Chapter 4

“You will be very weak for the first seven days.”

Astrix didn’t hear her mother’s warning. But then she didn’t need to. She’d studied physics, gravity, biology and chemistry during her sixteen years of life on Space Station Independence.

If you could call living inside a glass and metal box in the vacuum of space life.

Astrix sure didn’t.

“Will the Gaians like me?” Astrix wondered aloud. Beyond her window, the northeastern shores of the continent known as Africa exited night. She found the long Nile River and imagined that the ancient city of Cairo with its pharaohs and pyramids still thrived there.

But it didn’t. In fact, not more than ten thousand people lived on the entire, arid continent, ninety-nine point nine percent of them in Unity.

“You are a beautiful young woman,” her mother said too loudly. She combed her only daughter’s bobbed, black hair from crown to neck, again and again. “You’re a perfect example of humanity: tall, Asian, athletically inclined.” She stood back and surveyed her daughter. “Your rear end use could some padding.”

Astrix turned, her long bangs swirling into her thin, black eyes, and glared at her mother. “Small behinds are more efficient, Mother.”

“The Gaians are a queer bunch. They will not appreciate your upgrades, or your small behind. And, frankly,” she added in a whisper, “they want us all dead.”

Astrix met her mother’s eyes. “I don’t believe that!”

“Don’t be naive!” She pulled a bottle of gel from a panel in the wall next to Astrix and squirted a small bit into her fingers.

“No gel!” Astrix stood up and examined her gray jumper in the dressing table mirror. It displeased her.

Her mother pursed her lips. “The gel will give you–”

“No,” Astrix replied. “But if you can lend me great-grandmother’s orange dress…” She looked at her mother in the mirror, her eyebrows pleading.

Her mother glared at her. “Your father has already paired you, and well. Don’t get any ideas about–”

The door to Astrix’s compartment swished open. Astrix turned her body away in modesty, then prepared her sharpest glare for the only person who could possibly be so gauche as to barge in without knocking.

“Hello Astrix!”

Astrix turned her glare on the glasses-wearing, pimple-infested visage of Meridian, and added a sneer just to remind the both of them how much she hated the boy. Two years her junior, math champion since forever, he and Astrix were paired just last month at the joint insistence of their fathers.

And Meridian couldn’t wait to get things started.

Shorter than her but wider, his every smugness-exuding move caused her new agony. She turned away, her arms crossed, and stared out at the newly illuminated continent below her. Sunlight sparkled on the Nile and she took it as a sign. She must leave Independence, and never return.

“I want to wish you a safe trip,” Meridian said. “I made a tool for you. It will help you find your way on the surface of the planet.”

Astrix’s mother received the gift. “Thank you so much, very kind of you, what a dutiful and attentive pair, don’t you agree, Astrix?” She pinched the loose skin of Astrix’s shoulder and twisted.

Astrix pulled her shoulder away from her mother but the woman’s grip was steel. Astrix gritted her teeth. Fine. She turned back to Meridian. “Yes, very kind, thank you Meridian.”

He leaned forward, his cheeks puffed out and caffeine-stained teeth appeared where his smile should be. “I’ll be here waiting for you, preparing our berth for your return.”

Birth. And berth. The very sound disgusted her. The old people were crammed four to a room. The young people, six. More babies was out of the question for the people of Independence. But they were especially repugnant to Astrix. To think, something alive, wriggling inside of her. She shivered.

Meridian set the box on her dresser, turned and left, the sliding door jamming half-closed behind him with a whirring-crunching noise.

“Mother? Please?”

Her mother walked over, kicked the leading edge of the door, swiped her hand over the control sensor twice and then smacked the wall under the sensor. The door swished closed.

“About that dress?” Astrix asked.

“No, little girl. This is a scientific and diplomatic–”

“Father said I didn’t have to accept him!”

Her mother crossed her arms and shook her head. “This is a community And you know what that means.”

The door swished open again. Two men in navy blue flight suits stood outside.

Her mother grabbed Astrix under the armpits and pulled her up from the chair.

“Time to go? Already?” A dark fear welled up in Astrix. She turned and hugged her mother tight.

