Three days later, Janus Station hung in the silent void, awaiting the arrival of the corporate retrieval shuttle. Commander Elena Alvarez stood in the observation bay by the airlock, the same place where this nightmare had fully revealed itself not long ago. Now she was here to watch it hopefully come to an end—one way or another.
The plan was bold and fraught with risk, but they had rehearsed it to exhaustion. An "accident" had been orchestrated. When the shuttle's approach triggered the station's docking protocols, a power failure—carefully engineered by Devon—would strike the portside modules. In the chaos, one Michael would enter an escape pod and jettison, making it appear as if he had been tragically blown out into space during the malfunction. The remaining Michael would be found by the shuttle crew, shaken but alive.
HQ would receive a report: one crew member lost to a freak malfunction in the wake of the solar storm's damage. A tragedy, but not an impossible one. The evidence had been meticulously arranged: Sera had falsified internal logs, Juliet had prepared a lifeless biomonitor readout for a "body" that could never be recovered, and Devon had rigged the systems to cover the pod launch as a cascade of system failures.
All that remained was to execute it. And to live with the consequences.
Elena glanced sideways at the two suit-clad figures. To avoid any visual confusion for the shuttle's sensors, both would wear helmets until the moment only one should be seen. They were functionally identical now, and that fact gnawed at Elena's heart. Over the past days, she had grown to view them less as original and copy, and more as two individuals, both undeniably Michael yet each subtly developing his own demeanor under stress. And now she had to say goodbye to one.
They had all argued, at length, about who would stay and who would go. In the end, the Michaels themselves made the choice: the one with the bandaged side—the one likely born outside under the sun's fury—insisted that he should be the one to leave. He reasoned that the fewer physical discrepancies the remaining Michael had, the less chance of suspicion. Elena suspected he also felt it was his duty as the "extra" to remove himself. The other Michael had reluctantly agreed, under the condition they treat it as a temporary parting, not a death. They gave him a chance, however slim, to survive in that escape pod until a pre-arranged pickup by a sympathetic contact months later. It was hope, however faint.
Now the station's proximity alarm pulsed a gentle warning: the shuttle was approaching on final vector. Time to act.
Elena faced the two suit-clad figures. Through their visors, she could see their identical determined expressions. It was eerie and heart-wrenching all at once. She swallowed the lump in her throat. "It's time. Shuttle on final approach."
Both nodded. One gave her a small salute—Michael's usual playful gesture—and the other flashed a thumbs-up. She couldn't speak for a moment, afraid her voice would betray her emotions. Instead, she pressed her gloved hand against each of their helmet faceplates in turn, a silent benediction.
They knew the plan. Nothing more needed saying.
Elena retreated to the control console with Devon and Sera. Juliet stood further back, near medbay, ready to feign an emergency medical situation to distract the shuttle crew once docked. Everyone had a part to play.
On the console, lights flickered as the station shook slightly—Devon's induced power glitch taking effect. The hum of machinery faltered. Sera activated an alarm klaxon to add authenticity.
"Power loss in Module B," Sera intoned into the comm, playing up a panicked edge. "Reactor surge—containment failing!" It was the scripted gibberish they'd concocted to justify an evacuation of that section.
Elena's eyes stayed on the two Michaels by the airlock hatch. They clasped each other's forearms briefly—the only farewell they dared. Then one turned and climbed into the small escape pod adjacent to the airlock. The other stepped back into the shadows of the bay, ready to be "found" later.
Devon keyed the release. In the next instant, a loud bang reverberated through the hull. The pod blasted away, carrying one Michael into the star-flecked black.
Elena felt her chest tighten, but she had to focus. "Pod jettisoned! We've lost an escape pod!" she shouted into the general comm, selling the emergency.
Through the viewport, she caught a glimpse of the pod's thruster flare as it tumbled away. It was supposed to look uncontrolled, as if launched by accident. It disappeared from view quickly, out into the vast darkness.
Gone. He was gone. She allowed herself one second to clench her fists and take a sharp breath. Then she steeled herself.
The shuttle was now locking onto the station's docking port. Alarms still rang, lights flickered—a convincing simulation of a station in distress.
Juliet's voice came over next, perfectly on cue. "Explosion in B-module! We have a crew member missing—possibly blown out the airlock!" She injected genuine sounding terror into her words; Elena almost believed it herself, her heart was pounding so hard.
A new voice crackled in Elena's earpiece—the shuttle captain. "Janus Station, this is Corporate Rescue Shuttle Aegis. We have you docked and are dispatching a team to assist. Hold tight."
Elena muted her mic and spoke softly, "They're coming. All personnel take positions."
Devon killed the alarm klaxons but left lights dim as if on backup. Sera ran to join Juliet by the medbay, ready to pretend to triage an injured "remaining" Michael. Elena took a deep breath and rushed to the airlock, meeting the arriving rescue crew with feigned urgency.
The next minutes were a blur of feigned chaos. Two white-suited rescue techs clambered in, and Elena led them through the station. She watched as they found a dazed Michael—with an identical suit but conveniently missing his helmet—lying in the corridor by medbay, where Juliet was crying out for help. They assumed he was the sole Michael, injured in the blast. They never thought to look for a second one. How could they?
Elena gave clipped, frantic explanations: "We lost pressure—Michael went to fix—there was an explosion—he got caught—another pod blew out—" Her half-coherent story was enough in the moment. The rescue team was too busy stabilizing the one crewman they thought needed saving to probe deeply. They quickly moved to transfer "Michael" to the shuttle's infirmary.
