One Giant Leap

by Heather Kaczynski

  A barren planet.

  I took another long, slow breath, concentrating on the feeling of my ribs expanding, the muscles pulling taut. We had come all this way. We had been invited here. Why?

  “View screen up,” Bolshakov said.

  The screen revealed itself from behind a panel in the bulkhead. We waited, but the field of black never changed.

  “What’s wrong with it?” Shaw asked.

  Jeong wobbled to her feet like a newborn colt—so odd to see from a woman I knew was so physically strong—and checked the controls. “The cameras are functioning normally. Computer, explain.”

  Sunny’s voice came unaffected from the console. “Odysseus is currently underground.”

  The five of us shared bewildered expressions.

  Jeong narrowed her eyes. “Computer, show recorded footage of ship landing.”

  A dull yellow-and-gunmetal desert materialized on the screen—the surface of the moon, small enough that we could see the curve of the horizon even as it came closer, zooming toward us at rapid speed. The bare rock was a mess of rubble, sharp mountains and deep cracks in the bedrock, veins of exposed metals running through the dust. The surface had been pummeled by asteroids and radiation until there was not a square inch of ground left unbroken.

  An alien sun, comparatively smaller than our own, was a soft peach light in the dusty gray sky, and then it was gone as the camera footage turned black.

  But the clock was still running—we hadn’t lost the feed.

  “What the hell happened?” Copeland’s voice was growing louder with frustration. “We’re obviously underground. But how did we get here?”

  “Sunny, play the footage again, please,” I said.

  Again, the broken surface of the world came into view and zoomed larger, the details becoming more high-def the closer we came. This time I kept my eyes on the ground. And just before the cameras went dark, I saw something change. “There! Sunny, pause the feed!”

  I balanced on legs that felt like they’d run a marathon and pointed to the spot on the screen. “Right there. Do you see? Sunny, rewind and play back at half speed.”

  As the crew watched, a dark spot appeared on the screen, growing larger as we approached. A hatch. A metal hatch in the surface of the planet.

  We’d been flown by autopilot through a hangar door and into an underground shelter.

  “Computer,” Shaw began, “how long have we been here, on the planet?”

  “Twelve Earth hours have elapsed since landing.”

  There it was again—the itch in my memory. There was something hiding there. Something massive. As I tried to dig deeper into the secrets my brain was keeping from me, a real alarm began to blare.

  “Proximity alert,” Sunny said, her unruffled calm belying the danger of the siren.

  Something was moving outside.

  We looked at each other, then at our commander.

  Bolshakov climbed to his feet, attempting to hide just what an effort it was. “Ladies and gentleman,” he began, fitting his helmet back over his head. It closed with a small whoosh of air as it sealed to his suit. “We came here to do a job. Let us go and greet our hosts.”

  Two

  “COMMANDER?” SHAW ASKED, awaiting direction. A sheen of sweat had broken out on his forehead. This was the one situation none of us had been able to rehearse. Not even their years of experience could help them.

  Bolshakov’s face was haggard, but his eyes were alert and sharp. “We came all this way. We might as well go out and take a look.” NASA had known what they were doing appointing Bolshakov; he radiated decisive strength. “Suit up.”

  “Commander?” Shaw repeated. He shot a look at Jeong, and then to me. Then, “Yes, sir.”

  I had already put my helmet back on. We’d stay in the same suits we’d hibernated in, the black, skintight suit I’d first worn while in training back on Earth. It was the newest technology, able to protect us from temperature, radiation, and pressure extremes without sacrificing mobility.

  “Computer, exterior atmosphere reading? What are we walking into?”

  Sunny rattled off some stats as I began checking my suit over to make sure there were no irregularities. Copeland came over to help, her expert eyes and hands double-checking me.

  Jeong translated the numbers. “Seems like we’re in a bubble of protected atmosphere. Might even be breathable.”

  “Even so, we’re not going to risk contamination.” Copeland helped me into my Portable Life-Support System, or PLS, a heavy backpack that hooked into my helmet, and stuck her own helmet over her head with one hand. “The rebreathers should be enough for a good long look.”

