Earth's First Space Librarian

There are gaps in my memories. Small ones that feel like the little holes squirrels dig to bury their food for winter. I don’t know why my mind would be saving these gaps though unless it were trying to save me from something, squirreling them away until they are useful.

My first thought when I awoke was that I had been lied to, a realization that came as the drugs they gave me sent me drifting peacefully into sleep. I fell asleep on a worn-down cot with a thin pillow beneath my head and the snapping of the tent around me. Before I opened my eyes, I knew I was no longer in that tent with the solid ground barely a whole foot below my sagging bed. My eyelids felt heavy, and my eyes floated in a fog, drug induced but also adrift in something else, confusion mostly.

As my hands gripped the soft cloth that someone must have gently tucked in around me, I knew. They had lied when they brought me to that camp where they said if I joined their efforts, my family would be taken care of. I think I believed that part, that my sister and her child will be alright. The people who brought me there clearly had resources, and before I left my sister, for the last time, they were feeding them and giving them better clothing.

Oxygen levels normal, heart rate steady.

 A woman’s gentle voice sounded around me, and finally I found the strength to open my eyes. There was a hitch in my breath, a small gasp I allowed myself as I took in the small room in which I woke.

Yes, they lied. But then, did I ask for the truth, or any kind of transparency? Desperation had directed me, I let myself go along so that Allie and Will would be given what they needed. It was our only option and what I had to do. A memory here, Allie gripping my hand and placing a kiss on my forehead. But I can only see it from far off, as though maybe it didn’t happen to me at all.

Please take deep breaths, heart rate elevated.

I did as the voice told me as I sat up and took in my surroundings. The room I was in had walls so white and clean, I was afraid to touch them. But then, looking at my hands I realized I couldn’t get them dirty with my touch. Someone had cleaned them and had even trimmed and scrubbed my nails, I shivered at the thought but then again, had I lifted my hands for them? On my wrist dangled a plastic bracelet, my name etched in neat letters, Grace Malia Robinson. With a deep breath in, I stood and walked to the door before me that had a small window and a gleaming metal handle.

The window showed me nothing but more white walls, and the seams of more doors like the one I stood behind. Clean, artificial light filled the hallway. I turned to face the small room I had woken up in. After some exploring, I found a little closet which held some clothes. They felt new and the newness angered me just a little, but again, I pushed the thought away.

Please dress and wait for assistance.

“Assistance?” My voice cracked and I realized how dry it felt, as though it had recently been stuffed with cotton.

Assistance will arrive shortly, please stay calm.

Calm was becoming the last emotion I felt as I quickly dressed. The clothes fit me perfectly as though I had been measured, which I realized quickly I probably had been while I slept like the dead. The pants and long sleeve top that I dressed in were dark blue. Also, in the small closet I found boots of thick leather, clearly never worn and with gripping traction on the bottom.

I wondered what they did with my old clothes, the shoes with holes nearly worn in at the front, and the long, heavy cloak that was ill-fitting but kept me warm. While the clothes would not have kept me warm on those nights we couldn’t afford a fire, the boots would have been handy when trekking over hills looking for work or charity.

Please, take a deep breath and stay calm. Assistance—

“Yes, I bloody well know, assistance will be along shortly,” I interrupted the voice that had swiftly gone from gentle to grating. My voice sounded a little stronger to my ears, but it still felt dry, and I longed for water.

I took the deep breaths like I was told to do, hoping to steady my rapidly growing anxiety, and trying to understand my new surroundings. Everything around me is new and clean, so unlike what I have known since the plague had eased its way through the world. The only metal I had seen lately was rusted and dented, nothing like the smooth shining material that makes up the bed frame on which I slept. There’s also a small metal table next to the bed, its top empty leaving only a shining liquid like surface.

The disoriented feeling I woke up with had now faded and I spent a little time inventorying my body. The weakness of hunger I felt when I first entered the camp had disappeared, which meant either I don’t remember eating or I was fed intravenously. My muscles, though slightly stiff from the tension I feel at my unreadable situation, do not have the atrophied weakness from underuse. I’m unsure what could alleviate that situation and so I push it aside.

Overall, I feel stronger than I have in months and decide instantly with that thought that I no longer feel the need to wait for assistance.

 I didn’t expect the door to open so easily, but the handle turns and the door slides into the wall with a sound of pressurizing air. I wait a moment to see if the voice is going to gently tell me to stay in my room. There is nothing but silence as I step into the corridor outside my little room. Behind me the door slides back into place with another quiet breath of air. I take slow steps down the hallway, peeking into the identical windows into rooms that look similar to my own. Except these other rooms are empty, the beds made tightly and undisturbed. Now and then the corridor is intersected by another, holding more of the same doors which I assume contain more of the same little rooms. I continue down the perfectly lit hallway until I nearly reach the end.

I’m stopped in my tracks by the sound of a door opening and closing, near enough to hear but clearly down one of those offshoot hallways. Moving quickly, I reach the door at the end of this hall and with a quick prayer, I take a chance and turn the handle. It opens easily and closes once I’m inside. With my back to the wall next to the door, I hope that I can’t be seen through the window.

I hear footsteps passing the room and I relax just a little. I open my eyes which I had tightly squeezed when I panic-fled into this random room.

It’s not the same as all the others, this one is bigger with a large, long oval against the opposite wall. With hesitant steps and a quick glance back at the door, I move to the wall and place my hands against the wall beside the oval. My fingers brush over a patch of raised and unlabeled buttons, accidentally applying just enough pressure to a button on the side. Instantly, a panel begins lifting to slowly reveal a large window.

“Deep breaths, heart rate elevated,” I whispered to myself, a hysteric laugh bubbled in my chest, but I swallowed it down. Moving to stand at the middle of the window, I stared at what the panel had been hiding.

