Don’t think about it. You’ll just bring his ghost onto the ship.
The duct was tightening, squeezing around his shoulders. Nailer began to imagine himself stuck like a cork in a bottle. Pinned in the darkness, never able to get free. He strained forward and yanked down another length of wire.
Enough. More than enough.
Nailer hacked Bapi’s light crew code into the duct’s metal with his knife, doing it blind, but at least making a stab at saving the territory for later. He tightened himself into a ball. Knees against chin, elbows and spine scraping the duct walls as he turned himself around. Folding tighter, letting out his breath, fighting off images of corks and bottles and Jackson Boy caught in the darkness, dying alone. Tighter. Turning. Listening to the duct creak as he squeezed against metal.
He came free, gasping relief.
In another year, he’d be too big for this work and Sloth would take his niche for sure. He might be small for his age, but eventually everyone got too big for light crew.
Nailer squirmed back down the duct, rolling the wire ahead of him. The loudest sound was his own rasping breath in the filter mask. He paused and reached ahead for the loosened wire, confirming that it was still there, still leading him out to the light.
Don’t panic. You took this wire down yourself. You just need to keep following it-
A scuttling noise echoed behind him.
Nailer froze, skin crawling. A rat, probably. But it sounded big. Unbidden, another image intruded. Jackson Boy. Nailer could imagine the dead crew boy’s ghost in the ducts with him, creeping through the darkness. Stalking him. Reaching for his ankles with dry bone fingers.
Nailer fought down panic. It was just superstition. Paranoia was for Moon Girl, not for him. But the fear was in him now. He started shoving his scavenged wire aside, suddenly desperate for clean air and light. He’d crawl out, renew his LED paint, and then come back when he could see what was what. Screw Sloth and Bapi. He needed air.
Nailer started squeezing around his tangled bundle of copper. The duct creaked dangerously as he squirmed past, protesting the collected weight of himself and the wire. Stupid to gather so much. Should have cut it in sections and let Pima and Sloth spool it out. But he’d been hurrying, and now, of all things, he’d collected too much. Nailer clawed forward, jamming the wire aside. Felt a flush of triumph as he kicked the last tangling wires off his legs.
The duct groaned loudly and shuddered under him.
Nailer froze.
All around, the duct pinged and creaked. It sank slightly, tilting. The whole thing was on the verge of collapse. Nailer’s frantic activity and extra weight had weakened it.
Nailer spread out his weight and lay still, heart pounding. Trying to sense the duct’s intentions. The metal went quiet. Nailer waited, listening. Finally, he eased forward, delicately shifting his weight.
Metal shrieked. The duct dropped out from under him. Nailer scrabbled for handholds as his world gave way. His fingers seized scavenged wire. For a second it held, suspending him above an infinite pit. Then the wire tore loose. He plummeted.
I don’t want to be a Jackson Boy I don’t want to be a Jackson Boy I don’t-
He hit liquid, warm and viscous. Blackness swallowed him with barely a ripple.
3
SWIM YOU BASTARD swim you bastard swim you bastard…
Swim!
Nailer sank like a stone through warm reeking liquid. It was like trying to swim through thick air instead of water. No matter how hard he fought, the warmth gave way under him, sucking him deeper.
Why can’t I swim?
He was a good swimmer. Had never worried about drowning in the ocean, even in heavy surf. But now he kept sinking. His hand tangled in something solid-the copper wire. He grabbed for it, hoping it was still connected to the ducts above.
It slithered through his fingers, slick and slimy.
Oil!
Nailer fought off panic. It was impossible to swim in oil. It just swallowed you like quicksand. He clawed again for the copper and looped the wiring around his hand to counteract its slickness. His sinking stopped. He began hauling himself back up out of the muck. His lungs screamed for air. Hand over hand, he dragged himself higher. He fought the urge to breathe, to give up and fill his lungs with oil. It would be so easy-
He came out of the oil like a whale surfacing, oil sheeting off his face. He opened his mouth to breathe.
Nothing. Just a strange pressure on his face.
The mask!
Nailer tore it off, gasping. Sucked air. Petroleum vapors burned his lungs, but he could breathe. He used the mask’s clean interior to scrape at his eyes, clearing oil away. He opened them to an intense stinging and burning. Tears filled his eyes. He blinked rapidly.
Blackness all around. Pitch blackness.
He was in some kind of oil reservoir, maybe a leaked pool, or some secondary storage chamber, or… He had no idea where he was in the ship. If he was really unlucky, he was in one of the main oil reservoirs. He finished wiping his eyes and tossed away the now useless mask. The fumes were dizzying. He forced himself to breathe shallowly as he clung to the wire. His skin burned with its petroleum coating. Hammers rang faintly in the distance-workers banging away at the ship, all unaware of his emergency.
His hands started to slide off the wire. Nailer grabbed desperately for a better handhold, hooking his arm through the tangles. Overhead, the duct creaked alarmingly. A tingle of fear ran through him. A few strands of wire that stretched to that high overhead duct were all that kept him from drowning. But the safety was temporary. Soon the duct would give way and he’d sink again, his lungs filling with oil, thrashing and gurgling-
Calm down, you idiot.
Nailer considered trying to swim again, but discarded the idea. It was just his mind playing tricks, fantasizing that the liquid all around was actually water. But oil was different. It didn’t support a body, no matter how much you wished. It just swallowed you up. Nailer had seen a man on heavy crew drown that way. He’d thrashed briefly in the oil, shouting and panicked, then slipped under, long before anyone could throw him a rope.
Don’t panic. Think.
Nailer reached out, fingers straining into the blackness. Reaching for anything: a wall, some bit of floating junk, anything to tell him where he was. His hand found nothing but air and mucky oil. His movements made the duct creak overhead. The wire sank slightly as something gave way. Nailer held his breath, expecting to go under, but the wire stopped sinking.
“Pima!” he shouted.
His voice echoed back fast, bouncing all around.
Nailer clutched the wire, surprised. Judging from the sound, he wasn’t in as big a space as he’d thought. There were walls nearby. “Pima!”
Again the fast echo.
This wasn’t some giant oil tank. It was much, much smaller. Heartened by the impression of walls, Nailer reached out again. But this time, instead of using a hand, he stretched out into the darkness with this toes.
After two tries, rough metal met his skin. A wall of some sort, and something else… Nailer sucked in a grateful breath. A thin pipe running along its breadth. It was only a centimeter in diameter, but still, it had to be better than a tangle of copper dangling from a failing duct.
Without waiting to reconsider, Nailer lunged for the wall.
As he moved, the ducting overhead shrieked and gave way. Nailer sank, thrashing and scrabbling for the thin pipe. His slick hands touched the wall, slipped off. Caught. He dragged himself up against the wall, clinging by his fingertips. They trembled with the strain. The oil didn’t give him any float at all. Already he was tiring. He couldn’t support himself for long.