1 1 - The Rocket

If I had to describe the last four weeks in one word, I would use the word lonely. There were more than a thousand people in this tin can with me but I couldn't speak to any of them. It was my turn to be awake whilst the remainder of the crew lay in stasis, ignorant of anything beyond their own minds. Four weeks ago, my stasis pod was opened by some disgruntled gentleman who muttered to himself a lot. I never did quite catch his name as he took my place in the stasis pod and fell instantly into a comatose state. There had been no handover, no explanation as to what exactly I was meant to be doing for the next twelve months. So, for the past month I had wandered around almost aimlessly, checking the stasis pod vital signs, monitoring the blinking lights on the consoles and just trying to keep busy. Today though, as the rocket hurtled through the void, I sat beside a very particular stasis pod. This one may look like the rest from the outside, but within the cryogenic chamber laid an angel. She was so beautiful with her long, golden hair draped over one shoulder. Her hands held one another in the centre of her chest; they looked pale next to the navy-blue flight suit that covered her torso. I had visited this pod at least every second or third day, I longed for her smile, I missed the way she kissed me, and I ached to inhale her scent once more. I couldn't wait for the rocket to reach its destination and for my wife and me to start our new life together on the fringes of explored space. I found myself wondering when it would be her turn to be awake for a year. Had she already had her turn? If she did, did she think of me the way I think of her now? Lunch was the usual, nutrient paste; it had almost zero taste but apparently contained everything the body needed.

After I finished eating and had put my bowl and spoon into the cleaning unit, I retreated to the forward observation deck. I spent a lot of time on that deck, either watching the trillions of stars streaking past the window or reading whatever I could get my hands on. Today I had wandered around the rocket searching for something to keep me occupied, there was a beautiful ornate chess set on one of the tables in the observation deck. That infuriated me. Who puts a chess set here when there's only ever one person awake at a time? Was this some sort of joke? I continued my search for something to do. Eventually I found a copy of the rockets flight crew manual. It was a very dry read but it did give me a greater understanding of the giant, metal cylinder that I currently called home. For a while now I had wondered why the walkways and rooms within the rocket matched the shape of the outer cylinder, I always found it quite irksome that even the living areas reminded me that I was in a big tin can, I read about how the outer structure of the rocket rotated to generate normal Earth gravity within the inner cylinder. I looked up from the manual for a moment to take in the view when I saw something, a flashing red light in the glass. I rose slowly from my seat and leaned closer to the observation window to see what was causing the flashing light. My heart raced as my mind attempted to decipher what I was seeing. A wave of embarrassment washed over me as I realised that the light wasn't outside at all but a reflection. I turned and looked to where the red flash was emanating from. The screen of a console in the room across the hall was pulsing. I moved to the console and stared at the screen blankly before I realised what the computer was trying to tell me. I dropped the flight crew manual and sprinted back towards cryogenics.

Once in the cryo bay I brought up the warning that had caught my eye, the stasis pod failure was coming from pod 375. Without hesitation, I ran as fast as I could, the pods on the walls on either side of me almost became a blur, pod 132, pod 168, pod 247, until finally I reached pod number 375. I didn't even have time to look at who was in it; I straight away pulled open the manual access panel and began the fluid purge procedure. Time dragged on as I waited, if the purge took much longer the poor person within the pod would drown in cryo fluid. After what felt like an eternity, the stasis pod hissed and opened slightly. I immediately slid my fingers in the crack and heaved. It was cold, my fingers went numb. With every ounce of my strength, I pulled until the pod swung open to reveal a young woman inside. I reached into the stasis pod and pulled her out onto the floor.

She was still unconscious so I began pushing on her chest and exhaling into her mouth in an attempt to revive her. My muscles started to ache and my breathing became laboured. I checked her pulse, nothing. I began to pound on her chest harder and harder until I heard a noise stir within her torso. I leaned over her until my ear was right above her mouth, listening for the sound of her lungs filling with air. Suddenly, she coughed and cool, viscous fluid launched from behind her lips and clung to my face. She was alive. I couldn't believe it at first, in my experience it was very rare for someone to survive a cryogenics malfunction. I leaned back against the now empty stasis pod and gave the girl room to catch her breath. Her dark, shoulder length hair hung over her face, wet and matted. She coughed for a while to retch the last of the cryo fluid from her lungs and stomach. Shaking, the girl turned her head to look at me, her eyes were bloodshot and her flesh was deathly pale. As she opened her mouth, a strained, rattling noise emanated from within.

