A cosmonaut suit, a relic of Project AUTONOMÍA. Its shoulder patch reads, 'The Stars Are Ours, 77'.

A cosmonaut suit, a relic of Project AUTONOMÍA. Its shoulder patch reads, 'The Stars Are Ours, 77'.

Is this real?

If it is, then it's one of the few things for sale here that isn't a knock-off Luzian electronic, disc, or toy.

Check the price tag.

Five thousand sol.

No wonder it's still here, people with that kind of money don't shop in the Bazaar.

What happened in 77?

A classroom with a buffed blue floor and white fibreboard tiling. The teacher rolls a square little television in on a cart. The girls, in their final year of gymnasium, gather round.

The floor was cool against my legs.

The camera follows the white column up, up, and then it jerks, or cuts out. When the picture returns, there's just a white cloud sprouting new white limbs, the rocket nowhere to be seen.

For a long moment, none of the students can tell what's happening. Then, one by one, they realise.

A faulty seal, a minor propellant leak, next thing you know four cosmonauts are splattered across the face of god.

Except none of that happened. The explosion was staged.

A scale model stuffed with fireworks, fixed to a wire on a secret backlot and broadcast across the Developed World.

And we watched it live on TV.

You and millions of schoolchildren the world over.

What happened after?

Expensive, fruitless, the failure of Project AUTONOMÍA promptly tanks the Portofiran economy. Supreme Leader Nestor flees into his third exile not long after.

As for the Bazaar, it's saturated with surplus equipment, memorabilia, and replicas. This suit is most likely the latter.

People don't like being reminded of expensive, fiery death.

You once heard that the pressure in space can turn your whole body inside out, but that might be submarines.

You find the coolest stuff around here.

Few of it genuine, but does it matter if the feeling's real?

Just another fake.

In a world full of them.

The rocket exploded. I remember.

The end of Project AUTONOMÍA engulfing, with it, Portofiro's dreams of stars.

I could barely see the TV from where I was sitting.

You try to remember something of astronomical significance happening in the year 77, but all that comes to mind is that was the year you were asked to leave ballet.

An eating disorder dressed up as high art. No thanks.

Same with oboe, and watercolours, and photography.

None of this has anything to do with space, though.

I had potential, just undeveloped.

You told your mother you left on your own. She said she was embarrassed to raise such a terrible liar.

Wasn't there something, about a rocket, maybe...

That's an eye-level high kick. You could only manage tit-level.

Something... space... 77... astronaut... space...

Whatever. Space isn't real.

You heard it here first.

This suit is cursed.

Or perhaps it's you who's cursed.

Did anything especially bad happen in 77? That was the year your mother caught you stealing her cigarettes.

It was a mistake to get between a woman and her ciggies.

You pat your pocket involuntarily, the presence of a pack is comforting.

Either way, it says nothing about the origins of this mysterious space suit.

You pat your pocket involuntarily, the absence of the familiar pack is mildly discouraging.

It was a mistake for her to leave them on the counter.

Leave.

Your focus widens back to the Bazaar.