Page 4 of Bound By Stars
Ahead, porters sort the slow-moving crowd of Earthers. Tickets are scanned and people climb ladders or duck low into sleeping pods. Pods.
Why hadn’t I considered pods? It makes perfect sense. I know the specs. The ship holds 2,240 people. How else would we all fit?
One, two. One, two. My mental chant turns to panicked chaos. I need to get out of here.
ILSA places a curved hand on my shoulder.
I glance back to see the cloud icon on her face screen. Sky. Air. Exhaling slowly, I nod.
The praying man from my transport climbs into the middle row of pods, opening the door as we pass. Inside it’s small, but there’s light, a mirrored wall. Is that an air vent? Of course. They aren’t locking us in airless boxes. I picture myself pressing my face up close to it, imagine the brush of air against my cheeks, and tap my fingers to my thumb. One. Two. One. Two.
It’s only for sleeping. I can do this.
“Ticket?” The crew member glares at me like this isn’t the first time she’s had to ask.
“Oh, sorry.” I fumble with the thick black tag in my pocket and finally manage to pull it out to show her.
She takes it from me, scanning the embossed code. Pinching her eyebrows together, she looks me over, stained shoes to knotted hair. “You aren’t supposed to be here.”
My heart sinks. If I could have just finished reading the damn letter. Will they send me back? Arrest me?
She waves another crew member over, and I brace myself for detainment, the imminent firm grip on my upper arm or bonds clamping around my wrists.
“Follow me, please. Your accommodations are in another area.” She moves quickly, not waiting for questions.
My stomach pitches. My face goes cold. Oh god. There are even smaller pods.
She leads me up a sloped walkway that opens to a circular room with a high ceiling, semicircle mezzanine, and flat wall with a projection of an infographic with the ship’s name in the same long script as my ticket.
“The porter checked my ticket at the gate. Is there something wron…”
I tear my eyes away from the room and our guide is already gone.
ILSA and I follow the sound of clanking footsteps into a cold, echoey stairwell and spot her a flight above. Three levels up, we finally catch her, staying a couple steps behind as we exit.
The plain white floor becomes shiny black with a repeating pattern of small golden galaxies. An ornate banister winds upward, its swoop of polished wood reflecting the glittering chandelier above. An ancient-looking clock is mounted to the wall midway up the stairs.
Now I know I’m in the wrong place.
Below, the ship’s interior looked like what I’d expected of an interplanetary voyage, plain and minimalist. Function over frill. But up here, it’s like something out of a history book. Every inch needlessly adorned, pointlessly luxurious.
Opposite the staircase, a blond porter stands behind a solid wood podium sliding her finger over the top, tapping commands. Behind her, a set of ornate double doors carved with swirling patterns and five-pointed stars swing open. They’re not like the rest of the doors we’ve passed, unremarkable ports sliding in and out of the walls. A man with a thin mustache and the same navy vest steps out. I catch a flash of tables draped with ivory linens before the doors swing shut again.
The blond porter looks up from the podium to the mustached man. “The countdown clock isn’t running.”
“It’ll start any second. We’re behind schedule.” The man gives her a sideways glance, whispering a little too loudly as I pass. “A Big Six family made a scene about private transport, so we’re a few minutes behind.”
“Just a little farther this way,” our guide calls from the landing halfway up the grand staircase.
I walk faster, like I wasn’t shamelessly eavesdropping, and silently eye ILSA beside me. We ascend the steps together as the minute hand of the old clock ticks to the right. Under the hands keeping the time in our designated port city, my home, a set of blank plates rotate to display the days and hours remaining until we reach our destination:Thirty-six days, seven hours.About five weeks to Mars.
The woman leading us disappears onto the next level.
“Look, if there’s something wrong, I can…”
I can what? Find my own way back to Earth? The transport that brought me here already departed.
Either she’s hauling ass or I’m too distracted to keep up. Maybe both.
