Pilot’s Forge #6
Edith laughed. “It’s our sordid past. The Cranes were bootleggers back in the day. You’d never believe it by my grandmother, but the Cranes ran on the wrong side of the law now and again.”
Merritt gave a short laugh. Some things never changed.
They picked their way through the room, brushing away cobwebs. At the far end of the cellar was a wooden door, its threshold dull with dust. Edith put the key in the lock. It fitted but resisted her attempts to turn it.
“Damn,” she said. “Here, hold this.” She handed him the key while she rummaged through the junk piled up by the stairs, her flashlight shining wildly.
She held up a can. “I knew I saw some down here. WD-40. This and duct tape – keeps the universe together.” While Merritt kept the light steady, she sprayed the lock and tried again.
Sluggishly it turned. They both pulled on the door and it shrieked on stiff hinges as it came open.
With a scream of fury, Sam Grenady burst out of the open doorway.
For a second Merritt was back on the Godolphin, watching the wormhole close in, the figure of the man rushing towards him. It was him, he thought dazedly. The cycling of the Godolphin had brought him here, through time and space, to this moment, and sent him the key to save himself.
He realized all this even as Sam threw himself at Edith.
Merritt jumped on Sam’s back and pulled him off, then grabbed him under the arms and held on.
The flashlights rolled away, illuminating useless corners of the cellar, so the only light came from the stairs.
Sam screamed and fought, and Merritt wished he had brought his gun.
Light began to grow from behind them, and Merritt heard a familiar noise, the gathering sound and energy of a ship’s mechanics.
He could see the dawning wonder on Edith’s face and he knew what was happening behind him.
The airlock had returned, and behind it was the Godolphin corridor.
He probably even had time to get to his ship and cast off from the freighter, bolting before the Godolphin’s final destruction.
He could pull Sam through too, and the man would remain in the stasis, forever on the edge of the wormhole exactly as Merritt found him.
Merritt dragged Sam towards the airlock.
The whining noise rose and the soft chime of the warning system told him he was running out of time.
He backed into the open door, the white light of the Godolphin airlock all around him.
Sam struggled and fought, screaming and cursing, and Merritt tightened his hold even as the man threw himself backwards, trying to break Merritt’s nose with the back of his head.
Over Sam’s head Merritt could see Edith struggle to her feet.
The airlock whooshed shut. As he waited for the atmosphere to balance, he could see Edith through the tiny airlock window, impossibly far away.
Edith worked steadily at the forge on her land, coaxing the iron into shape with fire and hammer.
It was a facsimile of the airlock that had appeared in her cellar weeks before, made out of iron, to match the key and the lock.
Crazy, she thought to herself, more than once, but the concentric rings were beautiful.
Looking through, you had the impression you could see an infinite distance.
Edith took off her goggles and wiped back her hair with gloved hands that smelled of metal.
As far as the police knew, Sam had left town.
They found his truck off the side of the mountain, but he had disappeared.
They promised Edith they would make sure they caught him if he tried to sneak back into town.
They never asked about Merritt. It was as if he had never been there.
She had tried the key a couple of times, but the broken door always opened on the dark tunnel leading up the mountain, and never into the airlock.
So she decided to build a new one, forged of iron and hope.
It took her all day to haul the pieces of the new door down into her cellar, and almost all night to set it up, under a rig of lights that illuminated the dirt cellar and the remains of an old life.
The lights shed plenty of heat and Edith was drenched with sweat.
The close cellar smelled of it, along with metal and warm dirt.
Finished, she stepped back and looked at her handiwork.
The iron door with its concentric rings fitted in the opening, almost filling the cellar.
Merritt said he spent his lifetime looking for Earth.
It didn’t seem fair that he should find her, just to lose her again less than a day later.
The key brought him here once before. It would just have to do it again.
Plus, if she were going to found the clan that built the arks, she couldn’t do it alone.
She took a breath and fitted the key in the new lock. It turned without resistance. There was a pause, and then she heard a rising whine of power gathering behind the door. A chime signalled that the atmosphere stabilized, and the door swung inwards.