by Laura Lam
“The technology for cloned organs still exists, even if it’s illegal,” Hart pointed out. “They could have applied for an exemption and gotten it.” She sounded just as doubtful.
Haven hadn’t been the only company investing in cloning. Companies providing hearts and kidneys and the like still flourished—it was only wombs that were banned. Dennis Lee would definitely have had the skills to grow organic wombs. He’d helped pioneer it. Her eyes flickered to the thin tendrils of growing vat meat on the far wall. Naomi would be able to make them, especially if Hart helped.
It could be difficult to synthesise the growth medium in situ on Cavendish, or create the scaffold of alginate for the cells to grow in gravity. More fun with algae. Or they could grow them in orbit in the main body of the Atalanta. Valerie would have blueprints for the bioreactor where everything came together—would Lebedeva or Hixon be able to create it? Could they retrofit the vat meat bioreactor? So far Naomi hadn’t had any trouble so far with her vat meat experiments, but creating a hamburger was a lot easier than a womb.
Very worst-case scenario, the women on board had something the men didn’t.
“Those caretakers Valerie selected, a lot of them have already looked after babies in artificial wombs,” Hart said.
Naomi had a sudden, strange mental image of embryos in glowing tanks parked right next to the sofa in a living room.
“You’re saying this is what she’d always planned?” Naomi’s voice was weak.
Hart popped a strawberry in her mouth. “Valerie has consistently lied to us. It’s far more likely she put them there than Lockwood. Maybe it was added security, an insurance policy she hoped never to cash in on. It also implies that she knew the backup crew would be on board when we took off. Either way, she still didn’t tell us. And that’s inexcusable.” She clicked her tongue against her teeth. “What if a trigger tripped when we opened the chambers and she already knows what we found?”
“All the more reason to ask her. She came clean the other times. When she had to.” Naomi’s mouth tasted of iron. “We should talk to Hixon and Lebedeva first. Though, what if they know?” She realised how that sounded. Hixon was the second in command. If Valerie told the pilot it was top secret, would that military history mean Hixon would follow orders? Keep it from even her own wife? Lebedeva was fiercely loyal to Valerie. “God. What if they all already know and we’re the ones left in the dark?”
“No.” Hart shook her head, too hard. “Jerrie hates the idea of being pregnant. I mean hates. The idea of disembodied babies growing in vats would have given her nightmares. And if they failed or couldn’t grow on Cavendish and there was even the slightest possibility that Valerie would ask us to carry the embryos—this is not something she’d keep quiet about. She wouldn’t do it even if it meant saving humanity. I’d carry two to spare her it. If I had to.” Her lips were stained dark with strawberry juice.
Naomi gave her a small smile, despite the tingling in her fingertips. “I suppose that’s a spot of sweetness in this horror.” Her smile faded. “She wouldn’t make us carry them, surely.” One womb on board was already occupied. Was that why Valerie had taken the news so well?
Hart made a derisive noise in her throat. “She’d frame it as a choice. Not sure it actually would be.”
Naomi left Hart to the strawberries, taking down the algae tubes for that day’s harvest as an excuse to gather herself. The batches were all growing as they should. No flickering lights, the algae a vibrant purple beneath the glow lights, not milky from contaminants. She hoped she never saw the tubes pulsing again.
As she loaded yesterday’s algae into the nutriblock machine, a terrible thought unfurled in Naomi’s mind. So awful she almost didn’t mention it to Hart, but if she didn’t speak it, the thought would burrow its way deeper.
“If she added the embryos, they’d have been a last-minute addition,” Naomi said slowly. “She must have bribed someone to look the other way as the robots brought the embryos up and hid them as they installed Cole and the others.”
Hart gave a grunt. “Wouldn’t have been easy. Wonder how much she paid? And what else could have been done with that money.”
“It wouldn’t have gone through the same quality checks as everything else. What if—what if that addition was the reason for the power surge? It’d explain why Hixon was so frustrated by the calculations.”
Hart’s hands fell still. She picked a strawberry leaf, twirled it in her hands. “You’re saying Valerie could have been responsible for their deaths?”