“You’re going to be fine. It’s only a year. Just remember why you were chosen, my darling gremlin. Remember your mission. Your people are counting on you.”

General Javal paraded into the tiny room, his funny gold and blue hat under his right arm, his full complement of shined medals on the chest of his matching blue uniform and his close-cropped mustache twitching more rapidly than ever.

“My dear Astrix Volkov, congratulations on your selection as Prime for the year 2205. You have demonstrated an unflinching commitment to science and–”

“Can we skip to the end? I’m ready,” Astrix said.

All eyes focused disapproving glances on the impudent teen.

Javal cleared his throat and began to pace in a line perpendicular to Astrix’s line of sight, blocking her path to the door.

“Now listen here, Ms….”

“Volkov,” her mother filled in.

“Ms. Volkov. The Gaians want you to believe that you are receiving an advanced education in biology, zoology, environmental sciences and other soft disciplines that we lack expertise in. This is propaganda!”

Astrix sighed and sat down. Her mother grabbed her and pulled her back up again.

“Vile and self-conscious propaganda! The Gaians have painted themselves into a corner down there. They wiped out ninety-eight point six percent of the Earthbound population while we watched, unable to intervene, up here.”

A mischievous energy surged through Astrix. “And why didn’t we? We have access to the space elevators. We–”

“Child, this is why you received a B in our history class, isn’t it?”

Astrix looked down.

“Before they killed off nine point nine billion of our fellow human beings, the Gaians built and co-opted from others the great production and defense systems of Earth.”

“They don’t–” Astrix started.

Javal looked at his wrist. “It’s time.” He turned and walked out of the room. His two officers strode in, turned sharply around and interlocked one arm each with each of Astrix’s arms. They marched as one to the door.

Astrix stopped. “Wait. Mother?”

Her mother trotted over to face her daughter.

Astrix looked up at her, her eyes wet and red. Her arms shook but she reached them out and clung tightly to the older woman. “I miss you already.”

Her mother gave Astrix a quick, tight hug. “Back in a year, yes.” The words scraped from her throat. She turned and trotted down the corridor.

“Come along!” Javal yelled.

They exited into the pristine, narrow hallway. To their right, a square shaft ran up to the top of this apartment block, so far up that Astrix never managed to actually see its end.

Javal held the elevator doors open for them. The three joined him, the doors swished closed and they rose, the g-force pulling at Astrid’s feet. She looked at Javal and he regarded her severely.

“Remember your mission. We need free access to Earth for soil, seeds, water, air and other resources,” he said.

The elevator burst out of the living area and into the farming zone. Greens and yellows burst around her through the transparent elevator walls. Water flowed and steam obscured her view in places.

“I still don’t understand why we can’t get what we need from the Moon and the asteroids,” Astrix said.

“You must not speak of that! Ever!” Javal yelled.

Astrix took a step back and one of the airmen pushed her back towards Javal. “I know, okay? I know. You and my mother told me a million times.”

Javal’s hands shook. “If they find out, they have the weapons necessary to put a hole in the hull. What atmosphere we have will vent in minutes.”

“But why? We’re friends! I mean that’s why I’m going, right?”

The elevator rocketed past the grow zone and slowed to a stop. Above them, gargantuan, orange strips reflected sunlight. Next to the strips, the black of space showed through in a narrow ribbon. All around them, green fields and steel structures curved up and away in a thin half-circle. Beyond that, Astrix knew that the circle completed in a tubular torus. Today she would see the complete structure that was her home for the first time.

Or so she hoped.

A shrill beep started on Javal’s wrist and then seemed to come from everywhere around her. Javal tapped his wrist.

“Damn!” he muttered.

Astrix watched him, a knot forming in her stomach. How serious was it this time? Was it the end of Independence? Or a minor malfunction of a forgotten system?

The shuttle landed next to them. A transparent sphere with four seats, its four spinning helicopter blades slowed and it bounced gently to a stop next to them.

“My dear,” Javal said, his face dark and his eyes looking far away past her, “you will go on alone. I wish you alertness, strength of will and a good memory.” He turned back to the elevator, the two airmen leading the way.

