by Kate Rauner
There was something new, though. A large decal stuck to the last door before the blue residential segment. It had a cartoon drawing of an eye and the word glasses.
What a funny, old-fashioned idea that was. But Erik said he needed to study the robo-surgeons before he'd let them operate on anyone's eyes, and, besides, vision had to be stable before surgery was indicated. So, glasses. A temporary solution.
At least eyesight would be corrected eventually. Stasis sickness couldn't be fixed. Someone would have to invent a treatment once they figured out what was actually wrong with the damaged nerves. Drew was wearing his ankle brace again because even fifty percent gravity made him wobbly. His numb left foot was the only part of his legs that wasn't sore, though the aches were fading as he adjusted to gravity. He could ignore the niggling twinge that clung to each joint when he was busy in the bio lab.
Drew ran a finger across the decal. Vision problems were common thanks to body fluids shifting upward in low gravity, and more likely to effect men than women for some unknown reason. In a rare piece of luck, he'd been spared.
The station's spin wasn't enough to return eyeballs to normal, but no one seemed ready to argue with Erik. Glasses were an improvement. Everything on the station was an improvement.
Drew stepped over the segment's lip into a lounge above the blue quarters.
People had brought their old clothes from Earth with them, so there weren't a lot of coveralls to see. Erik performed his balance evaluations in the lounge, and a group encouraged one woman as she tried to walk a straight line while blindfolded with her arms folded across her chest.
Farther down at the segment's middle, someone had activated the screens that curved across the ceiling from one edge of the floor to the opposite side. Several paces long, they presented a view of Titan on one side and Saturn on the other. The fuzzy yellowish moon wasn't very interesting, but Saturn was overwhelming. Its braided rings cast a shadow on the bright, striated globe.
The screens were meant to simulate a window, but the worlds hung stationery despite the station's spin. That wasn't realistic, but there was no reason to make everyone space sick with a view of actual motion. Titan orbited pretty much at Saturn's equator, so would the rings show at all?
Drew snorted. Maybe the image wasn't accurate either, not exactly what you'd see from a window. A twist on reality, like the Kin's supposed genealogical history. Drew knew better, he'd been able to study archeology in his university library on Earth. But to say anything, about genealogy or the view of Saturn, would only get him in trouble. He might not be very smart, but he'd learned when to keep his mouth shut.
He knew most of the Kin who sat in chairs below the screens, leaning forward on their knees in some engaging discussion.
"Hey, Drew," a squarely built blond said. "We're volunteering to form a utilities team. Wanna join us?" He tapped his sleeve and Saturn was overlaid with a square window showing a maintenance video.
"Thanks, but I need to get back to my lab." Drew continued to the far end of the segment before stopping to look back. Four dozen Kin were hidden from sight by the curve of the segment, but knowing they were there made the station feel alive.
Caring for each other and setting up crews, they could turn the ring into a home. Right now, it seemed like they'd carry on this way forever, friendly and cooperative. They hadn't heard yet about Maliah, but Orpheus linked their pads to the domes' cybernet, so news would arrive soon.
A baby was good news, but Fynn said his mother was worried. That made Drew worried too and quivers tightened his gut. The scene hidden by the segment's curve was a beautiful bubble, bound to burst. He shivered.
***
Sitting on a hallway bench, arms folded, Fynn waited. Every time he managed to slip into planning for the furnaces or the fuel depot, a groan from the treatment room yanked him back. When quiet resumed, his heart raced worse than ever. A scream launched him to his feet.
Seconds hung in the air until Greta opened the door just enough to slip out. Her face was like marble, and she shook her head. "Muscles in the birth canal were weak, and there was so much fluid in the baby's lungs. She never tried to take a breath."
Fynn stood slack-jawed, refusing to understand what his mother was saying.
"You mean..." Fynn gulped. "The baby? It's dead?"
Greta nodded and slumped against the wall.
"Fynn." Maliah's call was urgent.
He traded places with Greta so he could open the door. Inside the small room, Kumar hovered near the foot of the bed, fiddling with some hand-held instrument. Maj pressed herself into a corner, her eyes red-rimmed.
