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There were sixteen hours left.
She wasn’t sure they would have enough time to give Lovelace a proper burial at sea. Not before the contact event, so maybe not ever. Renée wasn't prepared to even think about Hilbert’s remains.
No. She would find a way to do right by them, especially Lovelace. She owed it to her.
A big part of Renée wanted to just go curl up in her bunk, sit in the dark, let the enormity of the last couple hours wash over her. They had all been completely aware of the risks, but there’s knowing the risks and then there's listening as the life of a comrade is snuffed out, being certain that your friend is next, but he’ll probably be tortured a while first. There’s knowing the consequences and then there’s putting a gun to a woman’s head and pulling the trigger and hearing the bang and singular thunk of metal tearing through a human brain. A world divides knowing the risks from experiencing the consequences, and Renée is not the kind of person who will ever, ever be able to accept the consequences without feeling their weight on her shoulders.
But there wasn’t time to think about it then, not when there were two men to lock up and potentially aliens to meet and a ship to pilot and a way home to plan.
Jacobi proceeded mutely to the makeshift brig when she came for him, and she locked him up like she had locked Hilbert up what seemed like a lifetime ago. Just like Hilbert back then, Jacobi’s frustration and resolve to make trouble at the first opportunity radiated off him. Whether Renée was the same person she had been just over a year ago, she would have to think on. That, too, was for later, maybe never.
When she went to the armory to get Eiffel, he was standing like a statue, his gun trained on Kepler. When Renée entered the room, Kepler raised his eyebrows at her, and she kept her face as impassive as she knew how. There was one stray spot of of Lovelace’s blood on Eiffel’s cheek. Renée made herself look over at Lovelace’s limp form, with her unrecognizable face. She swallowed hard, pushing down the sorrow and anger the best she knew how. Kepler was standing, relaxed, with a faint smirk on his face.
“Hands on the back of your head,” was all she said to him. He complied wordlessly and allowed her and Eiffel to escort him out of the room. They all knew this wasn’t over.
With Kepler and Jacobi stashed away - for now, but Renée knew they would have to re-evaluate soon - Renée and Eiffel went to the Comms Room. They leaned against the communications array and stared out the window at the star.
“So. Got any of those homemade cigarettes still hidden around here?” asked Renée.
Eiffel dissolved into shaky, hysterical laughter, and over the comms, Hera joined in, her giggle glitchy and stuttering.
“Never thought I’d miss that time in my life,” Eiffel said. He wore a twisted un-smile on his face, and his eyes were frantic.
“Never thought I’d miss the plant monster,” Renée replied, grinning back. Their laughter faded, lapsing into a pregnant pause.
Hera broke the silence. “So. What comes next?”
“We have sixteen hours, til. You know. E.T. Or the xenomorphs. Or… whatever,” Eiffel commented, and the corner of his mouth twitched up.
“Less than sixteen hours,” Hera corrected him.
As one, they looked out the window again. Fire leapt and tumbled across the surface of Wolf 359. It seemed to reach out and grasp at the Haphaestus.
Renée bit her lip. “Let’s take 15 and then… Well, we’ll keep going. We’ll see if we can get the Urania ready to leave without Lovelace. And then we’ll see what happens.”
“When have we ever not played it by ear?” Eiffel asked no one in particular as he stepped forward to stand next to Renée at the window. “What do you think will happen tomorrow? Think we’ll really meet aliens, like Kepler does?”
“I don’t know, Eiffel.”
“Do you want to? Meet aliens?”
“Can’t be any worse than Goddard Futuristics,” said Renée with a bitter chuckle that Eiffel echoed. “I don’t know, Eiffel. If you had asked me that question when we first came up here, then I would’ve said, yes, absolutely. But now, I’m just not sure. I just can’t think about it right now. We just need to focus on how we’ll get home. I’m done with this.”
There was only a slight hesitation to Eiffel as he put his arm around her shoulders. “Me too, Commander.” He paused, briefly. “Thanks, Minkowski.”
It’s not that it was hard to remember how Eiffel was a thorn in her side for a while. Eiffel was genuinely an irritating person, with his unprofessionalism, his laziness, his non-stop stream of stupid jokes. And despite everything that had happened to them over the course of their mission, Eiffel was still the same person.
But now he was also, unequivocally, a friend. Renée leaned into his side.
“Thanks, Eiffel,” she said.
“And Hera,” Eiffel added, and he reached out to put a hand against the wall. Renée moved so she could touch the wall, too.
“Group hug,” said Eiffel.
“You’re stepping on the moment, Eiffel,” Hera commented, her digital voice warm with affection.
“So.” Renée squared her shoulders. “That was fifteen. Hera, how much time until the contact event?”
“Fourteen hours and thirty-two minutes.”
“Alright, so, Captain Bligh’s out of the way, for now. What next?”
Renée considered. “Well-”
“You see what condition the Urania is in and what you need to do to make it ready to go back to Earth,” Hera interrupted. She only glitched slightly, on the word “go”.
Eiffel and Renée exchanged glances.
“But what about you, Hera?”
“First things first. Who knows if you can even get the Urania working for you? Start there. And then…” she trailed off.
“Then we’ll see,” Renée completed her thought. Eiffel was still frowning, but he walked out of the room at her side.
They had fourteen and a half hours left, and they’d face whatever was coming together.