Routine— Chapter 22

Five days after the attack, classes were suspended and a curfew was imposed. The students remained in their dormitories. The Ceres Army established a headquarters in the courtyard of College S, still marked by the shadows of the gray funeral.

Logistics teams mapped the area. The invasion had been carried out by a low-flying aircraft that crossed the radar undetected. The toll: eighty Arcadian soldiers dead, ten of them killed by Theo, a seventeen-year-old student, and three by the student Ceres. Fifteen students died defenseless.

The atmosphere was unbearable.

On the sixth day, with the headquarters dismantled and the psychological-assistance and ICU teams withdrawn, a piece of news interrupted the inertia of grief: Daime, a wheelchair-bound student, was discharged.

He had been hit by a shot that ricocheted off the college’s impact-resistant black marble walls. The bullet, though superficial, caused severe bleeding.

He survived.

He was authorized to resume his activities, under observation.

In the cafeteria, eyes crossed — longing for those who were gone, relief at still being there. As if, in silence, they were confirming: things will return to normal. It was what remained to believe.

Theo and Tycho, his younger brother, sat as they had before the attack, repeating the simple gesture of breaking bread. The food seemed to have flavor again, but the memory still burned. For Theo, those weeks isolated on the benches of the military college had been a rehearsal for war. But the war had been real. Dead children. Soldiers sent to kill students.

Theo smiled at his brother, trying to protect him even with his gaze. He thought of Daime — the friend he had carried in his arms, covered in blood, and entrusted to Ana in the bunker.

Ana appeared in the cafeteria at that moment, silent. A brief smile between the two confirmed: everyone was alive.

Cors and Vanks, from a distance, exchanged glances with Theo. Neither said anything. Both had also killed soldiers that day, under Theo’s leadership — the informal leader of the boys at the college. The look they exchanged said: we are alive, but that changes nothing. The rivalry would return tomorrow. That was only a day of truce.

Kan, more discreet, made a gesture with his head, silently agreeing with something that did not need to be said.

— Is Daime okay? — Tycho asked, in a low voice.

Theo hesitated. He looked at his plate.

— I don’t know... When I went in, he was with Ana in the bunker. I haven’t heard anything since.

Tycho lowered his head.

Across the hall, Ana kept her eyes fixed on Theo. There was something anguished in her silence. The fear was not about what had happened — it was for Daime. In the past, she and Daime had been a couple. After the Flagball accident, everything changed. But the memory still bound them together. The care was still love — even if painful, even if unspoken.

Theo saw her on the other side of the courtyard. Ceres. Her eyes — deep blue, seeming to drown everything they touched — searched for his. They met.

It was only an instant, but it lasted longer than the entire week isolated under curfew. Six days of strict rules, without words, watched by drones and soldiers who took turns between maps, mourning, and silence.

Now, there, amid the sound of cutlery in the cafeteria and the corridors beginning to pulse again with everyday life, there they were: two survivors looking at each other as if begging for confirmation. Approval. From one another.

Ceres’s eyes fell upon Theo with hunger and longing. Not hunger for flesh, not yet — but for contact. For touch. For a gesture that said: we are alive, and that gives us permission to want.

They both knew what they had done. Ceres killed three adult men. Theo killed ten. Trained soldiers. Armed men. Men sent to kill children. They fought back. They won.

But there, in that godless city where only Mother Ceres reigned, there was no guilt. They did what they had to do. Not because they wanted to, but because they were ready.

The college had shaped them for this. The training, the repetitions, the lessons about security and patriotism. No dilemmas remained, only answers.

Ceres had nearly been killed by one of those soldiers — hands around her neck, her voice disappearing, the darkness approaching. It was Theo who pulled the attacker off her with a direct shot to the head. Blood in his eyes. Silence after the shot.

He wanted to flee that night. Leave the city. But the desire faded. Ceres saw it. She saw it in his gesture, in his choice. He loves Mother Ceres. And because he loves Mother Ceres, she loves him.

She remembered her words, spoken in the darkness in Cora’s flower field, when she was still trembling from adrenaline and fever:

— You love Mother Ceres. You proved it. Just as I love her... I love you.

Now, in that distant gaze between the tables, they wanted to devour each other. But not yet. Not yet.

The shock was glued to their skin, trapped inside the body like a second flesh. The desire existed, but it could not cross the mourning.

The only living divinity in that city was Mother Ceres. And Mother Ceres was enough.

Routine was beginning to return. The crowded cafeteria, the schedule sirens sounding through the corridors, the gates opening and closing again with the ritual sound of normal things.

And there she was: Cora.

Collecting food scraps in an organic box, separating peels, seeds, leftovers that were still good. She carried everything to the small cabin she had built alone at the edge of the training field — a shelter for dogs, cats, and even the occasional domesticated rat. That was what she said:

“Neither dogs, nor cats, nor rats go hungry in Ceres.”

An old city motto, repeated in a low voice like someone repeating a childhood prayer.

Cora also carried seeds in her pockets. And she threw them onto the black marble sidewalks, into cracks in walls, into the soil behind the college. Always saying:

“Shallow or deep, roots will come. Every hope needs to be born ugly before it becomes beautiful.”

