Oh, Grace Under Pressure....
Jan. 13th, 2007 03:13 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cinaedWhat can I say, after I watched "Grace Under Pressure" and "McKay and Mrs. Miller" a plotbunny was born. *shifty eyes* Unfinished, obviously, because I glanced at the clock and said to myself, "Hey, it's almost six AM. I should sleep. Sleep is a good thing."
When Radek was seven, his father took the family to a lake. Decades later, Radek would remember very little about the trip—save for the last few minutes of it, which he could recall in painful detail. Beyond that, however, the rest of the day was just a handful of memories, mere flickers of sensation really, like how the sun felt caressing their upturned faces and freckling their bare shoulders, or the way he watched the strain ease from his parents’ faces as worldly cares were set aside for a few brief hours.
Mostly, though, he remembered Eliška’s glares as he trailed after her along the edges of the lake, her mouth twisted into a hard, angry line whenever she turned and found him just a step behind her. At the ancient and extremely impatient age of eleven, she hated how Radek followed her around like some imprinted duckling, wanting to go everywhere she went, wanting to see everything she saw.
Even after thirty-odd years, Eliška still went pale and miserable and refused to talk about that day, so Radek could only assume that she decided to teach him a lesson, one that would get him to stop following her around once and for all, because that was the only reason she would have dared him to climb to the top of the cliff that overlooked the lake.
Radek had been quietly uneasy about heights even at the age of seven, never joining the other neighborhood children in climbing trees, and so when Eliška shot him a taunting little smile and marched towards the cliff, he nervously scrambled after her, forward and up that steep, rocky terrain.
It was then that the memory became powerful, intense enough that Radek could recall each and every painful detail. He remembered how his heart felt lodged in his throat as Eliška kicked dust into his face, could sometimes still feel the gritty texture of the dirt under his fingers and the sharp stones beneath his bare feet, if he concentrated hard enough.
His head spun when they finally made it to the top and could peer out at that supposedly serene stretch of water. The quiet uneasiness stirred in his belly, coiling into a knot of almost-fear, because the cliff had not seemed half as high when he and Eliška were scaling it. Radek stared down, down, down towards the murky green lake, which suddenly didn’t quite so friendly, his toes curling and digging into the dirt of the cliff as though to get a stronger foothold.
“Maybe we should go back down,” he said, the words turning vinegar-sour in his mouth at his sister’s taunting laugh, and to prove he wasn’t a baby, that he wasn’t scared, he stepped closer to the edge. “It’s just, we’re probably not allowed, and--” At another of his sister’s harsh, barking laughs, he swallowed, ignored the heart lodged at the back of his throat and the knot tight and hot in his belly, and stepped to the very edge. “See, I’m not a baby, I only--”
The edge of the cliff crumbled under his feet and he dropped like a stone, too shocked to make a sound as the water rushed up to meet him. It was his sister who shrieked, her piercing cries following him until he hit the water. If he dropped like a stone, then he sank like he was in a suit of armor, the murky green water swallowing him whole and dragging him swiftly down to the depths.
To this day, he remembered how the water felt as it pressed down, filling his nose and mouth, remembered his feet hitting the bottom and kicking at the sand and silt there frantically as a tendril of something coarse attempted to curl around one ankle and keep him there, remembered the way his lungs burned and his mind screamed the words that his mouth couldn’t voice.
If he sat and remembered long enough, he could still feel a ghost-memory, an ache in his shoulder when his father’s thick, powerful fingers had grabbed his wrist and yanked him upwards, out of the grip of the weeds, still feel the cool air caress his face as he broke the surface and gasped for air.
Radek had been quietly uneasy about heights before, but afterwards, afterwards he was terrified of both water and heights. Just the mere mention of the lake and he could feel terror wrap its fingers around his throat and squeeze. The terror stayed with him throughout the rest of his childhood, and even as an adult, with his fear easing to mostly manageable levels, he could still feel the thick water burning in his lungs and the sense-memory of the weeds wrapping around his ankles.
To the day of his death, Radek believed that one of the universe’s greatest cosmic jokes was what he would come to Atlantis and fall in love with the city. The city in the middle of an ocean. The city which could fly.
*
“Are you going to be all right?”
