These Broken Stars

by Amie Kaufman

  I’m walking, anyway. She’s hobbling along, grabbing trees for support when she thinks I’m not looking. She’s still clinging to the idea that she’s fine, that this is all simply some horrible inconvenience, and her regular life is going to resume at any moment. God forbid she drop her airs and graces for five minutes. If she’d just accept some damned help, we’d be moving a lot more quickly.

  At this rate, we’re not going to have to worry about the owner of the big paw prints—though I wish I knew what left them—or the risk of injury or starvation. We’re going to die of old age before we make it a klick.

  We’re on a deadline, and that knowledge drums through me like a pulse. If we can’t find a colony, we’re going to have to get to the wreck as quickly as we can.

  Our pod will just be one of a thousand pieces of wreckage strewn through the forest, with nothing about it to show there are survivors nearby. And even if they do recognize it as a downed escape pod, there’s nothing to distinguish it from those that fell still attached to the Icarus. Nothing to say, We’re alive, come get us. We can’t rig up a smoke signal, because all around us are chunks of debris sending up columns of black smoke like an endless procession of funeral pyres.

  The only place we can guarantee we’ll be found is at the wreck. That’s where the rescue crews will go, looking for survivors and salvage. That’s where they’ll set up their base of operations.

  We have days of walking ahead of us. I don’t think she realizes how deceiving vast distances can be—but if she knew it’d be a week or more, I’m not sure I could get her moving at all. And I can’t afford to waste a moment. If we’re too slow, depending on whether they’re finding other survivors, they could pull out before we even arrive. I could make better time on my own, but if I leave her behind, I’m not sure she’d survive until I make it back.

  It’s only through an exhausting combination of frequent rests and liberal insults that we make it through the next few hours. I could tell myself that I’m doing it because she’ll get back to her feet just to spite me—but the truth is, I really just want to piss her off. Keeping her moving is a bonus. I’m starting to think we might be able to make some progress when I hear a particularly loud gasp for breath.

  I pause, staring ahead. It looks the same in front as behind, the same behind as to the sides. Uneven ground, underbrush with burs and scrub to catch at you, leaf litter, and straight, even tree trunks, like they were laid out with a laser sight. Slow breath in, slow breath out, then I turn.

  She’s standing still again, leaning against a tree for support. I know she’s struggling, but does she have to stop every fifteen minutes? I open my mouth to try a new method of prodding her onward, but then I see her face—twisted with pain, not anger.

  “How are your shoes?” I ask.

  She swallows, regaining enough composure to scowl at me. “My shoes are fine.”

  I consider the heels I saw slide through the metal grating on the pod’s floor. I know she’s lying, and she knows I know.

  “Well,” I reply, using the calm tone I know gets under her skin. I wish I was noble enough not to enjoy it, but I came to terms with my lack of nobility long ago. “Way I see it, we have two options. Either I can take a look at your feet and try and patch them up a little for walking, or you can press on, descend into agony, get blisters, bleed, contract an infection, lose anything from a toe to your life, and end up being too slow for either of us to reach a colony or the wreck before we starve. Which do you fancy, Miss LaRoux?”

  She shivers, looking away and wrapping her arms around her middle, squeezing herself tight. “Is this what you did on Patron? Terrorized them all with graphic threats?”

  Kill me. She’s acting like I offered to shoot her, instead of telling her the truth. “Call me unsophisticated, Miss LaRoux, but it works.” I gesture toward a fallen tree, and she reluctantly sits.

  Her feet are a mess, and I have to bite back a hiss when I see them. The straps have rubbed her skin raw, and her toes are puffy with blisters. The skin’s red and shiny, and there’ll be blood sooner, not later. Both her ankles are swollen.

  Luckily for me, she’s busy staring into space, as though she’s too embarrassed to look at her own feet. That’s good, because I’m pretty sure she’s not going to like what comes next. I’m gentle as I slide the little straps through the buckles, unthreading the shoes and easing them off. I turn them over in my hands—such delicate things, probably worth a month’s pay each—and snap the heels off.