His sister lay against a pile of pillows, golden strands of hair plastered to her face, hugging a blanketed bundle.
"Maliah, I'm so sorry."
Her eyes scanned the room, unfocused until they landed on Fynn, and her face hardened.
Her voice was so low, he leaned forward to hear the growl. "You did this."
He blinked, confused.
"I should have been on the station. You stopped Magnus. You ruined everything."
Kumar's eyes widened in alarm. "Doctor Lund. Greta! We need you back."
Maj reached a hand to Maliah's shoulder but she shook it off.
"I'll never forget this." Maliah sat straight up, hugging her tiny bundle. "Get out."
Fynn stumbled against his mother at the door, pushed past her into the hallway and staggered out the clinic door.
He stopped, surrounded by a mass of blue coveralls. Dozens of people quietly pressed close. Some message from inside, perhaps, or maybe the look on his face, began to spread the news. Close to the door, people wailed and fell into each other's arms.
The chant began. "Kin, Kin, Kin."
Fynn darted through the crowd, the chant filling his ears until he was clear to run for the greenhouse tunnel.
Chap ter 21
G reta sat at her daughter's side. "I'm so sorry. Please know that you're not alone. I'll be here. And Maj is right beside you." She glanced at the adjunct. Lines of sorrow turned her face old.
Maliah hugged the blanket-wrapped baby. Her throat convulsed from time to time, and when she spoke, her voice was hoarse. "I failed."
"No, Maliah."
Maj lay a hand softly on the trailing edge of the blanket. "Your baby will never be forgotten. She's a martyr to lead Kin into paradise."
Maliah looked up, her amber eyes suddenly sharp. "Kin must be told."
"I sent Kumar out," Greta said. "He's telling people the baby was stillborn. I didn't know what else you might want to say."
Maliah swiped damp strands of hair from her face. "Call the Kin to the playing field, Maj, and help me up."
Greta touched her daughter's shoulder. "You should rest."
"I viewed all the videos, Mom. I know what to expect. Just bring me clean coveralls and some towels." She winced at a passing cramp.
Greta nodded at Maj, who slipped around the bed and out of the room. "It takes a little time to assemble the Kin. Lie still for a few minutes. Let me apply a local anesthetic."
Maliah collapsed back onto the pillows, eyes dry, her expression flat again.
Greta busied herself sponging Maliah clean and then wiping dry the film of water that clung to her body. She brought clean clothes and Maliah swung her legs over the bed's edge.
She lay the baby down, slid her arms into the blue coveralls, retrieved the baby, and spun abruptly toward her mother.
Greta jerked back at the sudden change. A broad smile covered Maliah's face. Her eyes sparkled. "This is the first Kin born on Titan, so of course she must join the martyrs. To watch over us."
Maliah pushed past her and out the door. Greta grabbed her medical bag and an armload of towels and followed.
Maliah careened up the tower stairs, her footsteps echoing off the plastic treads. Below on the playing field, Kin faced her, arrayed in rows of two barracks units each, a dozen rows deep. Spaces were held open here and there for missing Kin, either sent
to the space station or lost but not forgotten.
Maliah hugged the baby in one arm and swept the other out, encompassing the crowd. "Here is the first true Kin, born on Titan. Here is Rhea, my daughter, born of mother Earth and father Sky. She did not linger to spend her days among us. Destiny took her to join Tanaka, to be a martyr guiding us to paradise."
A roar rose from below. Arms interlaced and a stomping march began. Rows in the center of the formation curved into an inner circle. Others surrounded them until three rings of Kin moved in alternating directions. The pounding of their feet on the plastic floor drowned the constant whir of ventilation fans. "Kin, Kin, Kin." A wave passed through each circle as leaps merged with the rhythm.
Greta's heart pounded in time with the chants. She ran to Maliah's side. Tears coated her daughter's amber face and her eyes flashed wild. When Greta touched her shoulder, she turned a manic grin on her mother, and Greta flinched.