Radek looked up, fought back the frown that wanted to twist his lips at the inquiry. He never should have told Rod about his mild anxiety when it came to heights. It had been in a moment of weakness, and he’d regretted it the second the admission escaped his lips. Sure enough, Rod had been his normal, overly helpful self ever since, offering to take all of the missions that involved using Jumpers, even going so far as to offer to test-fly all the Jumpers for him, as though by ‘mild anxiety’ Radek had actually meant ‘horrible, crippling fear.’
“Of course I am,” he said, raising an eyebrow and forcing his mouth into a bland smile that probably didn’t reach his eyes. “It is a simple test-flight, to make certain Jumper Six is back in working order.”
“Right, right, of course,” Rod said, smiling agreeably and going on as though Radek hadn’t actually spoken. “But you know, if you want, I could go with Griffin instead--”
Radek resisted the urge to curse under his breath. Grumbling in his native tongue had lost much of its appeal the day that Rod had laughed and responded to an insult with a casual, ‘Actually, my parents were married when I was born. And to each other no less.’ (Radek still wanted to know who had taught the man Czech. He had much to say to that person.)
Rather than mutter to himself, he continued packing the equipment he would need for the flight. Without looking over at his fellow scientist, he said firmly, “I will be fine, Rod.”
“Right, right,” Rod said again, tone just as dismissive as before. “Though, I was thinking, if you needed an extra pair of eyes, I could--”
“I already have four eyes, remember?” Radek remarked dryly, tapping on the rims of his glasses and earning a slow, lopsided smile. “Rod, I can handle this myself. Just because I am a bit uneasy when it comes to heights does not mean I cannot take a Jumper out for a test-flight. Please, let me do my job.”
“I know,” Rod said, this time sounding like he actually meant it a little, and that startled Radek into glancing over. Rod wore a rueful smile. “I was really just kind of hoping to get out of the city for a few hours. Get some fresh air. Relax.”
Radek raised an eyebrow, immediately suspicious, because Rod McKay never admitted he needed a break. He was like that rabbit in the battery commercial that went on and on…and on, only unlike that rabbit, Rod occasionally did fall asleep on his feet or in the labs. So either Rod was somehow about to snap and no one had noticed, or he was trying to twist the situation and make it seem like Radek was doing him a favor by letting him do the test-flight.
“You have a mission in two days,” he pointed out, and Rod shrugged, the rueful smile deepening into a look of almost boyish mischief.
“Not the same, and you know it.”
Radek stared at the other man for a long moment, taking in his earnest expression and hopeful blue eyes. At last, he sighed, fighting against the voice that whispered in the back of his head that defeat was inevitable when it came to arguing with Rod. He slid his glasses from his nose, rubbed at his face. “I have already told Elizabeth that I am taking Jumper Six out.”
“Oh, I’ve already spoken to Elizabeth,” Rod said, waving a dismissive hand. “She said that if you didn’t mind, Sheppard and I could take the Jumper out.”
Radek’s hand paused where it was pinching at the bridge of his nose, and he stared, irritation warring with bemusement. “You and Sheppard? You just said you and Griffin--”
Rod shrugged. “Yes, well, Sheppard needs some fresh air too.”
“Of course he does,” Radek said sourly. He should have known, of course. Sheppard and Rod were as thick as thieves, practically joined at the hip. Why wouldn’t they leap at the chance to run off to the mainland with the excuse of test-flying the Jumper? Resettling his glasses on his nose, he scowled. “Griffin and I will be test-flying the Jumper today, Rod.”
For a barest flicker of a second, Rod’s amiable mask cracked, his eyes narrowing in a mixture of confusion and annoyance, his mouth pursing into a scowl, and then the moment was gone, and his expression smoothed out into a good-natured look. “If you feel that’s best,” he said diplomatically. “Well, I’d best be heading off to the control room.”
The unsaid In case you change your mind lingered in the air, along with the strong smell of leather as Rod smiled, gave Radek a pat on the shoulder, and strolled away with a casual, “Mnoho štěsti!”
Radek resisted the urge to glare after him. Someday, he would discover who had taught Rod Czech and hurt them. Slowly and painfully.
*
“So, let me ask you something,” Griffin said.
