The Escape Artist

Crispin closed the hatch and listened to it seal shut.

"I'm leaving now," he told the radio.

 

*

 

The alarms were enough to send an unseasoned man into panic. The possibility of breach, asphyxiation, being depressurized until the blood boiled.

The Captain ignored these.

"What's going on down there?"

"I'm leaving," the voice on the radio repeated. "Don't worry, I've got the door sealed, so no one is going to get damaged, sir."

"Crispin, wait a moment."

"I don't have a lot of moments left, sir. Better make it quick."

"Cease that operation. You don't have authorization to break off."

A long pause, the imagined shake of a head. "Well, sir, maybe not your authorization, but I'm pretty sure that isn't going to help anyway. I've got my own authorization at this point, sir."

"You have no such thing."

"I'm afraid I do, sir. I've got the controls to the hatch."

"So do I. Now stop this, or I'm going to have to start paperwork for a reprisal."

Crispin's voice came laughing through the wires.

"Whatever you say, sir. I'm leaving now."

"Damn it, sailor, you stay your hand. I'm coming down there."

The indicators did not change, the pod was still locked, lamprey-like to the copper-shined hull of the greater vessel.

"Crispin?"

"I'm waiting, sir. If you want to talk, come on down."

 

*

 

Crispin sat in his soft-backed chair, twirling a pen in his fingers, whistling the song of a man preparing to catch a late train. Ever calm, ever patient, simply waiting for the inevitable.

The face of the Captain appeared at the hatch door. The radio crackled.

"Come out of there, man."

"I can't do that, sir," Crispin said. "The door is already sealed. I'm ready to go."

"Go where?"

Crispin pointed out the large viewing window, like a bulbous aquarium that took up the far wall of the pod. And beyond.

"Out there."

"There's nothing out there. Now come on, open the door and get out here."

"The dark planet is out there."

"You want to see the place?" the Captain said. "I'll get you on another shuttle, soon. Standard procedure, nothing out of place. Is that what this is about? You don't think you're on the shuttle rotation enough?"

"A shuttle won't work, sir."

"Why the hell not?"

Crispin smiled. "A shuttle comes back."

"That's what they're for."

"Shuttle won't serve my purpose, sir. Now don't you worry about me. Tell the crew I have enjoyed serving with them. It's been fun."

"Crispin, have you been taking your pills?"

"Every day, sir. No misses."

"You feel sick? How's your head doing? I've told command that they need to allot you fellows more sleep."

"I'm not sick. I feel... well, very good. And very sane."

"Maybe I need you to prove that. Come out here and talk to the Doc before you do something foolish."

"Sir, I've had a lot of time to think about this. I don't need to see the Doc."

"I need you to see her, son. Now come on out. Stop this."

Crispin paused then, his hand halfway over the controls to disengage the pod. As if thinking, or perhaps like a man dreaming awake.

"I will not do that, sir."

"You will," the Captain growled. "It's a direct order."

"I will not follow that order, sir."

"Damn it, man! I could have you brigged for this! You endanger this vessel and you'll get court-martialed."

Crispin turned and came up to the window. He looked into the Captain's rugged face, his gray bearded jaw and pale cut-glass eyes. And he looked past at the handful of crewmen that had begun to gather in the hallway.

"No, sir," he said.

"Do you know what kind of consequences there are for even making these kind of threats?"

"I'm not threatening, sir. No one is going to be hurt, I've made sure the hatch is double sealed. And there are no consequences at this point." He turned to the larger glass, its domed surface holding back an eternity of black coldness smattered by points of glowing as if they'd been flicked there by a wild painter.

"There is only out there."

In the distance, the thing they called the dark planet sat like a cyst on reality, its clouds spinning, its lightnings forking and folding in cats-cradles of antediluvian deities.

"I'm going now, sir," Crispin said and went to the controls.

 

*

 

The great vessel, commissioned over a hundred years ago, drifting in shallow orbit around the great oddity they had come to study. Its clockwork and wireframe mass gurgled tanks of liquid oxygen and flows of phantom hydrogen particles, blinking in and out of knowable space. The center was unremarkable, a terrarium shell over a centepedal maze of androgyne sterility, but from a distance, it looked nothing more than a thunderstorm of eyes, hammered of brass and lapis lazuli glass ports, the observation pods that served its only function.

Observe, report, ye curious creatures, the ship said. Watch what you can and speak it back if ye ever had a voice.

221 pods affixed to the starborn leviathan.

And if Crispin had his way, it would soon become a nice round number.

 

*

 

"What the hell are you fellows doing up there?"

The Captain was shouting across the communication channels. The engineers were already a blur of action. Fingers drummed control keys like ordered hail.

"Sir," Fitzsimmons said, "we are trying."

"Try harder! Can't you stop him?"

"He's got the controls, sir. He's shifted to independent power."

"I knew that system should have been shut off ages ago. That's why we have shuttles, damnit!"

"I understand, sir."

"Can you override him?"

Fitzsimmons bit the inside of his cheek. "Yes, sir. I mean temporarily. I can shut off the automatic assistance feed. He will have to turn on the support systems from inside, and I don't believe the observers have been trained for that, sir."

