Station Breaker

18 Crawlspace

I slide into the small gap between the wooden slats and knock one of the boards loose. The littlest one picks the plank up and starts to carry it through until the girl (his sister?) makes him put it back. I think she called him Luca.

Once I'm on the other side she leans the board back over the gap, kind of hiding our tracks.

I glance around at the trash-filled alley. It's a narrow passage, four feet wide with concrete walls on either side. To the left is an unfinished house with no side wall and bare wooden struts supporting the upper floor.

Rotten plywood and dirty plastic tarps litter the interior.

I unscrew my helmet for the first time since I landed. Something hits my shoulder and falls to the dirt.

The sat phone.

I kneel down to pick it up. The screen is bashed in and non-functioning.

So much for hearing from Capricorn. Although he made it sound like his part of the mission was over.

I realize what the sharp pain was I felt on my ear when I landed. My fingers reach up and touch the blood and broken shards stuck into my lobe.

"Você está machucado?" asks tiny little Luca with a sad look on his face.

"I'll be fine." I hand him the helmet — which is half the size he is.

"Quieto!" says the girl as she peers through the gap in the fence.

Two police officers, wearing bullet proof vests, are walking to the top of the trash heap. One of them uses his hand to shield his eyes as he studies the fading contrail of my spaceship.

That didn't take them long to get here. I need to keep moving.

I take off my gloves and toss them into the helmet, then start removing the chest piece. The other boy is fascinated by this process. He inspects each part of the suit as I set it down.

When I'm finished, I'm left in the bright blue iCosmos thermal suit, which is proper attire for a micro-gravity space station, but not exactly inconspicuous.

Although, I wouldn't look entirely out of place as a goalie on a soccer field.

Speaking of which, I've got to figure out how to get to the stadium before the polícia find me.

First order of business is hiding this suit. I step into the abandoned house and look for a plastic tarp to cover the parts.

I have zero expectation that it'll last more then 45 seconds after I'm gone and the little ones here decide they want to flip the thing to their local junk dealer.

But if I can keep the authorities from finding it long enough to get away from where I am, that gives me some advantage.

I grab a paint-splattered piece of plastic and carefully pull it aside, not wanting to alert the cops who are still outside trying to decide if someone really did land via parachute or if this was just another chupacabra sighting.

The little girl taps me on the back and points to a piece of chipped plywood. "Aqui."

"What?"

She points to the board and says, "Aqui," again.

The older boy goes over to the edge and raises the plywood, revealing a small hole dug into the ground.

I look inside and see their little stash of treasure. There's a Thor action figure missing an arm, several stuffed animals in various states of disrepair and a collection of water-stained children's books.

Alright, you little con artists, get me to put this in your safe place and when I come back, it'll be gone. Just make sure the junk man gives you a good price for this thing. You could buy a whole neighborhood with what it's really worth.

I stow my suit and packed chute inside their hiding spot, and almost forget to take the square Peterson gave me right before she…

Focus, David.

I take a glance through the fence, hoping the cops have decided to go elsewhere.

Nope. There are four of them now. One is pointing in our direction.

Damn.

"Por aqui," whispers the little girl as she tugs on my arm, pulling me back into the alley. The older boy does the same.

They dart away through the choked passage, climbing under boards and over piles of broken toilets. I do my best to follow, but this was not meant for adults.

"Damn!"

I look down at my feet and see that I just stepped on a pile of rusty screws.

The bottom of my thermal is just a thick piece of fabric with some heat exchanging wires. It wasn't meant to be rugged urban wear.

I try to go a little further but have to stop when I reach a bunch of broken glass.

The kids, all of them barefoot, have no trouble. They possess the advantage of being nimble, lightweight and have callouses on their feet as thick as a baseball glove.

Luca, the slowest one, sees me struggling. "Pare!" he whispers to the others.

The girl sees me rubbing the bottom of my feet.

I point and say, "Zappos?"

This gets me a confused look, then she nods her head and replies, "Sapatos?"

Close enough. "Yes." I start digging through the rubble for something I can wrap around them, even a Tyvek plastic bag would help.

She says something to the older boy and he takes off running.

I glance back towards the entrance of the alley, worried the cops might be coming at any moment. With their thick police boots, they'll have no trouble stomping through here.

The girl squeezes past me and goes back to the wooden fence to watch what they're up to. Suddenly, she jumps back.

I duck behind a pile of concrete mix sacks. Luca, thinking this is a game, or totally understanding the stakes, slides a rotten piece of cardboard over me.

An adult voice echoes down the alley. I can only make out a few words. I'm pretty sure he said something like "pára-quedas," which sounds an awful lot like parachute.

The little girl responds, "Não, não." Which I'm pretty sure isn't Portuguese for, "The man you're looking for is cowering in the alley behind me and completely vulnerable."

The adult voice stops and the girl comes running back down the alley to my hiding spot.

When she pokes her head under the cardboard she puts a finger to her lips, which is the universal sign for keep your fat mouth shut.

She glances up at the sound of small footsteps running from the other direction.

The older boy climbs over a pile of tiles and presents a pair of rubber boots to me.

They're not exactly Nikes, but they fit.

I have no idea where he got them from, and I don't think I want to know.

There's a crashing sound from the alley entrance and the children wave for me to finishing putting the boots on and hurry my slow ass up.