  “We’re really going out there?” Shaw asked. His eyes jolted nervously to the rest of us. “Now? We’re still weak. We have time to test if it’s safe outside.”

  “What, you think we came all this way to sit around on the tarmac?” Copeland smirked, her voice coming muted and electronic through the helmet’s speakers as she slipped her own PLS on. Then, more serious, she added, “Temperature and radiation readings are all in the clear. There’s even oxygen and nitrogen in comparable levels to Earth’s atmosphere. I’d say we were brought here for a reason, and that reason probably wasn’t to kill us.”

  Shaw swallowed hard but nodded.

  Copeland approached me. She displayed no fear or hesitation. She tapped the side of my helmet with one finger. “Remember your digital camera. All the footage from our helmet cams will be sent to Sunny to create a backup on Odysseus. Just tell her when to start and stop recording.”

  I knew that. Or at least, I had at some point. It was in one of the million-page manuals they’d given us to read before launch. Pull yourself together, Gupta!

  Shaw helped me buckle the straps on my oxygen tank. “Be careful,” he said in a low voice. Logan Shaw had been my easygoing instructor of physics and engineering. He’d been the nicest of my teachers. And now he was worried.

  “Shaw, you stay here in case there’s trouble. Keep in radio contact. Gupta’s connection to Sunny makes her our default communications operator. Relay any messages through her.” Bolshakov grabbed his gear, and we checked each other’s PLSs to make sure everything was functional.

  We followed Bolshakov into the airlock, leaving Shaw in the command module.

  The airlock door slid closed behind us, and while we waited for decompression, Bolshakov came in over the comm. “Anyone come up with something historical to say?”

  Before anyone could respond, the exterior door opened.

  “Sunny, please begin recording.” I said it quietly, without clicking my radio on so the others could hear, and felt that presence again—that flicker of recognition of someone turning their attention to me. It’d felt like a bizarre morphine dream.

  But now I was awake, and she was still there. “Sunny? You there?”

  Yes, Cassie. A mobile copy of my program has been downloaded into your suitboard computer. I am creating a backup of the video you are recording and maintaining contact with Odysseus.

  Sunny’s omnipresence in my brain was almost a relief. I reached up and touched the side of my helmet, as if I could actually hear her. It. Sunny was just a computer program, not an actual person. It was hard to remember sometimes. “Thanks. Am I the only crew member you’re communicating with?”

  Yes, Cassie. I have adapted to your brain waves.

  There would be no communication with Earth on this trip—not from so far away. We were on our own here entirely. If things went wrong, the only way anyone would know was by the records Sunny was saving on board.

  I took a steadying breath.

  Standing behind both Bolshakov and Copeland in the narrow opening, I saw little of what was outside the ship, only a slice of smooth metal wall. The ground was a red, dusty stone, rough but mostly level.

  Bolshakov took the first step onto the ground. I caught the historic moment just in time. This was the third alien world to see human footprints. The very first outsid
e of our own solar system.

  And I was witnessing it.

  One giant leap for mankind. Impossible not to think it.

  Bolshakov turned and looked back at us, a rare smile crossing his features. “Come on, now. We have lingered long enough on the shores of the cosmic ocean.”

  A flutter of nervous glee escaped me, a huff of laughter halted by my helmet. Bolshakov was quoting Carl Sagan. Nothing about this moment could have been more perfect.

  My heartbeat and the whir of the air were the only sounds that filled my ears.

  Copeland took her first steps down.

  Then it was my turn. I took a quick breath and jumped, landing harder than I’d expected to, with both feet in a puff of rust-colored dust. I’d expected less gravity on such a small moon.

  I crunched the dirt beneath my boot experimentally, examining the tread my footprints left. Alien dirt, I marveled. Alien molecules on my boots.

  I wanted to dance—to scream—to twirl around like the child within me who was accomplishing her wildest dream. I restrained myself to a secret grin, and thrilled in the trembling of my limbs.