Radek glanced up from the panel, almost grateful for the distraction -- a quiet, frantic voice chanted a mantra along the lines of I’m in the air, oh God, I’m way, way too high up in the air, where’s the ground, oh God, had been whimpering in his head ever since he first stepped into the Jumper. Even his shoulders ached from barely withheld tension. “Yes?”
“As a scientist, does it bother you that most of your work, no matter how brilliant, will eventually be considered misguided? ‘Cause that would bother me.”
Radek blinked, felt himself frown, not certain whether to be amused or insulted by the query. “Excuse me?”
Griffin raised an eyebrow, an easy smile on his face. “Well, given enough time, everything's pretty much proven wrong, right?” When Radek just stared, uncomprehending, the pilot waved a hand. “Well, you know. Everything from the Earth being flat, to the sun revolving around us.”
After a moment, he settled for being amused, one corner of his mouth lifting into a half-smile as he thought of what Sheppard’s expression would have been, had he been here for this conversation. “You do realize you’ve just told me my life’s work is pointless, yes?”
“Not pointless,” Griffin objected. “Just…misguided. A stepping stone to the right answer. Scientists get it wrong more times than they get it right.” He shrugged. “Take the tomato.”
“The tomato,” Radek repeated, incredulous, and made a mental note to suggest to Elizabeth that they have Heightmeyer check the relative sanity of the population, starting with Griffin.
That thought must have flickered across his face, because Griffin suddenly looked a little defiant. “Yeah, the tomato. After the conquest of Mexico in 1519, tomatoes were carried eastward to Europe, where they were believed to be poisonous.”
“I see,” Radek said, and the voice in the back of his head worried louder, muttering frantically about insane pilots who were going to get them killed. He licked his lips, anxiously eyed the blue, blue sky beyond the windshield, tried to ignore the unease that clenched his stomach. “Could you, ah, possibly concentrate more on flying?”
“I’ve got it covered,” Griffin said easily. “You worry about you.”
By all accounts, Griffin didn’t know Czech, and so Radek allowed himself to be particularly verbose in his mutterings about certain tomato-obsessed pilots who didn’t understand how dangerous flying was and should’ve been history teachers instead. “This is the first flight the Jumper has had since it was shot down and repaired. It deserves all of your attention, so please, I--” He couldn’t bring himself to look out the window at the endless stretch of ocean and sky anymore, and started towards the back of the ship.
He could almost hear Griffin’s shrug. “It made it to the mainland. If anything was going to go wrong, it would have gone wrong by now.” There was a pause, and then Griffin continued conversationally, “It took the Italians and the Spaniards to realize that tomatoes are, in fact, delicious.”
“How wonderful for them,” Radek deadpanned.
Griffin glanced over his shoulder, grinned a little, presumably at Radek’s sour expression. Continuing on as though Radek was actually interested in the topic, he said, “Columbus was Spanish -- he figured out the Earth was round.”
“He was Italian.” The correction slipped out before Radek could bite the words back, a little sharper than he intended, but the muscles in his shoulders were wound too tight, so much so that the tension was spreading down his back and tightening up the muscles there.
Griffin didn’t seem phased at all, instead his tone became pensive. “Huh. I wonder what it is that makes Spaniards so good at debunking bad science?”
“You will have to ask a Spaniard when we get back to Atlantis,” Radek said, hoping his tone conveyed how deeply he desired an end to this conversation. “I believe there is a new scientist, a, a biologist, if I remember correctly, who is from Madrid--”
The Jumper lurched under his feet, and his stomach roiled, sweat breaking out on the back of his neck in a moment of sudden, startled terror. It took him a moment to catch his breath enough to demand, “What is it? Turbulence?” and stumble to the front of the Jumper, collapsing into the co-pilot’s seat.
Griffin was frowning, brow knitted in concentration. “The inertial dampeners on this thing should smooth that out,” he muttered, almost to himself, and then a startled, “What the hell?” escaped his lips as the Jumper shuddered once more, a convulsive jolt that rattled Radek’s heart from his chest and lodged it in his throat.
He peered at the screens, ignoring how his stomach was still churning and the fact that he felt like he was going to be violently ill. “Right drive pod's intermittently switching to reverse thrust,” he reported, and hoped that Griffin was too distracted to notice how his voice wobbled.