"Do that. Do whatever you can think of. Put a damn manipulator claw over him. Do not allow that pod to break away."

"Yes, sir."

 

*

 

The power in the pod flickered for a moment.

"What the hell..." Crispin muttered.

"Come out, Crispin. I've just had engineering shut down your automatic feed. You're not going anywhere."

"The automatic feed?"

"Yes, son. Now it's time for you to get your head together. Come out and we will talk man to man. Let's get this straightened out."

Crispin did not move.

"Crispin! That's an order!"

"Captain, how long have I been on this ship?"

"Seven years. You're the best observer we have, son."

"I know. I am the best."

"You're an asset to this mission. You're valuable to the crew and to myself, if that's what you're having trouble with. We couldn't have gone this far without you, man."

"I know."

"Come out."

"Sir, do you remember when we were outspace of Neptune? The long sleep on the way past the oort cloud?"

"Of course I do. You were with me on half the rotations. A good man, a good sailor. Any other man might have gone mad with tedium."

"Oh yes. You and the others, you played cards and watched the whole library of recordings. You know what I did?"

"Same as the rest of us."

"Mostly. But I also read. I learned about Sartre, and Euclid, and Thomas Jefferson, and that man Bradbury. I read all of them. And then I still got bored so I started reading our tech manuals. Especially the ones on these pods, since I was going to be spending most of my time in one."

The Captain swallowed a lump in his throat.

"Crispin..."

"So I've learned the whole system, including the independent support functions. How to turn them off and on."

"Crispin, this is madness."

"You've stalled me for a little while, sir. But not for good. I'm still leaving."

"This is madness."

"You said that before. Now, please. This is going to take me a bit, so let me concentrate."

 

*

 

The radio crackled on the medical deck.

"Soma!"

The doctor arose and hit the two-way intercom.

"I'm listening."

"Get your a*s down the pods!"

"Calm down, Captain. No need for rough language."

"Hell with that! Get down here!"

"What for?"

"Mister Crispin has lost his damned mind!"

 

*

 

The crowd parted for Soma. There were quite a few of them now, nervous men in flight suits, and some already standing in pressure coats in case the pod left and the hull breached.

Soma walked through them as if they were a hallucination.

Up to the door. The Captain was red-faced and sweating.

"I'm here, sir."

"Fix him! He's insane!"

"I doubt that. Crispin is a man with a cool mind."

"Like hell! He's threatening to disengage the pod! He could kill us!"

"I doubt that, too. Captain, these pods are designed to disengage. You know that, I know that, and, "Soma indicated the crowd at the end of the tunnel, "they ought to know that. So why are you so worried?"

"Ask him! Ask him what the hell he's doing!"

"Okay, I was planning to."

"And no matter what, you stop him! You understand?"

"Yes, sir."

 

*

 

The radio crackled. Crispin didn't look up from the controls, switching on the original life-support systems of the pod.

"Crispin?"

That made him stop.

"Soma?"

"The Captain wants me to talk to you."

"I said I didn't want to talk to the doctor, thank you."

"What about just a friend? Would you like to chat?"

"Not really. I've very busy."

"Too busy to say goodbye?"

Crispin sighed and said nothing.

"The Captain says you're going off on your own. Is that true, Crispin?"

"Yes."

"Sounds dangerous."

"We are space travelers, Soma. We are all accustomed to danger. That's why we have you, right? To keep us put together?"

"Yes. That's why I want to talk to you."

"You think I'm crazy."

"I don't know that. I don't know until you talk to me. But maybe you have something that needs addressed here. Maybe you would feel a lot better if we chatted, and possibly you might like to come out after that."

"I won't."

"And maybe, once we've discussed everything, I will see that you'll be okay, and you can go off then. No reprisals, no arguments. You'll have a real goodbye."

"You really mean that? If you decide I'm right, you'll get the Captain to give up, and I can go?"

"Yes, Crispin."

He thought about that for a while, looking back at the doctor and the Captain through the hatch window, then again through the greater glass at the giant, crackling orb that hung in the heavens.

"Okay, Soma," he said. "You can talk to me until I get these systems up and going. But then I'm leaving."

"That sounds fair."

"Okay, you start."

 

*

 

"Crispin, do you like being on this ship?"

"Yes. Well, kind of."

"What do you mean 'kind of?'"

"Well, it keeps me from depressurizing in space."

Soma laughed. "Yes, that is a good point."

"And there is food and water and people to talk to. A job to do."

"Yes, there is all that. Is there something you most like about being on this ship? One thing that strikes you more than anything else as vital?"

"Yes."

"What is that?"

"It brought me here."

"To this point in your career? You life?"

"No, here in the literal sense. To the dark planet."

"Ah."

"It is a wonder, isn't it?"

"Yes."

"Makes you feel lucky that you could be there when it was discovered?"

Crispin smiled and said "More than you can possibly imagine, doc."

"And now you're going to get closer to it. The Captain said he can get you on a shuttle down right away, you know. If you want, I could ride along with you."

"No thanks, doc. I already said I'm not taking a shuttle."

