This is Two Zero Seven Actual.
I've got work to do before I set off for Earth, and sadly a
lot of it takes precedence over these updates. The scrubbers in the ship I'm
using needed replacing and it's not a small job, as then all the inhibitors
needed upgrading. I've got a starport full of abandoned ships to choose from
and cannibalise. I'm lucky I'm an engineer.
So. The Salvation is gone.
I remember much about the following few hours. I remember
the sinking feeling, then that cold sharp shock of unreality, like I was stuck
in a bad dream and that what was happening wasn't actually happening, and that
I'd stepped out of my body for a few moments while the drama continued, and
that I'd slowly slip back in when everything had worked out.
Then there was the cold terror, then the thought that the
ship had moved and I simply couldn't see it, so I spent a few minutes with my
face jammed against the cockpit window trying to see around me, until I
realised I was the actual pilot of the fucking ship and that I could swing it
around. So I did, quite a few times.
Then, as I flew around Charon and then Pluto, I spent an
hour screaming down the channels, knowing full well that the Salvation had
no doubt already accelerated beyond the speed of my small communications
capability and would never hear me. Then I spent a short while punching the
shit out of my chair, punching until my knuckles split and the blood smeared
the fabric, when I realised that I should have got on the comms straight away,
but that it wouldn't have mattered because once the singularity engine is fired
there's no stopping it.
But at least I could have said goodbye to my wife, and told
my son how much his daddy loved him and that he was going to be okay, even
though hearing his voice would have made me tear my hair out as all I would
have wanted to do was hold him, even briefly.
At least I would have had that.
Then there was an entire day of sitting in the chair and
staring out at the deep dark black, and realising that I was the only one here
because nobody had answered my transmissions, even though I'd thrown the
channel wide and broadcast my torn soul to the stars.
I managed to get inside the Charon support base quite
easily. They hadn't locked it, or left a light on, or even set up any
security. I remember a briefing, long ago, saying that everything would be left
open and usable in case anyone needed it, or any traveller, human or otherwise,
came across the remnants of our civilisation. The stations would be powered by
their fusion cores for decades to come.
So that was good news, at least.
I spent the next few days in a kind of stupor, constantly
checking the comms for any messages in case my signal had made it, and
wandering the huge eight-mile station, looking for nothing. There was plenty of
freeze-dried food and supplements, enough to last me a year or so, and for
something to do I gathered as many supplies as I thought I'd need.
But what does a man do when he's been left in a solar system
stripped of humankind? I couldn't think of the next step, I couldn't see the
next avenue to take. It all seemed pointless, without my wife to share it with
or my son to experience it with.
Of course, there were a few questions tumbling through my
mind, namely why it was I was sent to release a feedpipe when there was
obviously nothing wrong with it. How did I get forgotten about? How did they
not realise I hadn't returned to the ship? Admin error? A very human mistake?
Could someone have done it on purpose?
