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Chapter 4
Zach Croft: 2030
Zach swam in and out of consciousness as his mind fought to regain control. He was only aware of a few things: sirens, flashing red lights, and screams. He reached up to touch his head and felt a patch of wetness under his hair. Blood?
The ringing in his ears was overpowering. Only the agonizing cries of those around him broke through the noise.
Two hands—not his own—found his restraints and yanked them free. “Zach! Hey, hey, can you hear me?” It sounded as if the words were spoken through a pillow: muffled, stretched, distorted. “Are you hurt?” Quinton asked, probing the nooks beneath Zach’s jawline and then around the back of his neck. He briefly patted Zach’s shoulders and chest before sitting back with a sigh. “Wake up. Wake up.”
As Zach came to, the gravity of their situation became apparent. One of the dropship’s walls had crumpled. Frayed wires dangled from above, raining hot sparks on the displaced floor panels. Dozens of seats were torn from their foundations.
And the people. Oh, the people.
The already-crowded cabin had succumbed to anarchy. Desperate screams and pleas for help echoed all around. Those who were able to stand frantically moved through the cabin. Some stopped to help injured loved ones or friends; others wailed over the bodies of the fallen; others pawed through whatever supplies weren’t already crushed or destroyed.
However, the outer walls didn’t appear to have been breached, so oxygen and pressurization seemed normal. That was one good thing.
Zach reached out to his father but found only empty air. He glanced around until he spotted Quinton ten feet away, tying a tourniquet around a badly damaged leg. His hands, slick with blood, pressed a square of torn cloth against the wound as he tightened the cord with his teeth.
Nearby, a man shouted for his wife repeatedly as he pushed through the aisles. A deep gash stretched from his cheekbone to his chin, and his eye was purple and swollen shut.
A small child clutched a torn teddy bear only a few seats away from Zach and spoke silent, tearful words into it. His mother slumped in the seat beside him, her body lifeless and unmoving, her head tilted at an awkward angle on her broken neck.
At the command module, one of the pilots lay dead with a broken back. The other, cradling a bruise on his forehead, called into a radio headset, “Dropships One and Three, do you read me?”
“Anything?” Quinton asked, rolling up his red-stained sleeves.
The man shook his head with a grimace. “One landed okay, but the other… I don’t know.”
Nobody knew anything. That was the problem. Zach found it hard to focus on anything but the pain in the back of his head and the blinding crimson lights.
As he studied the chaos, Zach cursed the decision to come to Prescott. Only a few moments before, he had accepted his new life. The change of scenery. The exciting possibilities. But all that was just a means to an end—starting over on Alpha Cen.
Would they even survive that long? They were just beginning their journey, and they’d already crash-landed. Countless people were dead; even more were injured. And they hadn’t even made it into the actual colony yet. Would their oxygen work? Would the hydrofarm yield enough food? And what if it failed? What then?
“An extraction team is coming from Dropship Three!” the pilot announced.
Quinton frowned, assessing the damage to a young woman’s ankle. “Extraction? What do you mean, extraction?”
“They’re gonna get us out of here.” The pilot glanced at the window, squinting at the reddish landscape beyond it. “One by one.”
“No, that’ll take too long,” said Quinton. “There has to be another way.”
“Half of these people can’t walk.”
Quinton thought it over while scratching his ear. “Okay. Get them over here.” His fingers left behind a streak of red that ran down his neck. “Welcome to Mars, everybody,” he said under his breath. “Welcome to Mars.”
Cora Keaton: 2030
Cora anxiously walked the perimeter of her room.
She couldn’t stop. She didn’t want to stop. She would do anything to take her mind off the possibility of Zach being dead. She and Zach had been friends for so long, and she hadn’t wanted him to go on the mission in the first place. But, of course, it wasn’t her choice to make. And now, Zach could be dead.
It was all because of her father. He was the one who asked Quinton to lead the mission. God, why had he done that?
“Why don’t you send Mr. Carver? He doesn’t have kids!” Cora had argued.
Victor had been fastening his work tie in the mirror, not giving his full attention. “Quinton’s the most qualified. And I’m not thrilled about him bringing his kid there either, but he can’t leave Zach behind.”
Cora stubbed her big toe on her wooden dresser, pulling her away from the memory. Pain pulsated through her foot, causing her to grab it with both hands. She hopped for a moment before settling down on her bed with a faint sigh.
She looked at the large fountain outside their house through the giant glass window that made up half her wall. The clear, burbling water. The vibrant green grass surrounding the property, always precisely level.
Most of the exterior was glass; a single rock could bring the whole thing down. She had a terrace with a blue-watered pool that overlooked the entire city. The liquid rippled in the warm sunlight, luminescence passing through the transparent walls of the pool and casting down on the beautiful driveway below. A half-dozen palm trees hung over the house, providing a spiky shade that cooled the property. Beyond it, a line of hedges assumed the job of a fence. Perfectly trimmed and tended to.
Her parents’ room was on the other side of the home; she could see it through the window. The house had been constructed in a handlebar shape that allowed viewing of every room in the estate.
Cora felt the sudden urge to check the Prescott brochure, the pamphlet she had stolen from her father’s drawer. She impulsively dug under her bed, fished the paper out, and read through it, scanning the words, taking in and analyzing them. It said just about everything she’d expect it to say—how many colonists were going, how families could communicate with their loved ones, how long they’ll be gone, yada yada yada.
Her eyes lingered on the last sentence: BE READY TO HEAR GREAT NEWS. What did that mean? She didn’t even know why she had the brochure. She only took it because she was curious. Creasing the tri-fold back to its cover, Cora spotted the infamous Prescott logo.
“Cora,” Victor said as he entered the room. He noticed the pamphlet but seemed too tired to care. The tips of his fingers danced on her wooden desk anxiously.
“What is it?” Cora curled the brochure, wringing it tightly in her fists.
“We got news from Prescott.”
Cora sat bolt upright. “Oh god. Is Zach okay?”
Victor nodded. “Yes, he made it through.”
“Are you sure?”
“I am.”
As Cora exhaled in relief, she noticed a brief flicker of something indecipherable crossing her father’s eyes. Was it… doubt?
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” Victor gave her a slight smile. He looked tired. “They’re going to be okay.
“Those were the words Cora wanted to hear. She just wished she could believe them.
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