Chapter 26

WIDE — Baikonur jail cell. Barred window, steel door, brick walls. Ryland hunched on bunk.

WIDERYLANDRESIGNED

"It looked kind of like a college dorm room. Painted brick walls, desk, chair, bed. But the door was steel."

MEDIUM — The barred window. Distant launchpad visible through the bars across the steppe.

MEDIUMCELL WINDOWHEAVY

"That launch would be today. Soon some muscular guards would come with a doctor and a needle."

CLOSE-UP — The steel door's lock. The sound of it turning: *clink*.

CLOSE-UPCELL DOORDREAD

"Almost on cue I heard the clink of the door being unlocked. A braver person might have charged the door."

MEDIUM — Stratt walks in. Ryland glares from the bunk. Guards pull the door shut.

TWO-SHOTRYLAND / STRATTHOSTILE / CALM

"The door opened and Stratt walked in. The guards closed the door behind her."

MEDIUM TWO-SHOT — Stratt sits in the chair. Ryland on bunk, arms crossed, glaring.

TWO-SHOTRYLAND / STRATTTENSE

"She sat in the chair. "I know you won't believe this, but it wasn't easy for me to do this to you.""

CLOSE-UP — Stratt's face. Not her usual armour. Something human, remembering.

CLOSE-UPSTRATTRARE VULNERABILITY

"History. I was a history major." She smirked. "Hard to imagine me like that, eh?"

MEDIUM — Stratt stands at the barred window, looking out toward the launchpad. Talking about history.

MEDIUMSTRATTREFLECTIVE

"She looked out the barred window. "For fifty thousand years, civilization was about one thing: food.""

MEDIUM — Stratt pacing, gesturing. Diagram: 50,000 years of civilization = food production.

MEDIUMSTRATTLECTURING

"Fifty thousand years. Every culture: hunting, farming, storing, distributing. All about food."

MEDIUM — Stratt wraps her arms around herself. Ryland watching. First crack in her armour.

MEDIUMSTRATTVULNERABLE

"She wrapped her arms around herself. I'd never seen her look so vulnerable."

MEDIUM TWO-SHOT — Stratt facing Ryland. The four horsemen hang between them.

TWO-SHOTSTRATTAPOCALYPTIC WEIGHT

"Astrophage is literally the apocalypse. The Hail Mary is all we have. I'll make any sacrifice."

MEDIUM — Stratt at the door, knocking. Ryland on his bunk, turned away. Final exchange.

MEDIUMRYLAND / STRATTBITTER FAREWELL

"Go to hell." / "Oh, I will, believe me. Hell is coming to us."

MEDIUM — Ryland floating, defiant. "I'm hell. I'm coming back." Then: he's 18 days from Tau Ceti.

MEDIUMRYLANDDEFIANT / WRY

"Yeah? Well, hell's coming back to you, Stratt. In the form of me. I mean...I don't know what I'll say."

WIDE — The Hail Mary crossing Tau Ceti's heliopause. Radiation sensors climbing.

WIDEHAIL MARYPROGRESS / LONELINESS

"18 days into a nearly 4-year journey. Just now reaching Tau Ceti's heliopause. Progress, at least."

CLOSE-UP — Ryland staring at the ceiling, completely glazed over. Bored out of his mind.

CLOSE-UPRYLANDPROFOUND BOREDOM

"I'm bored. I'm by myself in a spaceship without much to do. Clean lab, catalog, video games."

WIDE — Ryland checking the ten Taumoeba farms. Green lights down the row. All nominal.

WIDERYLANDSATISFIED

"I check the Taumoeba farms. All ten are doing just fine. Feed them Astrophage, keep them breeding."

INSERT DIAGRAM — Ryland's plan: throw a ball of Taumoeba-infested Astrophage at Venus.

INSERTCONCEPT DIAGRAMPROBLEM-SOLVING

"Why not drop off the Taumoeba at Venus on my way home? Wad up a ball, throw it in. They'll have a field day."

MEDIUM — Ryland at food stores, counting packs. Three months of real food left.

MEDIUMRYLANDCALCULATING

"I check food stores. Three months of real food left. Then it's coma slurry. Maybe a coma isn't that bad."

MEDIUM — Ryland standing back from the coma pod, arms loose, not wanting to get in.

MEDIUMRYLANDRELUCTANT

"I'm reluctant to go back into a coma. Yáo and Ilyukhina had the genes too. Why risk death?"

INSERT — Navigation panel. Course confirmed: heading for home.

INSERTNAV PANELCAUTIOUS CONFIDENCE

"Whenever I spot-check I'm still on course. But what if something goes wrong while I'm in a coma?"

MEDIUM — Ryland thinking about his students. 26 years will have passed. Some probably won't survive.

MEDIUMRYLANDMELANCHOLY

"All my students will be adults. Twenty-six years. I hope they all survive. But some probably won't."

MEDIUM — Ryland at his desk, beginning to write up notes about Rocky and the Eridians.

MEDIUMRYLANDENGAGED

"I could write papers. I hung out with an intelligent alien for two months. Might want to jot things down."

MEDIUM — Ryland climbing the ladder to the control room. The daily ritual begins.

MEDIUMRYLANDWISTFUL RITUAL

"I climb the ladder to the control room. I sit in the pilot's seat. I really shouldn't do this, but..."

WIDE — Ryland alone in the lab, surrounded by equipment and nothing else. The ship is silent.