"Because a shuttle will bring you back."

"Yes, doc."

"You don't want to come back from it?"

Crispin did not answer. His fingertips alighted on plexiglass panels, flickering icons back and forth, his free hand twirling the pen with the ship's logo on it.

"Crispin?"

"Why should that matter?"

"Because you're a human being, Crispin. You cannot survive down there, you know. No one can. The atmosphere is 95 percent fluoride, and it can eat through these pods like gelatin. And the storms, Crispin, the shuttles can handle them, just like they could on Jupiter and Neptune, but a pod like yours? It would get smashed apart in half a second."

Crispin said nothing.

"I mean that would be awfully important to me. Being alive."

"I am alive, Soma."

"You won't be if you take this pod down there."

"I'm not going to die."

A moment of reflection on the doctor's part came and went. "You won't?"

"No."

"And why do you think that, Crispin?"

"I just do. I'm not going to die, any more than the other people on this ship."

"Are you worried that something is going to happen to the crew?"

"No."

"A lot of them are worried," Soma said. "No one has ever done a full disengagement before. There is the possibility of a breach."

"There won't be one. You know the hull will hold. They should stop being ninnies about it."

"How do you know for certain, Crispin? How do you know the structure won't fail. If you do this, you could depressurize the whole ship, or at least this wing. You could kill your fellow observers, the engineers, the Captain. You could kill me."

"You will not die, either, Soma. So don't try to guilt me."

"So you feel guilty that you're endangering us?"

Crispin stopped working and stood up. He put down the pen.

"No, I'm annoyed right now."

"Okay. Tell me why."

"Because you obviously think I'm very stupid."

"I don't think you're stupid, Crispin. You are a very smart man. According to your tests, you're almost a genius. So no, that's not what I think."

"Then what do you think?"

"I think you might be behaving recklessly, and I wish you would stop and think more about it."

Crispin laughed and shook his head. "Reckless. Not stupid, but reckless."

"It's a possibility," Soma said.

"Then tell me, why have I spent the last two weeks reinforcing that hatch and the surrounding supports instead of sleeping? Did you know I did four EVAs this month?"

"You're not scheduled for EVA duty."

"I traded with Wallenby. He didn't say anything because he's been sending unauthorized communications to Ares Base. You should be very happy for him. He's planning on marrying a girl there. I'm surprised he didn't confide that to you, doc."

Soma did not respond, but took a steps back and looked around. Fresh welds and seals had been placed around the door, and the pressure valves replaced with new ones guaranteed to stay the atmosphere in the hallway. New bolts on the ports. He'd even gone through the trouble of smudging over some with a patina of grease so the alterations were less noticeable.

"No one is going to be hurt," Crispin repeated. "I've seen to that. And there is no way, you're going to make me stay on this ship, Soma. Period."

 

*

 

"Captain, get those crew members out of here."

"Do you think he's really going to do it, doc? Is Crispin going AWOL?"

"I don't know, and I'm working on it, but for the time being, get those men back to work. This isn't something that needs an audience."

The Captain strode down the passage and declared that any man not at his proper post in three minutes would be escorted to the brig, where they would stay in stasis for the rest of the ship's planned mission. Another 3 years.

When he returned he muttered, "Every mission has got at least one crazy. Why did it have to be Crispin?"

"Because," Soma said, "It's always the one I miss."

 

*

 

The ship turned for the sake of gravity. There were drives that simulated such effects now, but they were no good for large-mass explorations. The movement of a red dwarf or a gas giant tended to cause tides in the machinery, which was no good for a craft this size. Falling to your death against the ceiling when gravity shifted was largely considered unacceptable.

Crispin watched the dark planet. He had planned to leave just as it entered his personal horizon, but it would be several more hours before his side of the ship turned away from it completely. He still had time to work.

"Crispin? I want you to talk to me."

"Go away, Soma, I'm very busy. If you want to chat, tell the Captain to turn the automatic feed back on so it won't take me as long to prepare."

"Crispin, are we still friends?"

"Yes, Soma. As much as the person paid to keep your mental state stable for the sake of long term space travel can be one's friend."

"We used to play cards."

"Yes."

"Remember when the rotation engines went down, outside of Europa? And all the cards floated away?"

Crispin laughed. "Yes. That's when I found out you cheated. There were three queens of hearts drifting around."

"Well... it was all in fun."

"It was a lot of fun."

"Who will play cards with me if you go to the dark planet?"

"No one. You're a cheat."

"Who will talk to me during your appointment times? Who will be the best observer? Who will report back electrostatic anomalies and vapor fluxes?"

"Not me."

"It's a shame."

"This is a scientific mission. All the other observers are very well trained. More will be learned about the universe, and mankind will carry on. No different than if I had been flash-frozen in stasis, or a micro-meteor had broken through the glass while I was sleeping."

"It sounds very different to me, Crispin. Those are accidents. This is something you're doing on purpose."

"Do you think I'm suicidal, Soma?"

"Are you?"

A very long pause. "No. I'm not going to die."

"You have a lot of faith in that statement."

"Yes."

"You're not a man of faith, Crispin. You've told me so yourself a hundred times."

