The Cosmonaut Who Died Twice, part 4
(Includes links to previous chapters) + book news
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[ As always, all my stories are 100% human-written ]
( This chapter has some limited profanity, so it’s NSFW )
SYNOPSIS
After scientists discover an alien pyramid orbiting Jupiter, Galina Agafonov is tasked with a mission to make first contact with the aliens. She says goodbye to her son Viktor, and assures him she will be home in a few months.
But first contact doesn’t go as planned, and Galina’s ship is sent hurtling back toward Earth.
Elsewhen, an eccentric amphibian trader by the name of Duran is dealing in human treasures. He comes across something so rare that his only way to value it and keep his head is to visit the museum systems of ‘They’, a nameless, ageless species of aliens who collect almost anything they encounter, including their visitors.
Will Duran escape their exhibits, and will Galina ever see her son again?
Find out in THE COSMONAUT WHO DIED TWICE.
THE COSMONAUT WHO DIED TWICE
CHAPTER 4 - TO THE STARS
On the day of the launch, everything went perfectly. The public still had no idea what the real mission was about, believing the lie because it was the truth. This really was the first manned expedition beyond Mars. It really was the first attempt to send humans this far out into space, and to return them safely. But Galina and her crew had been briefed about potential disasters the likes of which hardly anyone back on Earth could comprehend. If there was a biological agent that infected the crew for example, the Pallas starship had strict instructions to ferry their bodies into Martian orbit and shut down there, where future missions could safely isolate and investigate alien biology in the decades to come.
If there were living beings on the tetrahedron, a strict plan was in place for first contact. Galina was the designated communicator. After the ship’s computers had had their chance at mathematical flirting, she was to be the ambassador for the human race, most of whom would have no idea she was up there representing them.
The thought weighed heavily on her as the rocket lifted itself from the Earth’s surface, levitated by controlled explosions on its way to contact with the Pallas starship. The Pallas had been put together partially in orbit, the work of an unprecedented partnership between most of the world’s spacefaring nations.
Galina felt her hair compress at the back of her head, her body sinking into the soft seat, her skin pulled back against her skull. She had done this before, but this time felt different. It felt faster, more violent, as if the crew were not simply leaving the planet but were being forcibly rejected by it. She held the Lego escape pod so tightly in her right hand that she felt its cylindrical shape change under the force. Luckily, Viktor had drawn up instructions on how to repair it, which were safely tucked into Galina’s personal belongings, right between two printed photos of her mother, and Viktor as a baby. The two of them would right now be sat in mission control, no doubt worrying about Galina in their own ways.
Galina looked to her left, to EM, and to her right, to Jeven and Clance. All were more serious than usual, all apparently struck with the same foreboding feeling that had kept Galina awake the night before.
“Fucking hell,” Clance said, holding back vomit. Jeven smirked. On the night before launch Clance had cockily placed a bet that EM, being the youngest and least experienced, would get sick first during launch. Jeven had just won $400. EM was the first to laugh, then Galina, then Jeven. Finally, once the nervousness had settled and he was sure he wouldn’t throw up, Clance burst out laughing too.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about that damn pyramid last night,” Clance said.
“Me neither. It’s haunting me. I’m only going there now just to get the thing out of my head,” Galina admitted. “After that, I never want to look at a pyramid again.”
As the rocket left Earth’s atmosphere EM tapped Galina on the arm, showing her a four-sided dice she had brought with her.
“You can’t roll dice in space,” Galina said. Then she realised the shape of it, saw EM’s eyebrows moving up and down, and laughed with her.
It would be hours before they reached the Pallas, days before they reached Mars, weeks before they reached the pyramid, and months before they returned home. Galina turned her attention away from the Lego spacecraft, focusing on the important business of babysitting the ship’s computers. From here until Mars, almost everything was automated.
The Pallas was a large, semicircular ship that loomed heavy against the rocket approaching it. The crew connected the two craft without incident, stepped across the proboscis bridge between them, and released the rocket back into Earth orbit, where it would wait until their triumphant return. The Pallas set off on its silent mission, each minute piercing further into regions of space that had never before been reached by humans.