“Unintentionally, perhaps.” Naomi’s forehead crinkled in pain. “She came down, when I was saying goodbye to Cole. She said it was her responsibility to pull the plug, to see to the bodies. I thought it was a kindness.”
Hart’s eyes were filled with pity. “She did it so she could make sure no one found out what was hidden behind them. To check the cryopods still had power and the embryos were still safe.”
Naomi let out a sob but swallowed the others. The grief for Cole rose up as fresh as the day it’d happened. After so many years under her roof, Naomi knew how to work through Valerie’s likely thought patterns. “What if the bodies weren’t even damaged? She saw that the fuel efficiency was compromised, and rather than risk the embryos, she could have adjusted the screen readouts. What if—what if we were the ones who voted to kill them?”
Hart left the strawberry plants, coming close and resting a hand on Naomi’s forearm. “I wish I could say I couldn’t see her doing that, but I’m not going to lie to you, Lovelace. Valerie Black needs fealty. Hell, doing it could have been a test. What do we choose to do when faced with such a tough decision? We made the choice she wanted. We agreed to pull the plug. Maybe that means she knows that, when push comes to shove, we’d fall into line with the embryos. Or whatever else she’s up to.”
Naomi had no response to that. She gripped the empty algae tube so hard it’d have shattered if it wasn’t reinforced.
Hart continued, relentless. “Valerie always had that loyalty from you, and she knew this. She’s well aware Oksana and Jerrie also feel like they owe her everything. Valerie could give you all that NASA no longer could. A chance to come up here.”
“Weren’t you desperate to go to space?” Naomi asked.
Hart laughed. “Not really. I mean, it’s cool and all, don’t get me wrong. A monumentally important moment, arguably the defining moment of humanity. We’ll go down in the history books, and that’s damn satisfying, even if they might paint us as the villains. But I also would have been happy enough back on Earth. With my friends, my family. I’m never going to see my niece grow up. She’s only two. When those I love are dying, I won’t be able to say goodbye in person. Of all of you, I think I left behind the most. Oksana already gave up everything when she left Russia. Jerrie’s been cut off from her family since she came out, and she pulled away from her friends when she realised we had an actual shot at this. You did the same, didn’t you?”
Naomi opened her mouth in denial, but snapped it shut. She had plenty of friendly acquaintances on Earth—people she’d see for coffee, or to catch a film and grab dinner. Co-workers, usually. It’d been years since she’d allowed herself a close friend. Who had she turned to when things were difficult? After the NASA rejection, and then the acceptance. When she planned on the abortion. When she needed comforting after the miscarriage. It had always been Valerie, and often only Valerie.
Hart’s voice was soft. “Valerie was never as sure with me, I don’t think. She respected my work, my abilities, but I always had the sense that she would have rather chosen someone else to be the flight surgeon if I wasn’t a package deal with Jerrie. I’m not diffident enough.” She raised her hands, then let them fall. “I’m not saying you all are, just…”
“I am, I think. Or I was.” So many little things Naomi never stopped to think about. The way Valerie would fire people at Hawthorne if she didn’t find them respectful enough. She’d distanced herself from her own son when Evan
hadn’t moulded his life the way she wanted. Naomi had long learned to stay silent, keep her head down, focus on the work. One of Naomi’s most painful memories was that rift that opened between her and Valerie when she moved to Scotland. Before then, and once she’d come back to Hawthorne, she’d been desperate to prove she was worthy of the attention Valerie had given her over the years. The money Valerie spent on her education when her parents’ inheritance ran out.
Had she been loyal to a fault?
Her entire understanding of who she was, the life she thought she had, was shifting to something she didn’t like the look of.
“So we speak to Hixon and Lebedeva first,” Naomi said. “Lay it all out, then go to Valerie.”
“Agreed.” Hart leaned over to Naomi’s tablet, brought up the ship feed. “Valerie’s in her office. Hixon and Lebedeva are down in the bridge. Should we go to them now?”
Naomi nodded. “Yes, I’ll just wrap this up and be right behind you.”
