Chapter 1: Rust and Breath
Karl Hasser pressed his gloved palm against the cold skin of the corridor bulkhead and felt the frigate shudder around him, a slow metallic sigh that meant the hull was cooling again. The sound was familiar, almost friendly, like the ship reminding him it was still alive—at least in the way a dying animal is alive, twitching long after the wound has gone septic. He pushed away from the wall and drifted forward, helmet lamp slicing a thin white path through the dark. Somewhere aft a pump rattled in irregular pulses, coughing fluid and air in turns. He counted the beats—one, two, three, pause—because counting kept the silence from growing teeth.
The corridor curved slightly downward, following the spine of the *Hasser's Folly*, once a mid-class patrol frigate, now a floating grave with three quarters of its bays sealed by emergency blast doors. Karl had walked this curve every day for eight weeks, marking time with chalk slashes so small they looked like scratches from a nervous cat. Eight weeks since the engine two detonation, eight weeks since the rest of the crew stopped answering comms, eight weeks of patching holes with foil, prayer, and recycled duct tape. The chalkboard in his head said forty-one days; the chronometer on his wrist said forty-two. He trusted neither, but the contradiction kept him alert.
He reached the airlock that used to separate cargo from crew quarters. The inner hatch stood open, edges peeled back like torn tin. Beyond it lay the starboard cargo bay, now a cavern open to vacuum. A jagged hole three meters wide stared into black, rimmed by frozen curls of metal that caught the lamplight like tiny knives. Karl hooked a tether to the last intact rung and swung himself through. The moment he passed the threshold, the temperature dropped twenty degrees. Frost bloomed across his visor; he wiped it with a gloved thumb, smearing grease into a crescent moon that partly obscured his view. He didn't bother clearing it completely—half a view was still more than none.
The bay had once carried spare conduit, reactor shielding, and a year's worth of ration bricks stacked in color-coded crates. Now it carried nothing but starlight and twisted ribs of steel. He planted his mag boots on the warped deck and activated the magnets. The soles grabbed with a reluctant clank, barely holding. Every step sounded like tearing paper. He crossed to the center of the breach and knelt, planting the portable hull printer upright on the deck. The unit was a squat gray box the size of a suitcase, corners scorched black, handle melted into a droop that resembled a frown. He slapped the power pad. The screen flickered awake, casting sickly green light across his helmet.
The menu offered three choices: PATCH, SEAL, FABRICATE. He selected PATCH, then dragged a finger across the cracked diagram until the outline of the starboard bay glowed red. The machine whirred, tested its internal cartridge, and reported thirty-seven percent nanite paste remaining. Enough for a single layer across the breach, not enough for a mistake. Karl exhaled slowly, watched his breath cloud the visor, then positioned the printer's tripod feet. The unit extruded metal spikes that bit into the deck with insect precision. A low hum rose through his gloves as the print head extended, nozzle glowing dull orange.
He stepped back, boots skidding, and keyed the commence icon. Nanite paste sprayed in a thin gray sheet, clinging to the jagged edges of the hole. The paste moved like living fog, spreading outward in threads that thickened and hardened into fresh alloy. Each pass of the print head overlapped the last, building a new skin between the ship and the void. Karl counted the layers—one, two, three—until the count reached twelve and the printer chimed. The breach was sealed, but the new metal looked pale and sick compared to the original hull, like scar tissue on old skin. He pressed his glove to the patch; no draft, no whistle. For the moment the ship was whole.
He powered the unit down, retracted the tripod, and clipped the printer to his belt. The weight pulled at his hips, but mass meant little in zero g. He took a final look at the stars now hidden behind fresh alloy and felt a sliver of something that might have been pride, or might have been relief pretending it had a spine. He turned, walked back across the torn deck, and ducked through the warped hatch. The inner emergency shutter hung askew, unable to close fully. He wrapped the wheel with duct tape, three tight turns, then added a fourth for the guilt of not having a welder. Primitive, but the tape had kept him alive before; it would keep him alive again.
