Murmansk-13

She’d tried so hard to improve her self control over the years, but ever since she left the ring she’d had no outlet for her anger. Now even the littlest things provoked an intrinsic need to lash out.

“Hey, Tala? Yo?” Tala scrunched her eyes up at the nasally sound of Hernandez trying to capture her attention, she loved the man as a friend, but he knew how to press her buttons. “Tala…?”

“What?” She hissed.

“The way I see it,” Hernandez began, pacing around the cell, “that key opens this door, si?” He coughed an affected cough and pointed at his cell lock. “How about, maybe you throw over that key so that I can go get a lil’ help?”

Tala let out a resigned breath.

“Maybe before our darling crewmember in the lab coat returns and finds her lock opening trinket missing,” Hernandez wheedled.

“Fine,” Tala removed herself from Katja and fished the key from the wrong lock, tossing it across and to the left of the narrow corridor. The key skittered to the base of Hernandez cell.

☣☭☠

Jamal looked at the key wistfully as Hernandez removed the gauntlet from his EVA suit to retrieve it. If only I hadn’t got shot. But he had, he was hobbled, once valued, now forgotten. Jamal waited and hoped they put him down before Oleg turned, hoped there was no further need for experiments. Let me have just that.

The once powerful Belorussian lay slumped on the far bulkhead, his breathing growing irregular and ragged. The exposed skin around the neck of his jumpsuit had become a patchwork of red hues and slowly decaying vasculature – arteries and veins darkening with coagulum. The last time Oleg had opened his eyes, the blood vessels were close to bursting, the sclera appeared cleft with crimson fault lines. Sweat poured from Oleg as he rapidly wasted away. In his short time in the cell, Hernandez had made a point to avoid the scene, turning his attention to the cell with his shipmates in and away from his dying jail mates.

“You know, you’re going to need to take your suit off to get outta here,” Jamal observed, his voice raspy. “Not much point stopping at the gloves, man.”

Hernandez looked down on him with curiosity etched in his native features. He spoke in a reverent tone. “You help my crew, ese?”

“If getting them locked up helped,” Jamal wanted to laugh, but a hacking cough prevented him, when he spoke again it was breathless. His body was failing to its own infection. Maybe I’ll kick it before Oleg. Jamal smiled to himself. “Yeah, I guess.”

“Then I owe you, man,” Hernandez started uncoupling the other gauntlet. “But tell me, how do I get back to my ship without my EVA?”

Jamal shrugged. “You want to get your friends out or yourself? Because whichever it is, you ain’t fitting through that itty-bitty air duct up there in your suit,” Jamal motioned toward the grating above the antechamber. “You get help, then your suit is still here, waiting for you, but those two girls over there don’t have suits,” he gestured with his head toward Katja and Tala. “If you get what I’m saying, man.”

Hernandez nodded grimly. “How am I going to get up there? That grating is like ten feet above the ground, cabron. I’m five-four and that’s in low g.”

“I guess I’m going to have to learn to walk again,” said Jamal, clenching the bars and pushing himself up against the bulkhead.

Hernandez managed to pop the lock, pushing the cell door open before the auto lock mechanism snapped it shut again. He glanced at the mess that had been Jamal’s shin, nose wrinkling in a mixture of disgust and sympathy. Splintered bone chips showed through where Jamal had torn away the pant leg, the edge of the bullet hole bore an insalubrious green hue. Blood and pus created a gelatinous film over the entrance wound. “Yo, your leg is all messed up.”

“It’ll have to do,” Jamal spoke through clenched teeth as he gingerly tested his weight on the injured leg. Even the slightest touch against the deck was like hot knives being inserted into the places where sensation began. He was sure the bullet had ricocheted into his foot, everything below his knee was a hot and cold mixture of numbness.

“You ain’t going to be able to do this, ese.” Hernandez peeled away the rest of his suit, speaking in a hushed tone. The cells suddenly reeked of warm rubber and fermented body odour, the effect not unlike a freshly opened bag of jerky.

I’d kill for a bag of Jack Links beef jerky. Jamal would never taste it again, never taste a lot of things again. Of all Jamal had to mourn, missed foodstuffs seemed the least of his cares. His sisters face flashed in his mind, only when she’d been much younger, when Jamal had walked her to elementary school, her first day. All chubby cheeks and gorky colourful glasses, the hinge taped together by Moms. Her hair a nest of curls.