Arriving home

“This is insane. This is absolutely ridiculous.”, Davin said furiously. He whirled on Jean. “You are insane. You’re being ridiculous, Jean.”

“Am not!”, Jean protested halfheartedly, her tongue sticking out in concentration as she focused on buttoning up her anti-gravity jacket. It was no easy task, Davin had to admit- one wrong move and you could turn the jacket on and end up in space.

“Are you sure you really want this?”, he asked her.

“You’ve asked me this at least a thousand times, Davin.”, Jean said quellingly. “Yes, for the thousandth time, I’m sure I want this. I’ve wanted this ever since I was born.”

“Think about this, Jean. You’ve had one near death experience already, isn’t that about enough for a lifetime?”

 “I don’t have any plans to die.”, Jean finished buttoning up the jacket and clambered into the spacecraft next to Davin. “I’ll be fine.”

“You’re breaking about fifty intergalactic laws, you’re going to drive one of the most expensive vehicles in the world with no idea how to, and you’re planning to travel the whole Universe when you’ve never even left the solar system before.”, Davin said furiously. “There is no way we’re going to survive this.”

Jean rolled her eyes. “Don’t be overdramatic. We’ll be fine.”

Davin threw his hands up. “I don’t even know why I’m coming with you. I’m such an idiot.”

 “A sentimental idiot.”, Jean said, smirking. She turned around and began fussing with assortment of seatbelts, strapping herself firmly to the fancy, cushiony seat. “You don’t need to come if you don’t want to.”

Davin glared at her. “You know I will. I mightn’t ever get a chance to visit earth again. Ever.”

Jean shrugged. “Like I said, sentimental.”

Davin glared at her as she finished strapping herself in and began to fiddle with the cables. “Sentimental? Me? I cant help if you’re a heartless monster.”

Jean laughed at that, the sound echoing in the empty spaceship like so many dying screams.

Okay, maybe Davin was just being dramatic there. But someone had to compensate for Jean’s stunted emotional development.

“Seriously, earth is your home! Don’t you miss it? At all?”, Davin asked desperately.

“Earth was my home.”, Jean said. “Not anymore. Earth’s dead, Davin. Get over it.”

She turned back to the spaceship, focusing, and pressed a huge red button. The ship flared to life, a low thrumming emerging from its bowels.

Jean turned to Davin, her infectious excitement spilling into a grin. “So…I’m going to guess you haven’t changed your mind about coming?”

Reluctantly, Davin sighed and shook his head.

He leaned back in his seat and studied the complicated designs on the starship’s ceiling as Jean began to start it. If they were going to die, now, he didn’t want to watch .

The starship grunted slightly, the sound swirling from deep inside it, and he felt the sharp jerk of gravity in the pit of his stomach. The ship shuddered. A horrible, low roar pierced the air, making his stomach lurch. His fingers curled around the seat, and he squeezed his eyes shut. They had not even taken off yet, and he was sure he was going to die.

The silence that followed was perhaps even more terrifying than the roar. Noise was proof of action, whether dangerous or safe, and a subtle report as to what was happening. But silence could cover anything. Silence could mean the starship had crashed. It could mean they were both dead, and he didn’t realize it. It could mean the police had caught them, and Jean was out trying to explain, and they were both going to get arrested.

“Are you just going to sit like that the whole time?”, Jean’s voice sliced into his thoughts.

Davin glared at the ceiling fiercely, lacking the courage to look at Jean and the starship and find out exactly how much destruction had been caused. “Until we actually leave the planet, yes.”

“We have left the planet, Davin. We left the atmosphere five minutes ago.”

Or silence could mean they had actually taken off.

Blushing fiercely, Davin looked forward. It was true. In front of him, he could see the vast expanse of grey that was space. Throught the starship’s tiny aperture, though, Space looked rather cluttered, as if all the asteroids and planets and stars had been squeezed into a place far too tiny for them.

He had to hold back a laugh at that thought. Tiny, indeed. He had never thought that would be a word he would use to describe space.

“Why’re you laughing?”, Davin started. He had almost forgotten that Jean was next to him.

“No reason.”, He said quietly. His earlier nervousness nagged at him, refusing to quite fade away. “How long will it take to reach earth?”

Jean frowned. “I’d guess at maybe..another ten minutes?”

“Ten minutes?”, Davin exclaimed in disbelief. “That’s it?”

“Yeah. Since the starship operates by converting the gravitational pull of a star to energy, and we are only moving closer to the sun, this thing moves pretty fast.”

“Cool”, Davin said vaguely. He glanced out of the aperture in the starship again.

Turmoil was rearing its ugly head, once again. It seemed, since the Rescue aliens had brought him to Mars, there was little he could look forward to without that curious hesitation that boiled over to turmoil so quickly. Nothing felt simple, anymore. In a way, he envied Jean, who had a purpose and would go to any length for it. No doubts, no fears, no hesitation. Purpose that was dangerous, and yet must be enthralling.