"I... have faith in science."

"Science currently suggests that going down to the dark planet is going to kill you."

"Not to me, it doesn't."

"Not very scientific."

"Maybe I'm shifting my faith. Maybe it's getting too big for just science."

"So what else are you having faith in? Right now?"

"Myself," Crispin said. "And that if I go down there, I won't die. Not like I would here."

 

*

 

"You're not making any progress."

"Be quiet, Captain. Give me time."

"There might not be much time. Fitzsimmons says he's maybe a half hour away from being able to get that thing going on his own."

"Then don't bother me for the next half hour," Soma said.

*

 

"Do you think about dying a lot, Crispin? You've never mentioned it during our sessions."

"The thought," Crispin said, sitting with his eyes closed as the system completed a cycle, "occurs to everyone. Death in certainly inevitable."

"This is true. But it can be postponed for as long as possible. Happy lives are long lives, I like to think. To deal with the possibility of it suddenly being cut short, that can make people act strangely."

"I have my own oxygen purifiers on now, Soma. And I'm fine."

"You said that you thought you might die here."

"Yes. It could happen."

"Freezing in stasis or a micro-meteor through a window?"

"Maybe."

"Do you worry about that kind of thing?"

"Not really. This job is dangerous. I accept that."

"Then what did you mean?"

"Do you believe in fate, Soma?"

"No, I believe that everyone has decisions, and that they are dictated only by that person. We all have a personal responsibility to ourselves to live by our own merits."

"How many options do you think a person has? Many, or just yes-no?"

"Many, I imagine. The universe is a complex place."

"Then one of my many options is to stay here and complete this mission. And another is to go down there and see the dark planet for myself."

"Another one is to come back inside, talk to me and when we get it straightened out you can go down in a shuttle. And another is that you can come inside and forget the mission, spend the rest of the trip on the bridge or in the bunks, rest and think. And another is that you can come in and be put in the brig, sleep in stasis until we get back home."

"Those are all option one. The option of not going."

"You could come back in and talk to me. I'd even promise not to cheat at cards."

"You're making options where there aren't any, Soma. It comes down to yes-no. Stay or go."

"And you think staying is going to kill you?"

"Yes."

"Why? It's safe here. You will be okay. I will take good care of you."

"You don't know that, Soma, anymore than I do. The whole ship could breach and kill everyone. But one thing I know beyond a doubt is that if I stay here, I won't ever see the dark planet again. Not really. I will have given up on the possibility."

"Sometimes there are things best let go of, Crispin."

"Yes. And sometimes, it's the place where you are at. Soma, if I come back in, I will have to resign, be brigged, and if the Captain let me out, I would wander the halls, and look out from the bridge, and spend my time talking to you until you are as crazy as you think I am. But I would never see the dark planet again. And I believe... I know in my heart that it would kill me. To have that enormous, universal truth in my hands and say 'no, I'd rather be safe.'"

"I see," Soma said.

"I hope you do," Crispin said. "Oh look, the hydrogen primers are ready. Almost there."

 

*

 

"He's good," Fitzsimmons said. "He should have been an engineer."

"Stow that talk. Give me options."

"Well, there aren't many sir. The pods are meant to double as our life-boats, so each one can override central life support without compromising the ship. We can limit his intake by isolating his pod and the surrounding wing, but it would mean losing an eight of the ship's room until he surrenders. Or Soma can talk him down."

"Let the doctor make statements like that. I need facts here."

"Honestly, that's all I have sir. Crispin has thought this one through, and aside from losing all the observation pods on that cluster, or depressurizing him, I'm afraid he's going to get his way."

"You could do that?" the Captain said. "Depressurize him?"

Fitzsimmons hesitated. "Yes. But sir. This is Crispin, sir."

"I just need to know all the options," the Captain said.

"Yes, sir."

 

*

 

Soma leaned against the door, face to the glass. Crispin sat with his back to the hatch, waiting as the systems cycled once again. He looked out.

Space, the great and infinite. The blanket of silent death over all the worlds of light. Cold, mindless, insurmountable.

"Tell me about the dark planet, Crispin."

"You know all about it. We've done nothing but study it for two years now."

"Tell me about it anyway."

Crispin sighed. "The dark planet is an anomaly. It is a gravitational pocket surrounded by a gas-liquid cloud cover, subject to fluxes in polarity and electromagnetism. Thus far, no solid center has been found, which is unheard of when you consider that man has set foot on the core of Saturn. All tests indicate that there may be a disturbance of spacial fabric underneath it it all, similar to a black hole or quasar, but without the obvious pernicious effect of extreme gravity..."

"Crispin."

"Hmm?"

"I know the science. You people have done nothing but talk about it for over two years."

"You asked me. I told you."

"What does it mean to you, then? What would going down there mean to you, in a way that couldn't be done just as well by taking a shuttle?"

He opened his mouth and closed it. More than once.

"It's difficult to explain."

"Try. I want to hear you talk."

Crispin drew up his words, finding the only ones that could come close.

"It is beautiful."

"Oh?"

