The last hour

A dream? I clap both hands to my chest, my face, my neck. The tractor veers across ploughed furrows, snapping me left and right. I take the wheel and pull back on the joystick, decelerating to a rapid stop. The plough has cut a swathe across rows of neatly turned earth. Part of me thinks 'I'll have to do those again'. Most of me is in shock.

My heart pounds, cool air from the vents blow over my face. I am alive. Something pulls at my attention. I don't want to look, but I do.

There, on the slope above me, the place I decided taking manual control to traverse a steep hill with the heavy plough raised and angled downslope was a safe thing to do. What an idiot. The scene plays out in my mind like an actual recording. The front wheel hits a dip, the weight of the plough jerks downslope, I have time to feel panic, then the tractor is spinning through the air to smash into the ground as only a four ton piece of equipment can. Somewhere in the middle of this, I die.

I reach back and rub my neck, dispelling both a sudden tingle and the memory of a brutal thump and crack. The thought it may have been some dream compressed to an instant of inatention is ripped away into the ether, irretrievable.

Like every farmer I ever knew I have turned a tractor before, but never thought I'd do it a second time. But my instincts still aren't tuned to this place; the difference in gravity, the way the earth gives under the tires. Even terraformed, the place is just - different. I sag forward and rest my head on the steering wheel. My body accepts before my mind will.

I fumble the phone from my thigh pocket and turn my head to squint at it. No signal. No antenna out here yet. I don't want to think about that right now. Colony hassles. No different, really, from earth hassles. I try to make the call anyway, to my wife, but I just get the beeps. I could drive back to the farm but I don't want to drive this tractor anywhere. I shut off the engine and open the door of the cab, realising detachedly that I didn't check the atmosphere monitor. There are living things - and decomposing things - here that sometimes add up to localised changes, which can be lethal. But that is a problem for people with a future.

My legs are trembling. I jump/fall to the dirt and set off towards the farm. I have an hour - how I know this, I can't say, but I know it.

I don't want to check my watch, but my eyes betray me. 14.15. How much time has already passed? In 45, or 40 minutes will I just die, right there, on the spot? Don't think about it. Get to the farm, get in the jeep, drive into town and go and see your wife. Tell her whatever you can tell her. Call your daughter. Tell her whatever you can. A sound comes out of me, like a frightened animal.

Off the ploughed field I can move faster. I jog, then run. Along the dirt road, up the slope, down again and over the bridge. I'm sucking in air, my heart is pumping. I'm alive and I have something to do. I slow down as I head up the steeper slope to the farm. I pull out my phone. My hands are sweaty and my eyes squint. Maybe that is why the phone doesn't recognise me. I stop and key in the code. Two bar signal. I take in a couple of deep breaths and stretch out the fingers of each trembling hand in turn. Images of home life go through my mind, images of my funeral, images of my wife and my daughter...alone. I call. No answer. I call the office number, continuing up the hill as it starts to ring, the sound jagged and broken.

'Colony registrar's office'

I'm stopped in my tracks.

'Sandra?' breath catches in my throat and I don't know if I can speak

'What is it? Has something happened?'

'No, no, no, it's ok. I'm coming into town. Can you take a break?'

'Kinda busy here. What's it about?'

My brain spins. Nothing comes.

'Something...I should be there in half an hour. Try to make time'

I bite back the 'please'

'Ok...'

'See you soon baby'

'Baby?' She laughs 'Ploughing makes you amorous now?'

The rush of pure joy, sadness and love I feel in that moment is indescribable.

I actually laugh.

'I love you'

'Ok...love you too'

We hang up. I don't look at my watch. I reach the farm. The 4x4 is gone, my brother in law must be using it. I make for the quad bike. Someone calls my name. It's one of the shepherds, wondering what happened to the tractor. I don't stop walking. I yell over my shoulder

'I'm going into town, be back later'

No I won't.

The keys are in the ignition. With my hand on the throttle, the watch is in my line of sight. 14.29.

The day is long here, and although I was - am- what is now, now? - hours into the working day the twin suns are barely above the horizon. I look at the sky, the spinning tyres of the quad throwing up the alien dirt, the track disappearing under the bike. I wish I could see Earth again.

At some point along the route, right before the last hill over the valley of our new civilisation, my brain finally accepts the inevitable. I'm not going to make it. I look out across the wide, alien valley. Thousands of people; good people, crazy people, ambitious people, working stiffs. Humanity on just another piece of rock, trying to make it work. My part in it ends here.

My last acts will be to call the two people I love the most in the universe. I still have no idea what I will say.