When everyone was already in the courtyard, Daime appeared.

Wheelchair, bandages around his leg, face a little thinner, but alive. Very alive.

When he appeared at the gate, the entire courtyard seemed to freeze for an instant. Ana saw him. Sitting with her tray still half-full, she lowered her head and squeezed her eyes shut — not to hide her tears, but to protect the feeling. Something intimate, still open. Still wounded.

Theo was the first to run to him.

— Are you okay? — he asked, squeezing his friend’s shoulder.

Daime raised an eyebrow and answered with a crooked smile:

— I’m great... I spent six days fighting with doctors and nurses to see who could let out the stinkiest fart in the ICU. I got shot in the thigh, you crude animal!

Theo burst out laughing. Rare. Loud. Pure relief. A sound that had not been heard since before the attack.

Ceres watched the two of them. From a distance. Her blue eyes rested on the scene, light and melancholy. They were alive. That was everything.

Daime pulled the identification necklace he was still wearing around his neck, turned it around, and looked at Theo with a corner-of-the-mouth grin:

— I heard you killed ten... Ten, fuck! You should’ve killed more. That bunch of Arcadian sons of bitches wanted to fuck up our Mother’s system. They deserved every shot. Every fall. — And he spat lightly on the ground, as if sealing a vow.

Theo laughed again. Ceres kept watching.

Then Daime saw Ceres. Their eyes met, and he let out a short, provocative whistle:

— And you, Ceres... three kills? Those blue eyes of yours really are killers, huh? Watch out for her, Theo. She kills with her eyes... and with the rest of her too.

Theo simply looked at Ceres. He did not answer. He did not need to. The air between them was too charged for a joke. But the smile on his lips was sincere. Daime was alive. Ceres was alive. They were there. The Mother had kept them safe.

And the world — that small world of black marble, washed blood, and seeds growing between the stones — breathed. Not free yet. But alive.

Later, in one of the reading rooms of College S, already empty and darkened by the low light of dusk, Daime and Ana met.

She leaned against the wall, arms crossed, no mask on her face — only silence, only waiting.

He maneuvered the wheelchair with some difficulty, still adapting, still feeling the physical pain and another pain he did not know how to name.

Daime cleared his throat. He cleared it like someone forcing himself to speak before silence overcame him.

— I wanted... to apologize to you.

Ana remained quiet for a second longer than was comfortable. Then she answered, her voice firm:

— You don’t have to. I understand. You’re in the wheelchair.

Daime shook his head, laughed without humor.

— It’s not because of the wheelchair. I thought I was going to die. For real. And at that moment, all I could think about was you. But not the way you imagine. It was more... like: why did I do what I did? Why did I throw you out like that? Why didn’t I know how to deal with... with you being stronger than me?

Ana took a deep breath, like someone closing a wound with her own hands.

— It’s always been difficult for me, Daime. You think this only started now?

He looked at her as if he had not seen her in years. As if he were noticing something that had always been there, but that he had always looked away from.

— Three years from now, our Mother Ceres is going to devour us. — he said, with the hard and resigned tone of someone stating a universal truth. — So today... just today... I wanted it to be different. I wanted you to know that I don’t want to insult you anymore. That I know I was an idiot. Maybe I still am. But I don’t want to be that with you anymore.

Ana smiled with her eyes, without showing her teeth. That cold sweetness of hers, intact. Then she said:

— I don’t care if you’re an asshole.

Daime let out a muffled laugh.

— I’ve always been like that. With the wheelchair or without it.

Ana took a step forward.

— Asshole?

— Yes... you said a swear word out loud, Ana. Just like I taught you.

They stood there, looking at each other for long seconds. On the walls, the echo of war, of deaths, of stolen childhoods — but there, only the two of them.

One step from her.

His silence.

And then, the kiss.

It took time. Without haste. It did not have the heat of uncontrolled passion, but the exact temperature of something kept hidden for a long time. Like a whisper among ruins. Like a flower blooming in a military courtyard.

Ceres might have been watching. Maybe Mother Ceres was too. But neither of them cared.

The crack had been made.

And through it, finally, light entered.

The evening made the light in the college more yellow, filtered through the thick windows of the empty corridor. Theo pushed open the door to the teachers’ room. No sound, no presence. The teachers were gathered to rearrange the schedules lost over the past few days. The city had to go on. So did the college.

In the center of the room, on the meeting table, there was a basket of fresh fruit. Some in abundance: pears, persimmons, apples, three ripe peaches. Mother Ceres’s seal. Special harvest.

Theo looked around. Absolute silence.

He took the three peaches and left.

No one saw.

He walked through the corridors with slow steps. The memory of Dark detained in detention still vibrated in his mind. He would spend months there. What he had done in the Flagball game in Oplan, in the locker room... everything still echoed. But something greater was coming: the launch of the CERES 2 space mission. His brother, Tomas, would leave the planet and be swallowed by the sky.

Thinking about it gave him the feeling that things would return to normal.

Farther ahead, he saw Ceres.

Beautiful, motionless, firm as marble. Pale skin, blue eyes open like a silent sky.

