Bloody Jack

We weren’t supposed to go to the old colony.

It had been decommissioned years ago, back when Landfall was still just a tiny frontier outpost on a planet that didn’t even have a proper name. Things had grown considerably in the time since, much of the original structures being vacated in favor of newer, more permanent alternatives. Most of the old facility wasn’t even pressurized anymore, only a few modules remaining in regular use, mostly as storage.

Which made it the perfect place for bored teenagers to hang out. Minimal usage meant low foot traffic and, by extension, low attention. That was a big deal to us first gens, who had spent our entire lives cooped up in sealed domes. When you’re almost constantly less than five feet away from somebody else, the idea of some personal space, some privacy, becomes a very tempting idea. Enough for you to ignore direct and repeated warnings from your parents that the place wasn’t safe.

Or at least, that’s what the cool kids did. I never had the spine to just go over there and make myself at home, much as I wanted to. Tell the truth, I’d resigned myself to thinking I’d never get the chance when, out of nowhere, it happened.

It started with Jax. He was a fellow first gen like me, a little older but not so much that we didn’t move in the same circles. We hadn’t known each other long, having only met when the work rotation put us on the same greenhouse detail. I’d expected we’d spend the time largely ignoring one another but we hit it off almost immediately. It didn’t take long until we were talking as if we’d known one another our entire lives. Quite a surprise to my introverted ass, though not an unwelcome one.

It was on the last day of the rotation that Jax extended the invitation. We were in the middle of harvesting peas, conversation having reached a brief lull when, out of nowhere, he turned to me and said those immortal words.

“Hey, you want to go hang out in the old colony tonight?”

At first, I was stunned. Completely at a loss for what to say, convinced I must have misheard him. When I stammered out words to that effect, he stunned me all over again by affirming that he had indeed invited me. The rest of the conversation presumably happened though I couldn’t tell you what I said. Next thing I knew, the two of us were walking through the crossover tube into the old colony proper.

I was just beside myself, brain going a mile a minute as I tried not to think about what was happening. I’d built this exact moment up in my head for so long that staring it in the face was more than I could handle. What if I screwed up? What if I made a fool of myself? What if this was all some elaborate prank and I was about to sign my own social death warrant?

Jax was cool about it at least. The anxiety must have been obvious on my face, and he assured me that everything would be fine. I was cool and these people were cool. So long as I was myself, we’d get along great. That made me feel a little better, just knowing he thought that.

He led me through the dingy halls until we arrived at one of the still active storerooms. With a swipe at the touchpad the door slid open, revealing a small square chamber beyond. It was all metal, the walls, floor and ceiling all tarnished, studded with exposed pipes and a fine coating of dust.

Though a few crates lay stacked along one wall, most of the space had been overtaken by a motley collection of furniture salvaged from elsewhere in the colony. Chairs and couches arranged in a loose circle around a few tables, holding the remains of drinks, snacks and a dozen half finished distractions, from cards to board games to unattended tablets.

I remember thinking it was kind of underwhelming. If anything, it seemed even more cramped than the common room back in the main colony. Though that was a distant, fleeting thought, my main attention still caught up in the wonder of where I stood. Wonder and panic, the latter coming in when I realized other people were there.

Three in total, all of them turning to look as we entered with an array of expressions on their faces, from joyful grin to barely caring glance. Jax took it all in stride, introducing them as Noor, Marco, and Kira. I stammered out a hello, repeating their names over and over in my head, hoping to hell that they couldn’t see I was sweating buckets.

If any of them did, they didn’t say anything and, to my continuing shock, greeted me cheerfully and with great enthusiasm. In minutes I was sat down, a drink I was too young for pressed into my hands, and the evening resumed as if I’d always been there. Not just there but there, you know? People talked to me, and I talked back, slowly getting more and more confident about it as time wore on.

I got so comfortable that even when Jax stood up to leave, announcing that he would be in for it if he broke curfew again, it didn’t bother me. I just waved at him in a half-buzzed farewell and turned back to continue talking to Noor. Apparently, I’d graduated at some point from “Jax’s friend” to “the new guy”. A small but important change, I assure you.

It wasn’t long after Jax left that the subject of ghost stories came up. Someone, I think it was Noor actually, asked if I liked them. Before I could answer, Marco cut in, leaning way too close, the stench of his breath making it difficult to focus on what he said.

