Renovo

RENOVO

By

G. Wakeling

Copyright © 2015 by G. Wakeling

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission of the author, except for brief quotations used in reviews and critiques.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

About the Author

Chapter 1

It was cold, barren, and the last place Rachel wanted to go, but if she was ever to pay off her debts, a rotation on the Mars colony was the one obvious choice. Space never failed to provide continued allure to the naïve. It called the dreamers of Earth towards the heavens; until its true hostility revealed itself. When that occurred there was only one thing to draw the Environment Habitat Developers out; cash. An 18 month chore as an ENVO would solve all her issues. She could repay her loans, take care of mounting bills, and return to the relative luxury of Earth. There was only one problem – the thing that terrified her more than space itself – hypersleep. Unfortunately that was a mandatory part of her upcoming tour. Black. Nothingness. No dreaming, no calm drifting into sleep, the absence of a blissful awakening. Just emptiness. Death. It was truly frightening.

Rachel looked down at her bare legs as she sat under the harsh lights of the prep room. She should’ve shaved; the small black hairs were well past acceptable levels. They pricked the surface like the first spines on a young porcupine. The metal floor was cold under her feet, the bench beneath her hard and uncomfortable. She was about to face her worst nightmare and yet, here she was, thinking about just how undesirable she’d appear when her lukewarm body was flopped into the sleep box.

The door behind her slid open and Rachel instinctively drew her thin robe closer – she could hold on to her modesty for a little longer.

Dr. Galliance?

The man entering looked up from his tablet device as she nodded.

If you’d come with me.

She stood, wondering if he saw through the attempted bravado. Her forced smile wasn’t as strong as she’d hoped for, and she could feel herself trembling. It was too late to back out now. All the arrangements had been made. There was only one thing laying in her future; Mars.

Even with her eyes closed, she could see them still; the dark and wailing skulls that haunted her without reprieve. They loomed in the night sky, pulsing in and out of view like a moving tide, blazing bright with piercing tones of bloody red and the fires of Earth’s end. The heavens were filled with the thunder of roars, the lightning of screams. The sound came from her own lips as well as others; unseen strangers, lone voices becoming an orchestra of terror. Did the blackness end? Were her companions ever silenced? Or was the torment one never-ending cascade as hell itself must be? Darkness. Terrifying blackness. A nightmare that knew no end.

Rachel awoke with a start, fear spreading through her body as pins and needles froze her. It took a moment, but her mind finally found its place, bringing with it the clarity needed to eradicate the panic.

The transparent ceiling of her sleep box was already whirring away out of sight. The same action occurred along the line of coffin-shapes that loomed in the dimly lit room as if only shadows. Aside from the low, mechanical whir there was silence. Stillness. A complete absence of life.

She lay there in the cocoon of swaddling; material like cotton wool that wrapped her skin as if a fleece to a sheep. The tingling in her bones subsided quickly and she shrank from her outstretched position to a curled, foetal shape as the abruptness of her waking shocked her. It was cold, and the air pricking against her skin felt like an ice-cube sticking to a frozen windshield.

You’d have thought they’d have turned on the heat, brought us a flannel and handed out some salted nuts for our arrival.

She looked across and saw a tanned and broad man sitting bolt upright in his box. He seemed remarkably awake considering her own blurred consciousness. He saw her looking and winked.

Guess the service ain’t quite up to the standards all those brochures promise.

He stood, stepping out of his sleeping container without a stitch of clothing on.

Dendrick, he smiled, hovering over her box so that nothing was left to the imagination. She shrank further into her cushioning, hiding her pale and prickly legs as the sight of him reminded her she was alone in the presence of strangers.

Rachel Galliance, she replied, not quite knowing why she felt the need to share her surname. You know you’re naked, right?

Sure do. I’m in and out of hypersleep just as God himself intended; naked as the day I was born and ripped down to the finest millimetre. His muscular thighs strode by her to the lockers on the wall and he began fumbling with the handles.

Well if you could cover up that millimetre sometime soon I’d be grateful.

There was a chuckle to her left, and Rachel saw the rest of the unit was waking. Almost a dozen or so sleeping boxes now had movement from within. A hand came waving through the air for a high-five. Rachel was so long without interaction that the slap against her palm sent a stinging sensation through her.

I couldn’t have said it better myself. Put the midget away, we’re all gonna puke before we’ve even had breakfast. I’m Louanne.

She looked up from her stinging hand and saw a bright face in the box next to her. The woman had fine features and closely cropped hair. Like Dendrick, she was alert, and began to climb out and put herself in order. Though, unlike the man, a small crop top and boxer shorts protected her modesty.

The first time’s always a bitch. Few more rotations like us two and you’ll get used to it.

Are you and...

Feck, no! Dendrick called as he pulled a blue T-shirt over his head.

