http://www.asstr.org/files/Authors/srb/www/
Don't read if under 18 or illegal in your little corner of the world, like you'll listen. This 
should appear only on my site http://www.asstr.org/files/Authors/srb/www/ F3, Futanari 
Palace, Pal's archive site, through Pal's yahoo group, on Pal's Forum... well, it basically 
should be wherever Pal's stuff is. Also at the Grey Archive, and some other places they 
might end up, they know who they are. 

This is copyright me, so don't call it yours. Feedback can be left here. I created all the 
characters, they are all fictional, and any relevance to anyone living or dead, is incidental

BTW there is plenty of different portions which have been reused by numerous science 
fiction shows movies and books, including nanotechnology, rapid pregnancy, and various 
scientific mumbo jumbo, which I will try to keep to a minimum. (Bounce a graviton 
particle beam off the main deflector dish…)

THIS CHAPTER contains no sex


Chapter 17
Nightmares 


'FUCKING alarm' David thought to himself, as his bloodshot eyes opened a slit. He had 
always hated alarms before being in space. Now that there was a lack of a set day or night 
schedule for him to become naturally attuned to, he was reliant on the clock to let him 
know what time it was. Even in a general sense, as he couldn't open his eyes and see it 
was still night, or it was morning. He couldn't tell that the sun was waning, or even the 
cold grip of night. 

His hand reached out, smacking the alarm clock, his vision far too blurry to see the 
numbers in the dark. 'TURN THE FUCK OFF!' his mind ordered, pleading for the 
constant annoying bleat to cease. He pulled the strap off before turning the lights on, very 
dimly. In doing so, the movement itself caused him a constant thrumming headache. He 
looked at the clock, puzzled. 'This is…I shouldn't be up for another three something 
hours?' It had been a long time since he had slept without the nightmares. As his mind 
began to arise, he realized he had woken up into a nightmare.

"FUCK!" he shouted, as through the haze he finally recognized the alarm. He didn't even 
stop for a stim pack, his usual breakfast, before strapping his magnetic boots on. He 
rushed out the door, running as fast as his boots would allow. He knew this was a matter 
of life and death. It was whose death he was most worried about.

The dreadful noise was the alarm on the ship, what David called the "Smoke 'em if you 
got 'em" alarm. This wasn't the "Wet your pants we're being shot at" alarm. This alarm 
meant that a number of serious safeguards that would normally protect the ship had 
somehow failed. This would lead to some kind of catastrophic problem onboard, such as 
a reactor breach, a containment failure, or a core meltdown, which was essentially the 
sound of death in a ship such as this. The nuclear powered core of a large transport such 
as this, was a very finely tuned instrument. If there was a danger of the core going, then 
they were doomed to a horrible death alone in the deep recesses of space, with no one to 
even come and bother identifying their bodies.  

Even if the ship didn't explode, it wouldn't matter, flying adrift in space the ship would 
run out of electricity necessary to recycle the air, to power the computer systems, to heat 
the ship, to sustain the food, and most importantly to stop the ship. At this rate of speed, 
the ship was going to collide with the Mars, and the nuclear waste accelerating the death 
of millions. 

*

Nadia groaned as she heard the alarm sound. At first she feared this was a nightmare, as 
she woke up next to Terra's naked body. She had remembered all too closely the night 
when everything seemed to change, when her life and more importantly Terra's seemed 
to become irreversibly different. An alarm going off, lying naked next to Terra, her mind 
recoiled at the memory. 

Terra held her head, her eyes opening up as she looked at Nadia. "What's, what's going 
on?" she asked. In her exhausted state it took her a moment to notice the fear in Nadia's 
face, the same kind of fear she had seen once before. It instantly sent a chill down her 
spine.

"I, I'm not sure," Nadia said, her mind struggling to remember something. Ages ago 
when she and her husband had gone to Mars, she had gone through the orientation 
classes. There was an emergency alarm, a sound that if she had heard, she was supposed 
to go to the nearest escape pod, and wait for instructions. She tapped her head, trying to 
will a memory to resurface that would not come. "Get your clothes on," Nadia said, 
unstrapping the two of them. She couldn't recall the alarm, she didn't even know if this 
was the same one. It could be the "Dinner's ready" alarm for all she knew.