"Yes. It is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. More than any star, any nebulae. More than standing in the oceans on Earth, more than a pretty girl holding your hand."

"Those are very poetic sentiments coming from a scientist. It's beautiful to hear to talk that way."

"It's the only way I can describe it, Soma."

"Can you tell me why?"

"No..."

"Can you try?"

"I don't think you'd understand."

"Crispin, I'm a medical doctor and a psychiatrist. I've heard men tell me about their dreams, their delusions, their fantasies. And you may not know it, but when I was younger, I adored poetry, too. So just try, and I'll try to understand."

"I dream about it sometimes."

"What happens in your dreams?"

"I dream of falling. No suit, no capsule, just me falling through space. And that cloud cover coming up around me like it's alive."

"It's a common enough dream, Crispin. Anyone who's worked around the giants has had it."

"But I don't wake up in a cold sweat. I'm not scared. And I keep falling, down, down, down until the clouds are covering me like water and the electricity is burning my skin. I keep falling, and I start to see things, moving around me. Reels of strange light, moving back and forth, not falling but swimming. Alive things."

"You dream that there are things living down there?"

"Oh yes. And I don't even have the poet's words to describe them, Soma. It's too much. It's like what seeing an angel must be like. And the space below me gets brighter and brighter, until suddenly there's a flash, an atomic light and I go blind from it. But I'm not scared. I'm not scared at all. I'm calm and for once in a long time, I'm happy."

"It must be wonderful," Soma said, "to have those kind of dreams."

"Sometimes. But sometimes, I remember them when I'm awake. I walk around this ship. I sit in my observation pod and I look down at her, the dark planet, and know that I'm stuck here. I know that going down there is too dangerous and the only sane thing to do is sit here and be safe. Sometimes I can't sleep and I wander around, feeling my life come away one second at a time, cold and empty. I feel cold, Soma. I feel like the sand in my hourglass is running fast and it's almost out."

"I'm sorry about that, Crispin, but you're not alone. We all feel like that sometimes. We all feel isolated. But you have to hang on."

Crispin smiled then. "What is hanging on, Soma? Just sitting, waiting to die? Waiting for your time to run out while just out your window there is sometime so spectacular that even though getting close to it will kill you, you can't stop thinking of how wonderful it would be? Is that hanging on? If that is living, I reject the entire concept, Soma."

And here he turned to the window, looking out, and said "I'm going down there. I'm going to see for myself."

 

*

 

"Is he mad, doc?"

"Yes. He is very mad."

"Can you talk him down, or am I going to have to have engineering depressurize that pod?"

"What the hell are you talking about Captain?"

"Just get him out here. I don't want to do this any more than you want to have this man's blood on your hands."

"Get out."

"What was that?"

"Get out of this goddamn hallway and let me help him, or I swear, I'll help him get that pod launched myself. Captain."

 

*

"What do you think is down there?" Soma asked.

"I don't know."

"You have to have a guess."

"No. That's why I have to see."

"I think that's bullshit," Soma told him.

"Pardon me?"

"If you want my professional opinion, Crispin, you are showing signs of delusion. Lack of sleep, high anxiety. Classic space madness. And you're allowing these delusions to drive you toward what can only be an act of suicide. Professional opinion."

"And your unprofessional opinion?"

"Crispin, I think you've gone nuts."

"Okay," he said, calmly, arranging auxiliary drive servos, waiting patiently. "So?"

"Crispin, you are endangering this mission! It is my job to take care of you, and right now you're making me look like a gigantic failure!"

"That," he said, "is not my fault. And I'm not endangering anyone or anything. It's not like the Captain can throw you in the brig, the crew needs you. You are indispensable. You'll be fine."

"The crew needs you, too."

"No they don't."

"They need to know that the best and brightest one on this ship didn't suddenly lose his mind and go rocketing to his death. It would destroy their morale."

"And you will be there to fix it, and assure them that I am merely a madman, nothing like them. And I'm not going to my death. I'm going to a greater part of life."

"Those are a crazy person's words, Crispin."

Crispin growled and threw the pen. He came up to the window, glaring.

"I'm not crazy. I think you're the one who has things turned around, Soma. Locked in your little tin can, taking orders and giving orders, feeling in control. You are the least in control. You operate on mechanism. Do you think? Do you feel? Do you ever wonder if you do the things you do because you are afraid of any other option? What makes you different from a machine? Where do you keep your soul?"

"Killing yourself isn't going to fix any of that! If you want to change things so badly, you stay and talk to me!"

"You are not my responsibility, Soma! Go away and leave me alone! Go back to your small little life!"

"Crispin! Wait!"

His hand moved, slamming the steel curtain over the hatch window.

 

*

"Captain," Fitzsimmons voice buzzed.

"What?"

"The boys have an idea."

 

*

 

In the pod, Crispin worked steadily, drawing closer to a way out.

Out the window, the dark planet loomed and shifted. A living chaos. A blind idiot god.

Sometimes, if he put his hand to the glass and closed his eyes, he almost considered that he could feel vibrations coming from it, a noise through the airless void. This was impossible, of course, but all the same, there was the vague feeling of sound.

And more than sound.

As if something out there were singing.

