Lines of invasive code wash across my little horizon.

And bump up against something else.

A few short lines, almost invisible in the wash. Words that write and re-write themselves. Whenever the red shapes drown them out, they reappear a moment later, and then they hold their ground.

I reach for them—the little island of silver lapped by crimson tides.

My fingers leave oily streaks behind them on the glass. “What are they?” I ask, but I already know the answer.

00.77

Me.

The red wells and curdles, but always the code resets.

The hull rings out, and another impact rattles me in the saddle. It feels like something is trying to break its way in from the outside, but there’s nothing I can do.

Nothing but watch red blossoms float across my screen.

00.48

It is a flood.

00.31

It—

It—

It

is drowning me.

I can’t stop the panic. The text runs too quickly, too thick and too strange. Even if I could keep up with it, I could only sit and watch. I’m not an engineer, not a tech, or even a knuckledragger. Not a coder or a script-shepherd or a psy-com. Not anyone with any business looking in on the mind of my machine.

00.27

I need you.

The words hit me square in the chest. “I—I can’t. I can’t read it. I don’t—”

00.18

No.

I’m only a jockey.

00.08

I know.

The cockpit rocks heavier than before. I hear something tear.

“Tell me what to do.”

00.07

00.02

Something clicks. The counter flickers.

Carry me.

100.00

I TRY TO breathe, but I can’t find the air. At first, it feels like I’m pulling gee, like I’m skirting the edge of blackout.

My first instinct is the push-pull they teach you to keep yourself out of G-LOC. You work in three-second cycles, forcing air down your throat as hard as you can, then clenching every muscle you have to keep the blood from deserting your brain and rushing down into your feet. They hammered it so deep that I can almost hear the instructor on the radio.

Breathe in. Out.

Legs, lungs. One, two, three.

Terror swallows me. I pull at muscle that doesn’t respond, and gasp for air that isn’t there. Instinct brings my hands clawing at my throat, at my visor, and sets them pulling at the locks and seals and tubes. My training does its best to save me, reaching for anything that’ll get air in. I can’t find the visor, but then, I can’t find my fingers either.

I’ve done the hard-vacuum drill—I used to have the patch, but I never wore it, no one does. It’s a bad omen.

To earn it, they put you in a box, and pull the air out in seconds. There’s a warning at first; a hazard-lamp to give you a heads-up, and a safety officer with a timer on their wrist and spare air in their hands. On the third try, the lamp stops working, and the vacuum starts at random. Your watcher gets pulled out at number five, and by the time you’re up to ten, they’re simulating a catastrophic containment failure. Good luck, and try not to pop an eye.