Beyond the Sun

by Bryan Thomas Schmidt

  Godfrey considered this while sidling towards the doorway. He looked back at Ivarsen, then to Lisa, and then to me.

  “Sorry man,” was all he said.

  Then he was gone, and Lisa and I were rushing to Ivarsen’s side. The guard’s heart still beat, and his lungs took in air. That was good. But the deep laceration on his head bled profusely, and I dared not explore it for fear of finding pulp where there should be skull.

  Lisa ripped open Ivarsen’s shirt, and we tore off pieces to use as a temporary bandage.

  Outside, the dumper’s electric engine started up. We heard its large tires crunch on the dirt as Godfrey drove away.

  Lisa was cursing and started to rise to her feet, but I stopped her.

  “Let him go. We’ve got more immediate concerns.”

  She thought for a second.

  “We can take him on the shovel. It will be fastest.”

  I nodded—there was a first aid locker in Ivarsen’s hooch.

  Could we get to it in time?

  *

  Godfrey had gone off-road and disappeared over the southern hills by the time we got Ivarsen back to camp. I drove the shovel while Lisa sat on a pallet we’d cleared, which now held Ivarsen’s unmoving body. The pallet was perched on the fork of the shovel’s hydraulic arm, and I did my best to avoid bumps. At ten kilometers per hour, it took precious minutes to motor out of the crater and follow the trail along the rim wall to where the hooches sat.

  I set the pallet down and Lisa leapt off, running into Ivarsen’s hooch to get his cot. It wasn’t a perfect stretcher, but we managed to get him onto it, moving him into his hooch so he’d be out of the sun.

  Lisa helped me rummage through the first aid locker and apply a more suitable bandage to the head wound.

  Next I checked his pupils with a flashlight, alarmed to see that one of them had gone as wide as the iris would allow.

  “Lord,” I said.

  “Is it that bad?” Lisa asked.

  “Bad enough. We need Ivarsen’s satellite phone. If he doesn’t get a medevac soon, he’s as good as dead.”

  “I think the phone was in the cab of the dumper,” Lisa said. “He always kept it there when we were working.”

  Lisa and I looked at each other. Neither of us needed to say what was on our minds.

  When the SWAT guys got here, it wouldn’t matter what story we told them. All they’d find was a dead Corrections officer, and two live prisoners. And that would be that. Meaning me and Lisa. Done. And Godfrey, when they tracked him down, as surely they would. We’d all be lucky if they sent us back to The Island. More probably, we’d be shot.

  I stood up from Ivarsen’s side and stomped out into the glaring sunlight, sweat making my shirt damp, and my eyes squinting in spite of my sunglasses. I screamed and kicked the treads on the shovel. Years of patient effort. Down the toilet. Thanks to a dumb kid.

  I’d have kept screaming, except that I thought of Ivarsen, and how he’d deserved this even less. Me, I’d lost my life a long time ago. And deservedly so. But Ivarsen had been a decent man. Such a waste!

  I went back inside to find Lisa rummaging furiously through Ivarsen’s other things. Our patient’s breaths had become quicker, more shallow, and a sheen of sweat covered the exposed areas of his skin. I unzipped his sleeping bag and threw it over him for a blanket, then went to help Lisa. She was obviously looking for a backup phone. Surely they wouldn’t issue Ivarsen just the single unit?

  The only thing we found was the remote for the mirrors in the crater.

  Lisa threw the remote to the floor in disgust, but I picked it up and walked outside, staring up into the cerulean sky. Lisa came out and looked up with me.

  “What?”

  “How many satellites watch this region?” I asked.

  “Heck if I know.”

  I kept looking. Then I quickly strode to the crater’s rim wall and scrambled up its side until I was standing on the top and staring down into the circular field of mirrors.

  The remote had several preset codes. I chose the toggle for manual movement. The circular thumb pad in the middle illuminated, and I depressed it, pushing first to the north, then to the south. Out in the field, the little servos on the base of each mirror began to whine. The mirrors obediently leaned to the south, then back to the north.