"Okay," Terra gulped, fearing the sound of the alarm, fearing the unknown, but most of 
all fearing the terror in Nadia's voice and face.

*

Giselle was running as fast as she could, wishing in the back of her head that she were 
somewhere else. On Earth, on Mars, even on one of the now abandoned lunar stations. 
She could be enjoying a beach, or climbing a mountain, traveling through a busy city 
street, just anywhere else besides here.

'That incompetent drunk probably passed out on one of the buttons and now we're all 
doomed to die here!' she thought to herself, as she struggled to keep herself moving 
forward. Trying to move so quickly was like trying to run in water, it seldom works and it 
exhausts the body.

She burst into the helm, seeing Sergio pressing buttons and going over the different 
computer stations.

"What's happening?" Giselle asked.

"It's the core," Sergio said, working as fast as he could. Although he had consumed a 
large amount of alcohol, the act of working all of the operations and the prospect of being 
killed were very sobering. "The temperature is way past the danger zone, there's going to 
be a meltdown!" he didn't have to tell her what that meant. The core was in the middle of 
a meltdown. It would essentially doom them all. The nuclear fuel, stored inside of the 
nuclear vessel, was overheating, already past the point of safety. Once the nuclear vessel 
overheated, it would melt the surrounding carriage.

"How did you do it? It was fine hours ago!" Giselle screamed at him. She had checked 
the helm before going into the meeting, making sure that everything was going to be fine. 
She trusted David to keep an eye on things, but doubted very much his ability to take 
charge of a situation like this. 

"I didn't do anything!" Sergio screamed, frustrated beyond all measure. This kind of 
situation hurt him down to his soul, any wound on his ship felt to him like a wound unto 
himself.

"Who's down there?" Giselle demanded.

"Flynn is on duty, but I can't get a hold of him. There's too much radiation, it's all static. 
We're going to have to get in suits before we can get down there!" Sergio shouted. He 
bolted up and ran to the door as quick as he could. 

"Someone's gotta be here!" Giselle shouted at him.

"There's nothing we can do right now!" Sergio said. "We gotta get down there and fix 
this problem before we go sky high!" Giselle weighed the options, and decided a moment 
later that she would rather be there doing something than sitting around waiting and 
wondering.

*

Yoshi tossed and turned in midair, wishing that the annoying bleating alarm would 
silence itself. When he awoke, he naturally sought pillows to cram around either ear, as 
though there was roadwork happening outside of his house. He sighed to himself, 
wondering what was going on. 'Did that drunken oaf of a captain knock a beer on the 
computers, or did one of those little twerps head butt the fucking control?' he thought, 
weighing his options. He didn't want to get up, and didn't want to bother getting back 
into work. His eyes were strained from all the work he had done, and his mind was so 
bored his dreams were filled with pads and numbers in columns. 

He turned over, hoping that somehow the alarm would cease, so he could get some peace 
and quiet. He resigned himself to the fact he would either live to find out what happened 
or die in his sleep.

*

"David?" Sergio asked, as the elevator doors opened, "What the hell are you doing?" 

"What the fuck do you think, get in!" David shouted at him and Giselle. "I heard the 
alarm, what the fuck is wrong?" he screamed, making room for them. He noticed 
instantly that they were wearing radiation suits, something he unfortunately lacked. His 
exhaustion had clouded his memory. He was simply running on instinct. 

"The reactor is overheating," Sergio said. "It's way past the danger zone, and the 
temperature is still rising. We'll have a core meltdown if we don't stop it."

"How did you know to go to the engine room?" Giselle asked, suspicious at David.

"What else is going to go wrong?" David asked, lying through his teeth. He remembered 
Flynn's words,  'Yeah, well I gotta be off, I'm stuck on engine duty, I think I can coax a 
little more outta these babies, I just need a while. It'll give me something to do, either 
way.' Flynn had said. 

"That is true," Giselle said, making a note of it. 'If he were thinking so ahead of things, 
he would have been wearing the radiation suits, there are suits on every floor.' She 
thought. 

