After lending an extra hand as Ilika and Boro extracted the data module, Mati returned to the almost-closed door. She could see Sata, floating upside down while looking under a console, and could hear her describing a glyph to Timorafilia.
Mati’s suit happened to be touching the door when she felt a slight vibration, as if two pieces of metal had come into contact.
She turned and frowned at the door. “Um . . . Ilika? The door just closed all the way. I think it’s been slowly closing ever since we opened it.”
Boro, holding a large sample container for Ilika, looked up. “I can just pry it open again.”
“I felt a click, and have a bad feeling about it. Would you try it, as soon as you’re done there?”
Boro nodded, then focused on holding the container while Ilika slid the precious data module in.
“Kinetic energy detected,” Manessa said with her gentle voice. “The hatch, through which the excursion team entered the colony ship, just closed, and a nearby mechanism changed state.”
Rini was quickly at his station, requesting magnified images, and asking the ship to pinpoint the mechanism that moved. With his screen and his eyes focused on that area, just to the side of the now-closed hatch, Rini could see a small red triangle that he didn’t remember seeing before.
NEBADOR Book Seven: The Local Universe 38
“Manessa, show me the same place on the ship before the hatch closed, same magnification.”
Rini could see the small triangle, but before the hatch had closed, it was yellow.
Just then he became aware of Mati’s worry about the doors to the bridge.
Boro inserted the prying tool between the teeth of the only door out of the bridge, and pressed the activation symbol. The status light became yellow, and the gap widened a millimeter or two, but no farther. Kibi could see the doors vibrating, and Boro could feel his tool doing the same.
The status light became red, and eventually purple.
“Ilika . . . we have a problem,” the engineer said as calmly as he could, even though his stomach had just clenched itself into a knot.
Ilika tore himself away from the dark control panel he was studying.
When he took in the situation of closed metal door and overloaded prying tool, he frowned. “Power levels two and three have delays so you can get away in case things go flying. Everyone else, get behind something.”
Kibi, Sata, and Mati took cover.
Boro switched the device to level two, entered a delay of eight seconds, glanced behind him, and touched the activation symbol.
He and Ilika quickly found cover.
The halves of the door separated several more millimeters, and started to dent slightly on both sides. The prying tool’s status took longer to change to red, and finally purple, as it gave up the attempt.
“Ilika?” Rini’s shaking voice came through the intercom. “This is embarrassing. The hatch you went through . . . it closed so slowly I didn’t notice, and now . . . I have a hunch . . . it’s locked.”
As Ilika and Boro looked down at the prying tool that had failed at level two, and the three girls peeked over their shoulders, the captain of the Manessa Kwi felt a feeling of dread rise up inside himself, the same feeling he had last felt when his little ship visited the icy core of gas giant Sonmatia Seven.
“We . . . have a similar problem here, Rini. And I wouldn’t be surprised if
NEBADOR Book Seven: The Local Universe 39
the other two hatches we opened along the way are now closed and locked also.”
“There’s . . . level three . . .” Boro suggested with questioning brows.
Ilika nodded. “We’ll give the prying tool another try, then talk again, Rini.
You may not, under any circumstances, leave the ship.”
Boro prepared the tool as everyone else took cover. With a twenty-second delay, he slowly floated behind the console where Sata crouched.
As Kibi peeked out from her hiding place, she could see the door shaking violently, and the gap between the teeth widening to about a centimeter, maybe a little more, then closing back to a few millimeters as the powerful little machine gave up and relaxed.
“Rini . . .” the captain began with hesitation. “It looks like . . . we’re trapped.”
After the entire crew talked, and decided there was no better tool on board the Manessa Kwi, the five crew members on the mystery ship took a few minutes to search for any way off the bridge they hadn’t noticed. Everything that would, was opened, as they looked for a crawl space or an air duct. A few conduits were discovered that might allow passage for a very small mouse.
After Rini heard the results of their search, he spent a few minutes sitting silently at his station, tears threatening to come. His mind wandered back to Satamia Star Station, and his recent wedding to the pilot of the ship, a girl who had known slavery, just as he had, and who had journeyed with him all around the kingdom, then all over the planet, and finally to most of the planets of their solar system.
The strong touch of her mind brought him back to the present. After a few deep breaths for courage, he wiped his eyes, stood, and stepped into the passenger area. “I need a crew.”