01

The Morning After

Early morning,

Year 51, Day 88 following the I.S.S Tau Ceti's launch from Earth orbit.

The lunar complex was a vast, sprawling array of caverns and subsurface tunnels. It was capable of storing vast quantities of materials of all kinds, with the intention of providing fuel and parts for spacecraft leaving Earth's gravitational influence. Had there been enough time, it would likely have served precisely this purpose, and would have been fully stocked with not only the containers and materials needed for spacecraft launches from the moon or from orbit, but it would have had all of the machinery needed to convert materials from their raw constituents as they were either mined from the surrounding rock, or provided from imports from Earth, into more useful and more complex substances needed for vessels to operate in space, including breathable atmospheres, fuel, even photovoltaic panels.

Since the project never reached fruition, the massive storage space stood empty for half a century, almost completely devoid of any materials save for the initial atmospheric processors needed to allow a crew to work on the base. It stood with no-one to operate it, or to inhabit it.

Until yesterday.

Currently, the complex was shelter for almost a hundred thousand refugees from Earth's surface. Each person had a story to tell, and the scars to prove it. The overwhelming majority were far too malnourished to be considered healthy, and so emaciated, that it would be a wonder they could function at all without assistance. Indeed, the stories from Earth told a very bleak existence, with many people dying off before they ever reached their twenties. Those who survived to their fifties or older were considered almost unique in a society where the average life expectancy was just short of thirty years. A far cry from the technological height of humanity not more than fifty years ago.

Stephen Hayward was an exception, for one very simple reason.

He never grew up on Earth during the events that led to the near collapse of the species. He was in cryogenic sleep during that time, and grew up in a time when food was plentiful, wars were what happened "somewhere else", and infrastructure that no-one alive on the surface in recent years had ever heard of was the kind of stuff he had taken for granted before he launched into space. Half a century ago, before the first nuclear warheads detonated across the globe, the average life expectancy had climbed to eighty-seven years. Stephen was a physical age of twenty-seven right now, though his chronological age was seventy-six. Cryosleep had the ability to slow the ageing process to a glacial pace.

He was not unique in this. Three other people among the shelter had also grown up in the same era he had. One of them was their medical officer, a thirty-two year-old woman with a child on the way. Helen Deckland was selected for the mission to provide medical oversight on board a vessel that would be able to provide medical treatment for any shipboard ailment or injury. She was the ultimate decision-maker for medicine where the automated systems were insufficient for the task, and she had already assisted Stephen during a particularly unpleasant and unnecessary confrontation nearly three years before today.

This reminded Stephen of the second of their crew. Walter Davidson, recently promoted to Colonel, was a cryptographic expert and a covert military specialist, and the only member of their crew alive who was military. At just shy of thirty-seven, he was also the oldest member of the crew still alive. He was somewhat abrupt, abrasive, something of a stickler for protocol at times (even though he had loosened up to an almost unrecognisable fashion over the last three years). He was also built like a tank, massed almost a hundred ten kilograms, and topped out at two meters and three centimeters. His bulk resembled that of most Tau Cetians they had met over the last thirty-six months. Lean, rugged and very powerful. This was a man who took his callisthenics routines seriously, especially while the spacecraft coasted through the Tau Ceti system during their initial stages of the mission they had been sent on.

Stephen was a waif-like string bean in comparison to Davidson.

Stephen's friend, John Malakhi, rounded out their group. Twenty-nine years old, he was almost as tall as Stephen, who was almost two meters tall himself. John also had something of a wiry build, comprised of broad shoulders but on a slim, triangular body, along with some taut musculature that spoke of the same rugged exercise regime that Davidson followed, though to something of a lesser extent. John's tenuous similarity to Walter Davidson was superficial. The two men could not be further apart in terms of their personality, Stephen mused. Where Walter Davidson was no-nonsense, a hard task master, and intense most of the time, John was almost carefree, full of anecdotes, and jovial.

Well, he used to be, Stephen thought to himself, with sadness. John had lost a lot of his carefree innocence, and Stephen could hardly blame him. There used to be seven crew on board the ISS Tau Ceti.

