“You’re the guy if anyone is,” Garner said. He was quiet a beat. Then: “I’ve said all that it makes sense to say. Go back, and take all the time you need. If you never want this to happen, it never will.”
He held Travis’s gaze a few seconds longer, then gave him a last nod and walked away, back through the doorway he’d come from.
Travis stared after him, then looked down through the glass floor again. He watched until the yellow speck of Earth’s sun emerged once more into the frame.
I really can’t get there, he’d said to Paige. Keeping you in the dark about anything at all—I can’t imagine it.
He still couldn’t. Not in this or any timeline. He could imagine nothing other than going back and immediately telling Paige every detail. Garner and a few others, too, but Paige first. He would share everything with her except the weight of making the choice. That would be his alone. He could spare her even the stress of trying to sway him one way or the other, by simply leaving for a while. Going off by himself, maybe for weeks. Or months. Or years. Just thinking it all through, the card folded in his pocket at all times. He could use it from anywhere on Earth, as soon as he made up his mind.
He thought he knew which side of the choice he’d eventually come down on.
He imagined Paige would know too.
He thought about all that, and five seconds later he understood everything: all that’d transpired between the future versions of himself and Paige. Why she’d sent her message. Why he’d sent his. There’d been no misunderstanding at all.
He stared at the distant sun transiting the glass beneath his feet, and wondered if it was possible to feel emptier or more numb than this.
He patted the card, deep and secure in his pocket, and turned to the tunnel’s flared entry. He crossed to it and slipped inside, and began to push himself back toward home.
Acknowledgments
This last volume of the trilogy came to life with a lot of help from very smart and dedicated people. Great thanks to my editor, Gabe Robinson, along with many, many other people at HarperCollins, including Liate Stehlik, Seale Ballenger, Pamela Spengler-Jaffee, Megan Swartz, Adrienne Di Pietro, Kristine Macrides, and Danielle Bartlett. Thanks also to Ellen S. Leach, for catching a large number of mistakes that slipped past me but would not have slipped past readers.
And as always, thank you to Janet Reid, agent extraordinaire. Before writing books I knew there was more to this job than sitting down and typing, but I couldn’t have guessed how much more—and the incredible work you do is the reason I can do my part at all.
About the Author
PATRICK LEE lives in Michigan. He is the author of The Breach, Ghost Country, and Deep Sky.
To find out more, please visit www.patrickleefiction.com.
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By Patrick Lee
Deep Sky
Ghost Country
The Breach
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
DEEP SKY. Copyright © 2012 by Patrick Lee. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition JANUARY 2012 ISBN: 9780062096395
Print Edition ISBN: 9780061958793
FIRST EDITION
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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Table of Contents
Dedication
Definitions Established By Presidential Executive Order 1978-AU3
Part I
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Part II
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Thirty
Part III
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter Forty-Seven
Acknowledgments
About the Author
By Patrick Lee
Copyright
About the Publisher