Griffin’s face was tight and drawn, and when he snapped out, “Cut it. I can drive with just the left pod,” his voice was so authoritative that Radek moved to obey his order before he realized he was even heaving himself out of his seat and stumbling over to one of the side panels.
He swore, soft and fervent, a second later, as the Jumper trembled and bucked like a startled horse beneath his feet. “It is not recognizing any of my commands!”
“Brace for impact,” was the grim reply, and Radek made a sound that was supposed to be a “What?” but came out as a strangled noise instead. “We’re going down.”
“What? No, no, no,” Radek heard himself babbling, hands still leaping over the panel, looking for something, anything to get this Jumper to stop.
“Mayday, mayday, mayday!” Griffin shouted, the urgent calls echoed by the terrified voice in Radek’s head that wailed Falling, falling, falling—
And then the Jumper gave another violent shudder, one that sent Radek flying, and the last thing he heard was another of Griffin’s cries of, “Mayday!” before the floor of the Jumper rushed up to meet him and everything went black.
*
Inspired also in part by this poem:
The Art of Drowning by Billy Collins
I wonder how it all got started, this business
about seeing your life flash before your eyes
while you drown, as if panic, or the act of submergence,
could startle time into such compression, crushing
decades in the vice of your desperate, final seconds.
After falling off a steamship or being swept away
in a rush of floodwaters, wouldn't you hope
for a more leisurely review, an invisible hand
turning the pages of an album of photographs-
you up on a pony or blowing out candles in a conic hat.
How about a short animated film, a slide presentation?
Your life expressed in an essay, or in one model photograph?
Wouldn't any form be better than this sudden flash?
Your whole existence going off in your face
in an eyebrow-singeing explosion of biography-
nothing like the three large volumes you envisioned.
Survivors would have us believe in a brilliance
here, some bolt of truth forking across the water,
an ultimate Light before all the lights go out,
dawning on you with all its megalithic tonnage.
But if something does flash before your eyes
as you go under, it will probably be a fish,
a quick blur of curved silver darting away,
having nothing to do with your life or your death.
The tide will take you, or the lake will accept it all
as you sink toward the weedy disarray of the bottom,
leaving behind what you have already forgotten,
the surface, now overrun with the high travel of clouds.
When Radek was seven, his father took the family to a lake. Decades later, Radek would remember very little about the trip—save for the last few minutes of it, which he could recall in painful detail. Beyond that, however, the rest of the day was just a handful of memories, mere flickers of sensation really, like how the sun felt caressing their upturned faces and freckling their bare shoulders, or the way he watched the strain ease from his parents’ faces as worldly cares were set aside for a few brief hours.
Mostly, though, he remembered Eliška’s glares as he trailed after her along the edges of the lake, her mouth twisted into a hard, angry line whenever she turned and found him just a step behind her. At the ancient and extremely impatient age of eleven, she hated how Radek followed her around like some imprinted duckling, wanting to go everywhere she went, wanting to see everything she saw.
Even after thirty-odd years, Eliška still went pale and miserable and refused to talk about that day, so Radek could only assume that she decided to teach him a lesson, one that would get him to stop following her around once and for all, because that was the only reason she would have dared him to climb to the top of the cliff that overlooked the lake.
Radek had been quietly uneasy about heights even at the age of seven, never joining the other neighborhood children in climbing trees, and so when Eliška shot him a taunting little smile and marched towards the cliff, he nervously scrambled after her, forward and up that steep, rocky terrain.
It was then that the memory became powerful, intense enough that Radek could recall each and every painful detail. He remembered how his heart felt lodged in his throat as Eliška kicked dust into his face, could sometimes still feel the gritty texture of the dirt under his fingers and the sharp stones beneath his bare feet, if he concentrated hard enough.
His head spun when they finally made it to the top and could peer out at that supposedly serene stretch of water. The quiet uneasiness stirred in his belly, coiling into a knot of almost-fear, because the cliff had not seemed half as high when he and Eliška were scaling it. Radek stared down, down, down towards the murky green lake, which suddenly didn’t quite so friendly, his toes curling and digging into the dirt of the cliff as though to get a stronger foothold.
