Jaena flinched at the dull thunk that she felt through her feet more than heard, her breath fogging the plasglass window of her helmet. Her eyes were drawn up to the red DANGER sign above the circular door that continued to blink slowly for a few moments before finally becoming a solid green READY. A second dull thunk sounded before the metal bar that served as a door handle swung upwards.
Jeana glanced back at the door she had just stepped through while her heart raced, a door that had cut off everything about her past life the moment it had closed before turning to stare at the glare of incandescent lights shining in as the opposite door swung outward.
"You're Jeana?" a scratchy tenor said over the helmet radio.
"Yes," Jeana replied and reached down to pick up the one small cargo container that she had brought with her.
"Leave it'n close the door behind you," the voice said before the man turned and walked away, "I'll come up'n fetch it later.
"It's not safe to go hauling things about until you get your feet under you."
Jeana hesitated with a glance down at all her worldly possessions in a sealed box barely two feet long and one wide before stepping out to push the door closed and swing the metal bar down until it locked.
"Well, come on," the voice said causing Jeana to jump.
Jeana turned to see the man staring back at her several paces down a dingy metal hall that had piles of coarse gravel and dust piled randomly along the edge. Several of the overhead light panels had burned out and not been replaced which only added to the neglected and ill used appearance.
"Are you..." Jeana began and then had to clear her throat, "Are you Sloan?"
Jeana jumped again when a series of loud bangs sounded just before her body rocked forward as if from a small shove. The mag boots kept her from stumbling forward, her feet rooted firmly to the metal floor so that she had to quickly reach out a hand to steady herself against the wall.
"What with your skiff done just undocked and we the only two souls on this rock who else I'd be," the man, Sloan, replied before turning away.
Jeana watched him walk away, the hard shell suite he wore making him into a seven foot tall giant. The metal surface of the suite was scuffed and scratched from use, but well maintained and he moved with practiced, smooth ease. Jeana had to concentrate to walk, each step hesitant while the sensors detected the motion of her foot inside the boot and released its magnetic grip when she stepped forward before latching firmly down the moment her step landed.
There had been training, maybe an hour of actually getting to walk while wearing a suite, but her face still burned as she remembered Sloan's smooth and easy gait.
"It'll get so it's second nature," Sloan said over the helmet intercom.
Jeana glanced up from watching her boots to see Sloan turned back to watch her progress. A large, rectangular pressure door three meters on a side with rounded corners stood slightly open, just enough for a person in a pressure suite to squeeze through into a storage room beyond.
Jeana managed to get through the pressure door and glanced around curiously the moment she slipped into the room. Boxes, crates, cylinders and pallets covered in smaller items held in place with canvas netting were arranged in a much less haphazard way than what she had imagined. Everything was piled if not neatly, then at least in an assigned place with isles between the supplies kept clear.
"This here's for general bulk," Sloan said as he shoved the pressure door closed and locked it in place, "I keep it at fifty k so won't kill you, but you'll be wanting to keep your helmet on anyway."
"Fifty k?" Jeana asked.
"Fifty thousand pascals," Sloan replied, "You went through training, yes?"
Jeana's face flushed again at her slip of mind while she nodded and then blushed even more as she realized Sloan wouldn't be able to see her head move inside the helmet.
"Yes," Jeana replied, "Normal pressure is ninety to a hundred kilo pascals, I just... I hadn't heard it said like that."
After a moment Sloan gave a noncommittal grunt and then gestured towards yet another airlock.
"That's the lift down to the hab level," Sloan explained while he walked over to lift the bar and open the airlock, "You'll start to get your feet back as we go down, the rock's spun up so you'll get two thirds G down below."
"Oh," Jeana said in surprise while she stepped into the utilitarian elevator, "Doesn't...
"Doesn't that make it hard for you to mine if the asteroid is spinning?"
Sloan stepped in behind her and slammed the locking bar down.
"The nannies and bots don't much care," Sloan replied while sliding a collapsible metal gate across the hall between them and the airlock.
