by A.L. Davidson
“Did you think we’d make it this far?” Ensign Strauss inquired. A shiver overtook him, his body rocked unsteadily in the co-pilot’s seat. He slid down a ways, trying to get some movement into his aching spine from sitting still for so long.
Afraid to move.
Afraid to be seen.
“No, Johann, I didn’t,” Captain Santiago replied.
The universe stretched out before them with an unrelenting reach. Inky blackness surrounded them on all sides. It was terrifying, yet beautiful all at once. Their vessel pressed on steadily with a calm and calculated pacing.
The quiet stillness of it all was something both men had grown accustomed to. The thumps in the corridor no longer shocked them. The dull grey of their uniforms, the tug of artificial gravity against their systems, the not-quite-right feeling of their lungs’ inability to fully fill when they inhaled, all of it was normal. As natural as blinking. They trained for this moment, worked their bodies to bleeding and exhaustion for this moment, bid their families goodbye for this moment. The whole of their lives led to this moment.
Something behind them made a horrendous noise. The sound was like cannon fire against the silence, a silence so akin to death. The ensign swallowed hard.
Captain Santiago exhaled slowly as he fixed himself in his seat. The cockpit was cold. A red light blinked on the dash, the flicker reflected against the lenses of his spectacles. It stung his whiskey-hued eyes but he was scared to blink, to take his gaze off of that persistent red glow. His stomach growled. He no longer paid it any mind. There was nothing he could do to fix it.
Not now.
He couldn’t show weakness. Not while the man at his side still held out hope.
A plume of chilled air formed in front of the younger man’s face, escaping through his pinkish lips and chattering teeth. He was on the verge of tears. It broke the captain’s heart.
“How far do you think we’ll go?” Strauss asked with a quivering tongue.
“Dunno, Johann. Guess we’ll see when we get there, won’t we?” he replied.
“I’m cold, Marcus.”
“Me too.”
Captain Santiago turned his seat to face his trusted second. Johann Strauss shifted his soft blue eyes to face his commanding officer. The captain set his hand against his second’s face, caressed his pale lips with his thumb. His flesh was like ice. He noticed his own nail beds were a shade of purple that was not normal, that his vision was blurred.
“Have I told you that I love you yet, Johann?” he questioned.
Strauss smiled sheepishly, “No, Captain, I can’t say that you have.”
Another thump.
Louder.
Closer.
A scream followed.
Blood pooled beneath the door.
Captain Santiago turned his eyes back to the nav, to the blinking, ominous red light. It moved. He took his ensign’s hand in his own, tugged gently. He needed him in this hellish moment. Needed to feel something warm—if only just. Something human.
Strauss relented, he was too cold not to. He slid from his seat onto his captain’s lap, let his superior’s strong arms wrap him up in a feeble attempt to warm them both. He could feel the tender pounding of the captain’s heart against his cheek; it was slow, steady. A welcomed change from the chaotic noises that haunted the ship behind them.
All for this moment.
It was supposed to be easy. A simple trip to Mercury and back. A monumental excursion for humankind. Everything had been going according to the plan, to the most minuscule nanosecond. The captain wondered where it all went wrong.
How the brave crew under his command all died so quickly upon setting foot on the virgin planet. How the last three days had been spent trapped in the cockpit while their corpses banged on the door, wailing and groaning, with tendrils of alien origin protruding from every orifice. How the corridors became coated in slick, grotesque slime and the engines became overrun with entrails and limbs that had been torn asunder. How his final moments would be spent hurtling through the unknowns of space with his lover in his arms.
How did it all go so wrong? He couldn’t find the energy to theorize.
The control panel was dead. Oxygen and heat were running thin. No food, no blankets or water. It would end in death. They both knew it. At least they were together.
How far would they go, he questioned. A curious inquiry indeed. His ensign—innocent and childlike in his wonder and curiosity—begged to ask the most important inquiry of them all. A belief that somehow, someway, this wasn’t in vain.
How far would they make it before it all ended? He didn’t know.
He simply knew that, of all the ways he could breathe his last, he was glad it would be in the embrace of the one he loved the most. He prayed the cold would kill them first.
Strauss’s body had gone a bit limp in his hold, his blue eyes blinked closed. Santiago gripped tighter and attempted to inhale. It was getting harder to do so.
“I’m scared,” the ensign mumbled quietly, “Scared to close my eyes…”
“I’ll be right here when you open them again,” the captain assured, desperate to instill comfort in the soul of his dying lover.
“Promise me.”
“I swear it.”
The mess of bodies, made visible by the red light on the dash, grew in size. The pooling of blood that slipped under the door coagulated from the low temps. The pounding on the metal walls reverberated through the cockpit, the screams grew louder and the ship titled on its axis a slight ways as the pull of the universe tugged it along.
It would only be a matter of time.
The dash held a menagerie of warnings, signaling the end was nearing, and Captain Santiago softly laid his hand over his ensign’s eyes to shield him from the truth with a tender touch for a moment while he tried to figure out the words he wanted to say.
Oxygen levels at 5%. Internal temperature -12°. Ship off course.
“I love you, Johann,” Santiago repeated. It was all that could be said.
“And I… you, Marcus,” Strauss replied gently.
The captain and his ensign watched through weary eyes as the universe, unknown and untouched, pulled them far away from home into a blanket of blackness and bright stars that seemed so far off. At least the view was beautiful. At least they were together.
He wondered how far they had gone.
A.L. Davidson (she/they) is a disabled, queer author who specializes in cozy genre-blending web novels and tales of haunting horror romance. She writes stories about ghosts, grief, isolation, space exploration, eco-horror, queerness, and the human condition. She currently lives with her cat, Jukebox, in Kansas City. Find her on twitter @Maybmockingbird & Instagram @Maybemockingbird.