“You’re past the threshold now,” mission control said on the telephone. There was a dark silence in the cockpit, the whole crew consumed by the realisation.
“Now I’ve crossed one hundred thousand miles,” Galina joked, trying to brighten the mood.
“We won’t be able to broadcast that?” mission control replied.
EM put her Rubik’s cube ‘down’ for a moment, letting it float in front of her. “Why not?” she asked innocently.
“It’s Bowie. Space Oddity,” Galina explained.
“Oh.”
“You can’t be that young.”
“She is,” Jeven said. “Control. Can you put Godzilla on the line.”
There was a pause, after which someone in mission control lifted a heated blanket up to the camera, revealing Jeven’s pet lizard.
“I’ll be back soon,” Jeven said, his face taut and serious. To EM, he looked as if his eyes were holding back the weight of the world’s emotions. She felt that this moment would be the one the editors would broadcast, if the crew didn’t return. That bridge between species, a metaphor of the relationship humans would soon attempt to strike up with the aliens. That is, if the public were ever informed of the truth.
A few moments later, mission control moved the camera to face Clance’s family. EM turned to Clance, whose smile now seemed to be performative. His eyes betrayed his silent panic, and EM hoped this wouldn’t translate into the video feed back down on Earth.
“I love you guys,” he said to his family. He waited for a response. Out here the time difference was a constant reminder of just how far the Pallas was. It would soon become impractical, then impossible, to conduct a conversation with anyone back home. This would be the last time until the ship’s return some months later.
Once Clance had his conversation with his family, mission control moved their attentions to Galina.
“Galina, we have someone here to talk to you,” mission control said. The camera panned down to Viktor, who raised a Lego minifigure of himself to the camera, hiding himself out of frame.
“Hello mini-Viktor,” Galina said. She plucked the Lego escape pod from the air, spinning it for show, then fumbled with it to extract her own minifigure. She noticed the spiked black hair of her son popping up in the bottom left of the frame, and remarked, “New haircut?”
The boy was disappointed at first, then laughed, showing his mum his new style.
“Kimberly did it for me. She wants to get into fashion.”
“It is very fashionable.” Galina gestured to the other crewmembers, who positioned themselves floating in front of the camera.
“Very spiky!” Clance said.
“Like a 2016 Gary Numan,” EM confirmed.
“I might try that,” Jeven said. He brushed his greasy hair and smiled as it stayed up in zero gravity. Viktor laughed and Galina laughed with him, looking up and smiling at Jeven during the delay between Pallas and Earth.
“I love you mum!” Viktor said a moment later.
“I love you too,” Galina replied. She had finally extracted her minifigure, and set it spinning close to the camera. In the near future Viktor tried to do the same, but dropped his on the floor. Mission control permitted him some extra time to pick the character back up, and show it to his mum.
“I’ll see you again in a few months, but I left videos behind, and letters,” Galina said. She knew this would not be enough, that this would never be enough, but it was more than nothing.
The crew said another round of goodbyes to their families, pets, and friends, before closing the recording and opening comms with mission control only.
“We wish you the best of luck. Millions of aspiring astronauts look up at the sky tonight and hope for your success. You have already, as of this morning, taken a new step for the human species. Everything beyond this is a bonus,” Anton said. He lifted Godzilla up to the camera, and the lizard raised a front leg as if to wave goodbye.
Galina turned around and saw that Jeven was trying not to cry.
After a final rundown of the mission plans, mission control hung up. Galina turned to her crew, each of whom had a distinct look on their faces.
“We shouldn’t be out here, not without the public knowing why,” Jeven said.
“It’s the greatest existential mystery. Are we alone? No. And yet, we are keeping it secret,” EM added. She grabbed the Rubik’s cube from the air and continued playing with it.
“Oh come on, we’ve known we’re not alone for decades. We just aren’t allowed to talk about it,” Clance said. Everyone turned to look at him.
