There were a few moments of sheer panic as Victor spun out toward the stars.
"Shit shit shit shit." He took two deep breaths and reached for his air release. Small pufts of air out out of the right side of his oxygen pack stopped him from spinning. The station grew smaller by the moment as he carefully coordinated pufts of air out of both release valves at the same time, propelling himself back to the station. It was enough to bring him back to the 'Y' shaped antenna. Holding on for dear life, Victor considered going back to the air lock. Then he remembered that Roger had whispered into T.J.'s ear. What if the magnetic fail hadn't been by accident?
Victor fought panic and fear, reminding himself that no matter what Roger did he was no Dixon. Roger was nearing the pole, about three minutes from clenching victory. There wouldn't be a better chance to show him that Victor wasn't afraid of him and never would be. Standing on the pole so that the top of his head faced the finish line (pole), Victor crouched down and sprung off of it. Being hurled into space gave him an idea. The oxygen packs were equipped for an hour outside the station, but Victor had no intention of being out for any where near that time. He put his oxygen on full thrust, using it to propel himself toward the finish.
He kept his eyes on the small glowing HUD at the left of his helmet visor. At fifty percent oxygen he stopped using air and simply sped forward on his own momentum. He saw Roger's helmet look up in surprise. Victor laughed. Roger was slowing down by the moment and tired while Victor was cruising easily through the air. It was clear who was going to win.
There was another problem. Victor was going fast enough now that if he hit the pole he would seriously hurt himself or crack his visor. When he was ahead of Roger by enough that his win was certain he spent a little more air slowing himself to a reasonable pace and faced the pole feet down to brace for impact. When his feet touched the pole he was pleased to find his magnetic boots were working again.
Over his comm he heard cheers. Had they been making noise this whole time? Victor hadn't been paying attention to it.
"I win," Victor said simply, looking at Roger from his spot on the pole. Roger looked at him a long time, his expression inscrutable from within his space suit, then turned around to walk back to the nearest station airlock.
Inside there were cheers as students gathered around Victor and patted him on the back or ruffled his hair.
"Good job, Victor," Bracias said. He was beaming like he had just seen someone defy death. Had Bracias known that there would be sabotage of some sort?
Despite himself Victor found that he was loving the attention. Thankfully Roger and T.J. were already gone by the time he'd made it to the airlock. As the students began to disperse, the show being over, the monitor next to the viewing port buzzed to life.
"Victor? Are you there?" Victor was surprised to hear Alex's voice, though all the monitor showed was static.
"Alex? Where were you? You just missed --"
"Dude, drop what you're doing and come to Reactor Club." The monitor buzzed off again, switching back to view of the ship's hull.
The club rooms were in the giant hall that connected the inner loop to the outer. They were thinly veiled station maintenance assignments that were voluntary but popular due to their consistent yield of Eco and Social points. Victor was currently at the airlock nearest to the dorms, but was still running high on adrenaline. He ran the whole way to the club rooms, clocking himself at about ten minutes when he reached the The Reactor Club room door.
"What's up guys?" he said as the electronic door slid open. No one payed him any attention. The Reactor Club consisted of about fifteen people. It was one of the least popular clubs because it consisted mostly of people with high Mental Scores and low Social Scores. Hanging out with people who's scores were higher than yours boosted your own score when you interacted with them. That was why Alex had joined. His Social score was through the roof, but his Mental scores were fairly average. "Yeah, average compared with you geniuses," Alex was fond of saying when it came up, "back home I was top of my class." The high Mental Score low Social Score Reactor Club had welcomed Alex with open arms. Victor suspected that even without scores on the line they still would have done so.
"Hey, Vic, you're just in time. It's crazy in here," Alex said. He was grinning from ear to ear. All around other members of the club were shifting papers, typing rapidly, and communicating via ansible with the homeworlds. Seven members of the club were gathered around one of the wall monitors that showed the reactor along with readings and statistics.
"What's going on?" Victor asked. He'd tell Alex about his near-death experience the next time they sat down together.
"Okay," said Alex excitedly. "Where to begin?" He gestured over to the monitor overlooking the reactor. The reactor was a large, cylindrical structure that was underneath the center of the station, below the classroom. It was easy to forget because the only way to it was through the inner loop airlock with a space suit along the outside of the ship. "I don't understand it as well as these guys, but it looks like physics is breaking down in The Reactor room. The numbers aren't making sense, and it's not an error."
Victor wondered just how well Alex understood what was going on. He took a closer look at the monitor screen and listened in on the conversation of the other Reactor Club students.
"It just isn't making any sense," one boy with short black hair said as he pushed his glasses up on his nose. "According to these readings the energy is infinite."
Another boy with crossed arms and an unbuttoned white Nexus uniform that revealed a pot belly shook his head and rubbed his chin. "It's much worse than that. Pi doesn't even equal what it's supposed to near the anomaly. I mean, this reactor is highly experimental. We knew that. This is something entirely different. Physics is breaking down in there."
Victor turned to Alex, his expression betraying his worry.
"Don't worry. According to the readings the containment field seems to be holding up fine. We don't know how, but it is. We're contacting home via ansible to figure out what the hell is going on."
The student on the ansible was talking to a foggy figure in military uniform.
"You are to keep this to yourself. I repeat, you are not to make any mention of the readings from the reactor room to anyone but me. Any mention of this incident will result in automatic hyperbolic suspension. Do I make myself clear?"
The student listening nodded. After the screen went dark he ran his hands through his hair and turned to Alex. "What do we do now?"
The room was silent as the rest of the room exchanged glances and eventually all looked to Alex. Victor realized that he was their leader. Alex beamed a wide, reassuring smile and looked each and every person in the room in the eye.
"We're going to keep this quiet. Creating panic won't achieve anything. Keep monitoring the anomaly and report back like we were told."
"So we just go along with it?" One student said, incredulously.
"Yeah," said another. "They're clearly hiding something from us."
"No," said Alex, beaming. "We pretend to go along with them. They said not to tell anyone. We won't. However, they didn't say we couldn't investigate. They've underestimated us because they probably think we can't figure it out. We're going to prove them wrong."
The room considered this, smiles and nods beginning to appear as spirits lifted. Alex was working his magic. Victor admired his social ease. Out in the hallway Alex was different, nervous.
"They knew, Vic." He said simply as they headed for the last meal of the day. "They knew what was going on in the reactor. That was why they wanted to keep quiet."
Several hall drones pulled up to the pair, surrounding them from front and back.
"Alex Normstrom," said the mechanical, droning voice of the A.I. "Proceed to medbay hypebolic chamber, immediately."