Hart let out a long exhale. “Right.” She looked like she was trying to psych herself for whatever was to come. Naomi didn’t blame her one bit.
When the lab door closed behind Hart, Naomi grabbed her tablet. Typing as quickly as her shaking fingers would allow, she sent Evan an update of what she’d learned over the past few hours, hoping for a response sooner rather than later. After her long message, she dashed out a short one before she made her way down to the bridge.
Naomi Lovelace: I think I might have been wrong about her for all these years.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
127 Days After Launch
4 Days to Mars
122 Days to Cavendish
Naomi hated the sound of the lock to the bridge hissing shut.
There had been no need for locks on the common areas of Atalanta before.
Hixon glanced up from her navigations, frowning. Naomi made sure the comms panel by the door was switched off. Lebedeva floated closer, moving gracefully between the handrails. “What’s going on?” she asked, gaze shifting between Naomi and Hart.
“We’ve come across information you need to know about before we jump.” Naomi tethered herself to her chair, gathered her strength, and told them everything. Hart added a few comments here and there. Naomi tried to read the pilot and the engineer’s expressions. If Hixon knew or had suspected anything, she was good at hiding it. Lebedeva could be a stone statue for all she reacted. Perhaps it was not all such a shock to her. If something ever went wrong with the embryo storage, for example, it’d be Lebedeva Valerie would call on to fix it.
“There has to be a rational explanation,” Hixon said. “There was with the message from Cochran. It was a distraction when we needed to focus on the test jump.”
“She would have told us when she was ready,” Lebedeva agreed.
“She told you because I made her,” Naomi said. “I found out about it on my own and confronted her. I’m not sure she would have, otherwise.” The words were heavy. “Hixon, you’re second in command—she should have told you at least, shouldn’t she?”
Hixon’s chin rose. “You’re the one questioning her authority and mine in one swoop.” Her gaze flicked to Hart. “Both of you are.”
“So we shouldn’t question anything?” Hart asked. “You think we should follow orders even if they put us all in danger?”
The silence was sharp. Charged.
“The embryos are merely a protection. Assurance,” Lebedeva said. “The power surge would not have been on her. She would have checked the numbers.”
Naomi’s gut tightened. “You knew.”
Lebedeva blew out through her nose. “No.”
The smallest flicker on Hart’s face, the barest meeting of gazes. Neither she nor Naomi knew whether to believe her. A few months ago, Naomi would have sworn no one on this team would lie to each other. She couldn’t pretend she was any more honest than the others.
“I know she would not have jeopardised the backup crew,” Lebedeva said.
Naomi wished she could be as sure. Hart raised her eyebrows at Hixon. “Well?”
“I don’t know what to believe.” Hixon’s voice cracked.
“That’s why we should all speak to her,” Naomi said. “Pose a united front. Have everything on the table and make an informed decision, like we did with Cochran’s message. Maybe you’re right and there is an explanation, or we’re rushing to conclusions not supported by the facts. I mean, I want to be proven wrong. I don’t want Valerie to have done this. I think we can all agree on that.”
“We have to make decisions before the jump, or it’ll take months to send word back to Earth,” Hart said.
“And if you decide you do not like that Dr. Black kept things from us?” Lebedeva asked. “What, you suggest mutiny?” She gave something like a tch. “If we break, none of us will make it.”
Hixon grimaced. “It won’t come to that. We know Valerie. All of us. She wouldn’t kill five people. She won’t force us to do anything we don’t want to do. This crew is a collective. We work together, as a team. It’s not didactic, or a dictatorship. Secrets have no place here, though, I agree. We air everything.”
As if on cue, Naomi’s tablet in her pocket beeped with a new message. Lebedeva startled, then her eyes narrowed. They all knew that noise. Their tablets were identical, but no one else had heard that sound since Earth.
She picked it up. Read Evan’s message. Blanched.
She took in a breath, lowered her voice. “I’ve been able to access messages from Earth.” She figured it was safer to let them think she intercepted official information rather than that she was in direct conversation with Evan.
Hixon crossed her arms. “Looks like Valerie isn’t the only one keeping secrets.”
