up the hatch

After Ash was ripped out of the jammed exit bay by that spider-demon clinging to the hull, I was trapped in absolute darkness. I was still shaken from seeing that, and before that from Ash cursing me out. I used to remove Qli's soul chip all the time. Why couldn't he? I felt some metal roll by my boots as I felt for a foothold. I lowered my flight goggles over my eyes and flipped on the heat sensor.

I was the only living being in the tunnel. I could make out the outline of Ash's wings next to me. One was twisted and shredded into shrapnel, but the other one was largely intact except for where it snapped off from his flightpack rather cleanly.

I heard thumping from the other side of the hatch. It had to be the spider. If there was a way to open it from the outside, he was probably working on it. I had to climb up somehow, but the sides of the tunnel were too smooth.

I looked at the wings. The shredded one was too dangerous for me to pick up, much less use as a weapon or a climbing instrument. The other one...mostly intact. I felt the winding of gears in my brain. I saw ghost images of every object on the floor spinning madly and trying to connect, detach and reconnect with every other piece. My Spark was trying break through. My head started to throb. I wasn't ready for this yet. Too many possibilities!

My hand rested on the spare battery pack strapped to my waist. It was part of the Junior Wulfenbach Spark Scouts Package, or whatever Frau Lowey called it. I examined the wing socket, the wiring was intact. I fumbled through the bundle of wires, screws, nuts, bolts and other stuff I had been pocketing. When I was a child, Father never gave me toys. These construction leftovers made up my toybox. I made my own toys.

I plugged the socket of the wing to my battery by a length of wrapped wire. One final click and the cavorite membrane of the wings began to glow and lift upwards. I held the frame with both arms and bent it to be as symmetrical as possible as my boots dangled. I grinned. This was actually WORKING!

The tunnel flooded with light from below as the hatch groaned open. My vision was a blur of green, and I was holding on too tightly to the wing to risk falling by turning the heat sensor off.

"I SEE YE, CHILD! SOMEONE'S GONNA BE MY APPETIZER!" I looked down quickly to see him scuttling after me. "I GOT A JAR OF MANGO SALSA GLAZE WITH YOUR NAME ON IT!"

"Don't you know the Masons taste better in mole' sauce?" I shouted back. Of all the times for my sense of humor to come back...

"Mason? MASON? I..."

I couldn't hear the rest of it as I heard the quick rise of a rumbling sound above me.

"Oh PLEASE don't tell me sombody flushed..."