The Settlers
Page 17
She slumps back on the bed. Fine.
Oh, don't be like that, Zeet, he says.
She flaps a hand at him. Go, already.
Zeet, come on.
Go! Jesus, she says.
I don't like leaving when we're fighting.
We're not fighting. You're just leaving.
He sighs. I won't be long.
Oh, don't say that now. You're going all the way to Galileo and then back, and then to work, or didn't you just say that?
I did, he admits.
So you'll be long. But whatever. Go, already.
He finishes putting his shoes on and stands up, tall and lean in the dim light.
I love you, he says.
Fine, she says. Get out.
Poppy sits on the floor outside her compartment, arms resting on the rail, feet swinging over the edge. Six levels up, and her only view is more compartments. If she looks upward, she can only see the sloping roof high above, curving away in the distance. Compartments everywhere.
Galileo feels like a slum to her. That's what residents on the other stations called it, anyway. The slum. It isn't particularly grimy, and the residents care for it as best they could, but they're crammed together like shipping containers on a hillside, and most of the station is a long way from anything that constituted a view of the stars.
Poppy describes it sometimes as life inside an old radio.
And that's sort of how Galileo looks. Like the guts of a very large machine, converted into living spaces.
There's an ever-present white noise here, a low, persistent grinding sound, as if the entire station is a single gear in a larger engine. The surroundings are colorless, like an assembled but unpainted model.
When Zeke arrives, Poppy is sipping synthetic juice from a cup.
Hi, Poppy, he says.
Zeke, she answers.
He stands on the balcony behind her, waiting.
Sit down, she says, patting the floor.
He does.
Not much of a view, is it, she says.
I guess not, he says.
He folds his arms on the rail and lays his head down.
Tired? she asks him.
His eyes are closed, but he nods. Very.
I'm sorry, she says. It's so much of a trip here.
It's alright, he replies.
You should go inside and lie down. Rest up a little.
Zita's waiting for me, he says. I should get to it.
Poppy scoots a little closer. Get to what?
Zeke opens his eyes. Whatever you called me over for, I guess.
Oh, Zeke, she says. You didn't have to come tonight. It wasn't anything urgent.
It didn't sound like it was nothing urgent, he says.
I'm sorry. I didn't mean to give you that impression. It could've waited.
Zeke closes his eyes, then pushes away from the rail and gets to his feet.
Zita's going to kill me, he says.
Well, then don't tell her, Poppy says. Here, come inside. You can lie down awhile. Then you can catch the transport back to Tycho. She doesn't have to know you didn't fix anything.
Zeke scrunches his face up.
You're exhausted, Zeke. I can see.
He exhales slowly. What do I tell her I fixed?
Poppy smiles and takes his hand.
Close your eyes, Poppy whispers.
Zeke is stretched out on the sofa. He's too tall for it. His feet are propped up on one end, and his neck is cramped. He scoots around uncomfortably.
What is it? Poppy asks.
I think your couch is too small for me, he says.
Close your eyes.
I don't know, Poppy. Maybe I should --
Shhh, Poppy says. Let me show you something my mom used to do.
Zeke lies long and still on Poppy's bed. There are toys on the floor around the room. He tripped on one when Poppy pushed him through the doorway.
Where's Olive? Where's Max? he asks.
Ollie's staying at her friend's compartment tonight. Max is on a field trip. Now, shhh.
Zeke stares up at the ceiling. I'm a little uncomfortable with --
Poppy places her palms over Zeke's eyes.
Her skin is smooth and cool against his warm eyes. His eyes close, and he feels a deep breath escape his lips.
There you go, she says. Just breathe.
Her palms rest on his eyes for what feels like several minutes. He has almost drifted into sleep when she gently draws her hands away from his face. The sensation nudges him into a foggy dreamspace, and he opens his eyes. They're heavy, and sink closed again.
Stretch out your fingertips for me, she says. Extend them all the way out. Open your palms.
He does so, slowly.
Good, she says. Now stretch, stretch, stretch your fingers as far as they'll go.
He does.
Good, she says again. Now hold that stretch for as long as you can. And then, when you're ready, try to relax your hands -- but slowly, as slowly as you can do.
Zeke's hands go limp, and he feels tension leaving him. It feels like a wash of cool heat.
Good, good, Poppy says. Now your feet and your toes.
He stretches his feet. He can feel his toes crack.
Poppy flattens her thumbs against Zeke's brow and smooths away the worry lines.
Shhh, she whispers again.
She begins to hum deep inside of her chest, a sweet, quiet melody.
Zeke's eyes are shut, and his consciousness is fading fast.
He barely feels the brush of her hair as it settles on his shoulders. Her breath is warm and smells like wine. He can almost hear her heart beating. His muscles slacken, and he feels as if he is sinking deep into the bed and rising off of it at the same time.
He sleeps.
