They can’t restart the fire.
The fuel on the lake has burned away, save for a few flickers of flame in the centre that provide a little light. No matter what they do, they can’t get any other wood to catch.
And the fire isn’t the only thing that’s gone. Kahlil is dead. He slipped away without anyone noticing, his sightless eyes staring at the sky.
Mikhail is on his hands and knees, blowing with all his might. It would look ridiculous, Prakesh thinks, if the situation wasn’t so serious. He’s already told Mikhail that it’s not going to work–starting a fire from scratch requires fine motor skills. It requires time and energy to gather materials. The cold and damp is taking all of it away, but Mikhail won’t quit. He keeps blowing, refusing to give up hope.
“Shit,” Carver says, kicking a clod of dirt into the lake. The last cinder goes out with a puff, and Prakesh coughs as a loose wisp of smoke catches him in the throat.
Clay is praying loudly, invoking Buddha this time, praising his holy name. Carver rounds on him. “Will you shut up?”
Clay subsides, muttering. Carver looks at Prakesh, shivering as the wind scythes through him. “OK, P-Man. Your action. What do we do now?”
But before Prakesh can answer, Janice Okwembu speaks up. “We need to keep moving,” she says, getting to her feet and dusting herself off. “Walking will keep us warm, and we can look for food.”
“No.” Mikhail has finally abandoned the fire and is sitting back on his heels. Prakesh doesn’t like the look in his eyes, doesn’t like the naked fear he sees there. “We stay here. You heard the radio message. There’s sanctuary out there.” He leans on the word, as if it’ll keep the cold away. “They’ll come for us. We swim out, we get more fuel. We restart the fire.”
“And end up like him?” Carver jerks his head at Khalil’s body. Mikhail glares at him.
“It won’t work,” Okwembu says, folding her arms. “If the people who broadcast that message are out there, we need to get to them. We can’t wait for them to come to us.”
Suddenly they’re all talking at once. Mikhail and Carver are shouting at each other, Okwembu trying to intervene. Clay’s prayers get louder.
“Enough,” Prakesh says. When nobody listens, he bellows, “Hey!”
Everyone falls silent. Mikhail’s shoulders are rising and falling with exertion. Above his beard, his eyes are gleaming with panic.
“She’s half right,” says Prakesh, pointing to Okwembu. “We keep moving.”
Okwembu nods, but Mikhail growls in frustration. “We’ll never make it.”
Prakesh talks over him. “We’re too exposed here. Feel that wind coming off the lake?”
The others nod. Of course they do.
“Moving will keep us warm. And we’re not going far–just until we find somewhere out of the wind. Once we’re there, we group together for warmth, wait until morning. It’s the best chance we’ve got.”
“We don’t even know where we are,” Mikhail says. Prakesh can hear the fear in his voice.
Clay stops praying, then clears his throat. “Actually, I think I do.”
They all turn to stare at him, and he swallows before continuing. “I looked at some old maps on the ship’s computer before we came down here,” he says, pointing to the water. “I think this is Eklutna Lake. South shore.”
He swallows again, knotting his hands. “We’re north-east of Anchorage. It’s far, but all we have to do is head that way.” He points into the forest.
Prakesh doesn’t wait for an answer. He walks away from the group, moving into the trees, rubbing his arms furiously. For a long moment the only sounds are his feet crunching on the frosty ground. They’re not coming, he thinks. They’re actually going to sit there and freeze to death.
But a moment later he hears them coming after him. He slows down, waiting for them to catch up. No one mentions Kahlil.
The ground slopes slightly, and before long Prakesh’s knees are aching from the descent. His eyes have adjusted to the dark, but it’s a relative term. The forest is as dark as space itself. He can just make out the stunted trees against the black sky. Once again, he feels that excitement–a feeling that refuses to go away, despite their situation.
How can there possibly still be trees down here? Why has this part of the planet survived, when everything they know about Earth says it should be a frozen, radioactive dustball? Is the planet starting to fix itself? How long has it been like this? Surely not long–they would have seen it when they sent the Earth Return mission down, when they were scanning the planet for landing sites. That means it’s only been like this for seven years, at the most. How is it even possible?
A hundred years before, the people still on Earth were using every technological trick they had to turn the tide of climate change. Cloud seeding, messing with the ionosphere, carbon capturing. None of it really worked, and then the nukes came raining down and it didn’t matter any more. But here, something has changed. Something made this part of the world different.
His thoughts return to his parents, back on Outer Earth. The regret comes rushing back, rough and familiar as an old blanket.
But what is he supposed to do? How can he possibly help anybody who might be alive on Outer Earth? There’s only one thing he can do now, and that’s survive. If he’s going to live through the night, then he’s got to shut out everything else.
The wind has got worse–it’s constant now, whistling through the tree branches and every gust freezes him to the bone. He keeps hoping that the slope will deviate, that there’ll be a depression or gully where they can get out of the wind. But there’s nothing–no matter where they go, the ground is evenly sloped.
Carver is to his right, and he can hear Mikhail behind him, swearing as he pushes through the foliage. He can’t hear Clay, or Okwembu, and he doesn’t want to lose them. “Everybody still here?” he calls.
“Still here,” mutters Carver. The others echo him, one by one, their voices betraying their exhaustion.
Abruptly, the trees open up. They’re in a small clearing, no more than fifty yards wide. There’s a sliver of moonlight, peeking down through a tiny gap in the clouds–enough for Prakesh to see some strange structures ahead of them. He identifies an old wooden table, half of it rotted away. Plants have grown into it, winding tendrils through the wood. Next to it is what appears to be a large steel drum, now rusted, most of its top half gone. The bottom is still held in place by two metal brackets.
Prakesh runs his hand across the edge of the drum. It would have been installed over a hundred years ago, and probably hasn’t been visited in about as long.
One thought leads to another. If humans really have survived, then they’ll have managed to keep some tech going–they wouldn’t have been able to broadcast a radio signal otherwise. The excitement rises again at the thought of what else might be out there.
He pulls his hand back from the drum. Wouldn’t do to get an infected cut out here.
The others stumble into the clearing behind him. Mikhail collapses on the table, which groans in protest.
“Keep moving,” Prakesh says.
But Mikhail is shaking his head. “No. No. This isn’t right. We stay here. We can light another fire.”
“Mikhail.” It’s Okwembu. She’s shivering, too, holding herself tightly, but her voice is as calm and controlled as ever. “Get up.”
If Mikhail hears her, he gives no sign. He’s still shaking his head, muttering to himself.
Okwembu walks up to him, grabs him by the shoulders. “Get up,” she says, and this time there’s real fury in her voice. He ignores her, rocking back and forth on the rotten wood.
Carver strides off, heading for the other side of the clearing.
“Aaron!” Prakesh catches up to him just before he disappears into the trees.
The wind has got even worse, and Prakesh struggles to hear Carver’s voice. “Forget that. He wants to stay where he is? Fine! Let him!”
“We need to stick together,” Prakesh says, but he doesn’t even know if Carver can hear him. He plunges into the trees, almost tripping over a rock, and has to put his hand against one of the tree trunks to stop himself from falling. The bark is damp and frigid against his skin, speckled with frost.
“Wait!” Clay screams the word, stumbling after them. Prakesh can feel a panic of his own rising, as if the presence of the others was the only thing keeping it down. He is colder than he has ever been in his life, and every breath feels like it has to physically claw its way out of his lungs. The wind has increased now, strong enough that he has to lean into it. He can hear the trees beginning to bend, the old wood creaking.