Terraformer

by Scott McElhaney

  “But don’t you remember that span of time when a bunch of dreamers like me were the ones heading out here? That’s all it was for a couple decades and back then, the videos and advertisements were telling us the planet was a tropical paradise,” I argued.

  She abruptly hit the pause button and turned to me with a scowl on her face, “So, what are you saying? The terraformers built this planet, then as they all slowly drifted into retirement or died off over the next few decades, all that was left to manage the world were all those immigrant airheads like you who just wanted to… wait… listen… no, no, no, I’m sorry!”

  I shook my head, discovering yet again that she truly had no respect for me or my kind at all. She had often spoke without thinking, but I had to believe that those misspoken words were expressed from her heart. I found myself wrapped in her embrace, and I felt I should hold her as well, but I was discovering over and over again that she had something against those of us who were just blowing their money to migrate here.

  “Listen, before you say anything, I was merely mad about my own people – the terraformers. I was mad at the people who shouldn’t have left us with that hell down there,” she continued to squeeze me in her arms, “I admit, though, that I really once believed that those who were merely hitching a ride on the Frontier were nothing more than dead weight. I had believed this before I got to know you, so that’s where such a rude statement could have risen from.”

  I didn’t know what to say, so I merely sat there in her arms and rested my head against hers. I was still hurt, but at least I now understood why she could say such a thing. If she had that sort of attitude toward the people funding this trip, then some of that could still have been buried inside her heart.

  “And your word and description was far more appropriate than mine. You used ‘dreamer’ to identify all the people who started coming out here. I’m sorry for saying ‘airhead’. You’re a dreamer and that’s a beautiful thing, Cuttar. Your drawings show that you’re a dreamer with a wonderful imagination. I love that about you, baby,” she said, releasing me from her embrace as she then examined my eyes, “Would you please forgive me? I saw the hurt in your eyes a moment ago and it destroyed me.”

  I nodded, “Of course I forgive you, Sydney. And thank you for caring enough to clarify.”

  “I care more for you than I think I’ve cared for anyone in my entire life. I absolutely positively love you,” she reaffirmed.

  The chime rang just then, returning our attention back to the planet beneath us. She held up a finger and repeated the word ‘greenhouses’.

  “How much are you willing to bet it’s one of the words in this reply?” I grinned.

  “Hmm… interesting! I’ll bet…” she seemed to ponder it for a moment, “If I’m wrong, you can have another tear-jerker back massage tomorrow. If I’m right, I get one.”

  “You’re on!” I laughed as we both darted from the sofa.

  TWENTY-TWO

  We both rushed over to her terminal to see what their reply would be. Little did they realize that anything they said in regards to the death of their planet and their ongoing survival would fall under the judgmental eyes of a highly educated terraformer. I was anxious to hear what Sydney would have to say regarding whatever we were about to read.

  She hit a key and brought up the message while I knelt down next to her. We both read the message in silence: “Inglenook didn’t really seem to be suited for life as everything that had been planted over the years began to die. The oceans slowly turned into enormous swamps and as of 2340, the decision had been made to expand the underground shelters inside Sacred Mount. These had originally started out as small cavernous homes intended to provide sturdy protection for the first terraformers,

  “The people went to work in three very important areas. Some worked on creating a subterranean world where we could survive indefinitely while others labored at creating an aqueduct to supply that hidden world with water. And then there were the ones who went to work harnessing the local sun Tau Ceti. Their jobs involved not just building dozens of greenhouses along the mountainside, but also installing various solar farms across the entire mountain range. Now, this is the world where a population of six-hundred and eight people reside:”

  Sydney clicked the box, switching the screen to instantly offer us about twenty thumbnail photos. She clicked the first photo, causing it to enlarge and display a well-lit massive cave. The sheer magnitude and enormity of the subterranean room was conveyed by the existence of a central ten-story ‘skyscraper’ rising from the floor of the cave to the ceiling. It had clearly been carved from the inside of the mountain. Surrounding this central building were several other imitation buildings that were evidently embedded into all the perimeter walls of the giant cave. Many of those outer buildings were carved as halves of buildings, perhaps with one or two corners inside the room while the rest of the structures were left up to the imagination. One of those buildings would have perhaps been cylindrical had it fully existed in its entirety, but all we could see was the protruding semicircular half.

  This wasn’t what made the scene so spectacular. That came from the various raised stone and metal walkways or promenades that winded through the miniature city, connecting all those buildings at different levels. And throughout it all, those concourses were lit up with thousands upon thousands of tiny little lights, making the place look almost like a subterranean Christmas village from centuries past.

  She clicked another thumbnail, showing us now the interior of one of those buildings. This was perhaps a library or a den. The walls were clearly made of stone, yet the furniture in the room was all modern. She clicked another photo and then another, one-by-one showing evidence of an underground society that had managed to make their world comfortable by carving it all from the inside of a mountain.

  “It’s beautiful! Look at that fountain,” I said, just as she clicked past it to another photo.

