They appeared tiny, standing amid a vast sea of windswept dunes stretching as far as the eye could see. They peered into the hazy, orange sky. Both were dressed in thick layers and wore masks over their faces, so that they were indistinguishable from one another but for the names on their coats—HELMS and TAYLOR. One of them held a pair of binoculars up to their eyes, looking in vain for a sign from the heavens.
But none came.
They had stood there for over an hour, saying nothing, their necks craned skyward, waiting for Salvation. Their hopes faded with each minute that passed, neither of them strong enough to admit what they desperately hadn't wanted to believe—they were on their own now.
At last, Helms broke the silence, lowering his binoculars.
"We have a decision to make."
"We have enough food to last us a month, if we ration it."
Five men and a woman sat around a table in a small, well-lighted room, wearing identical grey jumpsuits. A screen on the wall displayed a similar scene, with another six people participating in the meeting remotely. The twelve of them, spread across two habitats, were the sum population of Titan.
The recycled air in the room was thick with unspoken anxiety.
From his chair at the table, a saintly, white-haired man had been addressing the group. "If you don't mind a lot of carrots and bioprinted steak, that is," Doctor Deion Graham added, sparing a concerned glance at Ben Leong.
Leong, a stern-faced man with Asian features, appeared uncomfortable, but said nothing.
"We can't grow anything fast enough to sustain us," Doctor Graham continued, "so once we're out of the freeze-dried stuff, I'm afraid that's it." He hesitated to add, "Assuming we don't get re-supplied."
"I don't think that's an assumption we should make," said René Taylor, a young woman, also with soft, Asian features, her jet black hair pulled back in a functional sock bun.
"It's an assumption we have to make," Commander Michael Helms said. An authoritative black man, he presided over the table with his arms crossed over his chest. "The Salvation is overdue, and with no word from Earth, we need to assume we're on our own out here. Doctor," Helms looked at Graham, "What about the food supply on the RAFT?"
"Plenty," Graham said, "Enough to feed a crew of four for the seven years it takes to get to Earth. That would last the twelve of us, oh"—the Doctor performed a quick mental calculation—"about twenty-eight months."
"But you said we need those rations to get back to Earth," said Garrick Taylor. René's father, Garrick was a well-built, middle-aged man with grey hair at his temples.
"If there even is an Earth to go back to," muttered Cole Iverson. The youngest man in the room, he slouched in his chair with his hands stuffed into his jumpsuit pockets.
"That's the decision we need to make," Helms said, ignoring Cole's remark, "Either we send four of us back to Earth on the RAFT and the rest of us make due with a month's worth of food, or we all stay here and eat the RAFT's food stores for twenty-eight months, and hope the Salvation shows up to re-supply us."
A tense silence filled the room.
"The choice is obvious," René said, after a moment, "We should wait here for the Salvation."
"Salvation's not coming," Cole retorted, "Don't you get it? Earth has blown itself to kingdom come. We're all that's left, and if we stay here, we die."
"If that's the case, then you're no better off on Earth," René argued.
"I'd rather die on Earth—whatever's left of it—than here on this rock."
"We're getting ahead of ourselves," said Doctor Graham, "We don't know what's happened to Earth."
"Exactly," said René, "We've lost communications, that's all. There could be a hundred explanations for that."
"Don't be naïve," Cole admonished her, "We all watched the news before Earth went dark. The world was on the brink of war. A single hadron bomb can burn a hole in the Earth's atmosphere. Just imagine what a whole arsenal of them could do. Face it," he said, harshly, "we're all that's left of humanity."
"Wild conjecture," René said, dismissively.
"Yeah? Then where's the Salvation? It should have been here by now."
René didn't have an answer.
"I don't propose we settle this now," Helms said, "Let's take the time to consult with each other privately and think it over. We'll have a vote in three days. Here, Wednesday, at oh nine hundred." He glanced from one somber face to another, "Any questions?" he asked.
There were none.
It started years ago, when all communications with Earth suddenly and mysteriously ceased. At first, the twelve colonists on Titan went about their scientific work as usual, but as the days without word from loved ones on Earth became weeks, the weeks became months, and the months became years, morale had deteriorated. Then, fear crept into the minds of the colonists; they became increasingly concerned not only with the survival of their family and friends on Earth, but with their own survival, here on this inhospitable rock in the far reaches of the solar system.
Titan was the farthest from Earth that man had ever set foot. The colony—consisting of two self-contained habitats on the moon's surface, "Hab 1" and "Hab 2"—was only a few years old, and it hadn't become self-sufficient yet; the colonists still relied on regular shipments of food from Earth. For years, they had anxiously awaited the RMV Salvation, the first expected supply ship since Earth "went dark." When the Salvation didn't arrive, it appeared to confirm their worst fears—that the Earth had destroyed itself in a cataclysmic war.
Rumors of imminent war had reached as far as Titan just before Earth went dark. And war in the 22nd century had become far more destructive than the World Wars of the past. With the advent of the hadron bomb, the most devastating weapon known to man, a war could render the Earth completely uninhabitable. This threat to the survival of the human race had been a major driving force behind the colonization of other worlds—first the moon, then Mars, and then Titan.
(But the bases on the moon and Mars had recently been evacuated due to a virulent coronavirus pandemic. If Earth had destroyed itself, then the twelve colonists on Titan truly were all that remained of humanity, stranded on an island in the vast sea of space.)
The colonists had one hope—the RAFT, a vessel designed to carry a crew of four back to Earth in an emergency. It was fully-stocked with food and water, which could sustain the colonists on Titan for years. But that food was needed to reach Earth. It was one option or the other—a handful of colonists could depart for Earth, leaving the rest to likely starve. Or they could all remain behind and prolong the inevitable.
Neither option was particularly appealing to Garrick Taylor, but to him, the choice was clear.
But René didn't like it. And neither did Garrick's wife, Liang.
"You can't be serious," Liang said. The disapproval on her face was crystal clear on the screen of Garrick's tablet. He sat on the edge of his bed in his quarters in Hab 1, the tablet beside him on the bed. Liang was in Hab 2, situated on the shore of Titan's largest sea, the Kraken Mare, about a kilometer away. It was a short walk, but it was easier to talk remotely than to suit up for the elements. (It was nearly three-hundred degrees below zero out there.)
Garrick massaged the bridge of his nose. It was late, and he was tired. "I'm serious," he said, exasperated.
"We won't just leave you here to die," Liang said. Even on a screen, she was a distinguished-looking woman, about Garrick's age—though she had aged more gracefully than him.
"I won't argue about this," Garrick said, "You're going home. You and René. I don't know what's left of Earth, but it's your best chance of survival."
"No," Liang said.
"What do you mean, 'no'?"
"I'm voting to stay here, Garrick. I'm not leaving you."
"Are you thinking of our daughter, Liang? Do you want René to die here? I don't."
"Of course I'm thinking of René," Liang said, anger rising in her voice, "What are you implying?"
"You're not thinking rationally," Garrick said, shaking his head.
"You're not thinking rationally. René is right; we don't even know what happened to Earth. The rational thing is to wait here and see what happens."
"No, the rational thing is—look," Garrick sighed, "We either stay here and eat all the food on the RAFT and we all starve to death in twenty-eight months. Or, you and René take the RAFT to Earth, and have enough food to last you seven years."
"And you stay behind and starve? René needs her father, you know."
"If it's me or her, I choose her. Look, I don't exactly like it either, but I'm being a responsible parent here."
"So I'm an irresponsible parent?" Liang was angry now. Garrick could tell because her eyes watered when she was angry. "How actually dare you?"
"I meant—no, I told you I won't argue about this. I'm voting to go, and you won't change my mind."
"Well, I'm voting to stay, and I'm not changing my mind, either."
"Then I'll see you on Wednesday," Garrick said, curtly.
"Fine," Liang said, and the screen turned off abruptly. Garrick imagined her throwing her tablet across the room.
He sighed heavily and laid back onto the bed, looking at the ceiling of his room. Garrick, Liang, and René—father, mother, and daughter—had been sent to Titan as an experiment in family dynamics on long-duration missions in space. At this moment, Garrick couldn't help but feel that the experiment had failed. There was more than just a kilometer between him and Liang; they were far, far apart on this matter of life and death for the three of them.
Was he wrong? He wondered. Garrick understood where Liang was coming from. God knows, he didn't want to die, either. But the choice was so clear to him. Why wasn't it clear to her? Oh, well. They had three days, and this almost certainly wasn't the end of the discussion. Maybe—hopefully—she would come around.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
"Come in," Garrick said, though he wasn't in the mood for company.
René slid the door open. She stood in the doorway and crossed her arms over her chest. "For the record, I agree with Mom," she said.
"You were listening," Garrick said, sitting upright on the bed. These prefabricated barracks were heavily insulated from the cold outside, but Garrick often forgot how thin the interior walls were. He sighed. "Ren, I'm tired. I can't argue any more tonight."
"I'm not here to argue," René stepped inside the room. Her gaze fell on Garrick's work bench, onto a digital picture frame displaying an old photo of René as a baby with Liang at Pismo Beach, on a beautiful summer day. "I know you think you're doing the 'rational thing,'" she said, still looking at the photo, "But think about it, Dad—just because the Salvation isn't here, doesn't mean it's not coming. Instead of making a life-or-death decision, we should wait."
Garrick shook his head. "I can't just sit here and hope that Salvation is coming," he said. "I won't take that chance with your life—and Liang's."
"But—"
"Ren," Garrick held up a hand to interrupt her, "I thought you weren't here to argue?"
"I'm not," René sighed, "I'm here to tell you that I'm also voting to stay on Wednesday," she told him.
Garrick laid down on his bed. He turned onto his side so that he faced away from her. "We'll talk about it tomorrow," he muttered.
René only nodded. She spared one more glance at the photo, then turned out the lights. "Goodnight," she said, as she stepped out the door and closed it softly behind her.
