“But, Daddy, I—”

“No. It’s not fair for us to guilt you into this. It’ll be easier for you to make an honest decision if you do it without facing us.”

“But I promised you. I promised Mom.” My voice cracked. My eyes burned painfully, and I squeezed them shut. Two hot trails of tears leaked down my face.

“Doesn’t matter. That’s too big of a promise for us to make you keep. You have to make this choice yourself — if you want to stay here, I understand. I’m giving you a way out.”

“But they don’t need you! You could stay here with me! You’re not even important to the mission — you’re with the military, for Pete’s sake! How is a battlefield analyst supposed to help on a new planet? You could stay here, you could be—”

Daddy shook his head.

“—with me,” I whispered, but there was no point in asking him to stay. His mind was made up. And it wasn’t true, anyway. Daddy was sixth in command, and while that didn’t exactly make him commander in chief, it was still pretty high up. Mom was important too; no one was better at genetic splicing, and they needed her to help develop crops that could grow on the new planet.

I was the only one not needed.

Daddy went behind the curtain and undressed, and when he came out, Ed and Hassan let him use a hand towel to cover himself as he walked to the cryo chamber. They took it away when he lay down, and I forced my eyes to stare at his face, to not make this worse for either of us. But his face radiated pain, a look I had never seen Daddy wear before. It made my insides twist with even more fear, more doubt. I watched them plug the two IVs in. I watched them seal his eyes. I tried to retreat within myself, silence the scream of horror reverberating in my mind, and stand straight with a spine made of iron and a face made of stone. Then Daddy squeezed my hand, once, hard, as they crammed the tubes down his throat, and I crumbled, inside and out.