Brin was tossed and jostled by the press of the panicked crowd. She could see the airlock at the end of the docking arm. The enormous tetra-redundant voidglass panels had been designed to give disembarking passengers an awe-inspiring view of the nebula while impressing upon them the prowess of the mighty Republic. But now it only served to heighten Brin’s sense of vulnerability.
The ice hauler Redmoon Remembers stretched out like an appendage from its stall, requisitioned for the evacuations. It was the last ship on the station, and it wouldn’t be nearly enough.
The throng crushed and abated like a squall. The competing sounds of shouting and rebounding bodies were overwhelming. A young looking officer in her neat black and gold Republic uniform clambered atop a pile of abandoned luggage and cupped her hands around her mouth to give direction to the unlistening thrall.
“Move aside! Let the injured through!”
It was a doubly wasted effort, as the stretcher bearers were preceded by exo-armored soldiers who hydraulically swatted a path through people like machetes through tall grass. They almost certainly left more injured bodies in their wake than they’d managed to evacuate by stretcher onto the Redmoon.
The officer was shouting again. “She’s full! More shuttles are coming! There’s no need to panic!”
The giant titanium hatch door fell shut with a clank from within their pockets, and then all hell broke loose.
Brin couldn’t do anything but ride the waves. She grasped her elbows and pressed her arms in front of her, fighting for enough space to expand her lungs. She looked again and the officer was gone, swept into the uncaring crowd. There was blood on the hatch. Useless. It would not open. Then there were screams, and heads turned to the Redmoon‘s bow, two kilometers away but easily visible through the glass walls. It was being consumed in a bright silvery smoke.
“Nanoweapons!”
The invisible bots were climbing the Redmoon Remembers like locusts. Such things didn’t differentiate between ice haulers and space stations, they only saw mass in need of conversion.
Someone on the ship’s bridge must have made a quick decision before they were converted to gray sludge themselves, because the Redmoon fired its chemical engines—far too close to the station by normal safety regulations—and it lurched away in an uncontrolled spin, severing its physical connection with the station and likely saving everyone on the station. Small white puffs fired off from the Redmoon. Brin thought they were attitude adjusters, but realized with horror they were the ship’s desperate passengers, launching themselves into the void rather than be eaten by the nanoweapons. Some of them bounced of the glass with dull reverberations, already unmoving.
The crushing stopped, and a silence fell. Now they were trapped, and the Republic would not be sending help.
Warmup Pages 