I watch them as they shuffle into the station's only barroom. The places where they grew up and the cultures that they were raised in could not be more different, but they all have one thing in common. They all came here to make a living.

They have a hard look in their eyes. They're survivors, pioneers. Hardy people who wear scruffy kerchiefs around their heads, lumberjack coats that fray at the seams and jeans that have long ago molded to the form of their legs. Their faces are creased from hard work in the blaze of sunshine.

These are the lifers: the technicians of the station who take their mandated six month break every three years, and then immediately return from Earth for another three years of work here. They've made their lives here, and range in age from early twenties to late fifties. And I've been sent to Asteroid 433 Eros specifically to be their boss.

We couldn't be more different. Some of them barely finished high school but at thirty years old, I just completed my Doctor of Philosophy in Geological Sciences at the University of British Columbia. Unlike them, I don't want to be here. What I really wanted was to do was become a professor: to publish scientific articles, run a lab and field experiments, and maybe teach a few classes.

But in the past few years, there's been a sudden glut of people with advanced degrees in all fields. Gaining a professorial position, let alone tenure, has become all by impossible. My choice was clear. Either sign up for endless postdocs or take a job with Interplanetary Mining, Incorporated. Now I'm their lead Geotechnical Engineer on the second largest near-Earth object in rotation around the sun.

The site is rich in precious ores needed back on Earth. They're used in the manufacturing of everything from consumer goods to the space shuttle that brought me here. Interplanetary has already finished the first phase of mining consisting of removing the large piles of ore and stones from the asteroid's surface. Now they're ready for phase two: underground mining. And that's why they need me.

When I arrived, I was assigned a crew of mine engineers and monitoring technicians. Their job was to map the mining shafts, cataloging the types of rock and amount and type of ores found within. My job is to oversee their operations. And so I have to maintain professional distance. I can't be a part of their gossip or the ghost stories they like to tell about the asteroid.

Karen, a gruff forty-something woman who serves as my administrative assistant, comes lumbering towards me. I'm sitting at a wobbly table on my own as my subordinates file in. For them, this was a weekly ritual: bar night. It's only open once a week to curtail the alcoholism that plagued the station in its early days. At least, that's what Karen had told me. There was nothing to do on Eros 433 back then, she said, so most people would spend every one of their off-duty hours in the bar. Since then, Interplanetary added a shiny new gym, a dry lounge with pool and ping pong tables, a library and a movie screening room complete with massage chairs. But every Friday night from quitting time to five a.m., the bar is packed. It's a dimly lit, wood paneled room that shines from the grease of pub food. At the back, there's a long bar with a brass rail. The rest of the room is crowded with broken chairs and crooked tables. There's a dart board on one wall.

She sits down heavily across from me. "You heard?"

"The new arrival? Yeah, I heard."

"Sure to god we'll miss Aggie, but this one's young and from what I've heard, he's hungry."

"Guess that's good," I agree in the telegraphic speech that everyone here seems to favor.

"None too hard on the eyes I hear."

"Okay."

She smiles at me conspiratorially. "Finally someone for you."

I inwardly groan as she winks. But I get what she's saying. Ever since I arrived a month ago, I've been isolated. Aggie -- a Brazilian man who's real name was Agamemnon and who was the station's IT department, was the only worker on the station who was had the same level of education as me. But he was close to retirement. We didn't have much in common. Add to that the fact that he was constantly solving issues with the AI and data systems, and that I know next to nothing about the workings of computers. Most of the time we'd only exchange a friendly nod of recognition.

But now Aggie was gone for good, back to Earth to enjoy the gobs of money he's accumulated here after working for a couple decades and having nothing to spend it all on. After all, it's not as if there's anything on this rock except the mining station. Now the only person who's not my subordinate at the station hierarchy was Grayson, the station director who is everyone's boss and the corporate representative for Interplanetary. And I don't exactly enjoy talking to him.

She leaves to find her first drink. I fiddle with my glass filled with rum and coke, pretending that I don't see how every one of the mine workers barely notice me on their way to the bar. I watch as the ice cubes slowly melt into the coke, and wonder where I'd be now if I had only stayed on Earth. Two years and eleven months. That's how much longer I'm contractually obliged to stay on this tiny rock spinning around the sun. Where did I get the guts to just leave my life on Earth and come here? I know the answer all too well. It wasn't guts. It was running away from my problems. I raise the glass to my lips, downing the rest of the drink in a single gulp.

"This seat taken?" As I lower the glass, I see that someone's come over to my table. The first thing I notice about him is that he's smiling -- a sideways smile that is immediately disarming. The second thing I realize is that, like everyone here, he has an accent. But I can't place it.