  Okay . . .

  I programmed in a repeating series of motions, pressed the SEND button, and then dropped the remote into my pocket and watched the mirrors begin their slow dance.

  Lisa nodded, catching on. “I hope someone is paying attention, Ev.”

  *

  The day wore on, and we stayed in the guard’s tent. Lisa occasionally sponged Ivarsen down with a wet rag, and I ran checks on his vitals every fifteen minutes as well as checking his pupils. The dilated one stayed dilated, and I wondered if the man wasn’t just a vegetable already.

  Out in the crater, the mirrors kept spinning and swiveling.

  There was no sound, other than the occasional wind across the camp.

  Evening came quickly. When I checked the supply bunker I discovered that Godfrey had been there before us and taken most of the cases of meals. He’d at least been that smart. But without water I knew he’d be getting thirsty real soon. And unless he found a natural spring, or we got some rain, he’d be in a bad way before the following day was out.

  I allowed myself a small amount of satisfaction at the thought of Godfrey dying for lack of water, then heated two trays for Lisa and I and went back into the tent.

  I almost dropped the trays when Ivarsen’s head turned to look at me.

  “Ladouceur,” the man said, whisperingly.

  My relief could not have been more obvious. “Good Lord, Ivarsen. I thought you’d gone to mush on us.”

  “Can’t—” he said, then stopped. “Hard . . . to think.”

  “Can you drink water?”

  “. . . Try . . .”

  Lisa put her canteen to his lips and gave him a sip, which he kept down. Giving him too much would be worse than giving him none at all, so we waited and watched while he blinked randomly.

  “Godfrey?” Ivarsen finally asked.

  “Gone,” I said. “He took the dumper, your gun, and most of the food. And your satellite phone. I’ve got the mirrors in the crater waving around, hoping to attract some satellite attention. Like it will do us any good after dark.”

  “Good . . . idea.”

  He went silent again for several minutes.

  Then, “Ev . . .”

  It was the only time he’d ever used my first name.

  I leaned over him. “Yah, boss?”

  “Not your fault . . . have to . . . tell them.”

  “Just hang in there. You’re not dead yet.”

  “Will be . . . soon.”

  Lisa held Ivarsen’s hand. Her expression was agonized.

  “Lisa,” Ivarsen said. “Find my . . . PDA.”

  Lisa and I bugged our eyes out at each other. We never knew he had one!

  Reading our surprise, Ivarsen said, “Access panel on the . . . solar power battery.”

  Lisa and I both raced out into the gloaming light, finding the big battery for the camp. We pried off the service plate with our fingernails. The little PDA was perched out of sight, just inside and to the left.

  Lisa grabbed it and we charged back to the hooch, freezing when we looked at Ivarsen’s face.

  His eyes were still open, along with his mouth. But his chest no longer drew air.

  *

  We did what we could for Ivarsen’s body, then despondently trudged for our separate hooches, figuring there was nothing to be done but to sleep, and wait.

  To my surprise, Lisa stopped me and motioned me towards her door.

  Raising an eyebrow, I went with her into the hooch. It was amazingly neat and orderly, right down to the dirt floor having been lined with used meal trays—as makeshift tiles.

  She sat down on her cot and I took a seat next to her, the lights
from EC5’s three small moons shining through the mesh walls around us.

  “Months? That was all?” Lisa said.

  “Yeah,” I replied. “Three. I was getting real short.”

  “I can’t even think about parole yet.”

  “Shoplifting?” I said, smiling at my own joke.

  “Drugs,” Lisa replied, not smiling. “I used to be a pharmacist, back in the world. Got hooked on my own product, you might say. Started dealing. Stupid. Got caught. Wound up detoxing on The Island. Almost killed me. But at least I got clean.”

  “That sucks,” I said, turning serious.

  “You ever been addicted to anything, Ev?”

  “Not really. I’m a teetotaler.” And that was the truth.