In the commotion, no one noticed Elena slip away back to the observation bay, ostensibly to secure the area. In truth, she needed a moment alone.
She pressed her face to a small porthole, searching the stars outside for any sign of the escape pod. Nothing visible—he was long gone into the void's expanse. They had programmed the pod's trajectory to drift toward a remote orbital path, where in a few weeks a covert ship might pick it up. If everything went to plan. If he survived that long with limited supplies. If no one intercepted him first. So many ifs.
Her breath fogged the glass. She realized she was trembling. One of her crew—no, two of her crew—were now effectively gone.
A footstep behind her made her turn. It was the Michael they had kept—a rescue tech supporting him as he hobbled. He looked back at her, and through the visor of the support frame around his neck, she saw his eyes: full of sorrow and relief and pain all at once. The tech urged him onward toward the shuttle dock, and he complied, but he kept his gaze on Elena as long as he could.
She offered a tight nod, the most reassurance she could give in this public setting. "You'll be okay," she mouthed silently. Whether he understood, she couldn't tell, but he gave a faint, tired smile. Then he was carried out of sight.
And then there was one.
---
In the weeks that followed, the official debriefs took place in a haze. Elena recounted the fictitious series of events that led to Michael Chan's tragic accident to a panel of stone-faced corporate investigators. The logs, the crew testimonies, everything backed up the story. The investigators eventually left, satisfied that Janus Station's anomaly was just another line in a risk assessment report and a hefty insurance payout. No mention of clones or duplicates ever arose. The crew of Janus Station was cleared of wrongdoing, deemed survivors of an unfortunate incident.
Janus Station itself was decommissioned shortly after. The corporation cited cost efficiency, but Elena suspected they wanted their clandestine project hardware—Gemini—removed from the public eye. The crew was reassigned to different posts, scattered across other company ventures. They said their goodbyes, promising to stay in contact and to reconvene when they could. They were bound by secrets and shared trauma now, a quiet kinship deeper than ordinary colleagues.
As for Michael, or rather the Michael who remained under that name: he spent a few weeks recovering at corporate medical on Earth before being given leave to visit his family. Elena met him one last time before he went home, in a small café near headquarters.
He looked good—healthier, the color returned to his cheeks. To anyone else, he was just Michael Chan, back from a harrowing mission. But Elena could see the subtle change in him. A piece of him was missing.
They spoke in cautious phrases, aware of possible corporate ears. He indicated he had not heard any news of an escape pod retrieval yet. The contact was still searching, he believed. There was no guarantee.
When it was time to part, he thanked her. "For everything, Captain," he said, eyes sincere but haunted.
She shook her head. "We failed you both in a way," she replied quietly.
He lowered his gaze. "Maybe not. Maybe one day…" He didn't finish the sentence. Some hopes were too painful to voice in full.
They parted with a hug and a shared understanding that this might be the last time they saw each other in person for a long while.
Now Elena found herself alone, stepping through the spaceport terminal where shuttles took off to various orbital facilities. She watched a particular shuttle preparing for departure—the one bound for a remote research station beyond Luna. On that shuttle, among dozens of passengers, sat Michael Chan. He had told her he intended to travel, to take up a quieter posting far away, at least until the memory of Janus Station faded from corporate memory. She understood; it was a way to honor the one who wasn't here. Perhaps out there, he'd secretly continue searching for a signal from that lost escape pod.
Elena pressed a hand to the cold window overlooking the launch pad as the shuttle's engines ignited in a flare of white. She squinted, her eyes moist.
As the shuttle rose, a small point of light against the darkening evening sky, she felt a pang of uncertainty. They had done all they could to save Michael—both Michaels. But in the end, was the man on that shuttle the same Michael she had known before?
He carried Michael's name, Michael's memories, Michael's face. But part of him was a fabrication, a duplicate life given flesh by corporate science. Even he perhaps questioned, in the quiet of night, whether he was truly the original or just a continuation of something now lost.
Elena closed her eyes and rested her forehead against the glass. In her heart, she decided it didn't matter. He was Michael, as real as any soul she'd met. But doubt is a pernicious thing. It would shadow him—and her—the rest of their days.
Out there in the void, somewhere, drifted another soul just as real, tethered to life by hope and fading oxygen. Would they ever find him? Would he find himself out in those starry depths, or simply become another phantom inconsistency in the tapestry of reality?
The shuttle was gone from sight now, leaving only the stars. Those same indifferent stars that had watched a man beg for life outside an airlock, that had borne silent witness to a cosmic duplicity.
Elena turned away from the window, unable to bear the weight of that starry gaze. As she walked down the corridor, her reflection appeared on the polished wall panels—tired, burdened, yet resolute. She carried the secrets of Janus Station with her, and likely would forever.
In that reflection, for just a fleeting instant, she thought she saw a second figure walking beside her—a trick of light, a double image. Her heart skipped, a flash of deja vu and dread, before she realized it was merely her own reflection refracted. A reminder of how easily reality could split and converge, leaving one to question what is real.
Elena allowed herself a small, sad smile at her nerves. Then she continued down the hallway, alone with her thoughts. Behind her, the stars gleamed through the terminal windows, distant and unknowable. Among them drifted unanswered questions, tangled memories, and the faint hope that somewhere, somehow, both Michaels might yet find their peace.
Whether the Michael who lived on was the original, the copy, or something indefinitely in-between, Elena knew one truth: he was human. He was her crew. And in this vast, cold universe, that was enough of a reality to hold onto.