I shake my head and gesture to the empty seat across from me. I don't recognize him from the station. "You must be the new guy," I say.

He places his pint of ale down on the table and another rum and coke in front of me. "Is it that obvious?"

"Other than being a new face, no one else would dare approach me like this. Afraid to get a bad evaluation, I think."

"Even if you were my boss, I couldn't just let you drink alone, could I?"

I find out that his name is Stephan Lavoie and that he grew up outside Paris, in some little town that no one's ever heard of.

"And your name?"

No reason for me to act coy when the IT guy is destined to be my only friend. "It's Willow. Willow Mason. And so what brings you here?" I ask the inevitable question.

"Adventure. Stay for three years; go back to Earth changed by the experience. Isn't that what everyone wants here?"

"Not everyone. Some people stay their whole lives."

"But not you, I think?"

I look down into my drink. I'm not sure how much to tell him.

"You didn't come here for the adventure?"

"It was more of a perfect timing thing."

"What do you mean?"

"Buy me one more drink and I'll tell you?"

I'm true to my word. I tell him the whole story.

Anders and I were over. Long over, only neither of us wanted to admit it. He'd supported me emotionally through school. From the time we were both 18, he'd been there. And I did the same for him, while he went through pre-law and law school. But I'd changed in all that time. He'd changed. And I knew we were headed in different directions.

And then there was the fact that I couldn't find a job on Earth. When I told him I found an off-Earth position, it began the biggest fight that we'd ever had.

"What am I supposed to do?" Anders asked. "While you're up there in space, what am I supposed to do? Wait for you?"

"You could come with me."

"And what? Give up my job?" Anders was on track to become a partner at his firm. Everyone knew that law was still an Earth-bound career. If anyone working on a near-Earth asteroid needed a lawyer, they just went back home.

So when they offered me the job, it seemed like the perfect way to end what had already passed its expiry date. But Anders wasn't going to let me go without a fight. Or at least without getting the last word in. We didn't part on good terms.

"Most people would get a haircut, dye their hair, or get a tattoo to mark the end of a relationship," I explain to Stephan. "That's most people's idea of radically marking a break-up. But not me, that wasn't radical enough for me. I had to leave Earth."

"That's unpleasant."

"Sorry to bring you down."

"It's not that. It's just that it makes me feel sad. I'm sorry that's why you're here."

"No worries. After all, it's not all bad." I try to put a brave face on it. But then he smiles at me, and suddenly I feel as though I might be right. It's not all bad up here.

#

Over the next few months, we start a new habit. Every day at one o'clock p.m., we meet in the stark management lunchroom. At least, 1:00 is what the red LED numbers on wall say. There's not really daytime here, not in the same way as on Earth. The planetoid's rotation around its axis is just over five hours, so that it feels like the sun is forever rising and setting, and then rising and setting again. The near constant glare of them, contrasted against the blackness of space, is irritating during the imposed Earth hours of our workday.

During our lunches together, I find out that Stephan is a computer geek. I also notice that he looks nothing like Anders, who was tall with black hair and long limbs. Stephan, on the other hand, has a compact body with short limbs and stocky muscles. He's got ash blonde hair and small blue eyes that would be called beady on an older man.

One afternoon, while we're lingering over the corporate supplied sandwiches with their limb roast beef, he tells me about his childhood.

"My parents always wanted us to grow up smart, you know?"

"I know what you mean." I remember the atlases that populated my childhood home. I can still remember pulling them down from the shelf and finding a quiet corner where I could pour over them for hours.

"They always put puzzles in front of us, always chess for our game. There were three of us kids, and we were supposed to challenge each other to solve harder and harder puzzles."

"It doesn't sound like much fun."

"Are you kidding? I loved it. My parents -- they were great. They were the ones who made me love puzzles so much. Logic puzzles, word puzzles, math puzzles -- anything. Computers, for me, are the ultimate puzzle. I wouldn't be where I was today if it weren't for them. I can't imagine better parents."

"You think computers are like a puzzle?"

"Definitely. Software engineering is one big word puzzle. Computing programming is a lot like using a language, you know."

"Really?"

"Yeah. And I always loved learning new languages. Figuring out the internal logic of the system, the new terms."

"That's...your full of amazing surprises, aren't you?" It's at that moment that I know that there's something between us.

#

Later, I'm working in my lab. Day is sliding into what passes into evening here. As I get up from bending over a micro splitter, I realize that my workday should have ended hours ago. Sometimes, I get lost in my work. But it's not like it matters. No one is waiting for me to come home.