  She looks down to see what I’m doing and gasps, one hand lifting to cover her mouth. But in whatever passes for reality for her, even she must see the shoes have done their duty. She’s silent as I hunt through the first-aid kit, carefully wrapping and taping the worst parts of her feet. In the end I have to let out the straps, and fasten the newly flat shoes around her swollen feet as best I can.

  I offer her my hands, and she lets me help her to her feet. She does this without a groan, without a whimper. I’m not sure I could’ve made it this far on feet that badly torn up. Lilac LaRoux’s handled a forced march with more determination than some of the recruits I’ve taken out in the last couple of years, even if she seems to be doing it out of spite more than anything else.

  I give her hands a squeeze. “There, see? When you get home, all the girls on Corinth will be dying for heelless high heels. I know you know how to set a trend.”

  And there it is, against all hope, like the sun peeking out from behind the clouds. The smallest hint of a smile.

  “Did you have any goal other than reaching the crash site?”

  “You make it sound as though I conspired to get myself landed on the planet.”

  “And why would you do that?”

  “That’s my point. We wanted nothing more than to get out of there.”

  “Very well. What happened next?”

  TEN

  LILAC

  I’m too out of breath to talk and walk at the same time. Major Merendsen keeps upping the pace, so I’m forced to pant and struggle along behind him, with very little opportunity for complaint. Eventually, after the fifth or sixth time that I’ve tripped over a low-lying root, I let gravity finish its work and claim me. I hit the ground harder than I’d like, but I’m too tired to care.

  Ahead of me his footsteps come to a halt. There’s a long, long silence before he speaks. “Take a break. Rest your feet, have some water. Let’s move again in fifteen minutes.”

  From somewhere I find the energy to push myself up on my arms. My legs are made of lead, and each movement rubs the straps of my shoes against raw skin despite the tape. I can’t help but wonder how long it will take the blisters and calluses on my feet to fade when we’re rescued. How soon will I be able to wear proper shoes again without displaying my battle scars?

  He’s standing some distance away, not even winded. Does he have to rub it in, how easy this is for him? I’m determined not to give him the satisfaction of pitying me. I’ll show him how much a LaRoux can handle.

  For all I know, there are rescue craft headed for our pod’s crash site as we speak, but because of his idiocy, we’re out in the middle of the forest instead of somewhere they might see us.

  A tiny voice at the back of my mind tries to point out how much better suited for this situation he is than I am—how much more he knows.

  But I’m tired of being weak. I’m tired of being led. I’m tired of having this soldier decide my every step. I’m Lilac LaRoux.

  “Major, we need to rethink our plan.” I try to keep my voice even, but I’m not doing a very good job. “The Icarus crashed behind a mountain range. There’s no way we can make this sort of trek. I know it worked for you on Patron, but you had a whole team of soldiers and field researchers there. Just because it worked once doesn’t mean it’s the solution now. We can do something to make the pod more visible.”

  “There’s nothing we can do that will guarantee us anything,” he replies, shaking his head in quick dismissal. “We ca
n be sure there’ll be rescue craft at the wreck site.”

  “If we make it there,” I snap. “We have to go back, it’s our best hope.”

  “I prefer to make my own hope.” He snaps right back, wheeling around to look me up and down, as though he finds me wanting. “Listen, I can’t drag your ass through the forest for you. You have to work with me.”

  “I’d thank you not to do anything at all with my ass,” I reply, glaring at him. “You’re not the lord and master of this planet, and you’re not the lord and master of me. My opinion is as valid as yours!”

  “Are we going to discuss every single step we take?” I’ve reduced him to a frustrated roar, but there’s no lick of satisfaction in response—I’m too furious myself. This stupid, arrogant boy. How old is he? He can’t be more than a couple of years older than me, yet he acts like he’s got a lifetime of experience just because he liberated one tiny outpost once. A one-trick pony with a chest full of medals.