Theo stopped. She saw him.

For moments, the two remained motionless.

They recognized each other. As if asking one another for approval.

There was something between them that had been born in the middle of chaos.

Theo remembered the moment he saved Ceres, when she nearly died being strangled by one of the soldiers. He remembered the shot he fired. He remembered the blood.

And her words.

But now it was something else. It was the aftermath.

He walked toward her.

— Come with me — he said, without explaining.

— Where?

— Don’t question it. I’m the leader.

He smiled, with a light tone of authority. Ceres lowered her eyes, embarrassed, but went with him.

They walked side by side along the path leading to the armored train station. They were alone at the back of the college, where the tracks disappeared into the horizon.

Theo took a peach from his pocket and offered it.

— Want one?

— Are they really from here?

— From our land. Born here. They grew like we did.

She accepted. Took a bite. Theo did too.

They chewed in silence as they walked.

The train waited in the distance for the dawn loading.

The metal structure reflected the last rays of sunlight.

— Can I eat a piece of yours? — Theo asked, looking directly into her eyes.

— But it’s the same as yours.

— Even so, I want a piece of yours.

She hesitated. Took a bite. Held out the fruit.

Theo did not take it with his hand.

He took a step.

Moved closer.

And, as if it were inevitable, he took the piece of peach from her mouth — with his own mouth.

In a long, firm, silent kiss.

There was no one to see.

Only the two of them, surrounded by the muffled sound of the world returning to normal. Or pretending to.

Ceres closed her eyes.

Theo did too.

The peach fell to the ground.

And in that godless city, only Mother Ceres reigned.

And the children of the revolution were learning to love.

Even after killing.

Even after surviving.

Even knowing it was not over yet.

The armored train advanced along the switching tracks, its metal carcass groaning toward the center of the City of Ceres.

Theo and Ceres discreetly climbed up the side of the train. They sat on the roof, where the steel vibrated beneath their feet, where the city looked like a dismantled toy below.

From up there, everything lost its weight.

The sun spilled slowly across the horizon with an almost divine slowness. Amber light touched Ceres’s pale face, making her skin and the sky blend together — two tones, two worlds, two atmospheres.

Her eyes reflected the firmament: they were not blue eyes, they were portals.

Theo was not contemplating only one sunset — he was contemplating two. The one setting in the world, and the one burning inside her.

In the distance, silhouetted against the burning sky, the surveillance tower watched in silence, like an eternal sentinel.

Even so, fear hid itself.

Because you cannot be afraid all the time.

For an instant, Ceres allowed herself to feel. An accidental peace. A truce within the body.

Being there, beside someone who shared her pain and her devotion, gave that moment an unimaginable lightness.

Her mind, made of lead, knew the rules.

But her heart, in that second, asked for silence.

Theo fell silent too.

He watched the neighborhoods passing below like endless corridors. He remembered Dark. He had always seen him climb onto these trains, like a madman searching for something no one understood. Now he understood.

Dark was not seeking escape. He was seeking air.

Up there, between steel and sky, there was something that could not be distributed, cultivated, or punished.

Freedom.

Ceres rested her head on his shoulder. Theo let her.

Neither of them said it was love. Because it wasn’t. Not yet.

But it was something else.

The absence of war.

The absence of loneliness.

The train continued. The city drew closer.

And the two of them remained there, up high, where not even the cameras could reach them.

Ceres turned her face toward him, her hair pulled by the wind.

And with a voice that carried the calm of those who had survived the storm, she asked:

— What did you ask for in the wish they granted everyone in that dark-gray letter?

Theo did not answer.

Not yet.

Everything recedes.

The ambient sound of the tracks disappears.

The train continues.

Epilogue

Advanced Orbital Training and Research Base — Southern Sector of Ceres

Five and a half months remain until the launch of the CERES 2 mission.

Specialist Tomas J. V. Makor’s Routine:

04:45 — Wakes to artificial light simulating the sun of the Northern Hemisphere.
05:00 — Mandatory stretching for gravitational adaptation.
05:30 — Synthetic breakfast and calcium tablets.
06:00 — Reading session on dormant seeds.
07:45 — Practical class on photosynthetic rotation under space conditions.
09:15 — Tests with biosensors and modified soil.
12:00 — Meal with the unit.
13:00 — Interstellar communication simulation under stress.
15:00 — Neurological examinations.
18:00 — 30 minutes free. Today, he writes.

"I study forms of life that sprout where nothing should grow.

I work with equipment that costs billions.

I produce reports that can alter the course of nations.

I studied to the extreme. And even so, I know that I know nothing.

There are cultures I ignored. There are feelings I once despised.

Today, I think about my son — a child I never knew.

If I were to write a manual on how to be a father,

I would make a 100 x 150 cm book. 470 blank pages.

On the cover, the title: How to Be a Father.

And inside it, a single word:

Presence."

Before going to sleep, Tomas records a letter for his brother Theo.

He attaches a single image to it:

the photograph of a child, eyes identical to his own, bearing his inherited name, encrypted in civil identification:

Joá 14JV3.

No additional text. No explanation.

Only the image.

It will be enough.