Do You Dream of Terra-Two?

She didn’t say anything. She simply stared at him for half a minute, her eyes shining with hurt. ‘I’m sorry…’

It only occurred to him to chase after her a moment later, by which time she was already scrambling down the ladder that led out of the garden.

Chapter 25 JESSE

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AFTER WHAT HAPPENED IN the greenhouse, Jesse was almost convinced he’d deserved what Harry did to him a month later. They had been alone in the games room, Jesse watching Harry play on the simulator. He watched so long, leaning back on one of the beanbags, that the game took on a pattern, and he really began to notice Harry’s strengths and weaknesses. He was fast – it was a thrill to watch his lightning-quick reflexes as he dived past every obstacle that swung into his path. And he was a quick study, picking up the manoeuvres that the computer taught him with such uncanny ease that Jesse understood why Commander Sheppard had selected him to co-pilot their ship. But Harry’s greatest strength was his determination. Hours of tackling the game had given him a formidable knowledge of the simulation, and he ascended the levels with a practised ease, even at the complex higher levels. There the computer anticipated his next moves and blocked his way, pitched surprises and forced him to combine or alter the various manoeuvres he’d learned on the easier levels.

But, Jesse observed, Harry couldn’t tolerate surprises. When a fuel tank exploded, his sudden impulsive jerk of the controller sent him veering off in the wrong direction, losing power too soon to complete his mission. When a rogue ship careened past, Harry was too surprised to prevent a collision. He seemed to lack the cunning or creativity to improvise at higher levels.

After the fuel tank explosion, Jesse said, ‘Hey, you know if you switch from the damaged fuel tanks to the secondary rocket boosters you’ll be able to land without too much excess drag.’ Harry had said nothing. ‘Also, it’s all about the angle of entry,’ Jesse added, ‘right now you’re going in too steep. That’s why you keep—’

Harry interrupted by switching off the simulator and yanking off his goggles.

‘Hey, Jesse,’ he said, ‘do you want to see something?’

‘See what?’

Harry spun round in his seat and leapt off with a little chuckle. ‘I can’t tell you,’ he said. ‘That would ruin the fun.’

‘No, I’m fine here I think.’

‘Really? You don’t have a minute or two for a little competition?’

Jesse’s immediate desire was to shrug his shoulders and remain in the comfort of the games room. But it was the way Harry always said the word ‘competition’ that piqued something inside Jesse, something like curiosity and determination.

So he followed him into the half-lit corridor where, instead of climbing up the ladder as Jesse had expected, Harry slid towards the store rooms. Jesse had only ever gone down that way a few times, during that first night when they were all moving in, or when Cai requested extra cartons of stock solutions to mix more fertilizer.

Further down the hall was the round door he’d never touched.

‘The airlock,’ Jesse said.

‘That’s right. So they taught you something about the ship during your midnight astronaut crash course.’

A quick flame of annoyance sparked inside Jesse, but he didn’t want to give Harry the satisfaction of seeing him ruffled. ‘I’m just as trained as you,’ he said.

‘Actually, you’re about half as trained as me.’

Jesse had expected this, sooner or later. Each time he asked a question in their tutorials about something he had not been taught he could almost feel the sneer on Harry’s lips. It made him sheepish and embarrassed, keen to hide his deficiencies but certain everyone was taking note of them. Jesse said what Commander Sheppard kept repeating to him: ‘Everything else I need to know I can learn on this ship.’

‘Exactly.’ Harry’s eyes glittered. ‘Like how the airlock works.’

‘I know how the airlock works. It allows entry or exit without compromising the environment inside the ship.’

‘Good. How does it do that?’

‘Why are you asking me?’

‘How does it do that, Jesse?’

‘Two doors – well, two pressure-sealed hatches – and a space in between; one opens out into space, the other into the ship. If someone is leaving, the compartment between depressurizes. The opposite if they are entering.’

They were standing before it; the round door with the fat metal latches. Jesse peered at his reflection in the airlock’s porthole as Harry found the gearbox mounted on the side of the wall and twisted the handle. The hinge mechanism groaned and then, with a low hiss of air, the hatch swung open.

The airlock was about the size of their tiny bathroom. Two spacesuits were charging, hooked to either wall, and they stared out at Jesse like astronauts with darkness for eyes. On the far end was a window to space.

‘You scared?’ Harry asked,

‘There’s nothing to be scared of.’