“Andyoucan start by refreshing those harvesting procedures,” OS says.
“Wow, that was salty. I kind of like it,” I say, smiling up at the disembodied voice, my hands punching into my pockets, to show off the muscles of my arms. Am I flirting with my operating system? I think I’m flirting with my operating system. Thatvoice. “Food first, though. I’m starving.”
“My reference sources indicate that after physical trauma, you should not yet be hungry. I was ready to have Rover hook you back up to an intravenous drip to feed you.”
“Well, your data was wrong. I told you I’m not your run-of-the-mill crewman. I hope Rover’s a good chef.”
_-* Tasks Remaining: 342 *-_
It’s a good thing the manicotti has a printed label on it, because I wouldn’t have known what it was otherwise. It’s basically white gluten and red oil, with dominant polycarb notes. Pretty close to my own home cooking, actually. Not like the manicotti Minerva used to make us every Friday night. I run my fingers over the printed name. Getting this meal onto Fédération ships was her doing, I’m sure of it. I remember watching her fingers as she sprinkled sea salt and Parmesan.
I stare at harvesting training reel projections while I chew, surrounded by the humming machinery of theEndeavor. I’m sort of loving the chance to eat manicotti, it turns out. Minerva used to cancel awards ceremonies, training sessions, anything that came up on a Friday night, all so she could be with her little brother. I could eat this manicotti forever.
A voice comes on. I sit up, rod straight. It’s not Devon Mujaba. This voice is low, almost a growl. Sounds like gruel and bar fights. Fédération language, but with a Dimokratía accent. “Put the OS’s voice back to the female one.”
“Spacefarer Celius?” I say, getting up so quickly that I bang my head on an open cabinet door. “Is that you?”
“Do as I ask. I don’t have access to OS personalization.”
“We should meet.” My voice breaks. It hasn’t done that in years.
“There’s no need for that.”
“Of course there is. We need to plan out the asteroid harvesting, for starters. Come over for dinner. I insist.”
The ship’s sensitive mics pick up his slow breathing, the friction of his jumpsuit as he readjusts his body. “Did you really just invite me over for dinner?”
“I ate, but in another five hours or so I’ll want some more. Maybe we should actually call it dinner number two. Come over for dinner number two.”
“Meeting you isn’t permitted.”
“Isn’t permitted by whom? Your Dimokratía commanders? It’s only the two of us here. Well, plus OS and Rover.” There’s no answer, except for more soft breathing.Vulnerability is the one thing you have to learn, the mission’s head psychologist once said.The Cusk family didn’t prepare you for it.I cough. “Kodiak, do you remember anything of the launch? Or anything right before it? I’m scrubbed as of a few days beforehand, as far as I can tell.”
“I’ll ask you one more time. Put the voice back.”
“Before you mute my side, Kodiak, know that I’ll be up at the orange door in precisely five hours. I hope to see you. For the good of the mission. For our lives. We need to meet. And you know what? People like me. You might like me.”
“The voice, Cusk.”
“Only if you agree to see me, Celius.”
A growl, then the comm shuts off.
_-* Tasks Remaining: 342 *-_
Four hours to go. I take frequent breaks from my asteroid-harvesting training reels to pace theEndeavor, sucking away at a water sleeve. This raging thirst won’t go away.
Seven sets of natty blue jumpsuits, seven rotating breakfasts (the berry oats look especially promising), seven rotating lunches, seven rotating dinners. It tickles me that the Cusk planners organized my life into weeks, when I’m in an artificially heated polycarbonate hull surrounded by an imponderably immense void, a dust mote floating through an empty stadium. But at least I know when it’s Tuesday!
Three and a half hours to go. Once I’ve gleaned everything I can from the training reels, the only thing left to do while I wait out the final hours until we reach the asteroid is to complete some programming debugs from OS’s list. In between edits, I poke through every cranny of the ship. I feel like I know it all now, except for whatever’s behind the portal reserved for our arrival on Titan. And whatever’s on theAurora.
I keep flipping between giddiness and gloom, and from moment to moment I can’t predict which emotion is going to bubble up next. It’s like my own mind is an abandoned house that I’m exploring. I know the cause: I’m spendingtoo much time alone. That’s a fast road to crazy. I was known as the lone wolf back in the academy, love-’em-and-leave-’em Ambrose Cusk, but I wish I could go back and redo it. Have some of the pillow talk I always avoided by sneaking away from whatever sweaty body was sharing my bunk, by ducking out in the predawn hours to train.
I open the last unexplored cabinet. My eyes dart with tears. I don’t remember deciding to bring this.
It’s a violin.Myviolin. I pull it out of its case, curl my fingers around its tangerine neck, its black fingerboard. So delicate. The only delicate thing on the ship, unless you count me (and maybe Kodiak, wouldn’t know). I tune it up, tighten the bow, and draw it across the A string, lancing the white noise of the ship. Minerva laughed at me for loving the violin, called it a waste of time, and that’s probably why I kept doing it. Like my mother, she gave me the most attention when I was disappointing her. I start with scales before switching to the Prokofiev concerto, vibrato painful from my soft finger pads.
The pieces of this instrument were once trees that lived for hundreds of years, surrounded by other plants and woodland creatures long before I was alive, before any humans had ever gone to space at all. I run my fingers along the lines of the wood grain. Wood is so many things. It is hard and soft, it is smooth and rippled.
