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Despite all our evolution, we are still animals.
Running, screaming, and pushing. That was what happened at the Petrova Task Force after the explosion of the lab. Like a stampede of wild horses getting away from a natural disaster. But then...
"Casualty projections go up exponentially if we delay. We launch on schedule with a replacement science officer" Stratt stated at the other side of the table.
There was an uncanny silence. All eyes were on him. And as he lifted his head from his hands, he could see it in their faces. Fear. Raw, innate, instinctive fear.
He had to ask. They were looking at him as if he was a dog about to be euthanized "Okay, but...who?" He swallowed. No answer. "I mean, that..." The words were left unsaid, but it was clear in Ilyukhina's frown, in Yáo's sigh, in Stratt's furrowed brows. "I'm not an astronaut" He stuttered.
"I don't need an astronaut. I need an expert on astrophage who's mission-ready" Stratt explained. Visibly calm, yet, her shoulders were stiff –carrying the weight of the world–.
Ryland couldn't do it. He was no hero.
"I'm not ready. I don't have any training" He chuckled, not a hint of humor behind it. "I'm not an astronaut! I put the 'not' in astronaut. I've never done anything, I've never done a space walk. I can't even moonwalk!" He tried to reason.
"You're smart. You'll figure it out" Stratt affirmed.
He understood the meaning. He had to figure it out. They would give him the responsibility of saving the world and the people in it. It was the right thing to do, everyone knew it. Stratt was just forgetting something.
"You're missing out on an important part of the mission, which is the suicide part" He remembered her, because she should get it. No one wanted to die, no matter how much they pretended to like saving the world, animals wanted to survive.
"If you don't go, you die anyway" But not alone, in space, with a duty he didn't know if he could fulfill.
"Yeah, but I die in 60 years with–"
"With the rest of us" Stratt sighed disappointed. "You have no immediate family. You don't even have a dog" She huffed.
He had a family. Carl said that they told his family where he was. Stratt even gave him drawings from his children. Were the people he cared about not enough for them? Was his life so miserable that they thought it was worthless? Was he even human for them? Was his family–
"I do. Have a family, I mean" He choked, locking eyes with Stratt. Her face changed from pity to anger. As if he was blatantly lying in a desperate attempt to save himself. She thought he was lying.
"You have three hours" Stratt finished the conversation, walking to the door and leaving with the rest of the people in the conference room. He stayed still as the lights of the room turned off. Instinct crawling around his skin.
Like a deer caught up in the highlights, an animal always recognizes the danger they might be in.
—
Ironically, Grace did have a family.
The picture of Colt Seavers stared at Eva in a way that made her feel a little guilty, just a little. Because it wasn't her fault that the team she tasked with his background check had missed the part where his brother changed his name. But that didn't matter now.
It didn't matter if Dr. Grace had a family or not. Humanity needed him at the Hail Mary. Not only for his brain but also for his genes. A very rare gene that made him coma-resistant. She wouldn't get that in another candidate without looking for at least a couple of months, plus the training.
The launch had to be in the next days as planned. The panic in the team proved that. It was a reflection of how the world would react after the news of the explosion. Animals were prone to violence at the smallest threat of dead. The sun dying was not a small threat.
"They're ready for you, boss" Carl informed her. She nodded, fixing her clothes.
The Petrova Task Force had been tied to the media coverage since its beginning. It was inevitable, since everyone wanted to be aware of the sun situation. And of course, Eva lied about most things at first. She didn't want the whole world to panic.
However, people are not as stupid as they make themselves look. And a lot of wannabe scientists had spread the rumors of the sun dying all over the internet, she couldn't control that. So now a press conference was the only thing they could do to avoid more chaos, especially after a news channel had reported the explosion earlier that day.
"Miss Stratt, why didn't the Petrova Task Force address the severity of the situation beforehand?" A reporter asked. A bunch of reporters were pushing each other behind him, all of them fighting for asking something.
"We gave the proper information to the media. Anything else was classified" She answered. Giving the people too much information would have messed with the calm of the world.
"You don't think the extinction of the world is a matter that we all should be aware of?" Another reporter questioned.