“Maybe we should go back down,” he said, the words turning vinegar-sour in his mouth at his sister’s taunting laugh, and to prove he wasn’t a baby, that he wasn’t scared, he stepped closer to the edge. “It’s just, we’re probably not allowed, and--” At another of his sister’s harsh, barking laughs, he swallowed, ignored the heart lodged at the back of his throat and the knot tight and hot in his belly, and stepped to the very edge. “See, I’m not a baby, I only--”
The edge of the cliff crumbled under his feet and he dropped like a stone, too shocked to make a sound as the water rushed up to meet him. It was his sister who shrieked, her piercing cries following him until he hit the water. If he dropped like a stone, then he sank like he was in a suit of armor, the murky green water swallowing him whole and dragging him swiftly down to the depths.
To this day, he remembered how the water felt as it pressed down, filling his nose and mouth, remembered his feet hitting the bottom and kicking at the sand and silt there frantically as a tendril of something coarse attempted to curl around one ankle and keep him there, remembered the way his lungs burned and his mind screamed the words that his mouth couldn’t voice.
If he sat and remembered long enough, he could still feel a ghost-memory, an ache in his shoulder when his father’s thick, powerful fingers had grabbed his wrist and yanked him upwards, out of the grip of the weeds, still feel the cool air caress his face as he broke the surface and gasped for air.
Radek had been quietly uneasy about heights before, but afterwards, afterwards he was terrified of both water and heights. Just the mere mention of the lake and he could feel terror wrap its fingers around his throat and squeeze. The terror stayed with him throughout the rest of his childhood, and even as an adult, with his fear easing to mostly manageable levels, he could still feel the thick water burning in his lungs and the sense-memory of the weeds wrapping around his ankles.
To the day of his death, Radek believed that one of the universe’s greatest cosmic jokes was what he would come to Atlantis and fall in love with the city. The city in the middle of an ocean. The city which could fly.
“Are you going to be all right?”
Radek looked up, fought back the frown that wanted to twist his lips at the inquiry. He never should have told Rod about his mild anxiety when it came to heights. It had been in a moment of weakness, and he’d regretted it the second the admission escaped his lips. Sure enough, Rod had been his normal, overly helpful self ever since, offering to take all of the missions that involved using Jumpers, even going so far as to offer to test-fly all the Jumpers for him, as though by ‘mild anxiety’ Radek had actually meant ‘horrible, crippling fear.’
“Of course I am,” he said, raising an eyebrow and forcing his mouth into a bland smile that probably didn’t reach his eyes. “It is a simple test-flight, to make certain Jumper Six is back in working order.”
“Right, right, of course,” Rod said, smiling agreeably and going on as though Radek hadn’t actually spoken. “But you know, if you want, I could go with Griffin instead--”
Radek resisted the urge to curse under his breath. Grumbling in his native tongue had lost much of its appeal the day that Rod had laughed and responded to an insult with a casual, ‘Actually, my parents were married when I was born. And to each other no less.’ (Radek still wanted to know who had taught the man Czech. He had much to say to that person.)
Rather than mutter to himself, he continued packing the equipment he would need for the flight. Without looking over at his fellow scientist, he said firmly, “I will be fine, Rod.”
“Right, right,” Rod said again, tone just as dismissive as before. “Though, I was thinking, if you needed an extra pair of eyes, I could--”
“I already have four eyes, remember?” Radek remarked dryly, tapping on the rims of his glasses and earning a slow, lopsided smile. “Rod, I can handle this myself. Just because I am a bit uneasy when it comes to heights does not mean I cannot take a Jumper out for a test-flight. Please, let me do my job.”
“I know,” Rod said, this time sounding like he actually meant it a little, and that startled Radek into glancing over. Rod wore a rueful smile. “I was really just kind of hoping to get out of the city for a few hours. Get some fresh air. Relax.”
Radek raised an eyebrow, immediately suspicious, because Rod McKay never admitted he needed a break. He was like that rabbit in the battery commercial that went on and on…and on, only unlike that rabbit, Rod occasionally did fall asleep on his feet or in the labs. So either Rod was somehow about to snap and no one had noticed, or he was trying to twist the situation and make it seem like Radek was doing him a favor by letting him do the test-flight.