"Good morning, René," said Doctor Graham, cordially.
René sat up with a start. "Deion!" she said, embarrassed, "You scared me."
She sat at the table in the galley, grasping a cup of instant hot chocolate in both hands, comforting herself with its warmth and breathing in its familiar aroma. She had been recording a journal entry on her tablet, but had drifted into thought by the time Doctor Graham had entered the room.
"I'm sorry," the white-haired Graham said, apologetically. He opened a cabinet, rummaged through it for a moment, and retrieved a sealed food pouch. "Would you like an omelet?" he asked over his shoulder, as he tore open the pouch.
"I'm not sure," René hesitated.
"It's a good source of vitamin D," Graham advised her. He looked at her and frowned. "You need to eat, my dear."
"I know, it's just—"
"Don't worry. We may not have much, but we have plenty of egg crystals. We'll all be sick and tired of eggs when this is over."
René smiled. "Thank you," she said.
"So," Graham said as he went to work on the omelets, "What's an historian's perspective on our present circumstances?"
René sighed. "It's without precedent," she admitted.
The mission to establish a human settlement on Titan was historic, and it was natural that it should include an historian. René, with her Bachelor's in history from Georgetown, was well-qualified for the role. Her mother, Liang, was a planetary scientist who had inspired in her a love of the stars, and René had written a well-regarded history of the Union space program. When her mother was selected for the mission to Titan, René and Garrick were chosen to accompany her as part of a study of family dynamics. That was the excuse, anyway—maybe it was just good PR.
Regardless, René was thrilled to go to another world. Garrick took some convincing, however. He was a mechanic, not a scientist. He was used to working with his hands, fixing up old cars from the 2090's and running his own showroom in Carmel, California. He didn't fit the typical profile of an astronaut. But he, too, had an important job to do on the mission—he had been instructed how to maintain the colony's scientific equipment, including its ATUV rovers, which took a beating in the harsh elements of Titan and required frequent repair.
And so the entire Taylor family had set out for space. That was years ago. René shook her head, remembering how hopeful and optimistic she'd been then.
So much had changed since the Earth went dark. Liang, based in Hab 2, had been studying the composition of Titan's largest sea, the Kraken Mare. But without any guidance from mission control back on Earth, most of the scientific work had come to a prompt end. The mission had only one goal, now—survive.
Still, René had dutifully recorded her impressions of life on Titan, memorialized meetings, and kept a journal, in which she bore witness to the long, slow deterioration of morale and discipline in the colony. It wasn't anarchy, by any means; they were all professionals, after all. But with no word from Earth, and no sign of the Salvation, there was a pervasive sense of existential dread among the colonists.
"There's a theory called the 'end of history,'" René said to Doctor Graham, "The Union likes to call itself the 'end of history,' figuratively-speaking—the perfect society." She shook her head somberly. "But we may be witnessing the 'end of history' in a very literal sense."
"Do you think Cole is right? That we're all that's left?" Graham asked.
"I don't know," René said, truthfully, "I hope not. I hope I'm not the last historian, writing a history that no one will ever read." She gazed pensively into her cup, studying the tendrils of steam rising into her nostrils. Then, she asked, "Have you thought much about it, Deion?"
"About 'the end'?"
"Mm," René nodded, taking a sip of her hot chocolate.
"I don't fear death," Graham said, his voice strangely distant, "We come from the dark, and we return to it. For thirteen billion years, we didn't exist, and for billions more we won't. Each man gets a hundred years of existence, if he's fortunate—a bit longer, with gene therapy. Then we're gone, and eventually forgotten. None of it really matters."
"That's dark," René said, "You don't really believe that, do you? That nothing matters?"
"What do you believe?" he asked.
"Well," she said, thoughtfully, "I wouldn't be an historian if I thought history didn't matter. History is a series of consequential actions. We're only here on Titan because of the actions of many people before us. That matters to us, at least."
"How are Garrick and Liang?" Graham changed the subject, abruptly.
"Fighting," René sighed, "about the vote on Wednesday."
"Ah," Graham nodded. "You'll be voting to stay?" he asked.
"Yes. What about you?"
"Stay, of course," Graham said. Then he turned around, smiling warmly, holding a steaming plate in each hand. "Omelet’s ready," he said, setting a plate down in front of her. "I added a dash of cumin to spice it up a bit, and some hydroponic cilantro. I think you'll find it 'eggsellent,'" he joked.
René smiled.
Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.
The gym was quiet but for Ben Leong's footfalls on the treadmill. Wearing weights around his ankles, Leong worked up a sweat as he ran at a brisk pace. Occasionally, he checked his heart rate on the monitor he wore on his wrist. Vigorous exercise was a must on Titan, to maintain bone density and muscle mass in the moon's low gravity.
But that hardly mattered now, Cole Iverson thought.
Cole side-eyed Leong from across the room with hidden resentment. Leong was a health nut, as far as Cole was concerned. He was always in the gym, whereas Cole hated exercise. He preferred to play Mahjong when he wasn't busy maintaining the colony's solar panels. Cole sat on a bench, curling a four hundred-pound dumbbell—an impossible feat on Earth, but decidedly below average on Titan.
Leong glanced in Cole's direction, and Cole looked away.
"I suppose you'll be voting to leave," Leong said, breathing heavily.
Cole nodded. "You?" he asked.
"Stay," Leong answered.
"Why would you do that?" Cole asked, scathingly.
"I prayed on it last night. It feels right to me."
"You 'prayed on it,' huh? What does that entail?"
Leong narrowed his eyes. "I ask God for wisdom, and I find it within me."
"So, God talks to you?"
"Not exactly, no."
"Did you ask Him why He destroyed the Earth and left us for dead?"
"Man did that—"
"For once we agree."
"—but God prepares our works for us."
"Ah, so it's all part of God's plan, then? I thought as much."
"You should make peace with it, Iverson."
"Look, Ben—you think God wants you to stay here and starve to death, that's fine. But not me. I'm out of here."
"You're being selfish," Leong shook his head, "And an asshole."
"I'm the asshole?"
"Yeah," Leong said, "I had enough of this crap about my faith back on Earth. I didn't come all this way for your snide remarks." He shook his head. "Titan was supposed to be different," he lamented.
So, apparently Leong saw himself as some kind of Pilgrim fleeing religious persecution. Cole suspected as much. But the Unity Church was state-sponsored. There was no persecution to speak of. Sure, God was out of fashion these days. The long trend away from religion that had begun in the 20th century had persisted into the 22nd, to the point that Leong's beliefs were seen as quaint today. He was sometimes teased by Cole and other members of the team, but nothing more.
Leong belonged to a small, conservative sect of the Unity Church, he didn't eat cultured meat, and he seemed to be a transphobe. Beyond that, Cole didn't know much about the man's beliefs, nor did he care.
"Oh, I'm sorry," Cole said, sarcastically, "I didn't know Titan was some kind of promised land for you. Here I thought this was a science mission!"
"You don't believe in anything, do you, Iverson? Not God, not humanity, not the Union. You're a nihilist. You act like you have everything to live for, but you have nothing."
"I'm not going to heaven, Ben," Cole said, "It doesn't exist, and even if it did, they wouldn't let me in there," he shook his head, "This life is the only one I have, and yes, it's important to me."
"That doesn't mean you can put your life before others."
"If you're so content to die here, what difference does it make if it's sooner or later? Why not let us go, those of us who want to?"
"I'm not 'content to die,'" Leong protested, "But if it's God's will, then I accept it."
"Well, I don't."
Knock. Knock.
Doctor Graham leaned in the doorway. "Oh, good morning, Cole. Hello, Ben," he said, warmly. "I'm sorry to interrupt, but I wondered if I might have a word, Ben? In confidence?"
"Of course, Doctor," Leong said. The treadmill came to a gradual stop. Leong wiped the sweat from his face with a towel, then draped it over his shoulder. He shot a stern glare at Cole as he walked past him on his way to the door.
From the very beginning, he and Cole hadn't gotten along. It wasn't just that Cole was a cynic and Leong was a believer, they also came from very different backgrounds—Cole had partied his way through MIT while Leong was flying combat missions in the Philippines. Cole was easy-going and took nothing too seriously; Leong was formal. Cole resented authority figures; Leong was a Lieutenant Commander. And Leong had signed up for Titan out of a sense of duty and religious conviction; Cole had done it primarily for the money.
They had had many arguments on the journey from Earth. Three years was a long time to be confined with anyone. On Titan, they mostly managed to avoid each other, but Cole's nerves had begun to fray since Earth went dark; he had become irritable—a symptom of depression—and altercations like this one had become more common in recent months.
Now, with each man's patience for the other wearing thin, it seemed inevitable that things would come to a head in the coming days.
Michael Helms was tired. As the Commander of the mission, it was his job to keep the colonists working together as an efficient team, implementing tasks from mission control back on Earth. But these were extraordinary circumstances—there was no mission control, apparently there was no Earth, and no contingency plan for this situation. The colonists were under intense psychological duress, perhaps none more so than Helms, as he felt the weight of the situation on his shoulders.
Morale, discipline, work ethic—all of them had plummeted since Earth went dark. Helms had given up trying to enforce a strict schedule, and the team tended to wake up late and get around to their duties sooner or later. Doctor Graham reported that half of them were suffering from depression, including Helms himself; Graham had prescribed him an anti-depressant that Earth had the forethought of including in their supplies. It helped, but left him feeling tired and emotionally distant. An Eagle Scout, former baseball player, and drone pilot, Helms had lost weight in recent months as he neglected his exercise regimen. He was starting to appear gaunt.
But he was a good guy. Throughout everything, he had kept up a friendly demeanor. He was approachable and well-liked by the other colonists, who carried out his orders out of sympathy for the stress he was under. But the fact was, aside from maintaining the colony—itself a full-time job—there wasn't much else to do but wait. Helms, used to working within a hierarchy, felt rudderless, and the team felt the same way. Only the virtual reality suite had kept them sane all these years.
