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6.1

15 July 2057

Cape St. Vincent, Portugal

Earth Surface


A full moon hung, lovely and full of promise, in the midnight sky, peeking out through low clouds that scudded by in the swift ocean breeze. Lawrence Edgar Killian had his hands on the railing of the villa’s back porch, balanced precariously on the edge of the sandstone cliff overlooking the Atlantic. Sir Lawrence. He was as close as he could physically get to the spaceport at Paramaribo, on the Atlantic’s other side, while still remaining in Europe. He’d never been here before, and he would never be here again. Though he was a rich man—the third richest in all the world—there was still so much he hadn’t seen, and never would. That perfect white circle in the sky was one of the last full moons he’d ever see.

He counted: three more, and then he’d be gone, not to the grave but to the Moon itself, never to return. He’d never been to space, and the idea quite frankly terrified him. Which was strange, because Lawrence had raced motorcycles and jumped out of airplanes, and flown a helium airship through the storms of Antarctica. It was strange, too, because Harvest Moon Industries had carried hundreds of people into space, and currently operated three moonbases. No, four, he reminded himself. With the addition of Second Dawn Retirement Community, it was four, now, or it would be once they got the dome fully pressurized. Lawrence had never been to any of them.

He’d been too busy, right? He’d spent his youth building assets—airlines, news networks, music publishers, gravel pits. He was always in motion back then, always on video calls or in boardrooms or out on factory floors, or else lazing in the arms of his beloved Rosalyn. Then, for reasons that confused even him, he’d spent his middle age selling these same assets off to fund the larger dream of space travel, and instead of making him poorer as he’d expected, it had instead made him fantastically richer. Life was funny that way. And then Rosalyn’s heart had given out, without the slightest flicker of warning. The best doctors in the world had assured her that her heart was in good shape, outstanding shape, but one day she’d clutched her chest, fallen gently to the floor, and said, “Darling, I don’t feel at all well.” Half an hour later, she was declared dead, and most of Lawrence had gone with her, to whatever place lay beyond this world.

Then, a shell of his former self, he’d spent his old age working even harder, playing even harder, trying to prove to the world that he was still in it, when any halfwit could see he wasn’t. Then his doctors and his staff had stepped in, aided and abetted by his adventuresome chums, to clip his wings and keep him Earthbound and at low velocity, except in the safe carriage of a private jet. And then, as if in confirmation, his own heart had started showing its age. There was pain. There were surgeries, and pills, and admonitions about diet and exercise. Water exercise, twice daily!

And so it had simply made sense to leave his Earthly life behind, to leave all the intrigues of cislunar space behind and retreat, finally, to the whisper-light gravity of that white circle up there.

Retirement.

The word seemed more alien than the Moon itself. A word for other people! And yet, for years now, Sir Lawrence had been trying to devolve power to underlings who did not really want it, and to steer it away from those who wanted it too much. He and Rosalyn had left no heirs, and he wanted to minimize the mess his death would leave behind.

He didn’t sleep much these days, and so, with the summer night’s salty breeze in what remained of his hair, with his final destination casting down a spectral light across the cliffs and the sea and the white stucco of the villa, there was little to do except contemplate his choices.

Had it been good and right and proper to found seven companies? Had it helped the world, for him to sell off all but one? Had he granted mankind unprecedented access to the riches of space? Or had he, as some insisted, simply inserted himself in between those riches and the people of Earth? Was he, in the end, a good person? Had he ever been, or could he become one now? He’d always given generously to charity. Hundreds of billions of dollars! But could that expunge all the sins that any businessman must, of necessity, commit? He didn’t know. There was no one left who’d answer him frankly about it.

And what about Rosalyn? Had he loved her well enough? He certainly hadn’t loved her long enough, but damnation, if he had it all to do over again, would he ever have left her arms? Would she have wanted him to? She’d had a rich life of her own—a musician, a painter, an ever-smiling philanthropist! When he’d first heard the lilt and croon of her recorded voice, he’d approved the contract at once, and then sought an audience with her shortly thereafter. The courtship had been sunrise-brief and noon-bright, the wedding ceremony a mere formality. Ah, God, had he loved her well enough? There was no way to know.