I'm a woman alone for the first time since I was 18, and I know that I'm scared shitless of being alone and having to get to know myself as an adult. Whenever I return to my tiny sleeping quarters on the station, the hours seemed stretch out. The place is filled with silence.

And so that night, I don't go back to my place. I go to Stephan's pod-like quarters instead. When he invites me in, we both know what's about to happen. At least, I think we do. It's not until we're sitting next to each other on the couch, my hands in his and his lips on mine, that he pulls away.

"I'm not sure we should do this," he says breathlessly.

"Why not? Did you leave someone on Earth?"

"Sort of."

"Sort of? Is she waiting for you?" I knew the feeling of leaving someone behind on Earth. But I could only imagine what it would be like to have that person wait for me to return. No one's waiting for my return after this three-year term.

"I don't know. We didn't exactly leave it on positive or even really...established terms, okay?"

"Okay." I'm beginning to comprehend that he really doesn't have anyone back on Earth. Not in any way that he can rely on. "Well, I guess I can leave, if that's what you want?" I get up off the couch and back towards the door. He watches me go, a deep sadness pouring from his small eyes. But it's not until I've opened his door and escaped into the hall that he says anything.

"No. Wait." He comes and takes my hand. "Stay." He draws me into his quarters, closing the flimsy pocket door behind me.

#

It becomes a soothing habit for me. I spend every night at Stephan's quarters and every lunch break in his company. It means that I can ignore the fact that I'm alone. But we never talk about it. One night, I suddenly feel the urge to define what we are to each other.

I'm lying in his arms with only his thin sheet covering us. The round windows of his quarters have their shutters drawn up, and I can see clearly across the dusty, grey wasteland of the Asteroid. We'll never be able to venture out to explore that landscape.

I turn to look at his face. The sunlight coming through the windows falls in a bright semicircle across his features. He's looking up at the ceiling, his eyes half closed.

"Hey, Stephan?" I venture to break the silence. "This is...it's just an asteroid thing, right? You and me, I mean."

He turns his head towards the window, where there are no clouds to obscure the Milky Way and the cosmos beyond. "Yeah. Sure. If that's what you want."

"But what do you want?"

He smiles. "I guess we'll always have 433."

The statement startles me. I prop myself up on an elbow to get a better look at his expression. "Are you a romantic, Stephan?"

He smiles at me. "Who, me? Nah. Never."

#

I push his words from my mind. I don't think about them again until the next day, when I rush into the staff lunchroom at one o'clock and find it empty.

As I eat alone, I'm terrified that he's becoming attached to me. It's not allowed. This is just a fling -- just a way to get over Anders while I spend my time on this rock.

Forty-five minutes pass, and he still doesn't appear. My heart sinks and I realize that maybe I needed to define what we are for my sake. Maybe I'm the one who's getting attached.

Just then, Bill enters the room. The miners don't usually eat up here -- mostly it's only Stephan and I, since Grayson is always far to busy with work to talk to us. But I'm shaken back to reality by Bill's entrance.

Bill is a middle-aged man with short, dyed-blonde hair. I can tell by his provincial accent that he isn't as educated as Stephan and I, but he's smart enough to work here. This is, after all, where the money is nowadays.

He's handsome and charismatic, with lines around his eyes from working on the sunny surface of the asteroid most of his time. The mineshaft is encapsulated within an air-tight dome, complete with artificial climate and artificial gravity. But the sun always comes blazing through.

"Hey, Will." He calls me by the nickname that most of the technicians favor. I hate it. It's as if they think of me as their own children, who could be in the same situation as me on an asteroid like 1036 Ganymed. That's what I tell myself. Either way, I'm annoyed every time they call me pet names.

"Hey, Bill. How are you?"

"I've been looking for you everywhere. We found something down there." I know what he means by down there. It's the slang around here for the mine.

"What?"

"You just have to see for yourself. Meet me in your lab in a few?"

I throw the rest of my lunch in the garbage and rush to the geological lab. It's not like Bill to get worked up. He's usually such a calm guy. So I know this isn't just one of their ghost stories.

A couple minutes later, he saunters into my lab. The place is a mess, with maps and schematics printed onto plastic sheets covering every surface, including my computer keyboard. 3D printed models of the mining shaft are covered with bits of rock and raw metals. But I'm past caring about how my organized chaos appears to other people.

"Good day so far, dear?"

"Be better if I knew what you needed from me." Usually technicians only came to this part of the site when something had gone wrong. I brace myself for the bad news. As part of my duties here, I'm in charge of my crew's safety.