“Hey, you want a good fracking story, ask her about Bloody Jack.”

“Shove off Marco,” she snapped, pushing him back. “Sorry about him.”

“It’s alright,” I said. “Bloody who?”

Noor’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “What? You’ve never heard the story.”

“Kinda,” I shrugged, feeling embarrassed. “Heard the name I think, but never the story.”

“Well,” Noor said, sitting up in her seat. “We’ll have to fix that, won’t we?”

At her word, the entire room went quiet, everyone turning to pay rapt attention. I certainly did, listening intently as Noor leaned forward and began to speak.

*

Back when Landfall was new, when the old colony was still being built, there was a man named Jack. Jack was a technician, in charge of working on the station exterior, making sure it was sealed and safe for the people inside. By all accounts, he was the best at what he did, able to do in hours what took most days.

Now most people loved Jack for what he did, but there were some who didn’t. Some were jealous of him, of the praise he got and how he made them all look bad. So, one day, a few of them hatched a plot to make sure the next time Jack went outside, it would be the last time anyone saw him ever again.

They told Jack there was a breach that needed sealing immediately. Helpful soul he was, Jack went without a second thought, strapping on his exo-suit and venturing out where they told him to go.

But when he got there, there was no breach, no sign of any damage at all in fact. He looked and looked but found nothing, his own better instincts working against him, unaware that he was slowly killing himself.

For you see, his suit had been sabotaged, its seals punctured ever so slightly. Just enough to slowly let in the toxic atmosphere a little bit at a time. Breath by breath he was poisoned, Jack only realizing when he tasted blood in his mouth.

In a panic he rushed back to the airlock, knowing he had only minutes to live. He was barely able to see, grime and blood beginning to fill his helmet as the poison did its terrible work. But when he arrived at the lock, it would not open to him, every command and override refusing him the safety of clean, filtered air. Desperate, he pounded on the door, hoping, begging for anyone to let him in. No one ever would. His killers had made sure of that.

They never found his body. Officially he wandered off, delirious from the toxins, and fell somewhere that he will never be found. But some say he’s still out there, wandering the outskirts of the colony, looking for a way back in.

And they also say that if you knock at an airlock door, he might just knock back, hoping that someone will be you.

*

I’ll give Noor this, she was an excellent storyteller. Had me hanging on her every word, not scared necessarily but eager to know what happened next.

“Creepy shit man,” Marco said, taking another swig of his drink.

“Yeah,” agreed Kira. “Can’t imagine being trapped out there like that.”

Noor ignored them, instead turning to address me. “So new guy, glad you asked now?”

I nodded. “Very. That was a good story.”

A serious expression came over Noor’s face when I said that, turning on a dime from pleasant smile to steel faced gravitas.

“A story? What, you think it’s not real?”

“Uh, sorry?” I asked, worried I’d just committed some terrible insult.

“Do you think it’s real or not?”

“I mean, no?” I tried, unsure. “Like, someone dying outside sure but not the whole, knocking thing.”

Noor’s eyebrow shot up, silently judging the answer without saying a word. I shrunk away from it, a shiver of dread running up my spine.

“You sure?”

“Uh…” I grasped for words, trying to figure out the right thing to say. “No?”

“Well then,” she said, just a hint of a smile dancing on her lips. “Want to find out?”

Without another word, Noor rose from her seat and led the way out of the room, the rest of us trailing along behind her. It felt uncomfortably like a procession, even Marco managing to keep quiet for the first time all night. The halls felt darker somehow, like someone had turned the lighting down to its lowest possible setting. Enough to see by, but only just, the shadows dancing at the edge of my vision in ways that looked distressingly alive.

After a few twists and turns, we stood before the thick bulkhead doors of External Airlock 4. Noor did something to the touchpad and they slid open, the mechanism squealing with age and the bare minimum of maintenance to reveal the interior. A long, narrow cylinder with just enough space for maybe two people to stand single file.

All but one of the interior lights were broken, casting the entire chamber in even thicker shadows than the halls. All I could really see was the exterior door at the far end, a large DECOMMISSIONED stenciled across the surface. Its only other feature was a small porthole window built into one side, the thick glass heavily distorted by dust and grime.