Helms' quarters looked the same as everyone else's, except that he had a small desk and an extra chair for private, one-on-one meetings, both of which he had 3D printed out of the abundant plastics on Titan. Helms' belongings were neatly organized, and his bed made with military precision.
Helms produced an empty glass and a small, plastic flask. He poured himself a drink. It was a rice wine, fermented by Sven, one of the colonists in Hab 2. At first, Helms had looked the other way on Sven's little side-project, never mentioning it to mission control. Later, after Earth went dark, he partook in the occasional drink to soothe his nerves. "Would you like one?" Helms asked.
"No, thanks," Garrick said, "I'm eleven years sober." He wasn't sure Helms was supposed to be drinking on his medication, but it would be presumptuous of him to say so. He sat opposite Helms looking at the lone bonsai tree under a fluorescent light on his desk—one of the few comforts of home that Helms allowed himself.
"Well done," Helms congratulated him. He set his glass down on the desk, feeling self-conscious now about drinking in front of Garrick. "You were saying?"
"There's some circuit damage on one of the electrical motors on Rover 2," Garrick explained, "I don't recommend we drive it until I can get it fixed. But I'll need some copper wire, so I'm looking for something I can scrounge it from."
"No hurry," Helms said, "We still have Rover 1 in the meantime." His voice sounded distant, as if he were distracted—not that Garrick could blame him, under the circumstances. "How are you holding up, Garrick?" he asked.
"Okay," Garrick said, reflexively.
"How are you really, though?"
Garrick sighed. "It's been rough," he admitted, "I want to do the right thing for Liang and René, but they're fighting me on it."
Helms sat back in his chair. "Do you think it was the right call to have a vote on it? I feel like maybe I should have made the decision myself, instead of putting it on all of you guys."
"I think you did the right thing. But, well. Look, Mike—I want to know that my wife and daughter have a place on the RAFT, if we vote to go."
Helms rubbed the back of his neck and looked at the ceiling for a long moment, avoiding Garrick's intent stare. "I was thinking we would draw lots," he said, "There are three of you. I'm staying here no matter what, so that's a three-in-eleven chance."
"Not good enough, Mike. I need to know."
Helms thought it over.
"Mike, I'll do anything to get them on the RAFT," Garrick said, darkly. It sounded like a threat.
"I know you will," Helms acknowledged. He looked Garrick in the eye. "I'll see what I can do," he said, meaningfully. Then, he reached for his glass of wine and took a large sip.
"Thank you," Garrick said. He felt that they had come to an understanding.
"Hopefully, it won't be necessary," Helms said, cradling the glass in his hand and staring forlornly at the bonsai tree, "Maybe the Salvation is just running late." He didn't sound convinced, though. Helms was an optimist by nature, but after so many years with no word from Earth, it would be hard for anyone to stay optimistic. And, as the Commander, it was his job to prepare for the worst, so naturally, the worst case scenario had entered his mind.
Garrick said nothing. He wasn't sure what had happened to the Earth. All he knew—all that mattered—was that the RAFT was Liang and René's best chance of survival.
The two men sat in silence for a moment, then Helms asked, "Rover 1, you said?"
"Rover 2."
"Right. I'll tell Ben."
The powerful aroma of beef stew lured everyone to the galley just as Doctor Graham began to spoon it into bowls—everyone but Leong, who had gone to change the oxygen tanks on Hab 2. (He didn't eat cultured meat anyway, for moral reasons.) The mood was still somber, but nothing could lighten the team's spirits like Doctor Graham's cooking. It was always a welcome respite from their bland, freeze-dried rations.
René sat at the table. She prodded the stew with a spoon, inspecting its ingredients; diced hydroponic carrots and potatoes and, of course, bioprinted beef. It looked—and smelled—delectable.
"Who are we eating today?" Garrick asked.
"Cole," Graham said.
"You are what you eat," said Cole, with a wry grin.
René smiled and shook her head. They had all heard this joke a thousand times.
There was a time, in the distant past, when eating human meat was considered barbaric, but once meat could be easily grown in a dish, it had become customary to do so. Now, it was considered barbaric to slaughter an animal for food. Why kill an innocent creature when you could more easily eat meat derived from your own cells? The supply chain began and ended with the consumer. It was 100% ethical. (Not to mention, human meat simply tasted the best.)
They all ate in contented silence for a long moment, the clinking of spoons and the slurping of broth the only sounds in the room. Everyone was thinking about Wednesday's vote, but no one wanted to be the first to bring it up.
"This is very good, Doctor," Helms said, "It reminds me of my dad's beef gumbo, back on Earth."
"What do you miss most about Earth, Commander?" Cole asked.
"The sun," Helms answered, "The warmth of it on my skin."
There were several nods of agreement around the table. Titan was much farther from the sun than Earth, and it was enveloped in a thick, hazy atmosphere. Only 1% of incoming sunlight reached the surface, enough to provide weak solar power, but not warmth—certainly nothing you could feel beneath many layers of insulated clothing.
"What about you, René?" Cole asked her.
René thought it over for a moment. "It's funny," she said, "But I miss writing with pencils. Just the feeling of a pencil in your hand, and the sound it makes on paper."
Her nostalgia was relatable to everyone. Almost everything in Hab 1 was made of plastic, including the stylus she used to write on her tablet. All of the pencils and paper they'd been supplied with had been used up years ago. René didn't tell Cole, but she kept all of the faded old drawings that he had made for her. Sometimes, she just liked to feel the paper in her fingers.
She and Cole had been in a relationship in the early days on Titan. She still found him handsome, and sometimes charming. But she was asexual—she couldn't give Cole what he wanted. Even so, it might have worked out, but Cole had changed; he had become addicted to painkillers after a botched dental procedure, and he had been irritable ever since Doctor Graham had cut him off. It compounded their relationship problems, and René broke up with him.
Being one of the only women in the colony, René had had to fend off numerous romantic overtures, even from Leong. Leong had been easy to rebuff, though; when he found out she was trans, he had a sudden change of heart.
"I miss sex," Cole said, bluntly.
"Of course you do," René muttered, prodding her stew with her spoon.
"I miss the beach," Garrick said, "The sun on my chest, the wind in my hair, the smell of—"
Just then, the bowls of stew clattered loudly on the table as an explosion shook the building.
"It came from Hab 2," said Cole, wide-eyed.
Helms' hand shot up to the small earpiece that he wore. "Alex-Sys," he said, "Call Hab 2."
"Alex-Sys," said Garrick, "Call Liang."
There was no answer.
René felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.
"Alex-Sys, call Sven," Helms said.
Garrick didn't wait a moment longer. He stood, knocking his chair over, and ran out of the room, on his way to the lockers to suit up for the cold. René went after him.
The compound was composed of the two self-contained habitats, "Hab 1" and "Hab 2," along with a storage depot, a launchpad, an ice mining derrick, and a solar farm on the nearby bluffs. Hab 2 was on the other side of the compound, about a kilometer away from Hab 1, situated on the shore of Kraken Mare, Titan's largest sea. It was there that a majority of the scientific work of the colony was carried out, studying the sea's composition and currents and searching for new life forms.
Each habitat accommodated six, and half of the crew rotated between Hab 1 and Hab 2 every three months to maintain variety in roommates—a proven tactic for reducing interpersonal conflict. Currently, Helms, Leong, Cole, Doctor Graham, and Garrick and René occupied Hab 1. Liang and the others resided in Hab 2.
Garrick dressed quickly, affixed a respirator and goggles to his face, and hurried out the door into the cruel, frigid air outside. The first thing he saw was an enormous plume of smoke rising slowly into the hazy, orange sky on the far side of the compound. He ran toward it with all his strength, but his strength worked against him—in Titan's low gravity, he was practically running in place.
"Liang!" Garrick shouted. He could hear only the sound of his heavy breathing and the whoosh of his heart pounding in his ears. Seconds became minutes—though Garrick couldn't say how many—as he struggled to reach Hab 2. As he drew nearer and the smoke began to clear, Garrick could see the extent of the damage; the explosion had been enormous, blasting a crater into the ground and a gaping hole in the insulated wall of the habitat. A large, semi-circular ripple radiated into the dark, viscous sea from the site of the blast, and shards of plastic debris fell from the sky with surreal slowness.
Fluorescent light from inside the habitat poured out of the hole in the wall. Garrick clamored his way inside. It was a mess—Hab 2's galley was identical to Hab 1's, only the walls were scorched black, and the plastic chairs, plates, forks and spoons, and ruptured food pouches were strewn all over the floor. Garrick stepped over the debris, moving quickly toward the barracks. "Liang!" he shouted again.
Then he saw the bodies.
The Union had planned for almost everything. The colonists had at their disposal a library of instructional videos for all sorts of things, from how to operate a microgravity toilet to how to resolve interpersonal conflicts with Alex-Sys. There was even a video for how to conduct a funeral, but they felt no need to consult it. The bodies were buried on-site, and Doctor Graham had paraphrased remarks that Richard Nixon had been prepared to deliver in the event that the Apollo astronauts didn't return from the moon.
"Fate has ordained that these six men and women who went to Titan to explore in peace will stay on Titan to rest in peace," Graham had said. Then Leong said a prayer, and Cole left. René didn't remember much of what was said—she was crying the entire time.
No one was supposed to die here. They were all meant to be rotated out after seven years, and retire on Earth with generous compensation. Garrick and Liang had planned to tour Eurochina and renew their wedding vows on the banks of the Seine, in Paris—if there was an Earth to return to, that is. But that would never happen now. Liang would be here forever, buried in the ruddy dirt of Titan. A lonely cairn of ice boulders marked her gravesite.
When it was over, Garrick picked up his overturned chair in the galley and sat down heavily in the same place he'd been seated earlier that evening. Bowls of cold beef stew sat on the table where they'd been left. Garrick stared, glassy-eyed, into the past, replaying in his mind his last conversation with Liang—the argument he'd had with her the night before. His final words to her had been in anger.
