CHAPTER 42 – STORMY WEATHER
"Pass me my shoes," Jack said as he sat on the edge of his berth and motioned toward his locker. Elizabeth was standing in front of the metal storage compartment which was only two feet by four feet in size and meant to hold a passenger's personal belongings for the four-month long flight.
Elizabeth yawned. "Can't we just go back to bed?" she asked tiredly as she pulled his sneakers from his locker and handed them to Jack who had already gotten dressed.
"Didn't you sleep well?"
"Just not long enough. The midwife from the Pegasus says its normal to be tired."
"Why don't you go back to bed? Send a message to your students and delay lessons for a couple hours. You're the teacher. You get to make the rules."
Elizabeth, who was still wearing the tee-shirt and shorts in which she had slept, threw her blouse back into her own locker, turned around, and began climbing up the ladder to her berth. 'You're right"
Jack chuckled. "That didn't take a lot of convincing."
Elizabeth almost immediately fell asleep within seconds of laying down. She didn't bother to open her eyes when she felt Jack's lips on her cheek.
"I love you, dandelion. Have a good sleep."
"mmmm. love you," she mumbled back.
An hour and forty-five minutes later, Elizabeth finished brushing her teeth and reached for her hairbrush. The extra sleep had been wonderful. The only downside was that she had missed breakfast to sleep and was going to miss the lunch meal to teach class. She frowned as she heard her stomach grumble. Her usual school day was just four hours every morning, but she had slept through almost half of that. And she hated to shorten her lesson just to make it to the cafeteria for the lunch hour.
She wasn't worried about her students; they would be fine because they had eaten breakfast and their parents would likely save them some lunch.
That's it! I'll just have Abigail put aside some food for me.
Pulling her hair back and wrapping a soft elastic around it, she gave herself one final look in the mirror before heading to her locker and taking out her "sucky" shoes and her lead apron. She had gotten used to wearing the shoes and no longer griped every time she put them on. The heavy protective apron was still bothersome but the doctor had agreed that she only needed to wear it when she was in a room or hallway which ran along the outer edges of the transporter. Unfortunately, the only available room for teaching was on the top floor outer edge of the transporter.
It's for the baby, she reminded herself as she tied the apron around her waist. Three more weeks on this transporter and we are home!
Elizabeth glanced at the calendar on the wall and smiled optimistically. The flight had taken longer than the scheduled four months due to the detour to pick up the stowaway, and then there had been a three-day slowdown while a broken part needed fixing, but she was hopeful that there would be no more delays. She'd be just about five months pregnant when they landed.
She picked up an apple from never-ending supply that Jack made sure was always there, and then almost immediately set it back down in the bowl.
I'm sick of apples. Why are they the only fruit that last for months after they're picked? What I'd give for a nice juicy peach, she thought longingly.
Maybe Jack and I will start a peach farm on Earth.
A sun-filled orchard of peaches.
Next to a field of dandelions, she thought with a smile.
Jack had already told her that when they bought their home, he wasn't going to mow their lawn because he wanted it filled with yellow dandelions.
She thought it was a foolish idea but she loved it. She loved him even more for saying it.
Elizabeth looked at her watch as her stomach growled loud enough for the students to hear. Thirty more minutes. Jack's will have finished eating lunch and gone back to the office.
"Lulu, can you please explain to the class what derivatives you used to solve the problem?" Elizabeth encouraged the sweet fourteen-year old girl sitting in one of the room's desks as she turned her attention back to Differential Equations.
"Yes, ma'am, I –"
The girl's explanation was cut off by a loud bang which echoed through the room startling all of them. The students looked around curiously and then turned to Elizabeth for reassurance.
"I'm sure it's nothing", Elizabeth said calmly. "Probably just oxygen going through a pipe and causing a rattle. Go ahead, Lulu."
"Newton's Second Law of Motion says that an object of mass is moving with acceleration and being acted on with –."
Lulu paused as the ship made an atypical movement. Almost a jolt. It was a move that was out of the ordinary on a transporter that prided itself on smooth maneuvers.
"It's okay," Elizabeth told her worried students. "Let's just finish this problem and then you can all go back to your living quarters. You've been great sports about letting me sleep in this morning," she added with a smile as she tried not to show her concern.
The teenager began speaking again. Her voice a little nervous as she tried for the third time to explain her math problem. "Newton's Second Law of Motion says that an object of mass is moving with acceleration and being acted on with force –."
The girl stumbled as the transporter jerked sharply to the right.
"Everyone, grab onto something. Now!" Elizabeth ordered.
The words were barely out of her mouth, when the ship titled severely in one direction and then abruptly tilted even farther in the other direction. Computers slid off the student's desks and slammed to the floor, cracking their screens and sending bits of polymer flying through the air.
Elizabeth held tightly to a pipe that lined the wall next to her and said a silent prayer that her shoes had suction which were keeping her from sliding on the smooth floor.
