Dramatis Personae
Areanna Clovar, Arvad Specialist Scientist Historian
Vikram Jay Stephenson, former Department Head of Engineering
Then long Eternity shall greet our bliss
With an individual kiss;…
Attir’d with Stars, we shall for ever sit,
Triumphing over Death, and Chance, and thee O Time.
Excerpt from “On Time” by John Milton
Areanna frowned. “Don’t call me kid, old man.”
A sad smile tugged at Vikram’s lips. Theirs was an old fight, a somber reminder of bitter resentments from long ago. “My apologies.”
“It’s fine,” Areanna sighed, annoyed more at herself than anyone by the swirl of complicated emotions she still felt whenever Vikram set that particular boundary. “What did you want to talk about?”
“Are you alone?”
She glanced back over her shoulder as she continued to walk down the corridor. The Hawks were no longer visible and likely returned to the simulation, and no one else had passed her since. “Yes, and I’ll be back in my quarters in a couple of minutes.”
“That’s good,” Vikram nodded, the gesture barely visible on the Muse’s fuzzy screen. Communications between Arkos and Ya’axche could be flaky, garbling words or obscuring smaller movements. “Would you like the good news first? Or the bad news.”
News of any kind was rare these days. Everyone was effectively working towards the same goal: exodus. The Prime Council made its announcements occasionally, but they trended more toward status updates than anything particularly newsworthy. Areanna’s curiosity was decidedly piqued.
“Can you give me a hint?” she asked.
Vikram snorted in amusement. “Good news it is. Are you still looking for an asteroid for For the Record?”
For the Record, or FTR, was the working name of Areanna’s organization. It was Vikram’s idea years ago, referencing Areanna’s tendency to request permission to publish articles based on her conversations with others. She delighted in the wordplay as both a pedant and a historian passionate about documenting humanity’s transition from the Arvad to Adalia Prime and soon to the rest of the belt.
“Yes,” she replied, cautiously optimistic. As a former member of the Prime Council, she knew Vikram had exposure to capital and opportunities that others could only dream of. As Adalia’s preeminent engineer, he was both highly in-demand and presumably very well compensated.
However, he was a founding member of the First Alliance. Despite being a fellow moderate with no particular loyalty to the Prime Council — a fact Areanna found endlessly amusing and fascinating — he continued to support an organization with enough power and resources to be inherently distrustful in her eyes.
Vikram faltered, sensing her hesitation. Once, many years ago, they had been incredibly close. Her father was among his most trusted senior engineers, one of very few Vikram allowed near the Arvad’s reactors. Areanna’s ascension to Specialist and subsequent exposure to the entire Prime Council, combined with Vikram’s relationship with her father, meant they spent considerable time together.
“Well,” Vikram said after a beat, “I may have found a suitable one. Take a look at ID five-zero-seven-nine.”
Areanna pulled up the SWAY mainnet on her Muse and typed the ID. It took a few seconds, but the image of an asteroid taken from a great distance ultimately appeared, followed by a list of specifications.
She whistled. “Five hundred and thirty-three square kilometres? Registering carbonaceous, silicate, and icy on the spectrometer? Low inclination, too, wow. She’s a beauty.”
“That’s not all. Take a look at the results of the long-range scan,” Vikram said.
Two men wearing crisp new jumpsuits emblazoned with the First Alliance logo stepped through a doorway mere feet from Areanna. “One sec,” she said, pressing her back against the wall to give them space. They nodded to her as she slid past. Once she was sure they were out of earshot, she returned her attention to her Muse.
Her eyes widened as she scanned the datasheet. “Readings indicate an average composition density of fifteen percent above average across all resource types!?”
“Not to mention additional hits for metals, volatiles, and fissiles.”
“Wow,” she breathed. “It certainly is an impressive rock. There’s no way FTR can afford the rights to her, though.”
Vikram smiled more broadly and genuinely than he had before. “You don’t need to. It’s yours if you want it.”
Areanna felt her knees weaken. Only about one percent of the 250,000 asteroids in Adalia were the ideal composition for producing food entirely on-site. “What?”
“It’s yours.”
She arrived at her quarters and held her Muse to the door’s scanner. A short BEEP indicated the lock had disengaged. “I just got to my room. Give me a minute; I need to sit down.”
“Sure. And I did warn you,” Vikram replied with a chuckle.
Her Muse was automated to display essential notifications on her return home, and they flashed obnoxiously as she stepped inside, blocking Vikram’s feed and the datasheet.
Welcome home, Areanna.
Here are the most recent updates from the Prime Council >>
Continue reading Remembering Peasants by Patrick Joyce >>
3 new important messages >>
Not now, she thought and tapped to dismiss them. Her mind raced furiously to process the implications of Vikram’s offer; everything else was only a distraction.