Back on earth, he had always been the impulsive, purposeful one, the guy who couldn’t spare time for a second thought. After the Apocalypse, though,  he had felt like he had nothing left.

Without even realizing it, Davin had spent all his life living for earth, if, admittedly, because he couldn’t imagine anything else to live for. Whatever he had dreamed of being- a policeman, a scientist, an artist, a clown (he had been young then, okay)- it had all been for humans. Now most of the humans left were dead and earth was nothing more than a burnt, crumpled shell, ozone layer ripped apart, atmosphere dark with carbon dioxide, black with the filth humans had left behind. What was Davin even supposed to hope for, anymore?

 “We’re going to land in a minute. Look, you can see earth from here!”, Jean said, and Davin jerked forward, his eyes widening.

He had seen lots of photos of earth in books. They had always looked oh-so-pretty, the perfect blue and green sphere everyone wanted to believe the earth was. Not anymore. For a moment, Davin could hardly believe he was looking at earth at all. The pieces of earth that had once looked green now alternated between grey and a dry, tired brown. The blue oceans had overflowed beyond what he had thought possible, filling most of the planet and obscuring the shapes of the continents he was used to.  A few straggly, wispy white clouds floated across the atmosphere-or what was left of it, anyway.

The brown planet grew bigger as they zoomed towards it, and Davin could see the flakes of dry mud more clearly. The soil was a light, sandy brown, like a desert’s. It rose in hot, dusty clouds as they landed, enveloping the starship in a haze of yellow. Davin felt much as if he was in some sort of dream.

He didn’t wait for the dust to settle, fumbling to unstrap himself the moment he felt the starship rumble to a stop. The belts fell away and he stood up, nearly frantic with desperation and longing. The starship’s door automatically slid open and Davin staggered out onto the surface of earth.

Instantly, he was enveloped by the cloud of dust that the starship had stirred up. It was thick, heavy dust, the kind that got in your eyes and mouth and nostrils and stayed there. Coughing and sneezing, he staggered out of the cloud, yelling back at Jean to turn off the engine.

In a way, that dust was a blessing, for it provided a buffer between himself and the moment of harsh realization as to what earth had become. His first sight of the planet in over a year was through half-lidded eyes, through a haze of dust. He made out the blurry outlines of fat, rusted lorries; grey cars whose colours had faded away; empty buildings with layers of peeling paint.

It was nothing like the earth he had often imagined visiting. Logically, he knew he should have expected this, but it still felt like a slap to the face. 

He pulled off the jacket he had been wearing. The heat was intense, and he felt almost as if he might catch fire. The ground was baked, so hot it was practically smoking. He didn’t even try to touch the metal vehicles, aware even his slight stupor that that would not be a good idea. It really was a miracle that they hadn’t melted yet.

He knew he should feel like crying. After all, the castle he had constructed in his mind was crashing to the ground. The earth he insisted was merely in hibernation really was dead. And yet, he felt strangely numb. Next to him, Jean got off the spaceship and scrambled to the ground, hissing at the heat of it. They walked through the empty streets together, Jean in sympathetic silence, Davin feeling too lost to talk. It felt almost like they were in a funeral, commemorating earth in a silent obituary.

 These weren’t the streets of his youth, but they weren’t really that different. He could imagine twenty children, emerging from their houses to laugh and tease each other and play cricket. He looked down at the road , wondering if he could actually step on it now without the thick martian boots that protected his feet.

Enormous, gangly apartment buildings covered the roadsides, sporting rows of once neat windows which now looked like enormous holes in the wall. The fancy curtains that had lent them color were now torn and rotting, nibbled through by rats. The overpowering stench of broken sewers poisoned the air. A single, lonely supermarket with a bright neon billboard rose out of the grey like some misfit monster, filled with expired packets and rotting vegetables.

Something wet hit his cheek and rolled down, and he laughed sadly. So he was crying, at last. He didn’t even feel like he was crying, but the tear was too cold and wet to be mistaken.

Or so he thought, until something equally wet and cold hit the back of his neck.

Davin frowned. He was fairly sure tears couldn’t actually reach the other side of one’s neck. Wiping the back of his neck, he automatically looked up, searching for rain in the habit fostered by years on earth. Nothing.

“Did you feel something? Like rain?”, Davin asked Jean.

“You felt it, too?”, Jean exclaimed. “I thought I was imagining it!”

But it was rapidly becoming clearer that this couldn’t possibly be the products of either of their imaginations. More wet, cold flakes drifted down to join their brothers , hissing and sizzling as they hit the baked ground. Soft white piles began to collect on the colder surfaces, heaping themselves on the icy puddles their predeccesors had melted into.

“Its snowing!”, Davin exclaimed, staring upward. The snow fell onto his face and he laughed, sticking out his tongue to catch them.

“This is impossible! There’s no way..”, Jean trailed off in disbelief, scooping up the snow to feel it. Dry and powdery as it was, it was unmistakably snow.

