by Amie Kaufman
“Poor Dex,” Jules murmurs.
“Well, he and Neal are keeping busy, anyway. It’s going to take a long time to unravel the intricacies of Undying technology even with their help, and even longer to reproduce it and implement it in all the cities and towns that need that power, but in a couple of years the world is going to look completely different. Clean power, clean water, all across the globe … it’s hard to imagine.”
Jules exhales a long sigh. “Mehercule. It doesn’t seem real, does it?”
“Well, it’s not all sunshine and rainbows,” I point out. “There’s still half a dozen Undying operatives unaccounted for, who clearly don’t like the idea of the peace accords. And as many countries who refuse to allow Undying to immigrate, out of fear. There’ve been anti-Undying protests all over the place, including London, and there are plenty of people who think we should’ve blown the ship out of orbit.”
Jules waves his empty hand in a dismissive gesture. “People are idiots,” he says simply. “Nothing’s going to change that. But I think as soon as the lights start coming on, thanks to the Undying tech they’re sharing with us, people are going to come around.”
“I hope so.”
Jules watches me for a few moments, head tilted, as if studying me. “So how do you like it here?”
“Oxford?” I blink, considering my answer. “It’s … very different. Wet, for one thing.”
“I meant here, this house.”
I blink again, and look down at him. “To be honest, I barely paid much attention. I was a bit focused on seeing you. But it’s nice. Big. Nice banisters on the stairs, seems like you could really get some speed up.”
Though I say the words lightly, Jules laughs regardless and mutters, “He’s such a tattletale.” His laughter fades in favor of a keen-eyed, penetrating look. “But you like it?”
“Yeah, I like it.”
“I was thinking once my dad lets me go up and down stairs, this could be your room.”
“My—” Voice cracking, words failing me, I splutter to a halt and stare at him. “My—?”
“Your room,” Jules echoes firmly. “Dad thinks it’s a great idea. We can’t afford to keep you in the hotel indefinitely, or get you your own place, but we’ve got more room than we need. Evie could stay here too, although my dad thinks he can get her into that school in London that we were talking about, and they’ve got housing. He’s got a lot of clout these days.”
Head spinning, I stagger to my feet, hand pulling away from Jules so that I can move—my legs feel like they’re full of bees. “You want me to live with you?”
“Well, yeah, if you want to. Look, it’s weird, I know it’s weird. It wouldn’t be like … it’s not like I’m asking you to move in with me.” Jules takes a long, careful breath, watching me as I pace back and forth. “But if you wanted to stay … there’s a place for you here.”
I glance back at him, and he holds my gaze for a long moment before I manage to look away again. “You kept saying that.”
“And I meant it.”
I keep moving, aware that I’m tangling my fingers together and fidgeting like a child, and not caring. “Jules—don’t you think you should wait? Think about it? You’re still recovering … You haven’t gotten back to your normal life yet. Oxford and classes and … and your dad, and everything. How do you know you’ll want me here when your real life starts up again?”
Jules doesn’t answer for a long, long time, not until I stop to look back at him and find his gaze waiting for mine, one eyebrow raised. “For one of the smartest people I know,” he says gently, “you can be unbelievably stupid.”
That startles a little huff of laughter from my lips. I don’t know which word surprised me more: smartest or stupid. I shake my head, my throat too tight to speak.
“Mia,” he says softly. “We’ve been to the other side of the universe and back. I told you we wouldn’t let an ocean defeat us. A few classes and some work with my dad won’t, either. Unless you’ve changed your mind”—and his voice is very careful now, very even and quiet—“and you’d rather go back.”
His eyes, even at this distance, halfway across the room, catch and hold mine. There’s a question there, an uncertainty that belies his firm words. For a moment I think maybe he’s not sure about this after all, that he does actually have doubts about whether I’d fit in here in his world.
And then he blinks, lips quivering, and I realize: He’s not sure if I want to stay. If I want him.