"There shall be no extinction. The planet's life expectancy is sixty years, in which the last thirty are the ones that represent the most danger. We have it controlled. We have a plan" She stated confidently. Everything would be alright if her plan succeeded.
"What's the plan?" Someone screamed at the background.
"We are sending a team of experts to space to fix the problem" She revealed. The media didn't need the whole plan, just the important part. The knowledge that everyone would hopefully live if Grace accepted to go the Hail Mary launched.
She still explained the basics. The astrophage eating the sun, Tau Ceti having the solution, the long journey of almost thirty years that the crew would have to endure to save the planet just in time before the real danger started. And, well, the astronauts sacrificing their lives.
"Who are the people that accepted to make this sacrifice?" The reporter demanded.
"They're Yáo Li-Jie as the captain" She motioned Yáo to the front, who gave a nod. "Olesya Ilyukhina as the engineer" Ilyukhina presented herself with a smile. "And our scientist..." She hesitated for a moment. "Ryland Grace" The crowd clapped, but she saw her astronauts flinch.
In the back of her mind, she remembered Grace's bright smile on the day of the party. She remembered the all nighters he pulled to solve the problems she entrusted him. She remembered the children who thought their teacher was coming back to the classroom as a hero.
Grace could be a hero.
Eva found, that in the big scheme of things, sacrificing Ryland Grace was a bigger mercy that letting him watch the world he loved die. Because she knew Grace loved the world, they shared that in common. One of them was just too coward to act upon that love.
"I need you to call the doctor who's putting the crew in the induced coma" She ordered Carl after the conference. "I'm going to do something I'm not proud of" She confessed.
For the safety of the world, if Grace wasn't willing to be the savior. He would have to be the sacrificing lamb.
—
Tom was not an early riser.
Despite his boyfriend's insistence that humans were diurnal animals, he wouldn't wake up early even to save his life. The twins, though, they were both morning birds, it seemed.
"Tom! Tom! Open the goddam door!" Colt banged hard on his door. He looked at the clock, it was six in the morning. What the hell?
He opened the door only to be wildly dragged to the living room by Colt, who was at the same time being pushed by Jody, who had Dan behind her. They were acting like cats in the rain. He felt like he was missing out on something important.
"Where's the fire?" He joked, trying to light up the mood. But no one listened.
"Where's the remote, man?" Dan asked, looking around the messy couches. Sue him, he was not a cleaner either. That was usually part of Ryland's chores.
"I don't know" He sighed. "Did you wake me up this early to watch tv?" He huffed indignantly.
"Tom! Just turn on the fucking tv!" Colt yelled. Oh no, he was being serious, and that could only mean...
He hurried to the tv to turn it on manually. "What happened? Is it Ry?" He questioned frantically, changing the channels until he found the news. "Oh, fuck" He breathed sharply.
There was an explosion in the place where the Petrova Task Force was currently working at. Some scientists had died. His lover was a scientist. The world felt like it was spinning.
"Hey, hey. It's not Ry" Jody calmed him. "Just pay attention" She said, helping Tom sit on the couch. He focused on the reporter.
"–injured. But only doctor Martin DuBois and doctor Annie Shapiro were confirmed dead" That was a relief. "In a few hours the lider of the Petrova Task Force is going to hold a press conference, to explain the situation to the public" The news lady informed.
"I was running when I got the notification" Colt explained. "How much do you think that's gonna delay Ry coming home?" He questioned uselessly. Tom didn't know. There was no way of knowing.
"Let's hope not more than a couple of weeks" He wished. "Since I presume we're gonna wait for the press conference. Who wants breakfast?" He proposed.
Tom had never made so many pancakes in a row, but keeping himself busy was helping with the uneasiness he was experiencing. One glance at Colt told him enough to understand that the other man was also nervous.
About ten in the morning, when the press conference started, Tom made his way into the couch, finishing the last of his breakfast. Jody turned the tv on and sat with him. While Dan and Colt were standing up behind them, the later walking around in circles like a zoo animal.