Davin’s own surprise melted into euphoria just like the snow into the ground and he laughed. Throwing both arms around, he twirled, trying to enjoy every moment of the snowfall. He did not bother to put on his jacket again- he wanted to feel every flake, every drop. He ran across the broad, empty road, shrieking in joy.

When he paused to look around, panting, the area seemed to have transformed. He saw now that he had been quite wrong about earth being dead. Sure, there was no life to be seen at a quick look around, but that didn’t mean a thing. The entire scene was filled with a hundred little miracles. The fact that the cars and bikes hadn’t caught fire and blown up, yet. The rats that were clearly still alive to nibble at the curtains. The grass that had managed to find a little footing amidst the buildings. The mud that was still so clearly visible now that the cement had been blown away. The water, even the salty water, that still sustained on the earth in enormous oceans.

And the one miracle to top it all off, what felt like a kind of sign to him- the snow that was so real he was sure he must be dreaming.

He turned to Jean, who had followed him- more, he suspected out of concern for him than because she shared is awe of the snow. She seemed intrigued by it, however, watching the snow with an interested expression.

“This is awesome, isn’t it?”

Jean smiled softly at him. “Yep. Sure is.”

“No-no-its just such a miracle!”, Davin stuttered out, unable to convey the sheer magnitude of this event. It felt like Jean was being far too calm about this. “This is the best thing that ever happened to me!”

Jean grinned. “It is rather amazing, isn’t it? Lets leave after it stops.”

Davin gaped at her. She couldn’t be serious, right? “You want to leave?”

“Um, duh! What else?”, Jean said easily, as if it was obvious.

“I’m staying here! Right here!”, the very concept of leaving was foreign to Davin, and he couldn’t believe Jean was even considering it. “Why would I leave?”

“Staying here?”, Jean repeated incredulously. “You’re kidding , right?”

“No, of course not! Don’t you see? The snow, the curtains, the cars- earth is just waiting for someone to come and rescue it!”, Aware of how much like a madman he sounded, and yet not caring, Davin leaned forward. “And I’m going to be that person.”

“Davin, come on. I’m not saying the snow isn’t cool and all, but just look around.”

“That’s exactly what I’m asking you to do, Jean! Just look around! Life still exists here, it just needs a little..help.”

“A little? Davin, I get that you’re excited about the snow, and it is sort of a miracle, but-“

“Its more than a miracle, Jean! Its an omen. Its like the earth itself is telling me to help.”

Jean stared at him. “Are you even hearing yourself? You never believed in omens, before.”

Davin grinned. “I don’t now, either. It just- this one feels right, you know?”

It seemed exactly how serious Davin was about this was finally settling into Jean. She crossed her arms. “I’m not staying. I’ve dreamed of travelling my whole life, I’m not going to chain myself to a planet I just escaped.”

“I’m not asking you to. You go on, live your dreams, I’ll live mine.”

Jean bit her lip, looking as if she was wondering how she could make Davin understand. “Its different.”, she said desperately. “I’m only traveling, you’re planning to stay back to rebuild a dead planet.”

“You’re going to drive a vehicle that you have never operated over multiple galaxies, all of which you have never been to before, landing on new planets and meeting literal aliens every few days. Not to mention, you arent even supposed to be driving because you arent old enough to drive yet.

“Technically, I’ve driven the starship once already.”, Jean said. “And besides, just because I’m only fourteen doesn’t mean I cant drive. You’re trying to bring life back here all on your own. Do you even have any idea how to do that?”

“Not anymore than you knew how to drive when you started.”, Davin beamed at her. “I’ll figure it out.”

“This isn’t something you just figure out, Davin.”

“Nor is driving in space. I guess we’re both on suicide missions. ”, He smiled encouragingly at her. “Go on, trust me. I’ll be fine.”

She shook her head. “This is insane. You’re insane. Please, lets just go.”

“Nope!”, Davin said jovially. His spirits were higher than ever before, and he was feeling nearly dizzy with happiness. It was as if, in the space of barely fifteen minutes, earth had turned his whole life around once more. It had given him a reason to do something, anything at all.

He had always known there was something special about his planet.

They argued more, but it didn’t really matter because both of them knew the conversation was over. Jean finally gave up and went back to the ship, her concern crystallizing into anger that Davin knew would pass. After all, he had been just as angry at her, when he had first learnt what she would be doing.

“Fine! Do whatever you want, see if I care!”, she yelled as she left, but paused before she actually got into the spaceship. “But do try and be careful, okay?”

He grinned and yelled back “You too! Try not to kill anybody while driving!”

It was only after the starship had taken off in its rumbling, ponderous way that Davin realized just how alone he was. There was not a single person on this planet, be it human or alien, other than him. He had little way of reaching out to anyone else, besides the SOS radar in his pocket. He was completely on his own.

And yet, he had never felt less lonely in his life.