  Lisa shuddered. “Don’t. Don’t ever.”

  I’d never seen her more stone-cold serious.

  “Yes ma’am,” I whispered.

  And that was all I could say

  Silence filled the dark. This was more personal information than Lisa had ever shared with me before. I felt we were both in particularly uncomfortable territory.

  “Do you think we’ll be executed?” She asked.

  “Yes,” I said. “Corrections doesn’t play around when it comes to one of their own going down in the line of duty. On my last brick site, I saw a guy actually try to take out the guard with a shiv. Guy was crazy to do it. The guard emptied a whole clip into the perp. Corrections never even did an investigation. The hurt guard left on a medevac, and we three prisoners who remained, all got split up. That was when they sent me here. To work for Ivarsen.”

  Lisa’s head hung to her chest for an undetermined period of time, and when she looked back up at me I saw wetness on her cheeks. Which put a lump in my throat, for her sake. I suddenly felt stupid for telling her about the prisoner who got shot—like she really needed to hear that from me at this moment. Idiot.

  I sighed and looked at the floor. It wasn’t fair. She was young. And, apparently at last, clean. As a pharmacist, she was educated too. She deserved a fresh start. But wouldn’t get it.

  Just like me.

  For no particular reason that I can recall, I slowly leaned down and pressed my lips to hers. Just a peck.

  She surprised me in that my kiss was returned warmly.

  “Thank you,” Lisa said.

  “No, thank you,” I said.

  We held hands as we sat on her cot. The most intimate contact I’d had with any person in years.

  Then, she asked, “What about you, Ev?”

  “Huh?”

  “You now know why I’m in. But what about you?”

  My hesitation must have been palpable.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t want to pry. I just figured—”

  “It’s okay,” I said. “I suppose you oughta know.”

  I breathed in and collected my thoughts.

  The younger me had had a problem with his temper. I’d kept it under wraps when I was in school, but after I got out, I’d gone through a few different jobs because I couldn’t keep my lip zipped in front of the boss.

  Then came the day on the work site when one little jerk of an engineer had decided to get up in my face. He’d been smaller and smarter than me, and he’d let me know exactly what kind of loser he thought I was. Insults turned to screams, and before I knew it I’d knocked the man onto his back and began beating him with my wrench. Hard, vicious strokes. The kind of blows a man doesn’t just get up and walk away from.

  They told me later that the other workers had to pry me off the engineer, who was pronounced dead at the scene before the constabulary cuffed me and took me away to Corrections. I can still remember sitting in the back of the wagon, bawling my eyes out. What had I done?

  Dad had tried to keep me from doing time. He’d spent what he could for legal help. But it didn’t matter. I’d killed another human being. Eta Cassiopeiae Five might have been frontier territory, but you didn’t just murder a man—in hot blood or cold—and walk away from it unscathed.

  Back on Earth they had people to spare. On EC5? No way. Especially not when the victim had been educated.

  There weren’t any levels or degrees of punishment with Corrections. Once the government deemed you a threat to society, it was The Island. Goodbye. Civilization officially washed its hands of you.

  I still remembered the look on Dad’s face when they loaded me onto the transport. He’d been sure he was never going to see me again.

  I’d spent every day since regretting what I’d done. And learning to be a different person as a result.

  The whole time I told my story, Lisa listened intently. Then she said softly, “I’m sorry, Ev.”

  “I’m sorry too,” I said. “But not for this.”

  I bent my head down and kissed her again.

  *

  “Wake up, Prisoner Ladouceur.”

  I didn’t move. I felt like last night’s cold fish.

  “Prisoner Ladouceur, on your feet!”

  A gloved fist slugged my shoulder, and suddenly I was tumbling out of my cot, shaking. Morning light streamed into the tent, and I found myself face-to-face with four armed Corrections SWAT officers in mottled fatigues.

  Lisa was nowhere in sight. Had they hit her hooch first?

  “Chip worked, huh?” I said, realizing the time had finally come.