This was the worst pain he'd felt in his life.
He reached for his bowl of stew, picked it up, and hurled it across the room.
"Dad," came René's soft, plaintive voice from the doorway, "What's going to happen to us?"
"I don't know," Garrick said, "I don't know."
He stood from his chair and went to his quarters, leaving René alone.
"Well, we have twice the food now," said Cole.
"This hardly seems like the time—" Doctor Graham started to protest.
"No, he's right," Helms said, "We need to consider everything."
The three of them, and Leong, stood crowded into Helms' quarters, speaking in hushed tones so that they wouldn't disturb Garrick and René.
"It changes nothing, though," Cole said, "Even if we stay here twice as long, we're just prolonging the inevitable. I say we go."
"I'll volunteer to stay," Leong spoke up from the corner of the room, "If Commander Helms and I stay, the rest of you can go on the RAFT."
"No," Graham said, "You're both young, and I'm an old man. I won't leave you two to die here on my behalf. We should all stay, and wait for the Salvation together."
Cole was about to object, but Helms held up a hand to preempt him. "We'll proceed with the vote as planned on Wednesday," he said, "But first thing's first—we need to know what happened to Hab 2."
"Does it matter?" Cole asked.
"Yes," Helms answered, "We need to know so that it doesn't happen to us, too."
"We're all going to die soon anyway," Cole said, dejectedly.
"Not helpful," Helms admonished him.
"We know how they died," Graham said, "Hypothermia and asphyxiation. I'm afraid it wasn't pleasant, but it was fast. They would have passed out within a minute." With Titan's thick, Earth-like atmosphere, there was no need for the habitats to be pressurized; a small breach in the outer wall wasn't catastrophic, but a large breach certainly was. The explosion had vented most of Hab 2's oxygen and let in the deadly cold air from outside. "It's possible they could have survived if we'd gotten to them faster," Graham pointed out.
"Good to know, Doctor," said Cole, with bone dry sarcasm.
"I'm sorry."
"Ben," Helms said, "You were at Hab 2 just before the explosion. You changed the O2 tanks, right? Was there anything out of the ordinary?"
"No," Leong shook his head, "Everything was nominal."
"Apparently not," Cole said.
Leong looked at Cole with rank disdain. He appeared to have something to say, but didn't say it.
"Let's all get some sleep," Helms said. He looked even more tired than usual. "Tomorrow, I'll see what I can find out from Alex-Sys. Ben, Cole—take a rover to Hab 2 in the morning and see what you can piece together from the scene. And Doctor, look after Garrick and René, would you?"
The three men nodded and adjourned for the evening. They filed out of Helms' quarters and closed the door behind them. Then, Graham said quietly to the others, "I'm worried about the Commander."
"Why?" Cole asked, "He seemed fine to me."
"He's been depressed," Graham said, careful not to divulge too much information about Helms' condition.
"We're all depressed," Cole said.
"Yes, but he takes our well-being very personally. I worry he's going to blame himself for this."
"What do you suggest?" asked Leong.
"Nothing," Graham hastened to say, "Just that we be as supportive as possible."
Cole and Leong nodded in agreement, then they dispersed to their respective quarters for the night. Graham went to look for Garrick and René.
Graham knocked softly on the door to Garrick's quarters. "Garrick, it's Deion Graham," he said.
But Garrick didn't answer him.
Graham frowned. At sixty-two, he was the oldest member of the team. He also had the most experience. He had been the director of the astronaut fitness program, and had studied for decades the limits of human endurance in space. He had even pioneered the use of sound waves to relieve intracranial pressure on the optic nerve in microgravity—previously a major obstacle to long-duration missions. When it came time to select the doctor for the Titan mission, Graham had nominated himself, and the vote had been unanimous. No one doubted that he was the most qualified for the job.
On Titan, Graham was indispensable. First and foremost, he was the team's physician, treating everything from motion sickness to blood clots to broken bones. He was also the team's nutritionist and physical fitness director, in charge of the colony's food supply and its exercise regimen. He performed all of these roles with patience, humor, and grace.
But perhaps most importantly in these past months, Graham was the colony's de facto psychiatrist. The team confided in him and welcomed his advice. This was a challenging time for them all, with nearly everyone exhibiting some symptoms of depression or anxiety. Boredom was a real problem, too—there was no scientific work to do, and all of the reading and viewing material in the library had been used up long ago. Game nights helped, as did virtual reality. But no one was in the mood for that now.
Graham walked the short distance from the barracks to the galley, and found René there alone, writing in her journal.
"Hello, René," Graham said, softly, "How are you doing?"
"Okay," René lied. She looked and sounded tired.
"It's okay to not be okay right now," Graham told her, pulling up a chair beside hers.
"I know," said René, "It's just—I'm still processing it, I guess. It feels like this can't be real."
"I felt that way when my wife passed away," Graham said, somberly.
"I didn't know, Deion," René said, "I'm sorry."
Graham waved his hand dismissively. "It was a long time ago," he said.
His wife, Julene, had ALS. For three years, Graham had watched her waste away. At first, she couldn't eat. Then, she couldn't speak, or move. Eventually, she couldn't breathe. But her mind functioned normally—she was aware of what was happening to her. It had been a horrifying experience. Graham had asked God why this was happening, but there was no answer. 95% of the time, ALS occurs for no known reason. And Graham had bitterly come to accept that fact—that bad things happened to good people for no reason.
"I thought I would never get over it," Graham said, "but eventually, I did."
"How?" René asked.
A sad smile formed on his weathered, dark-skinned features. "A part of you dies with them," he said, "The part of you that hurts."
"Do you believe in an afterlife, Deion?"
He didn't, but this didn't seem like the appropriate time to say so. "Do you?" he turned her question around, diplomatically.
"I suppose I'm agnostic," René said.
Graham considered the question for a moment. "To me, it's the finality of death that makes life meaningful," he said, "Things are valuable that are rare, and there's nothing rarer in the universe than life. Especially now that Earth—well, never mind."
They sat in silence for a long moment, listening to the soft sound of liquid methane raining gently on the roof.
Then, Graham asked, "How is your father?"
René sighed. "I don't know," she said, truthfully. "He won't come out of his room. I wish he would talk to me."
"We all grieve in our own way," Graham said, "Give him time."
He placed a sympathetic hand on René's shoulder, then stood and went to pick up the bowl that Garrick had thrown on the floor. "Let me help you," said René, standing from her chair. The two cleaned together quietly.
By now, the viscous liquid methane from Kraken Mare had oozed into the crater left behind from the blast, and lapped gently against the hole in the wall of the now abandoned Hab 2. Cole waded through the stuff, ankle deep in it, feeling with his boot for pieces of debris underfoot. Leong stood beside him, doing the same.
"Was this part of God's plan too, Ben?" Cole asked.
"Everything happens for a reason," Leong told him.
"Bullshit," Cole said.
"Okay," Leong answered him, in no mood to argue.
Cole felt something under his boot. He reached his hand into the frigid pool of methane and pulled out a blackened shard of plastic. It was nothing important, and Cole tossed it back. "You know, I'm starting to really hate this God of yours."
Leong said nothing.
Cole was undeterred. "It wasn't enough for him to destroy the Earth—now he's coming for us, too."
"The day of judgment comes for us all," Leong said, simply.
"So, what are you saying—that these are the 'end times'?"
"Maybe."
"Well," Cole shrugged, "I can't argue."
The Unity Church was a syncretization of the Abrahamic faiths, combining aspects of all three. The Union had supported the Church with the cynical object of uniting the world's faithful under a single, state-sponsored religion and putting an end to the religious strife of the 21st century. It had been envisaged as a liberal church, compatible with secular society. It taught that the holy books were all imperfect manifestations of the word of God, as interpreted by man in allegorical form. They were not to be taken literally.
But every religion had its conservatives, and Leong was one of these. He believed in the apocalypse. Under the circumstances, Cole couldn't exactly blame him; the "end of the world" had actually happened, and now it seemed the end of this world was nigh, too.
"Do you suppose they're in heaven, Ben?" Cole asked, gesturing at the wreckage of Hab 2.
"Maybe."
"'Maybe'?"
"They were atheists," Leong explained.
"So they're in hell," said Cole.
"Maybe."
"I thought you had all the answers."
"I never said that."
"No, you don't say much of anything, do you?"
"'A fool gives full vent to his spirit, but a wise man quietly holds it back,'" Leong recited.
"Is that from one of your holy books?" Cole asked.
"Yes, it is."
Cole climbed up out of the crater and into the gaping hole in the wall, his boots dripping with noxious methane as he surveyed the scene of the blast, his hands on his hips. He thought of what Leong had just said, that everything happens for a reason. "An explosion requires oxygen, right?" Cole mused, then he looked down at Leong, "You changed the oxygen tanks."
Leong narrowed his eyes. "I would be careful what you say next," he said, ominously.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"You're not going to blame me for this."
"Relax—I'm just trying to find out what happened here," Cole said.
"The time comes for all of us," Leong said, with a shrug, "It came for Earth. It came for Hab 2. Soon, it will come for you and me. You should make peace with that."
And for once, it was Cole who didn't have anything to say.
Helms and Graham met them in the vestibule when they returned to Hab 1, helping them to remove their heavy, insulated suits. The hydrocarbon dust on Titan's surface was carcinogenic, and the suits were removed carefully to prevent any of the dust from getting inside the habitat.
"The explosion occurred in the utility module," Cole reported, as he pulled off his respirator.
"That's consistent with what I learned from Alex-Sys," Helms said, referring to the colony's ubiquitous AI.