In fact, there used to be an ISS Tau Ceti in orbit of Earth. The ship had been crippled, the habitat ring destroyed, and two members of their crew killed by the attack that had tried to prevent the Tau Cetians from communicating the presence of their enemy to their home-world. Adam Su Lee, a twenty-two year old Chinese-American from Nebraska, had a lot of charisma and a sense of humor that was well contrasted with the demure attitude of his friend and fellow mission specialist, Twenty-three year old Caitlin Xi Foster, another Chinese-American, this time from Minnesota. Both of them brought some unique talents to the mission, Adam his prodigious engineering talents, Caitlin, her linguistics skills and training in communication protocols.

The third crew member who had been killed recently was their mission commander. Naval Captain Marlon Greenfield was a jovial, carefree forty-year-old who had also found a balance between friendliness and protocol, and was the only other member of the crew to hold military rank. It was his oversight that made their mission to Tau Ceti successful, and his treatment of the crew was both fair and encouraging, bringing out the best of everyone. This had the chain-reaction of making everyone's performance that much greater, and this translated into far easier relations between them as the visitors, and the Tau Cetians as the residents.

His loss was devastating... Though it was devastating most of all to Helen; the child she carried had been fathered by him. They had been a couple for as long as Stephen knew them, and until the last few days, they had been steadfast.

Stephen terminated that line of thought. Helen was going to have a tough enough time as it was dealing with her loss without any pettiness from anyone else. She was no doubt already berating herself at a missed opportunity to part on good terms with the man. She no doubt was keenly aware that she would never get another chance.

This thought segued into thoughts about the newest person he had become acquainted with.

Janet Fletcher, a twenty-something European-American female from Arizona, was sat near him, asleep in her chair. She had taken to keeping him near her at all times since their departure from the surface a few days before. She had also been the de facto leader of the remaining population of the Phoenix shelter that was once located just outside of town where he had lived before his mission.

She was a very hard woman, having lived a desperate fight for survival since the day she was born. A lot about her was unknown, such as her exact age (she had no real way to measure how long she had been alive since timekeeping was something of a luxury among the survivors), as well as a lot of her background past the usual refugee reports of harsh survival. Seldom did she show vulnerability to anyone, and even those she did, she did so infrequently. One of those times happened yesterday, and it had led to an incident that put Stephen in a medical cot off of the main gathering area, where he was still being treated for several broken bones, internal bleeding, and a variety of other injuries.

It had all been a misunderstanding, of course. One of the local residents of the Phoenix Shelter, a teenager by the name of Jason, had assaulted Stephen, thinking that Stephen had been responsible for causing Janet some anguish, pain or injury. Without bothering to check what had actually happened, Jason had launched into a flying fit of rage, and would have likely killed Stephen. Despite his weakened condition, he was vicious, sneaky, and did not mind using whatever advantage he could get. Stephen, on the other hand, was not a combat expert, not proficient in hand-to-hand fighting, and had no desire to harm anyone. It had been mostly one-sided, until Jason had been stopped by several Tau Cetian guards, and the misunderstanding had all been somewhat straightened out.

Somewhat...

Jason's response was to utter some crude nonsense about sexual relations between Janet and Stephen, and Edward, the boy's father, decided to mete out some rough justice. The shock of the retaliation against the boy temporarily drove the adolescent narcissistic bravado out of him, and Edward stormed off, not wanting to talk with his son for a time.

For all Stephen knew, Edward still wasn't talking to the boy. Not that Stephen blamed the man. Jason was enough to try anyone's patience, and made Walter Davidson in his worst moments seem downright friendly. The fact that Jason had been so crude, and had acted disgusted at the idea of Janet Fletcher and Stephen Hayward engaged in any acts of intimacy, was so far beyond Stephen's comprehension, that he could not fathom what the boy's problem was.

Notwithstanding the fact that neither he nor Janet had ever gone so far as to do more than exchange kisses and the occasional comforting embrace, frankly as far as Stephen was concerned, what Janet did with anyone else was none of Jason's concern.

That would be a problem for another day.

Having not long woken up from his rather long yet uncomfortable sleep, Stephen was feeling restless. He needed to talk to someone, and was loathe to disturb Janet. She could be downright irritable at times, and while he did not fear her wrath, he did desire not to irritate her when she was still recovering from a lifetime of hard survival among a populace that had been as trustworthy, and as trusting, as a colony of vultures.

Stephen wanted to give her a chance to rest... But he was uncomfortable, needed the restroom, and plain needed to move from this weird position he had awoken in.