“Berate me later. The message says there’s a potential illness outbreak.” She copied the text of the message to the larger screen, hiding who had sent it.
That local outbreak is a virus. Something new. Something vicious. We’re still investigating it, but so far it’s like an unholy blend of Marburg spreading like a common cold. Could be airborne. Fatality is high. It’s early days, but I don’t know if we’ll be able to slow its spread. We’re locking down a perimeter, and my team and I are trying to find either a vaccine, a cure, or something to help slow the symptoms. That’ll take time—months at least, years more likely—and we might not have it. They’re trying to avoid making a widespread announcement on Earth, but it’s only a matter of time. I don’t think we’ll be able to contain this.
The four women stared at the screen, reading silently.
“Who sent this?” Hixon asked.
“A contact,” Naomi said, worried to admit even that much. The blood had already rushed to her face from the lack of gravity, the skin of her cheeks hot and puffy. Her arms and legs had floated up, leaving her suspended, and her fingers and toes were cold.
A virus. Evan had mentioned it after the test jump, but she’d been so distracted she’d glossed over it. She knew that area from that first summer working at Argaine. Dry and dusty, the corn fields even more choked than when she’d been there as an undergraduate student. The nearest town had thirty-five thousand people. If it was airborne and deadly, that was a big enough node to spread. How many people had already passed through that sleepy, sunburned town? A quick, hot meal while their car charged. It was a place to pass through on the way to Los Angeles.
“If this spreads, that’ll be a catastrophe,” Naomi said. “A pandemic.”
“There’ve been plenty of outbreaks recently,” Hixon said. “That Marburg outbreak on the East Coast a few years ago. It’d been bad, but. And remember Ebola before they found a vaccine?”
“Ebola only spread through bodily fluids like blood or semen,” Hart said. “And it took them years before they had something resembling that vaccine. A sickness as lethal but airborne? It could be a modern-day plague. Wipe out a sizable percentage of the population.” Her voice was hushed.
“That means that Valerie’s plan, i
f it was hers, was good idea. Embryos were worth keeping,” Lebedeva said. She gave them a look, blue eyes catching on Naomi’s growing belly. “And yes, I would carry one. If I had to,” she said. “It will not come to that.”
“Stop,” Hixon said. “Let me think.” Her face tightened as she worked through the new information with the ruthless efficiency she’d learned in the military. “We are still a crew. A team. No more postulations. No more what-ifs. We speak to Valerie.”
“That’s the right answer, Hixon,” came Valerie’s voice over the comms.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
127 Days After Launch
4 Days to Mars
122 Days to Cavendish
Naomi’s body jerked in mid-air, the adrenaline firing through her nerve endings.
The women had spent hundreds of hours on the Atalanta simulators and grown to know every corner of the craft after living on it for months. Even in the emergency instructions, there was nothing about being able to overhear or see someone in a room if they hadn’t accessed the comms, and Naomi had made sure they were switched off before she said a word.
Valerie told them to meet her in the rec room. For the barest hesitation, Naomi and the others debated staying put, barricading themselves on the bridge, but that would only last as long as their hunger and thirst did. They climbed the ladder back to the ring, rung by rung, their bodies gradually growing heavier. As second in command, Hixon took the lead, Naomi next, with Hart and Lebedeva trailing behind.
Valerie waited for them. She’d shifted the background of the rec room to the proposed landing site on Cavendish—a clearing surrounded by the same blue-green moss and ferns Naomi had grown back on Earth. The gentle waves of the freshwater lake lapped at the shore. Mountains rose in the distance, tinged orange and pink in the haze. Valerie had uploaded her blueprints to the program, as if Catherine Lovelace’s robots had already erected the ghostly outlines of buildings. The sleeping pods were clustered around a main structure that would be largely 3D printed. The bridge of the Atalanta would remain in orbit. The ark ships out would hopefully carry hundreds, or at least dozens, rather than five. Their largest ships were designed for thousands. The VR wall showed the outline of the greenhouse where Naomi was to conduct her experiments. Valerie had even added vague animated figures coming and going. Living their idyllic, golden life on their new planet.