There was one more picture on the nightstand, this one unframed. He picked it up, lying back in the bed, ignoring the cold places where he had sweated into the sheets. He stared at the image, trying to place himself there, next to her, next to Claire. She had looked ill when the photograph had been taken, her skin sallow and waxy, aging before her time. She had smiled bravely for the camera despite the way she had felt, despite the depression. She had always been strong, willing to fight her way out of the corners Life sometimes shoved her into.
He closed his eyes, pressing the photograph against his forehead, willing time to turn back, willing things to change, wishing that their lives had turned out differently two years ago, ten years ago, from the beginning.
“I miss you,” he whispered, and his shoulders shook.
He put the photograph aside, opened his eyes again. Nothing had changed, nothing ever changed, nothing ever would. The rules of his physical world did not permit such things and would not permit him to turn back time. In his world there was no higher power than the laws of physics.
He pushed the sheet away and eased slowly from the bed, trying to stretch, ignoring the little signs of age in his back, his joints. Denial of the process of aging—more an act of ignoring the physical in favor of the cerebral—had led, for a time, to an obsession with the gradual degradation of his body. That had eventually petered out, leaving him only with periodic e-mails from the gym about renewing his membership and an occasional pseudo-concerned note from his homeopath.
He walked into the bathroom, habitually making a quarter-turn to go through the narrow doorway, not bothering to close the door. A quick leak in slow motion, then a quick bodywash that sloughed away the traces of sweat along with any accumulated grime.
He set out his shaving kit, filling a shaving mug-with scalding water. He foamed his face carefully and picked up the pearl-handled straight razor, opening it out with a slow, careful movement, reflecting slivers of his lined face. He turned the razor slightly in his hands, saw the hard, cold reflection of his eyes.
Dismissing the image, he looked up into his mirror and applied the edge of the razor to his face, shaving in smooth, even strokes. This method of shaving was an anachronism, seen as an affectation, tolerated or ignored by those who knew of his proclivity. Once upon a time Weir had preferred it; these days it was no more than habit. Shaving this way had been another enforcement of precision, another element in the plan shaping his life. As with so much else in that plan, it had assumed the air of reflex.
Drip. Startled by the sound, he lifted the razor away from his face, his breathing stilled for a moment. He clearly heard the sound of air whispering through the ventilator grill in the bathroom. Drip. He looked to one side of his reflection, focusing on the bathtub tucked into a corner of the tiny bathroom. Drip. Slowly, he turned around, staring.
He felt very cold, but knew that the temperature had not changed.
Water oozed from the faucet, coalescing into a large, ungainly bubble of water before giving way to the demands of gravity. Odd, he thought, that gravity demands so much of us that when we rest we fall asleep.
Drip.
He turned back to the mirror and resumed his shaving, slowly, precisely, and smoothly. He splashed water into his face, toweled himself dry, throwing the towel over the rack when he was done. The bathroom needed cleaning, he noted, but he could not be bothered to stoop to the chore often these days. He picked up his comb and swiped carelessly at his hair, pushing it back into place. He was a scientist, and no one really cared how a scientist looked.
Just deliver the super-bomb, Doctor, and we’ll overlook your breach of the dress code.
From the bathroom to the closet, and a change of clothes, half-heartedly smoothing out wrinkles. Dressed, he went into the kitchenette, opened the tiny refrigerator, and stared helplessly into its disorganized interior. New forms of life were being generated in there, he was sure; in the “meantime, the examination yielded only the usual archaeological data. One of these days he was going to have to put something fresh in there or arrange for a biohazard team to remove the fridge.
He opened a cabinet, extracted a box of instant oatmeal, added milk powder, water, salt, and too much sugar, irradiating the compound result in the microwave until it was suitably unappetizing and had developed a texture akin to wet, sweetened sawdust. Spooning a mouthful of this unwelcome body fuel into his mouth and chewing morosely, he went to the window. Another mouthful of too-sweet mush, then the last part of the morning ritual.
He reached out and opened the blinds that covered the window. The starscape blazed in at him, giving color to his gray world. The stars were the main attraction in this habitat section of Daylight Station—Earth lay below them, beneath the “south” side, and all that could be seen from his quarters was a cheerful glow at the bottom edge of the window, if you leaned forward in just the right way. Weir never bothered to try and catch the glow, and he never really looked at the starscape, never had, his mind always being on something else. These days his mind was usually empty when he looked out this way, voided in dreams and nightmares. Even so, nothing came to him now, only the hard clarity of too many stars seen through vacuum.
He finished his oatmeal, retracing his steps to the kitchenette, putting the bowl into the dishwasher. Several others, crusted with varying amounts of decaying oatmeal, already occupied the top rack. He closed the machine carefully and poured himself a glass of tepid water.
The videophone buzzed angrily, startling him. He placed his glass on the kitchenette counter, and made his way around to the phone. He could barely remember the last call he had received—no one called him unless they needed something. Most of the people he knew or worked with tried to avoid needing anything from him.
The videophone buzzed again. He tugged at his bottom lip, frowning at the blank-screened instrument. He scanned the nameplate—Microsoft-NYNEX—absently, then, as the third buzz began, waved his hand over the call pickup sensor.
“This is Weir,” he said, and was surprised at how dusty and unused his voice sounded. Take a note, Billy Weir: you need to socialize more.
The screen lit and cleared. Weir was not surprised at the face that appeared—he could not think of a reason why anyone other than Admiral Hollis’ adjutant, Lyle, would be calling him. Station Maintenance, perhaps, but they responded only to service calls, and he had made none of those for a while.
Lyle’s face, attractive, dark, too young for the sort of position she held in the ranks of the United States Aerospace Command, gazed at him, guileless, composed. She was making an effort, then, because Lyle never took pains to conceal how tolerant she was when talking to Weir, never let Weir forget how precious every moment of her time was. Lyle sat at the right hand of God.
Hollis had never done anything to disabuse his adjutant of this notion.
Composed, smooth, Lyle managed a smile and said, her voice coming tinnily from the videophone speaker, “Dr. Weir, Admiral Hollis would like to see you as soon as possible.”
Weir closed his eyes for a moment, blotting out Lyle’s face. He knew.
Beyond any hope of rational explanation, he knew. Hollis should have taught his assistant not to make an effort to hide secrets behind a diplomat’s mask.
He opened his eyes, nodded coldly, and waved a hand over the call hangup sensor. As soon as possible was not more than MilSpeak for now, so to hell with Lyle if the adjutant had a problem with his manners.
Chapter Two
The traverse through Daylight Station could not have been quick enough for Weir: He doubted that it was quick enough for Admiral Hollis either. Hollis was not used to waiting for anything he wanted.