Liquid Fire

Fire floats in outer space. The heat can’t go up, so it it just stays in a ghostly bright bubble. When space systems catch on fire (despite everything’s flame-retardant coating) the plasma races along their surface and looks more like the work of a spiritualist than a gravitic phenomenon. The fire racing up the outside of my safety suit acted like a possession. It stuck on no matter how I twisted and thrashed. My only thought was to get out of the jumpsuit before the gnawing combustion ate through the shielding layer.

I tore off the helmet. It spun off and collided with the wall of the airlock chamber, bouncing back and forth between the window that looked out into the black emptiness and the window with a view into the cool white light of the crew quarters. The suit was still burning with a strange glow that wavered between blue and orange. I unstrapped it, feeling the heat on my fingers through the heavy gloves, then pulled it away from my body.

The fire had started from a buildup of static and liquid oxygen, and I had to assume that there was some stray grease on a hinge or mechanical couple. I wasn’t sure how the final contact had happened. the whole airlock had erupted in tiny blue balls of light as soon as I had pressurized the chamber with oxygen for my re-entry.

It seemed like everything was under control. I was out of my suit and I could get back inside and depressurize the airlock. That would immediately kill any remaining fire. I clipped the suit to a bracket and turned to the airlock door. The helmet beat me to it, landing square on the the big red emergency depressurization button. The door behind me opened, and I felt my body freeze in a matter of a second or two.