TheEndeavorwill never be a ship again, that’s for sure. The wreckage is open on three sides, and whole chambers are missing, probably strewn across this planet. I find nospacesuits in the debris, but there is a broken helmet—it looks gouged by a tool, strangely enough, more than just damaged in a crash—and in the dim sunlit night I find a supply of blankets, all piled together. I band my arms and legs and torso with them, fastening them with the polycarb-printed restraints from my bunk. I wrench a pipe from the wreck to use as a support, and start along the glowing path toward the other half of theCoordinated Endeavor, calling out Kodiak’s name as I go.
I’m short of breath as soon as I start, and it only gets worse. At first I think it’s my body responding to the trauma of my wake-up and then crash, but then I realize because of the low oxygen I’ve now probably got altitude sickness on top of my body’s other current complaints. At least there’s nothing left in my stomach to come up.
I soon prove myself wrong, leaving a puddle of organic material on the dark ground. Though dimly lit by the distant sun, the night feels permanent. Until I can salvage the data on the ship’s computer, I have no way of knowing how long this planet’s rotation is. This exoplanet night could be only a few hours, or it could last the equivalent of six months or more.
Horror lives right alongside wonder as I make my nighttime trek. It’s like the universe has split open, or has revealed that it was split open all along, that we’d always been teetering over a void. This strange land, with its unknown skyand its unknown core, and this strange quest my lighter-than-real body is taking to save a stranger, threaten to set me spinning off into that void.
A light appears at the horizon as I trudge, and at first I think I’m getting my first glimpse of the larger sun. But I’m not; I’ve crested a shallow rise of crumbly soil, and gotten a view of the second half of the downed ship, its surfaces reflecting the light of the planet’s distant second sun.
I speed up, my steps easily becoming leaps in the low gravity.
I listen for any sounds, any movements in the sky, and signs of advanced life. But these microorganisms under my feet seem to be it so far. Kodiak and I could be as advanced as it gets around here.
“Kodiak!” I call.
The wind whistles.
My vision brightens as I go, and at first I think it’s because I’m nearing the flaming wreckage. I realize, though, that dawn is finally arriving. The orb that’s emerging is the same size and color as the sun I’ve always known.
Have I ever seen that Earth sun?
This planet is a soft yellow-green color, rocky, all its surfaces covered in a heath of algae. It’s a little like how the early Earth might have looked. The sun and the wind and the cold are the only enemies, and without predators and prey, life has no need to move around, to have eyes and teeth.It can be... soft.
“Kodiak?” I call.
There’s another orange portal here, lit by the dual suns. Unlike mine, this one is sealed tight. The ship behind it is virtually identical to my own. “Kodiak?”
I giggle, and then stop. Why did I justgiggle?
I easily leap up to the portal, and use my weight—lighter here, but still of enough use for these purposes—to pull the handle down with me.
TheAurorais dark. I take one step, then another, taking in the Dimokratía text on the wall, the polycarb floor barely lit by the rays of the distant sun. “Kodiak?”
This time I hear a response. A groan. I rush along the corridor. The farther I get from the orange portal the darker it gets, until I’m going mainly on sound and touch, relying on my memory of training in a model of my own ship. “Kodiak? I’m here.”
He’s in the same room as me, but I can’t see a thing. “Flashlight... against wall,” he says, the words strangled.
I grope along the wall until I find the light, then click it on.
Kodiak is in a fetal position, lit in jumping shadows by the flashlight, hands pinned between his thighs. “Leg,” he says. “Broken.”
There’s a bump on his calf, visible even beneath the fabric of his suit. “May I?” I ask.
He nods, grimacing. Flashlight between my teeth, Igingerly raise the pant leg. The bone hasn’t burst out of the skin, but it will definitely need setting and splinting. If we can get the portaprinter operational, we’ll make a cast.
“Are you in much pain?” I ask. “I can see if I can track down meds.”
“Your voice,” he says through gritted teeth. “Are you drunk?”
“No, I’m not th-runk,” I say. Well. I guess that did sound slurred.
Kodiak sniffs. “Narcosis. There’s more nitrogen in this atmosphere than we’re used to. Judging by my headache, too, there’s some trace cyanide.”
Who is this guy? “That headache could also be, um, from your shattered tibia.”
“Fibula. Otherwise we’d be in significant trouble. Speaking of—” He winces, his voice breaking off.
“Splint. Right. I’m on it.”