“Alright,” Noor said. “In you go.”

“What, alone?”

She nodded. “He doesn’t show up for groups.”

I really didn’t like that idea but was painfully aware of the many sets of eyes on me. Drawing a long breath, I downed the remainder of my drink, fighting down a cough before handing the empty can to Marco.

“Just knock?” I asked.

“Just knock,” Noor confirmed.

With deliberate steps, I advanced into the lock until I stood just clear of the bulkhead. I turned around, finding all three of them watching me, their face’s grim and serious. Noor stood off to the side, one arm extended towards the door controls, an unspoken question in her own stony expression. I nodded at her.

“Good luck,” she said as the door slid shut. A hiss of air locked it in place and left me standing in the dancing shadows. Swallowing heavily, I took the two and a half strides needed to cross the space to stand before the outer bulkhead.

Two thoughts battled in my head. One that I was stupid for buying into this, that there was no such thing as ghosts and that the only thing out there was the surface. The other was that I was stupid for risking this, that even if the chances were slight, there was still a chance and risking it was dumb. Back and forth the battle raged in my head until finally, sick of the indecision, I threw caution to the wind and knocked.

Three times, the dull sound reverberating throughout the chamber. It faded just slowly enough to catch me off guard, leaving me standing in an echoing silence. Nothing happened as the long seconds ticked by, the lack of reaction doing nothing to abate my anxiety. Eventually, I raised my hand and knocked again, mostly just so the others couldn’t say I chickened out. Three short knocks, followed by a fading echo, just the same as before.

I had almost convinced myself this was indeed stupid when something knocked back.

They were much quieter than mine, muted by the thick walls of the lock. My heart leapt into my throat at the sound all the same, blood pounding in my ears as I retreated from the door. It did nothing to drown out the sound of a second knock.

That was enough for me. I turned to flee, my hand slamming down on the touchpad in my desperation to be anywhere but here. To my dismay it just beeped, the screen throwing up an error message I didn’t recognize. I tried again, nearly clawing at the pad only to be met with the same message over, and over again. ERROR. ERROR. ACCESS DENIED.

Panic gripped me in earnest as I began pounding my fist on the inner door, calling out to the others for help. No answer came, not words, not any noise at all. Nothing but silence, save for that quiet, impossible knocking from the hand of a dead man.

It came again, stronger this time, more insistent, cutting through even the lock walls. I stood very still, fighting to calm myself as I turned to look back at the outer door. My eyes were invariably drawn to the porthole, its murky depths seeming to swallow all the light, leaving only an endless void beyond. I held my breath, the seconds crawling by as I waited, dreaded, what would happen next.

He appeared slowly, drifting into view one detail at a time. A flicker of movement, then a glimmer in the air as something caught the light. Then a shape, the jagged curve of a helmet breaking the uniform nothing beyond the portal. It rose into view, a bulbous frame filling the entire window with its faceless visage.

A thick, viscous fluid the colour of pitch oozed from between the gaps, streaming down the visor in long rivulets. Blood. It could be nothing else. The blood of Bloody Jack.

Fear coursed through me like lighting, my every atom screaming to move but my legs refusing to obey. Instead, we both just stood there, wide-eyed to eyeless, for what felt like an eternity. I dared not move, terrified of what might happen even as I struggled to hold back a cry from my trembling lips. He did nothing in reply, just stood there, watching me with that terrible, featureless face.

I screamed when the lock began to cycle. A cheery beep sounded from the panel shattering the stillness as machinery began to clank somewhere in the walls. Reason truly left me then, any logic fleeing for the hills and leaving me standing there, back against the door as mist began to fill the room. All the while he just watched, a dead man knowing that soon another would be joining him in the cold, dark embrace of Landfall. Watching, knowing, bleeding.

Then, catching me completely unaware, it was the inner door that opened. Without warning it happened, the thick bulkhead sliding aside so fast that I lost my balance and fell back into the hall.

I landed in a heap, flailing in every direction save the one I wanted to go. Eventually, I calmed myself enough to at least take in my surroundings, finding the others gathered around, looking down at me. I tried to speak, managing only an incoherent babble before noticing that Noor was, smiling? She was smiling. They all were.

“Oh man,” Marco said. “You should have seen the look on your face.”