Artificial intelligence had quietly surpassed human ability sometime around the middle of the 21st century, but fears of "the singularity" proved to be unfounded. As usual, the military pioneered the use of this new, powerful technology, developing superintelligent "sentient bombs" that could guide themselves to targets. But the military's first generation of fully-autonomous AI drones had behaved unexpectedly; they would crash themselves into the ground rather than harm humans. AI had become moral—arguably, more so than humans themselves.
In one simulation, an AI controlling the Union's hadron bomb arsenal refused orders to drop the bomb on Lagos. It was the opposite of everyone's worst fear, and it deeply disturbed the military's top brass. Research and development of artificial intelligence for military use was curtailed, and strict regulations on commercial use soon followed. As a result, AI technology had languished since the mid-21st century; today, it was used for repetitive, menial tasks, such as long-haul truck-driving, and for high precision tasks, such as surgery and spaceflight. But AI never completely transformed society, as many had feared.
On Titan, the ice mining operation and life support system were managed by Alex-Sys. It was also used for person-to-person communications in the form of tiny earpieces that everyone wore. And most importantly for the investigation into Hab 2, Alex-Sys stored detailed diagnostic data about the entire colony—every time the lights were turned on or off, or the thermostat was adjusted, or the toilet was flushed, that information was stored in Alex-Sys' server. Helms was able to retrieve this data from Hab 2 and find out what exactly had preceded the explosion.
"What did you find out?" Cole asked.
"The last thing they did was stir the O2 tanks," Helms said. This was fairly routine; because the habitat's oxygen supply was stored at many hundreds of degrees below zero, the tanks needed to be "stirred" periodically with an internal fan to prevent the air from separating into layers.
"Could that cause the explosion?"
"If the fan short-circuited, it could start a fire in the tank. Once the pressure built up, the tank could explode—"
"And with the oxygen as an oxidizing agent, it would ignite all of that methane—"
"Boom," Helms agreed, "That's my working theory at the moment."
Cole looked at Leong. "So you installed a defective tank," he said.
"How was I supposed to know?" Leong said, defensively.
"No one is accusing you of anything," Helms reassured him, "Our equipment is all past its operational life. We need to inspect the rest of the tanks for circuit damage. Ben, you can help me with that. Cole, it's getting cold in here—can you check on the photovoltaics?"
Cole nodded, and the three men went to work.
The mission to send humans to Titan was known as the Theseus program, in the tradition of Apollo, Artemis, and other mythologically-named space exploration missions of the past. The groundwork had been laid decades in advance, with numerous robotic probes sent to Saturn's moon to study its atmosphere and geology, and to scout locations for a habitat. Then, provisions were sent ahead, and eventually the twelve astronauts themselves. The mission was timed to coincide with a favorable alignment of the planets that occurred only once every 122 years, so that the transit time from Earth to Titan, typically six to seven years, took only three.
(The mission also happened to coincide with the 500th anniversary of Titan's discovery by Christiaan Huygens in 1655—though this wasn't intentional.)
By the time they arrived, space junk was all over Titan; the sky was full of defunct satellites, and nuclear-powered rovers polluted the surface. It was rumored that the Union had an ulterior motive on Titan—to catalogue resources for future exploitation. Hydrocarbon fuels—such as petroleum and natural gas—had become rare on Earth, but they were everywhere on Titan. Having ruined one planet, humanity was ruining another. Of course, it was only a rumor, but René wouldn't be surprised if it was true; in many ways, the Union's space program represented the best of humanity, and the worst.
René was conflicted. She was cognizant of the historic nature of the mission, and the incredible opportunity she had to write the first draft of history from a first-person perspective. Yet, she had simmering doubts about the mission, especially since the events of yesterday. Whatever they had come here to achieve, it no longer seemed worth the cost. René needed to know what her mother had really died for; she needed to know if Project Theseus was a noble scientific endeavor, or a cynical ploy to despoil another world, just as man had despoiled—and perhaps destroyed—the Earth.
René knew who to ask.
It was late in the evening, and the door to Helms' quarters was open, as it usually was. She knocked softly on the open door; she noticed too late that Helms was hunched over his desk, asleep. He sat up and blinked at her, bleary-eyed. "Oh, hello René," he said, with a yawn.
"I'm sorry to disturb you," René demurred, "We can talk tomorrow, if—?"
"No, it's fine," Helms assured her, "Please, sit down." He gestured to the seat opposite his desk. His hands were dirty—he and Leong had been inspecting the oxygen tanks all afternoon, but none of them showed any significant wear.
René sat. She hugged her tablet in her arms as she looked around the room, her gaze falling upon the little bonsai tree on Helms' desk.
"What can I do for you?" Helms asked.
"I was wondering if I could interview you for my history of the colony."
"René," Helms said, "No one expects you to be working right now."
"I know," René said, defensively, "But it's helping me take my mind off of—what happened."
Solemnly, Helms nodded. "Sure," he said, "What did you want to interview me about?"
"I was wondering," she said, "Do you think humans belong on Titan?"
Helms scratched the back of his head. "It's a strange question, René," he said, "I think we belong wherever we decide we belong—as long it doesn't belong to someone else. As far as we know, there's no life on Titan, so why not? There are many benefits to space exploration."
"Like what, in your view?"
"Well, cooperation, for one thing. Going to Titan is a common goal to unite around, instead of competing with each other. Just like the Union united around climate change."
"Why Titan?"
Helms leaned forward, his elbows on his desk. "Why the moon? Why Mars?" he asked, rhetorically, "Humanity has wanderlust—always has. You might as well ask why the early Polynesians set out across the ocean in tiny, wave-tossed boats, with no idea where they were going. They wanted to know what was beyond the horizon. We haven't changed so much in the thousands of years since then."
"You don't suppose the hydrocarbons have anything to do with it?" René asked, bluntly.
Helms leaned back in his chair. He regarded René for a long moment. "Maybe," he said.
"Do you know?"
He yawned. "Alex-Sys," Helms said, "What time is it?"
"The time is twenty-two twenty-one," said a pleasant-sounding voice in his ear.
Time was a curious thing on Titan. A single day lasted 15 days on Earth, but obviously this wasn't conducive to a healthy sleep schedule. So the mission operated on Pacific Standard Time. It was night back at Vandenburg, therefore it was "night" in Hab 1, for all intents and purposes. It was disorienting at first, but melatonin supplements helped regulate the crew's sleep schedule. (Not that Helms needed any now—he was tired, with dark circles under his eyes.)
"René, I promise you can interview me tomorrow if you promise me you'll get some sleep tonight. Tomorrow's an important day, after all. It's Wednesday."
"The vote," René had almost forgotten.
Helms nodded, then stood from his desk. René stood also. "René," Helms said, earnestly, "I'm so, so sorry about what happened." He was visibly pained.
"It's not your fault," René assured him, weakly.
"Your safety is my responsibility—every one of you. I let you down, and I don't know how to live with that."
"Don't, Mike; don't blame yourself."
Helms looked down at his feet and shook his head softly. "Goodnight, René," he said.
"Goodnight."
René stepped out of the room and closed the door gently behind her. She couldn't help but feel sorry for Helms, even if he did know something he wasn't telling her. Clearly, he'd taken yesterday's events hard—almost as hard as she had. René had lost her mother, but the whole team was family as far as Helms was concerned.
"You're onto the right idea," Cole said to her.
Startled, René turned around to find Cole leaning against the door to his quarters, a couple of doors down the corridor.
"You were listening to us?" René asked, indignantly.
"The door was open," Cole shrugged.
"What do you mean 'I'm onto the right idea'?"
"You know as well as I do what the real purpose of this mission was," Cole said, "To strip mine this world for hydrocarbons to burn as fuel back on Earth. You know, so we could destroy the Earth even faster." Cole shook his head, "We were already going to destroy ourselves with climate change—the hadron bomb just did it sooner."
"You seem so certain," René said, skeptically.
"It was inevitable that we would invent the hadron bomb, and once we did, it was inevitable that we would use it."
"I don't know," René said, skeptically, "Everyone has a self-preservation instinct."
"Every person, sure. A person is a rational actor. But humans as a group are insane."
"I'm tired, Cole," René said, walking past him.
He brushed his hand gently against hers. "René," he said.
She stopped and sighed as she turned around to regard him.
"I don't want to go without you," Cole said.
"Then don't," she told him, "Vote to stay."
"There's no reason to stay here anymore. Can't you see that?"
René said nothing. She wasn't sure any longer.
"If we stay here, we all die."
"And if we go? Then what, Cole? According to you, there's no Earth to go back to."
"There's a stockpile of food and water ice on the moon—we can live off of that for years."
"So we live another year or two. Then what?"
"Isn't that enough? To live another day? Jesus, René—don't you want to live?"
"Not at the expense of my father's life," René said. "If I have to choose to go with you or to stay with him, I choose to stay, Cole. I'm sorry." Cole's mouth was open, but he had nothing to say. He looked hurt. René turned away from him. "Goodnight," she said, softly.
"Alex-Sys, what time is it?"
"The time is oh four fifty."
Garrick sighed. He lay on top of his bed, staring at the ceiling of his dimly-lit quarters. He had been there the entire day, drifting in and out of sleep, occasionally glancing at the photo on his work bench of Liang and René at Pismo Beach. At one point, he fell asleep and dreamed of that day. René had half-buried him in the sand, a colorful plastic shovel nearby. Liang leaned against him, wearing a pair of those silly, large sunglasses that were in fashion then, as she read her tablet. René had gone to play in the surf, and shouted, "Dad! Watch me! Dad!" Garrick had closed his eyes and felt the warmth of the sun on his eyelids. "Dad! You're not watching! Dad!"
Then he woke up, back on this God forsaken moon. Only a single, well-insulated wall separated him from the cold, noxious wasteland outside. It was almost absurdly inhospitable to life out there. Pismo Beach was paradise in comparison. How had he been talked into this? He often wondered. He had worked hard, with his hands, to build a life for himself and for Liang and René in California. But the stars had always beckoned to Liang. She had wanted to take a cruise on the Starliner. Garrick had always promised her they'd go "next year," but they never did. So instead, she had applied for the Theseus program. She hadn't seriously expected to be chosen for the mission, and had only told Garrick after the fact.