"What's happening?! What's happening?!" the students screamed.
Elizabeth didn't answer but gripped the pipe even harder as the transporter began to shudder and alarms flooded through the intercoms.
"Watch out!" she screamed as a tile fell from the ceiling and electrical wires came tumbling down. The children scrambled from their seats and struggled to hide under their desks for security but the desks were skidding around the room and slamming into one another.
Pounding battered the ship as it continued to jerk through space.
It was like they were on a toy metal ship being pelted with rocks while at the same time tumbling in a laundry dryer.
The children were crying out but she could barely hear them above the wailing alarms.
Elizabeth's eyes grew wide as she saw a crack form in the wall in front of her. She watched in horror as it grew longer and longer until it was more than three-feet in length. She frantically wondered if the room would split in two.
The electronic board in the front of the room fell off the wall and crashed to the floor catching her attention and she swiveled her head towards the sound. She watched as the heavy board slid into one of the students who was laying on his belly. Elizabeth felt horrified as the boy lay unresponsively while a puddle of red quickly formed on the floor by his head.
Still holding the pipe in her outstretched arms above her head, she lowered herself to the floor and debated if she should try to crawl to the injured teenager.
When the other children saw the blood, they screamed even louder. Wails of fear. But the ship didn't care. The battering continued. The jerking movements. The loud knocks and thuds. It seemed to never stop.
The explosion of one of the lights which sent a spray of pieces raining on the children and hitting Elizabeth's lead apron caused her to react.
She pulled a two-inch long sharp plastic dagger out of her protective garment where it had become embedded and began crawling toward her students.
"Stay down", she yelled but her voice didn't carry above the beeping alarm and the wailing siren.
She made her way to Tessa, who was closest to her, and held the sobbing girl against her body while a warning light above the door feverously flashed in red.
Urging the girl forward, they moved together to the next closest child. When they reached Lulu, the floor finally stopped tilting and the bangs had become fewer. Whatever had happened appeared to be coming to an end. At least for now.
The children scampered across the floor where they huddled around the injured student. There was a lot of blood but Elizabeth remembered that head wounds always bleed a lot. It's going to be okay, she told herself. Head wounds always bleed a lot. Even minor injuries.
Elizabeth stood up and ran towards the doorway. She slammed her hand against the intercom button on the wall and called for a medic. The response had too much static for her to know if the person at the other end understood her.
Taking a deep breath, she tried again. "This is Ms. Thornton. I need a medic in room 1F. outer ring. I have an unconscious thirteen-year old child with a bleeding head injury. I need a medic now."
While Elizabeth waited for the medics and held her hysterical students, she managed to maneuver her hand around the head of one of them and type out a simple message to Jack so he wouldn't worry.
Of the six children on this flight, five were now in tears. The sixth one was still unconscious.
"Lulu, take your sister and stay in your living quarters", Elizabeth said reassuringly as the group which had been walking down a corridor stopped in front of a sliding door.
She had waited until the medics had taken her injured student to the infirmary, and then Elizabeth had begun to personally escort each remaining child to their living quarters.
"Your parents will be here any second."
"I'm worried," the older of the sisters said quietly so her sibling wouldn't hear as the ten-year old crawled into a berth. She needn't have bothered, the beeping of a few alarms which still penetrated the air causing the girl to have to speak even louder to Elizabeth. "What if it happens again?"
ALL PERSONAL - CHECK YOUR AREAS FOR DAMAGE. SUBMIT SITUATION REPORTS TO THE FIRST OFFICER.
Elizabeth waited until the announcement which was blaring over the intercom had finished. Announcements had been coming over the system for the last fifteen minutes as the transporter tried to get itself back in order.
"Look, here come your parents now." Elizabeth nodded down the hallway as a man and woman came hurrying towards them. "You'll be fine. Have them put some ice on your arm where you banged it."
After next dropping off Tessa and a young boy to their grateful parents, Elizabeth sent another quick message to Jack letting him know she was going to the infirmary to check on her injured student.
"Elizabeth! Are you okay?!" Abigail came rushing towards her fifteen minutes later as Elizabeth walked out of the infirmary.
"I'm fine. I have to hand it to Doc and those stupid shoes he's had me wearing, and the lead apron. They came in handy," Elizabeth assured her. "One of my students was knocked out for a few minutes. I was checking on him. Thank goodness, he woke up. Maybe a slight concussion but he'll be fine. The place is a zoo."
"Are you sure that you're okay. And the baby?"
"He or she is just fine," Elizabeth said with a smile as she reached under the protective apron and touched her belly, which was only slightly swollen. "I felt him again today," she announced giddily.
"Him?"
"I'm not sure. Doc is hopeless at the ultrasound machine. He told me yesterday that we needed to wait another few weeks. It's still too soon to see 'parts'. Are you okay?" Elizabeth asked as she looked at her friend, who appeared disheveled and had large wet red blotches across her clothes.
