Winter World (The Long Winter #1)(35)

A few silent minutes pass before the forward thrusters fire. We’re on approach.

“Where are you from?”

I catch myself before saying, “Edgefield.” I’ll wait until later to tell her that I’m a convicted felon out on an astronaut work-release program.

“I grew up in Asheville, North Carolina. You?”

“New York City.”

She’s slipping her long johns back on. The force inside the capsule has subsided. She’s a lot more coordinated than I am up here.

“You always wanted to be an astronaut?”

“Not growing up. I just wanted to get away from people. Solitude.”

“And you chose to be crammed in a confined space with no escape for months at a time?”

She laughs. “Well, ISS wasn’t exactly my plan initially.”

“What was?”

“Commercial space travel was advancing so fast when I was growing up. Unmanned trips to Mars. Drones exploring the belt to scout for asteroid mining. I wanted to be part of one of the first human colonies.”

Interesting. There’s more to her than I thought. None of this was in the file.

I try to come up with something insightful to say, but sadly settle on: “That’d be cool.”

“It was my dream. Surviving on a new world. Setting up a new kind of society.”

“What kind of society would Emma Matthews set up?”

“One with decency. Civility. Equality.”

“I’d live in that colony.”

“I haven’t given up on the idea.”

“You’ve just been blown off course a bit.”

She grins widely. “I rate that space pun as a three on the pain scale.”

“But you’ve recently course-corrected?”

“Four.”

“Okay, I’ll stop.”

She laughs and stares out the porthole window. “I’m alive. That’s good enough for now.”

“Alive and floating through space half-naked with a strange man. What would your parents say?”

Her smile turns somber. Her parents are dead. Shouldn’t have said that.

“You don’t seem that strange,” she says.

“Yeah, I’m super normal.”

She squints. She’s got a good sarcasm detector. That’s essential for communication with me.

“Have you always wanted to be a drone designer?”

“Actually, I’m not a… drone designer per se.”

“Per se, what are you?”

“A robotics engineer focused on… more complex devices.”

“What kind of complex devices?”

She doesn’t know what I did or what it cost me—or how the world sees me. Better to get it out there now. “The kind that got me in trouble.”

She squints, wondering if I’m kidding. “In trouble with who?”

“Pretty much everyone.”

Her tone lightens. “So you’re a rebel.”

“A freedom fighter.”

“Whose freedom?”

“Everyone’s, actually.”

Her smile fades. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“Usually I’m not, but in this instance, yes. I created something I thought would help restore decency and freedom. To the whole world.”

“And you got in trouble for it?”

“I did. I miscalculated. I didn’t factor in human nature. Never bothered to consider how people would see what I created. I learned a very valuable lesson.”

“Which was?”

“Any change that takes power from those who have it will face opposition. The greater the change, the greater the force with which it will be struck down.”

“Sort of like Newton’s Third Law of Motion: for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.”

“Never thought about it that way, but yeah, it’s a lot like that.”

And she and I are a lot alike. She wanted to get away from people and the world that was so flawed and start over anew. I saw the same messed-up world and wanted to stay and fix it. Look where it got me.

The forward thrusters fire again. We’re less than five minutes to rendezvous. The inertia in the capsule is still strong, but manageable.

“T minus five. Better suit up.”





When we reach the rendezvous point, there are only three capsules waiting. I was hoping for more. And I hope more are coming. I try to hide my concern from Emma, but I sense she sees it.

We float to opposite portholes and peer out.

“These two are unmanned,” I call back to her.

“Same with this one. What now?”

“Now we wait.”

“These four capsules won’t assemble?”

“No. Well, they can, but there’s a preferred assembly sequence. The capsules are programmed to wait and see what shows up. And we need one of the larger engine components to really get anywhere.”

“How long do we wait?”

“About two hours left.”

“And what do we do with those two hours?”

I reach for a bag with MREs. “First, we’re going to rehydrate you and get some food in you.”