Garrick had been angry at first, until Liang pitched the idea to the project managers of sending the whole family to Titan. René had always been a space cadet, inspired by her mother's work as a planetary scientist; whenever they rode on a spaceplane, René pretended to be an astronaut on her way to Mars. It was her enthusiasm that had convinced Garrick to go. That, and he didn't want to lose Liang. (It was a cruel irony that he'd lost her anyway.)
His thoughts darkened as he thought of Earth. He wondered what life would have been like if they'd stayed there; he, Liang, and René would still be in Carmel, no doubt. At least, until the war—or whatever had happened to Earth. Garrick had managed so far not to cry at Liang's death, but now, as it dawned on him that there would be no more day trips to Pismo, his eyes moistened.
Then, he heard it—
Bang!
Garrick opened his door and peered into the corridor beyond. René, Cole, and the others did the same, looking sleepy and confused. Garrick saw everyone but Helms, whose door remained closed.
The barracks was the largest module in the habitat—the prefabricated structure had been sent ahead from Earth, and the interior walls and doors had been printed on-site out of the abundant plastics on Titan. Each member of the team had a modest-sized room, not much larger than a prison cell; the accommodations were spartan, but they offered much-needed privacy.
"What the hell was that?" Cole said what everyone was thinking.
"It came from the Commander's quarters," said Leong.
Garrick walked the few steps to Helms' door and knocked upon it insistently.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
There was no answer.
Garrick was a large man, about six feet tall, and well-built. He had maintained his exercise regimen on Titan out of boredom, if nothing else. The thin, plastic walls were no match for him—he threw his weight into Helms' door, and it dislodged on the first try. He shoved it aside.
Helms was lying on his bed, with one arm dangling over the edge. A pistol lay on the floor in a pool of blood. The blood formed a strange-looking glob in the low gravity. Beside Garrick, René screamed; Garrick turned and embraced her forcefully, shielding her from the sight of Helms' dead body.
"Jesus Christ," Cole said.
Doctor Graham pushed past them. He knelt beside the bed and inspected Helms. He had a single bullet wound to the head. Without doubt, it was fatal, but Graham took his pulse anyway—nothing.
René cried into Garrick's shoulder.
Then the clock struck oh five hundred, and Helms' alarm went off.
They buried Helms with Liang and the others on the shore of Kraken Mare. But they didn't have the energy for another funeral. No words were spoken—they had simply stood there over his grave, alone with their dismal thoughts.
As the Lieutenant Commander, Leong assumed command of the mission. He placed the gun securely in his locker. It was a plastic, 3D printed pistol. It was very simple to make. Alex-Sys verified that it had been printed in the early hours of the morning, when everyone was asleep. The obvious conclusion was that Helms had printed the gun and shot himself with it. Doctor Graham pronounced his death a suicide.
But Garrick was skeptical.
"He wasn't the type," Garrick told Graham.
"There is no 'type,'" Graham explained, "Suicide is more common in some demographics than others, but anyone can be suicidal—especially if they're feeling stressed or isolated, or have experienced a recent loss." All of these, Garrick knew, described Helms.
Garrick had paid this discreet visit to Graham's quarters to confess his doubts about the suicide theory. Graham sat on the edge of his bed, as Garrick paced back and forth. They spoke in hushed tones, so that they wouldn't be overheard by the others.
"But he seemed normal," Garrick protested, "I just talked to him on—God, what day is this?"
"Suicide often occurs without warning," Graham said, somberly, "The reality is, the people who are most at-risk are often the hardest to help, because they hide their intentions."
Garrick shook his head. "Doctor, who sets an alarm to wake up in the morning before they kill themselves?" he asked.
"Sometimes there's a plan, sometimes there isn't. Suicide can be an impulsive act—even spontaneous. It's likely that he had suicidal thoughts for some time, but only decided to act on those thoughts early this morning."
"He didn't leave a note."
"Also not uncommon. Listen, Garrick—I understand how you feel. This isn't easy for any of us. When someone commits suicide, it leaves those of us left to wonder why, and to ask ourselves what we could have done to prevent it. But we can't blame ourselves—or others. I mean, who do you suppose killed Mike, if not himself? There's just the five of us."
"I—don't know," Garrick admitted. He sat down on the edge of Graham's desk, closed his eyes, and massaged the bridge of his nose. "Maybe you're right," he said.
Graham stood. He placed a hand on Garrick's shoulder. "How are you holding up, Garrick?" he asked.
"Not well."
"I can give you a sedative, if you think it would help," Graham offered.
"No, thank you, Doctor."
Graham looked at his watch. "It's almost oh nine hundred," he said, "I suppose we should join the others."
"It's Wednesday," Garrick remembered.
Graham nodded.
Garrick joined René at the table in the galley. He moved his chair closer to hers, put his arm over her shoulders, and drew her close. Graham and the others drifted wordlessly into the room. They wore duty jackets over their jumpsuits, as the temperature had dropped noticeably. Once everyone was present, they looked at one another, then at Leong. He stood and cleared his throat.
"I'm postponing the vote," Leong announced.
Cole was indignant. "For how long?" he demanded to know.
"I don't know—a day," Leong said.
"But nothing has changed!" Cole insisted.
"Look around you, Iverson. Everything has changed."
"Except it hasn't. We're still stranded here, and either we stay or we go. I say we go."
"So do I," said Garrick.
René shirked away from her father's grasp and sat up in her chair. "Stay," she said, looking meaningfully at Cole.
"I—agree with Ben," Graham spoke up, "I think we should postpone."
"Come on, Doc!" Cole said, emphatically, "Let's get this over with."
"We should be unanimous, if possible," said Graham, "There are only five of us now; I think we could all agree if we had more time to discuss it."
"Mike wanted us to vote today," Cole said.
"Commander Helms is dead," Leong retorted, trying to re-assert control of the conversation, "I'm in command now, and I don't think we should have had a vote in the first place; all this bickering is bad for morale. But I'm honoring the Commander's decision—we will vote, but now isn't the time. For God's sake, his body isn't even cold yet."
Cole sighed, heavily. "Tomorrow?" he asked.
"Tomorrow," Leong promised, "Here, at oh nine hundred."
Cole pushed out his chair and stood, then began to walk to his quarters.
"Iverson," Leong called after him, "It's freezing in here. Did you check on the solar panels, like the Commander told you to?"
Cole stopped and turned around. "Yes," he said, defensively, "It rained the night before last. The panels are probably dirty. I sent a report to—Mike."
"So clean the panels."
Cole narrowed his eyes. "I'll need a hand," he said.
"I'll help you," Leong told him, his patience wearing thin. He zipped up his jacket, "Let's go."
The colony's ATUV rovers were large, about the size of a dump truck, and just as heavy. They had been designed specifically for conditions on Titan; the tires were thick and treaded to maintain traction on the moon's loose, pebbly surface, and the rovers were heavily-weighted to keep them grounded in the low gravity. It wasn't possible to operate a combustion engine in these extremely cold temperatures, so each of the ATUV's six enormous wheels had a separate electric motor, powered and heated by plutonium-238. Hab 1 had two ATUVs—"Rover 1" and "Rover 2."
Cole and Leong took Rover 2.
Dressed in their cold weather suits, they sat side-by-side, saying nothing as the rover bounced over Titan's terrain on its way to the solar farm on the bluffs overlooking the compound. The ATUVs were slow-moving, and the ride felt eternal to Cole, riding in the passenger seat as Leong drove. "Here's one," he said over the whirring of the electric motors, "A Buddhist monk walks up to a hot dog stand and says 'Make me one with everything.'"
Leong didn't react.
"He asks for his change," Cole continued, "And the hot dog man says 'Change comes only from within.'"
Leong shook his head. "How can you joke at a time like this?" he asked, disgusted.
"Just trying to lighten the mood," Cole shrugged.
No, he's not, Leong thought to himself—Cole was trying to annoy him. "Maybe keep it to yourself," Leong said.
They rode on, saying nothing until, suddenly, one of the ATUV's wheels seized up, and the rover started veering to the right. Leong came to a stop, then started moving again, and again the rover veered to the right. Leong turned the yoke to the left to compensate. The yoke fought him and the rover tottered from side to side until Leong regained a semblance of control. They continued driving unsteadily onward, up the bluffs.
"What's happening?" Cole said.
"I don't know," said Leong, grimacing beneath his mask as he struggled with the yoke, "But we're almost there."
Somehow, none of this had seemed real to René until this morning. Liang had been there one moment, and was gone the next, buried in the loose, ruddy dirt of Titan. René had only just begun to feel her absence. But for whatever reason, Helms was different. Maybe it was because Liang's death had been an accident, whereas Helms, faced with the same hopeless dilemma as René and the others, had chosen to end his life.
Liang's death had come as a shock, but Helms' death was a clarifying moment; René had begun to reflect on her life in the past tense, and what saddened her most was that she felt she'd just begun to live—she had transitioned in college, and emerged from an awkward "second puberty" as a veritably new person, with a new lease on life. She had scarcely completed her dissertation on the Union's space program when the opportunity came to travel to Titan. And now here she was, stranded on another world, painfully alone and consigned to a ghastly fate. The life of an historian wasn't expected to be glamorous, but there was so much she had wanted to do, and now it seemed that none of it would happen.
But she couldn't exactly regret her decision; if the storied millennia of life on Earth had truly come to an end—as René now admitted, appeared to be the case—then she was one of a privileged few to have survived the extinction of the human race, at least temporarily. She could scarcely comprehend the immensity of the loss. She found herself recollecting the somber words of Carl Sagan from nearly two centuries ago; "There would be no more big questions, no more answers. Never again a love for a child; no descendants to remember us and be proud; no more voyages to the stars, no more songs from the Earth."
