Page 142 of Homebound
“Well, considering it came from a junkyard… I am amazed it can fly.”
As she said it, the reality hit, and the wonder of it nearly took Gemma’s breath away. She turned to face him, swallowing the annoying feeling of sickness.
“Simon, we’re in space!” She couldn't disguise her elation and her sheer awe. “You did it! You got us up and out.”
He was silent for a long time. “That was the easy part.”
Chapter 31
Gemma pushed herself off the wall with just enough force to float away from the calendar where she’d marked off another day. Since the paper-and-pencil version hadn’t made it on the trip to space due to their hasty departure, she improvised by scratching the numbers onto a metal plate with a knife.
The production of keeping a calendar in deep space was an exercise in futility and approximation. How did you mark a new day when there was no sun to rise over the earth in the morning, and no earth?
“Time is nothing but a measure of the distance traveled,” Simon had told her once after she had vented her frustrations. “On a planet, it’s usually the planet’s full orbit around its star. It’s repetitive, it’s constant, and therefore it works well as a benchmark.”
“But how do you measure time here?”
“You don’t.”
“Then how do you judge the distance we’ve traveled?” It was all too mind-boggling.
“Butan uses autonomous radio navigation to stay on course.” Simon had briefly explained to her how that worked. “It’s a time-tested technology, universally accepted as accurate and reliable. Except nothing is accurate or reliable on Butan,” he had added sourly.
Gemma estimated they had been traversing the space for three months, give or take.
Forced to rely on her internal clock, she marked a new day on the calendar every time she woke up from a “good night's” sleep. Since her body demanded rest at regular intervals, she figured she could trust those inborn cycles. That system worked fine except for the days when bouts of nausea interrupted her normal sleep pattern and threw her time-marking routine off track.
Gemma floated to one of the two small portholes located at the back of the ship. Thick sealed crystals acted as windows, protecting their craft’s interior from the harsh conditions of the open space while allowing a glimpse of the great cosmic beyond. Not that there was much to stare at besides the vast inky darkness dotted by white lights of the stars. Gemma looked out nonetheless, unimpressed by the sight, wishing for a glimpse of familiar images like trees, and buildings, and clear blue skies.
Her stomach gave a familiar weak somersault.
Evidently, she was not a born space cadet. Weightlessness caused her to be sick, and she stayed sick pretty much the entire time. Space was a bizarre place, and her body refused to cooperate where there was no ‘down.’
Simon had said that some people were sensitive like that.
“But you can handle it. Thousands of others can,” she had groused.
“Mostcan. The brain can be trained to not need a fixed anchor to position itself. Butsomecan’t get used to it.”
Rix eyes weren’t designed to convey a wealth of emotion, but she had thought she detected pity in Simon’s when he said that.
Aren’t I special.
Ignoring the persistent queasiness, Gemma did a somersault that brought her close to the ‘pantry’ where they stored food. She had organized and reorganized the strips of dried chicken meat, dehydrated apple slices, croutons, and several varieties of canned goods multiple times, out of sheer boredom rather than the need to inventory their supplies. She knew exactly how fast their stash was diminishing.
She fingered several ration-sized airtight pouches before selecting one for herself. Simon wouldn’t want any now, as he ate so little.
Gemma chewed on the unappetizing dry food and took a small sip of water. It tasted stale. The water provisions were solely for her benefit, and whereas the food should comfortably last them for about a year, the water was worth its weight in gold. There wasn’t enough of it, and she knew it. She had meant to procure more storage containers to fill before they took off, but of course, the time had run out.
She suppressed a sigh, chasing the worry away for there was absolutely nothing she could do about the water.
Life in this confined space was boring, but with Simon by her side, she didn’t feel frightened or lonely. They were comfortable in each other’s company, their conversations meaningful and their silences peaceful.
Gemma had asked him to teach her Rix language, and listening to her pronunciation provided an unending source of entertainment for him.
“I know, I have no aptitude for languages,” she always felt frustrated at the end of their sessions.
“You’re doing better. I can hear progress.”