The three of them were collectively trying to will the elevator to speed up. David looked 
on at Sergio, realizing that he wasn't wearing any kind of protective suit. If the ship was 
giving out radioactive emissions, then he was likely being bombarded with radiation. 
'But that's nothing compared to what Flynn is dealing with, oh god, please let him have 
gotten out' he thought to himself, silently praying, 'please god just let him be safe.' 

"Get the girls, tell them to get down to the 'Spirit of the Skies', try to get her as far as 
they can, give them a chance at least," Sergio said, interrupting as the elevator stopped 
short. "I promised to take care of them."

"No fucking way!" David said, before being kicked out forcibly by Sergio.

"You don't have a suit m'boy!" Sergio shouted, as the door closed. The momentum of 
the kick sent him flying hard enough to prevent him from returning into the elevator in 
time. 

He looked at the elevator. Sergio, or most likely Giselle, had locked out the elevator, and 
it would only go down now. The other elevator was at the other side of the ship, and it 
was going to take forever for it to get here. 'If I'm just gonna wait here I might as well 
help someone' he rationalized to himself as he resigned to getting the girls. 

'These girls have been nothing but trouble,' he thought to himself as he made his way 
down the corridor. He started feeling sick, his stomach was turning, and he was getting 
light headed. 'God I need some stimulants' he thought to himself as he raced down. 
While the symptoms were similar as withdrawal from the stimulants, that wasn't what 
was making him sick.

He found the door, and began banging on it loudly. It took less than a minute for an 
irritated Nadia to open it. "What the fuck is going on?" she asked, trying to put on a brave 
face. His loud banging on her door had annoyed her, but she was obviously scared.

"There's a problem with the reactor, it's overheating to a dangerous level, we're being 
bombarded by near lethal levels of radiation, we have to go, now!" he shouted, taking 
Nadia by the arm to force the point. 

"I can go by myself, but where the hell are we going?" Nadia asked, pulling her arm free 
as she felt Terra rush up behind her.

"You two are going to go to the docking bay, from there take Sergio's ship, the one you 
came in with, the 'Spirit of the Skies' and get ready to leave. If it goes critical, you bolt, 
get the fuck out of here, and try to make it back to Earth. If your lucky, there'll be enough 
fuel to get you there fast enough that you can approach Earth and make it there before 
you run out of food, or oxygen. It's a long shot, but it'll be better than what we'll have," 
David said, the full extend of his body language trying to will them out of the door.

"Come on," Nadia said to Terra, as she stepped outside. "We can get Yoshi and be gone 
in minutes!"

"But what are you going to do?" Terra asked, following behind the two of them.

"I'm going back to try to fix the engine," David said, leading the three of them down the 
corridor. He began picking up speed as quickly as he could.

"But why? Why not come down with us and escape?" Terra asked. She didn't feel a real 
closeness like she would have with Nadia, or even Yoshi, but nevertheless she didn't 
want anyone to die.

"I've got to make it to Mars, I've got some unfinished business there. Besides, I can't 
leave my friend behind," David said desperately, seeing the elevator in sight. He wanted 
to sound brave, or stoic, or like some hero, but he felt like a scared kid.

"Let's go Terra," Nadia said, looking back at Terra. "Come on, we have to escape!"

Ever since her mother had been kidnapped, Terra didn't know how to respond. She 
constantly felt weak, worthless, and powerless to do anything to change or improve her 
current situation. 

But she was sick of running away, she was sick of fleeing. She had hidden in the dark as 
her friends were gunned down. She had fled in the darkness while her mother was 
transported to a Martian ship. She headed for the hills and hid at her family's house when 
the news about the futanaris was released. 

She thought about her mother and Tom, captured and held prisoner on some ship, if they 
were lucky. She thought about the pain and suffering Nadia and Yoshi had undergone 
that night, gunned down at the facility. She could only have imagined what Nadia's 
daughter was dealing with. Nadia had told her that her interrogations would not be 
pleasant. Now, Sergio, Giselle, and all the rest of the crew were in danger.

She didn't want to let someone else get hurt, she didn't want to run away or hide in the 
darkness or just escape. She wanted to do something.

"Look, you guys have to get out of here now!" David said, "It's not up for debate!"

"I, I want to help," Terra said meekly. She looked up at David, unsure of her own resolve, 
and tried to steady her voice, "I want to help."

