Excerpt

aEven though he'd done this before, something in Sarah's stomach flipped and twisted in pure, elemental fear as the distant stars and planets around her glimmered into view. The control panel, floor, and seats were solid, but the spiral arms of the Milky Way swirled in the distance, enfolding them.

There was another bump that sent the ship rolling sideways. A stray external gravitational field buffeting the ship? Had they bumped into something? Her guts felt like they wobbled along with it.

Paulo pointed to a colourful patch. "Crab Nebula," he said, leaning over to Patience. "It's all colourful because I have wavelength filters on. If you saw it with your naked eye, it would just be kinda greenish-blue an' white." He grinned. "Some of these ships were just over in that nebula, picking through shattered planets."

"How far away from that is Kepler-62?"

"Isthra, the Yteran home star?" Paulo said, with just a hint of tartness. "About eight hundred light years apart, if I remember right. Oh, here we go."

A massive, rather ugly hunk of metal sped towards them. It was designed for efficiency rather than beauty. Ships, crafts, and even small asteroids studded its surface like an errant blob of gum covered in gravel. Some were docked in ports, but some were clearly restrained in place with auxiliary chains, bolts, and levers.

The ship itself was massive, blob-shaped—clearly, it wasn't designed to land or navigate the atmosphere of anything, and it didn't need to be streamlined. But it was very large, at least a kilometre or two across, and had the scorched, weathered look of something that had encountered both heavy industrial use and bad luck.

She wasn't sure what Paulo was looking for. How was he going to land on this thing, even with algorithms to help? Yet somehow, he had the practiced, relaxed body language of a man pulling into a familiar garage.

There was a thunk and a clang, and the entire ship shook again. Despite the lack of gravity, every bone in her body rattled. Then a few more clunks.

Patience gripped Sarah's hand like it was the only thing holding her down. "What was that?" she squeaked.

There was a violent jerk that echoed through the whole ship.

"What was that?" Toby whispered.

Paulo coughed. "We're not aligned with the dock properly. If the base ship goes through the wormhole without us being fully attached, we could go spinning sideways. That's the good option."

"The good option?" Sarah squeaked.

"The bad option potentially involves getting stuck in the wormhole or hit by the ship. Try not to think about it."

A terrified silence descended over the cabin.

Paulo's forehead beaded with sweat as he concentrated. Automated error messages droned through the cabin as he tried to latch, then failed to lock again.

"Wormhole entrance in three minutes. All ships must now be secured for transport. Failure to clear the area may result in unintended spatial dislocation or damage."

Sarah heard Toby trying to steady his breathing. Suddenly, his eyes shot open. "Maria, play 'Mas Que Nada' by Ben Jorge."

Cheerful bossa nova music and playful horns filled the cabin. Paulo smiled, his shoulders relaxing immediately. He tapped a few screens, tracing his fingers in patterns to guide the ship's locking mechanisms into the right configuration.

"Positioning achieved," cooed the Maria Negra.

Paulo wiped the flesh part of his forehead in relief as he turned back to them. "Good thinking, with the music," he said to Toby, dipping his chin in a nod. "Calmed me down just enough."

Toby gave him a weak smile. "Happy to help. Happier to not be splattered."

Sarah let out a nervous giggle.

Another stream of more irritable-sounding chirrups and stridulations came over the comm. Paulo replied with a long, somewhat mournful croon. "She's not thrilled with me for taking so long," he said, clearing his throat. "But hey, we're latched. Everyone, get ready."

Patience's hand relaxed a little. "So we're safe?"

Paulo leaned back in his seat, grinning like a madman, and spread his arms in a stretch—then unclipped himself. Sarah watched as he paddled through the air, reaching for handholds and nooks and crannies to make his way over to the sink. He pulled down a shallow, strangely-shaped pot and a container of matcha tablets, along with a ball-case whisk. Setting the water to boil, he extricated a set of narrow, flexible cups. "Safe-ish. Here. They're capillary, but be careful with how you suck 'em up. Tea'll still be hot." When the tea was done, he inserted a long needle-like spout to fill the sleeve cups.

Patience was still white-knuckling her chair, and hadn't unclipped. "How can you drink tea at a time like this?" she whispered.

"We're in the flow field of this ship an' clamped on. Very secure. Ah, have a look at that, we're going through the hole." He smiled and toasted as the ship manoeuvred through a massive tube—no, a ring, she realised.

Sarah glanced from side to side. She could only barely see the edges of the tunnel. How massive was it?

"Stable holes like this are what my friend Crystal builds," Sarah said to Patience.

Paulo floated over with effortless grace. "Takes a lot to keep these things open an' make sure they don't just rip elsewhere." He zoomed out the field of view so they could see it. It had to be hundreds or even thousands of kilometres wide.

"So, what would happen if that went wrong?" questioned Patience, clutching her sleeve of matcha.

