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Far from the Light of Heaven

Tade Thompson
Chapters (65)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Epigraph
  4. Chapter One
  5. Ten Years Later…
  6. Chapter Two
  7. Chapter Three
  8. Fin
  9. Chapter Four
  10. Chapter Five
  11. Salvo
  12. Chapter Six
  13. Chapter Seven
  14. Shell
  15. Fin
  16. Chapter Eight
  17. Chapter Nine
  18. Chapter Ten
  19. Chapter Eleven
  20. Chapter Twelve
  21. Chapter Thirteen
  22. Beko
  23. Chapter Fourteen
  24. Chapter Fifteen
  25. Chapter Sixteen
  26. Chapter Seventeen
  27. Chapter Eighteen
  28. Awe
  29. Chapter Nineteen
  30. Chapter Twenty
  31. Chapter Twenty-one
  32. Chapter Twenty-two
  33. Chapter Twenty-three
  34. Chapter Twenty-four
  35. Chapter Twenty-five
  36. Chapter Twenty-six
  37. Chapter Twenty-seven
  38. Chapter Twenty-eight
  39. Chapter Twenty-nine
  40. Chapter Thirty
  41. Chapter Thirty-one
  42. Chapter Thirty-two
  43. Chapter Thirty-three
  44. Chapter Thirty-four
  45. Chapter Thirty-five
  46. Chapter Thirty-six
  47. Chapter Thirty-seven
  48. Chapter Thirty-eight
  49. Chapter Thirty-nine
  50. Shell
  51. Chapter Forty
  52. Chapter Forty-one
  53. Chapter Forty-two
  54. Chapter Forty-three
  55. Chapter Forty-four
  56. Chapter Forty-five
  57. Chapter Forty-six
  58. Chapter Forty-seven
  59. Afterword
  60. Acknowledgements
  61. Discover More
  62. extras
  63. meet the author
  64. A Preview of "Nophek Gloss"
  65. By Tade Thompson

Cover

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Dedication

To Beth.

I’m getting there.

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Epigraph

Space is the Brink of Death

Anonymous graffiti in the oldest service duct of Space Station Daedalus, 2077.

Chapter One

Earth / Ragtime: Michelle “Shell” Campion

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There is no need to know what no one will ask.

Walking on gravel, boots crunching with each step, Shell doesn’t know if she is who she is because it’s what she wants or because it’s what her family expects of her. The desire for spaceflight has been omnipresent since she can remember, since she was three. Going to space, escaping the solar system, surfing wormhole relativity, none of these is any kind of frontier any more. There will be no documentary about the life and times of Michelle Campion. She still wants to know, though. For herself.

The isolation is getting to her, no doubt. No, not isolation, because she’s used to that from training. Isolation without progress is what bothers her, isolation without object. She thinks herself at the exact centre of the quarantine house courtyard. It’s like being in a prison yard for exercise, staggered hours so she doesn’t run into anyone. Prison without a sentence. They run tests on her blood and her tissues and she waits, day after day.

She stops and breathes in the summer breeze, looks up to get the Florida sun on her face. She’s cut her hair short for the spaceflight. She toyed with the idea of shaving her head, but MaxGalactix didn’t think this would be media-friendly, whatever that means.

Shell spots something and bends over. A weed, a small sprout, pushing its way up between the stones. It shouldn’t be there in the chemically treated ground, but here it is, implacable life. She feels an urge to pluck the fragile green thread, but she does not. She strokes the weed once and straightens up. Humans in the cosmos are like errant weeds. Shell wonders what giants or gods stroke humanity when they slip between the stars.

The wind changes and Shell smells food from the kitchen prepared for the ground staff and their families. Passengers and crew like Shell are already eating space food, like they’ve already left Earth.

Around her are the living areas of the quarantine house. High-rises of glass and steel forming a rectangle around the courtyard. One thousand passengers waiting to board various space shuttles that will ferry them to the starship Ragtime.