragging the case with one arm, and crooking arms with the girl with the other. She felt the strange sensation of her body being pulled in different directions. Her chest tightened, making it almost impossible to breathe. It took her ten minutes to reach the bank and find the pressure hatch. She tossed the case down and began the descent, spotting the girl above her by directing her feet on the ladder rungs. She'd forgotten to close the hatch and damned herself. She felt so weak she had a hard time lifting her arms. Dazed, she looked down the corridor and saw two figures running toward her. They both wore masks and ward suits.

Dorothy took Tilly's case and wrapped her arm around her shoulder, while Fia got the girl in tow.

“We had to come looking for you,” said Fia, “when we heard how bad it was. Can you breathe all right?”

Tilly nodded, slobbering in the mask. “So many dead up there. I wanted to find Sue Lin.”

“You can't do that when you're dead,” said Fia. “We have about 150 people in the shelter, and everybody's in bad shape. Six fatalities. Almost seven.” She gave Tilly a look of motherly reprimand.

Tilly coughed. “Sorry. I just know that Sue Lin is in trouble.”

“If she's not in trouble, she's safe, or past worrying about now,” said Fia.

They made it to the shelter, locking the last two pressure hatches. Tilly thought that if any more survivors made it down into the corridor they would hear them banging on the hatch and let them in. But they all agreed that the chance of anyone still alive in the dome area was unlikely unless they had supplemental oxygen.

Tilly counted around 25 miners in the group, and she only knew this by the excess facial hair. The rest of the occupants were split fairly evenly between shop owners, civilians and wards. It didn't look like they needed to assign bedding arrangements, since they were plentiful. A large number of people were injured and lying on cots, attended to by others. Six miners stood at the flat screen, trying to dial into a live station. About fifteen people had already invaded the kitchen, opening up boxes and spreading produce over the counters. A few passed out blankets and air pillows.

When Fia saw the disorder in the kitchen, she stomped a foot and doubled her fists. “Oh, no. This ain't happening. Not on my watch.” She stormed into the kitchen, shoved and slapped hands. “There will be order here!” she demanded. “Hands off the supplies. Get to your cots and stay there.”

Tilly looked around, concerned. “Dorothy, what happened to the dead bodies?”

“We put them in the walk-in refrigerator. It's still working. We didn't know what else to do with them.”

“Good thinking. We don't have a lot of options.” She looked up at the vents and lights. “I wonder how much longer we'll have power. I don't know how the system works.”

“We should ask one of the miners. They'd know about stuff like that.”

Tilly nodded and approached one of the men standing at the flat screen. She heard the heated conversation between them.

“No reception means the control center is out,” said one of them.

“Bullshit,” said another. “The emergency system is independent from the control room. And that system is in the broadcast station next to Block 17. I'm telling you the broadcast station was taken out.”

“Control room, dog breath. That's why the pressure doors were in the closed position. The god damned fail-safe shut them doors up, but there was no juice to the override it and pull ‘em open again. How do you explain them jammed tight like that, otherwise?”

“And I'm telling ya that as soon as somebody links in to the broadcast station they'll activate this frequency and we'll get a signal coming through.”

Tilly tapped one of the men on his shoulder. He turned around, looked her up and down. “What is it? Oh, it's you. Right now I'm busy…” He turned away.

She tugged on his jacket again. “Look, I just want to know how long this shelter can run on its own without the main motors, or whatever.”

“Scat, bitch!”

Another miner stepped up to her. “The emergency generators can keep these shelters going for 90 days. That's the fuel limit. That's plenty of time for a rescue. If the generators go down, it'll kick over to an emergency battery bank. Batteries will last three days, give or take. The access chute is closed off to the topside. That means we have to wait it out and let them open it from the top.”

“Where's the access chute? Will they be coming in that way?”

“It's over one of the bathroom stalls. That's the way they'll come in. Unless they come down the shaft we just passed through. Doesn't look like they'll be coming from that direction, though.”

“Why?”

“The main dome took multiple hits, along with six or seven spoke corridors.” He grabbed her shoulder. “We've been compromised, little lady. A whole swarm of golden bee bees done poked our ass full of holes. This entire complex is history if they don't get a construction team and a shitload of engineers to patch her up again.”

“How long will it take to fix it?”

“Hah! The company bean counters will drag it out for years before they even start. You can kiss off your job at Tranquility Harbor, if that's what you're asking. They'll keep most of the Dogs on the site, tossing our asses in temp shelters. Where the hell else are they gonna get their precious titanium?”

Tilly shrugged. “I'm sorry to hear that.”

“Why be sorry? It's your ticket out of here.”

Tilly didn't care about “tickets out of here” at the moment. The injured needed help, so she joined the others. Dorothy helped by offering aid to the adults, while Fia took over control of the shelter, setting down guidelines. Tilly began with the youngest, those between the ages of six and twelve. She found a ten-year old boy who had a broken arm, and fashioned a splint for him. She gave the boy crushed-up pain pills, mixed with a synthetic fruit drink. She gave three others oxygen, getting their breathing stabilized. A few cried from shock and trauma, having been separated from their parents. She wrapped them up in blankets and soothed them with soft words. She discovered one small girl cowering under a bunk in the far corner of the room. After enticing her out, she found the girl's face badly bruised and her fingers bleeding. Tilly asked her what happened.

“Everybody ran from the park. I got knocked down and they stepped on me.”

Trampled,
thought Tilly, and used some antiseptic to treat the wounds, bandage them, and place the girl in a cot. She made a note of the children who were without parents, obviously tourists. Those kids would require regular rounds to make sure they were fed and comforted. Some of the more serious wounds belonged to the adults, so Tilly pitched in to help Dorothy. It seemed everyone had aches and pains. Those that didn't have visible injures suffered from shock. The rest of the healthier adults bitched, moaned or cried.

The second day in the shelter brought the first physical fight between the survivors. Tilly backed away from the scuffle as four miners traded blows. One was knocked unconscious; the three standing heaved for breath. Two of them accused the single miner of cowardice.