Astronaut

A future astronaut deals with feelings of insignificance and lonliness. (CW for Suicidal Ideation)

Breathe in and out. That’s what they always said.

Breathe in and out and everything would be okay. What a wonderful lie that is. It doesn’t stop their peering eyes or the hum of dull conversation. Being stuck in a tin can every morning was excruciating. It made Brian’s knees itch. He tried to scratch them unsuccessfully. Hard to scratch a knee through half a centimetre of rubberised material. He held his hands back; not wanting to damage his spacesuit.

Everyone surrounding him had a near identical suit; adorned with some badly designed corporate logos that managed to make a shipyard look like a mangled ribcage. Despite the shabby grey of suits everyone seemed lit up in them. Coloured hair and small piercings visible by virtue of everyone standing or sitting with their helmets in their hands. Laughing carelessly in a way that felt pointed to Brian; the only one wearing his helmet, it’s visor opened just a crack to allow what passed for fresh air to flow into the suit.

“Ay-yo Brian see the game last night?” Brian tensed as he felt the rush of annoyance and fear. Why can’t he just leave me alone? The other man who sat down beside Brian had crimson hair and a prominent labret piercing.

“Can’t say I did.” Brian retorted with a bit more frustration than he intended.

“You missed out Bri!” Brian hated when Tawley acted over-familiar with him. They just work together. Why would he care? “There is a repeat on tonight at the bar on Mons Street if you want to come? A Few of us from work are going.” Tawley made an awkward smile and nodded to similar colourful haired and pierced individuals down the other end of the oppressive cabin who repeated Tawley’s awkward smile and waved.

“Nah it’s not for me.” Brian replied curtly, keeping his eyes fixed on his boots. The thought of having to spend an evening with people was terrifying. He would probably hate them and visa versa.

“Well if you change your mind we’ll be there about one moon hour after work.” Tawley gave a shy smile and a wink. There was no such thing as a moon hour. It was one of those little jokes that wasn’t funny and nobody understood but the person who insisted on telling it.

…

A moment of peace. He felt his muscles relax as he stared into space. Dim stars suffocated by emptiness. Eternal nothing; an escape from everything. But, he had a job to do; checking the seams on the freshly laid hull, the same thing every day. But for a moment he could bask in the peace. For a moment nobody could bother him. Nobody could make him feel awkward or out of place. Nobody could ask him to waste his time on them or theirs on him.

He walked along the almost invisible seams sweeping the scanner back and forth. It was a grand project. The first warp vessel capable of ferrying smaller ships from the outer solar system and back within days rather than the month’s long journey it has been for the last hundred years. Beneath his feet was a hope for humanity. The outer solar system would go from small outposts to large cities in a matter of years. The resources would allow the construction of larger, more powerful vessels capable of getting us to Alpha Centauri. Humanity would reach the stars.

But what was the point? All these busy ants working to be part of something they themselves would never get to be part of themselves. Brian’s life wouldn’t change. Not really. He would be stuck scanning seams until his body gave out. Nobody would remember him, nor care. At most he might be in some roster in an archive some 100 years from now before some accident or regime change rendered that file lost and forgotten. If he was very lucky an archivist might remember his name for two seconds after skimming past it. Maybe they would give a small chuckle at the name Brian. A name that went out of vogue decades ago even by the standards of his time.

Brian, lost in thought, forgot to click his heel down fully and nearly slipped off the surface. He shouldn’t normally have needed to put his heel down so far but his boots had been faulty for weeks. He didn’t see the point in getting them fixed. One foot hung on; Magnetised to the surface while the other drifted out to the void. He stayed there for half a minute. Tempted to just let go. To drift off. No more people. No more responsibilities. No more seams. No more being a tick crawling along the surface of a leviathan that wouldn’t even acknowledge him. Alone for a short eternity then oblivion. Nothing. An end to the constant noise.

Brian pulled his leg back to the surface with a strained effort and felt the thud as the boot magnetised properly to the hull. His heart began to calm down. He hadn’t even noticed how strongly it was beating. Not from fear but from elation. A moments rest turned into a waves of serenity.

“You alright Bri?” Tawley’s interruption destroying Brian’s sense of peace. The tenseness returned. “You looked like you had it under control but you had me reaching for your line there!” Brian had forgotten about the line. A tether just in case you do exactly what he did. He reached for the karabiner that joined it to his belt and rubbed it with his gloved fingers absently; rolling the screw lock open then closed.

“Yeah all good Tawley. Don’t worry.” Brian tried his best to sound okay. He at least felt okay. He thought anyway.

“Yeah alright Bri.” He didn’t sound convinced.

…

Brian had spent the night before alone as he always did. Scrolling his tablet, watching video feeds from around the earth. The moon, or Luna as some had started calling it to mimic old sci-fi shows, was just close enough that you could still keep up with what was happening on a day to day basis. Riot, flood, discrimination. Nothing really new but there was always a particular flavour in vogue at any time. He watched people at their worst as he did every night.

Today, however, he was back to scanning. Swing 90 degrees this way then back. Brian fiddled with the karabiner again out of boredom. Open. Close. Open. Close. What if he just let go? He opened the karabiner and held the tether in his hand. He felt his heard beat as his head went calm again. He sighed, fogging up his visor, and went to attach the line back to his belt. But he misjudged where his belt was in the rubberised suit and let the tether go, it listed away from him. He reached out but fumbled the line and it floated away. As he panicked and scrambled to reach the tether his boot malfunctioned and he joined the line on the float.

