Project Hail Mary

by Andy Weir

It’s a dark and depressing feeling to have all your closest colleagues get together and decide you should die.

“Understand. Not actually understand, but…understand.”

“Eat that.” “It tastes bad.” “Food experience not that important.” “Hey.” I point at him. “To humans, food experience is very important.” “Humans strange.”

“Obvious I can do that! You are stupid right now. You sleep. I watch and also design replacement tank. Agree, question?”

“On Earth, we have a scary, deadly creature called a spider. You look like one of those. Just so you know.” “Good. Proud. I am scary space monster. You are leaky space blob.”

“For fifty thousand years, right up to the industrial revolution, human civilization was about one thing and one thing only: food. Every culture that existed put most of their time, energy, manpower, and resources into food. Hunting it, gathering it, farming it, ranching it, storing it, distributing it…it was all about food.

“Settled.” He puts his claw against the divider. “Fist my bump.” I laugh and put my knuckles against the xenonite. “Fist-bump. It’s just ‘fist-bump.’ ” “Understand.”