Чарли Андерс - Six Months, Three Days, Five Others

“You’ve received a letter,” Josiah says as Palm Strike scans newsfeeds on his tablet. “An actual piece of paper. On stationery.”

Palm Strike—now he’s Luc Deveaux, because he’s out of costume—shrugs, which makes his ribs flare with agony. But then Josiah hands him the letter, already opened, and the Space Administration logo sends a shiver through Luc before he even sees the words.

“Congratulations. You have been selected to join the next colonization wave…”

The Space Agency interview process is the last vivid memory Luc has of Rene. And he remembers it two different ways.

First version: They were happy, a family, in this together. His son leaned his head against Luc’s shoulder in the waiting room, with its framed Naïve-art posters of happy colonists unsnapping helmets under a wild new sun. Rene joked about his main qualification being his ability to invent a brand new style of dance for a higher-gravity world, and even demonstrated high-gravity dancing for the other families in the waiting room, to general applause. Rene aced the interviews, they both did, and Luc was so proud of his son, as he gave clever answers, dressed up in a little suit like a baby banker.

In that version of the memory, Rene turned to Luc in the waiting room and said, “I know our main selling point is you, your geo-engineering experience. But they’ll need young people who are up for literally whatever, any challenge, to make this planet livable. And that’ll be me. You’ll see, Dad.”

So. Damn. Proud.

The other version of the memory only comes to Luc when he’s half asleep, or when he’s had a few single malts and is sick of lying to himself. In that other version, Rene was being a smartmouth the whole time—in the waiting room, in the interviews, the whole time—and Luc had to chew his tongue bloody to keep from telling his son to put a sock in it. They both knew that Luc was the one with the land-reclamation skills the colony would need, and all Rene had to do was shut his trap and let them think he’d make himself useful and not be too much of a smart-ass. That’s all.

Luc can just about remember the stiffening in his neck and chest every time Rene acted out or failed to follow the script in those interviews. Rene had to get cute, doing his high-gravity dance and annoying all the other families. It’s a close cousin to the anger that keeps him laying into Dark Shard’s thugs every night, if he wants to be honest with himself, which he mostly doesn’t. Except after a few single malts, or when he’s half asleep.

Both versions of the memory are true, Luc guesses. If he really wanted a second opinion, he could ask Josiah if he was too hard on Rene when his son was alive, but he never does.

He has too many other regrets crowding that one out, anyway. Like, why didn’t he pick Rene up from school himself that day? And keep better tabs, in general? Or, why didn’t he get Rene off this doomed planet before it was too late to save him?

Now Luc grips the letter in both hands, wondering whose idea of a joke this is.

“You have to go,” Josiah says. Luc is already crumpling the letter into a ball, aiming for the recycling. “You have to go. Sir. If you stay, you’ll die.”

“My work here is not done.” Luc realizes he’s slept through most of the day. Almost time to suit up. “Dark Shard still needs to pay. For Rene. And all the rest.”

Luc can’t find his headpiece. A jet-black scowling half-mask, with a shock-absorbing duroplex helmet built in, it usually isn’t hard to spot in the midst of civilized bedroom furnishings and nice linens. But it’s gone. Now he remembers—Josiah took it from him when he was strapped to the gurney.

“How do you think you’ll best honor Rene’s memory?” Josiah is touching Luc’s arm. “By throwing your life away here? Or by following Rene’s dream and going to another planet, where you could really make a difference? You’ve destroyed Dark Shard’s lair. Which will weaken him a little, but also drive him further underground.”

“Where is my headpiece?” Luc asks. Josiah won’t answer. “Where did you put my helmet? Tell me.”

Josiah backs away, even though Luc still walks teeteringly.

“You could help build something new,” Josiah says. “Instead of breaking things, over and over, until you’re broken in turn. You could build something.”

“That part of me is dead.” Luc is already thinking about alternatives to the headpiece. There are prototypes, which he hid someplace even Josiah doesn’t know about. Flawed designs, but good enough for a night or two, until Josiah comes around. “This is all I have left.”

The nanofiber-reinforced lower half of his costume still has that bullet-hole, and his leg is so heavily bandaged that the pants barely fit. This could be a problem, especially if the rip widens around the bandages. He could end up with a big white patch on his leg, like a target for every thug to aim at in the darkness. Stain the bandages black? Wrap black tape around them?

“Luc. Please.” Josiah grabs his arm and shoves the letter, which he’s retrieved and uncrumpled, in Luc’s face. “I helped bury your son. I don’t want to bury you.” He has tears in his eyes, which are also puffy from sleepless nights caring for Luc’s slow-healing wounds. “There’s more than one way to be a hero. You taught me that, before all this.”

Luc stares at the letter again. Departure date is in just a few weeks, and there are a lot of training sessions and tests before then. Someone must have backed out, or maybe washed out. “If I go,” he growls at Josiah, “I won’t leave you any money. I’ve spent every last penny on my fight.”

“I know that, sir,” Josiah says, smiling wearily. “Who do you think has been keeping them from taking the house? We’ve restructured your debt five times in the last two years.”

In the end, Luc says yes, even though every instinct rebels against it. Not because Josiah hid his mask, but because something inside him, his core, is suddenly too exhausted to do anything else. Sleeping for a hundred years sounds perfect. Maybe he’ll wake up having understood something. Maybe he won’t wake up at all—even better.

After that, Luc’s trapped in the clutches of officialdom. Imprisoned. Every spare minute goes to medical tests—even with the healing mojo, he still has to explain the scars and old broken bones—and briefings on absolutely everything they know about Kepler, which people are calling Newfoundland. The same facts are repeated over and over, like the fact that Newfoundland has 1.27 times Earth gravity and a year that lasts fifteen Earth months. Only one of the seven continents is habitable, the south pole. Blah blah blah. There is a whole three-hour talk on what to do if you wake up early, and five days devoted to how to convert the ship into a survival module on landing—the crew should know, but if the crew are dead, then the colonists may need to know, too. The other colonists in the briefings are cute, fresh-faced. Mostly around Luc’s age, but he feels much, much older.

And meanwhile, all of Luc’s sources in the underworld suggest that Dark Shard has blown town, and his organization is in disarray.

At last, the day comes. Two days of fasting, then Luc strips naked and climbs inside the decontamination vat—which sears off a few layers of skin—and then the cryo-module. The technicians close the lid over his face, and he feels the ice threading through his veins and into his muscles and joints.

Just as the paralysis starts to take hold, he’s dead certain he hears someone say, “Palm Strike.” With a chuckle.

Palm Strike hears his name and comes to life. But it’s too late. Palm Strike tries to fight the cold tendrils immobilizing his body, to stay awake. He almost sits up in his tiny chamber. He only needs to pull out these tubes. He battles with everything he has, kicking against the top of his coffin. But the clammy grip pulls him under, into an ocean with no surface.