“Atropos 99 to Mission Control, do you read me? Over.” Ira’s monotonous voice fed over the shuttle’s intercom once more. A stagnant stream of words that had lost their meaning after too many hours. How his voice hadn’t failed him yet was a miracle – or a curse.
Ira had barely left the intercom since we lost contact, but he still hadn’t registered a Mayday message. He still had hope. Usually, I could drown out the incessant, repetitive drone of his words until it was only a hum in the background, a reprieve from the deafening silence of space. Today, not so much.
“Come on,” I sighed, resting my chin on my hands, “Let’s play a game instead. If they come back online, they’ll reach out to us.”
Ira knew I was right, but that didn’t mean he liked it. He stretched his long, lanky arms behind his head, and I heard his shoulders pop a few times. He spun around to face me in his chair. His expression was calm, but a crackling undercurrent of annoyance radiated from him.
“What are we playing this time?” He sighed, and raised his eyebrows in question to humour me.
“Space doesn’t exist.” I grinned mischievously back at him.
Ira rolled his eyes exasperatedly. He knew this one. “You know we’re still exploring space, right? But fine, fine. Tell me why space doesn’t exist?”
I laughed softly. Playing these games was the only method I had found to keep my mind off of the inevitable. I shook away the dark thoughts threatening to plague the quiet peace and focused on the game. “Space, and everything existing outside of Earth, is just a conspiracy,” I started, gesticulating like a mad-woman, “created by the government so that we won’t question what’s really going on. It’s all a distraction.”
“What, pray-tell, is going on then?” Ira smirked in spite of himself.
“W-well,” I hurried to put my thoughts together, not wanting to lose grasp of this little moment of happiness, “The world is dying. People need hope that something else is out there that we can inhabit. The truth is that there is nothing else. We will ruin our planet, inevitably. People live with false hope that ‘astronauts’,” I said the word with air quotations as though they weren’t real and rolled my eyes, “will find us a new world to take over and destroy.” I finished in a flurry of hands and an awkward bow.
Ira chuckled, “Well, that got dark. Tell me what you really think, Dayna.” He rolled his eyes sarcastically, uncrossing his legs and folding his arms against himself.
“Yeah, not the direction I thought I was going in either, honestly. But, that’s the fun of the game.” I scratched my head and laughed softly. “Your turn next time.”
Ira gave me a heavy pointed look but gave in anyway. “My theory will blow you away, just you wait.” He stood up and stretched his body out, grimacing as his back gave way to several clunks and cracks. Something he should have expected after hours of sitting in his chair at the intercom.
Then came the hardest part of my day. Ira left to take a shower and generally clean up, and I was stuck alone with my thoughts. I fidgeted and picked at the arms of my chair, plucking at the worn leather. I couldn’t do this, I just couldn’t. I couldn’t be alone.
I stood and began rapidly pacing the tight area of the flight deck. My heart was racing and sweat began to pour from my cold skin. I needed to focus on something before I fainted. I closed my eyes and remembered.
I hadn’t left much behind when I chose the path of an astronaut. I’d never married, never had kids. Hell, I was the only child of a single mother and had a dead-beat dad somewhere across the other side of the country – it was safer for everyone if I was alone. Damaged goods, as they would say. Ma worked full time until she died thanks to the big C word. I’d already started my study, originally in aero-space engineering, I thought I’d be able to support the two of us when I finished. I’d only had to add a couple classes to get amongst the stars. My own house wasn’t a home anymore, and neither was my planet. Both were broken, just like me.
The study was all kind of a blur of failed units and make-up tests. It’s not important. The only thing that mattered was getting to the Space Administration. The hours I spent flying jets were the only break I got from the crappy hand reality had dealt me.
The shower started running, Ira would still be a while.
That’s how I met Ira. My superior at the S.A. He was given the task of training me to be an astronaut, much to his dismay. It took us all of about five minutes to realise we were polar opposites in every way. I remembered his face after he asked me what drove me to get here. No one had ever looked at me with such an appalled expression. He didn’t understand.
“You spent years of your life studying to get to this point… just to escape your shitty life?” He’d squeaked out, his tanned complexion taking on the appearance of a crimson boil. I’d thought he might explode, instead, he just turned on his heel and left.
Later, I discovered that he’d asked to be assigned to someone else, anyone else. His superior’s had made it clear that wasn’t an option. When I saw him next he was statuesque. Treating me as a job to be completed and nothing more. The only thing he really ever said to me was ‘stop scratching your head’, a nasty habit I’d picked up in times of stress. He kept this cold façade up for the better part of a year.
That was until he found out we were expected to go on a voyage together in about six months’ time.
It took me until then to fully understand why he couldn’t put up with me. Why whenever he looked at me there was disappointment on his face and a furrow in his dense, dark brows. I finally figured it out when even his dislike for me didn’t outweigh his excitement for the voyage, and his fear for it too.
He was in the gym, sitting on the floor with his forehead resting on his knuckles. Twenty minutes ago, he’d been patted on the back by one of the superior’s. Tears of joy were falling from the corners of his eyes. I’d been nodding and half smiling to the person who’d revealed the news to me, but I’d been more focused on trying to figure out what this meant to Ira.
“What’s up?” Was the ‘thoughtful and cunning’ way I’d tried to start a conversation with him. I’d almost turned around and left right then out of embarrassment.
Ira had raised his head to meet my eyes as I moved to sit in front of him. “What’s up?” He repeated numbly.
