Light of the World
A companion short story to the story I posted through the Inklings Challenge. Technically I wrote this first, as part of a short story prompt with my writing group for last Christmas (hence why I didn’t choose this world for the Inklings Challenge: Christmas Edition). At that point, Andrew and Nikki (I called her “Nicola”) and the world of Zenith Station were fairly new, so you can see some of the details changed since last year.
Strictly speaking, candles were against the rules.
Fire and space and all that. Recycled oxygen. Closed systems. Etc cetera, et cetera.
But Christmas Eve didn’t feel right without at least one candle. Sitting there among the holographic flames. No one would notice. Or, if they did, it would be so far back in their minds that they wouldn’t really pay attention.
Now if Andrew really was feeling like nitpicking, he would complain that it didn’t feel like Christmas without snow. Call it a hold-over from an extremely affluent childhood, where snow would literally be ordered for Christmas.
He caught Nikki’s eye where she stood in the half-light several pews from the front and suppressed a grin. She was good—good enough to disable the smoke detectors for a few hours—but not that good. He’d told her about snow once and she’d looked at him like he was insane.
Ok, so most people still did that. Of all of the things you could have done with your life, you chose this?
Andrew forced his mind back to the routine at hand. It was a good thing he had the Christmas story memorized. He’d got all the way to the manger on autopilot and only stuttered when his brain caught up to his mouth.
“...because there was no room for them in the inn.”
He saw several people mouthing along with the story, and he did smile then. Yes, thank God, he’d chosen this. This rotation of miners and merchants that slipped through between the lifers on Zenith Station. This home of hullmetal and rounded walls and ductwork that rattled at all hours, reminding him that he was one malfunction away from suffocation and the vacuum of space.
He glanced at the candle.
It was all worth it.
“But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart.”
Somewhere at the back, one of the younger kids made a noise of complaint. For many of them it was just another evening. Their parents might have brought them here on Christmas Eve, but they didn’t have that genetic memory of a sleepless night and a morning of presents and breakfast and family gathered around.
Andrew finished the Christmas story and closed his Bible (yes, an actual book of paper and binding, which he had to keep locked up between services and study sessions because this was the brink, after all).
“Now if you’ll all join me in a hymn. Music is on your screens.”
From this angle he could almost ignore the faint glow of the displays that popped up at the top of each pew. Children stood on tiptoes and craned to see the music. More than a few people shuffled awkwardly. The only music tonight was Sister Philomena on her ancient violin. Andrew refused to use a recording tonight.
After the first couple of verses of Silent Night, enough people remembered the tune that their voices warmed the church pod. Nikki’s voice rose above the rest, a warbly contralto. Her cheeks were flushed but she pressed on encouragingly.
The singing drew to a close and Andrew held up a hand. “Before we go, I’ll say a prayer, and then I’d like for the kids to line up,” and he gestured to one side, where Naomie and Zus had been busy shuffling aside the (fake) candles and piling packages on the table. An excited murmur started up. Andrew let it go until almost everyone was looking at him again. Finding him waiting, they bowed their heads.
He kept the prayer short.
~~~~
Nikki wandered up to him a few minutes later, after he’d extricated himself from the mob of kids. Her hands were buried as always in the pockets of her coveralls. She bumped his shoulder, no doubt smearing his single suit coat with grease.
“Real wrapping paper?” she said.
Andrew ducked his head and pretended to fiddle with his tablet. “Yeah, well...it cost a fortune to ship in. I spent four hours watching videos on how to wrap it without tape.”
When Nikki didn’t say anything, he glanced at her. She was staring at him with her lips smooshed to one side.
“What?”
“Did you use the church’s money for wrapping paper?”
“No!” A little too loud. He coughed. “No, it was my Christmas present. From my sister.”
Nikki shook her head. “You hide it so well, you know?”
“What’s that?”
She waved a hand to take in his suit, paying particular attention to the seam he’d patched around the pocket in his pants. “Your….”
“My background? My family’s influence?”
“Your connections,” she allowed with a dip of her head. “If you aren’t careful someone is going to kidnap you for a ransom.”