Oi! You think I’d even stay with you with that thing?! Louanne cajoled as she joined him by the lockers and winked as she glanced between his legs. She unsnapped a door and began to pull out her own belongings. We always do the geo rotations together. Pays better that way; I’m the brains, he’s my brawn.

Hey! I’ve got my PhD too.

Yeah, yeah, is that what they call those crappy credentials from that busted institute? She smiled affectionately at him, before waltzing back across the room and offering a hand to Rachel. Rachel took it thankfully, the grey fuzziness beginning to fade but jading her senses no less. So newbie, what you here for?

Bio sourcing and recognition.

Ha, the alien expert, eh? Go forth and find life...or some crap like that, right? I wouldn’t get excited; only new thing you’ll find is some goddamn tasteless mould in the algae processors.

How many times you been out here? Rachel asked as she stood in front of the lockers and searched for her name. As usual, she found herself right at the top. A pigeon hole, mailbox, locker; it didn’t matter what it was, it was always at the top, despite her small stature causing an obvious issue. But people didn’t have time for problems, and luck never seemed to be on her side.

Thanks, she smiled as Dendrick saw her pondering, unsnapped the metal storage box and passed the bundle of clothes and small bag into her arms.

The rest will be in cargo, he said, answering her next question before attending to her previous one. Fourth and last vacation, baby. You gotta love Mars, but the sand is way nicer down in sunny Ha-Wa-iiiiiii.

Yeah, and we’d be there already if this idiot hadn’t signed us up for a final road trip. Third time’s a charm, I say. We’re set up for the next few years, I plead. And this one puts our names down again.

That’s MY brains for you; after this we’re retiring and living the life of luxury. He gave the women a wink, before adding, And you, Dr. Galliance, can come join us any time you like.

Guess I need to do a few more rotations before I can pay my way, Rachel replied as she set her things on the floor and began to pull on the standard ENVO jumpsuit. Around her, others were doing the same, until the entire room was filled with uniformed blue lemmings ready to get to whatever work was instructed. Where is everyone?

"No meet’n’greet here. This ain’t no Butlins. By the time we get off this planet, we’ll all be the colour o’ red, have that ENVO stink, and be lacking the social niceties of home. I seen it all before. You gotta work for that money, ere."

Rachel turned to find the source of the North England accent. His teeth were bright ivory against his dark skin. Despite his words, his eyes were cheery, his tone upbeat.

Ballard, he said, nodding slightly.

Dr. Galliance, bio-sourcing and…

I ‘eard you. Now, if it ain’t time for brekkie, I don’t know. I gotta fill my gut before we land and this hunk o’ junk gets disassembled.

He moved towards the door and led the group, pulling an ID card from his jumpsuit and swiping it across the sensor. Rachel reached up to her own breast pocket as the door slid open and found she also had a small, hard card stowed on her. She pulled it out and saw it was similar to her Identicard from Earth, though her details and biochip were imprinted across the red, grainy image of Mars’s surface.

There were voices outside, and Rachel followed Ballard and the others in joining the throng of blue jumpsuits as if she were a tributary’s water flowing into a rushing river. It was true what he’d said; the Renovo – Ballard’s ‘hunk o’ junk’ – was more than their transport; she was their new home too. Once landed, the vast modules of metal, the junctions, circuits, bolts and sheeting that had so silently glided through space, would be disassembled, repurposed and added to the growing Mars colony they were now orbiting. She was a one-way ship, a vessel with far more to give than the journey itself. She was, as Rachel thought of it, in her infant form awaiting metamorphosis. Perhaps, as a newbie ENVO herself, the two of them shared a similar fate.

There was laughter ahead, and Rachel looked and saw they’d emerged into a mess hall. There were no windows; every room, each corridor, served a purpose for later. Windows were a luxurious extra that the colonists had to minimise. Instead, a wide metal box with a low ceiling was laid out with narrow tables and benches cutting across the rectangular space. Breakfast was dispensed by vending machines. Industrial pipes disappeared into the ceiling above each booth; chutes down which their meals dropped once their new ID cards had been scanned.

Rachel took a tray, swiped her card at the first machine and looked disdainfully down at the small, non-descript silver pouch that dropped from the vending machine. There was a straw fastened on one side, and she turned it over in her hands, squeezing it slightly in her fingers to discover that it was squidgy. ‘Rehydration Solution – Strawberry’, she saw, written in machine-stamped black text. It was far from a milkshake, but at least they’d managed to tailor it towards her taste. Though, as she placed the packet on her tray, she suspected it’d taste much like the nose-wrinkling protein shake monstrosities from back home.

Moving to the next booth, Rachel was equally as disappointed when another pouch fell out. This time it rattled when she shook it. She peeled back the opening edge slightly and saw there were several dried, brown cubes inside. The deposit was followed by a bottle of water taped inside a thin