A Spaceman

Chapter 7--Live and let die slowly

I lay on the floor of the laundry room, listening to the steady hum of the dryer. Warm. Soothing. Rhythmic. My one happy place on any base. No matter what, there's always a laundry. When a Major or General is in there, people tend to leave you alone. I'd turn every machine on and just listen to the warm steady hum.

I do pushups, my biceps burning, eyes of course, squeezed closed. I'm facing the door but I don't open my eyes. I just do push ups and listen to the dryer. And am okay. for this moment in space suspended by this sound I am okay.

The door opens. I drop to the floor and open my eyes, defeated. But it's only Anya, carrying her baby, she sits down, back to the door.

"Hey," she says, smiling a little.

"Hey," I say, sitting up against the dryer, which is humming nicely. I press my cheek against it. "Hey little Dasha. How are you handsome man?" I reach out a hand to the baby who giggles appropriately and takes my horrible scarred fingers.

"He likes you," she says.

"He ought to. Come here, want to see how ugly you'll be in fifteen years, eh?" I ask, holding out my hands for him. Anya hands him over, and I pick the baby up. He smiles in delight at my face.

"You're not ugly," Anya says, "You're handsome."

"Hmmm, she's biased 'cause she's going to have to tell you that someday, isn't she?" I ask, setting him in my lap. He giggles.

"I'm not, you look fine," she says.

"They were staring at my arms," I say, darkly, looking down at the child in my lap.

"What happened?" Anya asks, gently.

"I was wrong, about something---in a battle, I'm not used to being wrong the Isylgyns---it's like there's the most logical thing I'm leading them to do and then they do the complete opposite, and I wanted to go fight, my men were dying but they wouldn't let me and----anyway I haven't done it since the scars, just----everyone I'm around doesn't talk about them they're used to it by now. it's not so bad, it wouldn't be so bad but of course I pick at it," I say, staring down at Dasha who is patting my chest with his chubby hands. "Was I this fat as a kid?"

"He's not fat, babies are intended to look like that, they're babies," she says.

"Yeah but was I?" I ask, sniffing his hair, "He doesn't smell like me. You said he does."

"He does and it's creepy," she says, smiling. Dasha is my clone. A little something arranged by Space Command when they realized they only had one of me and they were losing me fast. They tried it with multiple other prospective mothers until they went to Anya. The embryos wouldn't take with anyone else. She agreed immediately, which surprised me since she was sixteen at the time, still in school. She said that if I was going to exist again she wanted to be able to take care of me. It isn't me, obviously. Just a genetic duplicate, exactly like an identical twin. That my sister gave birth to. So still weird. Anatoly is my fraternal twin, much to Space Command's disappointment.

"How often do they come and check on him?" I ask.

"They used to once every month, now they just do it at the check ups--- here," she takes my hand and moves it to her stomach. I feel a slight movement.

"That's super weird I have no idea why you're doing that," I say, grinning but not moving my hand away.

"Both embryos lived, it's twins this time," she says, leaning her head against my head.

"Last time, right?" I ask.

"Yeah, it should be. four of you is more than enough," she says, hugging Dasha to us as well. one weird small family.