Andrew laughed. “Good luck. Dad warned me he’d never pay a ransom.”
They wandered toward the back table and the safe disguised beneath it. Andrew entered the codes to unlock it and stuck his Bible inside, next to the communion crackers he’d brought with him. They were running low. He could only imagine what it would cost to order those.
You could also just...have some made, you know. Like snow, some things they could do without.
A few congregants called out and Andrew waved to say he’d be over in a minute. He paused halfway to standing up, his eyes coming level with the real candle.
More specifically, the spot of wax on the table.
“Thank you for this,” he told Nikki.
She lifted her shoulders. “I couldn’t get you anything.”
He grinned. “So you hacked into the alarm systems and disabled them?”
“Only temporarily.” She raised an eyebrow and, when he nodded, leaned over and puffed out the candle. A sliver of smoke drifted toward the ceiling.
“I never thought I’d miss fire,” she mused, watching it coil and dissipate.
Andrew turned for the door and she linked arms with him, heedless of the stains she was sharing.
“I miss water,” Andrew said. When she quirked an eyebrow, he amended, “Good fresh water. There was a spring near my house. Lona and I would go swimming in the summer.” Or what passed for summer on Andraste. Snow didn’t last long in that perpetually temperate climate.
Nikki waited while Andrew said good night to the lingering families. Most of the kids had listened to Naomie’s instructions that the presents were to be saved for morning, but a few had either missed this or not cared. They held their small gifts in one hand and carefully-folded, untorn paper in the other, their eyes devouring their names spelled out in real ink.
So many luxuries Andrew had always taken for granted.
Nikki helped put everything back in order and waited in the hall, humming to herself, while he locked up the pod. The water pipes ticked and pinged behind the thin metal walls. The echo of boots on grating carried down from the next level up.
For once, Nikki didn’t protest when Andrew wordlessly turned them toward her complex.
“I did get you one more thing,” she burst out halfway to her apartment.
Andrew raised an eyebrow. His fingers released the tiny box in his pocket. “You didn’t have to.”
“Oh, but I did.” She pulled out a strand of wire from her breast pocket and dangled it in front of his face. “I spent like a sixteenth of a cred on this, you know.”
“What’s that?”
Nikki rolled her eyes. “The one thing you need to repair that ridiculous 3D in your office.”
Andrew just blinked at her.
“You know, the one you’ve been growling at for three weeks because every time you try to explain a timeline it fritzes?”
“You mean that’s not normal?”
Nikki clicked her tongue and tucked the wire back into her pocket. “I’ll stop by tomorrow to fix it, and in exchange you will finally show me that art collection you’ve been raving about. D. Ricardo or whatever. The one with the goats.”
“The one with—” Andrew laughed. “It’s not about the goats, Nikki.”
“And tomorrow you can prove that to me. Deal?”
“I don’t think that’s how a gift is supposed to work.” At her frown, he conceded. “Deal. Now.” He caught her sleeve with his fingers, hauling her to a stop before the final turn. She tilted her head.
“I got you something, too. And there’s no ‘in exchange’ with this one.”
He pulled out the small package and awkwardly held it out. “I hope it’s the right one.”
Eyes round as a bird’s, Nikki snagged the box and lifted off the lid. She stared at the small bottle inside. “Is this….” She held it up, rattling it, even though the contents were finely ground. “This is actual chili powder.” Carefully she opened the lid and breathed deeply.
Andrew winced. He’d nearly spilled the whole thing doing that.
Nikki’s eyes brightened with tears. “How did you…?”
“I’m Santa Claus.”
She didn’t react. She didn’t move (seriously, that was freaky), only stared at him with tears brimming in her eyes.
After a solid thirty seconds of this, Andrew cleared his throat. “Right. So. Merry Christmas.” He tried herding her down the hall.
Sniffling, Nikki pocketed the tiny canister of spice. She rocked back on her heels, dashed a hand across her dirty cheeks, and threw her arms around him.
Andrew was so stunned he didn’t have a chance to hug her back before she was pulling away and tripping up the hall. Over her shoulder she called, “Merry Christmas!”