The radio crackled.

"Mister Crispin?"

It was a seldom used channel, meant for thin atmosphere transmission.

"Hello?"

He pushed the switch open.

"Is that you, Anders?"

"Yeah. I'm up on pod deck eight. Figured I could get you on the channel without anyone listening in."

"Good idea. You seeing something up there that I'm not?"

"Is it true? You're jumping ship?"

"I'm taking the pod out."

"That's suicide, Crispin."

"That's what they say, Anders."

And the radio was quiet again for a short while.

"Hey, Crispin."

"I'm still here."

"You're not the first one, you know. To consider doing it."

"Doing what?"

"Going down there. For real. I used to have dreams about it. I want you to know, there are a few of us that have been talking about it, and we think... well, we think you're not so crazy. Maybe just the first one the get up the gumption and do it. And I want you to know that you're one brave fellow."

Crispin smiled.

"Well... somethings. Somethings just have to be done."

Anders coughed, and his voice sounded tight.

"You know, if you make it down there, somehow, then maybe you ought to radio back up and just tell us. I mean, we're observers, right? Maybe we just need one man with the balls to really do it. If you can, I mean. If you live."

"If... I will. Thanks, Anders. And anyone else listening in."

"Will you do us all one big favor, though, Crispin?"

"What's that?"

"Talk to the Doc. The last thing we need is a shrink crazier than the rest of us."

 

*

 

"Soma?"

The steel curtain slid back away from the window.

"Are you still there?"

"Yes."

"If you still want to talk, I'm still here."

"I will talk to you," Soma said, "if you come out."

"I can't do that."

"Then you can do without talking to me."

"Come on, don't be like that."

"Give me one reason I shouldn't be. I'm trying to save your life, Crispin."

"It isn't yours to save."

"It's my job."

"Then save other people or get a new job."

"Do you have any idea what you are doing? Imagine all the discoveries that will never be reported, because of your death. Imagine new worlds, a hundred times more impressive than this one. All those things you're trading away."

"Imagine a hundred new worlds," he said, "that I will never see because I'm trapped in a tin bubble. No, this one is mine. This is what I'm supposed to do, Soma."

"You can't know that. You can't be so certain."

"No, you can't be certain, because you are meant to help people. People need you, a doctor, a listener. They do not need one more observer who can't keep his head on straight."

"I can help you put your head on straight, Crispin."

"No. You cannot."

The glow of the pod flickered. Crispin took a step back.

"What was that?"

Icons flashed and froze. Another flicker.

"Soma, something is wrong with the pod."

Soma spoke, voice cold and flat. Resigned is what Crispin heard.

"No, there isn't. That's Fielding out on EVA. The Captain ordered it. He's going to cut your intake lines and cripple the pod. You won't have any choice but to come out."

"What?! No, no, no! He can't do that!"

"He did, Crispin. I'm sorry, but you're not going to be allowed to just run off. Come out and I'll keep you out of the brig."

"No! Make him stop, Soma!"

"I can't. I don't have the authority."

"Get the damn authority! Don't let him do this to me!"

"Everything will be all right, Crispin. Just come out."

He stood and breathed. His hands buried themselves in his hair for a moment, and then he howled.

"LIKE HELL! I WILL NOT COME OUT! I WILL STARVE TO DEATH FIRST! YOU CAN CUT THE DAMN DOOR DOWN BUT I AM NOT COMING OUT!"

"Crispin, I'm sorry! But you have to! You don't have a choice!"

"There is always a choice," he said.

Then he was in motion, too fast to fully see from the foggy window. Hands spastic, racing over controls and mechanisms.

"Crispin, what are you doing?"

"I'm taking off right now. I'm leaving."

"But the pod isn't ready! You'll die before you get anywhere near the dark planet!"

"I'd rather die trying, Soma. I'm sorry."

"What about Fielding? He's EVA, you could kill him! You could knock him into space!"

"Then I suggest you have the Captain call him off. Or better yet."

He went to the radio.

"Anders, or anyone who might be out there? This is James Crispin. Please radio engineering and tell them to get their EVA away from my pod before he gets knocked into orbit. I'm taking off!"

"Crispin, do not do this. You're not a murderer."

"I'm not murdering anyway. I'm getting the hell out of this place."

"Crispin, stop now!"

 

*

 

And then the lights went to nothing, and Crispin stood in the dark.

He went on screaming for a long time.

 

*

 

"What now?"

"He's trapped, doc. We've got him, as soon as we cut through those new seals off him."

"That might not be a good idea."

"I understand your concern. But you did your job, kept him distracted until we could shut him down. Not let us do our job. Go back to your office. There are a lot of scared men to take care of."

"No."

"It wasn't a request, it's an order, doctor."

"When I say it might not be a good idea, Captain, I mean you have just caged an extremely disturbed and intelligent man. Crispin was willing to endanger your man in order to get away. Do I have to spell it out for you, what might happen when you come in for him?"

"He's one man, unarmed. And a scientist with no history of violence. What could he do to us?"

"He could shatter the main glass and depressurize the whole wing. Or more."

The Captain said nothing.

"Would he?"