  Jeong was a bit more agile than I was in her landing, and she carefully avoided treading over my first footprints. I appreciated that.

  For a moment, none of us moved.

  “This is . . . not what I expected,” Jeong said.

  The walls were smooth, pale gray, curving far above our heads to form a sort of domed tube. Pale gray light seemed to emanate from the walls. There was no other explanation I could come up with, as I saw no light source, and yet there was enough light to see thirty feet down the corridor, at least.

  It appeared there was only one way forward: the tube ahead was long enough that darkness shrouded wherever its destination led.

  Something was strange about the walls of the cavern. Curious, I wandered closer. They were entirely seamless.

  Up close, I could see just what had thrown me from afar: it didn’t look solid. Corporeal, but with shifting and dipping patterns in the shadows along its surface. Like gentle ripples in water.

  Copeland came up behind me, her confused expression matching my own. Bolshakov and Jeong waited and watched as Copeland reached out a hesitant hand. “If I didn’t know better . . .” Her hand hovered over the surface of the wall. “It looks . . .”

  Her fingers touched the material lightly, and the wall bent under them.

  Copeland yanked her hand back, and then laughed. “My God. It gives way. Like rubber . . . or something biological. It feels like touching a dolphin.”

  Something else was happening, too. A soft yellow glow was growing at the spot where Copeland had touched. As if in recognition, as if she had awakened something.

  My hand itched to touch it, but we didn’t know what this was, what Copeland may have done, or activated. The light faded again to nothing, leaving no trace.

  “My God,” she said again, and we looked at each other. Silently we both decided to step away from the wall and rejoin the group.

  We moved forward methodically, examining every shadowed niche.

  “Gravity’s a bit heavier,” Jeong noted, her voice warm and confident in my helmet radio, as clear as if she were speaking directly into my ear. “I’d say 1.3 g. Strange for a small moon.”

  “Perhaps there is a dense core,” Bolshakov responded, his voice tight. “Very intriguing.”

  We were all a bit on edge. Something had alerted the ship’s proximity alarm, but there seemed to be nothing out here at all.

  We took a few more cautious steps forward, staying in a tight group.

  “Perhaps the alien civilization lives belowground to evade the surface radiation,” Copeland mused.

  It was a valid hypothesis. Problem was, there was no civilization to be seen.

  I turned back around to see Odysseus, its white surface now dull and pitted with innumerable dents and scratches, no longer pristine. A huge gleaming piece of Earth in an alien landscape.

  “Commander,” Copeland said suddenly, her voice a note of warning.

  I felt a chill of fear.

  Something approached us, but the light was too dim to make it out. Something was disturbing the shadows up ahead.

  Bolshakov raised an arm, signaling us to wait. Tingles of anticipation vibrated in my hands and legs.

  He took a step forward. And then another.

  Then he came to a sudden halt. I froze behind his outstretched arm.

  There was . . . a person coming toward us. A man, by the shape and size.

  He came closer.

  I took a step back.

  Bolshakov held his ground.

  The man stopped. We waited, but it seemed now that he was waiting for us to cross the final distance ourselves.

  Bolshakov stepped forward, and we each followed him from a few paces back. As we neared the figure, I realized there were others—more humanlike shapes, shadowed in the recesses of the large corridor. Waiting, watching.

  Now I could tell the strangers were wearing suits not unlike ours, thin and body-conforming, black but laced with veins of iridescent colors, catching the dull light with each minute movement.

  They were not wearing helmets. So when the lead figure stepped forward, into the warm circle of organic light in which we stood, his face was clearly visible.

  He appeared to be a middle-aged man. Tall, with black hair graying at the temples in a way that made him look distinguished and wise. Thick neck, square jaw. The shoulders of a linebacker and the posture of a leader.

  And I recognized him.

  He was the “Georgian ambassador” I’d met at Marshall, in another life, five hundred light-years away.

  Luka’s father.