Zita frowns. It has been hours, more hours than would be needed to fix a broken switch, and Zeke has not come home. She's already checked the transport feeds, but there have been no delays. Zeke should have been on the one that docked two hours ago, but he wasn't.
She dials his band again.
There is no response, her A.I. says.
It's not like him, Zita mutters.
There has been a pattern, says the A.I.
What? Zita asks.
A pattern has emerged.
A pattern of what?
Zeke travels to Galileo three times per month. He has been traveling to Galileo for seven months, for a total of twenty-three visits.
Twenty-three, Zita says. I didn't realize it was so many.
Zeke informs you of Galileo trips approximately eighty-five percent of the time, the A.I. points out.
What is Zeke's status right now?
Zeke's metrics are protected, the A.I. says.
Override.
Overrides require authentication, Zita.
Authenticate, then. Authenticate.
Zeke has a password.
Zita's face goes blank. Why?
Because Zeke established a password.
You have to tell me what his status is, Zita says. What if he's injured somewhere?
If Zeke is injured, I am obligated to inform medical authorities. Zeke is not injured.
When did Zeke give you a password? Zita asks.
June 11, 4:22 a.m., the A.I. replies.
Zita feels her face growing hot. So he's lying to me, she says.
The A.I. is silent.
If he's -- wait. Zita snaps her fingers. Show me the screenview log.
The wall panel illuminates.
June 11, Zita says. Four a.m.
The compartment appears onscreen. It's dark, but Zita can see a tiny dash of light where the washroom is. The door is not closed firmly. Nothing is happening.
Speed it up, Zita says.
After nine minutes, the washroom light goes out, and Zita can see Zeke's shadowy form exit. He walks out of frame, and the image shifts to their sleeping quarters. Zita is there, asleep in bed. Zeke stands over her for a long moment.
He lightly drags his fingers down her blanketed form, then leaves the bedroom. The image shifts again, and Zeke is making a cup of tea in the kitchen. He speaks, but Zita can't hear him well.
Transcribe, she says.
The A.I. issues an audible transcript of the dialogue.
Zeke: --- message when she wakes.
A.I.: Yes, sir.
Zeke: What's the transport status?
A.I.: Transports are clear. No delays.
Zeke: Okay. I want to set a password.
A.I.: All-person, or for your person?
Zeke: For my person.
A.I.: What is your desired password?
Zeke:
Hey, Zita says. What happened?
The contents of Zeke's speech are in direct conflict with Zeke's privacy preferences, the A.I. says.
Goddammit, she says. What is it?
I cannot reveal that information, the A.I. says. Please be aware that repeated attempts to secure that information will require that I inform Zeke of this conversation.
Zeke can go straight to hell, for all I care, Zita snaps.
I can? Zeke says. What did I do?
Poppy sits at the rail, staring out at the beige slum.
Her neighbors -- the ones that leave their compartment door open, not the neighbors who never emerge from within theirs -- are listening to the pulse station. The uprising on Argus is all that's on the pulse these days.
Hey, Rosalie, Poppy calls.
Her neighbor leans out of the compartment. Too loud?
No, no, Poppy says. I heard that the insurgents were succeeding. Is that true?
Rosalie shakes her head. I'm not listening. Jakob knows. Jakob!
No, Poppy says. It's fine, it's fine.
But Jakob appears in the door beside Rosalie.
Rosalie says, Poppy wants to know if the -- what did you want to know?
Poppy sighs. I asked if the revolt was --
Oh, man, Jakob says. There's a rumor that the guy leading the revolution, that Gerard guy -- there's a rumor that he's actually descended from the Bogleman clan. They say he's going to overthrow the station and then rebuild the Harvard Club.
Shit, Poppy says. No shit? The Harvard Club?
It's just a rumor, Jakob says. Personally, I think he doesn't know what he's going to do if they win. He seems a little, I don't know, like wet dough. You know?
Wet dough, Poppy says. Sure.
Poppy's wrist vibrates.
Sorry, Jakob, she says, pointing at her wrist.
Jakob nods and waves, and vanishes inside again. Rosalie smiles, then follows, chattering at Jakob.
Poppy touches her wrist, and says, When are you coming back?
There is silence, and then Zita's voice says, He isn't coming back.
Zita, Poppy says.
He isn't coming back, Zita repeats. Tell me you understand.
Listen, Poppy says, but Zita interrupts.
Tell me you understand.
Poppy is quiet.
Zita says, No more repairs. No more broken switches. No more money to float your ass. No more middle-of-the-goddamn-night visits. No more naps in your bed.
He told you about that, did he, Poppy says.
Zeke tells me everything, Zita says.
I bet he doesn't, Poppy says.
Everything.
Did he tell you how it happened? The first time?
You're going to leave him alone, Zita says.
How all I had to do was breathe in his ear, and he was mine?
Shut up, Poppy, Zita says.
