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“Grace, you awake, question?”
I come to consciousness slowly, the bright lights of the Hail Mary making me want to sleep forever. But, that’s not how it goes. There’s too much to do. And with only two of us, I can’t take a sick day.
Even when I feel this crumby.
I sit up slowly, carefully, as not to make the dizziness worse. I haven’t opened my eyes yet, they’re crusty with eye gunk and sleep. I take as deep of a breath I can, and attempt to stretch. Holy cow, it hurts. I’m not surprised that it does, I’ve come to expect it. But this level of pain is new.
I finally muster the strength to open my eyes. The light is so intense, it makes me want to slam them shut again. It’s like waking up from the coma again. But worse. The world spins around me until I blink a few times, and I take stock of my body. My joints are sore, like they were left out to dry in the sun. They crack and crunch when I swing my legs over the side of the bunk. My muscles ache, and I look down and see some new bruises running along my arms. I swallow, my mouth dry, and my teeth hurt.
All typical for this point in the journey.
With a croaky voice, I face where I heard Rocky speak from, and tell him “Yep, awake. Computer, water”. The nanny bot arms swing down with a pouch of water, and I sip on it slowly. I want to drink it as fast as possible, but I’m not stupid. I know we are running out. The journey is getting close to ending, and we have supplies to make water, but it’s incredibly dangerous. Especially when I’m, well, starving.
Ok I’m not actually starved. I’ve been drinking the coma slurry for years now, and it hasn’t gotten any better tasting. Mixing it with Taumoeba has been the best compromise, getting my nutrients as far as possible. But I’m already starting to feel the effects of severe vitamin deficiency. I know, based on the cut I got from picking up a shattered microscope lense. It happened two months ago, and yet I have to redress it daily. It just isn’t healing like it’s supposed to.
“-ace. Grace, question?” Oh yeah, Rocky is talking to me. I space out a lot these days, but it helps lose track of time. I look up to him and nod, showing him I’m paying attention. “We need check Taumoeba farms.” Our morning tradition to make sure our hard work hasn’t been in vain. I methodically check every farm, double checking their vitality by putting a slide of Astrophage into their enclosures, and sure enough, an hour later they’ve been gobbled up by hungry Taomoeba.
After my checks, I lay down. I do a lot of that. Rocky tells me the components of the ship I’ve passed into his side that he has been working on, but I don’t really hear much. I trust his engineering more than I trust myself. He’s darn good at what he does. I hope the rest of the Eridians agree and treat him like the hero he is. “We will be heroes, not just me” He warbles confidently. He always juts out his carapace whenever we bring up Erid and getting to his home. I’m glad he’s feeling proud, it makes it worth it. But oh, I said that out loud. Sometimes my brain is so exhausted it doesn’t remember to filter things. Oh well, Rocky doesn’t judge. He worries, by god does he worry. But he doesn’t think badly of me. I smile back at him and nod, words failing to match his happiness.
It’s hard to feel happy. That requires energy. Energy which I don’t really have. I can perform science after a meal and with some water, and I can do maintenance just fine under Rocky’s supervision. But his food has lasted him this long. Mine hasn’t. I drink the rest of my water pouch, and it shakes with my hand. I’m glad it isn’t a glass because water would be everywhere. And the fact that we’re in zero g, come on Grace.
Rocky is still watching me. He does that when he thinks I’m not looking. But I can feel it. He usually works on something while he watches. But right now I think he’s in one of his moods again. “You okay, Grace, question?” He asks, his voice an entire octave higher than normal. Oh boy, he’s really nervous.
I nod and wave a hand at him. “I’ll be fine, Rocky. The scientists of your planet will help you said, right? So once we get in contact with them, we can get me fixed, good as new”. I know I’m lying to him, and myself. Optimism is easier than facing the hard reality that I’m probably going to die. Erid’S biological sciences are nowhere near similar to Earth. They have completely different everything. The chance that they can synthesize the vitamins and nutrients that I need is slim to none. But the one time I tried bringing that up to Rocky, he shut that pity party down quickly with a stomp of a foot and a kindly as possible lecture on not giving up. I kind of have to listen to him, he was alone in an alien star system for so many years that he has seniority on this matter.
His little notes of sorrow and fear sound like a foreboding symphony. Like his vocal cords (they’re not human vocal cords, they have sacks that they press against their- anyways, it’s quite similar to a whale, actually) are quivering as he speaks. “You no die. No question.” I admire his confidence.
I turn over in my bunk and mutter “okay, Rocky. I’m going to have a nap. You watch?”
“Yes, I observe, close close close.”
“Goodnight, Rocky”
“Goodnight, Grace”
We don’t talk about how it’s not nearly time for REM sleep, or how quickly I pass out. I guess Scurvy and Beriberi will do that to you.