After trying to move quietly to the exit to find the nearest facility he could use, he was met outside by one of the Klankharii guards. This one was named Elidim, a tall, willowy man, with the same hardened musculature of all Tau Cetians. His face registered slight concern at Stephen's presence outside of the medical bed he had been left in, and he made as if to support Stephen.

"It's fine, Elidim," Stephen told the soldier. "I need the rest room."

Elidim frowned slightly, as though in thought. Stephen tried again, this time in the language of the Tau Cetian people. That time, Elidim understood, and pointed toward the doorway across the corridor. Stephen limped across the hall to answer a call of nature, carry out his morning ablutions, and then return to the bed he had just vacated.

Who would have thought being badly injured would be so exhausting on parts of the body that were otherwise healthy? Stephen wondered about that, but did not deny that just the morning exercise he had undertaken had tired him sufficiently that he wanted nothing more than to lay horizontally on that medical bed again.

He stepped slowly back into the room, trying to close the door silently so as not to disturb Janet, only to realise upon turning to face her, that she was not only awake, but staring at him, her face unreadable.

"Good morning?" He asked, almost sheepishly. What was the matter with him?!

"Is it?" She asked in a flat tone, her face giving nothing away. What was the matter with her?!

Frowning, Stephen paused a moment before answering. "Something on your mind?" he finally asked.

"Yeah," Janet barked. "You're on your feet following an attack that nearly killed you, and don't think I can't tell how badly your injuries are affecting you." Stephen was perplexed, because on the one hand, her sudden anger seemed unjustified, and yet, she was also on her feet, striding quickly to him, stepping to one side to provide support on his injured side. "Come on and get back on that bed before you drop to the floor, you stupid fuck!"

"Hey, whoa, what the hell, Janet?" Stephen, while he did not physically resist her assistance, protested in a deliberately even tone, leeching all possible heat from it. Stephen had already learned that she was incredibly hot headed, had a hair-trigger temper, and often reacted on instinct, only to regret it later. "I'm fine-"

"You're not fucking fine, Stephen. Don't lie to me!"

"Stop!" Stephen said firmly, this time stopping himself physically. Janet, for all of her toughness and survival attributes on the surface of Earth, did not have the raw strength and muscle-density of Stephen, even in his weakened state, so she had been caught off-guard by his sudden immobility. "Look at me," he told her gently.

Janet did. Her glare was like a blazing inferno, made more intense by the noticeable scar running down one side of her face and across the left side of her jaw, across the bridge of her nose, and extending past her right eyebrow. Combined with the emaciated, gaunt look of her cheeks and her other features, it gave the impression of someone who could kill in a second if she felt threatened.

Stephen was not so foolhardy as to provoke such a reaction from her a second time, the first being in orbit of Earth a few days before when he was right in the middle of an impending possessor attack and had just borne the loss of two close friends and colleagues... And while all of that was still fresh in his mind, they were all now on the other side of it, and things were already changing.

"Look at me what, Stephen?" She sighed finally, looking away briefly before returning her gaze to him once again. She was clearly struggling for patience, and Stephen needed to get to the point.

"I get it. You're worried about me-"

"Don't patroni-"

"Seriously, I am not in the mood for bullshit today, Janet. Yesterday, our commanding officer gave his life to ensure our survival down here!" Stephen had to stop at that moment. Marlon's death had been a major blow to all affected, and despite the fact that Stephen had always openly addressed him like a military senior officer, he had seen the man more like an uncle, someone he could talk to about things, have a friendly chat with, get stuff off of his chest. Taking a deep breath, Stephen continued, ignoring the tightness in his throat. "Please don't take offence at every single fucking sentence I speak. I'm tired, and I need to recover."

Janet did not interrupt, which Stephen was glad for, though he could tell she wanted to. He stopped for a moment to give her an opportunity to reply.

"You need to be in that bed over there, not wandering all over the place," Janet told him in what, for her, were measured tones. "Gonna kill that fucking kid," she muttered under her breath.

"No," Stephen told her. "You're going to continue to help us build a life for ourselves. You can't very well do that from inside a prison."

Janet stood back, slightly unnerved. "Prison? What?!"

"Janet, the time for summary executions is gone," Stephen told her gently. "I hadn't intended to talk to you about this until well after we were on the road to recovery, but since it's relevant, I may as well tell you now. At least, can we do it while I'm back in bed?"

Considering his body was still sore, and some parts of him were in intense pain from the damage he had received at Jason's hands, it was a wonder he had managed to stay on his feet as long as he did.