"Something like a fly stuck to a bullet train getting flung against the wall of a tunnel," said Paulo casually.

Toby choked on his tea.

"Exactly. That's why I focused on doing it right, an' not on what happens if it goes wrong." Paulo lifted his sleeve of tea in a toast.

The ship moved into the ring, carrying them with it—and the stars outside began to stretch. Scintillating patterns danced across the star-covered walls. They reminded Sarah of the nebula colours, but different somehow. Between the lack of gravity and the twisting, whirling colours, it reminded her of the times when she'd done mushrooms—but instead of her body and mind becoming strange, it was the world around them. Liminal iridescence spread around the pinpoint stars, rippled, and twisted.

A planet revealed itself, magnificent brown, gold, and sepia rings surrounding the gold and yellow swirls of a gas giant planet.

Sarah pointed, grinning. "It looks like Saturn back home, in the Sol System!"

The lights twisted again, dancing around the room. She suddenly noticed how dark it was. Paulo must have done that on purpose, she thought. She glanced over at him.

He was floating with his limbs outstretched, just taking in the sights around him. He looked relaxed, even reverent—clearly enjoying himself.

"I guess you don't get space sick, huh?" he said, making eye contact with Sarah.

Sarah grinned in delight. "I guess not. This is amazing. It's so beautiful!"

"I think I'm gonna hurl," Toby said faintly. He put his head between his hands, breathing slowly.

Sarah reached over, grabbing a vomit envelope for him, and held it out. He clutched it, closing his eyes tight, but didn't open it yet.

"This looks even stranger than it feels. How long till we're out of the wormhole?" muttered Patience, still wild-eyed.

"Eh, couple more seconds. But it'll be an hour or two before we can unclip an' I can turn the gravity back on. Gotta get some distance between us an' the officials."

A chatter of Coronite language burst from the comms, and he replied swiftly in a crooning song.

Sarah unclipped herself at last and started to move around. Shimmering colours twisted around them again, now pale and pastel. Tiny points of light and fog spread across one wall, representing the view outside.

"Star nursery," Paulo said, pointing to it. "Beautiful."

Sarah floated over and examined it, then zoomed in—but it flicked away. Ribbons of stars cascaded around them, unknown constellations flicking past faster than she could make them out. She still tried to watch for familiar shapes, especially when a slow, wide pulsation stretched space out around them, but it was too hard to follow. Crystal could totally do it, she thought, regretting her lack of expertise for a moment.

Toby and Patience glanced across the cockpit at each other. "How can you be so calm?" Patience asked.

Sarah shrugged. "It's that or existential terror. And my leg doesn't hurt near as much when I'm weightless." She swam towards the floor, then up towards the ceiling, grinning, and did a somersault. "C'mon."

In his cage, looking somewhat confused, Boo was clinging to the bars.

Patience glanced timidly at the enormous cargo freighter that spanned on either side of the little ship, then back at Sarah. "All right, fine." She unclipped herself, but kept clutching the chair, her eyes closed.

Sarah swam over and reached for her hand. "I got you. Do you trust me?"

Patience took a deep breath. "Yes, but even if I didn't, it's a bit late now." She slowly lifted her other hand from the armrest, and Sarah took it. Guiding her up and out of the chair, she pulled Patience through the cockpit and into the empty space in the ship. Paulo moved towards the back, hovering near the ceiling in the storage area.

Stars still pulsed and danced around them, a hundred thousand worlds—many empty, some speckled with life—flicking past as they travelled.

"Why can't we turn the gravity on?" Toby whimpered.

"Math reasons. It would fuck with the ship we're attached to, basically. An' right now, our weight is being counted as negligible space-junk. With the ship set to low-power mode, we register on scans as a hunk of metal. An' it won't attract other foreign objects to the ship. C'mon, you've felt the gravity turn off before," Paulo said, paddling towards him in the cockpit.

"Yeah, but this is more terrifying."

"Bein' scared of it won't make it safer."

Sarah had extricated Patience from the co-pilot seat. They floated in the middle of the room, holding hands.

"Open your eyes," Sarah whispered. She pointed to the viewscreen on the largest wall.

Patience took a deep breath, and did.

"It's like being out there," Sarah said, grinning at her.

Finally, Patience grinned back. Letting go of one of her hands, she tried to roll—and her eyebrows shot up to her hairline as she realised there was nothing to stop her from moving. "Toby, come on!" she said excitedly. "It's not so bad."

"Nope," he said, the words coming through gritted teeth. "I'm going to close my eyes and read a book against my eyelids until this is over."

Sarah couldn't help it; she giggled. Patience looked back at her and took a step against the floor, then pushed up to the ceiling. "Oof!"

Paulo stretched out across the front of the cockpit, legs crossed and one arm tucked behind his head. "See?" he called back to Sarah. "Now you get it."