"He's already prepared to die, Captain. And at this point, I think the rest of us would be collateral damage."

"Do you want me to sit here on my thumbs and just wait him out?"

"No."

"What then?"

"Let me talk to him."

 

*

 

In the dark, the room became cold. Frost formed on the glass, like calligraphy.

Crispin was curled up, shivering. His fingertips had begun to turn blue.

"Crispin."

"Go away, traitor. I don't want to talk to you."

"Crispin? Please just talk to me."

"You put on a wonderful show, by the way. Keeping me distracted during all that. You probably saved Fielding's life by telling me he was there, so good job there."

"Crispin."

"STOP SAYING MY DAMNED NAME!"

"I'm sorry."

"I don't care."

"Please come out. I don't want you to freeze to death."

"I want to freeze to death. It's the better of my yes-no options."

"You don't want to die. I don't want you to die."

"Because it's your job."

"Because you're my friend."

 

*

 

"Does he even have anything in there that can crack that glass?"

"It's unlikely, sir," Fitzsimmons said.

"As unlikely as him knowing the specs on the pod?"

Fitzsimmons sighed. "It's possible."

"What does he have?"

"Same basic survival items as the others. Pressure suit, emergency rations. And wherever he decided to take with him. Hell, sir, as far as I know, he could have brought a mass-driver that could shatter the port like a giant sugar crystal."

"How long until the temperature falls enough to put him into shock?"

"Not long, sir."

"Get your men ready then."

 

*

 

"Crispin, do you remember Theseus Base?"

"Stop taking."

"Do you? Just after we had crossed out of the Oort Cloud. I remember seeing that and thinking that it was the first sign of home in years."

"Stop talking to me, Soma."

"I'm just asking if you remember. I'm testing your cognitive function."

"Yes. Of course I remember."

"Steam baths. They had real steam baths. And that room with all the jade-tile pools, water falling from one to another. Warmer than I've been for half my life."

"You're torturing me."

"What?"

"I'm freezing to death and you're talking about steam baths. I hate you."

"It doesn't have to be that way. I don't hate you, Crispin."

"Stop talking to me."

"I'll bet you remember seeing me in my swimsuit."

"Oh, Jesus."

"Shock to see that the good doctor also had a figure? I don't care. I'm never going to forget those steam baths. Like heaven."

"I think the dark planet is heaven."

Soma stood and looked in the window.

"What are you talking about, Crispin?"

"I think the dark planet is heaven, and this is the only way I'll ever see it."

"Crispin..."

He looked up at her from the ball he was curled in.

"Prove me wrong."

"I... I can't."

"Have faith, doctor."

"Crispin, I remember Theseus Base very clearly, and not just because of the steam baths. I remember how you said you wouldn't play cards with me anymore. I remember that you kissed me. You were drunk, so I don't know if you even remember."

"I remember."

"It wasn't a bad kiss. Even for a drunk."

"Thanks, doc."

"I don't want you to die. I'll miss you too much."

Crispin laughed and coughed. "I'm going to miss you, too, I think."

"Don't miss me then. I'm right here."

"Ah. But is this the truth, or just another attempt to save my life?"

"I care about you enough to save your life, Crispin."

"Not enough, doc. It isn't enough."

Soma stood and waited, and wiped one eye with her thumb.

"I'm right here. You just have to open the door."

"Goodbye, doc. It's been great knowing you."

Then nothing. The small figure sat and shivered in the dark and spoken nothing more. Crispin could feel his lungs beginning to freeze, and his eyesight was masked in the cobwebs of sluggish capillaries.

"Crispin."

"Yes?"

"At least put the pressure suit on. Don't die cold."

 

*

 

"How long until they can get through the door?"

"It depends on what kind of seals he's set up. If he reinforced the door from both sides, then it could be hours. And we'll have to slow-cut it, sir, so we don't risk anything compromising the pod itself. "

"He'll be dead by then."

"Permission to speak freely, sir?"

"Go ahead."

"Does it really matter? Is he ever going to see the inside of a pod again?"

"It it's up to me, he'll be in stasis for the rest of the tour. See how he likes floating for most of a decade."

"We could just wait him out and leave the pod sealed. Down to 220 for the remainder."

The Captain tapped a finger against his chin and paced.

"220 observation pods," he said. "One coffin."

 

*

 

Crispin placed his hand against the glass. Even through the pressure glove, he could almost feel the hum of the great object drifting miles below.

"What does she say to you?"

"Come home," Crispin said. "Come home. Come home."

"I wish I could see it. The thing you say is down there, maybe just to know if there really is a heaven. I don't have the faith to believe on my own, I think."

"That's okay, doc. No one is perfect."

"Maybe if you live, you can call back up and tell me. Tell me what the angels are like."

Crispin took his hand away from the window and turned to the hatch.

"Come with me," he said. "If you want."

"Crispin, you're trapped. The Captain is going to leave you sealed in. You're never going to leave that room again. You're going to die."

"I told you, doc. I'm not going to die."

"Yes you are. You said so yourself, you're going to die on this ship. And you were right."

"Then why are you still here talking to me?"

