Exhausted from self-pity and six consecutive nights of sex, unproductive conversations about a future together, more sex, brooding wakefulness and a mere three hours of sleep, she felt so close to fainting that she had finally been tempted away from the pool and into the chill-out room. She didn’t feel the slightest desire to have another opulent dinner in Selene, play-acting the sweet travel guide. She’d had enough. Either Julian went public about their relationship while they were still on the Moon, or he could rot alone on the Aristarchus Plateau. Her bad mood swelled into a reservoir of rage. So they couldn’t make contact? There was no response from Ganymede? The last sighting of the count was in 2025? Well, so what! It wasn’t her responsibility to keep checking up and searching. She was completely worn out, and now she didn’t even want Julian to find her – if he ever turned up again. In reality, she wanted nothing more than for him to find her, but just not right now. She wanted him to go out of his mind with worry first. To beat his fists into the empty pillow beside him. Miss her. Simmer in his guilt. Yes, that’s what he should do!
Similar to the design of the pool, the chill-out area was modelled on the surface of the Moon, full of little craters and secluded corners. Her bathrobe slung around her, she selected a discreetly located lounger, perfectly suited to not being found, stretched out on it and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep in just a matter of minutes. Breathing evenly, away from the gaze of possible search parties, she rested at the very base of all consciousness. Removed from time and reality, lured into the waiting room of death, she snored softly and felt nothing but heavenly peace, and then not even that.
Four storeys above her, hell was bubbling away.
Even though Gaia in its intact state resembled a youthful, perfectly functioning organism, whose life-support systems predestined it for heroic acts, gold medals and immortality, a few stray projectiles from a handgun had been enough to turn all the advantages of its systems and sub-systems against it in the blink of an eye. The hidden tanks, designed to offset shortages in the bio-regenerative circulation by pumping the most accurately gauged quantities of oxygen into the atmosphere, had revealed themselves to be a fatal weakness. Twenty minutes after the catastrophe had struck, the affected tank was already burnt out, while other systems, originally intended to be life-saving, gave the hellfire new nourishment. By this point, the sealed-off area had temperatures of over 1000 degrees Celsius. The casing on the oxygen candles had melted and liberated their contents, burning coolants had caused the pipelines to explode, and supposedly non-flammable wall casings were flowing down like glowing slurry. Unlike in the Earth’s gravitational pull, the blaze didn’t flare up high, but instead drifted curiously around, creeping into every corner, including the cabin of E2, the guest elevator, the doors of which hadn’t managed to shut in time because Anand’s collapsed body was blocking them. Only tarry clumps and bones remained of the three corpses; everything else had been swallowed up by the flame monster. Human tissue, synthetic materials, plants, and still its hunger was far from sated. While the prisoners in the Mama Quilla Club were planning their escape with Lynn and Tim, while Dana Lawrence was foaming with rage, hammering against the closed bulkhead, and while Nina Hedegaard was sleeping through the destruction, the flames raged against a second tank, until eventually its sealing couldn’t hold out any more and a further twenty litres of compressed oxygen unleashed the next phase of the inferno. In the absence of other materials, the monster began to gnaw at the security glass of the window and at the steel brace which held Gaia’s neck upright, weakening its structural solidarity.
At a quarter past nine, the first load-bearing constructions slowly began to give way.
‘No, it was absolutely right not to use the elevator,’ they heard Lynn say through the intercom system. She sounded tired and drained, robbed of all her strength. ‘The problem is that we can only make assumptions from down here. The sensors in the neck have failed; it’s possible that it’s still burning down there. The fire-extinguishing system was clearly able to make some progress in Chang’e, but there’s still contamination and considerable vacuum pressure. Almost all the oxygen has gone to blazes. I imagine the ventilators will balance that out in the course of the next two hours, just like in the shoulder area.’
‘But we can’t wait two hours,’ said Funaki, with a sideways glance at Rebecca Hsu. ‘And it’s getting hotter in here too.’
‘Okay, then—’
‘What about the ventilator shafts? We could climb down over the staircase.’
‘The data for that is contradictory. There seems to have been a slight loss of pressure in the eastern shaft, but that might just be because a little bit of smoke forced its way in. The western shaft looks okay. As far as the guest elevators are concerned, E2 has broken down, its cabin is stuck in the neck, and the staff elevator is in the cellar. E1 is in the lobby, near us. We’ve used it several times without any problems.’
‘E1 won’t be of much help to us,’ said Funaki. ‘It stops in the neck. If we’re going to use anything it can only be the staff elevator – that’s the only one that goes through to Selene.’
‘Just a moment.’
Muffled voices could be heard in the control centre. First Tim’s, then Walo Ögi’s.
‘I’d like to remind you that E1 and E2 are a good distance apart,’ Funaki added. ‘If E2 has been compromised, that doesn’t affect E1. The staff elevator, on the other hand, travels between the two, and would get very close to E2.’
‘Lynn?’ O’Keefe leaned over the intercom. ‘Could the fire spread to the other elevator shafts?’
‘In principle, no.’ She hesitated. ‘The likelihood is very slim. The shaft system is connected via passageways, but structured in such a way that flames and smoke can’t spread that quickly. And besides, the shaft itself is inflammable.’
‘What does “that quickly” mean exactly?’ asked Eva Borelius.
‘It means that we should test it,’ said Lynn with a steady voice. ‘We’ll send the staff elevator up to you. If the system considers it to be safe, its doors would open in Selene. After that we’ll call it back, look inside, and if there’s nothing to suggest otherwise, we’ll send it up again. Then you should be able to actually use it.’
O’Keefe exchanged glances with Funaki and tried to make eye contact with the others. Sushma was frozen in a state of fear, Olympiada was gnawing at her lower lip, and Karla and Eva were signalling their agreement.
‘Sounds sensible,’ said Mukesh.
‘Yes.’ A nervous laugh escaped from Karla. ‘Better than smoke-filled ventilation shafts.’
‘Okay,’ decided Funaki. ‘So let’s do it.’
‘Nothing can shock me now anyway,’ warbled Miranda.
The re-enlivening effect of having a plan seeped into the bloodstream of the small group and motivated them to climb down to Selene, where the temperatures were significantly higher. Funaki threw a precautionary glance at the bulkheads on the floor. There was nothing to suggest that smoke or flames were making their way upwards.
They waited. After a short while they heard the elevator approaching. For what felt like an eternity, the doors remained closed, then finally glided silently apart.
The cabin looked the same as it always did.
Funaki took a step inside and looked around.