“Admiral?”
“You have a lovely and strange world here, Samantha. Now the Starflyer’s gone, make the most of it.”
“Admiral!”
Wilson closed the link. She meant well, but she’d want to keep talking. He didn’t need companionship now. It was quite a revelation after so long, but he didn’t fear death anymore, not with Oscar and Anna showing him the way.
They’d find his body, and extract his memorycell, and re-life him. He was sure of that. But it wouldn’t be him who lived on in the future. He’d never accepted that form of continuation in the way the Commonwealth-born generations did. That old twenty-first-century way of thinking was one very tough habit to quit.
But this isn’t a bad place for it all to end, not after three hundred and eighty years. I flew up the highest mountain in the galaxy and helped defeat the monster. Shame I didn’t get the girl. I suppose she’ll be re-lifed with edited memories. Maybe her clone and my clone will have a beautiful future together. Be nice.
The cold closed in slowly. Wilson kept staring down on the planet. Watching the shadows lengthen and the atmosphere far below haze to gold.
Big black shape sliding through the heavens, blotting out the stars.
This must be the end, then.
Pain, just when he thought it had all ended. Jolting from side to side. Space suits. Low gravity. A long black ellipsoid parked on the gray-brown regolith. Airlock open, stairs extended.
I crashed. On Mars. Is this the rescue party from the Ulysses?
“Admiral, stay with us. Come on. The Searcher’s in orbit, we’ll get you up to their medical facility in no time. Stay with us now. This is Nigel. Remember me? Hang on! Understand?”
What about the flag? There was no flag in the ground. I thought we did that. It’s always the first thing you should do when you land on a planet. Says so right there in the manual.
***
Mellanie didn’t want to open her eyes. She was frightened of what she might see. There wasn’t any pain left, but her body remembered it only too well. It ghosted around her, taunting, threatening to return. So much so she thought its absence might only be an illusion. She could still see the horror on Giselle’s face. The blood that surrounded her like a fine mist as she spun helplessly. Kinetic weapons pulping her flesh.
“Am I dead?”
Nobody told her she was.
There was light now. Dark red of closed eyelids. Sheets touching her skin. Hard patches on her arms. Most of her torso was numb. She could hear her heart beating.
That has to be good.
She drew in a breath, and risked a quick glance. The room was strangely familiar. It took a while for the memory to come back: Bermuda room, the mansion on Illanum. There was a big cabinet of medical equipment beside the bed, tubes and wires led under the sheets.
Oh, well, there are worse jails.
Someone was curled up on the couch in the big bay window, snoring softly. Sunlight filtering through the white gauze drapes shone on his ginger hair.
The sight of him made Mellanie smile fondly. Crazy boy. Why he was here puzzled her, unless he’d been confined to this room by Nigel.
Her virtual vision grid was in peripheral mode. She told her e-butler to refresh it and brought it up to full operative status. A great many squares were dark; mostly her inserts. “What happened to them?” she asked her e-butler.
“You have received extensive clone grafting,” it replied. “Damaged systems and OCtattoos have not yet been replaced. Some functional systems were removed.”
The SI ones, she realized. Then she read the date. “Three weeks? I’ve been out for three weeks?”
“That is correct.”
“Why?”
“Time required for medical treatment.”
“Oh.” Now Mellanie really didn’t want to look under the sheets.
Orion stirred, saw she was awake, and sat bolt upright. “Are you okay?”
“I think so. I haven’t tried to move yet.”
“The nurses said it’d be another few days before you can get up.” He came over to stand beside the bed, gazing down at her in awe. “Are you really all right? I was really worried. They spent so long treating you. The chief doctor said they had to grow new bits. I didn’t know they could do that.”
“They can. Uh, Orion, why are you here?”
“They said I could be when you woke up.” He suddenly became terribly anxious. “Why? Don’t you want me here?”
“No…I’m glad you are, actually.” There weren’t many people she wanted to face right now. The boy was easy, though.
His smile was euphoric. “Really?”
“Yeah.”
His hand crept down to where hers lay outside the sheets, then darted back.
“So are we under arrest?” she asked.
“Huh? Oh, no. The security people weren’t very nice when the ambulance brought you back here. They said Nigel Sheldon was really cross with you. But it’s all been okay since he and Ozzie got back.”
“Back from where?”
“They flew to Dyson Alpha and restarted the barrier generator. It’s been on all the news shows.”
“Oh.” And I missed it all.
“There are Dynasty warships going off on Firewall flights right now. And there’s been alien agents arrested in the Commonwealth, and there was some big storm on Far Away that killed the Starflyer, and lots of other stuff. Tochee and I can hardly keep up with it.”
“Nigel’s back?”
“Yeah. He said to tell you the offer’s suspended. What does that mean?”
“He promised me an interview; that’s all.”
“Okay. And a bloke called Morton stopped by. He said you’d know where to find him if you wanted to.”
“Right.” He couldn’t be bothered to wait?
“Mellanie, where do you want to go when you’re better?”
“It’s a little early to…What did you call me?”
Orion hung his head sheepishly. He pulled a piece of paper from his pocket. It was heavily creased, as though it had been read a lot.
Mellanie recognized her own handwriting. She’d actually written it in this room.
Darling Orion,
I’m sorry I have to leave you like this. I don’t want to, but I’m not even who you think I am. My real name is Mellanie. One day I’ll explain, if you ever want me to.
“I’ve managed to find out most of it,” he said. “Who you are and everything, that the SI sent you. Ozzie explained.”
Her throat was tightening horribly. “Then why are you here?”
“I told you, they said I could be.”
“But, if you know…?”
He reached out, boldly this time, and brushed some of her hair from the side of her face. “None of that stuff changes the way I feel about you.”
Mellanie started crying. It just wasn’t fair that he was the only one in the universe who truly cared for her. Why couldn’t I have met him before any of the others? “I can’t do this. I’m wrong for you.”
“No you’re not, don’t say that.”
“I’m not a nice girl, Orion, really I’m not.”
Orion gave her a quick devilish grin. “Yeah. I remember. I was sort of hoping you’d go on being like that with me.”
She put her hand around his head and pulled him down for a kiss.
***
The building manager was standing outside the main entrance of the ancient five-story building, supervising the maintenancebot as it removed the sign. Paula watched the electromuscle tentacles drop it into a trolleybot’s wire cage. It lifted out the old sign and placed it on the stone wall, then began to screw it into place. She smiled at the familiar lettering.
“Madame!” the building manager’s face lit up. He bowed deeply. “You are back! Welcome, welcome. The world has regained its sanity.”
“Thank you, Maurice,” she said sincerely. “Slight exaggeration, but it does feel good.”
He kissed her on both cheeks. “Everybody is waiting for you inside. May I carry that?” He indicated the small plastic bag she was gripping in her left hand.
“No thank you, I can manage.” Paula took a breath, and walked up the steps. As the doors opened, the maintenancebot began polishing the letters on the sign. She paused and watched the ancient brass lettering start to gleam again in the Paris sunlight.