Eva Stratt talked about the end of the world –something they already knew thanks to Ryland's kids– and about a plan to send some astronauts to space to find a cure for their dying sun.
Now, if Tom could describe the feeling he got when she was about to announce the crew, he would say it was some form of protection instinct. He automatically traced the scar on his abdomen, where he had taken a bullet for his lover more than a year ago. It burned. Painfully.
"–our scientist... Ryland Grace" Stratt said.
Colt stopped his pacing abruptly, and he stared at the tv. It was probably a mistake, Tom knew it had to be a mistake. Except that the photos of the Hail Mary crew were right in front of him in the tv. Two astronauts, with their space uniforms, and Ryland, with a suit he used to wear for work.
He made a sound similar to a wounded animal.
Around him the world feel apart. He could hear Colt crying, a cup shattering against the ground, Jody struggling to keep them calm, but it was no use. He was sobbing so much he didn't think he would ever stop and the scar beneath his hands felt like he was bleeding out all over again.
Ryland was gone. The love of his life. The light of his days. The person who found the good in him was practically dead, dead, de–
"ENOUGH!" Jody yelled. "You can't lose your minds! We need to find a solution! We can't let this happen!" She chastised desperately.
"A solution for what?!" He cried. "There's nothing to fix! Ryland is going to a suicidal mission, and we can't do anything about it" He howled.
"No! He... Ry wouldn't agree to that" Colt croaked from where he was kneeling on the floor. "They most have made him".
It was delusional. He was denying reality. But then again, wasn't that what they had done the last few months? Hold into every tiny crumb of hope like animals in the edge of extinction. He was not giving up. Humans are made to survive.
"M-maybe you're right" Dan intervened. "He wasn't at the conference. The photo looked improvised too. And the dead scientists..." He added nervously.
"Yes! You see! We just have to... think a way of saving him. We just..." Jody tried to think of a solution while the news lady kept saying things.
"–everyone's going to be there, John! The president, the king. Uh! I heard they're going to allow some celebrities too! All to say goodbye to the Hail Mary!" The reporter gushed.
"We just have to go get him" He sniffed, pointing at the screen.
Survival of the fittest, he supposed. They were not letting Ryland go without a fight.
—
In his opinion, foxes are really cute.
Clever, sly, funny little things. Ryland's first knitting project was his favorite fox cardigan. It was comfortable in a way only your favorite animal can be. He loved foxes. They were not brave animals, but neither was he.
Another thing about foxes was...
"I'm trying to make understand what I'm about to do next"
... they know when to run.
"Come on. This is crazy" He sniffed, feeling trapped. He could see the doctor Stratt called getting closer to him. A hunter approaching their prey. A hound about to kill a fox.
"This may seem like me betraying you, but it's actually me believing in you" Stratt said with a certain hurt in her voice.
"No, it's not" He denied, getting away from her. "You're murdering me" Some bodyguards entered through the door behind him, ready to catch him if he ran.
" Sit down and we do it differently" Stratt Eva choked, a sound so painfully human, yet he felt like an animal.
They wanted to kill him. To take him to that ship. To force him to be away from his family. He had to do something. He had to run.
"You're murdering me! Don't do this! Don't!" He cried for mercy. The hunters made their way to him, so he climbed a shelf to get to the door. "I'll sabotage the mission! You kill me, I'll kill your mission" A desperate resource. Like a fox biting off its own leg to escape a trap.
The hunters didn't stop. Hands were on him as he jumped to the door, ready to run as fast as he could. The others following him with the same agility, maybe even more. But the metal mesh fence was so so close–
Someone knocked him to the ground.
"No! Don't do it" He screamed to no one in particular. "I can't do it!" He kicked. "COLT! COLT!" He called, but his brother was not there, no one was. "Tom! Tom!" He was alone. His only company was the hounds that were killing him. "Please don't!" He begged, but was rewarded with a needle on his neck.
The grass felt soft, even as his head was being pushed against the ground. He looked at the sky to catch a last glance of the sun but he merely saw foxes. Little orange foxes running and jumping around his head happily, like the ones he used to pet in the backyard of his childhood home.
It was kinda nice. He really liked foxes.