He looked up again, at the source of the night’s glow. Luna. It would spin ’round the Earth just three more times, and then he’d be on it. Starting a fourth and undeniably final phase of his life. Along with eight dozen other retirees, plus staff. Was that a good thing? It was something he could do—something only he could do. But he could not do it for everyone, no. Not for the slimmest fraction of everyone. What did it mean, to build the future? Nothing was ever really finished, nothing was ever for everyone. Was it wrong, then, to do it at all? He didn’t know.

“Sir?” said a voice behind him.

Gill Davis, his longtime personal assistant.

“Good evening,” Lawrence said, without taking his eyes off the Moon.

“Are you all right?” Gill asked gently. Oh, how tired Lawrence was of being spoken to gently!

“Just ruminating,” Lawrence assured him. Then: “Can’t sleep?”

“There are no curtains on the windows.”

“Ah. Indeed. Well, it’s a pleasant night for it, eh?”

“So it is, sir.”

Finally, Lawrence turned and looked at Gill, moonlit in his dressing gown.

“You’ll be out of a job, soon,” Lawrence said.

Gill smiled. “I will, sir.”

“I’ll miss you. I mean that.

“I don’t doubt it, sir. And I you.”

Lawrence left that hanging for several seconds, then turned and looked upward again.

“You’re still young. What will you do?”

“I haven’t decided,” Gill said, with refreshing candor. “You’ve been generous, which leaves me time to figure it out. And I’m not that young, not really. But yes, I suppose I will have to do something eventually. Something with a bit less travel.”

Lawrence chuckled. “Yes, yes. Less travel for both of us.”

Gill moved to the railing, and put his own hands on it, beside Lawrence’s. He looked up at the Moon and said, rather psychically, “It’s a frontier you opened.”

“Did I?” Lawrence asked, his voice suddenly carrying a whisper of bitterness.

“You did. No one doubts it.”

“Hmm.” He mulled that for a few seconds, and then said, with candor of his own, “It’s all right for you to tell me off, you know. There’s no further consequence if you do. I’m sure I haven’t been the easiest man to work for, not in such close quarters. You’ve seen me at my worst, time and again, and that can’t have been easy.”

“No job is easy.”

“Hmm. Well, I thank you for staying. What’s it been, now, nine years? Ten?”

“Eleven, sir.”

“You can stop calling me that, now. In fact, I’d like you to stop calling me that.”

“I . . . Well, that’s kind of you, sir, but I don’t know I’m that sort of person.”

Lawrence chuckled again. “No, I suppose not.”

He let the wind blow again for a while, and then said, “I didn’t imagine space would be so dangerous. Naïve of me, yes? Foolish. I thought about airlocks and booster rockets, not about human nature. But of course there are villains up there, of course there are weapons. Of course we’re not all in this together. I helped that happen as well. No one up there is safe, or ever will be.”

It was Gill’s turn to snort in amusement. “No one is safe anywhere, sir; it’s simply a matter of degree. And if you want me to tell you off, I’ll say it’s hubris to blame yourself for the failings of other people. You should focus on your own.” Then, after a pause, he walked that back by saying, “Power has corrupted you less than anyone had a right to expect. Perhaps you could ruminate on that. Other men in your position do have weapons. And harems, and other indulgences. I’ve always admired your widower’s faithfulness. It’s rare. Can you be an arsehole? You can. It would be strange if you couldn’t. But nothing kept me here with you. I could have left at any time. I could leave right now.”

“Yes.”

“The truth is, sir, it’s been a pleasure as well as an honor. I think you can be proud, and I think you should be.”

“I . . . see. Well, thank you. That means a lot.”

“I’m not going to call you, though. Right? I’ve done my time. I’ll think of you when I look up at the stars, at the Moon especially. But when this thing has run its course, I’ll be starting a new life, with no rockets.”

Lawrence could not help feeling slightly crestfallen at that. What man wouldn’t? But what he said was, “Understood, Gill. I wish you happiness and safe journeys.”


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