After Howard's betrayal and Clyde's death, our small group had become even smaller. Only seven of us remained, and we divided into three teams: Stanley and Kayla, with the help of the two drones, were sorting through the vegetable warehouse; Sara and I were organizing the dry goods and supply warehouses; Buzz, as a power supply specialist, was running power to the Atlas, with Emily assisting him.
The work in the warehouses was monotonous but necessary. We sorted through boxes, checked expiration dates, set aside spoiled items. The drones hummed quietly as they moved between the shelves, their manipulators carefully shifting loads. Stanley kept glancing at Kayla, while she seemed to find some kind of solace in the work.
We needed not only to restore the charge of the batteries but also to connect the craft's systems to a constant power supply to run the heaters—otherwise, the delicate electronic systems could fail in the increasingly severe cold. We also wanted to reactivate the SOS system to find out what was happening on the planet.
Outside, the cold was unlike anything I had ever experienced in my life. There were days when the thermometer dropped to minus forty-five, even minus fifty degrees Fahrenheit, accompanied by such a freezing, thick fog that even during the day we had to find our way to the Atlas by touch, clinging to the rope we had prudently strung.
The rope, strung from the shelter entrance to the Atlas, was the only thread connecting us to the craft. We moved along it like blind people, and each time we reached the hatch, we felt incredible relief.
December passed like this. And in early January, Buzz finally reported that the batteries were fully charged.
For such a momentous occasion, I went up top with Buzz and Emily. Despite the continuously running heating system, the temperature in the cabin barely rose above twenty degrees Fahrenheit. The metal parts of the seats were icy to the touch. But for the instruments, this temperature was perfectly comfortable, and we activated the Atlas's systems.
With a pounding heart, I initiated the self-diagnostic system and watched with relief as green readiness messages appeared on the screen, one after another. Systems came to life: navigation, communications, life support, flight control. Then we turned on the SOS system. The screen flickered; the antennas began scanning the airwaves.
Within the first minute, we saw flickering signals on the screen—weak, intermittent, but undeniably real.
"Excellent!" Buzz rejoiced, his face lighting up with a smile. "It turns out we're not the only survivors!"
In a burst of joy, Emily rushed to Buzz and gently pressed herself against him, and at that moment, I realized that even the harshest conditions we were in couldn't suppress that compelling feeling called love.
"Go ahead, Buzz, we need to respond!" I commanded and switched on the transmitting antenna.
About ten minutes later, a message flickered on our screen:
"The Chinese international orbital station Tiangong has lost contact with the People's Republic of China. Power reserves exhausted. Attempting to land on Earth independently. Request temporary shelter in any country where we are able to land."
"Chinese!" Buzz waved his hand in disappointment. "Giving shelter to those who destroyed the planet seems like a crime to me…"
I put my arm around Buzz's shoulders like a son.
"No, my dear, you're wrong about that. It seems there are so few of us left on Earth now that refusing help to any living being would be a crime…"
And I began entering our coordinates. I don't know if my decision was wise, but I couldn't have done otherwise.
We turned on the emergency lights and radio beacon. After several hours of waiting, a roar was heard in the sky—the familiar, low hum of liquid-fuel rocket engines, a sound we hadn't heard since the day of the catastrophe. From the low, leaden clouds, a reusable space shuttle emerged, resembling an enlarged Shenzhou with cargo and living modules attached. Powerful landing floodlights illuminated the mountain slopes, raising clouds of reddish dust and ash.
The craft made a controlled vertical landing on its landing struts on a flat area at the very base of the mountain.
Taking Buzz with me, we quickly gathered flashlights and weapons and began the long descent. The path was dangerous—ice covered the rocks, making them as slippery as glass. We had to move slowly, carefully checking each step, clinging to rock outcroppings. After several hours, making our way down the icy cliffs, we finally reached it. The shuttle stood almost level on its struts, hissing as it vented residual pressure and cooled its engines, releasing white clouds of nitrogen vapor into the atmosphere that immediately dissipated in the freezing air.