"We don't have time for this!" he said, running up to the elevator. "You two, take the 
elevator down, it should be here in a second, just go down and get ready, if you have to, 
get the hell out of here."

"I'm going to help," Terra said, her voice becoming more stable, even though it did not 
help dispel her diffidence. As the door opened, she put her arm in, forcing the point.

"Terra, come on, let's just go," Nadia pleaded, afraid of dying. She doubted that the 
nanobots could sustain them indefinitely, especially in the vacuum of space if the ship 
were to go. She even doubted how much of this radiation they could deal with.

Terra's response was to run into the elevator. She pushed the button for the floor with the 
engine room calmly, as one might hit the lobby button of a hotel. She looked at David, 
who jumped in. Nadia watched confused, feeling divided. She didn't want to turn her 
back on her possible chance of escape, of freedom. But she couldn't turn her back on 
Terra either. She jumped into the elevator, as best she could, a moment before the 
elevator closed.

There was an awkward silence in the elevator, as it slowly moved towards the engine 
room. Terra was doing everything she could to make a strong face, a tough look. Her 
heart was racing, but she wanted to do something for once in her life.

David couldn't hide his concern, his chest was tight, his mind was straining, he felt light-
headed, and he was worried more than he had been for seven weeks, ever since he had 
gotten that news…

Nadia was afraid, that fear never leaving her. She didn't know what was happening, she 
didn't know if the nanobots would protect her and Terra, she didn't know if the ship was 
going to blow up, she didn't even know how the reactor worked. She didn't know, and 
she dreaded the unknown. 

Mercifully, the elevator doors finally opened, and the three of them moved out. "Should 
we get Yoshi?" Terra asked, as she tried to keep up with David.

"We don't have time to go back!" David said, panicking.

"I don't think he would be able to help," Nadia said, huffing behind the two of them, 
terrified into cold sweats, "Knowing how a reactor works doesn't mean knowing how to 
fix it!" she shouted, not saying what was on her mind, 'Not knowing how a reactor works 
probably means that you don't know how to fix it either.'

"I mean if he wants to go," Terra said timidly. Although she had made the decision to try 
to help, and Nadia had gone along, she didn't want to deny Yoshi his chance to escape. 
Terra never got a chance to follow it up.

"What the hell are you doing?" Sergio shouted at David, as he watched the trio running 
towards them. "You were supposed to get them to the dock!"

"They wanted to come, what's the situation?" David asked, his hand already reaching for 
the door.

"It's no use boy, the door is fused shut," Sergio said, shaking his head.

"What about, what about…?" David said, unable to even say his name. He ignored 
Sergio's comment, grabbing the handle and using the full force of his body in an attempt 
to force it open. 

"He's, he's trying to fix it David," Giselle said, her voice full of sympathy and concern. 

"Get a blowtorch!" David said, his tears starting to flow from the corners of his eyes.

"If, if he does, it," Giselle said, her mouth was dry, and no matter what she did she could 
not wet her lips as she tried to talk, "Even if he does it,"

"He's dead already," Sergio said, his voice choking. 

"NO!" David said, redoubling his efforts. He pulled until his arms ached; he tried beyond 
all measure to will the door open. His eyes full of tears, his head woozy, his chest aching 
with pain, he continued to struggle. 

"…Sergio?" said a voice through the intercom, fuzzy, barely audible through the static.

"Flynn!" David shouted, his hopes rose for a moment.

"Hey Dave," came a raspy voice, weary and struggling to breath, let alone speak. 
"Sorry…can't take…you out…my, my fault…pushed the…engines too hard…"

"Flynn, save your strength, you're gonna be okay, you just gotta get out of there, we'll 
take care of you, you just, you just," David said, hoping beyond hope, trying desperately 
to convince himself, as well as Flynn. 

"It's okay Dave…" Flynn's labored voice let out, in between bouts of coughing and 
wheezing. "…I'm going to…tie the coolant…directly into the…reactor room."

"It might work," Sergio said. He hated himself right now for being overly practical, but 
while Flynn's situation was breaking his heart, it would do them all no good if they died 
as well. 'There will be time to grieve when this is over,' he thought, before saying 
"Flynn, if you can redirect the flow, if it cools the nuclear vessel, it could maintain it's 
integrity, and you might save the ship, but, but," he said, choking up.