  “Yes,” said the tall, black-skinned SWAT who had sergeant’s stripes on his arm. “But we were already on our way when officer Ivarsen expired. That idea you had, about the mirrors . . . pretty ingenious. Nobody remembers Morse Code anymore. Except for the computers. When the satellites started picking up your S.O.S. flashing over and over again, it was obvious something had gone wrong.”

  I looked down at my nude self, and then back at the sergeant.

  “Do I need to get dressed, or can we finish it here?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Come on. Bullet to the head. It’ll be quick. Justice will be done.”

  The sergeant’s white teeth grinned like the Cheshire cat’s.

  He held up Ivarsen’s PDA.

  “Don’t worry. I think your alibi is good. Officer Ivarsen apparently thought well of you, and Prisoner Phaan too. He had a feeling Godfrey was bad news. Ivarsen’s last few logs pretty much state that Godfrey was going to pull something. Too bad we can’t put Godfrey up against a wall. He definitely deserved it.”

  “You found him?”

  “Idiot rolled the dumper. Doing ninety kay over broken terrain. No safety harness. Thrown from the cab and crushed. Not much else to do but toe-tag the remains.”

  “Huh. Can’t say he didn’t have it coming. So what happens now?”

  *

  Ivarsen’s logs made all the difference. It was like having a character witness speaking from the grave. That, combined with circumstantial evidence, put Phaan and I in the clear.

  They split us up, of course, and sent us to separate sites to finish our original sentences.

  Parole came, and I was released back into civilization.

  I stayed at my sister’s house while I looked for work. It was as discouraging as I’d expected. Even the asteroid miners didn’t want me.

  But I had to do something—I didn’t like the idea of hanging around sis’s place, endlessly mooching.

  Dad finally came to visit one weekend. He hugged me harder and longer than he ever had in my whole life. He listened to the whole story, about my time on The Island, about the brick sites, about Ivarsen’s death. Then he looked me in the eye from across the living room coffee table and suggested I apply to Corrections.

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” I said.

  “Not at all,” Dad said. “This Ivarsen guy, you said he seemed at ease around your crew? Ran the place like it was just another job? The man was obviously an ex con.”

  I hadn’t thought of that before. Ivarsen had seemed too decent to be a criminal.

  But then, so were Phaan and I.

  The next day, I did what Dad suggested. To
my surprise, they picked me up without question. And after twelve weeks at the Corrections Academy they sent me out to run one of the brick sites.

  It was interesting being on the flip side of things. I found I actually liked being back in the desert with its blinding sun and fresh air and shimmering desolation. I’d missed it.

  Planetary months rolled into a planetary year. Then two. Paycheck after paycheck. With no out-of-pocket cost for room or food, my savings began to pile up. Enough for me to seriously consider my future.

  Using my PDA, I got on the Corrections network one night. Within a few minutes, I found Lisa Phaan’s file.

  She’d been telling the truth about the drug stuff.

  But every record since her incarceration showed her clean and included continued reports of good behavior.

  I remembered the pleasant sensation of her lips on mine.

  Could we have something? Or was I just fooling myself?

  Snapping my PDA off, I determined that I’d find out.

  Meanwhile, there was always more clay. And there were always more bricks.

  Sometimes human colonists themselves can be away so long, they begin seeing the Earth as a romantic, hopeful place different from what their ancestors who founded the colony might remember. In a reverse of our other stories, a bit of a Moses-esque promised land mythology arises amongst a religious sect of isolated colonists in regards to the Earthly home they left behind, driving some of them to live for one goal: to return home. But what if home is not the place their legends recall?

  THE FAR SIDE OF THE WILDERNESS

  ALEX SHVARTSMAN

  One way or another, I’m nearing the end of my journey.

  The spaceship is quiet now, except for the low rumble of the engines. It took me days, but I found all of the speakers which were filling the cabins with a cacophony of alarm bells. I pried each speaker open with a knife and cut the little rubbery wires, until the last of the infernal things had finally been silenced.