Of the shuttle's two modules, only one had its landing lights on—apparently, this was the habitable compartment. The second module was dark and lifeless. A characteristic click and hiss of the airlock unlocking sounded, and the door slid aside. A folding aluminum alloy ladder automatically extended downward. But no one appeared in the doorway.
"Something's wrong," Buzz muttered, instinctively gripping his shotgun and looking around.
"Stay here," I said and slowly climbed the ramp.
Inside the descent module, it was quiet and cold. Four seats, resembling upgraded airplane seats, were empty. Control panels with touchscreens and glowing switches blinked normally. The radio, with its standard flat monitor, was working, but dead silence came from the speakers, broken only by the hiss of static from the empty airwaves.
I opened the heavy hatch to the living module. Right on the floor, on the non-slip surface, lay a man in a blue uniform with the emblem of the China National Space Administration (CNSA). He stirred weakly, opened glazed eyes, and closed them again.
I pulled him aside against the wall and saw a second one. A gray-haired man in the same uniform sat slumped against the control panel, his head lying limply on the console. Nearby lay a partially removed Feitian-type spacesuit. I checked for a pulse—there was none. The body was cold and stiff. The third crew member had apparently died long ago, probably still on the station. His body was carefully wrapped in silver thermal insulation material and secured with straps under the ladder—a sad cargo they had brought with them, hoping to bury him on Earth.
In the adjacent cargo module, I found open cabinets with space food. All containers marked "food" were empty. Only empty, crumpled packages of freeze-dried noodles, rice, and compote lay on the floor, sad witnesses to a long agony of hunger.
I went back down and called Buzz. Together, carefully, almost carrying him, we brought out the surviving astronaut. He was young, with a gaunt face and a small, uneven beard. His complete helplessness moved even the unyielding Buzz.
Buzz quickly uncapped the flask of whiskey we had prudently brought along for the long descent and began giving him small sips. Gradually, a faint color returned to the astronaut's cheeks. He opened his eyes.
"What… what happened to the planet?" he whispered, barely audible, his gaze full of incomprehension and horror.
"We'd like to know that ourselves," I answered honestly. "Weren't you… wasn't anyone warned about a nuclear attack on the US?"
He shook his head weakly, barely perceptibly.
"What's your name?" I asked gently.
"Zhang… Zhang Wei," he breathed out and closed his eyes again, sinking into blissful oblivion.
The return journey with the exhausted astronaut took us the rest of the day. We carried him in turns, wrapped in several layers of thermal blankets we found in the shuttle. Our feet slipped on the icy rocks; the cold penetrated to the bone, but we couldn't stop for a minute. Tired and frozen, we reached the Atlas when, by my watch, it was already deep night.
Seeing the man, barely standing, weakened from prolonged hunger, Emily immediately sprang into action. She quickly heated water in the cargo bay, found an unopened package of artificial honey, and added it to the warm water. Then she began carefully feeding the astronaut with a spoon, her movements surprisingly gentle.
After eating, the astronaut fell into a heavy, almost unconscious sleep, carefully covered with a warm jacket. I was about to send Emily down to the shelter for Sara when the emergency beacon screen suddenly came to life.
A scrolling line of text appeared in English, duplicated in several other languages, including Chinese:
"ATTENTION! ALL SURVIVORS!
IMMEDIATELY REPORT YOUR COORDINATES FOR NECESSARY ASSISTANCE.
PRESIDENT DIXON. OUR COORDINATES: ….
ATTENTION! REPEATING…"
The message repeated cyclically, lifelessly and insistently, like the sound of a metronome in an empty room. Buzz, Emily, and I silently stared at the flickering letters. In the cabin, only the steady hum of the heating system and the heavy, uneven breathing of the sleeping Chinese man were audible.
I looked at Buzz. In his eyes, reflecting the green light of the screen, I read the same question spinning in my own mind: could this be our salvation?
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