Janet was immediately full of remorse, transforming her face completely. The sorrowful look she gave him at that moment tore at him, and he stumbled. Immediately, she caught him, utilising more strength than Stephen thought her capable of, though Stephen could tell it took everything she had. "Come on, you idiot," she muttered. "You're gonna make me mourn another guy all over again at this rate." Stephen stumbled again at that comment. He had known that her feelings for him were intense. That had gone with the territory, he realised. However, this reminder was startling for him even knowing her as he did. She hefted him to the bed. "Fucking hell Stephen, you're gonna make me do all the work here?"

"Sorry," he said gently. "You just caught me by surprise, that's all." Despite the heart-thumping reaction she had given him a moment ago, he nonetheless warmed up considerably, knowing she was viewing him in such a way. He probably shouldn't be so content, as this definitely wasn't normal behaviour where he came from; most people in his time got to know each other first.

Janet sighed. "There's a lot I don't know about your world, Stephen. I'm trying."

He nodded to her as he lay back in the bed, finally off of his feet and able to relax. "And I swear to you, I'm not intentionally making it any more difficult."

She frowned slightly. Did Stephen find a gap in her vocabulary? While she was surprisingly well spoken for someone who had been living in the post-nuclear equivalent of the Bronze Age, Stephen had no doubt there were limits. However, she continued speaking as if it was of no concern. "I know you don't mean to make it harder," she said, her voice a little rough. Suddenly, she turned her head away, letting it droop.

Stephen knew she was most likely trying to hide the fact that she was crying at that moment. It was something he had seen her do a few times in the last few days, though she had told him that it had been years before the first time.

This time, he didn't press. He simply sat, gripping her arm gently, while she composed herself.

"I don't know what I'm doing, Stephen," she said eventually. This confidence, as vague as it was starting out to be, was clear as day to Stephen. She only ever opened herself up like this to Edward and to Stephen. The only other person she had opened up to in this manner was a lover she had once had back on Earth, a man who had given his life to defend his people from an invading scavenger force. That she would open up like this to Stephen was a sign that she was clearly and heavily emotionally invested in him. "For as long as I can remember, I've had to know how to fight, to scavenge for scraps, to whip other people into shape, to show a solid wall of strength, never allowing anything that could be seen as weakness. I've always had to look over my shoulder, even with people I could otherwise trust completely, because while none of them ever meant me harm, the possibility that one of them might be under duress was always too great. Not even Edward, for all he has never failed to support me in my effort to keep order in the shelter, was immune to duress. After all, he loves his kids." While delivering this line, Janet's face held a hint of sadness. "Anyone who doesn't is a monster," she added, her face showing some anger. Then she sighed. "But if someone kidnaps your kids and demands you kill the person running the show, would you defy the kidnapper, or would you kill someone to protect your kids? It still meant I had to watch over my shoulder."

When she said no more than that for a time, Stephen slowly nodded. In an almost whisper while holding her gaze, he asked "Now?"

"Now..." She said, her face uncertain, almost fearful. This level of vulnerability wasn't new to Stephen. She had shown this side of herself to him yesterday as well. "Now I'm out of my depth! I'm lost, Stephen! When you said just now that there were no more summary executions, it hit me at that moment that everything I had learned to adapt to had been ripped out from under me!"

At that moment, her head dropped to his lap, and she let out a series of weak sobs. This, Stephen knew, was something of a crossroads for her psyche. The realisation that she was going to have to learn all over again what it meant to operate in a society so different to what you knew before, was enough to unnerve anyone. Stephen wondered if he would be able to cope in her place. Stroking her head gently, he allowed his head to relax into the pillow, and remained silent for as long as it took.

"What would make it easier for you?" Stephen gently probed after several minutes, when Janet's breathing had eased.

Her tear-streaked face looked up at him briefly, and then she rested against his lap again. "I need a place in this new world. I need to..." She sighed, sounding more than a little frustrated. "I need to be useful."

Stephen understood that feeling far too well. Being stuck under the surface of the moon with a hundred thousand of Earth's refugees while his friends and colleagues were fighting for their survival in lunar orbit was just about the most agonizing experience Stephen had ever had to face short of learning when some of them had died. It was not an experience he had cared to repeat, and yet, he recognised the fact that there may be a time some day, when he might just have to.

"That makes two of us," he sighed gently, continuing to stroke her hair. "And we'll find a way to fit in."