The Second Sphere

As the doors to the ship closed with a dull thud behind me, I realized my choice was made. I had a side now. I just wasn’t sure what side that was. Thinking about the future as a solid entity that I could influence didn’t seem possible. It had cracked apart and, with it, any hope of seeing my family again.

Malinda stood in the narrow passageway, lined with rainbow floral prints, waiting for me. A less than generous smirk stained her face. This secret had been waiting to get out for so long, hidden beneath layers of hubris. As I approached her, hoping I could get her side of this tale, she walked away. Not knowing what else to do, I followed her. Down the hallway, she made a left.

I stepped into a large oval room. A series of ornate leather chairs lined the walls. In one of them, Quincy Laslow reclined, his arms cradling his head. Behind the chairs were windows that gave a magnificent view of the sky space that spread across the moon. Buildings stretched into the distance. Sitting in another chair was Quincy’s assistant, Shari. She blinked once and gave me a knowing smile.

My gaze went back to Quincy. He gestured to a seat next to him. I sat down and strapped myself in. Malinda took a seat on the other side of Quincy. I couldn’t help but consider how wonderful an actress she truly was. At that moment, I saw the real Malinda, the person at his right hand.

The engines started with a rumble. The ship quivered as it slowly pulled away from the building’s dock. My stomach leapt into my throat. I grabbed the armrests next to me, clutching them desperately as the vessel shook. Damn, if I didn’t hate to fly.

“Mr. Laslow, we’re all set to engage. Ready to leave when you are,” a robotic voice said. Laslow flicked a button on his seat and said, “Ready.”

I couldn’t stop imagining the scene on the ground as the virus snaked its way through the population. Destroying the Laslow Building was the right thing to do. It was the only way to keep more from dying. But, as my thoughts turned to all the people I’d known there, all the lives lost and all that would be lost, I felt nauseous.

When the thrusters engaged and we began to move, Malinda gazed out the window. She studied what was outside as though she’d never seen the moon from that particular angle. The glaring lights of the developed moon blazed brightly, and it did seem quite beautiful from that view, a testament to human ability.

She had power in her hands, the power of destruction; the power to unmake a world that had taken so long to build; the power that I helped give her. She twirled the plastic trigger around her index finger.

I saw Malinda lift the black contraption to her face. She closed her eyes and mumbled something to herself, perhaps a prayer of forgiveness for the evil deed she was about to do. She held her finger away from the plastic device for a moment as though she considered letting it fall from her hands. But, she didn’t. She put her finger back around the trigger and pulled it.

Underneath us there was the momentary gasp of the explosion. The fire rose like thousands of fingers grasping at the oxygen, slamming into the dome that was just beneath us. My eyes stayed focused on the flames as the oxygen in the building spit orange and blue heat. Everywhere, metal flew. There was no hearing the screams of the dying as the dome melted and gravity left the constructed moon. She set the trigger down next to her and closed her eyes.

“It was the only thing we could do, Orion.” Quincy smiled as though life were now a bowl of cherries, as though hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of people hadn’t just died. The ship quivered in the radiance of the explosion. My stomach rolled with the movement. The ship gained speed and the yellow lights and orange fire receded.

“I wish I could say that we’ve won, Orion. I really do. But this isn’t going to stop,” Quincy said. “They’re going to keep coming, and they won’t stop until everyone who doesn’t serve them is gone, too.”

“I wouldn’t consider killing hundreds of thousands of people a victory, either,” I said.

“There’s no question that what we just did was unfortunate. But if we hadn’t done that, so many more would have died.”

“I know that, sir,” I said. “But right now, I’m more interested in understanding why you shot Bryan Valek; why I’m sitting here on a ship with you and Malinda and your goddamned assistant flying to who knows where.”

“You’re here because we want you to be here,” Malinda said.

“The revolution is coming,” Quincy said. “We need good people like you, Orion, to help the Green Revolution return power to the people of mother earth.”