Free The Origami Dragon And Other Tales by C. H. Aalberry Page B

shoulder. He
pointed at the red lights of the damaged panel, and Chen nodded.
They had spent so long doing repairs that they instinctively knew
which systems were the most important from all their repair works.
Chen stuck to the controls while Matt rushed to the life-support.
He reached an air filter and was surprised to find that the problem
was nothing more serious than a broken fuse. He replaced it
quickly, noting with concern that the insulation foam seemed burnt
and twisted.
    A series of
explosions vibrated overhead. Matt counted seven explosions as he
worked.
    “Bet those were
the message drones,” he complained as he worked.
    Chen soon
joined him in his repair work. The two men worked with efficiency
born from long practice, quickly replacing burnt fuses and layers
of insulation. Chen jumped on the comms panel and sent a new
message off to Earth. The Anomaly’s light would have reached the
Agency long before Chen’s message, so Earth would know something
was up.
    Matt worked
desperately to get the station sensors to work while Chen reported
all that they knew. The Anomaly flickered between colours and
pumped out radiation in bursts. Matt and Chen could feel their
adrenaline pumping through their bodies, both men ready to make a
leap for their transport spaceship, which was docked on the side of
the station opposite the Anomaly.
    The Anomaly
kept changing, defying everything they thought they knew about it.
They were probably going to die, but this was what they had been
waiting for their whole lives.
    “Bet you a
dollar that when we get promoted I’ll be your boss,” said Matt.
    Chen laughed
slightly, nervous but excited.
    “If this goes
badly, we will be lucky to get a job cleaning toilets,” he
said.
    “OK, but dibbs
on still being the boss because-”
    Matt’s
reasoning was interrupted by a shriek of metal on metal as some
part of the station ripped away and fell towards the Anomaly. The
two astronauts waited, tensed and ready for action.
    “That tearing
sounds was… ?” asked Matt.
    “Our ship being
pulled from the station,” confirmed Chen tersely.
    “Long walk
home,” said Matt quietly.
    The station
vibrated around them and then fell silent. The lights flashed, went
dark, flashed, held steady, fell dark again. The lights continued
in this manner for a few seconds and then the station remained
dark. Chen moved over to a signalling station. He pushed a few
buttons and then hissed in annoyance. All their signalling systems
were offline, even the most basic and reliable of them. There would
be no contacting Earth for help, advice, or even just to say
goodbye.
    “I have a
really big flashlight under my bunk,” offered Matt.
    For once he
wasn’t joking. The lights were playing out a single word in Morse
code, over and over again. The Anomaly was trying to talk to them,
and they wanted to talk back. Matt found his torch, and he and Chen
searched the station for a window overlooking the Anomaly. One of
the many oddities of the station was its surplus of windows, and
one of them gave a magnificent view of the Anomaly with the planet
in the background. Matt handed Chen the light and pulled out a
notepad.
    “Sending
‘contact’ back,” said Chen.
    It was an
obvious start. Deciding what came next wasn’t nearly as easy.
    “G-r-e-e-t-i-n-g-s space o-n space b-e-h-a-l-f space o-f space
e-a-r-t-h,” Matt wrote as Chen signalled.
    It was the best
they could do on such short notice. Earth had never decided on the
best way to greet an alien intelligence, and the final protocol had
been decided by committee. It was long, tedious and, since it
required the sending of photos and music samples by radio, now
unworkable.
    “If I thought
this might actually happen I would have spent more effort trying to
get the protocols changed,” Chen said.
    They waited for
over an hour in the darkness. They didn’t talk. The station was
running on its emergency supplies of oxygen, and they both knew
they wouldn’t last