“You have a mission in two days,” he pointed out, and Rod shrugged, the rueful smile deepening into a look of almost boyish mischief.
“Not the same, and you know it.”
Radek stared at the other man for a long moment, taking in his earnest expression and hopeful blue eyes. At last, he sighed, fighting against the voice that whispered in the back of his head that defeat was inevitable when it came to arguing with Rod. He slid his glasses from his nose, rubbed at his face. “I have already told Elizabeth that I am taking Jumper Six out.”
“Oh, I’ve already spoken to Elizabeth,” Rod said, waving a dismissive hand. “She said that if you didn’t mind, Sheppard and I could take the Jumper out.”
Radek’s hand paused where it was pinching at the bridge of his nose, and he stared, irritation warring with bemusement. “You and Sheppard? You just said you and Griffin--”
Rod shrugged. “Yes, well, Sheppard needs some fresh air too.”
“Of course he does,” Radek said sourly. He should have known, of course. Sheppard and Rod were as thick as thieves, practically joined at the hip. Why wouldn’t they leap at the chance to run off to the mainland with the excuse of test-flying the Jumper? Resettling his glasses on his nose, he scowled. “Griffin and I will be test-flying the Jumper today, Rod.”
For a barest flicker of a second, Rod’s amiable mask cracked, his eyes narrowing in a mixture of confusion and annoyance, his mouth pursing into a scowl, and then the moment was gone, and his expression smoothed out into a good-natured look. “If you feel that’s best,” he said diplomatically. “Well, I’d best be heading off to the control room.”
The unsaid In case you change your mind lingered in the air, along with the strong smell of leather as Rod smiled, gave Radek a pat on the shoulder, and strolled away with a casual, “Mnoho štěsti!”
Radek resisted the urge to glare after him. Someday, he would discover who had taught Rod Czech and hurt them. Slowly and painfully.
“So, let me ask you something,” Griffin said.
Radek glanced up from the panel, almost grateful for the distraction -- a quiet, frantic voice chanted a mantra along the lines of I’m in the air, oh God, I’m way, way too high up in the air, where’s the ground, oh God, had been whimpering in his head ever since he first stepped into the Jumper. Even his shoulders ached from barely withheld tension. “Yes?”
“As a scientist, does it bother you that most of your work, no matter how brilliant, will eventually be considered misguided? ‘Cause that would bother me.”
Radek blinked, felt himself frown, not certain whether to be amused or insulted by the query. “Excuse me?”
Griffin raised an eyebrow, an easy smile on his face. “Well, given enough time, everything's pretty much proven wrong, right?” When Radek just stared, uncomprehending, the pilot waved a hand. “Well, you know. Everything from the Earth being flat, to the sun revolving around us.”
After a moment, he settled for being amused, one corner of his mouth lifting into a half-smile as he thought of what Sheppard’s expression would have been, had he been here for this conversation. “You do realize you’ve just told me my life’s work is pointless, yes?”
“Not pointless,” Griffin objected. “Just…misguided. A stepping stone to the right answer. Scientists get it wrong more times than they get it right.” He shrugged. “Take the tomato.”
“The tomato,” Radek repeated, incredulous, and made a mental note to suggest to Elizabeth that they have Heightmeyer check the relative sanity of the population, starting with Griffin.
That thought must have flickered across his face, because Griffin suddenly looked a little defiant. “Yeah, the tomato. After the conquest of Mexico in 1519, tomatoes were carried eastward to Europe, where they were believed to be poisonous.”
“I see,” Radek said, and the voice in the back of his head worried louder, muttering frantically about insane pilots who were going to get them killed. He licked his lips, anxiously eyed the blue, blue sky beyond the windshield, tried to ignore the unease that clenched his stomach. “Could you, ah, possibly concentrate more on flying?”
“I’ve got it covered,” Griffin said easily. “You worry about you.”
By all accounts, Griffin didn’t know Czech, and so Radek allowed himself to be particularly verbose in his mutterings about certain tomato-obsessed pilots who didn’t understand how dangerous flying was and should’ve been history teachers instead. “This is the first flight the Jumper has had since it was shot down and repaired. It deserves all of your attention, so please, I--” He couldn’t bring himself to look out the window at the endless stretch of ocean and sky anymore, and started towards the back of the ship.
