Once the Tartarusios had settled into her hangar in the Basin of Trass, repairs began at once. The crew used the time to breathe — to scatter for a few hours and live for themselves again. Nearly everyone aboard already had a home of some kind on Antia. Tarko did not. He had been sixty-three years old when he left his own time, thrown into a future he could not begin to understand, side by side with a crew he had known for only a few weeks. As the others drifted out of the base one by one, he stayed behind and simply stood there, watching them go from a distance, quietly alone. This was a world he understood nothing about.
He was gazing out through the hangar shield at the planet beyond when Youri noticed him. He came and stood beside him and asked, in a calm, low voice, "Hey, old man. How's the future looking?"
Tarko smirked. "Unimaginable."
Youri pulled out a cigarette and lit it. As the flame flickered, he said, "Well, if I were in your shoes, I guess I'd say the same."
Tarko turned toward him, and his eyes went wide when he saw the smoke curling up from the cigarette. "Give me one of those," he said, loud and rough.
Youri handed one over, and Tarko took a long, deep drag. "Do you know how much I've missed this? My god."
Youri grinned. "I know the feeling. I ran out a while back. It almost drove me crazy."
Tarko stared out at the view in front of him. "Now even if I die, I can die a peaceful man," he said — and promptly choked on the smoke.
"Take it easy, old man," Youri said, patting him on the back. "You're a free man now. No need to rush."
They stubbed out the filters and walked toward the exit of the base. Outside, across the colossal crater, a hundred and fifty kilometers away, lay the settlement of Brussels.
Brussels sprawled across the shallow floor of the Basin of Trass like cracked stone — an improvised city stitched together from whatever its people could drag or weld or repurpose until it held. Ancient shipwrecks formed its crooked skeleton: scavenged frigates, gutted transports and rust-eaten cargo haulers standing upright like warped towers, fused together with layers of scrap steel, bundles of cable and sheer stubborn ingenuity. Walkways of mismatched plating strung between them that hummed with borrowed power and the thrum of patched-up generators. Where metal failed, the Domes took over — great arching shells of reinforced glass and carbon lattice, clouded by years of sandstorms. Each one held a little world of its own inside: warm lanterns, food stalls built from shipping crates, small markets overflowing with scavenged tech, sun-lamps imitating a sky long since lost. Moss and hardy shrubs clung to hydroponic beds along the edges and gave the air a faint, earthy smell that almost fooled the senses into believing it was real. It was hardly big enough to be called a town, but it breathed with relentless activity. Wanderers arrived with dust on their boots and half-truths in their pockets, traders hauled crates of contraband and spare parts through its narrow alleys. Outlaws drank in taverns carved out of hollow ship hulls with their eyes sharp for opportunity or danger, which were often the same thing. The air was full of overlapping voices haggling, laughing, arguing, of engines roaring in open repair bays where mechanics worked knee-deep in grease, and of children weaving between the adults across metal decks that vibrated with the pulse of the settlement's life-support grid.
Youri glanced at Tarko. "Hey, old man. Found a place to crash yet?"
Tarko scratched his chin and answered with dry sarcasm. "Where exactly is a ten-thousand-year-old man supposed to live?"
Youri burst out laughing. "Well, there are plenty of hostels here, but if I were you, I'd stay the hell away from them. Things tend to disappear. And I'm guessing you don't have any money?"
"I haven't seen a banknote in ten thousand and thirty years," Tarko said, completely serious.
Youri laughed until he could barely breathe. "Oh, I haven't laughed like that in a long time. Thanks, old man. For that, I'll let you stay at my place."
Tarko's eyes widened with real relief. Youri smiled and nodded toward the parked vehicles. "Come on. Hop in."
As they drove across the Basin of Trass, Tarko could not stop marveling that anyone could live on such a desolate world. Everywhere he looked there was only dust and rock, and yet whole settlements thrived on it. After about an hour, they reached Brussels.
Youri lived inside the Atomium, an architectural relic built from fragments of abandoned Domes and said to be modeled on a design older than any known history. It was shaped like an atom, made of nine interconnected metal spheres, each one a self-contained apartment, with a tenth hanging in the central hub where all the pathways met, like a suspended penthouse. Every sphere was clad in reflective geodesic panels and linked to the others by cylindrical corridors, Inside, the apartments were small and simple, with curved walls, modest windows and smart surfaces that lit up at a touch or a word.
Tarko was in awe of it, and to his surprise, everyone who lived there was part of the Tartarusios' crew. Oscar was waiting at the entrance, leaning casually against the wall. "What took you so long? We finished our work ages ago."
"We stopped for a smoke," Youri said. "It took a while. But we're here, aren't we?"
Oscar walked straight up to Tarko, stopped in front of him, and pulled a card key from his pocket. "Hey, old man. We've got a welcome present for you." He held it out. "From now on, this is your home."
Tarko's eyes filled with tears, and he hugged Oscar tightly. "Thank you," he said. "Thank you for giving me a second chance at life."
While the crew shared that quiet, warm moment, far out in the cold void, Mikhail's fleet was drawing closer and closer. But none of that mattered just then. The Tartarusios were celebrating a new member of their family.