Mike v2.0 (A Firesetter Short Story) Read Online Free PDF Page B

was proud of myself for having done this,
and also from having recalled the layout from an old picture book
my mother read to me when I was younger. It was called, Flying to
Space with Fanny, or something like that, and it featured an
elephant who was also a pilot in the once great Imperial
SpaceNavy.
    “My dad, Steve, was once an Imperial SpaceNavy
pilot,” my mother would always say, which usually made me fall
over, rollicking with laughter, as I imagined my grandfather
dressed in the elephant’s silly uniform, a long trunk hanging from
what should have been his nose.
     
    Now, as I searched blindly through the
galley’s cabinet drawers, I began to worry about Steve and his
cough. Despite our dire situation, this was the first time, we had
been together without my dad or mom around. I realized, as I put my
hands on a coffee pot, I really liked Steve, and even though he was
sort of crazy, and most of the time, embarrassing, I was also
really proud of him.
     
    “Whoa Nelly, don’t you fall down that ladder,”
Steve called, his strong hands surrounding my waist, lifting me to
the engine room floor. He took the coffee pot and the three water
bottles, as well as the handful of straws.
    “Well done, Mike,” the other Mike said, his
voice sounding as if his head was inside a compartment. I could
hear the faint echo as it resonated off the metal walls. I could
also smell the scent of fire, an odor reminiscent of burning oil,
wafting through the room.
    “Thank you,” I replied.
    I was proud of myself, too. Not only had a
managed to traverse the plane entirely in the dark, but I could
identify sounds and smells with a clarity I had never known
before.
    There was also something else I was sensing. I
had a feeling, a new empathy for my grandfather. As we stood there
waiting for Mike to repair the transmission, I felt a sadness deep
in my bones. Every time Steve coughed, which he was doing with
increasing frequency, my heart lurched as if it were I who could
not breathe.
    Without knowing why, and without a glimpse at
his face, I knew that Steve was going away, and it disheartened me
more so than my lack of sight.
    “Why?” I asked, reaching for my grandfather’s
hand.
    “Well, you know, I’m getting up there. What am
I, like a hundred or so? I can’t even remember. And, you know, time
has to happen in the way it has to happen, more or less.” He
squeezed my hand. “That’s what my old man used to say.”
    Mike climbed out of the compartment and
proceeded to turn on the coffee pot.
    “What are you doing now?” Steve asked, as the
water began to boil. I could hear the tiny air bubbles rising to
the surface, bursting upward in miniature breaths of steam. “Time
for a coffee break? You want I should send Mikey back upstairs to
look for donuts and sweet rolls?”
    “I’m going to distill some hydraulic fluid,”
Mike replied. “I shall use our engine lubricant oil, refining it
until ‘tis it is light and sweet. That shall suffice for the
reminder of our journey.”
    “And, it probably tastes better than the
coffee your mother makes. Right Mikey?” Steve nudged me. “Your
mother may be the Empress, but her coffee tastes like
shit.”
    I laughed and nudged Steve back, following
which he wrapped an arm around my waist, and together we waited
while Mike poured something thick and heavy into the coffee pot.
Only a few moments later, I could smell the acrid stench of oil
cooking, and hear the drips of the newly refined oil siphoning
through the straws.
    This process seemed to take forever, and Steve
began another coughing fit, after which his breath sounded hoarse
and thick with phlegm.
    “Go on upstairs,” Mike suggested. “I’ll come
up when I’ve made enough.”
    “Thanks, man. I appreciate it,” Steve replied,
guiding me to the ladder. “Me and Mikey are going to sit down and
rest.”
     
    “Well, what should we do now, buddy?” Steve
asked, once we were seated in the cabin again. “I suppose were
going