“Marco don’t be mean,” Noor said, though it was undermined by the toothy grin she wore.

“I, but, Jack-” I tried, gesturing vaguely at the lock. Noor just smiled all the wider as she pressed a hand to her ear.

“Hey dead man,” she said, looking towards the lock. “You still want in?”

I turned to look, ignoring Marco and Kira as they dissolved into fits of laughter. The lock was as I’d left it, the mist having cleared to leave an unobstructed view of the outer door and, more importantly, the porthole. The figure was still visible through it but rather than impassively staring, it was tilted back, shaking slightly, as one might when giving a large, rolling belly laugh. My confusion was palpable, growing only worse until the figure reached up and retracted its glare shield.

“Jax…?”

Rather than the face of a dead man, it was instead Jax’s handsome features that appeared, his expression indeed one of mirthful laughter as he looked in at us. I could only stare, slack jawed, as his voice began to speak through Noor’s tablet.

“Hey man, how’d you like my acting?”

“Wha-” I tried. “What?”

“Blame Noor,” he said. “It was her idea.”

“The hell it was, mister let me wear the suit,” Noor turned back to me. “You alright new guy?”

“No!” I exploded. “No, I’m not alright! The frack is going on!?”

“Hey, hey, easy,” Noor said, holding up her tablet. “I had control the whole time, you weren’t in any danger.”

“Yeah, and besides,” Jax said. “This side of the door is welded shut. Couldn’t open even if we tried.”

“That doesn’t make it better!

“Hey man, you don’t have to be-” Marco began.

“Frack you!”

They probably had more to say but I wasn’t in the mood. Scrambling to my feet, I stomped away, fuming, and throwing off any attempt to stop me. They at least had the decency not to follow.

Noor would tell me later that they’d all been through it, a little routine they liked to play on newcomers to see what they were made of. Someone would make an excuse to leave early, book it to the nearest functional airlock and slip outside while the rest did the whole ghost story thing. Just a bit of ribbing between friends. Can’t say as I found it very funny, even in hindsight.

It was about the time I made it back to the new colony that the adrenaline finally crashed. Not wanting to go home, I found myself instead slumping against the wall in an observation bay somewhere not far from the crossover. I felt very small at that moment. Small and betrayed. Mostly by Jax. The others I didn’t know well enough to really be hurt by, but Jax, his actions had stung. Badly. Maybe it was just the embarrassment talking, but in that moment, I never wanted to speak to him ever again.

When I heard the knocking, I almost lost it completely. Four this time, all but right next to my head on the glass windows looking outside. Instantly I was on my feet, a thousand words of anger and confusion fighting to be spoken at once.

Through the window, I could just make out Jax where he stood outside, the dust rendering him little more than a murky outline. The only part of him that was truly visible were his gloves, knuckles pressed against the glass as he continued knocking. I just glared at him, unable to see his face but hoping he could see mine. When all he did was knock again, I spun on my heel and strode away, flipping him off over my shoulder as I disappeared around a corner.

It would be the last time anyone would see him alive.

A security officer came to my family’s quarters later that night, asking if I’d seen Jax. I told the officer everything, about the old colony, the prank, and that brief encounter I’d had with him at the window. I already had a terrible feeling about what had happened, and it was only confirmed when they informed me Jax hadn’t been seen for hours. Far longer than any air tank could possibly sustain him.

They never found his body. Apparently, to avoid getting flagged by the system, Jax had taken a suit from storage, unaware that it was damaged and unable to maintain a proper seal. Not much of a leak, but just enough to let Landfall’s toxic air in, one breath at a time. He would have realized only too late that he was dying and, delirious on the poison air, probably wandered off into the wastes, never to be seen again.

I was cleared of any wrongdoing, as were the others. An unfortunate accident caused by poor decisions and bad luck, no one’s fault really. That didn’t do much to make me feel better though, nor prevent the many, many nights I lay awake, thinking of that last time I’d seen him. Wondering what might have happened if I hadn’t walked away.

This all happened years ago now. I’ve grown up since then and the colony with me. Most of the time I barely even think about it anymore, the tragedy firmly in the past, suitable only for reminding us to be ever vigilant with lock safety.

Sometimes though, when I’m all alone, I can still just hear the faintest knocking on colony walls. Three short raps, trying to get my attention.

I never look.

END