Stardust: Trinity
Priorities change after you’re ejected into space with no chance of rescue
Trinity used to be proud of how she actively ignored her mother’s advice. From her earliest memories as a child through to their last chat before onboarding, she always did her best to not only ignore her mum’s cringing words of wisdom, but to do the opposite wherever possible.
Her mother’s words now haunted her: “don’t go looking for love, it will find you”, “from the highest to the lowest, we are all stardust”, “breathe deep and slow, atmosphere is precious”, and her favourite: “slow down. Look around you. Appreciate the wonders of it all.”
It was only now - in her final moments - did Trin finally understand what her mother had relentlessly been trying to hammer into her head.
Except for the advice about love. Not for want of trying, but Trinity had never found love. Silvanus was the closest she came to any kind of romance. He’d been always easy on the eye, but nothing had ever come of their flirtations once the mission launched. And now nothing ever would.
Trin refused to believe her final thoughts would be ones of regret, but here they were. She wished she had listened to her mother and savoured every breath.
She clearly remembered her last - in a panic as she flew out of the airlock she gulped as much air into her lungs as possible, before “exhale should the airlock fail” rang through her memories.
‘Who knew the childhood nursery rhymes mother sang to me would turn out to be useful?’ she thought.
Dying as an unappreciative daughter was not how she thought her life would end.
She had long visualised her exciting and celebrated future. At the end of a long career, starting on research trawlers, and ending with Trin leading a rag-tag rabble of freedom fighters to overthrow the corrupt administrators of the Sol system, her mother would hug her tightly and regret imparting such nonsense. And she would have forgiven her.
But there would be no career, no heroic adventures, no adulation. She’d only had a few weeks on the IDRT Corey before finding herself in the vacuum of space. They hadn’t even made their first delivery. She was dying a nobody.
No. That wasn’t true. She was not a nobody. Not any more.
Until today she had thought of herself as a nobody. Which is why she had fought so hard to get into the interplanetary corps. As soon as she was legally able, she left the drudgery of Ceres Outpost behind her, joining the mobile refining squad.
It wasn’t an armoured defence ship or even an exploratory craft, but it was the first step for her career. Step one: deliver nitrogen and oxygen to outposts across the solar system. Just one soul in a tiny crew on a massive hunk of machinery.
Or so she thought. Maybe if she’d listened to her mum’s advice she might have kept her eyes open and seen what she was truly a part of.
But at this precise moment, Trin had no choice but to stop, look around, and take it all in. She daren’t blink in case it blocked this magnificent view of the universe. The last thing she would ever see.
In the still of space, the brutal cold, in these final moments of her life, she was being forced to fully appreciate the majesty of it all. Finally follow her mother’s advice.
Heartbreak merged with the beauty: by taking in her surroundings, Trinity discovered that Tessa was not her mother. Not directly at least.
It became obvious the moment additional crew members floated past her. The Corey had a crew of eight. Not eighty.
So why were there so many bodies surrounding her? Not only that, why were these unexpected bodies identical to her fellow crew members?
That couldn’t be Ty. She had watched in horror as he was jettisoned into space before her. Why was he in a different uniform?
Watching this plethora of unknown crew float past, she noted uniforms and status badges along with their faces.
There was a second Sylvanus. Then a third. A fourth. A second Scod. A third. A fourth and a fifth. A Ty, a Chad, and then there was Trinity. Herself. A perfect copy. Another Trinity. And then another. And another. Over and over and over.
Each version was slightly different: some Trins had their hair up, some even wore researcher uniforms - but they were all undeniably her.
She wasn’t Trinity. Along with the dozens of others, she was a clone of Trinity.
She wasn’t a nobody. She was a clone of a nobody. Or was she a clone of somebody remarkable?
It didn’t matter.
She’d been lied to. They’d all been lied to.
Her team wasn’t in an isolated pod in sole control of the ship. She was in a self-contained compartment alongside dozens of groups of similar clone squads in different sectors. All believing they were an original doing work in an isolated control pod.
Did any of them know the truth? The original wouldn’t be here amongst them - surely not. Why risk someone so useful that cloners create a veritable army?
It was decided then. She was a clone of someone remarkable.
As if to counteract this uplifting thought, her heart plummeted again as more Trinitys floated by. Being the same person, there was no doubt they were all as shocked and angry as she was. Potentially having the same final thoughts.
Her original had a mother - obviously. Tessa. It’s where her memories came from. Nagging. Nursery rhymes. Probably everything up to survival training, that could have all come from the original. Her recent training, relationships and work, were they unique to her? Where did the original Trinity end and this life begin?
Maybe she had been in existence for a year or two? A little more? A little less?
Survival training. What a joke. All the training for emergencies meant nothing if there was no possibility of rescue. And with the IDRT Corey already building up speed towards the outer belt, it was obvious this would be her final resting place.
With so many thoughts rushing through her mind, she wondered how long she’d been out here. Training told her she had a scant 15-20 seconds before blacking out from lack of oxygen to the brain. Her time was almost up.
Trin wasn’t going to waste it being angry. Her friends, her crew mates, and the other crew, had been ejected into space to die. They had all been used, and lied to. And now murdered. A mass murder.
Nothing could be done to retaliate. No-one would be avenging this atrocity. No-one mourns clones.
She might as well finally follow her mother’s advice. It would make Tessa happy knowing she’d finally gotten through to her daughter.
One version of her daughter.
Turning her concentration past the debris, Trinity stared into the depths of space. In every direction were stars, planets, solar systems, galaxies, even nebula. Pinpricks of light that were indistinguishable from each other to the naked eye. With the moisture on her eye evaporating, those lights sharpened and began refracting into reds, greens and blues.
The starfield became a celebration of colour, light and life.
Her mother had always said stars connected us - “we’re made from their dust”. It was her way of saying everyone is equal. “Treat people kindly, they are made of the same stuff as you are.”
Aside from the floating bodies of her crew mates and various detritus that had been sucked out in the mass murder, the last things Trinity could see were stars.
Stars whose light had taken billions of years to reach her. Stars that had died cataclysmically eons ago, and whose leftover atoms were recycled into her skin, her bones, her cells.
It was truly beautiful. Mother was right. In the end, big or small, we are all equal.
She was stardust.
Cool concept for a story. Well done.