Chapter 9
9
Julian is sober by the time they join me in the lab tent, hours later. Dusk falls over the campsite, and twin moons paint the plain in silvery hues. It looks like a sea of mercury through the shitty tent windows, plasticky and warped as they are.
“Need some help?” Julian asks, face half-obscured by curtains of hair.
I’m in the middle of tinkering with a centrifuge. It’s got some kind of balance issue, and I can’t get it to spin right. “Nah,” I say. “Did you get a nap?”
“Yes, Mom.”
I shoot them a look. “Doesn’t it get exhausting?”
“What?”
“Being an obnoxious prick all the time.”
“Not at all,” they say airily, coming to watch me pry open the centrifuge with an old screwdriver. “It’s invigorating, actually. Your expressions of derision delight me in ways I can’t begin to express.”
“Uh-huh. At least it’s distracting you from G-dawg.”
Julian makes a face. “Who?”
“Christ. Never mind. Wanna give me a hand with this, actually?” I hold out the screwdriver. “I can’t get the bottom piece loosened.”
Julian takes the screwdriver wordlessly and begins daintily working at the same screw that was giving me trouble. I watch, half-focused on the scrape of metal on metal, half-focused on the undulation of the grass outside the window. It’s beautiful beyond description. Nothing like that ever existed on Earth.
“So what’s the deal with Ben?” Julian asks, still poking away with the screwdriver.
All my attention is on them now. “What do you mean?”
They shoot me a glance, brow raised. “Oh, I think you know. What was ‘ I need to show you that thing’ all about? His thing?”
“Shut up, that was—” I reach desperately for an explanation and come up short. “That was nothing.”
“So you didn’t go back to his tent and copulate?”
“ Copulate ? Oh my God, Jules, everything you say is so—”
“Correct?” They purse their lips. “I know.
“I was going to say infuriating.”
They shrug. “Hmm. I only ask because I thought we all decided he was a doofus.”
“I must have missed that meeting.” I did think he was a doofus. I still do. I do .
“It wasn’t a meeting , it is the natural state of physics, biology, and the universe. Intelligent, thoughtful women of science don’t waste their time with men who perform push-ups as a mating ritual.”
I snort, despite myself. “I’ve never once seen Ben do a push-up.”
Julian looks up, eyes narrowing. “But you have imagined it.”
“No—”
“You have !” they declare, triumphant, pointing the screwdriver at me. “Ha! Slumming it, pal. You’re a real squalid individual, you know that? I’d put money on him not even knowing where the clitoris is located.”
“Fuck off , Jules.”
“I bet he doesn’t even know what it is .” Julian chuckles, going back to uselessly jamming the screwdriver against the stuck screw. “Do you think he’s ever made a woman come before? Want me to educate him? I can whip together a slideshow within a quarter hour, easy. How to gently fuck J— ”
“Shut up ,” I snap, snatching the screwdriver from Julian’s grasp. “You’re pissing me off now. This is beyond unprofessional.”
Julian gives me a withering look. “Right, and this is such a buttoned-up, by-the-book expedition.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I go back to fiddling with the centrifuge. I think it must be rusted; we’ll need something more than a screwdriver to fix it.
“Don’t tell me you haven’t thought about it. Considering the situation, I mean.”
I pause and meet their gaze. “What situation?”
“Well, take into account your mother’s failed expedition, for one. The ramifications. The fact that you’re here. I mean, haven’t you once asked yourself the important questions? Like why the ECE spent millions to send a team of explorers back to the Planet, and they picked us of all people?”
I roll my eyes. Not another conspiracy theory. “Whatever you say, flat-earther. I’m more than qualified to be on this mission. I campaigned for years to get it off the ground.”
“No doubt, no doubt. All I’m saying is, look at this team. Every last one of us should be in a mental institution. But here we are, wandering around on an alien planet, gathering… I guess plant and water samples, or whatever.”
I let out a long breath. I set down the screwdriver and plant my hands on the table, palms down. “Spit it out. What’s your theory? They’re going to start sending crazy people to planets now instead of asylums? We’re the test run?”
“ Crazy is a slur,” Julian says primly. “And no, why on God’s brown Earth would they send all of our freaks to the one planet that might be viable for human colonization?”
“And freak isn’t a slur?”