He had struggled for a moment but settled fast. His helmet’s fans clicked on to try and clear the teardrops lifting away from Brian’s face. He realised that nobody had radioed him yet. It then occurred to him that everyone would be facing away from him. It wouldn’t be long before he would turn into a spec then disappear from view. He would get his wish. To be alone until he couldn’t feel lonely any more.

“Oh f**k I don’t want to die!” Brian screamed to himself, coming to his senses. “Oh god. Oh f**k. Oh f**k.” Shame and embarrassment ran through him like river. How could he be so stupid? They are all going to laugh at him. The idiot who drifted off because he couldn’t be bothered to repair his boots or secure his line. He had to ask for help. He had to reach out or he was going to die; cold and alone.

Brian switched his radio on to a private line. “Tawley?” He sniffed.

There was a beep as Tawley’s radio joined the line. “What’s up Bri? Thanks for the excuse to cut of the work group. If I have to listen to Anderson complain one more time about the chafing I might…” Tawley’s voice drifted off before changing from jovial to focused “Brian. Are you on the float?”

“Yeah” Brian bit back a cough.

“Okay what happened? I need you to breathe in and out. Stay nice and calm and give me whatever details you can. I’m gonna switch my transmission to the group line but only I will be able hear you okay?”

Brian knew it didn’t matter what he said. Tawley was gonna do what he felt was right.

“I didn’t repair my boots and the mag is faulty and I was messing about with my tether and dropped it” Brian felt his voice sounded like a whining child between trying to breathe through the messy snot and tears he tried to rub off on his already saturated foam nose scratcher. “Please don’t tell them”

“Okay Brian. I won’t” His voice was calm and reassuring and, to Brian’s surprise, lacking in judgement. “Alright folks I need everybody to gather at me and I’m going to attach my line to you. There has been a mishap and Brian’s on the float. I’m gonna grab him.” Brian could see folks scurrying alone the hull towards a single point.

“Absolutely not.” Brian’s radio crackled as a new frequency tuned globally. “We are not doing something so risky and stupid because you can’t be bothered to radio management to send a drone out.” The voice was stern and sensible.

“Look Dodger. Bri’s a good worker right? Always shows up. Does a grand job. Never let a bad seam get through right?” Tawley’s voice was somewhere between bargaining and pleading. “And you want to keep him yeh?”

A moment of silence followed Tawley’s plea. It was never said outright but the communication was clear. This f**k up was Brian’s own doing and if they called management then the investigation would find that and Brian wouldn’t come back.

“Fine. Do what the idiot says.” Dodger replied. “If you make this more of a mess, you did this after my protests and hacked my radio so I couldn’t do anything about it. Understood?”

“Understood.” Brian could hear Tawley’s head nod.

Brian listened to the whole exchange with baited breath. He didn’t want to get anyone in trouble but he didn’t want too either.

“So Brian. Why did you take this job?” Tawley was back to his usual jovial tone. “Personally I really liked how this rubber suit shows of my best assets” Brian could feel Tawley’s wink through the suits and half a kilometre of vacuum. Brian short circuited. Why was he asking about this now? He guess he had him trapped now. He got the conversation he always wanted and Brian never did.

“I guess; I always wanted to be an astronaut.” Brian really felt like a child now.

“Well hey childhood dreams achieved yeah. Jesus this is hard to do with these gloves. I’ll be there shortly okay?”

“Hardly. I just stand around scanning seam lines all day. Hardly exploring the stars.”

“Well one” Tawley grunted, clearly focused on something else “F**k you that’s what we all do. And two; It may not be what you imagined but you’re an astronaut!” There was almost elation in his voice. “Every day we work to bring humanity to the stars. How cool is that?”

“You sound like a corporate hiring campaign.” Brian became angry “Nothing we do matters! We’re still gonna be sleeping, eating and shitting until we die! We’re not gonna see those stars. We’re just gonna fade away. Nobody will care if I disappear. What’s the point?” Brian’s tone became defeated.

“Are you kidding me?” Tawley’s voice became a shade of anger he had never heard before. “Me and the team here are risking our arses trying to save you and your job. Nobody cares. F**k you.”

“You know what I mean!” Brian retorted “We don’t matter. Not in the grand scheme of things. We’ll just be forgotten”

“Yeah Probably” Tawley Laughed to Brian’s bafflement “Yeah definitely actually. Who cares.” Brian could see the light’s of Tawley’s helmet coming into focus. Like a star about to explode into his vision.

“How can you laugh?! How can you not care?”

“Because..” Tawley cut off as his full body smacked into Brian and he wrapped his arms around him before tying their suits together. He could have let go at that point but he held Brian in his arms. “It doesn’t matter if some history book cares about me. I’ll be dead why would I care? What matters is my mates, mate. I got friends and family and we all care about each other. We don’t need to make a history book when we have each other.” Tawley’s helmet was face to face with Brian and he could see Tawley’s smile.

“Okay folks reel us back in we’re all good here.” Tawley shouted down the radio. “So there’s this show on tonight we’re all going to. You coming?” Tawley’s voice was softer.

“Okay.” Brian choked and coughed.

“You’re buying the drinks tonight by the way. Least you can do.” Brian could see Tawley’s wink this time.

“No problem.” Brian let out a half laugh.

“And I’m gonna fix your boots. And I’ll be checking them every day. Okay?”

“Okay.” Brian smiled.

Author's Note

Any review welcome I just want to see what works and what doesn't