  I looked over at Sydney, watching as she stared blankly at the screen in front of her. She was moving quickly through the photos, clearly not studying any for more than a second or two now. I couldn’t make out what she might have been thinking, but I didn’t seem to coincide with my own thoughts.

  “They certainly came a long way in such a short period of time,” I said, hoping to get her to say something.

  She bit her lip while she flipped through some of the photos we’d already seen. Then finally when she spoke, it was only to utter an expletive. She repeated the obscenity louder this time as she leaned back in her seat and shook her head.

  “Acceptance!” she turned to me as she gestured toward the screen, “Their ancestors were faced with a dying planet that could have certainly been saved had they had an ounce of intelligence among them. Those people saw their world deteriorating and they could have stopped it and even reversed it! So what do they do? They chose to devote all their time to building an amazing underground world like that! They have the genius among them to build that, yet they couldn’t figure out how to better fertilize the soil!”

  I merely looked at her, wondering if there was anything I could say that wouldn’t offend her. Finally, she nodded as she held my gaze.

  “You’re thinking I should simply be proud of their ingenuity and perseverance. If so, then you forgot what I even insisted from you in the future,” she squinted as she seemed to examine me, “When things go bad up here, what do I expect from you, Cuttar?”

  “Go bad? Oh!” I smiled as the thought came to mind, “If things start to go bad between us, I’m to fight with everything I have in order to make it right.”

  She nodded even before I finished my sentence. Then she pointed back to the screen.

  “So don’t look at me like I’ve lost my mind when I tell you that I’m not proud of their forefathers. They didn’t fight. They accepted the failure and focused all their attention on making the best of it. As my husband and as a member of our tiny crew, you are to never ‘make the best of it’. Otherwise, y
ou’ll be burying yourself inside a dark cave and decorating it so it doesn’t look so bad,” she said.

  “Wow,” I breathed.

  “What kind of ‘wow’ is that? A good wow or a bad one?” she asked defensively.

  “I’m in awe. It’s so wild how two people could look at the same exact pictures and see two completely different things altogether. I saw the very beautiful final outcome, much the same as most of the people of Inglenook probably do. But you viewed the whole picture and see it as only a true leader would. That’s what you are, Sydney. You’re a leader and if you’d have been there several generations back, I’m confident that you would have taken charge and changed the whole world,” I said, “They obviously didn’t have someone like you back then or none of this would have happened.”

  She relaxed her posture, then leaned back in her chair as she gazed toward the ugly planet out that window. I got up and walked toward the giant window. I pondered what would have happened had all of our crew survived. I certainly wouldn’t have been up here on the bridge, but I had to believe that Sydney would. Her intellect would have been certainly called upon when we discovered a planet such as this.

  “I’ll take that back massage first thing tomorrow, even before breakfast,” she called toward me.

  “Greenhouses,” I recalled as I shook my head.

  “You know it!”

  TWENTY-THREE

  I awoke sometime in the night to find myself alone in Sydney’s bed. I rolled over onto her pillow while I waited for her to return from the bathroom. I pulled that polar bear over to me as I pondered my need to go to the bathroom as well. After a few moments, I sat up and looked over toward the bathroom. The door was still open and the light was off.

  “Sydney?” I spoke.

  After I got no response, I called her name louder. I looked over at the digital clock to see that it was now 2:34 in the morning. This worried me as I’d still gotten no response. I uncovered and then scooted out of bed. I made my way through the side door into my own room, quickly confirming that she wasn’t in there either. My worry had grown significantly at that point, so I rushed out into the corridor, still wearing nothing but the boxers I had been sleeping in.

  “Sydney?” I hollered loudly as the lights in the corridor automatically flickered on.

  “On the bridge!” I heard that faint voice in the distance.

  I rushed toward the bridge where the light melted into the hallway through that open door. There, I discovered my sexy wife sitting at her workstation wearing nothing but the pair of panties she had been sleeping in.

  “Now there’s a sight that can wake up any sleepy man,” I breathed.

  She looked over at me and smiled, gesturing for me to come toward her. I sidled up next to her, then leaned down toward those puckered lips and kissed her. Then I placed my hand on the back of her chair and gestured toward her workstation.

  “You couldn’t sleep, so this is where you go of all places?” I snickered, “I’d have thought my VID5 would have been a little bit more enjoyable than work.”

  “Yeah, I do still want to get that game going. But look over here at this, Cuttar,” she leaned forward and tapped a few keys, “I had come here to investigate something and stumbled across this. Emergency automated entry procedures.”

  “What? Really?” I asked, following her finger on the screen.

  “See, it occurred to me that the ship’s automated guidance systems had been in charge of the ship all this time. And it was an automated system apparently that settled us into this stable orbit. It would stand to reason that there were other automated systems that might help us. So I got to digging and here we are,” she said.

  “What would I do without you?” I laughed.

  “Well, I’m still not sure I fully trust it, considering that there’s a specific place we want to land this ship. But at least we have that option available to us,” she said.

  I yawned greatly as I rubbed my eyes, “The question still arises as to whether we want to stay up here or go down there.”