Maliah couldn't stand at the rail for long, so Greta prepared to catch her when her body collapsed, as it surely would. Whatever was wrong with her daughter, she hoped it would pass on its own. Because Greta didn't know what to do.
***
Drew sat at the pilots' kitchen. They were rationing their dwindling tea supply, so his cup held nothing but water. Erik hadn't asked him to set up a bioreactor in the medical lab yet, so maybe he could start work on microbes to produce tea. Or better yet, coffee. He set the cup down - it was so nice that his cup didn't float away - and pulled out his flat pad.
He snapped up straight as he scrolled past dozens of anguished messages. Maliah's baby was dead. He tried Fynn on the private channel, then Greta Lund, but got no reply.
The camera feeds didn't help much. A crowd was growing around the Village clinic. Greenhouse cameras couldn't see through the masses of fluttering foliage. Cameras in the furnace dome were shut off, as usual. None of that predicted what would happen next.
His chest tightened. All those barracks breaks on Earth when he'd stayed with Fynn, Maliah had treated Drew like a brother. She must be devastated, but he had no way to send her a private message. Since he'd joined the pilots, maybe he didn't want to remind her that he existed.
A more immediate problem was the Kin onboard. Sorrow or anger? He didn't know how they'd react. Or who they'd blame.
Drew dashed across the purple segment, above 3D printing and his bio lab, on through utilities, and slowed as he came under the blue segment's central screens. With images of Titan and Saturn swallowing him, he crept spinward until the lounge came into full view around the curve of the ring.
Small groups consoled each other, but the majority were forming a line, arms on each other's shoulders. Erik was with them, changed from his white medic's coveralls to True Blue.
Drew didn't see any of the pilots. "Orpheus, where's Tyra?"
"She's in the core dock with Evan and Kana."
"Tell them about the baby. Show them what's happening here." The ring's upper levels were thoroughly covered by a string of cameras.
Drew backed away before anyone could spot him. Greta had sent up the individuals most in need of gravity and those who'd been awake the longest. That mostly meant the original pirates who'd been Tanaka's chosen team. They probably still thought of themselves that way, as his devotees. Drew didn't want to be close until he saw how that played out.
"Tyra, do you see what's happening? Meet me in our green segment."
He ran back the way he'd come, intent on inventorying their food supplies. He'd already studied the manifest for his cryochamber and studied the strains of bacteria, yeast, and fungi some poor, deceased cohort had been clever enough to include. He could thaw out microbes that produced essential proteins from thin air, almost, in an aqueous slurry. The process wasn't much different from brewing beer, though not as tasty. With the pilots, he could hole-up indefinitely.
***
Mechanics had shoved cargo bins around to create their own playing field in the space between their barracks and the walled-off corridor to the Gravitron. It was smaller than the Village field, but adequate for their numbers, and they assembled there at the news of the baby's death.
They swayed more than stomped, their circle flowing into random shapes as small groups split off and rejoined.
Fynn tromped with them, finding solace in the group's movements, following the person in front of him, one link in a living chain. With his eyes closed, guided by the arms on his shoulders, his thoughts could flow freely.
Step, step, step.
He'd warned Liam when Magnus boarded the Poseidon. If Magnus had pulled the door shut, sealing in Titan's atmosphere, his suit would have kept him alive. If he'd planned to kill Liam, Fynn couldn't have saved the pilot. If only he'd been faster.
Step, step, step.
He knew the baby's death was terrible, but his sadness was distant. He didn't know her. Didn't know Maliah either, not anymore, and that started years ago. While he was at university, for years, he barely saw her. Maybe the Maliah he knew was in pain, or maybe she was gone.
Step, step, step.
She'd changed, and so had he.
Fynn leaned into Rica, and she tightened her grip. It was good to find her at his side, but he missed Drew. He missed his old barracks mates. He shook his head, eyes still closed. He missed university. Missed Earth.
Step, step, step.
Ben spun out from behind a pile of cargo bins, feet sliding. He'd been tending the furnaces. "Fynn! They're coming."