WIDERYLANDLONELY

"Speaking of loneliness, my thoughts turn to Rocky. My only friend now. Seriously. My only friend."

CLOSE-UP — Ryland's face, soft and quiet. Rocky a faint ghost image in the corner.

CLOSE-UPRYLANDMISSING ROCKY

"I didn't have much of a social life. Saturday-night beers with old friends — all a generation older now."

MEDIUM — Ryland thinking of Dimitri. Ghostly question mark where his friend used to be.

MEDIUMRYLANDFOND / UNCERTAIN

"I liked Dimitri. My favourite. But who knows what he's up to now? Russia and the US may be at war."

MEDIUM — Ryland in the pilot's seat, Nav panel up. The ritual.

MEDIUMRYLANDRITUAL

"I sit in the pilot's seat and bring up the Nav panel. I really shouldn't do this, but it's become a ritual."

CLOSE-UP — Spin drive controls. Ryland switches them off. Objects drift upward.

CLOSE-UPCONTROL PANELFAMILIAR RITUAL

"I shut off the spin drives and coast. Gravity immediately disappears, but I hardly notice. Used to it."

WIDE — Dark control room. Petrovascope screen. Ryland scanning. There: the Blip-A dot.

WIDERYLAND / PETROVASCOPERITUAL / SEARCHING

"I scan around. I know where to look. I quickly find it. The little dot of Petrova-frequency light."

CLOSE-UP — The Petrovascope screen. Just the single green dot. Rocky's engine flare.

CLOSE-UPPETROVASCOPE SCREENPOIGNANT

"The little dot of Petrova-frequency light. The Blip-A's engines. Within 100km it would vaporize me."

WIDE SPLIT — Left: Ryland at his Petrovascope. Right: Rocky in the Blip-A. Separated by a star system.

SPLIT WIDERYLAND / ROCKYSEPARATION

"I'm on one side. He's on the other. Even Tau Ceti just looks like a lightbulb. But I can see the engine flare."

MEDIUM — Ryland has an idea: Earth-Erid communication via Petrova light pulses. Morse code.

MEDIUMRYLANDCURIOUS / WRY

"Maybe Earth and Erid could communicate via Petrova light. Morse code. They have Wikipedia now."

INSERT DIAGRAM — Doppler red-shift. The Blip-A's light will be undetectable eventually.

INSERTPHYSICS DIAGRAMMELANCHOLY SCIENCE

"After a few months, relative velocities will red-shift his engines out of the Petrova wavelength."

MEDIUM — Ryland surrounded by relativistic equations. He does the math. "Yeah." Pathetically.

MEDIUMRYLANDSELF-AWARE PATHETIC

"Ridiculous relativistic math just to know how much longer he can see his friend. Pathetic? Yeah."

MEDIUM — The mechanical arm drops a bag of white powder on the bunk. Ryland watches.

MEDIUMRYLAND / SHIP SYSTEMSRESIGNED

"The mechanical arms come back with a bag of white powder and drop it on the bunk. Of course it's a powder."

CLOSE-UP — Ryland in the lab with the beaker of milky slurry. He sniffs. He sips. He grimaces.

CLOSE-UPRYLANDDISGUSTED

"Milky white slurry. Doesn't smell like anything. Then I take a sip. It takes effort not to spit it out."

CLOSE-UP — Ryland's face in full grimace. The Bitter Pill Chow. Several years of this.

CLOSE-UPRYLANDMAXIMUM DISGUST

"It tastes like aspirin. That nasty pill-like taste. I'm going to have to eat this every meal for several years."

WIDE — Four beetles in a row. John and Paul done. Ringo being worked on. George next.

WIDERYLAND / BEETLESMETHODICAL

"John and Paul: done. Today I'm working on Ringo. George will be easiest — just attach the mini-farm."

CLOSE-UP — The Eridian mini-farm capsule resting in Ryland's palm. Hand-sized.

CLOSE-UPMINI-FARMMARVEL OF ENGINEERING

"Four little Taumoeba farms courtesy of Rocky. Each one no larger than my hand. Eridian alloy steel."

MEDIUM — Ryland at the milling machine, drilling the 6mm hole into the beetle's fuel bay.

MEDIUMRYLANDFOCUSED / PATIENT

"The hardest part is the fuel bay. Completely sealed. Clamp it in the mill, use a 6mm bit. A whole big thing."

WIDE — The BOCOA on wheels. Ryland wheeling it to the lab bench, gripping handle with a towel.

WIDERYLAND / BOCOAMETHODICAL

"I pull out the BOCOA — big ol' container of Astrophage. Lightproof bin with wheels. I added the wheels."

CLOSE-UP — The syringe loaded with Astrophage. 100ml per shot. 200 shots per beetle.

CLOSE-UPREFUELING PROCESSPATIENT

"100ml per shot. About 600 grams. Two hundred times per beetle. Methodical. I'm getting good at it."

MEDIUM — Ryland opens the BOCOA and immediately reels back from the smell.

MEDIUMRYLANDALARM

"I open the BOCOA and — ugh! I wince and draw away. It smells horrible. Dead, rotting Astrophage."

CLOSE-UP — Ryland's face: wide-eyed realisation. The Taumoeba are loose again.

CLOSE-UPRYLANDHORROR / REALISATION

"Then it hits me. I know that smell. It's the smell of dead, rotting Astrophage. The Taumoeba are loose again."

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