Joyful, Joyful

Grace: Cello

No one can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say. I must be somewhere else then, because Lisa's voice floods the cold nothingness around me the moment I touch the cello.

I expected this; or at least something of the sort. The coaches told us they would try to unnerve us, wring out our minds like a wet towel, drain us until there's nothing left. Music was only a small fraction of our training: the rest was building the physical and psychological resilience to survive and keep playing.

So I ignore my daughter's wails; the instinctual ones that signal her hunger. I dismiss the vivid images that dance in my head; the ones of Lisa squirming in her cot, cheeks red with frustration, eyes squeezed shut in defiance of the world around her, her arms outstretched and reaching for her mother. Me.

Josephine promised she would be safe. Please, let me see her again.

I concentrate instead on the slow and heavy notes of Symphony No. 9. My hands move by themselves; I might as well have the sheet music dissolved in my veins.

Lucy: Violin

I can't believe my ears. The symphony is out of order. Distorted, discordant, dissonant. Wrong.

But I have bigger problems right now.

The room is a whirlwind of neon colours that ricochet from wall to wall like gigantic shards of cartoon glass. I shut my eyes, yet I can still see them. It's like I'm chained to the walls of a kaleidoscope held by a dancing toddler. A headache crawls into my skull and I wince in pain.

I continue playing regardless. My violin is a steady voice in the cacophony of sensation. It's the only thing keeping me on my feet. But a sudden rage fills my head and takes over my thoughts. What's the point of all this if they won't even let us play properly?

Marcus: Trombone, Tenor

They taunt me with images of Earth as it was. I'm in a park of some sort, with green grass stretching out towards the horizon in every direction. A few oak trees are scattered in the distance, and I can hear the laughter of children and the whispers of adult conversation behind me.

There's a summery scent in the air. Wild jasmine blooms litter the grass, much like the ones I used to grow in Portmeirion when I was a child. The same ones Morgan used to grow when she was alive, in the backyard of our small cottage. Sometimes, in the mornings, we would walk down the gentle slope together, making our way through the woods until we got to the edge. We'd lean against the railing and watch the early parkgoers as they arrived.

I want to turn around so badly, but I mustn't. My fingers are trembling—a bad sign.

I try to refocus my mind the way we were trained to. I feel the cold hard brass against my lips, the vibrations of the air flowing through the instrument, and the imperceptible resistance as I move the slide back and forth. I hear Beethoven's eternal notes, the same ones I've played a million times. And slowly, the tension in my body dissipates.

James: Trumpet

The science of it baffles me. I see my fingers moving and feel the air escaping my lungs. Yet I can't hear a single thing. It's surreal, and it sends a shiver down my spine.

Dark blobs of shadowy material stand around me, moving far too slowly to be human. And as they play their phantom instruments, I make out the distinct, yet somehow mournful tune of Ode to Joy.

I wonder what the limits of their powers are. Josephine explained the physics of the Eclipse to the entire orchestra at the start: the ship is a gigantic Fresnel lens positioned at the first Sun-Earth Lagrange point. It's scattering sunlight and causing a new Ice Age. Millions are dead already; my parents are among them.

The reason why we're performing for them is much more complicated. I don't understand everything, and the absurdity of the situation has pestered me from the very first day. But this is neither the time nor place for contemplation. The tempo rises, and I play accordingly.

Alan: Timpani

Water pours from a black sky, and tiny rivulets flow down my face and arms. I'm shivering miserably, and stifle a whimper between clenched teeth. Raindrops fly off the timpani in all directions. There's an eerie glow to the scene, punctuated by dazzling flashes of lightning atop the water.

I can't see much through the spray, so I don't even look. I know where the drums are, and though I can't hear them above the thunder, I keep to the rhythm of the symphony. The platform creaks and quakes ominously underfoot, and I brace myself.

All of a sudden, the water is rushing into my lungs and I'm desperately flailing my limbs in the ice-cold water.

The drumming continues without me somehow, and their thundering boom seems to come from both sky and sea. I'm flung out of the water by a debris-filled wave and thrown against the edge of the platform. There's a painful thud and a dull ringing in my ears. The murky depths draw closer as I slide off the slippery metal, motionless, and I have a single, crystal-clear thought before I lose consciousness and sink beneath the surface.

I'm going to die here.

Josephine

The camera doesn't show any change until after the forty-five-minute mark—a new record. All one hundred and fifty members are in their various positions, performing the fourth and final movement of Beethoven's greatest symphony. The choir sings Freudig, wie ein Held zum Siegen! Then there is some static. The ship's focal length changes imperceptibly, yet the computers beep in alarm.

The picture becomes oversaturated for a moment, as the computers adjust to the sudden rise in temperature. In that instant, they are nothing but pink shadows, moving ever so slightly. The music stops suddenly.

And then without warning, the orchestra vanishes.

Disintegrates is the better word; that is precisely what the unshielded human body does on sudden exposure to the artificially concentrated solar radiation at L1, and the harsh vacuum of space.

We know from slowed-down footage of previous missions that nothing really spectacular happens. Flesh and bone are very different substances, yet both react almost identically when subjected to temperatures exceeding 3,000°C. The orchestra—officially HXP Foxtrot—is gone without a trace.

Their minds were destroyed long before their bodies anyway. This is just the way the aliens indicate their disapproval.

I briefly wonder what they saw before their deaths.

Someone coughs behind me, breaking the stunned silence and bringing me back to reality. I hear the usual sounds of people vomiting and a few restrained sobs. A technician quietly unpins the Human Xenomusicological Project VI banner on the back wall of the room and lets it fall to the ground.

Étienne rushes to a console beside me and begins typing. LVB 9: FAILURE. The message will be relayed to the two dozen training facilities around the world. Mozart's Symphony No. 41 is next on the list, or so I'm told.

I think of Lisa.

A computer screen in the corner shows data from the ship: coordinates, albedo, and surface area. I don't bother checking them; the numbers have been unchanged for the last three years.

We will try again next month.