"Try not to speak just yet," I placed a comforting hand on her shoulder, "you may have minor freezer burn in your oesophagus."

She looked around the cryo bay to gather her bearings and come to terms with her situation before struggling to her feet, using the empty stasis pod to support her weight. There was a small first aid kit on the wall between the two stasis pods opposite the one I had just opened, I removed the aluminium thermal blanket and wrapped it around her. She struggled to find her voice to thank me, again I told her to avoid speaking for a while. She needed to get warm and dry; the metallic blanket would not suffice in the long term. I manoeuvred her arm around my shoulder and helped her out of cryogenics and towards the living quarters. As she showered, I warmed up some nutrient paste for her to eat, I felt bad that I had no hot chocolate or tea to offer her. When she emerged from the steam filled bathroom with a fresh navy-blue flight suit on, I offered her the bowl of nutrient paste, "it tastes like soggy cardboard, but it'll make you feel better. It's also the only thing we have."

This time her voice was able to form the words, "thank you."

Although the words were still quite rattly, it was a good indication that the chance of freezer burn was quite low. Having ones throat burned with cryo-grade coolant was a sure-fire way of losing ones voice permanently, the fact that her voice was recovering this quickly meant that she would most likely recover from the ordeal completely.

We sat together in the observation deck in near silence for a while before I decided to speak, "I'm sorry, I haven't introduced myself, I'm Jacob."

"I'm Katie, nice to meet you." Her voice still sounded raspy but was much better than before. "Thank you so much for saving me; I don't even know what happened, one minute I was stepping into my stasis pod back on Earth and the next minute I was lying on the floor coughing gunk into your face. Sorry about that, by the way."

"Its fine," I honestly didn't care about copping regurgitated fluid to the face, it was easy to clean up and was a small price to pay to save Katie's life.

Katie looked to be deep in thought for a moment, "how long have I been asleep?"

"I don't know, I was woken up for my duty period just a month ago. The guy before me didn't say a thing." I sat there for a moment before realising. "Oh my, that reminds me, I have to get to work on repairing that stasis pod."

"Why the rush?" Katie didn't seem to understand the predicament we were now in.

"Because, this thing," I gestured to the rocket we currently occupied, "was designed to have one stasis pod too few to ensure that no one decided to just go back to sleep during their duty year, which means that one of us will be without a pod."

Katie chewed on that information for a moment before responding with, "and you know how to fix it?"

I smiled knowingly. "Once I figure out what caused the malfunction it shouldn't be too difficult, I'm a cryo technician."

"Well that's lucky." Katie's lips curled into a smile. "Let me know if I can be of any help, I don't know what I can do though."

"Well what do you do for a living," I inquired.

"I handle internal affairs investigations."

"So you're a cop?"

Katie laughed at that. "Kind of, I'm sort of a data analyst."

I rose to my feet. "Well, I'm going to make a start on that pod."

Katie followed, I figured that she must have felt vulnerable after being so close to dying and she probably didn't want to be alone. I spent the rest of the afternoon running diagnostics tests on the pod and inspecting various components and wiring looms. Every so often, Katie would hand me a tool or ask a random question. I couldn't believe that just a few hours ago, I was completely prepared to spend the next eleven months in solitude, but by some miracle I now had someone to speak to.

"You know," Katie said, shifting slightly closer to me. "I still can't believe that this thing failed whilst a cryo tech was awake. Could you imagine if it happened when a cook or someone was on duty? Although, in saying that, a cook would at least be able to organise some better food for me."

I couldn't help but laugh at that last part. "I doubt even the catering staff could make anything worth tasting out of nutrient paste."

