“But it’s not enough! What if I had to do heart surgery, or—”
“You are all excellent”—he paused to pronounce each part, excellent—“condition. No heart attacks likely.”
“Okay, okay, but we should have a backup pilot, right?”
“You say that because I am pilot-engineer.”
“And if the pilot gets hurt? Not like a biologist breaking a leg, who cares? No pilot, nobody goes home.”
“Marc is good pilot.” He peered down the mouth of his beer, Anchor Steam Porter.
This non sequitur, she saw, was Viktor’s way of saying that he was resigned to not going. “Hey, is this phlegmatic acceptance routine of yours just the Russian coming out?”
His head jerked up and he stared at her, mouth open. “What means phlegmatic?”
“Stolid.”
“What means stolid?”
“What am I, a thesaurus? No, don’t bother, a thesaurus is—”
“I know thesaurus.”
“Passive, it means you sit on your ass and do nothing.”
“Whole world is sitting on ass, watching glorious Twenty-first century on TV.”
“Yeah, some truth to that.” She sighed and collapsed onto the couch next to him. “And they’ll be watching us.”
“You. I watch, too.”
“No, you’re going. I dunno how, but I’m gonna get you there.”
“You now say ‘gonna.’”
“So?”
“Notice how everybody now talks something like that?”
“Oh. Like Axelrod.”
“American Southern.”
“We’re taking on his mannerisms?”
“His ideas, too. Sounds to my ear, like.”
“I hadn’t noticed.”
“I think is nothing wrong with. Is his money.”
“And Microsoft’s and Boeing’s and Lockheed’s and don’t forget that fine old Russian Energiya, Inc.”
“Very ancient joke.” He suddenly turned and hugged her in his bearlike grip. “Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, is the reverse.”
“Okay, I get your drift.”
“So we rejected astronauts, we are angry but what can do?”
“I can—”
“No, me. I do for myself.”
Except…she embraced him fervently and could not think of anything he could do. In him she felt the simmering, sour longing.
Three of the other astronauts had simply disappeared. Lee Chen, her instructor in exobiology, who had recently joined the astronaut program, Gerda Braun, a German engineer inherited from the European Space Agency, and Claudine Jesum, a French pilot. Where had they gone? Probably off to various ventures in the burgeoning low orbital business. But they had all left quietly, letting nobody know their plans. Astronauts were not usually very public in their passions, and even less so in their defeats.
Viktor had said he would remain behind to support the mission, serving in systems operations, trying out variant routines in the simulators as they flew to Mars and met unanticipated problems. Fair enough, she supposed, especially if he were positioning himself to fly in a later expedition—if any, she reminded herself.
But would their relationship survive this? She murmured into his shoulder and realized that Axelrod’s decision had forced her to become something other than a standard, loyal team player.
The recognition surprised her. She did not want to go to Mars without Viktor. Even if it meant staying home.
She hesitated at the double glass doors. On the other side was the plush outer office of Axelrod’s huge suite at Genesmart. Here she was still safe, still one of the golden four astronauts picked to go to Mars. When she came out after their interview, what would she be? Just another failed candidate? How would she feel? She sighed inwardly. This isn’t going to get you anyplace, Jules, ol’ gal. Let’s get it over with. She pushed through the door and slogged across what felt like miles of thick carpeting to her appointment.
Axelrod somehow managed not to be dwarfed by the massive desk. He came around it to greet her, moving in his usual kinetic style. To her mild surprise, he was the clean-desk variety of leader. The mahogany desktop held exactly two pieces of paper, one pen, and a pop-up computer flatscreen.
He clasped her proffered hand in both of his, then guided her to a seat in an alcove of the room, sort of a coffee table and chairs arrangement. The vastness amazed her; he had more room in his office than they would occupy on Mars. She wondered briefly if he had any idea what he was asking them to do.
