Fiction Fragment Friday
There is so much I could say, but I’m going to save updates for another day. I have plans for the website, plans for submisisons, and overall thoughts on moving forward creatively. I don’t want to take away from this story though.
I started this story out with just the first line and watched the worldbuilding happen around it. I wanted to take you on an emotional journey and I believe I achieved that.
As the scene reached its conclusion, I realized I didn’t have closure. It was a strong start, but it wasn’t actually a flash fiction story. All I needed was that one final paragraph to wrap up my themes.
Did I give you all the answers? No, but that is a different story. This one isn’t about the bigger elements. It is about the emotional journey of one man.
My fingers bit into the flight couch’s armrests. If there is one thing you normally don’t want to hear aboard a spacecraft it is nothing. The engines hum, the air vents blow, and a million other systems become the background that defines life. As I sat there with only a single display for illumination the silence was deafening.
The view through my cockpit window was completely obscured by the largest ship I had ever seen. The most advanced scanner I had access to in that moment was my own eyes. Even with that limitation I could identify hangar bays, turrets larger than my own ship, and railguns I suspected were over a mile long. I wasn’t sure if our entire defense fleet could defeat this single vessel.
I shielded my eyes from the bright light that filled my entire cockpit. It took a few moments to convince myself that I wasn’t dead and let my eyes clear. Outside my cockpit glass only empty space remained. My two hours of hell were finally over.
“Computer, bring all systems online.” A small part of me tried to feel grateful that no one was there to see my moment of stupidity. It was drowned out by the silence reminding me of how alone I was. Without another word, I typed the startup command into the only active console on the ship. The engines spun up providing power to the rest of the ship. Over the next five minutes the rest of the ship systems came online. I’m not sure how long I sat there just listening to the sounds of a functional ship.
“Computer, perform a full scan of the system. Report any anomalies.”
While I waited for the results, I opened the communication system. Where I expected to see logistical beacon traffic I found nothing. Normally I would find screens of transponder codes, but I was the only one transmitting. Echoes of distress signals bounced around the system, but nothing was actively transmitting. The solar system showed no signs of life.
“Full system scan complete,” the ship responded in the emotionless tone only a computer can produce.
I started scrolling through the results. Each screen told a story I did not want to read. No other ships could be detected in the solar system. Where every orbital, station, or asteroid mining platform had been, now there was only debris. Worst of all, the single colonized planet in the system showed signs of intense volcanic activity, tectonic plate shifts, and its moon had been cracked in half.
I broadcast a text only message in hopes that other ships had hidden like I had. In that moment I didn’t trust my own voice not to break. After a moment to regain my composure, I prepared all three of my communication beacons. They were loaded with the scan results, all data gathered just before shutting my systems down, and my eyewitness report. It wasn’t enough, but it was all I had. Each beacon departed along a different vector toward the closest colonized world in that direction. I had no idea where the ship had gone, but if its destination was one of those three solar systems, the message could still reach the other two.
I just sat there staring out into space for a while before a flashing light on my console caught my attention. It was an incoming message. I looked in the queue and saw replies to my text broadcast arriving one after another. Transponders started coming online throughout the system. Tears of joy flowed from my eyes, and I realized that I was laughing. I wasn’t the only ship to hide. I wasn’t alone.