“What?” Galina asked, voicing the trio’s shock. Clance tried to lean back, accidentally spinning himself backwards in place. He gripped the side rails and righted himself.
“Well, you know how my daughter has a son on the way?”
The other three astronauts nodded. Clance leaned into the receiver and made sure it was turned off.
“Screw it,” he said. “They can’t fire me now. I figured it was a good time to properly talk with my pa, going away and all. We don’t talk much about anything, especially space. Not since his dismissal.”
“Go on,” Jeven said. EM had stopped playing with the Rubik’s cube. Galina was half-listening, checking up on the diagnostic screens. All was going according to plan.
“Half the parts on this ship are reverse engineered from shit we found in the desert,” Clance said. “That’s what dad says anyways. And I’m inclined to believe him.”
“Why?” EM cut through the story like a knife.
“Because he’s my dad, and he hates liars. And they wouldn’t fire him for nothing.”
“What did they fire him for?” EM asked, gentler this time, but still cuttingly efficient. Galina glanced over at her. EM was not like this on purpose, it was just her personality. She cared a lot about the truth, and getting to it efficiently. When she was this blunt, it was a sign she felt safe with the people around her.
Clance thought about the question, formulated an answer.
“I suppose he wanted someone to talk to, and in my absence, got chatting to the local press. There were triangular ships in North America, Canada, Vietnam. In the second world war, fighter pilots cut down some black orbs as well. In one case, the black orbs and the triangular things ‘danced’ with each other above the Pacific.”
“UFO sightings,” Galina said. She turned away from the diagnostics.
“Yes,” Clance said uneasily. “But dad said they caught one in the fifties.”
“I’m sorry Clance,” Jeven said, “I’m not convinced. If this were true, surely they’d have briefed us on it. Surely they wouldn’t tell us that what we are doing here is first contact when it’s second, or third.”
“That’s just the thing,” Clance said. “Technically, there has been no contact with living beings, not yet.”
That’s the mysterious end to chapter four of THE COSMONAUT WHO DIED TWICE. There are eleven chapters in total, making this point about 33% of the way through the book. The full paperback will be around 80 pages.
Right now you can pre-order the full eBook, which launches on June 5th.
As thanks to anyone who gets it early, the eBook is $2 in most retailers until June 25th, after which is becomes $3 for the general public.
After June 25th, the price is locked at $3.
The button up there leads to every single retailer which is currently stocking the eBook. That includes Amazon.
A Waterstones / Barnes&Noble gift card giveaway, coming soon.
My next post will be about some big news in my publishing life: I’ve finally managed to get WHO BUILT THE HUMANS? available for click and collect at Waterstones and Barnes&Noble. I’ve used this opportunity to launch a new special edition, which includes the sci-fi comedy story Hologram Kebab (from the upcoming sequel, WHO KILLED THE HUMANS?) and an exclusive afterword. It’s also in a neat new 8.5 by 5.5 inch format, making it easier for bookstores to stock.
And the cover will tile together with the cover for WHO KILLED THE HUMANS? so you can display them both on your shelf.
I wish more books did that.
I’m going to send out a post all about it next week, but for now, I wanted you to get a glimpse of what I’m planning to do to celebrate.
To celebrate my books finally finding their way onto the vast databanks of Waterstones and Barnes&Noble, I’ve been figuring out how to do a gift card giveaway for those stores.
The first thing you’ll need to do to enter is become a free subscriber to The Weird Worlds Of Phillip Carter, which you probably already are if you’re reading this.
And whilst my paid tier is very nice, you don’t need to be part of it to enter this giveaway. It’s for all subscribers.
The giveaway isn’t finalised yet, so there might be one or two more things I ask from entrants (like sharing a post here or on social media) and I’ll talk to you about those things next week when I’ve figured it all out. It might be interesting to give you ways to get more than one entry, for example.
Upcoming posts
FreeFictionFriday - SciFi
The Stephanie Glitch - more chapters
Who Built The Humans? Special edition - gift card announcement
Poetry - Some excerpts from False Vacuum and Branch Density