Abruptly I’m moving, my restlessness vanished, the tension in my body vanished. I drop down onto the edge of the bed and reach not for his hand, but for his cheek, leaning close until I can rest my forehead against his. “I want to stay with you,” I blurt, dimly aware of a tear clinging to my lashes. “Idiot.”
Jules laughs, but it’s quick, because in another instant he’s tipping his face toward mine and curling his hand around the back of my neck. Before I can protest on account of his injury, he’s kissing me, and for a moment I forget he was ever shot.
After a time, I lift my head reluctantly, gathering my wits with some difficulty. “Do you smell something?” I ask, blinking, my stomach stirring and reminding me that I was too nervous to eat this morning before I left to come here.
Jules looks up too, considering, one hand still resting at my waist. “That would be Dad making lunch,” he says. “Chicken and lime with porcini mushrooms, if I’m not mistaken.” I draw back enough to stare at him, and he grins. “Where do you think I learned to cook?”
30
DEX
SIX MONTHS LATER
THE FAREWELL SESSIONS ARE IN A LARGE, WHITE ROOM WITH A LOW ceiling. It’s a pristine, antiseptic environment, a nod to the quarantines they used to observe before the old astronaut launches. There’s nothing sterile about this place, though. The room is filled with talk and laughter.
There are dozens of tables spread around the place, laid out like we’re all about to participate in some kind of formal banquet with terrible catering. I’ve learned a lot about large-scale catering over the last six months, attending functions and negotiation sessions and planning meetings. And though I used to joke with Atlanta that we’d be ruined once we’d tasted real food planetside, the truth is that our stuff—sponge food, Neal calls it—beats out a watery faux-chicken cutlet any day. Good thing too, given how many sponges lie in my future.
But even as my lips quirk at the thought, I know I’m focusing on food to prevent myself from thinking about who’s at the table with us now, gathered around as if we’re about to begin a meal … and who’s not.
Jules and Mia sit side by side across from us, his arm around her shoulders, her hand on his leg underneath the table. They’re almost always touching, I’ve noticed, when they’re together. And when they’re not, they always know exactly where the other one is. Neal and I are only a few steps down the road to … what did he call it the other day? Our own personal demonstration of intercultural diplomacy.
But I sirsly hope one day we can be something like Jules and Mia.
We’ve got a long time ahead of us to see if we can.
Jules has his head together with Neal, and though Neal’s bigger frame is clad in his blue-and-white uniform, and Jules is in civvies, they look like brothers.
“I’m just saying,” Jules is insisting, “that if I were you, I’d be checking the cargo hold twice. They changed the crew manifest just this morning. Are you sure they’ve packed everything you need?”
Neal snorts. “Yeh, I’m not listening to you when it comes to packing, dear cousin. The way Mia tells it, you showed up on Gaia toting enough stuff for a party of six.”
“I was told there would be—”
“—transport available,” Neal and Mia finish for him, laughing.
Behind them I can see Dr. Addison standing with his brother and his sister-in-law—Neal’s parents—letting us have these last moments.
Mink is standing with De Luca, the pair of them scanning the roo
m—more similar than they want to admit—on the lookout for hassle.
Mink—I’ve adopted Jules and Mia’s name for her, and in truth, I think she likes it—is always scanning the room, no matter where she is. She’s always watching, always assessing. Sometimes I suspect that by the time we shift back Earthwards, she’ll be running the planet. In the first, vital hour of the first, vital meeting, she was the one who faced down the Undying leaders, and made them see that engineering a cure for the people of Lyon was more than a good diplomatic move—their future depended on it.
I’m pretty sure Mink can do anything, and for sure, she’s not done with us all yet. That story isn’t over.
But for now, Evie’s in school, and Mia’s as in-school as you can be, when you’re one half of the most recognizable couple on the planet. She passed her high school certification last week after finishing her private tutoring. And Mink’s been watching her, in particular—I suspect there’s a future in covert ops in store for Mia.
