The Long Forever. Eugene Lambert

      ‘Tell you later,’ he whispers back. And then, so that everyone can hear: ‘You don’t get it, Sky, do you?’

      ‘Don’t get what ?’ Sky says, scowling down at him.

      Murdo shows her his blood-framed teeth in a grimace. ‘Feeling sick, Sky? Guts twisting themselves inside out? Skin crawling? You look like death, you know.’

      ‘You don’t look so great yourself,’ she hisses.

      Murdo just glances past her at the watching kids. ‘Yeah, even you lot will be suffering.’ He jerks his head at the hatch he was brought in through. ‘There’s a big red sign on the other side of that. It’s a warning. Says this hold is unshielded. Which means that while they’ve got this tramp freighter’s leaky old drive going, you’re all being zapped. No big deal for nubloods – you heal fast enough to take it or they wouldn’t carry you back here. But Sky and me, we’ll be dead long before we make planetfall.’

      Sky snorts. ‘Bullshit!’

      ‘Is it? You’ll have felt them kill the drive before they dragged me in here. Why do that? So they didn’t get zapped, that’s why. And they were hardly in here any time at all. What’s that tell you about how lethal it is?’

      Feeling as crap as I do, I don’t doubt it’s the truth.

      ‘Fine,’ I say. ‘We bust out next chance we get.’

      A glance at Cam and the others and I don’t see anyone shake their head. They look well up for it. Sky, trembling visibly with the effort of staying on her feet, shoots me her darkest look, curses and nods.

      ‘We’ve no choice,’ I say.

      ‘Story of my fraggin’ life,’ she says.

      Growing up in the Barrenlands of Wrath, I’m no stranger to seeing people on the receiving end of beatings. Murdo’s looks worse than it is. A cracked rib or two; a lumpy, battered and bloody mess for a face.

      ‘You’ll live,’ I tell him.

      Fishing with a finger inside his torn mouth, Murdo glares at me out of the one black eye he can still open.

      ‘Only if we get out of here.’

      ‘Yeah, yeah. We heard you the first time,’ Sky says.

      ‘So come on, Murdo,’ I say. ‘How did you end up here?’

      But he says that telling can wait until after we’ve busted out. We’re all crammed up against the bars of the cage now, as far from the drive compartment as we can get, with us nubloods shielding Sky and Murdo from whatever crap the freighter’s drive is leaking out. That was Anuk’s suggestion, the girl with the pox-scarred face.

      Sky says it helps, but she’s clearly still suffering.

      ‘What are we up against?’ Cam asks.

      ‘There’s only five crewmen aboard,’ Murdo tells us. ‘Two gave me my kicking, another three watched.’

      ‘Good odds,’ I say. Especially with us being nubloods.

      ‘So we wait until they bring us food, then you pull your blasters and make them open the cage?’ Cam says.

      ‘Or shoot them, then blast the cage open,’ Sky says.

      Murdo shakes his head. ‘Bad idea. See that hull? It’ll only be a few mils thick. A stray blaster shot, even on low power, will punch through it like a hot knife through lard. And that’s vacuum the other side. One hole and it’s goodbye to the air in here. We’d be sucking on nothing.’

      I groan. ‘You mean we can’t use our blasters?’

      Sky curses. ‘Course we can. We don’t miss, that’s all.’

      Murdo rolls his eyes. ‘No! You don’t need blasters. There’s loads of us, five of them. And they won’t have energy weapons either, just killsticks or blades.’

      I picture the guys who brought Murdo in. And it’s true – neither carried a blaster.

      Sky snorts, clearly unconvinced.

      ‘You spring us out of this cage, we’ll take care of the crew for you,’ Cam says. And cracks his knuckles loudly.

      His hard-eyed mates nod behind him.

      ‘Should we blast the lock?’ I ask Murdo. ‘To get ready?’

      ‘No. Could be alarmed. Best wait until they show up to feed us. We’ll know they’re coming when the drive shuts down.’ He winces. ‘With luck, I’ll still be alive.’

      I glance at Sky. Will she last that long? I’m sure she’s thinking the same dismal thought.

      Next thing I know, she’s hauling out her blaster.

      ‘Uh, Sky,’ I say.

      Before I can stop her, she squirms round and snaps a crackling shot off through the bars of the cage. My skin was crawling off me; now I nearly jump out of it.

      ‘Are you crazy!?’ Murdo hisses.

      ‘No. Just sick of being fried, that’s all.’

      Her blaster round has hit one of the wooden crates stacked further up the hold. Flames lick at the blackened and splintered hole. I smell the choking stink of smoke.

      ‘Oh great,’ I moan. ‘So now we get to burn to death!’

      A siren starts to wail . . .

3

       BUSTING OUT

      Red lights flash. Everybody jumps up, shouting. Not that I can hear them over the wail of the siren, but I see the fear in their wide eyes, their scared mouths working.

      I pull my blaster, but Murdo snatches it off me.

      ‘I’ll sort the lock!’ he yells into my ear. ‘The alarm will bring the crew running. Get the kids ready.’

      And then he’s gone, scrambling towards the cage door.

      Cam’s nearest. I grab hold of him and shout into his ear, telling him to get his mates ready to bust out. And he might be sullen and hard work, but he’s no fool. He shoves me away and starts frantically passing the word on.

      Sky tries to get up again, but slumps back down.

      I go to help her, but she waves me away. So I run to see if Murdo needs a hand. He doesn’t. I see a flash, hear a bang. The cage door flies open. Murdo pulls it closed again, its rusty hinges screeching. A second later I feel that lurching sensation again and my skin stops crawling off me as the freighter’s drive shuts down. Cam’s got the kids ready. Too ready. They’re all eager and poised, eyes flashing.

      I wave at them. ‘No, no! Act scared.’

      Anuk gets it. She rattles the cage’s bars and starts yelling and screaming. ‘Help! There’s a fire in here!’

      More kids join in. Just in time, as a man’s wide-eyed face appears at a porthole in the forward hatch. Next thing, it’s opening. A crewman wriggles inside; two more follow close behind. By now the crate is really blazing. The first guy curses and shouts orders. The other two pull red tube things off the bulkhead. They scuttle as close to the burning crate as they dare and start spraying the flames with a white foam.

      Murdo shoves the cage door open. ‘Get them!’

      Cam’s first out, Anuk right behind him. The guy giving the orders sees them coming. His hand dips for something at his belt. Too slow. Cam’s already on him, drops a shoulder and knocks him flat. More kids scramble out, getting in my way. They hurl themselves on to the backs of the crewmen battling the fire. I see a girl snatch a packing strap off a crate. One end is a big