  “Oh, Cuttar,” she rose from her seat and wrapped me in her arms while I still rubbed my eyes, “My baby needs to get back to bed. I didn’t intend to wake you.”

  “You didn’t wake me. And for the record, I really think I like it when you refer to me as your baby. I actually came to find you just because I wanted to make sure you were okay,” I held her to me.

  “Well, I know how I’d feel if I woke up all alone in bed, so I apologize for the unintended scare. How about I take you back to bed and I hold you this time while you go back to sleep?”

  “I couldn’t imagine anything more comforting on this side of heaven.”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  We started our morning with the back massage I had owed her, then after showers, we made our way to the restaurant for breakfast. The only breakfast offerings on the ship were either freeze-dried granola or two varieties of heated sandwich pockets. Curiously, we both selected the sausage, egg, and cheese pockets which were still too blazing hot for any form of safe consumption. We both decided to give them a few moments to cool on our trays while we talked.

  “For the time being, let’s forget the whole ‘captain of the ship’ thing. I want to ask you something as your equal – as your wife,” she said, scooting her tray aside.

  “Sydney, I’m forever your husband even while I’m respecting you as my captain. I can fully appreciate the dichotomy of such a relationship,” I offered, lifting my hot sandwich from the tray.

  She chuckled as she seemed to find humor in my response, “You never cease to amaze me, Cuttar. I really value your intelligence and ability to juggle such an odd position. So, I guess I’ll just ask you what I have on my mind and hope it doesn’t upset you.”

  I set my sandwich down, never having even taken a bite. I looked at her curiously, wondering what it was that had concerned her so much.

  “You know what – it’s not a question. It’s a statement,” she blurted, “I think we should go down there. I absolutely hate the concept of us being perched up here indefinitely. We’re surrounded by the deadly vacuum of space and with every single orbit, we move three centimeters closer to the planet. Yeah, we're a thousand miles up, so that doesn’t seem like much. But in my dreams, those centimeters amount to a plummeting freefall. Even if it means that you and I exist forever inside this ship while on the surface of the planet. I was wondering how you felt about the idea of us not waiting up here in orbit.”

  I sighed, “You’ve been having nightmares? Is that why you got up in the middle of the night last night?”

  After a prolonged blink, she cleared her throat, “We don’t know if the automated system can safely land this craft on the planet. There were people trained to operate this ship and they are no longer with us. I’m asking you how you feel about a potential suicide mission. We just got together and now it appears I’m asking you to risk it all.”

  “We’ve remotely landed probes and spacecraft on planets and moons throughout history. Most of those systems are automated and some of those probes are landing on places like Venus or on distant comets. You’re a terraformer, Sydney. You chose a profession that pretty much sentenced you to a life in space. This is-”

  “Cuttar!” she shouted, causing me to jump, “Don’t continue down that path. I swear!”

  “No, you misunderstand! I’m saying that I trust these automated systems and wondered… well, you are far more educated in spacecraft than I am because of your career choice. Is there something you know that I don’t?”

  She shook her head, “Nice save, but I don’t think that’s what you were originally going to say. But yes, we’ve crashed more spacecraft onto Mercury and Venus than what we’ve actually landed. We crash-landed three ships or probes in other star systems. So no, it’s not a perfect art form and I’m not very confident in it.”

  “How bad are the nightmares?” I asked.

  “I’m steadily getting angrier and angrier, Cuttar. I know I have a
tendency to yell when I’m mad and I felt bad a moment ago when I made you jump. So I’m going to be polite and warn you that your unusual replies and lack of answers are really getting under my skin. I don’t want to yell.”

  I reached forward and held out my hands to her. She looked down at them for a moment then released a heavy breath. Finally she reluctantly put her hands in mine.

  “I’m sorry for upsetting you, Sydney. And thank you for the warning. My answer is this: I just got to know you and I’m enjoying spending time with my wife. I could spend the rest of my life in orbit with you and die a happy man. However, you clearly want to go down to the planet and I respect that. I’m with you a hundred percent, but only on the condition that you study up and even help me to learn what it takes somehow assist with flying the ship in an emergency. And I’d like to finish my response by stating that you’re making me mad also! I care about you, Sydney, so when I ask about your nightmares, it’s because I care. Don’t forget about my history as a child.”

  She bit her bottom lip while she continued to hold my hands. Finally, her eyes met mine and I could see in that moment that the anger had faded. As a matter of fact, there was a certain sweetness in those eyes.

  “I love you, Cuttar. I think this is how we need to be from now on. We need to boldly tell each other how we feel so we don’t blow up and hurt each other,” she said, releasing my hands while she slid her tray of food back in front of her, “Yes, I’ve had nightmares ever since you resuscitated me. I think it’s due to all these recent deaths. Mortality is in the forefront of my mind and as much as I fear death, I’m willing to risk my life to get rid of the fear.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “That’s why I didn’t want to say anything. I despise sympathy – always have. Don’t ever pity me,” she said.