“No, no. We’re not here to stay, not on paper anyway. But we’re also, shall we say, isolated individuals. Loners, if you catch my drift. I mean, did you have a single friend before training started?”
I stiffen, making a sound of protestation. Where the hell is Julian going with this?
“Mm. Thought not. Now let’s imagine if something… befell us on the Planet.”
“Let’s not and say we did.”
Julian holds my stare, their glasses glinting in the lamplight. “Just think about it. Who would even attend our funerals? You’re a classic case of CPTSD, Jill Jones. I’m a deeply depressed individual with narcissistic tendencies. Darcie… well, we both know what she’s been through. What I’m curious about, though, is our intrepid soldier. What, do you suppose, is deeply psychologically wrong with Benjamin ?”
“Someone called?” Ben’s voice cuts in from the lab entrance.
I glare at Julian, irritated at how easily they can unsettle me. “Ben, can you help us with uh, the centrifuge?”
Julian watches me, smiling. Sometimes I wish I could punch them and not hurt my knuckles doing it.
Ben strides in, his jacket open, thumbs hooked in the pockets of his cargoes. He takes in the scene. “You’re gonna break it,” he says.
“What do you know of esoteric lab equipment?” asks Julian.
“I know a centrifuge is not esoteric , for one.”
Julian makes an impressed sort of grunt. I stare at the screwdriver.
“Come on, team meeting in the main tent,” Ben says. He goes to the entrance, then turns back when nobody responds. “Now.”
The three of us traipse through the camp, the dusk now thickening to true evening. A navy blue blanket of night hangs over us, scattered with so many stars. I’ll never get used to this clear air, the newness of it. Is this how Earth used to be? Or is that a myth, an imaginary children’s story, and this is the real planet? The real beauty?
Ben holds the flap to the main tent, and we duck into the warm light. Darcie is already seated at the table. She smiles, but her usual cheerful demeanor has faded. I’ve seen it a dozen times. She lapses, sometimes, into a personal darkness.
“Right, let’s make this quick,” says Ben when we’ve all taken a seat at the table. He’s in full leader mode, hands on hips, brows drawn low. “Nobody wants to listen to me ramble about rules , so here’s the quick and dirty.”
I can feel Julian’s sideways glance and pointedly ignore it.
“The forest is safe to traverse, technically,” Ben continues. “But I still don’t like the idea of anyone leaving camp alone. You’re to go out in pairs and report in every hour, on the hour.”
All three of us make a collective sound of incredulity.
“But there’s only three of us,” Darcie protests. “So we’d always be going out as a trio.”
“You’re stifling my scientific process and creative expression,” Julian adds.
Ben holds up a hand for silence. “In case you forgot, I exist. I’m happy to join any of you in the field if you need a buddy.”
I brace for a humiliating comment from Julian or Darcie, but they’re both too wrapped up in their protestation to think of embarrassing me.
“Do you have the authority to make this call?” Darcie asks, her expression mask-like. “I thought this mission was cleared before launch. So what, did you find something weird in the forest?”
“A ravine?” Julian suggests. “A bunny rabbit?”
A muscle in Ben’s jaw flexes. “I do have the authority to make this call. I’m happy to direct you to the fine print in your mission handbooks. Listen, this is only temporary. A few days at most, until I’m satisfied the field is safe for solo work.”
I keep my mouth shut. I have long since learned there’s no point in raising a fuss over something out of my control. I don’t like Ben’s tone or the bite of his words. Right now, he’s not our friend, not our teammate. He’s our boss. And he’ll enforce whatever rules he lays down if he has to.
And I hate that Ben exercising his authority does it for me.
There’s continued grumbling, but nobody puts up a fight. Julian’s probably still worn out from their day drinking, and Darcie is obviously having an episode. I’d ask her if she’s okay, if she needs anything, but I already know how she’d react: badly.
“Okay,” says Ben, clapping his hands together. “That’s it, gang. Remember, teams of two!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Darcie mutters, getting up from the table and drifting away.
“You think she’ll still cook dinner?” Julian hisses in my ear.
“I will if you keep your trap shut,” Darcie calls over her shoulder.
Julian does a fist pump.
I think of Andrews, deep in the forest, utterly alone, and I’m quietly relieved.