It turns out you can’t touch the sky. I guess I really should have known it wasn’t possible. But I mustn’t be critical of my ignorant, younger self. In every picture I’d drawn in the nursery, I’d colored the top third in blue and left the page blank until the green line of the fields where I would be playing happily with Mother. I’d lived my whole life under a sky that had been solid: a dome, a protective layer we believed kept the horrors outside at bay. But of course, I’ve come to learn the real horror lay within.
Yet, despite the deathly cold and our dire situation, I’d stretched my heavy hand upwards, the moment I’d stepped on the surface of New Dawn. I couldn’t touch it, but it certainly touched me. But touch isn’t the right word. The howling wind had sought to rip the skin from my bones and I would have lost my hand in seconds had I not stuffed it back into my overall pocket. The sky is not soft – it’s harsh and ruthless, venting its anger at our small shelter standing in its way.
I nudge Rebekah. I don’t want to have to remind her, but my back is so numb with cold I fear it will shatter if we don’t change position. She grunts and rolls to face me. I catch her eye for a moment, but looks alone will not heat my back. I turn away, curl back into a ball, grateful to receive her precious warmth, as she wraps her arms around my shivering bones. We will repeat this process in twenty minutes time and continue to do so for the next four hours until we have no choice but to break apart to brave the cold to eat. Others moan and change their positions as we do what we can to stay alive on this hostile planet. If my face wasn’t frozen, I might manage a wry smile.
Mother was finally true to her word and delivered us to New Dawn – where she has left us alone to die.
The exhilaration we’d felt as we left the ship, anticipating our first sunrise quickly turned to despair. We’d eagerly waited in the landing shuttle for the snowstorm to stop so we could catch a glimpse of our new home; we longed so much for daylight, it hurt. We couldn’t wait for the moment we would feel the warmth of the two suns on our faces. But they’d refused to show their faces, leaving the storm to rage unchallenged, driving the hail into the window so hard we’d feared it would break. But when the lights of the lander dimmed, the doors had opened, and we had no choice but to take our chances outside.
I shuffle back a little against Rebekah’s body not wanting to leave a gap and lose heat.
The storm has blown relentlessly for twenty-one days since our arrival, although it could be twenty or even twenty-five – with no announcements and the constant night, it’s difficult to judge time. We have yet to see a sky of any color other than black streaked white by the blizzard. Rebekah has no warm sea where she could wade, and I have no tree to climb.
Nothing grows here. The few farm workers in our sorry group, say the hard ground beneath the snow, cannot be broken, making the seeds from the shuttle useless. If the ground doesn’t thaw before the supplies in the crates run out, we will starve. Already we eat less than half our daily ration, but as we grow weaker, our numbers dwindle. One worker from the laboratory has already succumbed to the cold, but as Jared noted, it does mean the food will last a day or two longer – but that only prolongs our suffering.
In the first few hours, while we still had hope, Rebekah pointed out that Mother must have sent us to one of the poles on the dark side of this world. She tried to explain that New Dawn appears to be tilted on its axis like Earth, so at times it faces away from the two suns during its orbit. But she couldn’t tell us the one thing we desperately need to know: how long before either of the suns rise. We have no idea because Mother hasn’t told us.
