Chapter 40 Arrival
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A knock on the other side of the fighter brought his head up.
"The missiles have all been safetied. Now what?" Prevost balanced on the cockpit's edge, staring down at her work center supervisor.
"Very funny. Now get down before you fall off and break something. We still have a lot of work to do."
"Gee, you do care."
"Only as much as I'll have to fill out all the paperwork." He gave her a smile, then managed to climb back down to the deck.
"Very funny." Prevost smiled, then punched him in the shoulder.
"Yeah, we have very clear rules against physical contact between men and women on board this ship." He mocked, rubbing his shoulder.
"Oh yeah, and what are you going to do about it? Report me?"
"No, I'm going to punch you back. He grabbed the petite woman by the shoulder and pulled her up close.
"Promises, promises," the small woman looked up into Bixby's face, swatted his cheek, pulled free of his grasp and sauntered away.
"That'll be enough of that," he called after her. "At least until we get these checks done."
"Then let's get to it. We need to have this done by the end of the day, or we'll have to work over, and I hate working over."
"I cut the power to the fusion reactor, so we'll have no problems there. That just leaves the cargo bay."
"Do these things even have a cargo bay?" The petite woman asked from on top of the still smoking heap.
"Yes, a small one, but they do have them, and we need to check it. Once that's finished, we can call senior chief, get this thing strapped up, moved and we can call it a day."
"I'll go get the crane, that way we'll be ahead of the game once senior chief gets here." At twenty-three, Samantha Prevost was the faster runner of the two, so she started to sprint towards the far wall, where the huge aircraft crane was parked.
They still called all of their equipment the same names as they did before they left earth, even though the enormous piece of metal they were going to lift had as much in common with the aircraft they used to work on as the Mayflower had with an aircraft carrier. It was just that they had been awake for such a short time they hadn't had time to designate anything. So they all just went with what was familiar.
In a few minutes, she had the crane's hook over the fighter's fuselage. Mark was on the fighter's hull. When the hook was lower to within arm's reach, he grabbed it and fastened it to the lifting brace built into the craft's upper hull.
"There," he yelled to Sam. Now let's check the cargo hold. It shouldn't take more than a few minutes. If we're lucky, there's nothing in there at all."
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Tamar had heard more than felt the impact. It was a hard contact with the space she was in. It was more like a nudge that sent her floor rocking from side to side. The floor she was on was metal. She knew that she'd spent more than enough time sleeping on a steel floor to know it when she felt it. There was but a single question that repeating itself in her brain. Where was she?
The last picture her mind could produce from her memories was flying through the air, then blackness. Tamar knew there was more, but her memories kept stopping at the same instant. That of landing hard on the steel surface upon which she now laid. Then nothing, nothing. That simple fact jarred something loose, a fact that was more painful than the lack of memory.
"Mal!" She bolted up into a crouch, then collapsed back onto her stomach, her arms not able to support her own weight.
"Mal." she whimpered softly.
She remembered everything now and wished for the life of her she couldn't. The ambush, Malachi throwing her into the air, her landing in what must be his fighter. Then his scream being cut off like a switch being thrown. The tilting of the floor just before she was knocked out must have been the fighter clawing for orbit.
So now she must be on his ship wherever that was. How many people had he said were on board, thirty, no, forty thousand? Tamar froze. She'd never been around that many people in her life, ever. Taking a tentative breath in through her nose, she recoiled. They were right outside, two of them, one man and a woman. Both were sweaty and grimy. As long as they didn't try to come in here, she'd be fine. All she had to do was wait until her Malachi came to get her. So she inched her way as far into the small compartment and waited. He'd come for her, he always had before.
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"Did you hear that?" Mark asked as he slid off the fighter's wing onto the deck.
"It sounded like a scream. I think there's someone in the cargo hold." Sam vaulted out of the crane and raced towards the bent and twisted rear end of the craft.
"Great, there's no way we'll get in there." Samantha threw up her hands, fists balled.
Mark knew what she meant the instant he got a clear look at the bay door. The hinge side was dented in two places, the once smooth metal now a mangled, disjointed mess.
"That's never going to move now." Sam bemoaned.
"It might, with some help." Mark ran towards the crane. "There's a toolbox on the back of this thing. I know it has at least two crowbars." He yelled over his shoulder.
A few minutes later, he was back at the hatch.
"Okay, when I say go, you push the button and I'll pry with this," he lifted the heavy six-foot pry bar. "With luck, we might be able to get it to open enough for one of us to get inside. You ready?"
Sam nodded, waiting for his signal.
Mark lifted the crowbar and slammed it wedge first into one of the many cracks in the seam where door meet fuselage. At the sound of metal striking metal, Samantha pressed down on the red button recessed into the fighter's hull near the other side of the door.
Motors whined and gears groaned as the door inched open. Mark's face turned red from the strain until with a pop the door jumped open a foot at most.
"Well, I guess that's better than nothing." Mark said, dropping the crowbar.
"Mal, it sure did take you long enough. Wait, you're not Malachi! Don't come in here. Don't come near me!" Both of them heard the voice from inside and redoubled their efforts.
"And what in the hell are you two doing? You were supposed to be done with this an hour ago." The voice boomed from behind them, but either of them turned.
"Senior chief, there's someone in here." Mark called without turning.
"There's no one in there, there can't be."
"We heard someone in there after we managed to get the door open. It's not open much, but I think I can squeeze through." Prevost told her senior chief.
"Then get that door open, they might be hurt!" he ran to join Bixby on the crowbar. Once ready, he called. "Hit it." This time, with two men prying, the door groaned open enough for a broad shaft of light to spill inside.
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