“A dark comet was discovered yesterday,” the Professor said. “It just rounded the sun on an eccentric orbit—”
“I knew it!” Ben shouted.
In autumn of 2014, the subject of comets earned Ben his fifteen minutes of fame. Comet Siding Spring had just whizzed past Mars at less than half the distance between Earth and its moon. Astronomers in Australia discovered the comet only twenty-two months beforehand. As manager of NASA’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) at JPL, Ben gave a press conference and used the opportunity to discuss the dangers of “dark,” or unseeable, comets. For the first time in his life, Ben’s warnings got picked up by mainstream media.
“Congratulations,” the Professor said with a note of hostility.
Ben sobered and tried to keep his mouth shut so the old man could continue.
“The comet has no name, only its label, UD3. No one at Spacewatch wanted to put their mark on it.”
“Hang on,” Ben cut in. “You mean those guys in Arizona called you first?”
“No. They called the NASA administrator first. He called your executive office.”
Ben waited only a couple beats.
“And?”
“And your country’s leadership wanted certainty,” the Professor said. “They wanted proven trajectory, definite odds of impact…all things we don’t have with an initial sighting. What they didn’t want was any early estimations that might be wrong and only cause a nationwide panic.”
He made a sound, a mix of a sigh and a harrumph.
“I suppose extinction is…inconceivable,” the Professor added. “Not just to the creationists in the administration but to the others as well. I guess we’re each the center of our own universe—”
“Extinction? How big is the comet?”
“Eight kilometers.”
There was silence on the line.
“So,” the Professor continued, “that’s why the NASA administrator called me. I was able to connect with the United Nations and the European Union. We have their cooperation.”
Ben gasped for breath, just realizing that he had been holding it.
“Did you say eight kilometers?” he asked.
“Yes. Most unfortunately.”
Ben could hear his own panting. With less than twenty-four hours of tracking, not much could be determined outside of the comet’s size and speed, which were terrifying enough.
“What’s the plan?”
“That’s why I called you,” the Professor said, losing patience. “You manage NASA’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies. You are the expert, are you not?”
“Well, yes,” Ben stuttered, and stood up straighter. “Asteroids and comets have been my life’s work.”
Ben often ran out of breath talking about cosmic impacts. Even Amy, a Star Wars follower, fantasy gamer, manga reader, and arguably the hottest ticket on the sci-fi convention circuit, had to ask, Do you ever shut up about asteroids and comets? In a word, no. And Ben would argue, how could anyone?
His first love had been dinosaurs. At six years old, he collected their miniature plastic likenesses and orchestrated epic battles on his parents’ shag rug. As Ben grew older, he learned of a much greater force of nature. The terrifying teeth of a Tyrannosaurus rex were no match for a ten-kilometer asteroid. The 150-million-year reign of dinosaurs ended after an impact generating more than a billion times the energy of an atomic bomb. Nothing posed a greater threat to complex life on Earth than cosmic impacts…aside from humans, anyway.
“And I’m chair of the IAA Planetary Defense Conference,” Ben added. “We’ve played out one hundred twenty-two hypothetical cosmic impact scenarios—”
“Good. Because we need to plan for the worst-case scenario. Now, unless you’d like to waste more time, I suggest you get on that plane and draft up names for your core team.”
The Professor cleared the moths and cobwebs from his throat and concluded, “I’ll be seeing you at the equator.”
The line went dead. Ben returned to his bedroom in a daze and flipped on the lights.
“Jesus,” Amy hissed. “I’m trying to sleep. I have work in the morning.”
Ben flipped off the lights and stood in the darkness. He wasn’t sure how much time passed before he flipped the lights back on.
“What?” Amy yelled. “What’s so damn important about space? It’s not like it won’t be there in the morning!”
Ben’s lips and eyelids fluttered with mental-processing overload. Seeing him struggle, Amy threw off the down comforter and jumped to his side.
“Sorry, babe,” she said. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
There was no way Amy could force her way into his head. She had to gently draw him out of it.
“Ben?”
Amy took his small hand in her smaller hands. Ben had long, delicate fingers, which he hated and she loved.
“Ben!”
“Do you remember some years back when comet Siding Spring did a flyby? You got pissed because I was sleeping at the office while we corralled all the Mars orbiters on the other side of the planet—”
“The duck-and-cover maneuver,” Amy finished for him.
Ben’s small smile disappeared, soon as it reached his lips.
“There’s another dark comet,” Ben said slowly.
Amy tried to interrupt and demand the estimated trajectory, probability, and date of impact, but Ben cut her off.
“They got a first glance yesterday—and it’s fucking huge.”
There was never a question of talking straight with Amy. Ben never assumed superiority with age, he being forty-two to her thirty-four, or with intelligence. Ben told Amy everything for the plain reason that he always wanted to. At his core, he was a lonely, nervous person. Amy added brass and steel to his intricate mettle.
“I have to go,” he said. “There’s…a car waiting outside.”
They stared at one another in silence before Amy asked where he was going.
“Airport. South American equator. We have to plan for the worst. That’s where they’ll launch an intercept vehicle, if it comes to that. Or, should I say I? That’s where I’ll launch. I’m the one who has to make a plan.”
He paused and let his imagination step into a room with seemingly endless rows of options, only to have it freeze with indecision. Bile crept up Ben’s esophagus and soured his mouth. Blind spots grew in the corners of his peripheral vision. He neared that part of a dream when he fell and lost equilibrium, only to jolt awake.
“He warned me. I can’t lose my head.”
Ben sat down on the bed and closed his eyes, but it wasn’t enough. Stumbling, he made it to their adjoining bathroom and vomited into the toilet bowl. Amy tiptoed in as he finished a round of dry heaving. She pulled a toiletry bag out from under the sink and dropped in her toothbrush, floss, deodorant, and tampons.
“Wait,” Ben said. “What’re you doing?”
He sank to the cool tile floor and wiped his mouth and jutting chin.
“Packing,” Amy said, ducking into their shower. “I’m coming.”
Ben shook his head and wobbled. When he tried to argue, Amy whipped around and glared with her gray eyes.