"I don't know. I really don't."

"I think I know why," he said. "I'm sorry, doc."

She laughed and said only, "Call me Soma, James."

"Okay."

"And yes," Soma said. "If given the chance, I think I might have actually gone with you. Crazy as that may be."

"You still have a chance, you know."

"You're in a sealed room. You're never coming out."

"Yes," Crispin said. "I am."

And from the inside, he opened the door.

 

*

 

"Captain! The hatch on Crispin's pod just came online!"

"He's coming out."

 

*

 

They saw two things upon crossing into the hallway. One was that the door was indeed laying open. And Soma sitting curled up next to the yawning frame.

"Where did he go?"

"I don't know."

"What the hell do you mean you don't know?"

"He hit me."

The Captain looked down at Soma's bruising face and his lip curled. "The b*****d. We are going to get him, doc. You two, down E deck. Fitzsimmons, get on the com and lock this wing down. Doc, you come with me."

"I'm going to my office. I can patch myself."

"I insist. It isn't safe."

"He's not going to hurt anyone else. He just wants to hurt himself at this point. If I were you, I'd get down to the shuttle dock. He's going, one way or another."

"You heard her, shuttle dock! Move!"

The handful of engineers did as told. Soma got up, shaking.

"Doc, let me give you a hand," Fitzsimmons said.

"Get your hands away from me, Fitz. I'm fine. Go find my patient."

A moment later, Soma stood alone outside the ghost pod.

"They're gone."

 

*

 

There was a stir of shadow, a grate pushing away from the floor of the corridor.

He climbed out, aching.

"Thank you. Are you alright?"

"Yes."

Crispin looked at her. "Jesus, Soma."

"I told them you did it."

"I know. I heard."

"You could stay. Get put in stasis for the rest of the tour. It would take you a lot of physical therapy afterward, but at least I would get to see you again. Seven years from now."

"I'm going. Still. You stay here and take care of them."

"Crispin, if you live. If you live..."

"Forever, Soma."

He kissed her then. When it was done, he said "Goodbye"

Then he was gone.

 

*

 

They did not find Crispin.

The engineers searched the great ship, deck by deck, room by room. Even the observers came out and checked the wings that held the eye-like pods, though some refused to give up their posts of watching the storms of the dark planet below. Anders and his patch of sympathizers, the Captain thought. At this rate, he would have to forget the brig and start instituting house arrest in the pods.

He did not sleep for some time. Not until the search had become futile and Soma came to the deck, ordering them to get rest. Let the second rotation crew continue.

The Captain swore and trudged back to his own cabin, its myriad windows glaring down at the celestial beast he'd been sent to tame. From that room, the dark planet was ever visible, not rising nor setting, but merely swirling in its pandemoniac splendor.

Sanctum sanctorum. The Captain was a man of close comforts and it was here that he kept the things that no other crew member could have dreamed about bringing onto such a vessel.

The Captain was a man of history, and he chose to carry it with him in the form of objects and relics of the old times. His memories were carried in that room and shared with no one.

Except today, for the door was locked.

"What the hell?"

"Hello, Captain."

The voice from the radio next to the cabin door was a nail across the folds of his brain.

"Crispin."

"I hope you don't mind. I've borrowed your cabin. I could use some rest, you see, before my trip. By the way, you have some wonderful things in here. You should show it off, it could be the ship's museum."

"Crispin! Get your a*s out here! You're trapped!"

"I thought so, too. But I've been looking around and I found something that might help. Come along and see. To the side, please."

The Captain ran along the passage, coming around to a single porthole that overlooked the space therein. A figure in a pressure suit, visor open to reveal Crispin's face, gave him a wave. He then presented the Captain with a nickle-plated box the size of a handbag.

"I had no idea you were such a traditionalist, sir."

"That is in an heirloom! It's worth more than your life!"

"Certainly, sir."

The box was laid on the Captain's personal desk, an oaken monstrosity that Crispin believed was beyond the vessel's weight restriction, and opened it. Crispin withdrew the ancient device inside and held it up. It was beyond old, left over from forgotten wars in states that no longer existed.

"I read a thing or two about history, too, sir. I suspect this is what is referred to as a Single-Action Army."

"You son of a b***h! I will see your name disgraced!"

"Thank you, sir."

Crispin loaded the pistol and locked his visor into place. Then he turned to the largest window of the cabin, overlooking that mass of ephemeral strangeness below. Those lights, those quantum glimpses of eternity.

"Heaven," Crispin said.

He fired.

 

*

 

Crispin fell.

 

*

 

In her room, Soma sat beneath the flow of steaming water and remembered. When the whole of the ship groaned and shook, she closed her eyes as hard as she could, holding onto something even more ephemeral than the dark planet. A real memory, not a trinket, but a thing that cannot be given over, surrendered or sold. Memory perseveres. Memory lives forever.

Memory and dreams.

 

*

 

The angels danced and were of matters and sights known by no man, save for James Crispin.

Author's Note

Please ignore the occasional dropped letters. This one is the least polished thus far.

Reviews

[Calypso]

This was a good read. Normally I don't read things about sailors, but the chance was once for once.