Fynn broke out of the circle, and Ben grabbed him. "I've been watching the Village cams. Maliah's taking the baby to Black and White Hill. She's coming this way. They're all coming."
Maliah slipped through the gap in the wall and followed the curve of the dome. Her long, bounding strides were unmistakable as she disappeared behind a pallet of filters.
A crowd erupted from the greenhouse tunnel, shoving through the gap and clambering over the bins. They ran into rows of cargo and, like a river tumbling over rocks, spilled between containers on their way to the airlock.
Maj ran straight to Fynn as the Mechanics circle fell apart to gawk at the invasion. She shouted before reaching him. "Get your crew to help these people into surface suits. Most of them have never been outside, and I don't want anyone to die."
He certainly didn't want hundreds of irrational Kin piling up in his dome. Fynn motioned to Rica, Lukas, and a couple other crewmates with surface experience. Kin kept coming. Barracks leaders shouted for their units to queue up, but split by the mess of cargo, they ran wildly.
Fynn leaped to the top of a pallet and jumped, monkey-like, across the cargo to get ahead of the crowd. The last dozen strides he plunged to the floor and galloped along the row of fliers in their charging stations.
Both stevedores stood in front of the airlock, backed against the door. Olsen perched on one bot, his stocky frame clinging to its center column. Maliah faced him with a bundle in her arms and a look of irritation on her golden face.
"Ah, Fynn." She lifted her chin toward the bots. "Clear these creatures away."
Fynn spotted Brigit pushing her way to the front of the crowd and caught her arm. "The trustees have six of the fliers out, searching for bodies. Maliah keeps four in the tower," he told her. "Even without those missing, there's nowhere near enough for everyone. Can you decide who goes? Here, climb up on the furnace platform."
While Brigit's teacher's voice settled the mob, Fynn stared at Maliah. She held her bundle in one arm, and her face was like stone. There was none of the pain and anger he'd seen in the clinic. She might have been in a trance.
If the Kin mirrored her placid demeanor, there was no danger to Fynn's crew. Getting them outside quickly seemed the best plan.
Fynn told his crewmates to grab fliers and follow Brigit. They passed a flier to her, and she passed it on to a unit leader who selected someone for the trip outside. The crowd quieted, waiting to see who'd be chosen.
Leaving them to handle the Kin, Fynn approached the s
tevedores. "Okay, Olsen. You can move the bots out of the way."
The stevedores rolled off to either side. Fynn spun the handle and pulled the door open enough for Maliah to enter the airlock.
Maj paused at Fynn's side. "I'll help her into a suit."
Kin with fliers jammed their way into the airlock. Fynn and his crewmates slid through the crowd, showing people how to seal boots and gloves, pulling up instructions on people's sleeve screens, and whispering urgent bits of advice. He saw Emily packed in near the outer hatch and waved to her with relief. She knew the most about the fliers and would keep an eye out for anyone got into trouble.
Then he spotted his mother, fully suited with a helmet under one arm. She snaked her empty arm toward him and they grasped hands, pulling each other close.
Standing side by side in the throng, he had to shout to be heard. "What's wrong with Maliah?"
"She's in shock. Don't abandon her now."
They wormed their way to the airlock wall. Fynn shoved one foot between two Kin donning boots and stepped up on the bench. He could see Maliah at the outer door with her helmet on and the bundle in one arm. She grabbed the hatch handle.
Fynn spun to his mother, snatched the helmet from her hands, and slammed it into place.
He elbowed his way out, finding Rica and Lukas as he went. They scurried to safely as wisps of fog flowed along the floor, freezing out humidity in the habitat's air. Fynn pushed the inner door closed but didn't seal it. He pressed close to the porthole, watching for anyone else trying to get out. But they all seemed to have their backs to him, their helmets in place.
The cold draft dissipated quickly around his feet, but Fynn's heart pounded. No one in the airlock was thrashing in panic, so he sealed the door and returned to the porthole.
Fynn's neck prickled as he watched Maliah hop lightly through the outer door. She could have killed someone.
