45. The Osimidite Chamber
The Osimidite Chamber
Idress quickly – and run.
I didn’t need to worry. To the side of the staircase is a hatch in the floor that must have been shut until now and unnoticeable in the dim corridor. Right now, the metal lid of the hatch has been slid out of the way, and all that’s left is a gaping hole. It could be a gateway to hell.
The sight of it makes me flinch.
Because it’s evidence that what I was praying so desperately wouldn’t be true, is.
Wasting no time, I start clambering down the rusting metal ladder inside it.
A musty scent fills my nostrils as I descend into the darkness, a faint humming in my ears.
I’d thought the brig and baths were hot on the deck above.
But the temperature is excruciating down here.
Like heading into a furnace, or like this really is hell.
And the closer I get to the bottom of the ladder, the more I’m aware of a thin mist surrounding me.
I realise, probably too late, that it must be escaped osimidite.
Remembering Cosmer said inhaling these traces was how he got addicted, I pull my blouse over my nose.
Engineers must have been here until only recently – there’s a coat rack with satchels hanging up on it, and discarded cannisters, thermometers, tools.
But it must be harder to guard the Chamber with so few engineers left.
Cosmer walking in here and taking what he wanted would have been like a soldier getting served in the Mess Hall.
How long has he been down here, with absolutely no one to stop him?
I suddenly get a thought I hadn’t even contemplated until now. An awful, impossibly possible thought, as unbearable to bear as the temperature here.
What if he’s dead?
“Cosmer?” I yell, high-pitched.
No reply.
My heart rate accelerates. I’m breathing twice the speed I was, which is not a good thing. I look around for a mask to protect myself from the gas but find none.
I yell his name again – and again hear nothing in response.
Sisters, I pray. Please don’t let me find him dead.
I’m not sure what I would do with myself if I did.
But then I do know.
The airlock. I’d go straight to the airlock.
I come to the end of the dank entryway I’m in.
A grated archway – also already open – leads out into a larger space almost entirely filled by a massive brass tank the vague shape of a human heart.
The humming is louder here, coming from the tank itself, which is fitted with various gauges and levers and has multiple valves.
Thick copper pipes run like arteries from it all along the walls and up into the ceiling.
There are metal grates within the ceiling, too, which I suppose must be for ventilation, but they don’t seem to be doing much for the mist, which is even thicker in here. It’s clinging to me.
I can’t see Cosmer. I stand there, just staring at this beating core of the ship, before deciding, just in case, to walk all the way around the tank.
And that’s when I finally find him.
He’s slumped against the back of it. No mask. Eyes shut and mouth slightly parted. He’s kicked his boots off, and now he’s barefoot. At first glance, I could convince myself he’s just fallen asleep.
But there are too many things I don’t like about the scene. The way he looks paler than ever. The way his legs are awkwardly splayed.
He almost blends in with the pipes with his lean, pale silhouette and copper hair. Just another part of the tank.
All of me wants to run to him. I know I should run to him.
But instead, I slow down. Take one step at a time.
Because, what if.
What if?
At least, in these seconds until I reach him, he could still be alive.
At least, in these seconds, I still have hope.
But it’s bleeding out of me like a valve in my own heart has been turned.