For now, she’s laughing again as Neal rattles off what he swears was a young Jules’s packing list for family holidays, over the splutters of his cousin. And the sound of their laughter fills up my heart.
But as fast as I can fill it, that happiness quietly drains out a hole in the bottom. The empty place at my side feels like a missing limb—like a missing heartbeat. I don’t know why, but some part of me thought maybe she’d come to see me off. To say goodbye. To let me hug her one last time.
In ten minutes, we’ll all part ways to head for the launch ceremony. Neal and I will be onstage with representatives of the rest of our crew, and they’ll be in the audience, listening to the speeches that outline our hopes for the future.
Our ship, the Unity, is on a ten-year mission. We won’t shift back Earthward more than a handful of times over the next decade, and by the time we’re done, nearly a hundred more ships will have joined the search with us.
The Unity is only the first step of a journey all parts of humanity—no matter where we’ve spent the last few centuries—will take together. We’ll head for Centauri once more, and we’ll go far beyond. None of us knows what we’ll find out there. I mean, just because we haven’t found an Earth-like planet yet doesn’t mean we won’t one day. As the boy across the table from me reminded us all just half a year ago, space is big, but we are magnificent. And we are stronger together.
Our crew will be a mix of the best and brightest humans (“and us,” Neal always says) from all backgrounds—Earthborn or Undying. At least at the beginning, those from our fleet will be young, trained for the gravity our Earth counterparts need. That youth will be an advantage, I think. Our minds haven’t grown closed, yet. Or most of them haven’t.
Others of my people will remain here on Earth, to share our technology or to learn, to travel or to make their homes, some among the other humans, some apart.
Atlanta is one of those who will remain on Earth. I compren that’s for the best, because it’s what she wants. But these last six months, I’ve been torn in two, pulled in both directions by the future that’s calling to me, and the past that’s so completely tangled up in my heart that I can’t begin to separate myself from it.
It’s like there’s a non-stop babble of voices in my head, calling me to hunt for her, to stay with my friends, to try one more time to get in contact, to push her from my mind and kiss Neal, to wonder if she got my messages, to focus on my next Unity briefing.
I never thought I’d shift apart from her like this. But then again, I never thought I’d betray her. All the soldiers who followed orders that day have been pardoned, but that’s only the official part of it. Forgiving ourselves, forgiving each other, that’s much more complicated. I still have no idea if she’ll ever forgive me. I never thought she’d need to.
I never thought I’d step aboard a ship and leave her behind.
But she’s finally planetside, with all the things she wanted. She can feel the breeze every day. She can learn to swim. She can run on grass and sleep in the shade of a tree. Though I miss her desperately, I hope that this place will be everything she dreamed.
As if he’s sensing the feeling welling up inside me, Neal reaches for my hand under the table, giving it a quick squeeze, even as he shoots a retort back at his cousin.
A soft chime rings through the room, and all around us, conversation stills. It’s the signal we need to wrap up our farewells. And suddenly, with the pressure of making our last words something meaningful, everyone’s tongue-tied.
“Look,” I say, honestly not sure as I begin it how my sentence is going to end. “These last six months—”
But I get no further. Mia interrupts me. “Dex,” she gasps, looking over my shoulder.
Beside her, Jules goes still. I can’t think what it could possibly be, and I twist around to—
All thought dies. The constant static, the babble in my head, is abruptly silenced for the first time in half a year.
Because Atlanta stands in the doorway, clad in the blue-and-white uniform of the Unity mission. The same uniform as me.
I gulp for air, like I’m a ten-year-old on my first assisted mission, glued to the spot until Neal firmly plants a hand between my shoulder blades, and pushes. Then I rise from my chair, legs unsteady, and half stumble the first few steps toward her.
Her lips curve into her usual, achingly familiar smirk, one brow lifting, as if to say, Really, you forgot how to walk? And for that, I remember how to run, dodging bodies and swerving around tables, shifting at the speed of light to fling myself into her open arms, our bodies smacking together.