All around me are stars like pinpoints in a deep, black cushion. My eyes widen as they take in the view, and my heart rate is certainly elevated as I take in the Earth, large and indescribable below me. I don’t know how long I stood staring out that window with a view of my old home like I have never seen it before. Eventually though, I’m aware of my hands going from my chest to my face, coming back wet with tears.

Yes, I was certainly lied to, but this is not what I would have expected. I fell asleep on a dirty cot in a thin-walled tent on a planet that was slowly dying and woke up in space.

“Please, don’t panic,” a man said, having entered the room while I was distracted by the wide universe on the other side of the window.

“Who are you?” I asked while taking a step back until I feel the window at my back.

“My name is Ian, I’m the lead scientist and interim captain of this space station,” he said. His eyes were kind as I took in what he said. I already knew I was on a space station; the view of Earth was enough to confirm that fact.

“Scientist of what? What are we doing here?” Before he could answer, I put up my hand and added another question. “Why was I not told that I would be sent to space? I signed up to help with research, not to participate in intergalactic travel.”

“All fair questions, though I assure you we intend to stay in this galaxy, but I will answer the last one first,” he said. “We knew when we began this mission, that secrecy was key. If we told you that you would be sent off the planet, with no assurance you would be returned, would you have left your family?”

I thought about Allie and Will, how we had struggled since losing everyone else we loved. How I had worried over every sign of a sniffle or weakness, wondering every day if they could make it without me. Would I have made that choice?

           “I’m not sure I would, but then I might if I had more information,” I answered after a pause. “What kind of medical mission needs to take place off planet?”

           Ian laughed and shook his head a little. “That is exactly what I said it would take, but I was overridden by those in higher ranks. Now that you are here, however, I think it’s time to give you that information.”

           He proceeded to tell me some things I already knew, like the chaos and panic that ensued nearly three years ago when people all over began dropping dead from anything and everything. It was a pandemic to end all pandemics, from the common cold to the worst kinds of cancers. Human bodies suddenly lost the ability to fight off even the simplest viruses. People feared leaving their houses because they might catch a cold, but even a spider bite obtained in their sleep could kill them within hours. Society crumbled in a matter of months, populations dwindled, and an apocalypse rose on the horizon.

           “Fear can make people do many things they never expected,” Ian said.

           “Like kidnap a woman and send her to space?” I replied, crossing my arms and waiting for him to continue.

           “In a word, yes,” he said. “Before the breakdown of societies across the globe, you were on track to be the youngest head research librarian Oxford has ever seen. You didn’t have peers, no one had your intelligence and spirit for your work. Your professors sang your praises, they told your colleagues at the Bodleian they would be fools not to promote you ahead of schedule.”

           “Very well, I’m brilliant,” I said impatiently. My mind was struggling to comprehend what my resume had to do with dragging me into space without my knowledge.

           “Yes, you are,” Ian laughed. “You’re also logical and pragmatic, and you excel at problem solving. Grace, I’d like to show you something. I’ll tell you more on the way.”

           As we made our way down one of the many long corridors, he told me about the work that had been done already on the space station. What they figured out rather quickly was that for some as yet unknowable reason, human immune systems were responding well to the artificial conditions created to live on the station, in fact they were thriving. They had been working around the clock to figure out why humanity’s immune system had failed so spectacularly and so suddenly on Earth. In fact, the work had begun long before the first victim was reported on the daily news. A group of Earth’s smartest, and naturally the wealthiest, people had gathered and began a project I was now being brought into. A last-ditch effort to save the world as we once knew it.

           “And I assume it’s being kept a secret to keep the masses of desperate people from storming every known space administration across the world,” I said.

           “Precisely,” Ian responded with a sad shrug of his shoulders. “Although, they would be hard pressed to find what doesn’t want to be found, known or unknown.”

           The goal, Ian told me as we walked, had changed from not just finding a cure but also a way to bring more and more people into space. No one had yet made a space station that could hold entire countries, decreased populations notwithstanding, but they were in the process of finding a way to save as many as they could.

           We turned a corner and a few feet in front of us was a wide door, no window on this one, only a pad next to it where Ian placed his hand. Seconds later, the door slid open, revealing a large room filled with shelves and shelves of books.

           “Bloody hell,” I whispered, unable to lift my jaw to close my mouth. I knew these books, and a lifetime ago I was meant to protect them. Rows upon rows of books and manuscripts, many in protective casings. I itched to put on clean, white gloves, and forced my hands to stay at my sides, rubbing my suddenly sweaty palms against my pants.

           “Yes,” Ian laughed. “These are only some of the books we have brought with us in our efforts toward our salvation. This is why we needed you, Grace. On this station are people from many different areas of study, from geneticists to sociologists, who need information and someone who can help them find it. And, God willing, we’ll find the answer to our problem. When we do, we will either make our way back down to our home planet and save everyone we love, or we will bring them here.”

           I knew before he could say another word that he was saying if I help them, maybe someday I can go back to Allie and Will before it’s too late. All my hard work in the years before, the speed with which I made my way up the ranks, it all mattered now as it never did previously.

           “Here, you will assist in research just as you were meant to do, but with one common goal,” Ian said, taking me further into the room where a wide desk sat with a computer situated in the middle. “As the head librarian, you will be entrusted with curating and protecting the knowledge of those who came before us.”

           While I still felt a sense of betrayal for how I arrived, I couldn’t stop the overwhelming sense of coming home. I felt something else, reluctantly, and deep within me—hope.

           “There’s a title I never thought I would have, nor even think was possible,” I said as I went to stand behind the desk.

           “And what is that?” Ian asked with a smile.

           “I get to be Earth’s first space librarian.”