"Hey ash, where's Cap?"
"Where do you think?" Ashley tilts her head to look at me, an exasperated expression on her face.
goddamn it.
She constructed this monstrosity based on her homeworld's vessels. It's not an asset in deep space, it's a death trap. One I had to navigate now.
I walk to the cargo bay and sure enough, local gravity's off. I hook on my maghands and drift out towards the starboard wall. Latched on, one hand after the other, I climb towards the roof of the cargo bay and into the conspicuously out of place hole and hallway that's been riveted in. It's against UTA regulations to free float inside a moving ship, but I know Cap well enough to know she doesn't care. Besides, if UTA is ever aboard our vessel, it probably means we're in custody anyways.
I climb for about a minute when her sobs become audible. Another minute and I'm in her shoddily constructed "crow's nest." She had to have heard me, the maghands slam into the metal bulkheads with each "step." She continues to sob quietly.
The room was about 3 feet in diameter and made of poorly riveted sheet metal. Along the walls were holo displays showing the void just beyond. It's terrifying but also somewhat soothing. since I know she wasn't going to do it, I made sure that during construction, i ran every structural scan I could to make sure the construction was safe, then I ran them again. The ship's auxiliary bulkhead system would be quick to shut any breach that occurs, so i was never too worried about it. We rarely make orbit around any planet since most of our... "clients" are travelling the void themselves, but it's still a liability. Sometimes, people shoot back.
I see her lying on the ground, curled up in a ball. She has her suit's maglocks holding her in place.
"cap? Are you alright?"
"Go away," she sobs.
"Can I just sit here with you? quietly?"
she whimpers. I sit in the silent darkness with her for quite awhile.
after about 20 minutes, I hear her voice. Barely a whisper.
"it's so different..."
"What do you mean?"
"it's so...dead."
She curled up even tighter.
"back home, we would see seabirds or whales or dolphins, there was life. The stars didn't move and we would find out way by them. They were always there, my companions. Comforting. It never occurred to me that they were dead. Out here, the only living things are us and the crawlers."
I put a hand on her, reassuringly.
"I built this crow's nest, modelled after the ships of my home, but there's nothing out here to see. The ship's sensors takes care of its job. It's just a fancy observation platform with nothing to observe. Just the stars. Only, they move and they die. Out here, we see it happening in real time. Back home, the crawlers hadn't even began feeding on our sky. My friends. My companions. With each jump they flee. With each jump, another gets snuffed out."
I don't know what to say back. She's right. I embrace her for the rest of the night cycle. The stars may not be the stable ground she hopes for, but maybe I can be.