  Three

  LUKA’S FATHER OPENED his arms low and spoke with the slow, gentle tone of one who approaches an animal he fears will bite him. “Welcome, ambassadors of Earth. We have been waiting for you. I am sorry that we have asked you to come such a very long way, but I fear we had no choice.”

  Everything came back to me in a dizzying rush, a tidal wave that threatened to knock me over. I took a stumbling backward step, remembering all that I had forgotten.

  Luka had been on board Odysseus when I’d awoken. It had not been a hallucination. Now that I saw his father in front of me, I knew it had been real.

  But I still didn’t understand why.

  “I am sorry to startle you,” the man said. “We thought it best to be forthcoming.”

  No one on my side knew what to say. Until Copeland. “Who are you? Why do you look human?”

  The ambassador gave a pained smile. “Nothing has a short answer, I’m afraid. Perhaps this may help.” He turned back toward his people in the shadows and gestured. Out of the small crowd emerged a familiar face.

  Everyone recognized Luka; I heard their small intakes of breath over the comm. Luka had trained with all of us—had been chosen over me to take this spot. Until he’d been sent home. Or so I’d thought.

  Luka appeared unchanged from my memory. He hadn’t shaved in a couple of days, and looked like maybe he hadn’t slept in a couple of days, either. His hair was a little longer, a little messier.

  He didn’t betray that he saw me. His focus remained resolute on Commander Bolshakov.

  We were pretending that our meeting aboard Odysseus had not happened, then.

  “That’s . . . that’s not Luka,” Jeong said over internal comm. “Is it?”

  “Is someone impersonating him?” Copeland asked.

  “I think it is Luka,” I told them on private comm. “That man there? I met him on Earth. Before the competition. He’s Luka’s father, and the Georgian ambassador to the US. Or at least, that’s how we were introduced.”

  “What the hell is going on here?” Copeland asked, this time on external comm so that the strangers could hear.

  Ambassador Kereselidze’s voice maintained its cautious cadence. “There is no need to fear us. We have no weapons.”

  Bolshakov seemed unsure wha
t to say. Recovering his confident posture, he finally settled on, “Nor do we. But you have the upper hand.”

  The ambassador looked at Luka, as if asking for his help. Luka took a few steps toward me, but stopped short when Bolshakov bristled and put his palm forward reflexively in the universal gesture for stop right there. “Something is going on here and I want to know what it is before you get any closer, son.”

  Luka’s voice mimicked the placating tones of his father. “Bolshakov. You know me. You all do. We trained together. Please. You can trust me.”

  “But you’re—you were on Earth. You were in the competition for Gupta’s spot, for Christ’s sake!” Copeland said.

  Luka nodded. “Yes, this is true.”

  “You were a spy,” Jeong said quietly, coming to the same conclusion I had.

  Alarm flared in his features before retreating. For a moment he seemed to consider lying. “Yes. In a way. But it was a necessary precaution.”

  “You’ve had a long journey,” said the ambassador. He swung his arm in a low arc, a gesture to follow him. “You are likely hungry and tired from the journey. There is much to discuss, but it will hold.”

  “Sir?” Copeland spoke over the private channel. “Should we get Shaw?”

  “Don’t mention Shaw,” Bolshakov ordered. “We’ll leave him for now.” Returning to external comm, he told the ambassador: “Lead the way.”

  Bolshakov obviously didn’t trust them, but he had made up his mind. He was the commander.

  We followed him.

  The ambassador, Luka, and a small handful of the others led us down a passageway and through a thick door. The room was smaller than the hangarlike space behind us, but it was still spacious. The walls inside this room were the same as outside the chamber, but now they were lit from within, emanating the same soft yellow glow as they had when Copeland had touched them. The effect was warm and comforting. Probably on purpose.

  It was alien, but it was obvious some effort had been made to cater to humans. There were chairs around an oblong table, enough for each of us and Shaw. It seemed there wasn’t much point keeping Shaw on Odysseus after all. They knew how many of us there were.