The Last Builder

by C G Cooper

  “Take this information about terraforming, study it, learn it, and know it by heart, so that when you take the leap, there’s no question, there’s no uncertainty, there’s no self-doubt. I know you can do this, Cutler. The vote was unanimous. I didn’t even have to make a speech.” Josiah laughed. “The Society chose you, not because you’re a survivor, and not because you’re brilliant, but because you’re a good person. And we need that out there right now.

  “One thing is certain about KV. It doesn’t discriminate. But just as it takes those from all walks of life, it has the potential to leave all walks of life behind. I have a feeling space is going to be more unforgiving than ever, but there’s hope. Remember what the Society taught you. Remember our purpose. Remember our code. If you can do that, there’s hope. Good luck, Cutler. I know you can do it.”

  The video ended and Josiah’s image was replaced by a series of files that filled the screen from top to bottom. Katherine felt a million questions burning in her chest, but the moment felt full of dread somehow, and she couldn’t bring herself to break the silence.

  “He was a professor at Juniper Academy,” her father said solemnly.

  She held her breath. Her father so rarely talked about his past. She was afraid that if she moved, if she even breathed, he’d shut down again.

  “He wasn’t there for long, but he left a lasting impression on a lot of people. Juniper didn’t want him to leave, but when he was offered a position in The Society, he couldn’t turn it down. No one would.”

  “What’s The Society?”

  He patted her hand and stood up. He walked to the end of the room and stood in the doorway, his back to her. She thought he was going to leave the room without answering her question, but he turned around and leaned against the wall. He looked pale.

  “At some point, the U.N.E. stopped acknowledging their existence. They could have turned the world against them, but this was worse. They turned them into a legend. A myth.”

  Her father looked at her and smiled, like he realized he was talking nonsense. “The Society for Truth and Scientific Advancement is an organization made up of scientists and philosophers. They’ve existed for generations. They have one purpose: to be guided by the truth. A corrupt government will always turn its back on science. The Society was created as opposition, back when opposition was still legal.”

  He began pacing now. “It worked at first, actually. The government saw The Society as a way to keep the people’s curiosity at bay. It reduced the number of riots. It kept a lot of people safe.”

  “What changed?”

  “People started listening to The Society more than the U.N.E. They saw Society members as leaders who could remain impartial, who had everyone’s best interests in mind. Citizens started clamoring for The Society to become their new form of government.”

  “I'll bet that went over well.”

  He laughed, but there was no humor in it. “Overnight, an order was issued to round up subversive members of The Society and execute them. The majority of them were killed, but a handful escaped to the moon, where they laid in wait until they could find somewhere to hide and continue their work. These were non-dissidents in good standing with the government. All they wanted was to continue to learn. They weren’t interested in power and money. They were only interested in truth. But remember, truth is the enemy of corruption.”

  “And now you’re in charge of it all?”

  His gaze cut back to the computer screen. He walked over to his chair and sat down again, but he didn’t touch the keyboard in front of him.

  “What is all this?”

  “Instructions.”

  “For what?”

  “Terraforming.”

  “Like, building planets?”

  “The process is complicated, to say the least. It’s a precise science to build the bomb that explodes and creates an atmosphere that will, over time, develop into something we can live in.”

  “A bomb?”

  “It’s the only way the correct amount of elements can be dispersed in a way that creates an atmosphere.”

  “Your job used to be to find suitable planets, and now it’s your job to turn those planets into worlds we can live on.”

  “Always moving forward.”

  “But they never taught you how to do it?”

  He looked up at her. “Apparently everything I need to know is in here.”

  “Everything you need to know to build a bomb that’ll create life instead of destroy it.”

  He smiled and reached for her hand. When his fingers wrapped around hers, there was a comfort there she hadn’t known until now.

  “That’s our mission now,” he said with a soft smile. “You in?”

  Katherine took a deep breath and looked at the files on the screen. None of it made sense to her. There was terror in her heart. And as the world died out there, it would be their job to build in the rubble.

  “I’m in,” she said.

  14

  Cutler

  Days turned into weeks, which turned into months. Four of them went by before Cutler made any kind of breakthrough on the files, and another two before he felt like he had enough of a grasp on the process to even attempt to put it into action.

  Time passed differently in space. Or, rather, the perception of time passing was different. There weren’t any sunrises and sunsets to remind you of the days or the hours. The Artemisia had clocks in every major room on the ship, and Cutler made sure both he and Katherine stuck to a rigid schedule. They’d wake up by seven, eat breakfast, stretch and exercise, have lunch, and then do their daily chores. Then Cutler would retreat to his workstation and attempt to crack the code on the files, and Katherine would find a way to entertain herself. She had already made it through the majority of the books in the small library aboard the ship.

