We clamped one of the soul transfer device’s arms onto the control panel, and the other onto my arm. Meva reminded me that she would only give me one minute. She wasn't going to risk any more time. I nodded and she pushed the button. The purple fuzz-ball beating inside the device cast light around the room, and I went into the ship.
The first sensation I felt was a lack of feelings. The aching hunger was gone. The pangs of starvation that wracked my body had slipped away in an instant. It was a relief. But then I remembered the short time I had and turned my mind to other things.
I could sense our place in space. Nearby planets and stars took shape in my mind and their names came to me, although I'd never seen them before. I realized the ship must have some navigational computer or log. At this thought more information poured into me. I could see the ship’s entire history in a moment. But my mind grasped at another image; P's crib.
P’s crib was being pulled aboard by a desperate looking crew during the heat of battle. The ship's door was sealed before taking off. The crib was chained to the wall. P was force-fed cans of beans to increase her output of P-tonium. She didn't laugh or smile. The crew's planet needed the P-tonium to survive. There were other planets that wanted the P-tonium too, and were willing to kill for it. As far as the ship’s computer identified P as the last of her kind.
Meva's voice echoed inside me. She was telling me to hurry. She was going to transfer me back.
In a panic, I pulled my mind from the computer, though there were so many more questions I knew it could answer, but I had to get to that control panel. Its levers and knobs were instantly familiar to me. I dimmed the bright lights that made it difficult to sleep. I discovered a water generator had been switched off. I turned it on, and the ship’s water storage began to fill.
But something was wrong. Not all of the controls were working. I could only make a minor adjustment to our speed. I could not reverse our course, and I could not change our trajectory. I dove deeper into these controls, tracing their connections until I found the problem. There were two dents in the hull where the ship had been hit by missiles while escaping. One had torn the metal open and damaged the ship’s controls.
I used the navigational computer to quickly chart a course. We were headed for a nearby planet. I calculated how long it would take to reach it.
At that moment, I woke up to the sensation of liquid on my face. Meva had pulled me out. She was smiling, holding a container of cool water. I drank it down in big gulps, but it did little to satiate the gnawing hunger in my stomach, or the growing fear in my mind.
I told her the bad news. We were about to crash land, and there was nothing we could do to stop it.