In which John Tracy is reacquainted with a the pleasures of Earth in general and good plumbing in particular; Scott Tracy reveals his new career path and tells a lie
Somewhere, there was a memory of a thin beam of light slicing across his face, a voice asking him a question, but it all got lost in the tangle of restless dreams and diving sleep. He opened his eyes, and saw that the clock by his bed read 4:30. He stared at the numbers for a minute or two, waiting for his brain to make some sort of sense of the information. Then he remembered where he was, sat up, and looked at the clock again. He had slept through to the next day. Actually, thinking about it, he wasn't entirely sure he hadn't gone clear through the whole day and into the next. He felt as if he hadn't so much slept through the night as plowed through it.
A half an hour later, hair still damp and clad in some worn jeans and a Harvard t-shirt, he was wandering quietly down the hallway, hoping he was going in the right direction. As much as he wanted to see if Scott had been serious about the house, he didn't want to start exploring until he had some coffee, and hopefully some food.
He found the kitchen after ducking down a few wrong hallways off the lounge. This wasn't a house, it was a rabbit warren. He knew his father never did anything by halves, but how much room did he really need? He didn't really expect that all of them were going to spend any great amount of time here, did he? The ISA space station was closer to his apartment in Miami than this island.
He found the coffee pot half full and still hot. Well, at least some things hadn't changed. He rummaged around until he found a mug and poured himself a cup. He snagged a couple of pieces of fruit from a bowl on the counter and went to go see if he could find Scott.
He was seated on the balcony, feet up on the railing, staring out over the ocean. He looked up when John pushed the door aside.
"Hey," he said. "You're awake."
"Had to happen sometime," John said, dragging a chair next to Scott'sand assuming the same position. "Is it Wednesday or Thursday?"
"Tuesday."
"God. Still?"
"It's tomorrow," Scott told him. "You crossed the dateline yesterday, remember?"
"Not really," John said. He took a sip of coffee and stared out at the ocean. This used to be his favorite time of the day, poised on the periphery of sunrise. The world looked almost devoid of color; as if the black of night had to be turned down to gray before the colors of day could be tuned in. It only lasted a few minutes, but he liked it, existing as it did on the edge of things.
"Do you feel better?" Scott asked. "You look better."
"I will after I eat something," John said. He put his coffee down on the ground next to him and started peeling an orange. "The shower here is amazing."
"It is?" Scott said.
John shrugged. "Water actually comes out of it, and it doesn't shut off after two minutes, so I'm a fan."
"Two minutes?"
"There's no water on the moon. Everything is recycled. And rationed. Really, really rationed."
"Right, of course. I keep forgetting."
John bit into the orange, and closed his eyes. Fresh fruit. Earth ruled. He opened his eyes to see Scott looking at him.
"Good orange?"
"Shut up. I'm having a moment."
"What did you miss the most?" Scott asked, curious. "I mean, aside from people."
"Fresh air," John said promptly. No question to that one. "After a while, everything there just smells the same, and it's really not the world's greatest smell. And…weather. Changes in temperature. You know, the temperature is regulated to the exact degree. So you can stand by the window and look out at a landscape that's frying at hundred and seventy degrees and is so bright you can barely look at it – and never feel any warmer. The sun hits the window, but there are so many spectral filters in the glass – if you want to call it glass – and it's tempered in such a way that no heat comes through. You're really in a bubble." He ate another piece of orange. "This is the greatest thing in the universe. You want some?"
"No, I don't want to deprive you," Scott said. "Fresh air, oranges…what else?"
John just shrugged. "It's…it's not like any place on earth, Scott. Obviously. So you just wind up missing – I don't know. What's here and not there? Pretty much the whole world. I missed everything."
"I couldn't deal with something like that," Scott said. "Being cooped up inside, the same people all the time. I'd go crazy."
John agreed. "You probably would. It's hard."
"It doesn't sound like it was too much fun."
"It's not fun. Fun is probably the last word on the list. But it's like running a marathon. That's not fun either." John took a deep breath. "But it's supposed to be good for you."
"Well, if it's any consolation, you nearly gave Dad an aneurysm when you said you were staying up there longer."
"Really?" This was interesting. "Why?"