He could almost hear Griffin’s shrug. “It made it to the mainland. If anything was going to go wrong, it would have gone wrong by now.” There was a pause, and then Griffin continued conversationally, “It took the Italians and the Spaniards to realize that tomatoes are, in fact, delicious.”
“How wonderful for them,” Radek deadpanned.
Griffin glanced over his shoulder, grinned a little, presumably at Radek’s sour expression. Continuing on as though Radek was actually interested in the topic, he said, “Columbus was Spanish -- he figured out the Earth was round.”
“He was Italian.” The correction slipped out before Radek could bite the words back, a little sharper than he intended, but the muscles in his shoulders were wound too tight, so much so that the tension was spreading down his back and tightening up the muscles there.
Griffin didn’t seem phased at all, instead his tone became pensive. “Huh. I wonder what it is that makes Spaniards so good at debunking bad science?”
“You will have to ask a Spaniard when we get back to Atlantis,” Radek said, hoping his tone conveyed how deeply he desired an end to this conversation. “I believe there is a new scientist, a, a biologist, if I remember correctly, who is from Madrid--”
The Jumper lurched under his feet, and his stomach roiled, sweat breaking out on the back of his neck in a moment of sudden, startled terror. It took him a moment to catch his breath enough to demand, “What is it? Turbulence?” and stumble to the front of the Jumper, collapsing into the co-pilot’s seat.
Griffin was frowning, brow knitted in concentration. “The inertial dampeners on this thing should smooth that out,” he muttered, almost to himself, and then a startled, “What the hell?” escaped his lips as the Jumper shuddered once more, a convulsive jolt that rattled Radek’s heart from his chest and lodged it in his throat.
He peered at the screens, ignoring how his stomach was still churning and the fact that he felt like he was going to be violently ill. “Right drive pod's intermittently switching to reverse thrust,” he reported, and hoped that Griffin was too distracted to notice how his voice wobbled.
Griffin’s face was tight and drawn, and when he snapped out, “Cut it. I can drive with just the left pod,” his voice was so authoritative that Radek moved to obey his order before he realized he was even heaving himself out of his seat and stumbling over to one of the side panels.
He swore, soft and fervent, a second later, as the Jumper trembled and bucked like a startled horse beneath his feet. “It is not recognizing any of my commands!”
“Brace for impact,” was the grim reply, and Radek made a sound that was supposed to be a “What?” but came out as a strangled noise instead. “We’re going down.”
“What? No, no, no,” Radek heard himself babbling, hands still leaping over the panel, looking for something, anything to get this Jumper to stop.
“Mayday, mayday, mayday!” Griffin shouted, the urgent calls echoed by the terrified voice in Radek’s head that wailed Falling, falling, falling—
And then the Jumper gave another violent shudder, one that sent Radek flying, and the last thing he heard was another of Griffin’s cries of, “Mayday!” before the floor of the Jumper rushed up to meet him and everything went black.
Inspired also in part by this poem:
The Art of Drowning by Billy Collins
I wonder how it all got started, this business
about seeing your life flash before your eyes
while you drown, as if panic, or the act of submergence,
could startle time into such compression, crushing
decades in the vice of your desperate, final seconds.
After falling off a steamship or being swept away
in a rush of floodwaters, wouldn't you hope
for a more leisurely review, an invisible hand
turning the pages of an album of photographs-
you up on a pony or blowing out candles in a conic hat.
How about a short animated film, a slide presentation?
Your life expressed in an essay, or in one model photograph?
Wouldn't any form be better than this sudden flash?
Your whole existence going off in your face
in an eyebrow-singeing explosion of biography-
nothing like the three large volumes you envisioned.
Survivors would have us believe in a brilliance
here, some bolt of truth forking across the water,
an ultimate Light before all the lights go out,
dawning on you with all its megalithic tonnage.
But if something does flash before your eyes
as you go under, it will probably be a fish,
a quick blur of curved silver darting away,
having nothing to do with your life or your death.
The tide will take you, or the lake will accept it all
as you sink toward the weedy disarray of the bottom,
leaving behind what you have already forgotten,
the surface, now overrun with the high travel of clouds.
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no subject
Date: 2007-01-14 04:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-01-14 08:29 pm (UTC)