  “Are you going to listen to reason, Major?”

  “If that’s what you call reason, then hell, no.”

  “No!” I echo him in frustration. “That’s all you ever say—no, you can’t rest again, no, we have to keep moving uphill, no, you can’t use the filtered water for bathing.”

  We stand, both locked in place, waiting for the other to break.

  “Miss LaRoux,” he says eventually, “I’ll do my best to protect you if you’ll let me. My duty demands that much. But I’m not going to sit here and die for you, waiting for rescue that may never come. And I’m certainly not going to beg to keep you safe, on top of everything else you’ve been serving up. If you refuse to come with me, that’s fine. I’m going, and you can come or not as you wish.”

  “Not.” My hand is itching to slap him, but I force myself to remain in place, spine stiff. “Leave me half the supplies and a blanket to carry them in, and you can be on your way. Relieved of duty,” I add nastily.

  “Fine,” he spits. He throws his pack down with unnecessary force, and without another moment of hesitation starts unpacking things and laying them out on a blanket. He makes two even piles of everything—the contents of the first-aid kit, the ration bars, the cable scavenged from our pod. Then one pile, plus a small metal case, a tatty jumpsuit from the pod, and a notebook I haven’t seen before, goes back into his pack, and the other is left on the blanket. I feel like telling him to keep the ration bars, since he seems to enjoy them so much.

  The Major straightens, casting me a dismissive look. “Best of luck.” He’s waiting for me to cave. We both know he’s not going to leave me alone in this forsaken wilderness—it’s a question of who will admit it first. He may be an ass but he’s a chivalrous one, and he’s not going to let me die to prove a point. I know it, he knows it—and as we watch each other across the blanket, I have to admit a flare of pleasure shoots through me. This is a game I know.

  “To you, as well,” I offer graciously. After all, I can afford to be gracious now, can’t I? I stoop and gather up the corners of my blanket. It’s ungainly and awkward as I sling it over my shoulder, and my battered feet nearly trip on the ragged hem of my dress, but a LaRoux doesn’t let those things stop her from making a statement. If it were my father, he’d have walked off into the forest hours ago, head held high. He’d have found a way to handle this.

  Snatches of sound rise up from the awful, untidy forest all around me, for a moment sounding just like voices, high and distressed. He doesn’t even seem to notice them—clearly at home surrounded by so much dirt—and just stands there with a scowl as I turn away.

  I hope I have enough time to make it back to the pod before sundown, but either way, he’ll probably catch up with me before then. I hear nothing behind me, but I can’t risk a look over my shoulder to see what he’s doing. It doesn’t matter—he’ll come back for me, I know it. I imagine him standing there, watching me go, and wish more than anything that I could see the expression on his face.

  I wonder how long he’ll last.

  “The situation was foreign to Miss LaRoux.”

  “Yes, though I had some experience handling civilians in the field.”

  “Ah, yes. The intelligence and research teams on Patron.”

  “Yes.”

  “What was your assessment of her state during that part of the walk?”

  “I thought she was handling it all right.”

  “There were no disagreements?”

  “No, we were getting on fine.”

  ELEVEN

  TARVER

  I take care to keep my pace slow as I start walking, breaking off branches and scuffing up the leaf litter so even a society girl should be able to tell which way I went. Important not to go too fast, otherwise she’ll never catch me up. Part of me wants to sit down on a log to wait, maybe write something in my notebook, have a snack. Wait to enjoy the look on her face when she turns around and comes back with her tail between her legs.

  This little insurrection has been coming, and though I’d rather she tried it on the plains, where I could keep an eye on her, waiting until we were out of the woods was definitely too much to ask.

  The arrogance, the sheer—what is she, sixteen? Amazing that she’s had time to get through all that military survival training.

