“Sure thing,” I agreed, skirting around the front of the pickup and pulling open the passenger door.

As we pulled away from the curb, I realized that Tamara hadn’t said a word the whole time.

◦ • ◦

The truck was a relic. Its vinyl seats were rough and cracked, and the rearview mirror had apparently fallen off at some point and been reattached with duct tape. Erick drove the vehicle himself, rather than relying on the self-steering mechanism. For some reason, this didn’t surprise me. The truck seemed to fit his personality in a way I couldn’t quite describe. Sort of old-fashioned, like a pioneer. I supposed it fit with the rugged-Martian-colonist stereotype you saw in flix, though I hadn’t ever known anyone who was actually like that in real life: sun-baked cowboys who wanted to shape the new planet with their own two hands.

It was the polar opposite of my dad. He’d always liked the modern conveniences. I don’t think he even knew how to drive a car himself. I guess maybe that’s why he wound up heading back to Earth, in the end. Building a new world yourself is too much work. That thought made me feel bitter, and I folded my arms and slumped down in my seat.

Erick steered the pickup in the opposite direction from the way Henry, Tamara and I usually walked, heading for the crosstown expressway. Through the window, red boulders and scraggy clumps of spider weeds gave way to ever-denser clusters of buildings. Before long, the blue of the bay disappeared behind the city skyline.

We rode in silence. He didn’t even have music streaming. There was nothing but the constant, electronic hum of the engine and the swoosh of the tires over the pavement. It was only a matter of time before the quiet drove me out of my mind.

Finally, I shifted in my seat and blurted out, “Well? Aren’t you going to ask me what I was doing in the crater?”

“Not unless you want to tell me.”

That wasn’t the response I’d expected, and it knocked the wind out of my sails. What was even with this guy? My mom would have been all over me—“Explain yourself, Isaak!” I supposed my dad wouldn’t have pressed, but that’s only because he wouldn’t have cared one way or the other. This was an approach I was unfamiliar with. Now I felt obligated to say something, since I’d opened my stupid mouth, but for the life of me, I couldn’t think of what to say.

So I just looked back out the windshield at the road in front of us.

After several more moments of silence, Erick said, “I understand you’re very close to your grandfather. He’s an archaeologist on Earth?”