As dinner time approached, I returned the tools to the cabinet and closed the panel on the stasis pod. Katie and I made our way to the dining area. It was similar to a sort of mess hall but with only one small square, metal table with bench-like seats on two sides. After dispensing some nutrient paste into two plastic bowls, I sat at the table opposite Katie. Before we began to eat, Katie grasped my hands and closed her eyes. She didn't say anything aloud but I knew she was praying, thanking whichever god or gods she believed in for not letting her die. I was not a religious man but I could not help but feel that there was something grander at work here, the odds that she actually survived a cryo failure were astronomical, not to mention the fact that the malfunction occurred when someone qualified to fix it was on duty. After dinner, we retreated back to the observation deck and sat on the semi-comfortable sofa chairs, just watching the stars streak past. I had done this hundreds of times over the past four weeks but this time was different, somehow the stars looked far more beautiful when I had someone to share them with. Even just sitting in silence together was enough to keep me occupied. Another hour passed and I heard Katie inhale deeply, I turned to see her with her hand in front of her mouth mid yawn. I rose and suggested that we get some sleep; after all, it had been a big day for both of us. Out of habit I made my way to the sleeping area with Katie in tow. As I stepped through the doorway, I realised a big hole in my plan to go to bed. There was only one bed.

"Damn, I forgot about that," I said, staring at the queen size bed. "You sleep here; I'll go curl up in a sofa chair back on the observation deck."

Katie caught my arm as I went to leave. "Don't be silly, you need a good rest just as much as I do. We are both adults and can sleep beside each other without any fuss."

I was quite embarrassed by what Katie had just said; it made me feel immature, like a teenager. We climbed into the bed, side by side, and both stared at the ceiling for a while, silence filled the bedroom; the only noise was the soft hum of the computers in the next room. My eyes were stinging after having such a stressful day; darkness crept around the border of my vision as sleep took hold of me. The last thing I remembered hearing before slipping into a deep slumber was Katie's voice. "Thank you."

The next few days passed rather quickly, between attempting to repair the stasis pod and spending my downtime with Katie, the hours flew by, much like the stars that I so often watched from the observation deck. The days turned to weeks and Katie and I were quickly becoming very close friends, I would have even considered her my best friend. Never before had I felt this close to anyone, my wife not included. On one occasion, about two months after I opened Katie's stasis pod, as I was making some repairs, my new housemate ran into cryogenics with a very excited expression on her face.

"Jake, guess what."

"I don't have to finish this pod because we have reached our destination?" I asked jokingly.

"Don't be ridiculous." Katie giggled. "I was going through the security data and found the access code for the personal effects storage."

"What?" I exclaimed.

"Yeah," she said, sounding very pleased with herself. "Look what I got out of my storage locker."

She drew her arms out from behind her back to reveal a wine bottle.

"I hope you like red." She smiled with glee.

That evening we sat in the sofa chairs on the observation deck and enjoyed sipping at the sweet red wine, we laughed and joked with each other most of the night. The wine was a rather fruity blend; the taste was almost euphoric after living on nothing but tasteless nutrient paste for three months. In no time at all we had almost drained the bottle, I rose, shakily from my sofa chair and staggered to Katie to request a refill. As I leaned closer to her to allow the wine bottle in her hand to reach my wine glass, our lips touched. It was in that moment that my uneventful, mediocre life began to tumble out of control. My head was spinning. I didn't know if it was because of Katie or the wine. I don't know why I didn't pull away but I remained there, lips pressed up against Katie's soft, pink lips. My heart seemed to flutter, I felt weightless, and I had to tap my foot to make sure that the gravity hadn't vanished.

I awoke the a few hours later, wrapped in the soft rug on the floor of the observation deck with Katie in my arms. Our flight suits were crumpled on the floor, next to one of the sofa chairs. I felt completely enveloped in Katie's sweet scent. I sat up and made my way to the bathroom, my head was pounding like it had just spent the last few hours being squeezed by a nutcracker. As I washed my hands in the sink and stared at my face in the mirror, my stomach dropped, I felt weak. What had I done? My beautiful wife laid in stasis just a few rooms away, how could I have done this? My knuckles were white as paper as my fingers gripped the edge of the sink. I almost jumped when Katie's warm, soft fingers touched my back and ran their way to the front of my body. She laid her head my back, between my shoulder blades. My heart felt as though it was being torn in two, I loved my wife, more than anything, but my feelings for Katie were also incredibly intense. I didn't know what to do, how would I tell Katie that last night was a mistake? How would I tell my poor wife once she was out of cryo? I decided to say nothing until I knew what to say. Together, Katie and I showered and dressed into fresh, navy blue flight-suits.

