An honest display of strength.
But why does Shelby feel the need to demonstrate her strength to us, the people her squadrons are supposed to protect? Is this meant to make us feel safe?
Grandpa emerges from the crowd and walks to the memorial stone. Standing there, the two squadrons frame him perfectly.
“Friends,” Grandpa calls, “we are faced with an impossible task. How does one mourn a planet? How do we honor such a loss? How do we move on?”
Beth’s tidy handwriting fills my brain, her list of names superimposing itself over the scene before me as Grandpa continues.
“The task seems beyond the scope of human imagination. It is certainly beyond me. But thankfully, we don’t depend on my wisdom alone.” He sucks in a breath and sighs it out. “My beloved wife died when our daughter was still a child. But she taught me a lot before she was taken from us. She always said a big problem is just a lot of little problems swimming together, like a school of fish. So if you want to solve a big problem, you just have to catch one of the little ones and gut it. Then you do it again and again until you’re done.”
He chuckles, almost to himself. “She was a ferocious woman, my Cleo. Dauntless. I can only hope that piece of her is still with me. Because the task facing us is monumental. But I know that we can accomplish it, one little fish at a time.”
He rests a hand on the memorial stone.
“But first, we must honor our loss. Grieve. Then, tomorrow, we will face all those little problems. Together.”
“Humanity is not lost. We are found. This planet is a new beginning. A clean slate, untouched and waiting for us to shape a new world. A new future.” He raises his arms, encompassing first the crowd, then the gray, soggy day behind him as he speaks.
The murmur of shared tears has faded into a crackling silence. Everyone is leaning forward like they’re metal filings and Grandpa is a magnet.
Everyone except Dad.
He’s texting.
What the hell is wrong with him? How can he be texting now, of all times?
My brain answers its own question.
“Where’s Mom?” I whisper to Beth, alarmed.
“I’m amazed it took you this long to notice,” Beth whispers back.
“I noticed,” I mutter. “I just figured she hadn’t gotten here yet when I showed up.”
“Something must be wrong,” Leela says, quietly. “She wouldn’t just bail on us.”
Dad lets his arms drop to his sides like his hands are suddenly heavy. I expect him to slip away and go find Mom. He doesn’t. He just stands there, staring dully as Grandpa gives his place at the memorial stone to Doc.
Doc begins the same Hindu prayer that he led us all through at Teddy’s funeral. Not all of us, I guess. Half the people there that day are dead now. Their names are written on the stone behind him.
I look back at Dad. He hasn’t moved.
“Go,” Beth whispers.
Leela nods in agreement, even though she’s mouthing the prayer along with her dad.
I slip along the edge of the praying crowd, then pick up speed when I reach the path back to the Landing.
I tap my flex as I jog up the hill. “Locate Commander Watson’s flex, please.”
The computer promptly replies, “Located. Commander Watson’s flex is in the Command Office, Joanna.”
The dirt path becomes a solar-tiled road lined with labs and family cabins. I turn left at the school and cut through the community garden to reach the street that runs behind Ground Control.
I burst through the back doors and dart through the empty hallways until I see the door to Mom’s office standing open ahead of me.
I call out, “Mom?”
There’s no answer.
I peer through the doorway anyway and find Mom standing at the wall screen, staring at an unsent message.
“Mom?”
She still doesn’t reply. It’s like she doesn’t even hear me.
I cross the office to stand beside her. From there, I can read the message she hasn’t sent.
This report was classified by the ISA. It contains information you need. I was under orders not to share it with you. The admiral and I have decided those orders no longer apply.
There’s an attachment.
A file marked PSR.Tau.Ceti.e.Classified. The message is addressed to the full Exploration & Pioneering Team.
No wonder Mom’s frozen up like this. This is the top-secret planetary survey report on Tau that she and the ISA hid from everyone. The whole team is about to discover that Mom knew about the Sorrow and the phytoraptors before we came here and kept them secret from the rest of us. That decision cost a lot of people their lives.
The ache of sympathy in the pit of my stomach is curdled by a surprising amount of lingering anger. How much did the ISA really know about the Sorrow and the phytoraptors when they sent us here? Could we have made a better start if we’d known the truth? Or would everything still have gone wrong?
“Computer, please edit message,” Mom says in a strained whisper. “Add sentence: I’m sorry.”
“My apologies, Alice,” the computer says. “I didn’t get that. Can you speak a little louder?”
“No,” she rasps, tears shredding her voice. “I can’t.”
She stares at the unsent message. Eyes brimming.
“Do you want me to add it, Mom?” I ask.
She’s so startled she almost stumbles, like the unexpected question was a physical blow.
“What are you doing here, Jo?” she snaps, scrubbing tears from her face.
“The memorial . . .”
“Oh.” She closes her eyes. “I was just going to share the report and go, but then . . .”
But then she stood here, staring at it for twenty minutes instead of hitting send. The thought is heavy and hot. I want to run away from it, but I can’t. I’m not a little girl anymore. I don’t get to pretend my mom is superhuman just because it makes me feel better.
“You were just following orders, Mom,” I say. “The ISA made you keep the survey report from us.”
“Maybe. But I knew it was wrong,” she says. “I knew it was a bad choice.”
“So why did you do it?”
I’ve wanted to ask that question for a long time. Now that it’s out, I think I want to take it back.
The series of expressions that pummel her face tells me more than any words could. Sadness. Anger. Guilt. And something that looks weirdly like pride.
Then she sighs, breathing out a tiny, sardonic smile.
“It seemed like a good idea at the time.”
It isn’t an answer, but at least that slice of a smile brought some life back into her face.
She turns back to the wall screen and jabs “send.” Then she slumps, like that took all the energy she had.
I wait for her to say something. Or move.
She doesn’t.
“Mom?” I try again, finally.
“I don’t see a way through this, Jo,” she says without looking at me. “I don’t know what to do.”
My heart hammers against my ribs, just once. A huge thud that shoots fear through my body. Mom always knows what to do. That’s just a thing that’s true. Like gravity or breathing. Except it isn’t anymore.
What am I supposed to do about that? An idea slips into my worry. I don’t know if it’s the right thing to say, but I have to say something.