The air in her quarters was dense, resulting from keeping the environmental controls at higher temperatures and humidity for her small family of plants. Her prized orchid, a Phalaenopsis, continued to thrive nearly fifty years after Vikram gifted it to her.
She ran a finger along one pink petal before dropping heavily into the lone chair, a metal straight-backed affair rarely more comfortable than simply standing.
“I don’t know if we can accept this,” she said slowly, choosing her words carefully. “That’s not to say I don’t appreciate the offer, but…”
“It’s a lot to take in, I know,” he said gently.
She nodded, then narrowed her eyes. “It’s also too generous. You know we want no part of your alliance, and I know you aren’t just offering this to me out of the goodness of your heart.”
The chill in her accusation stung. Vikram knew Areana was once in love with him, or she at least thought she was, but he never returned her affections. He was her senior by over forty years, and while all Adalians now enjoyed eternal life, no amount of time could change the fact he perceived her as the child of a trusted colleague.
But while he never harbored romantic feelings toward Areanna, he loved her in his own way. She had stolen his heart aboard the Arvad as only a precocious, curious child could. He understood why she hurt but had hoped for decades that time would heal the wound. Time clearly still has its work cut out for it, he thought.
“No obligation or association with First Alliance,” he said quietly. “Or me. It’s a gift.”
Areanna glared at him challengingly, summoning every ounce of intimidation and insight she could muster across the thousands of kilometres of vacuum to ensure he was not playing her. She hoped her grainy image on the screen of his Muse in Arkos conveyed the depth and sincerity of her misgivings.
Vikram, sensing her hostility, lowered his eyes. He was at a loss for words; if she declined his offer, he would not know whether their friendship was still intact.
He isn’t someone who manipulates others, Areanna scolded herself. Again frustrated by her emotional trigger, her brain tried convincing her heart that his offer was genuine.
Nearly thirty seconds passed before she could summon a response. “I’m sorry, Vikram. I’m tempted, but it would probably be inappropriate. How can you even afford this? Wouldn’t it be better for you to do something with it instead?” She allowed a small smile, attempting to soften her rejection and ease the tension she had just injected into the conversation.
Vikram looked up and, with considerable relief, returned her smile. “I understand your concerns. Let me assure you that I have other irons in the fire and more than I can possibly handle with First Alliance. Plus, this wouldn’t be just a gift, but an investment.”
Areanna cocked her right eyebrow. “Oh?”
Vikram laughed, his deep baritone carrying through even the Muse’s speakers. Areanna’s heart fluttered at the sound. Stop that, she scolded herself.
“Not that kind of investment. I believe in you and your mission. We are so concerned with survival and far from Earth that we risk losing some of the very things that make us human. We need you to help document our history; it will be humanity’s best resource for evolving further.
“This five-oh-seven-nine is large enough that it should support those efforts,” he continued. “My team and I have been crunching numbers from here to Sol, and there are few other combinations of raw resource potential for critical manufacturing. It will be an impressive industrial base.”
She nodded, placated. “It’s also going to be a farm.”
Vikram chuckled again. “Food is also important,” he agreed. “I can’t think of a better way to manufacture the acids you will need for that, either.”
A sharp pinching pain in her lower vertebrae suddenly interrupted Areanna’s recline, and she jumped out of the uncomfortable chair with a wince. After stretching her back, she said, “You say gift, but you also say investment. Are there any strings attached?”
“No,” he shook his head. “Like I said, I have enough on my plate, as does the alliance. I have no doubt they would love to add Satoshi to their tableau, but it’s yours. If you want it, of course.”
“Satoshi?” she asked.
“Ah, sorry, that’s its name: SatoshiNakamoto. No space.”
Areanna wrinkled her nose. “That’s… not my favorite.”
He shrugged. “That was its name when I acquired it. It doesn’t particularly bother me; there are far worse eponyms. Plus, you can rename it once it’s yours.”
“Ha, fair enough,” she laughed, finally letting her guard down and feeling genuine amusement for the first time since she answered the call. The sound warmed Vikram’s heart.
“Is that a yes?”
“Let me think about it for a day or so, but yeah, I think it is.”
“Wonderful!” Vikram exclaimed excitedly. “I’m so glad. It isn’t the largest or interior-most asteroid, but the combination of resources should make for a robust center of industry.
“And food production,” he added quickly.
She nodded again. “We can’t thank you enough. There’s no way we could have secured anything like Satoshi for ourselves.”
“You don’t need to thank me,” he said with another sad smile. “That’s not why I’m doing it. Plus, you haven’t heard the bad news yet.”
“Uh, oh,” Areanna said. “I knew there was a catch.”
“No, no, still no catch. But your dad is on his way to see you. He requisitioned an EVA and should arrive in Ya’axche in no more than 24 hours.”
“Oh,” Areanna said. “SHIT.”