Over the next few days I tried to focus almost completely on my repairs to the stasis pod. Katie's sunny disposition was almost infuriating as I secretly wrangled with my own anxiety. She would dance about the rocket humming or whistling, she would sneak up behind me and kiss the back of my neck, she even found a way to play music over the intercom. On the plus side, the stasis pod was almost fully functional again; the issue had been in the coolant transfer pump which had caused a backlog of cryo fluid to build up inside the pod. I had cleaned and serviced the transfer pump and had tested it extensively to ensure that it wouldn't fail again once Katie was inside the pod, I was just getting ready to position the pump back inside the maintenance panel when Katie's usually chirpy voice emanated from the intercom, sounding quite distressed. "Jake, I need you to come to operations, we are off course."

My stomach dropped once again. Without hesitation, I sprinted to the operations deck where I found Katie sitting in the command chair, staring at the computer screen.

"What happened?" I moved in to look at the screen.

Katie looked at me with glassy eyes. "The computer says that the star we just passed close to was a lot larger than it was supposed to be."

"What do you mean?" my mind struggled to comprehend the situation.

"Apparently, it was in the later stages of its life and has expanded quicker than expected; its gravitational pull has dragged us off course."

My heart was racing, like a galloping horse. "We have to correct the rockets trajectory, there's no guarantee that we would find a habitable planet in this direction, not to mention the fact our supplies would run dry at some point as well."

"Well where's the steering controls?" Katie searched the control console frantically. "We've got to steer the ship back on course before we get too far out."

"That's the problem," I said. "This isn't a ship, it's a rocket."

"So? How do we steer this thing?"

"We can't." Reading all those technical manuals had finally paid off. "Like I said, it's a rocket. This thing was launched in a particular direction from Earth, it wasn't designed to manoeuvre. We are basically in a gigantic bullet."

"So, what do we do?" Katie's face was now filled with fear.

I squeezed my head with my hands, trying to find a solution to the problem.

"I have and idea." I ran out of the room without an explanation, I could only hope that my plan worked. Katie's footfalls could be heard tailing me down the corridor. I reached the crossroads that lead to the port and starboard airlocks. "Go left and make sure you either tie down or removed any loose items you find."

"Why's that?" Katie called out.

"Just do it. I'll explain later." I sprinted down the right hand corridor and found a couple of crates, just inside the portside airlock. There was no tie down straps to be found so I dragged the crates, one at a time, up the corridor until I could separate them from the airlock via an inner door. As I returned to the crossroads, Katie was waiting for me.

"There was nothing down that way. I have a feeling I know what you're doing now so I closed the inner door part way up." She still looked panic stricken.

"Let's head back up to operations, hopefully when I open the airlock, the decompression will be enough to get us back on course."

Together, we raced back up to operations and I sat in the command chair before tapping on the controls to open the portside airlock. For what felt like forever, nothing happened on the screen. With bated breath we waited and stared at the computer generated image of the rocket on the screen. Eventually, the image shifted and we were back on course, I opened the starboard airlock to prevent us overshooting, then closed both sides once I was satisfied that we were heading in the correct direction.

"That was brilliant." Katie allowed her jaw to drop.

The red flash on the screen subsided, replaced with a solid green background with text scrawling across the screen. The text read, 'CORRECT TRAJECTORY ESTABLISHED. ESTIMATED TIME TO DESTINATION: 53 DAYS'

I could not contain the excitement that flooded my brain when I saw that. A stupid looking smile spread its way across my face.

Katie kissed my cheek and instantly the feeling of elation turned to dread when I realised that in only fifty-three days I would be facing my wife. It was a no brainer that I would tell her the truth, I loved her and she deserved better than being lied to. Knowing that I was the final person on duty now made sense; a cryo tech would be needed to awaken the crew just before we reached our destination. Suddenly, a thought hit me like a truck, if I was last, then how come Katie had not yet been awake since Earth?

The hair on the back of my neck stood on end as I mulled over this thought. Was there something to be worried about? Was there some nefarious purpose behind those pretty blue eyes? Or was I just being paranoid? Perhaps there were more passengers than necessary for twelve month rotations on duty.

"So if we're less than two months away from our new home, I won't have to go back to sleep, right?" Katie wore her usual, cute smile.

After my little panic attack, I would have preferred her to go back into stasis, just to be sure. Thankfully, I noticed a small blinking tab in the lower, left hand corner of the screen, I tapped it and another warning displayed, 'WARNING. LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEM DEGRADED.'