"It's this." He hands me a large chunk of rock. It's almost round, and about the size of a basketball, with striations of nickel and cobalt ore running through it. It looks like millions of other rocks found on the surface of the asteroid and pulled up from its depths.

"Yeah, so?" I take the stone as he hands it to me. I start to turn it over in my hands and he watches silently, as if waiting for something. I look up at him, waiting for an explanation. But just as I do, something catches my eye.

"What is that?"

"That's why I'm here."

There's a pattern of dots and fine lines that cover one side of the rock completely. The pattern is linear and precise.

"The thing came away from the wall as a chunk," explains Bill. "We found none of it on either side."

As I look at it, I realize that it is too meticulous, too perfect to be natural. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say it was deliberate."

Bill shrugs.

"But that's impossible. This asteroid is millions of years old, and we're the first people to ever mine it. No one could have left it there. Are you sure this isn't some sort of prank?"

"No way, Will. I saw come off the mine wall myself. It was there all along."

"I'll take care of this," I assure him. As he leaves the lab, I realize what to do.

#

I walk into Stephan's lab, with its blue glow of multiple computer screens and the constant hum of their exhaust fans.

"Got something for you," I say. He looks up from a computer screen and seems disheartened to see that it's me.

Before I hand the rock over to him, I decide to have it out. "Can't we talk about this?"

"About what?"

"Us. It was so comfortable, so easy. But you didn't come to lunch today. Has something changed?"

"I just...I feel like I've used you somehow, you know?"

I laugh.

"No, really," he continues. "You were getting over someone. You were vulnerable. And I took advantage of that."

"Well, then, I guess we took advantage of each other, since you were getting over someone as well."

"I guess." He sees the rock in my hands. "What's that?"

"Oh, yeah. This is what I came to talk to you about. Look at it." I show him the striations. "If I didn't know any better, I'd think it was..."

"A language."

"What do you think we should do?"

"Give a couple hours to look at it. I'll get back to you."

#

"You really think I'd give him the only copy?" Stephan asks me as we walk back to my lab. "Come on, you know me better than that."

I'm surprised at him, and raise my eyebrows. He always seems so by the book.

"We should decode it, shouldn't we?" He asks when I say nothing.

The truth is, I'm not sure what we should do. I don't think doing exactly the opposite of what our boss just told us to do is going to help my career.

A few hours after I gave the rock to Stephan, he came back to my lab. "Come on," he called as he passed the door. "We're going to Grayson."

When we arrive at Grayson's office, Stephan takes over explaining the situation. Grayson looks at us with skepticism. He's not much older than me, maybe 35, with a shock of black hair that reminds me too much of Anders. He never talks with any of us outside work. He barely even leaves his office and quarters.

"Look, I'm not sure what it is, but it seems to mean something, you know?"

Grayson forces a smiles. "Another of the miners' ghost stories, is it?"

"No, but --" Stephan starts.

"Look, Stephan, Willow, I'm glad you brought this to my attention. But don't worry about it. I'll file a report with the company. I just need you to leave this be. Understand?" I nod vigorously, fully prepared to do what he says.

"But it's weird, isn't it?" I ask Stephan. He's the only person on the station I can trust, but when he asks if we can decode it, I hesitate.

"Aren't you curious about what it says?" He asks.

"Sure, but --"

"Well, whether you come to help or not, I'm going to find out."

#

"Damnit, I know this," he says. "I know what this is. This means something." It's two in the morning, and the station is silent. But Stephan and I are still awake. We're in his lab as he agonizes over the pattern on the rock.

"Maybe the photo's just not clear enough?" This is my only way to offer support. Everything he's done is far beyond my skill set.

"Wait," he says suddenly. I think I got it. It's numbers."

"What do you mean?"

"Look, humans have many different languages that express meaning, right?"

"Yeah, so?"

"So some of them use the alphabet, or some other method of writing whether it be pictograms, ideograms or hieroglyphs, right?"

"Sure."

"But this seems to be conveying meaning with numbers."

"So what does it say?"

"This part's a diagram." He points to a place on the picture. All I see are striations in the rock. There's Earth, there's us, and that's the distance between the two."

"So what?"

"Hang on a second, the words are coming." He scribbles numerals into a notebook. "Whoa." He looks up at me.

"What is it?"

He scrawls something across the page of his notebook. It's only two words:

Go Back.

The End

~~~

S.A. Wilson is an author of science fiction and fantasy stories who has loved writing fiction since she was nine years old. RoboNomics, her first Wattpad novel, is about humans losing jobs to robots. She also has a teen fantasy novel on Wattpad called the Mage's Apprentice. You can check out these stories and more via her profile - swilson4995.