Back in the main corridor he killed his helmet lamp and stood in darkness so complete it pressed against his eyes. He listened: pump rattling, hull pinging, his own heartbeat. Three sounds, no more. Good. Extra sounds usually meant new problems. He switched the lamp back on and started forward, boots clanking softly. The path took him past the sealed medbay door. Yellow and black hazard striping crossed the hatch, edges blistered. Behind that door the ship's doctor and two med techs had died when a fire suppression valve burst and filled the compartment with foam laced with oxidizer. He had heard them scream until the comm went dead. He hadn't opened the door since. Some spaces were monuments, others were graves; he treated both with silence.
He reached the cockpit, a wedge of cracked plexiglass and flickering consoles suspended above the bow like an afterthought. The pilot chair hung from a broken pedestal, tilted thirty degrees starboard. He strapped himself in with cargo webbing, knotting the straps across his chest until the metal frame bit through the suit padding. Through the forward window the galaxy turned slowly, a million suns that did not blink. He pulled a plastic tube from the seat pouch, bit the valve, and drank recycled water that tasted of copper and old fear. The liquid was cold enough to make his teeth ache. He counted the sips—one, two, three—then capped the tube. Ration discipline was religion; break it and the ship broke you.
The flight computer woke at his touch, screen cracked but functional. He scrolled the log and read the last entry, his own voice printed in block letters: "Day 41. Hull breach sealed. Oxygen at 42 hours. Continuing repairs." He stared at the words until they stopped being language and became scratches. Then he added a new line: "Day 42. Patch confirmed holding. Reactor stable. Water recycler functional. Destination unknown." He saved the entry, closed the log, and rested his helmet against the window. Outside, the stars did not care. Inside, the cockpit heaters whined like tired dogs. He gave himself sixty seconds of stillness, counted them down, then unstrapped.
He pushed toward the engineering bay, a narrow shaft that smelled of burnt insulation and regret. The reactor housing loomed ahead, a squat cylinder wrapped in cracked ceramic tiles. One green led pulsed among a field of red, the heartbeat of the ship. He tapped the panel; the green stayed steady. Good. He opened the maintenance hatch and warm air breathed across his visor, carrying ozone and hot copper. Inside, the fusion bottle hung suspended in magnetic fields too small to see but deadly to touch. The stabilizer mounts showed hairline cracks, white lines etched into gray steel. He pulled the wrench from his thigh pouch, the only tool left with a full handle, and began tightening bolts, counting turns under his breath.
Each bolt took six turns to reach torque, six turns to hold the bottle steady, six turns to keep the lights on. He worked clockwise, never skipping, never rushing. When the last bolt snugged, he wiped sweat from his eyes inside the helmet and keyed the comm. "Reactor steady. Field variance within tolerance. Core temp eight hundred kelvin." The words echoed down the empty bay and died against the bulkheads. He closed the hatch, dogged the latches, and marked the task complete on his wrist pad. One more red light had surrendered to green. He stared at the panel until the colors blurred, then pushed away.
Back in the corridor he checked the battery rack. Of twelve bricks, two now glowed steady green, three pulsed amber, the rest were dead or missing. He swapped the weakest brick into the charging queue, knowing it would steal power without giving much back, but even a trickle might keep the coffee maker alive another week. Coffee was memory, memory was morale. He moved to the water recycler, opened the side panel, and pulled the filtration cartridges. The main filter was black with sludge, the backup not much better. He sealed both in waste bags and swapped in the last two spares from storage. Nine filters left. After that he would be distilling urine in a pressure pot over the reactor housing. He had done it before, would do it again, but preferred not to think about the taste.
He primed the pump, listened to the motor cough, then catch, then hum. A trickle of clean water dripped into the reservoir. The drip became a stream, steady and clear. He filled a squeeze bulb, drank half, and felt the metallic chill slide into his stomach. Then he filled two plastic bladders, capped them, and stored them behind the pilot chair. Routine, routine, routine. The ship ran on electricity and momentum, he ran on procedure. When both aligned, he survived.
Karl returned to the cockpit, strapped in, and ran a full status sweep. Reactor steady, batteries balanced, water flowing, hull holding. He stared at the board and saw more green than red. The sight hurt his eyes. He logged the moment, time stamped it, and saved it to the archive. Then he dimmed the lights, let the hum of the ship sink into his bones, and closed his eyes without fear of waking up dead. Outside, the void remained indifferent, but inside, the *Folly* whispered maybe.