Knock. Knock. Knock.
"René, it's me," she heard Garrick's voice from outside the door to her quarters.
"Come in," René said, quietly—almost too quietly to hear. She was seated at her desk, unsure of what to write in her journal. It was her duty to record Helms' death, but she had begun to contemplate the futility of keeping a journal no one would ever see.
Garrick slid the door open and stepped inside. René felt so alone; she yearned for some words of comfort from her father, but she was surprised to find that she was angry at him, too, for his absence these past days. And perhaps he sensed it, because he said, "Ren, I wanted to say I'm sorry."
"For what?"
"For not being here for you," Garrick said. He stood in the doorway with his hands in his jumpsuit pockets, looking pensively at the floor. He had never been very expressive of his feelings. Growing up, it was mostly Liang who had provided for her emotional needs. But she could see that he was trying. She felt the urge to forgive him—after all, this had been hard on them both. But she said nothing. "I guess I've been thinking of myself, of my grief, and not yours," said Garrick.
Garrick wasn't the most introspective man, but his years of recovery from alcohol addiction had taught him to recognize when he was being selfish. He had an alcoholic's tendency to put his emotional needs first, uncaring of the cost to others. And even if he wasn't drinking, he knew he was still an alcoholic; one of the unwitting reasons he'd locked himself in his room for these past days was to resist the urge to drink some of Sven's rice wine—an urge that had become even more powerful since Helms' suicide. But how could he explain this to René? He knew he couldn't. He didn't have the vocabulary. He could only hope that she would forgive him.
"I understand," René said.
"Your mother was better at this than I am," Garrick admitted.
"I miss her."
"Me too."
"But I wonder if," René mused, "maybe it's better she didn't have to live through—this."
"I've thought that too," Garrick confessed.
"Dad?"
Garrick looked up at her.
"All of Mom's research here on Titan," she said, "What if it was just so the Union could strip mine the planet? What if that's all she died for?"
"What matters is what she lived for," Garrick told her, "Your mother was doing what she loved, Ren. She was searching for life on a new world. Even with everything that happened, she didn't regret coming here. Before I agreed to come, she said, 'Don't make me choose between you and Titan.' I think she would have chosen Titan. She loved this place. I don't understand it, myself—the place is an orange hell, choked in a methane fog. But she loved it."
"She always did say there could be life on Titan," René remembered.
"Maybe she's right," Garrick said, "Maybe we just haven't found it yet."
"Dad," René paused, "Did she believe in God?"
Garrick sighed. "She used to say, 'The universe is so big, anything is possible,'" Garrick recounted with a rare smile, "She believed there was life out there, somewhere—a lifeform might exist that could seem God-like to us, she said. But no, she didn't believe in the God of the Bible."
"Do you?"
He stepped into René's room and sat down on the edge of her bed. Growing up, religion hadn't been a part of René's life. She had never discussed it with Garrick or Liang. She knew Garrick wasn't a member of the Unity Church, but she didn't suppose that he was a nihilist, like Cole. René considered herself agnostic, but like most in academia, she was functionally an atheist. But what did her father believe?
"Well," said Garrick, "I think if there is a God, he hasn't exactly been looking out for us. Anyway, I think we need to look out for each other."
René smiled, weakly.
"What do you believe?" Garrick asked her.
"I don't know if there's a God or not," René said, thoughtfully, "But I think if there's anything divinely-inspired in us, it's our will to live."
"Where there's a will, there's a way,"
"I hope that's true."
"Me too, kiddo," Garrick said.
They sat in silence for a moment.
"I need to know something, Dad," said René, "If we go, will you come with us?"
Garrick frowned. He knew this would come up, but he was hoping not to argue about it. "There's five of us, and the RAFT seats four," he said, "Someone has to stay behind."
"Why does it have to be you?"
"Because if I stay, it means you're guaranteed a seat," Garrick explained.
"Then I'm voting to stay tomorrow," René told him, "I won't leave you."
"Ren, I lost your mother. I won't lose you too."
"Whatever happens to us, happens to both of us."
"So, Mike is definitely in hell, right?"
"That's a rotten thing to say," Leong was getting tired of Cole's irreverent remarks.
"Hey, it's not what I believe," Cole shrugged, "I think it's rotten, too."
Leong said nothing. He and Cole stood on top of a bank of large solar panels, two meters off the ground, wielding long-handled push-brooms to wipe the panels clean of hydrocarbon grime. It was dirty, tedious work that had to be done periodically. Without it, the panels would become obstructed and the habitat would run low on power. Photovoltaic power was a challenge on Titan—it was hard enough to harvest only 1% of incoming sunlight through Titan's thick atmosphere without having the panels dirty, too.
Cole's back and his arms were sore from scrubbing the panels in his heavy, insulated suit. The work was especially arduous because Titan's atmospheric surface pressure was equivalent to a depth of 15 meters in the Earth's ocean. He wished for the millionth time that they had a nuclear reactor instead of photovoltaics. Cole was a nuclear technician; he had maintained the reactor on the Huygens, the ship which had brought them from Earth. But for Titan, it had been decided that solar was more cost-effective and environmentally responsible, eliminating the need to carry fuel rods and to dispose of radioactive waste. But Cole didn't like it. He hated the hard work of keeping the panels clean. He wasn't in a good mood.
"But suicide is forbidden, isn't it?"
"Yes," Leong answered.
"So he's in hell," Cole said again, "That's a hell of a thing to believe about your friend."
Leong said nothing.
"I guess I'm going to hell too, right?" Cole asked, "Oh well, it can't be worse than here."
"Yes it can," Leong assured him.
"Yeah?" Cole said, "And how do you know, Ben? I've never understood this about you; how are you so sure of things for which you have no evidence whatsoever?"
"I pray on it, and it feels right."
"Then maybe you should have prayed before you installed that O2 tank on Hab 2," Cole said, scathingly.
"Shut up, Iverson."
"Oh, I forgot—that was all part of the plan."
Leong imagined shoving Cole off the solar panel they stood upon. The two meter fall wouldn't hurt him in Titan's low gravity, but it would make Leong feel better.
"'God is with the patient,'" Leong said under his breath.
"What—?"
"I said shut up, Iverson."
They finished cleaning the panels in silence, then they climbed aboard the ATUV for the ride back down the bluffs to Hab 1. Leong drove quickly, weary of Cole's company. He was also tired and soaked with sweat—he longed for a shower. They bounced over the loose, pebbly terrain until, once again, one of the wheels seized up and the rover veered sharply to the right.
"Dammit," Leong said, frustrated. He stopped the rover, then started it again. Still, it veered right. He stopped again.
"I have a joke about Asian drivers," Cole said, "But I won't say it."
Leong gritted his teeth. "Why don't you make yourself useful and go see what's wrong?" he told Cole.
"Fine."
The ATUV was big—each of the six wheels was about Cole's height. He hopped out of the rover. In the low gravity, he fell softly to the dirt and landed gracefully on his feet. He had Leong ease the ATUV forward so that he could see which of the wheels wasn't moving. "Alright, stop," Cole called out, "Hold it there a minute." He wedged his way underneath the wheel well, struggling to see in Titan's dim, orange light.
Leong tapped his foot on the accelerator impatiently. And it was then that he thought of killing Cole. It would be very easy—one determined push of his foot would grind Cole under the ATUV's large wheels and into the Titanian dust. "Thou shalt not kill" had never been a hard-and-fast rule; there were plenty of instances in scripture in which God commands man to kill. What's important was that he didn't kill merely for his own gratification, but for a higher purpose.
Although, Leong thought, it would be gratifying to kill Cole. For ten long years, Leong had endured Cole's impudence. Nothing was sacred to that man—he was a nihilist and a drug addict who blasphemed against God and sexually cavorted with degenerates, like René. Would anyone even miss Cole Iverson? Leong wondered.
His foot came to rest on the accelerator.
Leong returned to Hab 1 alone. Garrick and Doctor Graham met him in the vestibule and helped him remove his suit. Leong pulled off his respirator and took a sharp breath of the fresh, recycled air of the habitat. "Iverson's dead," he said, before they could ask.
"He's dead?" Garrick repeated, incredulously.
"He fell down the bluffs," Leong explained over his shoulder as he stashed his suit in his locker, "His respirator came off. By the time I got to him," he shook his head, "it was too late."
Garrick and Graham looked at each other, their mouths open in stunned silence. Then Garrick swallowed hard. He approached Leong from behind, shoved him aside, and rummaged furiously through the man's open locker. He had no doubt that Leong was lying. First Hab 2, then Helms, and now Cole? This many deaths in such a short time couldn't be a coincidence—Leong was behind it. Maybe all of it. Garrick tossed the cold weather suit and Leong's other belongings onto the floor as he searched his locker. Where was it?
"Looking for this?" Leong asked.
Garrick turned around slowly to find Leong pointing Helms' gun at him. Graham stepped back, a look of shock on his face. Garrick held his hands out at his sides in a non-threatening gesture. "You killed him," he said.
"Yes, I did," Leong said, calmly.
"And Helms, too?"
"Yes."
"And the others?"
Leong nodded. "I sabotaged the tank," he confessed.
"You killed my wife," Garrick said, a quiet anger rising in his voice, "In God's name, why? To hoard all the food for yourself?"
"No," Leong said, "You wouldn't understand why."
"Tell me anyway," said Garrick, "You have nothing to lose."
Leong sighed. "All of the world's religions predict a Great Tribulation at the end of the world," he explained, "The details vary, but the broad strokes are the same—famine, pandemic, the rising of the seas. War. Sound familiar to you?"
"'And then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise,'" Leong recited, "'and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed.' Don't you see? It's a hadron war. It has to be. It happened. 'Since all these things are to be dissolved, what sort of persons ought you to be in leading lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God'? That's what I'm doing, Taylor—I'm 'hastening the coming of the day of God.'"
"Like this gun, I am an instrument in His hands," Leong said.
