41
FROM ENDLESS NIGHT
LEO SQUEEZES MY hand, pulls me in for one more kiss before we head for the hangar. It is quick, much quicker than our first, but with no less power—it is affirmation, it isthis was not a mistake.
We are business-as-usual as soon as the Control doors open, we are side-by-side-with-purpose. Anyone paying attention would see the newly charged air between us, but at this hour, no one is around to pay attention. We slip into the hangar deck, safe behind its viewing panel windows, just in time to see the runway light up with the electric-purple grav-force glow. Two seconds later, the bee glides smoothly onto the runway, not a scratch on it. I feel a swell of pride for Heath—he did this! Hedidit.
As soon as the pride crests, though, guilt rolls in to replace it: Leo.
While Heath was risking his life for the station—for me—I let myself pretend reality away, if only for a few minutes. Andthe way I did that, with Leo, even if only for a few minutes, will most certainly hurt Heath if he finds out. Not that I’ve made any commitment to Heath—but I absolutely do care about him. I hate that what I’ve done could hurt him, hate that it’s too late to change it.
And I hate that if I could go back and do the past hour over again, I’m not entirely sure I’d do it differently.
Heath is first out of the bee after they dock it, and Zesi climbs out right behind him. I wish I could see their faces, see their triumphant smiles through the strong purple glare on their helmets’ face shields—they did it, they actuallydidit!
“Mission complete,” Heath says, breathless, his words crackling over the viewing room speaker. Rather than triumphant, though, he sounds—defeated? Or maybe it’s just exhaustion. That has to be it, seeing as how they were clearly successful at flying there and back, and in retrieving food and fresh filters. Zesi unloads the supply pallets while Heath unfolds a steel pushcart from its hidden storage compartment. The cart looks almost exactly like the gurneys up in Medical, except this one’s purpose is to deliverlifeto us, not death.
It takes only a few minutes for them to fill the cart—three SpaceLove pro-pack pallets up top, along with a pair of bulky, awkward items below. A water filter and an extra for backup, I assume. Fingers crossed Zesi can figure out how to switch out our old filter for the new one; he’s quick to pick up everything else, so the installation should go smoothly. I hope.
Zesi and Heath maneuver the pushcart through the first airlock. I find myself holding my breath as the air turns over inside the sealed chamber, remind myself to breathe.
Once they’re through the second airlock and back with us in the viewing room, Heath tears his helmet off and barrels straight toward me. He wraps his arms around me, bear-hug-tight, and buries his cheek against the soft bend of my neck—and then he’s kissing me, one two three four five, like he’s leaving a path of stardust that ends at my lips.
Can he taste Leo on me like I taste starlight on him?
Leo—oh, no. I hear his breath catch behind me, a sound so quiet I easily could have missed it.
I slip out of the kiss, aim for a subtle break so as not to hurt... anyone. My cheeks are on fire. “You guys—you—you really did it.” It feels like an understatement. Like the words fall completely short at expressing the things I feel but can’t bring myself to say:
You didn’t crash.
You didn’t die.
You’ve missed a lot.
“Two fresh filters, ready to go,” Zesi says, settling his helmet onto its hook. “And everything we could pull that wasn’t in contaminated airspace.”
My heart dips. “Contaminated airspace?”Nautilusis so small the entire chamber could succumb to a contaminant. No room for quarantine onNautilusunless the unaffected spent it outside, in a spacesuit, tethered up with fully loaded ox-tanks.And even then, that’s not the best plan for survival.
I worried so hard over how we could very seriously infect them, I didn’t consider the possibility—the reality—
Heath bows his head. “They never answered when Zesi made contact from the bee,” he says. “We tried for the entire hour leading up to it... but...”
“Nothing,” Zesi finishes, the look on his face grave.
Fifteen more lives.
Fifteen more deaths.
“We pulled all we could from their hangar deck storage, but the filters weren’t in there, so we had to go inside,” Heath says. “Got in and out as quickly as possible. It... wasn’t pretty.” His eyes cloud over, like he’s staring into death itself.
The four of us stand, silent, for a long minute. I’m trying not to imagine it, the blood and decay and stench of what used to belife, brilliant life. I’ve seen my fair share of death, of course, but we’ve always cleared it from the station before anyone started to actually decompose. I can’t decide what’s worse: the idea of being the only one left alive there, or that thereisno one else left alive.
Heath takes my hand, and what else is there to do when someone has risked his life for the station and seen things that will haunt him for the rest of his days? I don’t let go. Things are complicating by the minute with us, but no matter what, he is still one of my very best friends. Right now, this is what he needs.
“That... isn’t the worst of it,” he says. His hand in minemakes all the more sense: this isn’t only whatheneeds—it’s what he thinksIneed.
“The crew,” Zesi picks up. “Their symptoms looked slightly different than the ones here did.”
