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Half of humanity died. They died cold and starving and scared, hands clasped in prayer or to keep warm or to hold onto their loved ones as they died. Eva Stratt knew it would happen, and was imprisoned as it happened, and through the grace of God or the grace of Grace, was part of the half that survived. She has always been right. It has always been abbout the wrong things.
The last red fox dies seventeen years after the Hail Mary's launch. Four years after the astronauts arrived at Tau Ceti. Four years after the too-low food supplies would have run out.
It was in captivity, when it died. As part of global conservation units it would have been taken from the world that loved it. She wonders if it ran. It probably did. It was probably scared, and it probably didn't want to die, and neither of those things would have stopped it from spending it's last days in a cell.
It was alone. It was probably cold. It was probably hungry.
Had she worked faster, better—had she stayed out of prison and helped the conservation efforts; had she not let her love for the world make her cautious in her destruction of Antarctica; had there been any other choice but the one that she made, maybe it would have survived.
There is no room for grief, with the sky on your shoulders.
And still, she has not worn a color other than black since that meeting, nine days before the launch. And still, she lays awake more nights than not hating her dry eyes. And still, she uses what little contact she has left with the outside world to track the numbers of people lost, the species disappeared, the years since the ship reached Tau Ceti, carrying humanity's hope and all of her love with it.
If the guards have tired of torturing her, she will do it herself.
There is no way a single woman could carry the grief of thousands of lives, but the weight of the sky has made her strong. Stronger than most. Stronger than all, maybe.
She cries for each of them. She cries into each report. She cries for every member of her team that is unaccounted for. She cries for her astronauts, for her scientists, for the last red fox.
When she learns of its death, she puts her head into her hands and sobs. It's cathartic, but mostly exhausting. She has been exhausted for years. She has been exhausted for her whole life. In her worst moments, she wonders what it was all for.
Hail, Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.
She wishes they'd let her keep the rosary. She could ask for a new one to be smuggled in, but that is too much an admission to her comfort.
Her prayers will not save the fox. The fox, when it lay dying, was not comforted.
Pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.
She thinks of the fox as it was: prancing about, never held still. Yipping and smiling at every smallest thing. She thinks of the fox as it was: scared. Running, but never fast enough. She thinks of the fox stiller than still.
She thinks, and she mourns, and she mourns, and she mourns. An Earth carrying billions of new corpses spins. Tau Ceti spins. Eva Stratt spins, and spins, and her heart spins out a thousand miles away, and the last red fox died, and nothing will bring it back.
Amen.