  I’ve been walking ten minutes or so when I hear her. Not right behind me, where I’m expecting her to be by now. She must have stayed in the clearing, or even walked away from me, because she’s something like half a klick back.

  She’s screaming.

  I’m sprinting before I know I’m moving, grab bag banging against my back, Gleidel hauled out of my holster and fitting into my hand without any conscious decision to draw it. You develop instincts. Like my drill sergeant used to say: Learn fast, or don’t.

  Branches whip my face and tear at my clothes as I crash through the undergrowth, churning up mud along the edge of the creek as I choose speed over caution.

  I burst into the clearing without any pretense of stealth.

  I see it immediately—a giant creature, some kind of wild cat, solid muscle beneath tawny fur, teeth bared in a snarl. I’ve never seen anything like this in my life—not on any planet. Long canines, dark, intelligent eyes. This thing outweighs me easily, and one bite will do for Lilac.

  It’s got its front paws up against the trunk of a tree, growling low in its throat as it rakes them down the bark, leaving a row of parallel gashes. Lilac’s up the tree, screaming, though how she got up there I don’t know. I lift the Gleidel and brace it with both hands. Closing one eye, I draw a breath, wait until I steady. The shriek of the laser mixes with the frustrated yowls of the beast as the gun leaps and quivers in my hands.

  The creature hits the ground with a crash, twitching and snarling as it kicks up the leaves and sends up clouds of dry dirt. It thrashes around for the count of ten and then lies still, the clearing filling with the horrible smell of burned hair and flesh. Up in the tree, Lilac’s screams descend into a series of ragged gasps. I stand and watch the cat for the count of thirty after it stops moving.

  Keeping the Gleidel in one hand, I walk slowly across the clearing to where the creature lies still. There’s a moan of relief from the tree, and I realize she hasn’t been able to see me until now. I can’t focus on her yet. “Stay up there,” I call. “It’s dead if it keeps its brain where it’s supposed to. Did it touch you?”

  There’s no reply, but she hasn’t fallen out of the tree yet, so I can only suppose she’s unharmed.

  I loose an extra bolt into the creature’s head for safety’s sake, the Gleidel shrieking again. I take my time over it, nudging it carefully with the toe of my boot, waiting for a response, and eventually stepping in for a closer inspection. The eyes are glassy, its side doesn’t rise or fall. Dead.

  What kind of a terraformed planet is this, with a thing like that running around? There’s no reason to introduce a higher-order predator into a place like this; the felines should be a quarter this size or less. Their part
in the ecosystem should be attacking small rodents, not chasing socialites up trees. This one has the same stripes around its face as the kind I’m used to, but it’s a man-eater.

  So how did this thing get here? I study it for a few moments longer, then give up—it’s dead, and that’s what matters. When I look up. Lilac’s white as a sheet, clinging to the lowest branch. She stares down at me, blue eyes wide, shining. She’s not even crying, which tells me how bad the fright has been.

  No kidding, Miss LaRoux, I’m pretty shaken up myself. As I stare up at her, a rush of relief overtakes me, my hand trembling where it holds the gun.

  I fight the urge to drag her down from the tree. I could shake her. I could kiss her. I can’t let myself do either. I can’t believe I was so moronic as to let her go off alone after I’d seen those paw prints. I have to be smart, handle this next part carefully. I swallow, clear my throat to make my voice even.

  “That was some climb. Do you need a hand down from there?”

  She ignores my offer, which reassures me more than anything else that she’s suffered no permanent damage. I’d be more concerned if she let me help her. She more falls down than climbs down, sliding sideways, dangling for a few seconds, then letting go so she can hit the ground with a thump. She crumples to sit on the dirt, then scrabbles backward away from the dead creature.

  I know this moment too well, I’ve seen it in the field. Hell, I’ve been there myself. I could rub it in that I was right, and she was wrong—that I saved her life, that she needs me to survive. But there’s no point. She knows it. I’m not going to force her to come crawling back. I’m the one with field experience. I should have stopped this from happening.