YOU WILL GO HOME. YOU WILL ACT AS OUR AGENT. YOU WILL NEVER RETURN.
Catherine leaned heavily against the console. Tom saying he didn’t remember long periods of time. Tom sabotaging the oxygenator, the rover. Tom trying to kill her more than once. It was because of the creature standing in front of her.
“Please, I don’t understand. What’s going to happen to me?”
WE ARE ONE MIND. ONE WILL. WHEN WE ARE ASCENDANT WITHIN YOU, YOU WILL SHARE OUR MIND. DO OUR WILL.
“Mind control?” Panic was rising in Catherine’s breast. “Is that it? You can’t. We’re a harmless people, please.”
WE ARE ALREADY WITHIN YOU. IT HAS STARTED.
“No, please!” It was too much; all of it was just too much. But the figure was already leaving the cockpit, shimmering out of sight. The only sign she had that it was gone was the sound of the air lock to the outside opening and closing.
Catherine’s vision grayed out around the edges, and no matter how hard she tried to cling to consciousness, she felt herself sink to her knees and fall to the cold floor beneath her, everything fading away.
Sagittarius I Mission
DAY UNKNOWN
ON BOARD SAGITTARIUS, LOCATION UNKNOWN
Catherine was flying the ship. She knew that much. That part seemed all right. But why was she alone in the cockpit? Normally Ava kept her company. Had she said anything to Catherine over breakfast that morning about having something else to do?
Breakfast that morning. Catherine had no memory of it. She didn’t remember sitting down in the pilot’s chair, for that matter. “Where the hell are we?”
She called up the navigation and the charts. They were flying away from TRAPPIST-1f. Had they landed on it? Had something gone wrong? Why couldn’t she remember anything? Catherine swallowed her panic and activated the ship’s autopilot, then got up to go find the rest of the crew.
The main dayroom of the ship was empty. There was no sound of anyone talking. Or laughing. Or moving around. The ship wasn’t that big. She should be hearing someone doing something.
The laboratory was empty. The galley was empty. This is wrong. This is very, very wrong. She checked all the quarters. Cubbyholes. Closets.
“Where is everyone?” she cried.
She checked the mission logs, the comm transmissions. There was nothing prior to Mission Day 865, before they landed. For some reason, she’d abandoned TRAPPIST-1f, leaving her crew—or their bodies—behind.
She was alone, and she had no idea why.
33
“THERE,” COMMANDER ADDY said, stepping back. “That should hold for a bit.”
“What should hold?” Cal sounded more and more agitated.
“The hive mind inside Catherine had a wall up between her and her memories,” Addy said. “My hive mind tore it down. We put the wall around them instead.” She sounded rather pleased with herself.
Catherine stood between them, stunned by all the images racing through her mind, not even sure where to begin.
“Catherine?” Cal gave her a little shake.
“I remember everything,” she said, barely recognizing the sound of her own voice.
“What?”
“All of it. All the lost time, the whole mission.”
“But how did you—” Cal started, looking at Addy.
Addy just looked back at him.
“You need to go now,” Addy said. “As long as she’s around me, her ‘friends’ will fight harder to get past that wall. They’re pissed.” Her voice was as calm as a Sunday afternoon on the front porch. To Catherine she said, “They shouldn’t control you anymore.” Her eyes narrowed. “And you shouldn’t let those bastards at NASA control you anymore, either.”
“I don’t understand,” Catherine began.
“Go.”
“Wait!” Catherine said. “Commander Addy. Iris. Come with us. We don’t understand what’s happening, and you do. We need your help. We’re trying to get NASA to bring back the crew of Sagittarius II, so this doesn’t happen to them, too.”
Addy sighed, slumping. “Catherine, NASA doesn’t want me. And I’m pretty sure I don’t want them. I don’t think there’s anything I can do to help.”
“But with both of us telling our stories, they might believe us…”
The older woman patted her cheek. “You’re still so trusting.” She looked at Cal again. “Take her and go.”
“Okay, okay, we’re going.” Cal started shepherding Catherine toward the door. “I’ve got you, come on.” He got her out to the car, having to stop and support her once or twice, strapping her in with her seat belt and pulling back onto the road.
Catherine sat limply in the passenger seat, looking out the window. She felt as if she’d run a marathon. The anger in her mind, the anger that hadn’t been coming from her, retreated, leaving her with her new memories, the faint burn of their resentment toward Catherine and Iris buried deep. Catherine knew too much now, and that was not in their plan.
What plan?
Oh, but she knew the answer to that now, too.
Neither of them said anything until they were back on the road.
“You doing okay?” Cal asked.
“I’m not sure. Maybe.”
“You really remember everything?” Catherine could tell he was dying to know, but she couldn’t muster the strength to tell the whole story just yet. “Cal… I’ll tell you, I promise. I just… I can’t right now.” She looked at him. “But I saw them.”
Cal shot her a startled look.
“They’re not just… voices in my head. I saw them. On Sagittarius. And Iris Addy isn’t crazy,” Catherine continued, feeling suddenly defensive. She looked straight ahead and was quiet for a long while.
Cal didn’t push her. All he did was reach for her hand.
He had to drive around for an hour before they found a roadside motel. The sun was starting to set, and Catherine was tired enough by that point that she didn’t care. Everyone at NASA thought they wanted the truth, but it turned out they’d had part of the truth all along and had ignored it, dismissed it, and pushed Iris Addy out for telling it. They’d worked so hard to discredit Iris—would they do the same to Catherine now?
She waited in the car while Cal checked them in. He came back with two room keys and handed her one. “Looks like we’re the only ones here, so we pretty much had our pick. Not that there’s much to choose from,” he added dubiously.
Her room was decorated in timeworn colors that might have once been charitably described as “desert sunset,” but had more likely been eye-bleeding shades of pink, orange, and brown when the paint was fresh. Still, it looked mostly clean. But if she closed her eyes, she could feel the gritty dirt of TRAPPIST-1f on her hands, grimed in her knuckles.
Cal put the key card on the dresser. He handed her a bottle of water and sat down across from her.
She focused on the water bottle, not able to look at him. “I remember everything.”
“Can you tell me?” he asked gently.
“I killed Tom Wetherbee,” she blurted. “I didn’t mean to kill him. I swear I didn’t. He was infected with something and out of his mind, and all I could think was that I couldn’t bring him back like that. I had to at least quarantine him…” The words broke open long-forgotten pain, and she swayed with the force of it.