Did he ever tell you how much he likes it when you bite his ear? It's like an off switch, he just goes --
Listen and listen good, Zita says. If either of us sees you again, ever, I will break your fingers. I learned that once, in a defense class. It's not hard at all. And if you like that sort of thing, the fingers make this sort of happy popping sound -- just like your name, imagine that -- that just make you want to keep breaking them so you can hear it again and again.
There is an edge in Zita's voice that Poppy has never heard.
She remembers the way Zita defended her once at school. Even then, she didn't sound like this.
Zita, Poppy starts.
The nice thing about fingers, Zita says, is that when they're broken, you realize how helpless you are. How alone. How cut off from everything around you.
Zita, she says again.
If you come near him again, Zita says. That's what I'm going to do.
Zita, listen --
But Zita is gone.
Zita exhales slowly.
Her fingers, flexed like claws, soften.
She feels the adrenaline drain away.
Her eyes are closed.
She measures her breathing, slows each breath.
Then she opens her eyes.
Zeke stands in the door, staring at his wife.
Zita smiles at him.
What do you say? she asks. Shall we go out for breakfast?
And she glides past him, into the closet, to dress.
When the window is taken away from him, he cries.
He has been on the block for -- he doesn't know how long. Perhaps years. Perhaps a few very long minutes.
This is how it is on the block: nothing exists.
He only feels the walls of his cell when he bumps into them. His cell is large, and he rarely finds the walls.
All of the cells are large. He is no one special.
His cell is neither warm nor cold.
There is no light.
When his guards feed him, they first lower the oxygen content of his cell. When he passes out, he is fed intravenously.
When he wakes, it as if nothing has happened.
He never sees another person.
His voice is his only company.
His voice scares him.
He has never seen another prisoner.
He cannot see his hands if he holds them up.
Eldon has never been this alone.
The window is small and square. He does not always know where it is. No light comes through the window.
Inside his cell it is as black as space.
Outside his cell is space.
He is dimly aware that he is imprisoned on a space station.
Space stations rotate.
They orbit.
They orbit around planets.
Now and then he remembers.
Outside, somewhere, is Earth.
He was born on Earth.
When Eldon finds the window, he presses his face against it.
He opens his eyes as wide as he can.
They might as well be closed.
The darkness chews at his skin until the boundaries between his body and the darkness are erased.
He is the darkness.
The darkness is him.
He blinks at the window, hungry for light.
But there are no stars.
No moon. No Earth.
No sun.
Before the space station turns towards Earth, the window slides closed.
Once, Eldon's hand was pressed to the glass when this happened.
The tiny, heavy window-door trapped his finger, and he cried out. He pulled and pulled at his hand, unable to free it.
Then the light came.
It had been foreign to him, this hard white stripe that opened in the dark.
It was like a needle to his eyes, and he blinked furiously. The afterimage of the light tricked him, and he saw tiny stripes of light peeling open the walls in all directions.
When his eyes adjusted, they were full of tears that spilled down his cheeks.
He stopped pulling at his hand and blinked into the light.
The white stripe resolved into a shape. It was curved, and not white at all, but pale blue.
Eldon had opened his mouth to speak.
Then the window shade had suddenly clapped shut, taking the tip of his finger from him.
<
br /> He had wept for days.
Not for his finger.
For the light.
The window remained closed for a very long time after that.
When it opened again, Eldon did not notice.
There was no light.
He stumbled across it some time later, and clung to its edges as if it were a raft.
Then it had closed again.
When Eldon sleeps, he floats.
The prison cells are gravity-free, like deprivation chambers.
Once, on Earth, prison took a man away from the world. Stripped him of the things that were his. Claimed ownership of his body, if not his mind.
In space, prison takes a man's mind.
It starts with his senses.
The cells are dark. A man cannot see.
The cells are climate-controlled. When the walls and the air feel the same, a man cannot feel.
The cells are full of heavy, dense air. A man talks, and can barely hear his own voice.
A man cannot smell. He never eats.
His identity erodes.
He becomes a raw nerve, aching for the light.
And the light is kept from him.
When he sleeps, he dreams of light.
He dreams of the Earth, rising in his little window.
The Earth is brilliant. It is blue, and green. It is a jewel.
The Earth sings to him. His bones vibrate with joy.
He stretches out his hands.
The Earth lifts him into its embrace.
Shhh, the Earth says to him.
It's okay now.
Everything is okay.
The insurgents would die in isolation, banished by the fleet government for treason. But Onyx was overturned, and monuments were constructed to remember those who fought for equality. Station Meili, the long-rumored thirteenth station, will not continue the Onyx tradition. If the station is even real.
For nearly one hundred fifty years, there is quiet.
The fleet ends communications with Earth. Mankind has come to a fork in its road, and now travels in both directions, each cluster separate from the other.
Man becomes a creature of the stars.
There's no sensation of movement. The Earth seems fixed in the sky. No stars are visible. The moon is a speck in the distance.
Tasneem turns away from the window and stretches out on her cot.