"…won't be pretty?" he asked rhetorically. "…we need to…depressurize…remove 
all…air…from entire section…don't have suit…you gotta…"

"Stay with us Flynn!" Giselle shouted, knowing that that the dying man in there was their 
only chance of surviving.

"…flood the room…turn flow back on…full two minutes…" Flynn said, gasping for air 
desperately.

"We'll have to do it from the bridge, we can do it though," Sergio said. "You three, come 
with me, Giselle, stay here and, and…" Sergio said, confronted with his most difficult 
decision as a captain. He wasn't accustomed to dealing with death.

"I understand," Giselle said, knowing what he meant. 'Or maybe, Stay here and keep him 
company while he expires'. 

"I'm staying," David said, his head spinning. 

"No my boy, it's no good," Sergio said, picking David up. On Earth or Mars, it would 
have been a Herculean feat for him, in space it was no more difficult than picking up a 
large blanket. David struggled against him, but even in his agitated state he wasn't able to 
stop Sergio. David did cause him great pain, both physical and emotional, but Sergio had 
pinned his arms against his body and he couldn't achieve much.

Nadia followed after Sergio and the kicking and screaming David quickly, she felt that 
their possible salvation was at hand. Terra looked back at Giselle, whose face was full of 
distress as she stared blankly into the intercom. Terra wanted to do something, anything, 
but there wasn't a thing for her to do. So she followed Sergio, running away yet again. 
She felt even worse than before, she had come to help and found out she could do nothing 
but watch.

*

Flynn's head was swimming, every moment was a struggle to keep awake. The air was 
being drained from the room, all the more important. The intercom was going off, Giselle 
was saying something, but he couldn't understand it anymore with the air being removed. 
He had turned the audio off on his end, and was just content to have something on. He 
could feel the air being sucked out of his lungs. His eyes were burning and he knew the 
air was being sucked out from there as well. He didn't have much strength left, but he 
had completed his final task. The coolant would fill the room, and if he was lucky, it 
would cool the nuclear vessel, in which the nuclear fuel was housed. It had already 
started to melt, but if the coolant could stop it, he knew that it would end the meltdown. 
The ship would be a powerless hulk carried by it's own momentum in space, but the 
meltdown would be contained, and it wouldn't take out the delicate and highly 
combustible machinery of the engines.

'Damn, I wish I had gotten me some of that ass' he thought to himself. Were he a poet, an 
educated man, or a philosopher perhaps his last thought would have been more eloquent. 
Perhaps saving the ship would elicit some remark about the needs of the many 
outweighing that of the few. Perhaps he would have reflected on the short life he had 
lived, the people he had loved, the friends he had made, the places he had seen, or just the 
conversations he had. Perhaps he would have waxes poetically about the fragile nature of 
life, and worry about his time wasted chasing after girls.

But he was not a poet, an educated man, or a philosopher. His brain was being starved of 
oxygen as the room was finished being depressurized. His eyesight had long gone, and 
without air there was no sound, as the old axiom went no one in space would hear you 
scream. But he could feel the vibrations of the pump, pouring the coolant into the room. 
His body was already numb from the vacuum of deep space. His body slipped on the 
coolant, as the life was extinguished from him.

*

"It's done" Sergio said, closing his eyes to shield the tears.

"Oh God," David said, his voice choking, his eyes streaming tears.

"Thine ear to our prayers. In which we humbly beseech thy mercy, that thou wouldst 
place the soul of thy servant Flynn," Terra said, recalling the prayer from her bible. She 
had gotten that far before David began breaking out in uncontrollable sobs. "Which thou 
hast caused to depart from this world, into the region of peace and light and unite in the 
fellowship of thy saints. Through Christ our Lord," she finished the prayer, reciting it by 
memory, although not sure exactly what good it meant. She hoped it would make David 
feel better, but she felt like she was just going through he motions. 

"Amen," Sergio said, taking out his flask and taking a drink in memory. He wasn't a 
religious man, but he said what one says after a prayer. The stinging taste of the vodka in 
his mouth did nothing to dull the sting in his soul.


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