Love and Other Metals by K.P. Redmond

Author:K.P. Redmond
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: UNKNOWN
Published: 2016-07-18T22:00:00+00:00

We’ve been aboard Allgood for over 2 months now. Weeks have gone by since we sent the reconnaissance drone. With each passing day, we get closer to Hrothgar but farther from Luna and Shacktown and only home I can remember, crappy as it was. Sometimes I look out the portholes in the galley and gaze at the star-sprinkled black that surrounds us. When I’m alone I turn the lights down low so I can see better. But Luna is a ways behind us now—a mere speck of light—so the only way to see her is to zoom in with one of the aft cameras. Sometimes Louis, Katya and I do that together, just to see Luna, and remind ourselves that we have a home and that we’ll be going back someday. It helps.

There’s no feeling of speed. It feels like the ship is holding still while the twinkling diorama of stars and galaxies in the portholes slowly change perspective, as if driven by some kind of massive clockwork mechanism. That’s when I get this feeling in the pit of my stomach, a ball of dark and nasty that festers in my insides: Is it fear? Loneliness? Or is it that I got no idea what’s going to happen to me?

On the one hand, I’ve developed a sort of easy friendship with my crewmates—except Nastez of course, who’s a jerk at all times. They’re good people, but knowing that I’m spying on them for the government makes me keep my distance. I don’t want to get real attached. I’m on the edge of a new life and I gotta discard these people like a snake sheds his old skin. I’m committed. So that’s how I feel, day to day—as I do my chores, keep my watch, study the learning materials, sleep, eat, and do whatever they ask me to. Here, but not completely here. Never really at ease. At least nobody is beating me up. That’s a nice change from Shacktown.

But after all the monotony, finally there is a buzz on the Allgood. Today’s the day the reconnaissance drone sends back close-up telemetry. I’m on the flight deck, my sticky boots planted behind Katya’s station, with Louis taking the console’s other saddle. Katya is making softly spoken progress updates into her headset, keeping the captain and Nastez up to date. Mostly critical telemetry items from the drone such as distance and speed. It’s been a waiting game, but today the drone will park itself beside the asteroid and tell us what it’s made of.

We watch the video streaming back from the drone as Hrothgar looms large in the screen. Nastez is in control of the multiple camera views from his console, switching back and forth between visual, infrared, and radar-mapping views. Katya has got maneuvering, although at this distance the bird is pretty much on its own. We watch as the drone decelerates to the speed of Hrothgar and begins skipping around it, like a hummingbird over a juicy flower, using its thrusters, photographing and analyzing and mapping the surface.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.