"Unfortunately, you still do," I said, pointing to the warning, "It looks like the decompression we used to manoeuvre the rocket put undue stress on the life support system. It seems that the two of us awake would not survive more than a couple of weeks; however the damaged life support system could easily provide one of us with breathable air until we reach our destination."

"Well," Katie placed her hands on her hips. "Why do I have to be the one to go back to sleep?"

"Because," I said matter-of-factly. "When we arrive, a cryo tech will be needed to safely awaken the crew."

Katie stood beside me in silence for a few moments before asking. "Have I done something wrong?"

"What? No."

"Well, you've been very distant since the night we-"

"Stop, you haven't done anything, I have." No time like the present, I thought.

"I get it, you're married, but I thought we had something." Tears welled in her eyes.

I exhaled deeply. "Katie, I love my wife. What happened between us was in the heat of the moment, it can't happen again."

Without another word, Katie stormed out of the room. I decided that there was nothing to do but finish the repairs on Katie's stasis pod. Slowly, I made my way towards cryogenics, thinking of my wife and of Katie. As I rounded the bend and stepped into the cryo bay, I noticed that Katie was also there, standing over a stasis pod.

"Katie," I yelled. "Step away from my wife's pod."

She looked at me with a wicked grin. I started running, as fast as I could. Katie was tapping on the stasis pods touchscreen display. Stricken with panic, I continued to run. It didn't take long to close on Katie and push her away from the pod. The diagnostics screen displayed a confirmation request. Katie had attempted to purge the stasis pod, jettisoning it into the void. I cancelled the purge and returned the pod to its normal operation. Katie lay sprawled across the floor, slowly rising onto her elbows. That was when I noticed the screwdriver in her hand. The pain hit me hard and suddenly, I looked down to see a quickly expanding, crimson, patch of moisture on my thigh. I had been stabbed. Katie laughed and retreated from cryogenics. I knew what I needed to do now. Staggering, I made my way straight to stasis pod 375, collapsed onto my knees and placed the coolant transfer pump into its bracket within the pod. I fastened the four bolts and attached the hoses to the pump. Once it was installed, I ran a diagnostic on the stasis pod. The name on the top left hand corner of the screen caught my eye; I had never thought to look at it before. It read 'D. L. PHILLIPS'.

So, Katie was up to something, if that was even her real name. I pressed a clean rag against my wound and taped it to my thigh with the roll of tape from the toolbox. Grasping the largest spanner I could find in the toolbox, I limped out of cryogenics and peered into each room, one by one, searching for the mystery woman. As I leaned to peer into the observation deck, I found Katie standing with her back to me.

"What are you going to do, Jacob?" she sniggered, "you won't kill me will you? It isn't in your nature, you forget that I know you, I probably know you better than your own wife, even."

I remained silent, with every drop of blood that seeped into the rag on my thigh, I grew weaker and speaking would just use valuable energy. I decided to take a step towards Katie, it was agony and I half wished that I could just die, but I refused to allow this woman to harm anyone in cryo, especially my wife. I focussed on taking each step, one at a time until I was within arm's reach of Katie. I raised the spanner, poised to strike the back of her head. Before I had the chance to swing my weapon, Katie twisted and I dropped to the floor to avoid the tip of the screwdriver. In the blink of an eye, she was on top of me, I caught her arm before the blade of the screwdriver found its way into my skull. With my good leg, I kicked my attacker and she rolled to the side, I struggled to my knees and struck her across the head with the large spanner. Katie was out cold on the floor of the observation deck; it was quite ironic that it ended here. I dragged her unconscious body back to cryogenics, the journey down the corridor was hell, lifting her into the stasis pod was even worse. Eventually, Katie was back inside pod 375, I initiated the stasis procedure and went to walk away, but the pod did not close. A warning appeared on the display, 'WARNING: STASIS CHAMBER CALIBRATED FOR ONE OCCUPANT. TWO LIFEFORMS PRESENT IN STASIS CHAMBER'.

Once again, my stomach dropped, Katie was carrying my child. I recalibrated the stasis pod and activated it. My only solace was that I had fifty-three days to figure out what to do, hopefully, I would discover who Katie was, why she had stowed aboard the rocket and what had become of D. L. Phillips. Fifty-three days of solitude inside this tin can as it rocketed towards my new home.