“Yeah…” I started, moving my fingers to scratch my head but catching myself before I did it, “You look troubled.” I averted my gaze, unable to look him directly in the eye. I picked at the threadbare ends on my jeans instead.
Ira sighed and tilted his head back to look at the ceiling. “You wouldn’t understand.” He mumbled.
I crossed my arms, squaring my jaw defiantly, “Try me.”
Ira brought his head back to face me and something changed in his expression, I’m still not entirely sure of what. He rested his arms across his lap. “I’ve worked for over fifteen years to get to this point. Did you know that?”
I nodded gently, at some point over the year I’d heard it mentioned.
Ira closed his eyes. “Don’t get the wrong idea, it’s not that I’m upset you’re here…It’s not that at all. After school, I was so excited to finally get here. After two more years, I got to go on my first voyage for three months. It was, and still is, the greatest experience in my life as an astronaut. But…” He cleared his throat and blinked rapidly, holding back the tears that threatened to fall.
I loosened up, trying to decide whether or not to pat him on the shoulder, when he continued.
“But once I got home, I met Lil.” He met my eyes with his sad, dark ones that implored me to understand.
And I did. Lil, or Lillian, was Ira’s wife. I’d met her once or twice at work events. Leaving loved ones was part of the job, but it was still difficult for those who had people to love. “You’re going to miss her.” I said, a personal thought that had crept its way into reality.
Ira laughed then, and I whipped my head around to look him in the eyes. “Miss her? Of course. Don’t you have someone to miss?” When I didn’t answer, he laughed again, a little more hysterically, “That’s not what worries me, Dayna. I-I… She’s pregnant.” His head fell into his hands as sobs wracked his body.
That was it. We were going into orbit in six months and he would miss the birth of his child. He would miss its first step, laugh, word. His baby wouldn’t learn ‘dada’ first, and it wouldn’t know who dada was or even what it really meant. Ira wouldn’t know, either. He worked so hard to get here, because he wanted to be here, it was his dream, his ambition. Me? It was an excuse, and escape. He had so much to live for, to work for, to dream for.
In the midst of my spiral, he went on, “She wants me to go, you know?” He wiped at his eyes, his voice shaking. “I’m expected to go by S.A too. I want to go. This is my dream, this life. But I never expected to find this kind of love, or to build this kind of family.” He sighed, “I know you think this pain you carry is going to be your whole life… but it’s not.”
That was when I realised we weren’t so different, after all.
“Dayna!?”
Hearing my name pulled me out of my own head and whisked me back into reality, arms wrapped around my knees on the floor of the flight deck. I took a deep breath as though I was surfacing from being underwater too long. I looked up, meeting Ira’s fear-filled eyes.
“Hey, what’s wrong?” His expression transitioned from frightened to concerned in a heartbeat. It made him a great astronaut; he could switch from emotional to controlled in a moment. He reached over and wiped a stray tear from my cheek. When did I start crying?
I quickly rubbed at my eyes and cleared the wetness from my cheeks. Breathe, Dayna, breathe. “I’m so sorry.” I blubbered.
Ira’s thick eyebrows moved together in puzzlement. “For what?”
“Tha-That you’re here wi-with me.” I finally managed to get out past the sob wracking my body.
Ira’s expression relaxed into something warmer, “It’s not your fault, Dayna.”
I shook my head, “That’s n-not,” I took another deep breath and wiped the mass of snot, drool, and tears that were merging together into an alien creature on my face, “That’s not the point. You’re stuck up here with me, in the middle of space with barely any supplies left. It’s been three-hundred and seventy-six days, Ira. We were meant to be here for two-hundred and sixty. We’re low on fuel, we’re low on supplies, the tech goes down all the time. Who knows!? Maybe the A.G.S will go next! You should be with them. Not doomed with me.” Tears sprung from my eyes once more, and I fought to control my emotions, to channel my inner Ira and pave in the cracks before the flood broke through.
Ira said nothing and held out a hand to me, I grabbed it and he hauled me to my feet. Not releasing, he dragged me to the private quarters of the shuttle. “Lay down.” He directed, pointing at my bed.
I did as he said and crawled onto it, pulling my pillow into my arms. Ira kicked off his boots and flopped onto the space next to me. I raised my head to look at him. “You must miss them so much.” I whispered, voice barely audible over the rumbling and groaning of the craft.
Ira’s Adam’s apple bobbed slightly, but he ignored the question. “There’s no one I’d rather be doomed with, Dayna. And if we lose the artificial gravity, there’s no one I’d rather float aimlessly around with, either.” He smiled gently and crossed his arms behind his head to prop himself up.
I half laughed and moved to scratch my head. Ira swatted my hand away.
“You told me earlier that it was my turn to play the game, right?” He looked down at me, seriously.
“Yeah,” My voice scraped out.
Ira was thoughtful for a moment, “Space doesn’t exist,” He started, taking a moment to think out his response, “because it can’t. Because even if you’re a playful storyteller, and I’m a man of logic and fact, I still want to believe you. You are my antithesis, Dayna. And yet, here we are.” He reached over and grabbed my hand softly, “You miss no one, I miss them with all my heart. So, I can’t believe in black and white anymore, because our situation is a shade of grey where we just don’t know what’s going to happen.”
“Ira –” I cut in.
“I’m not finished.” He said, shutting me up, “Our differences might mean there are lightyears between us,” He smiled sadly, “but it’s okay… because space doesn’t exist.”