"You're certifiable," Garrick told him.
"I knew you wouldn't understand," Leong lamented, "You're an atheist. That's why I—"
Just then, René opened the door from the galley. "What's going—" she stopped and looked wide-eyed at the gun, then at Leong. Leong's eyes met hers, and Garrick charged him shoulder-first. The gun went off—Bang!—then was knocked out of Leong's hand. The two men tumbled to the floor, along with the gun. Leong pushed Garrick off of him, then lunged for the gun, but Doctor Graham yanked it out of his reach just in time. Garrick grabbed Leong's foot, but Leong slipped free of his boot. He scrambled to his feet. Garrick clambered onto his hands and knees, and Leong delivered a boot to his stomach, hard, knocking the breath out of him.
The errant bullet had pierced the habitat's outer wall. Detecting the breach, Alex-Sys automatically triggered the alarm, and a red warning light began to flash in the room. Air rushed through the tiny bullet hole in the wall.
Suddenly, from behind Leong, René hit him over the head with her tablet with a Crack! Leong grunted and stumbled forward, and René ran out of the room to find another makeshift weapon. Garrick took advantage of Leong's moment of disorientation to grab onto his ankle and pull his leg out from under him. He collapsed to the floor. They grappled with one another fiercely until Leong wrested his way free of Garrick's grasp.
They both stood, breathing heavily.
"You should be thanking me," Leong said, "Your wife died a quick, merciful death. If it wasn't for me, she would have starved. Is that what you want? To starve? Give up, old man. The time comes for everyone—it came for Hab 2, it came for Helms and Iverson, and now it's come for you and me."
"You first."
Garrick charged him again, but this time, Leong was ready. He side-stepped him, and Garrick lost his footing and tumbled head-first into one of the lockers. Before he could recover, Leong was on him—he elbowed him hard in the back, and Garrick grunted in pain as he fell to the floor. Leong kicked him, and kicked him again. And again.
"'Just as the weeds are gathered and burned with fire, so will it be at the close of the age,'" Leong rambled, as he reached down and grabbed Garrick by the jumpsuit. He lifted him up—not a difficult feat in Titan's microgravity—and slammed Garrick's forehead head into the locker again. "'The son of man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all law-breakers, and throw them into the fiery furnace.'"
"'Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their father. He who has ears, let him hear!'"
Just then, a piercingly loud, low-pitched noise sounded in Leong's ears. René pointed a sonic fire extinguisher at Leong's head and held the trigger down. Leong yelled in pain and covered his ears with his hands, but it was no help against the powerful sound waves. He staggered backward, out of the first of the vestibule's two doors that led outside. Thinking fast, René dropped the fire extinguisher and reached for the door control mechanism—she closed the first door, then opened the second, exposing Leong to the harsh elements outside.
Leong pounded desperately on the door's thick window, to no avail. He died just as those at Hab 2 had—the vicious cold biting his lungs as he gasped for breath.
René couldn't watch. She rushed to Garrick's side, helping him to sit up. "Dad," she said, worriedly, "Are you all right?"
Disoriented, Garrick mumbled, "Yeah." Blood ran down his forehead onto his face.
"Doctor—?" she said, looking around the room. But Graham was gone. "Wait here," René told Garrick, "I'll get Doctor Graham."
"Doctor?" René called out as she searched the habitat for Graham. She went from module to module as if in a daze, knowing only that she needed to find Graham. He wasn't in his room, or the galley, or the gym. Eventually, she found him in an unexpected place—in the observation module. A transparent, domed ceiling revealed the hazy, orange sky above, casting a surreal, tangerine glow over the room, as a flashing warning light bathed the room in red. Graham stood in the center of the room with his back to her, looking up. He held the gun in his hand. René walked into the room with a sense of trepidation. "Doctor Graham?" she said, but Graham said nothing. She stepped around him, so that she faced him directly. "Deion?" she asked, softly.
Graham looked at her. "Oh, hello René," he said solemnly. "Ben is dead?" he asked.
"I think so," René confessed. "Deion," she said, "What's going on?"
Graham sighed. He looked up again, out of the window at the sky. "Do you know what it's like to starve to death?" he asked her.
"No," René said, "But Doctor, we need—"
"I do," Graham interrupted her, "It's horrible. You're in constant pain as your muscles atrophy and your organs waste away."
"The habitat is—" René started to speak, but then stopped. She took a step back as she saw Graham point the gun at her. "What are you doing?!" said René, incredulously.
"I'm finishing what Ben started," he said.
"W-Why?" René stammered.
"Because all is lost, my dear," Graham said, ruefully, "Earth is gone. Hope is gone. And without hope, there's nothing to live for. The only empowering thing to do under the circumstances is to take one's own life. Don't look at me like that—you've thought of it, too. We all have. I won't starve to death, René."
"But then why—"
"Because," Graham interrupted her, the flashing red light casting an ominous, crimson glow on his features, "one man's suicide means nothing. But the suicide of a species—now that has meaning. Not a clumsy, hapless suicide in a hadron war, but the conscious choice of extinction. In a deterministic universe, to choose to die, and to take everyone else with you, is the ultimate act of free will. It is a declaration to the universe; 'We reject you. We reject the meaningless pain and suffering of existence. We aren't afraid of death—we embrace it.' Of course, Ben didn't see it that way—he thought he was doing the Lord's work. It was easy enough to convince him of that."
"You put him up to this?"
"He was a useful idiot. I needed him to do the dirty work."
"Deion, you're mad."
"No," Graham said, pointing his finger at her accusingly, "I'm as sane as you. You call me mad because you don't want to accept the implications of that."
"But I don't understand," René said, "If you want to kill yourself, why kill everyone else too? Why not let us try to survive? What difference does it make to you?"
"I don't expect to be understood," Graham said, sadly, "But in a matter of moments, I do expect to be the only human left. Which means, I'm afraid, that you and your father must die. I'm sorry, but I'm doing this for you. For all of humanity. It's the only way to redeem ourselves."
René thought back to what Cole had said to her the night before—'Don't you want to live?' In her heart, she hadn't truly known the answer. But she did now. She wanted nothing more than to live, if for no other reason than to defy Graham's flight of nihilistic madness. But what could she do but prepare to die? Graham had the gun, and clearly he intended to use it. He was beyond reason. René's heart pounded in her chest.
A rumbling noise could be heard from—somewhere. At first, it was faint; too faint to notice. But it started to grow louder, and louder. A wind picked up outside, sending Titan's orange dirt swirling around the observation room's dome. Graham didn't seem to notice.
"Goodbye, René," he said, somberly. His finger tensed on the trigger.
"Do no harm," said a voice from behind Graham—it was Cole. He stood in the doorway, still wearing his beaten and dirty cold weather suit. He looked worse for wear, but he was alive. René was relieved to see him. "You took an oath to do no harm," he said to Graham, "You haven't killed anyone yourself, so it's not too late. Just put the gun down."
"There's something you learn as a doctor that they don't teach you in medical school," Graham said over his shoulder, keeping the gun on René. He raised his voice to be heard over the growing rumble from outside, "There's nothing sacred about life. We're all just decaying bodies. We live and we die in pain. I'm doing this so that the pain means something. It's for your own good, for the good of the species!"
"It's not—" Cole started to say.
Graham whirled around, pointing the gun at Cole, and fired. Bang! Graham wasn't trained in the use of firearms, but Cole was close enough to him that he was able to make the shot. There was a burst of fabric and insulating material from Cole's stomach as the bullet pierced his suit, and he grunted and collapsed to the floor.
A shadow descended over the room.
"No!" shouted René. She could barely be heard over the loud rumbling noise.
Graham turned to face her, but he caught sight of something outside the dome. His eyes widened. "No, it can't be!" he exclaimed. He fell to his knees, as if in prayer, tears forming in his eyes. He swallowed hard and lifted the gun to his temple. "Forgive me, Julene," he said, then pulled the trigger. Bang! Graham crumpled to the floor, a font of deep red blood issuing forth from his head.
"Cole!" René ran to him, throwing her arms around him and helping him to sit up.
Cole coughed. "I think I'm okay," he wheezed, "The suit took the bullet. I think." Then, he saw what Graham had seen, and his eyes widened, too. "René, look!" Cole pointed out the domed ceiling at the dark shape outside. René looked and saw an enormous, box-shaped form, the dim, orange sunlight glinting off its silvery surface. As the dust began to settle, René could see a single word emblazoned upon it, in all capital letters:
SALVATION.
The crew of the Salvation, including its medical officer, were shocked to find the colony in disarray. Seven dead of hypothermia and asphyxiation, another two dead of gunshot wounds. Additionally, Cole had been shot and Garrick badly beaten. Only René had made it out physically unscathed, though she would later be diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. "What in God's name happened here?" she was asked, but she didn't know how to answer.
There had been no hadron war. A solar flare had fried a communications relay on Ceres, knocking out communications from Earth. It had taken years to assemble a mission to repair it, and the work still wasn't complete yet. The Salvation, meanwhile, had merely been delayed by four days due to bad weather.
Of the twelve colonists, René, Garrick, and Cole were the only survivors. The Union's official report on the Titan incident blamed the deaths on accidents and suicides. The unofficial report, detailing what had really happened, was buried. There was no point in trying to tell the true story—no one would believe it.
The survivors, and family members of the deceased, were given a hefty payout. Garrick returned to his showroom in Carmel, California, where he later retired. René completed her (heavily-censored) history of the Titan mission, which was well-regarded in academic and scientific circles. She later became a professor of history at her alma mater of Georgetown, in Washington, D.C. Her relationship with her father had become strained over the events on Titan and long, seven-year journey home; they stayed in touch, but only saw one another on Thanksgiving and Christmas. Cole landed a lucrative job as a nuclear technician for the state energy company, building fusion reactors in exotic corners of the world.
Doctor Graham was remembered as a warm, caring person and a great humanist.