"I was making spaghetti and red sauce for tonight's dinner. The kitchen's a disaster. A couple of my crew had some bumps and maybe a sprain but nothing serious. There was a small fire in the navigation bay, and an explosion in the water purification room but no serious injuries. Some burns but nothing life-threatening."
"Is my roommate Candy okay? She works in water purification."
"Yeah. I saw her running down the corridor to help in one of the units. Did you hear what happened?"
"Space junk."
"That's what I heard but I didn't get any more than that."
"Apparently a large satellite hit a piece of space junk and caused it to explode. The 'junk' was an old abandoned Chinese space-lab the size of a football field. Hundreds of pieces were hurtled into space. We were flying right through it when it happened. That's why we felt like we were under attack. We were being bombarded by chunks of metal speeding through space. How's the rest of the ship?"
"There were some explosions. They're still taking inventory of the damage. Thank goodness the alarms finally stopped. I'm going to check on my roommates," Abigail said as she hugged Elizabeth. "By the way, I left you a lunch in one of the refrigerators before this all happened. Jack insisted I put in a slice of lemon meringue pie for you," she added with smile before hurrying down the corridor.
THE FITNESS CENTER HAS EXPEIRENCED MINOR DAMAGE TO THE CURRENT POOL. ALL NON-ESSENTIAL PERSONNEL AVOID THE FITNESS CENTER UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE.
Elizabeth watched her friend move out of sight as the intercom blared its latest announcement.
Despite the gravity of the morning, Elizabeth gave a comical shake of her head and smiled. Jack's idea for a slice of pie wasn't just meant to help her sweet tooth. She was pretty sure he was teasing her about her earlier nickname as the transporter's "tart".
It wasn't until after Elizabeth had dropped off each child with his or her parent, had visited the infirmary, had gone back to her classroom to complete a report of the damage, had picked up her boxed lunch in the cafeteria – which was littered with boxes, trays, dishes, and food, and was finally making her way back to her living quarters that she realized that Jack had never messaged her back.
She knew he was probably busy with reports, checking on passengers and crew, and maintaining order, but she paused in the hallway and sent him another message so he wouldn't worry about her, and so he could let her know when he'd be free to meet up. She took a deep sigh. It had been a hectic last hour.
She leaned against the wall and waited for his quick response.
CODE SILVER. MEDICS TO CARGO BAY. MEDICS TO CARGO BAY. STAT. CODE SILVER.
Elizabeth glanced at the intercom speaker and then back at her bracelet. She casually tapped her foot as she waited for Jack to get back to her.
She knew Jack would be busy with helping everyone, and for that reason, she tried not to get upset with him for failing to immediately respond to her message. Being married to a man in law enforcement meant that she had to take a backseat to emergencies.
Hearing the sound of heavy footsteps, Elizabeth glanced to the right and saw several medics rushing down the corridor in her direction as they made their way to the cargo bay. Sucking in her belly, she pressed her back against the wall so they could hurry past her with their stretcher and medical gear.
She hoped to get a glance of Jack with them; knowing that he would probably be on his way to the cargo bay. That was one of the reasons she loved him. Because he ran bravely towards danger to help victims.
He wouldn't have time to stop and talk. Not with everything that was going on. She knew that. But maybe she could at least give him a quick kiss on the cheek. A return kiss for the one he had given her this morning when she had been too lazy to do anything but mumble a reply.
She told herself that when she saw him, she'd just give him a quick kiss and let him get to work. Maybe she'd make sure he had enough to eat. A bottle of water. That's it. I'll give him my bottle of water from my boxed lunch. He's probably thirsty. And a kiss.
But Jack didn't rush by with the other crew members.
Elizabeth kept looking down the corridor, but it was now empty.
She glanced at her bracelet thinking that she had missed his message.
But there was no message.
She shook her bracelet to make sure that it hadn't broken during the earlier ruckus. Seeing nothing wrong with it, she realized that it was quite possible that the communication system on the transporter was going through some sort of glitches. She had seen enough wires and cables hanging from the ceiling that it likely that something had gone wrong with it.
Elizabeth started to send another message anyway when she felt the tiny movement of the baby. Pausing, she smiled and put her hand on her belly. Hello, sweet baby. Daddy and I love you.
And then it hit her. Like a punch to the stomach.
Like someone stealing the oxygen out of the room.
Like the long-curved blade of a scythe swiftly cutting her off at the knees and leaving her to fall to the floor.
Like all the light leaving the world.
She knew.
She knew why Jack hadn't answered her messages.
Why he wasn't in the hallway.
Why she hadn't seen him in the last hour.
Why he hadn't tried to find her.
Jack! her mind screamed.
And it was all so clear to her.
Jack was the injured person that the medics were trying to save in the cargo bay.
UP Next Chapter 43
Dear Readers: I posted this chapter long before the awful WCTH season 5 last two episodes. I would NEVER kill off Jack or Elizabeth! I may bruise them up a bit, but that's all. :)