He had to slam the gate into the latching mechanism three times before it finally caught and then punched a button on the wall. Jeana saw that there were only two buttons, both lit so that they glowed a dim yellow with one being a triangle pointed up and the other a triangle pointed down. The lift rumbled to life and Jeana was surprised to see the walls slipping slowly past. What she had taken to be an enclosed elevator was little more than a platform that rode up and down the shaft. Jeana could feel herself getting heavier with every instant the lift rumbled and jerked downward.
The trip out had taken nearly three months, three months that she had been accustomed to floating through the air like a mote of dust slipping through a sunbeam and she reached out to steady herself only to find Sloan gripping her arm to keep her from falling.
"Thank you," Jeana said with a nod of thanks before rolling her eyes at the useless gesture.
"Almost there," Sloan said several minutes later.
A second metal gate suddenly rose up into view just before the lift gave a heart wrenching jerk.
"Oh!" Jeana gasped and again would have fallen except for Sloan's arm holding her upright.
"You can turn your mags off now," Sloan said and unlatched the metal gate before collapsing it against the wall.
Jeana had to concentrate on the training she had gone through before remembering the steps to bring up the heads up display menu on the inside of her helmets plasglass face shield. The functions were controlled by tracking her eyes and by her blinking, something people had told her would become second nature, but she still fumbled through the steps.
Sloan had opened the airlock while she struggled her way through the menus until the magnetic boots suddenly released and caused her to stumble.
"Slow and easy till you get your feet," Sloan said and stepped through.
Jeana followed, her steps much easier without the magnetic boots clamping down on the floor with every step and quickly found herself in a spacious and surprisingly clean locker room. A bench ran down the center of the room with a half dozen metal lockers as well as four hardshell docking stations lining both walls. Sloan closed and locked the airlock door to the lift shaft before holding up a hand.
"Let the pressure equalize and then we can crack the seals," Sloan said.
The minute that slipped passed seemed more like hours while Jeana watched the pressure readout on the inside of her helmet climb.
"Alright, that's it," Sloan said when the pressure reached 950kPa.
Jeana couldn't help but stare as Sloan reached up to twist the locking ring at his neck before lifting his helmet off to reveal a mop of shaggy black hair. He reached up to vigorously scrub his hard suite fingers through that thick, black mop before walking over to face into the closest hardshell dock. The moment his suite was in the indentation the dock latched onto him with a series of loud clicks.
Jeana's fingers fumbled at the locking collar of her own helmet, but her heart wasn't in it as she tried to catch the first sight of Sloan's face. The back of his hardshell swung open from the hips up to the shoulders to reveal Sloan's back before he began to struggle to climb out. It was always a bit of a comedic contortionist's act getting in and out of the hard shells, but laughing was the last thing on Jeana's mind. She could see the muscles of his wide shoulders moving and flexing beneath the dark green one piece work jumper, but still couldn't catch a glimpse of his face.
Her fingers were still fumbling at the locking ring of her helmet when he turned around and she saw gray eyes framed by crows feet and an unkept black beard sprinkled with gray staring back at her.
"You'll be needing help?" Sloan asked, his deep tenor making Jeana bite the corner of her lip.
"Oh... ah... no, I'm just..." Jeana started to say before trailing off.
"Nerves jumpin', same's me," Sloan replied and walked slowly over before reaching up to rotate the locking collar at her throat.
There was a slight hiss as the pressure inside the helmet equalized before she suddenly smelled the sharp tang of burnt metal and gunpowder and had to fight back a sneeze. Sloan slowly and carefully lifted the helmet up over her head before holding it while he stared at her in slack jawed wonder.
Now that he was outside the hardshell he was no longer a seven foot ogre, but Jeana still had to look up to see Sloan's clear gray eyes, eyes that were flicking over her hair and mouth, chin and ears in wonder as if he had never seen a woman before in his life.
Or more likely not in a decade or two.
She had a moment to wonder what he thought of her close cropped auburn hair since his was so long and full while cursing the training classes that had required her to shave her head almost bald before allowing her to proceed.
"Which..." Jeana began and had to clear her throat, "Which docking station should I use?"
"Oh," Sloan said with a shake of his head as he came back to his senses with a wave of his hand at the nearest dock, "There's fine."
