Bram Möller's Arc

Chapter 63 of 63

Bram woke after twenty minutes because the cold had reached his bones. The spur was bare rock. No overhang, no windbreak, no cut for a fire. The wind came straight off the ridge and pulled heat out of his coat faster than his body could make it. Cora was shivering under her coat with her knees pulled up. Omondi's lips had gone gray. Four hours here and the crew would wake worse than they had lain down. Bram opened the worn journal on his knee and thumbed through the pin notes. He had marked this spur years back for a summer wait, not a winter one. There was no shelter listed because there had never been one. He closed the book. The problem was not the plan. The problem was the ground. "Up," he said. "We build heat or we don't sleep." Omondi sat up slow. His hands were shaking. "The envelope," he said. "We rig the envelope as a tent. Vent a quarter into the fabric and lay under it." "The crown seam won't take pressure," Bram said. "Not pressure. Warm gas, low fill. We drop the bag half onto the rock and crawl under the skirt." Omondi pushed his glasses up with a knuckle. "The fabric holds body heat if we cut the wind." Cora was already on her feet. She pulled the mechanical owl from its perch and set it on the vent ring. "I can run the orchid at one-eighth reverse," she said. "Warm steam through the skirt hem. Not the crown. It won't touch the seam." Bram looked at her. She had done the math already, in her head, in the cold. He nodded. They worked fast. Omondi slacked the north line and let the bag settle sideways against the rock. Cora reversed the orchid a hair and steam breathed into the lower fabric. The skirt puffed out along the ground and made a low tent against the spur. The owl gripped the ring and held the pressure steady with its brass claws. Bram crawled under the skirt first to check the heat. The air inside was still cold but the wind was gone. That was enough. He dragged in the tea crate for a floor and waved the others in. They lay down three in a row under the warm fabric. Omondi's shivering slowed within minutes. Cora fell asleep with one hand on the owl's back. Bram stayed awake long enough to watch the gauge. The orchid held. The seam held. The skirt kept the wind off. He slept. Four hours later the owl clicked its wake tone and the crew crawled out into a still, cold dawn. Omondi's hands were steady. Cora's color was back. The bag had held its shape. But the orchid's fuel reserve was down to a quarter. They had bought sleep with the fuel that was meant to catch Kesh.