“What are you doing here?” It’s a stupid question—she’s wearing the uniform. But I won’t believe it, I can’t believe it, until she says it.
“I’m going home,” she says quietly, arms still wrapped around me, head resting on my shoulder, cheek pressed to mine.
“But you are home,” I murmur. “We’ve spent our whole lives getting here, back to Earth.”
“No,” she says, finally easing back, dropping her hands to take hold of mine. “I finally figured out what you knew all along.” She’s looking over my shoulder, and when I glance back, there’s Neal—he must have run to keep up with me—shooting her one of his gentle, welcoming smiles. Jules and Mia have nearly reached us. “I don’t understand,” I admit.
“You are my home,” she says quietly. “I thought it was here, this planet, the place we came from, but I was wrong. You’re my home, Dex, you always have been.” She pauses, flicking her gaze to Neal, and wrinkling her nose. “Though I pledge, if you think I’m sharing a room with you two, you’re heading for ten kinds of hassle.”
I don’t have any kind of comeback, and Neal’s just laughing at her. “We already decorated,” he informs her. “You’re safe.”
“You made the crew list?” That’s Jules, and he doesn’t seem completely surprised. Nor, now I turn my head to look at the pair of them, does Mia.
“Yeh, approved about ten minutes ago,” Atlanta says. “Plenty of time to spare. It helps that my partner was already a crew member.”
The chime sounds again, and Neal turns away to pull Jules in for a hug, as I lean down to gather up Mia for the same. Neal’s parents close in now, and the Addison family, born and chosen, are one big tangle of limbs, clinging together for just a moment more.
“We’ll send you a vid first chance we get,” I promise, as we all step back.
“Keep an eye on the place for us,” Neal adds, tugging his uniform straight. “I may have dreamed about this my whole life, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to come back someday.”
And then it’s time to go.
It’s so sunny outside that as we head for the wide doors that lead out to the stage and the speeches, I can’t make out a thing that’s waiting for us.
But that’s all right. With Neal on one side of me and Atlanta on the other, I’m ready.
Together, we walk toward the light.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
It’s
been many years now, and we still pinch ourselves every day that we’re able to tell stories together for a living. We don’t ever plan to stop, and we’re so grateful for the people who helped us with this one.
To the readers, librarians and booksellers who help us share our stories, thank you from the bottom of our hearts. Without your support, none of this would be possible. Word of mouth is real—every time you tell someone to read one of our books, you’re doing us an immeasurable kindness. So thank you!
To the incredible team at Adams Literary—Josh and Tracey Adams and Cathy Kendrick, as well as to our fantastic film agent, Stephen Moore, and the many international agents who’ve helped these books find homes overseas, a thousand times thank you. We are grateful for you every day.
To the fantastic team at Hyperion—Laura Schreiber, Mary Mudd, Emily Meehan, and Cassie McGinty, to everyone in sales and marketing, publicity, production, managing editorial and everywhere in between, thank you for taking such great care of these books!
In Australia, a huge thank-you to Anna McFarlane, Jess Seaborn, Radhiah Chowdhury and all the wonderful Allen & Unwin team for your incredible support.
To the team at Listening Library, particularly the wonderful Nick Martorelli and Fred Sanders, and our incredible narrators Alex McKenna and Steve West—thank you so much for bringing Jules and Mia to life!
We owe the experts who helped us with our research a huge debt of gratitude—as always, everything we get right is down to them, and everything we get wrong is on us. Many thanks to Ellen Kushner for intel on French vending machines, Josh Hale for genetics advice, Marguerite Syvertson for space smarts, Howard Jones for defending the Earth while armed with nothing but a microwave, Jana and Vanessa for checking our German, Léane our French, and Albert Ubeda our Catalan. Many thanks to Soraya Een Hajji for the Latin cursing, and to Dr. Kate Irving for devising yet another way to wipe people out. We’re very grateful her Hippocratic oath doesn’t apply to fictional people.