  Cutler would cook dinner, sometimes teaching her little tricks you couldn’t find in any standard cookbook. They’d eat and then spend the rest of the night together, sometimes talking, sometimes sitting in silence. It wasn’t easy trying to get to know his adolescent daughter—Katherine certainly didn’t make it so—but the only thing that could drag Cutler away from the instructions on terraforming was the only other human being on his ship.

  He found it fascinating to watch her, his Kit.

  She preferred to read and generally keep to herself, but she was enamored with space. It was no longer an abstract concept for her, but something very real. She was much more interested in sociology than Cutler ever was, but she listened intently and asked the right questions when he explained the science behind his ship or the way planets were formed.

  It was hard not to give up hope. They had watched humanity disappear right in front of them. Kit had cried endlessly in those first few weeks as reports from Earth came in. Once the truth about KV had surfaced, the murder rate took care of the population almost as quickly as the virus did.

  They had no way to talk to anyone on Earth, and perhaps that was all for the best. He’d prayed that Kit’s friend Tiffany, and her family, would find a peaceful death—for Kit’s sake, if no one else’s. It seemed more likely, though, that they had succumbed to the massive riots that took over New York City in the days and weeks following their escape. They had not heard anything about Professor Witwick, or Benjamin, or any of the others they had known.

  As Earth was decimated by the virus and the viciousness that humanity was all too quick to descend to, those who had long ago left the planet watched on in horror. That is, until the virus began to affect those off-planet as well. Cutler couldn’t help but think of Jessie and all the things he hadn’t told her. All the things he would never be able to tell her.

  The news channel had cut out about two months in. There was no one left to broadcast. They had spent the last few months in silence, with no way of knowing what was truly happening outside their ship. Kit had turned eighteen while the world raged, but she had already become an adult the second she had been required to save her
own skin rather than that of her friends. She had tucked her teddy bear away in a deep corner of a closet. She had taken to constantly rubbing the crystal around her neck in worry.

  More so than life itself, thought Cutler, KV stole childhoods.

  The stark reality had made him work harder on decrypting The Society’s files. It was the only thing keeping him sane, his part in the fight against the virus. He played Josiah’s message so many times, both he and Katherine could quote it from start to finish.

  “What’s the point?” she’d said one night.

  Cutler had been working on the terraforming problem when she threw her book – one of the last unread ones on the ship, down in frustration.

  “Easy does it.”

  “Don’t play the hardened warrior of the galaxy with me. If we’re the last ones in the universe, what’s the point of sticking around just so we can gawk at how empty the world is?”

  “We’re not the last ones.”

  “Show me some proof.” She was worrying at her necklace. “I’ll bet you anything we could travel for fifty years in any direction and never again see a single human being. One thousand, Dad, that’s how many people Josiah said were left in the galaxy.”

  “I know it feels unlikely—”

  “Impossible—”

  “—but we will see someone else again. We’ll build worlds and they’ll find them.”

  “But what’s the point? Space is empty. What use is having the knowledge to grow planets from the ground up if we don’t have anyone to share it with?”

  He took her by the shoulders. He knew words couldn’t shake her tears or her sadness. “I miss her, too,” he said, hugging her close.

  His Kit froze for a moment, and then leaned into him, shaking with sobs. She gently pushed him away, wiping at her face. “It’s not just Mom.” She went over to the window and peered out into the vastness.

  “Then what is it?”

  “Everyone,” she said, turning around. There were tear tracks on her face now. “Why us? Why me? I’m just a kid. I don’t know how to do anything but read books. I can’t do anything to help anyone. I can’t fix this.”

  “No one can fix this.”

  “Then why are we doing this?” she shouted. “Why us, Dad, if we can’t stop what’s happened?”

  “We can help whoever is left over. That’s our mission now. That’s our job. Our obligation.”

  She took a shuddering breath and shook her head. “I didn’t ask for this.”

  “No one did.” He picked up her book and handed it back to her. “But if we give up hope, we might as well join everyone else.”

  “Sometimes I wish we would.” A look of regret came across her face. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.”

  “Yes, you did,” he said gently. “And it’s okay.”

  “No, it’s not. I don’t want to feel this way.”

  “It’s called survivor’s guilt. Anyone with a heart would feel that way. Congratulations, you’re a human being.”

  “It’s awful. It's debilitating.”

  “It’s powerful,” he said. “It’s only debilitating if you allow it to be. Use your fear, your anger, your uncertainty, and channel that into action.”

  “Like you are?”

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “You’ve been pouring over those instructions for months now. You’ve built the bomb. Now it’s time to test it.”

  “You can’t just rush into something like that. If something goes wrong, the planet is inhospitable.”

  “You’re afraid. Why is it okay for me to admit my fear, but you can’t? Because I’m a girl?”

  “Stop that.”

  “Because I’m barely an adult?”

  “I said stop it.”

  “You’re afraid, Dad. I heard what Josiah said about your last mission.”

  His mouth went dry.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” Her voice was silken, like Victoria’s.

  He sat down and said softly, “The Society sent me on a rescue mission.”