“I will do my best,” Astrix said.

Javal stopped, turned and walked back to her. “I don’t want to pressure you, my dear, but you - this mission of yours - is the last hope for us, and possibly for the Earth as well.”

Last hope? Astrix’s eyes glazed over as she struggled to process what could only be hyperbole. But Javal was not known for being dramatic.

“You were not our first choice, Astrix. You were not even on our list of candidates. But then it is the Gaians who choose the student each year and not us.”

Not their first choice? “But I earner the best–” she started.

“Sir,” an airman spoke up, “Dr. Leavitt says that system-wide pressure has dropped five percent. She’s asking for a decision.”

Javal listened, his eyes still firmly on Astrix. He nodded to the airman then turned back to her. “Astrix?”

“Yes, Professor?”

“Don’t screw this up!” Javal turned and yelled into his wrist. “Get as many people out as you can but seal it off before we hit seven–” The elevator doors closed behind him and he and the two airmen disappeared into the floor.

Astrix turned and strolled towards the shuttle. She climbed up, took a seat and strapped herself in. The craft’s blades spun up with a deep hum that made her gut vibrate. The sudden urge to vomit her morning rations grabbed her. She covered her mouth and choked them back down.

The door jerked from its position behind her, rolled into place across the opening and sealed with an increase in pressure that caused her ears to smart.

This was it, really it. She was going to Earth. It was really happening. And if she didn’t want to come back to this rusty deathtrap, well no one would make her. She’d run away. Maybe with a boy. Maybe on her own. She’d survive, have a garden, and that would be it. A small smile crept across her face and she thrilled at her escape plan.

The craft rose up and angled forward. She looked down on her people, her world, the only one she’d ever known. It was beautiful and frightening, a strip of steel and life-giving green between the fiery orange sun and the icy black vacuum.

She zipped through the exit hatch. The blades slowed and thrusters fired her forward, the seat biting into her back.

Vacuum all around her now, she turned to finally see the torus in its entirety, a chill passing over her before the heaters kicked into gear. It was a marvel of science, a wonder–

At the bottom of the ring, at its farthermost point from Earth, atmosphere and debris vented violently. Astrix did some mental calculations. That was where– No!

She moved to stand up but the harness held her back. She flapped her hands over her torso searching for the release mechanism but her mind could only think of him.

He worked in that section. He maintained the atmospheric scrubbers. And the water treatment plant. He was the Chief Engineer for Life Support. If there was trouble, he would be the last to leave.

The craft fired reverse thrusters. But Astrix’s eyes were on her home. She strained to distinguish the form of the debris that still exited through the hull breach. He might still be alive. He might be in a suit. He could exit once the section depressurized, then re-enter through the port.

Her craft slowed and entered the dispatching tunnel of the Gaian-controlled space elevator. The craft latched onto the two guide cables. The door closed behind her, cutting off her view of Independence. Red lights flashed. The compartment twisted around her.

“Remain still and calm. The mandatory inspection is underway. Resist or attempt to flee and your craft will be destroyed and discarded.” The voice was female but there was no courtesy in it, only a dead metal threat.

Her thoughts returned to the hole in her home. He was safe. He had to be. They have protocols for these things.

“Approved. Welcome to the Gaian System, Astrix Volkov. Stay in your seat until the door opens.”

The craft bounced as air filled the tube around her. The bottom retracted and the walls moved past her. Slowly, she felt gravity tug at her feet and pull her deeper into the chair.

Now she could see. Below her, deep green land decorated with a deep blue lake and two thin rivers stretched out to meet yellow-brown desert, then the deep blue ocean.

Braking began. She lost her view again.

The craft slowed to a stop, bounced and the door next to her opened. She stepped out and a rail-thin man greeted her.

“Ms. Volkov?”

She nodded. The air was heavy, hot and wet. A fresh smell, like soap only softer permeated the air. She stepped forward, tripped on nothing at all and fell to her knees.

“Ms. Volkov, welcome to the Gaian System.” He paused, looked away, then back again. “We just received word from the space station. I’m sorry, but your father has passed on.”