"You know how Dad gets when something interferes with his plan." Scott said "I – I mean, he was just running around railing against the incompetence of the ISA, and how if they had let NASA take the lead, it wouldn't be such a bureaucratic mess."
"Oh. Well, he's got a point," John said. "But if NASA was running the program, I would have spent the last two years in Florida, waiting for a chance to go up into space to test the effect of zero g on tadpoles or something."
"I guess so," Scott said. John and his father had spent countless hours arguing over the respective differences between ISA and NASA; John knew it bored everyone else senseless.
"So what's with you quitting the Air Force?" John said.
"Well, I never wanted to make a career of it, anyway," Scott said.
John blinked. Apparently, Scott had forgotten his childhood and adolescence.
"Besides, I got a better offer. You want some more coffee?"
John drained his cup and handed it to Scott, who took it and went inside.
The night had lost, and the sun was rising behind him, turning the sea from bloodless gray to turquoise. John stood up and leaned against the railing. He could see a small strip of rock-strewn beach below, ringed by a tangle of palm trees and undergrowth. Somewhere in there, a bird was screaming. He breathed as deeply as he knew how, and tasted salt at the back of his throat.
He heard Scott behind him. "Gordon's awake," he told him, handing John his coffee.
"What better offer?" John asked.
Scott hesitated for a moment so brief that John almost missed it. "Working with Father."
John turned around and leaned against the railing. "Doing what?"
"Working with him on some aircraft he's prototyping."
"You're working for the company?" John asked uncertainly.
"Yeah...on a project-by-project basis, though. And working directly for Father."
John frowned. "But…" he stopped.
"But what?" Scott asked.
"You're really working for the company?"
"I do have a passing acquaintance with aircraft, you know," Scott said, more amused than offended.
"Yeah, and I can fly the shuttle. It doesn't mean I know how to build one," John snapped.
Scott was taken aback. "What's it to you?"
Nothing. It was nothing to him. John didn't know why the idea bugged him.
"Virgil's more involved with design than I am," Scott admitted.
"Virgil's working for Dad too?"
"He's involved with the same project."
"Did Dad recruit everyone while I was away? Is Gordon in on it too?"
Scott raised an eyebrow. "No, Gordon's been in physical therapy."
That shut John up. He sat back down.
"Do you want to hear about the craft we're working on?" Scott asked. "Some of the ideas are really incredible – well, they're really Brains's ideas.Father discovered him at a symposium giving a lecture to an empty theater. The things he's come up with are years ahead of their time. Given the right circumstances, they could really change things here on earth."
John didn't say anything. Scott leaned forward to try to catch his eye.
"You listening, Johnny?"
"Yes. You're changing life as we know it."
Scott was annoyed. "Listen, you don't have to be…"
John cut him off wearily. "Forget it. That's not at you. Build your plane. It's just…" he stopped.
"What?" Scott said, more gently.
"Well, that's what ISA has been telling me since I got there. Actually, that's what ISA has been saying since it was set up. Life, humanity – all the world – will be better through this technology. Through these accomplishments." He looked at his brother. "Have you noticed any improvement? I haven't even noticed any change."
From inside the house, they could hear someone moving around. John turned around to look, but only saw his own reflection. He looked better than yesterday, but the week in zero g, combined with the flight home and the flight here, had taken their toll. Or maybe it was just that he was sitting next to Scott, who looked so at home.
"It's Gordon," Scott reminded John.
"How is he?"
Scott ran his finger around the rim of his coffee cup. "In a way, he's fine." He paused. "Virgil says that he's alive, and everything after that fact is a bonus."
"Does Gordon see it that way?" John asked.
"Well, you can try putting that in a way that won't get your head ripped off. He won't talk about it. He'll joke about it, but it's hard to get him to really say anything substantive. Virgil says that Gordon will come to it in his own time, or something." Scott gave an irritated wave.
"What do you think?" John asked.
"I think Gordon isn't Virgil."
"No argument there."
Scott sighed. "Gordon is a tough kid, but what happened to him…I don't think Virgil can really comprehend it. I know I can't. It's the type of thing you have to live through to really understand. It helped that everyone was there – we all practically lived at the hospital for around two months – but you can't recover for someone. He's got to go through it, and we try to help as much as we can, but he's got to do it by himself."
