Robert Sawyer: Above It All

“Say again, Paul.” McGovern’s voice, over the headset.

Rackham reached down, switched his suit radio from VOX to OFF. “What do you want?” he said again.

There was no answer. He waved his arms, batting around hundreds of dried drops of blood. They flew all over the cabin — except for an area, up ahead, the size of a man. In that area, they deflected before reaching the walls. Something was there — something unseen. Paul’s stomach contracted. He felt panic about to overtake him, when -

A hand on his shoulder, barely detectable through the bulky suit.

His heart jumped, and he swung around. He’d been floating backwards, moving away from the unseen presence, and had bumped into the corpse. He stopped dead — revolted by the prospect of touching the body again, terrified of moving in the other direction toward whatever was up ahead.

But he had to get out — somebody else could come back for Yuri. He’d find some way to explain it all later, but for now he had to escape. He grabbed hold of a handle on the wall and pushed off the bulkhead, trying to fly past the presence up ahead. He made it through into the core module. But something cold as space reached out and stopped him directly in front of the small window that looked down on the planet.

Look below, said a voice in Rackham’s head. What do you see?

He looked outside, saw the planet of his birth. “Africa.”

Millions of children starving to death.

Rackham moved his head left and right. “Not my fault.”

The view changed, faster than any orbital mechanics would allow. Look below, said the voice again. What do you see?

“China.”

A billion people living without freedom.

“Nothing I can do.”

Again, the world spun. Look below.

“The west coast of America. There’s San Francisco.”

The plague is everywhere, but nowhere is it worse than there.

“Someday they’ll find a cure.”

What else do you see?

“Los Angeles.”

The inner city. Slums. Poverty. They haven’t abandoned hope, those who live there … Hope has abandoned them.

“They can get out. They just need help.”

Whose help? Where will the money come from?

“I don’t know.”

Don’t you? Look below.

“No.”

Look. Your eyes have been closed too long. Open them. What do you see?

“Russia. Ah, now — Russia! Free! We defeated the Evil Empire. We defeated the Communist menace.”

The people are starving.

“But they’re free.”

They have nothing to eat. Twice now they’ve taken food destined for this station.

“I read about that. Terrible, unthinkable. Like committing murder.”

To take food from the mouths of the hungry. It is like committing murder, isn’t it?

“Yes. No. No, wait — that’s not what I meant.”

Isn’t it? The people need food.

“No. The space program provides jobs. And don’t forget the spinoffs — advanced plastics and pharmaceuticals and… and…”

Microwave ovens.

“Yes, and—”

And dehydrated ice cream.

“No, important stuff. Medical equipment. And all kinds of new electronic devices.”

That’s why you go into space, then? To make life better on Earth?

“Yes. Yes. Exactly.”

Look below.

“No. No, dammit, I won’t.”

Yuri looked below.

“Yuri was a cosmonaut — a Russian. Maybe — maybe Russia shouldn’t be spending all this money on space. But I’m an American. My country is rich.”

Los Angeles, said the voice that wasn’t a voice. San Francisco. And don’t forget New York. Slums, plague, a populace at war with itself.

Rackham felt his gloved fists clenching. He ground his teeth. “Damn you!”

Or you.

He closed his eyes, tried to think. Any price, he’d said — and now it was time to pay. For the good of everyone, he said — but the road was always paved with good intentions.

Starvation. Enslavement. Poverty. War.

He couldn’t go back to Discovery — he had no choice in the matter. It wouldn’t let him leave. But he’d be damned if he’d end up like Yuri, bait for yet another spacefarer.

He slipped into the control station just below the entrance portal that led from the docking adapter. He looked at the cameras fore and aft, the bulky white gloves covering them like beckoning hands. An ending, yes — and with the coffin closed. He scanned the controls, consulted the onboard computer, made his preparations. He couldn’t see the entity, couldn’t see its grin — but he knew they both were there.

“—in the hell, Paul?” McGovern’s voice, as Rackham turned his suit radio back on. “Why are you firing the ACS jets?”

“It— it must be a malfunction,” Rackham said, his finger still firmly on the red activation switch.

“Then get out of there. Get out before the delta-V gets too high. We can still pick you up if you get out now.”

“I can’t get out,” said Rackham. “The — the way to the EVA airlock is blocked.”

“Then get into the Soyuz and cast off. God’s sake, man, you’re accelerating down toward the atmosphere.”

“I— I don’t know how to fly a Soyuz.”

“We’ll get Kaliningrad to talk you through the separation sequence.”

“No — no, that won’t work.”

“Sure it will. We can bring the Soyuz descent capsule into our cargo bay, if need be — but hurry, man, hurry!”

“Goodbye, Charlie.”

“What do you mean, `Goodbye’? Jesus Christ, Paul—”

Rackham’s brow was slick with sweat. “Goodbye.”

The temperature continued to rise. Rackham reached down and undogged his helmet, the abrupt increase in air pressure hurting his ears. He lifted the great fishbowl off his head, letting it fly across the cabin. He then took off the Snoopy-eared headset array. It undulated up and away, a fabric bat in the shaft of earthlight, ending up pinned by acceleration to the ceiling.

Paint started peeling off the walls, and the plastic piping had a soft, unfocused look to it. The air was so hot it hurt to breathe. Yuri’s body was heating up, too. The smell from that direction was overpowering.

Rackham was close to one of the circular windows. Earth had swollen hugely beneath him. He couldn’t make out the geography for all the clouds — was that China or Africa, America or Russia below? It was all a blur. And all the same.

An orange glow began licking at the port as paint on the station’s hull burned up in the mesosphere. The water in the reticulum of tubes running over his body soon began to boil.

Flames were everywhere now. Atmospheric turbulence was tearing the station apart. The winglike solar panels flapped away, crisping into nothingness. Rackham felt his own flesh blistering.

The roar from outside the station was like a billion screams. Screams of the starving. Screams of the poor. Screams of the shackled. Through the port, he saw the Kristall module sheer clean off the docking adapter and go tumbling away.

Look below, the voice had said. Look below.

And he had.

Into space, at any price.

Into space — above it all.

The station disintegrated around him, metal shimmering and tearing away. Soon nothing was left except the flames. And they never stopped.