  “I thought you were just a scout?”

  “I was, but something had gone wrong with a civilian ship and we were the only ones close enough to get to them in time. I didn’t usually take on crews, but there was a planet I had discovered that had already showed signs of life. The Society wanted to confirm their findings, so they sent me out with a doctor, an engineer, and a biologist.”

  The heat from his memories seared his brain, but Kit’s cool hand on his neck brought him back to reality. “What happened, Dad?”

  “The ship that sent out the distress call was having engine failure. It shouldn’t have happened. There are a thousand fail-safes that prevent something like that from happening. As the pilot, I stayed behind. No one else could fly us out of there if something went wrong. We didn’t dock with the ship in case the worst-case scenario happened, so my crew used propulsion suits to conduct the rescue. But as soon as they got inside…”

  “Worst case scenario?”

  He nodded. “There was nothing left. I went back to The Society and requested only solo missions from then on.”

  “That wasn’t your fault, though.”

  “I know, but survivor’s guilt is a powerful thing. I thought of a thousand different ways that situation could’ve played out. I’d convinced myself I could’ve done something to prevent...all those deaths. It just proved to me that taking risks wasn’t worth the cost.”

  “I know what you sacrificed to come get me. And I know what you’re giving up by having me here.”

  “I’m not giving up anything.”

  “You are. You’re playing it safe because of me.”

  He felt the emotion rising in the back of his throat. “I can’t lose you.”

  “And I can’t lose you either, Daddy. I can’t lose anyone else. But we can’t keep living like this. I’m so afraid all the time. And I know you mean well, but you’re just feeding into that by keeping us secluded like this. We both need people. We need to be around them. We need to save them.”

  “When did you become so wise?” He realized he was smiling, the first genuine smile in weeks.

  “I’ve been this way for a while. You can thank Mom for that.” She smiled over her shoulder as she walked out of the room.

  “Hey, Kit?”

  She paused in the doorway.

  “Tomorrow we build our first planet.”

  15

  Cutler

  “It doesn’t look like much.”

  Katherine was peering out one of the windows of the ship and taking in the planet they had just landed on. Brown rocks and little else, nothing anyone would call even remotely hospitable about the place.

  “It’s perfect. Round, rocky, and close enough to a sun to allow for life to continue to grow.” He pulled at the seal straps on his suit, feeling instant snugness within. “The terrabomb does the rest of the work.”

  “Why can’t we just chuck it out the window and be done with it?”

  “It is a bomb,” he said, strapping his gloves on his hands. “Kind of have to be careful with it.”

  “I just don’t like being on the ship all by myself.”

  “I won’t be gone long.”

  “Yeah, but who knows what could go wrong here while you're away.”

  “Look, nearly everything on this ship is automated. You’ll probably be bored while I’m gone. And if something does go wrong, it should only take me ten or fifteen minutes to get back on board.”

  She nodded. She didn’t look convinced.

  “I need help putting on my helmet.”

  She picked up the fishbowl helmet and stood on her tiptoes to fit it over her father’s head. The helmet clicked into place, and the suit’s internal system kicked into gear, pumping filtered air around him. It was cool against his skin. This would be the most comfortable part of the job. Soon the weight of the suit and the exertion he was about to put his body through in placing the bomb would have him sweating in no
time.

  “All good?”

  He pointed to the headset sitting on the table next to them. She placed it on her head and clicked the microphone into place.

  “All good,” he said.

  “Be careful, Dad, please?” Her voice had a metallic ring as it played through his own headset.

  “I had other plans.”

  She rolled her eyes and started toward the antechamber that would allow Cutler to safely leave the ship. They had done a few dry runs before now. She would wait for his thumbs-up before hitting the button that opened the door into the airtight room.

  The last thing was a switch from artificial to real gravity. He nodded, and she switched off the generator.

  A millisecond of weightlessness, a woozy hoisting of his insides. Then all settled.

  “Well?”

  “Feels like Earth,” she said.

  He made one last check at the satchel strapped to his suit to make sure the terrabomb was secure. Thirty pounds of biblical cataclysm strapped to his hip. He chuckled nervously to himself, then gave a thumbs-up. Katherine nodded back and pressed the button to open the door. He stepped through, and the door sealed behind him.

  “Secure?”

  “Secure.” He gave her another thumbs-up and turned toward the desolate world. He braced himself for the roar of air being sucked out of the chamber. When it finally subsided, the LED above the outside door illuminated green. When the door slid open, he paused.

  “Everything okay?”

  “Yeah.” He was trying for calm. It didn’t work. “Just taking it all in.”

  “Describe it to me.”

  He smiled, proud of his daughter’s curiosity. A little of this exotic knowledge went a long way. It had made her hungry for more.

  “It’s like another world out there.”

  “Very funny.”

  He took a few steps forward and planted a boot on the rocky surface. He peered down at his temperature gauge. “It’s a little cooler than I’d hoped it would be.”