John listened, staring at the wavering reflection in the surface of his coffee. He had only been on Grissom Base a month or so, still somewhat entranced by the white noise, the lower gravity, the constant night outside the few windows, the utterly inorganic nature of the building. All of that had shattered when Dominic, his boss at the time, had knocked on his door and with an awkward brusqueness informed him that there was a message from Control. Gordon had been in some sort of accident. It was very serious. John remembered the sickening drop in his stomach, like hitting an air pocket and suddenly losing traction on the world. He had stared uncomprehendingly at Dominic's impassive, embarrassed gaze, wondering how it could be that Gordon could be dying and he could be on the moon. Surely that couldn't be right.
"But maybe he'll talk to you about it," Scott was saying, although he didn't sound convinced. "You might have better luck."
John shook himself back into the conversation. "Or Alan."
Scott shook his head. "Alan was in worse shape than Gordon, in a way. Alan won't talk about it at all."
"I guess that makes sense. What does Alan know about death?"
"What do you know about it?" Scott asked sharply.
"Jesus, John." Gordon said, coming out onto the balcony. "You've been here for less than a day, and already onto death lessons?" He pulled a chair forward, and put his feet up on the railing, copying his two brothers. "So what were you talking about?"
"Nothing." Scott said.
"You." John said.
Scott sighed. Gordon grinned. "I've learned my death lesson."
"I figured you had. I was talking about Alan." John said.
"Well, Alan's eighteen," Gordon said, either philosophically or diplomatically, John couldn't tell which. "So. See that shadow over to the right, where the water gets a little bluer?"
"Yeah."
"That's the reef. It's almost a mile long. Keep going to your right, or east, and you hit the caves."
"What caves?"
"There's underwater caves on the east side of the island. Keep going, and you hit the nice beach. It's a little less rocky, but there's a pretty strong riptide. So general recreational swimming by those of us who don't have medals for it goes on right down there. What'll it be?"
"We're going swimming?"
"There isn't a whole lot else to do here. Reef, caves, nice beach or rocky beach?"
"Which would you rather?" John asked. "I'm happy with any water."
"He was very excited about the shower," Scott said. John gave him annoyed look.
"You look like you need some sun," Gordon said critically, and John laughed. "Let's do the reef." Gordon got up. "I'll get the stuff." He went inside.
"Don't be all day down there," Scott said. "I know Father wants to talk to you."
John stiffened. "About what?"
"He just wants to talk to you," Scott said.
"About what?" John repeated.
"You've been away for a while, John. I think he just wants to talk to you."
"I'm going to be here as long as he wants me to be here," John said, although that wasn't precisely true. "Is it something pressing?"
"You've been away for over a year, and he wants to talk to you!" Scott said, annoyed. "What are you getting so defensive for?"
"You're making it sound like I'm in trouble or something," John shot back. "And if Father wants to talk to me, he'll talk to me. I don't see why you have to be involved."
He went inside, shouldering past a rumple-headed Virgil who barely dodged out of the way in time to avoid spilling his coffee. Virgil watched him go.
"What was that about?" Virgil asked.
"I have absolutely no idea. But good news: he hasn't changed any."
Virgil nodded absently, and sat in the chair John had vacated. "He's probably just jet-lagged. Shuttle-lagged. Something like that."
"I don't know, Virg. I just can never tell. Half the time we get along great, and half the time he's thirteen again." Scott stopped himself. "It doesn't matter. You're right. He's probably just tired."
"Where's he going?"
"Swimming with Gordon."
Virgil buried his face in his coffee cup. "Why does everyone in this family get up at the crack of dawn? It's like a curse or something."
"He asked why I quit the Air Force."
Virgil looked up. "What did you tell him?"
"That I was working with Father. What he told me to say." Scott let out a breath. "I wish I didn't have to. We shouldn't be lying to them."
"True." The coffee was waking Virgil up. "Look at it this way. We're not lying to them. We're protecting them from the truth."
Scott gave him a wry look. "You'd make a great politician."
Virgil shook his head. "No, I wouldn't. I don't like lying any more than you do. But Father said as soon as his rotation was up, he'd broach it with John. So I'm guessing it's just a matter of time, now."