***
Doc died three days later. I found his body sprawled on the floor in the corridor outside the galley. He’d run out of room on the walls inside and was working his way down the hallway towards the control room. I was glad to see he’d found the turkey gravy.
I don’t know what killed him, but I moved him into the freezer with the others. The freezer wasn’t working too well. I don’t know why. I don’t know much anymore. Seems hard to concentrate. Maybe my left hand wasn’t the only thing affected by the wormhole.
But I’m going to keep my promise; I’m going to get Anne back to Earth, home by Christmas.
I was a little worried, though. I’d been sending signals for days, maybe weeks, I wasn’t sure, but hadn’t heard a peep from anyone back home. It didn’t make sense. We were close enough, now, even for radio waves, much less sub-space sonics.
But nothing.
Zip. Zilch. Nada.
I couldn’t even raise Moon Base.
Something was wrong. I mean, even more wrong than everything else.
The next day was Christmas Eve. I moved Anne out of her bunk and into the control room, so she could see the glorious blue-green globe floating before us. But she couldn’t see it, of course. Not just because her eyes weren’t there anymore.
Anne wasn’t there anymore either, at least the part of her that mattered. What was left—well, it didn’t bear thinking of.
And I still couldn’t raise a soul on anything, across any communication band.
Surely everyone wasn’t off celebrating Christmas? Not everyone in the entire world, not while we were up above their heads, floating like the biggest tree ornament in history?
“Houston, come in,” I said for the thousandth time—or maybe the millionth. I didn’t know anymore. “Houston, do you read?”
I’d edged the Starbound into orbit, just outside the atmosphere. Not geo-synchronous; I didn’t want to hover over the same spot. I wanted to see the world, that lovely ball of water and mud, turning like an azure jewel below me, as she’d turned forever and would always do so.
I watched as the knife-edge of black raced towards me—night approaching, a galloping horse. Did night bring his mares with him?
The world beneath me was covered by the galloping dark. I watched for the lights that meant cities, wondering how many I’d be able to name.
Darkness covered the earth.
Then I remembered the last thing Doc had told me. The wormhole; it had been a temporal anomaly. That meant—what, exactly?
I put my head in my hand—my right one. The left one doesn’t work anymore. Did I mention that already? I could smell things on my hand that I didn’t want to think about, but I tried to ignore them.
Temporal. That meant time, I was pretty sure.
What about anomaly?
My head hurt.
Then the words began to come. Incongruity. Abnormality. Inconsistency.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Wrong time. Right place.
Sure. But wrong time. Wrong time.
The darkness below me was complete.
So was the darkness in my soul.
I’d got Anne home, but was I too late for Christmas, or too early?
Didn’t matter. She was gone. So were Doc and all my crew. Now it was my turn.
I set the controls. A slowly decaying orbit; that was my best option. Didn’t want to hurt anyone below. The Starbound would drop into the atmosphere, then jerk out again. Just like skipping stones across a pond. But finally, she’d be captured by the thickening air and start to descend, catching fire from the friction of the air against her sides. She’d drop, lower and lower, slower and slower as the air grabbed at her, her sides gleaming brighter and brighter as the heat built to a fury, hotter than the sun.
By that time, I’d be dead. I’d be with all my crew.
And with Anne.
“I’m sorry, Anne,” I whispered. “I did my best. But I failed you.”
And I seemed to hear her answer me: “No one could have done better.”
I only wished it were true.
Omega and Alpha & Rest My Brothers Page 3