The hatch door opens, and a stocky astronaut emerges, with a half-eaten sandwich in hand. “You bitches better hurry up before I eat all the food on this shuttle.”
“Josh,” says a slender man on an exercise bike. “We’ll have enough for 3 months if you don’t eat it all.”
Josh responds, “Well, Leo, you told me you don’t fuck with the pimento sandwiches so I can eat your share, right?”
Leo interjects, “I guess so, whatever.” He adds, “Aaron may want a couple, save him some.”
A voice over the intercom interrupts the conversation suddenly, “Have you two prepped the coolant system yet?” “I’ve activated lights out at 22:00, if that’s cool with you guys.”
Josh stares at Leo intensely for a few seconds, then quietly asks, “U sure about this?”
Leo responds quickly, “It’s now or never.”
Josh picks up the intercom mic and says eagerly, “Yea Aaron, we’ve prepped, let’s do this shit.”
Aaron responds over the intercom, “Ok bet, I’ll meet you two in the cryo chamber in around half an hour.”
In the control room, a man of average build stretches and yawns. Two whole weeks. Don’t think I’ve slept that long since the Mars reconnaissance mission back in 89’. If only I could dream about Maria and the kids back home, but that’s impossible since my brain functions will be shut off. Aaron says to himself. He double-checks the autopilot system to make sure its calibrated for their rest. The screen reads, ‘336 hours cryosleep starting 22:00 on 4.22.2097 to 5.9.2097’
About 20 minutes later, Aaron makes his way over to the cryo chamber room. The room is dark and to his surprise the green light on Josh and Leo’s doors is already activated. That means they’re already in the pods. Huh, I guess they couldn’t wait for me. That’s a shame, I wanted to say goodnight.
Aaron walks over to the clothing closet and strips down to his underwear. He notices two other outfits in the closet. Strange, those weren’t the outfits they wore today. He heads over to his pod ready for cryosleep. He slides open the pod door, enters, and inserts the food and waste catheters. Taking a deep breath, he counts down from 100. 49.. 48.. 47.. 46.. The anesthetic has fully kicked in and Aaron falls fast asleep.
Aaron gasps, waking up inside his pod, it feels like only a moment has passed. Goddamn, has it really been two weeks? He removes the catheters and grabs the door handle. A red light flicks on and he opens the door. Disoriented, but feeling rested, he emerges. Well, I’d better get dressed and check on the guys. “Alright time to wake up you fuckers!” he shouts, then chuckles.
The lights on Josh and Leo’s chambers still read green. Damn these guys just slept for two weeks and still want their beauty sleep. He finishes putting on his clothes. “Ready or not here I come!” he shouts. Then grabbing the handle on Leo’s door, he slides it wide open. No one inside. The hell? Aaron moves over to Josh’s pod door, opens it, but like Leo’s nobody is inside. How are the green lights activated but they aren’t inside? Someone would’ve had to override the signaling system. He accesses the intercom near the hatch door.
“Hilarious prank! I’m dying of laughter you two.” He waits for a second, but no response. “Hurry up! Bring the CPR kit in here I can’t breathe.” Dead silence. Why aren’t they responding? “Great job overriding the cryo pod signal systems!” “Leo probably had to help you with that, right Josh?” Still no response.
Aaron angrily opens the cryo chamber hatch door and steps out into the hallway. Alright time to find where they are hiding. Josh must’ve convinced Leo to get in on this shit. No way his dumbass could’ve overridden the signaling systems. It automatically wakes us up at around the same time, so they probably skipped the cryo nap. All this effort for a prank though?
Aaron decides to check around the recreation area, then the dining room. No one there. What time is it? Forgot to check the clock in the cryo chamber. He raises his wrist up, glancing at the screen on his watch. ’22:30’ Hm, if they opted out of the cryo nap, then they must be in their regular chambers right now.
Aaron proceeds to the sleeping quarters. Entering the room, he activates the lights. Huh, looks exactly like it did the day before I took the cryo nap. Is the AC dead? Damn cold in here. Sitting down on the nearest bed, he rests his head on his hand. Man, this is getting weird. Doesn’t feel like a joke they would pull on me.
His eyes glance on a small object lying beside Leo’s bed. Aaron walks over and notices it is a red bottle cap with a hazard sign on it. Strange, I’ve never seen this in here before. As he pockets the cap, a muffled metallic thud echos from down the hallway.
Aaron jolts back. Fuck was that? “Hello?!” Rushing over to his bed he opens the nightstand to acquire his multitool. The sound occurs again. What direction is that coming from? I’d better check the ship camera feeds, maybe they’ll pick up what made that sound. He makes a run for it out of the chambers.
Finally, entering the control room, he walks over to the security camera feeds panel. He watches them for a couple minutes. Hm, nothing out of the ordinary. Damn its cold as shit in here, didn’t they prep the coolant systems? Suddenly, in the distance, he hears that sound once more. Aaron, frantically grabbing his multitool, pulls the knife out. The hell is going on?
Aaron notices his watch thermometer reads ‘7.2 C°’. Whatever is going on here can wait, I’d better go prep the fucking coolant system before my balls freeze off. He checks the camera feeds once more, then runs down to the basement.
Aaron, entering the radiator room, makes his way to the chemical storage unit. He stops in his tracks. Shit, only Leo knows what kind of antifreeze to use. Well, let me think. Ethyl, ethylene something. Browsing the chemicals trying to remember the right antifreeze for the coolant system, his eyes gaze upon a red carton with the cap missing. He looks at the label ‘Ethylene Glycol 1 Gallon’ That’s it! Ethylene Glycol. Aaron reaches down, grasping the carton. He lifts it up with surprising ease. Damn, looks like three fourths of the fluid is missing. Christ, is this even enough? How are we almost out? No way Leo used this much already. This is the first time we’ve needed to prep the coolant system since the trip started.
Aaron’s left hand brushes against his trouser pocket, feeling the red cap. He realizes it matches the Ethylene Glycol carton perfectly. Strange, why was this up in Leo’s room? Suddenly, the sound he heard from before vibrates through the ceiling.
Aaron quickly grabs the carton and walks to the shuttle radiator. This will have to do for now. Pouring the remaining antifreeze into the radiator’s siphon, he empties the carton then closes the siphon lid. He sets the carton down, then pockets the red cap.
The thud echoes through the ceiling again and is immediately accompanied by a loud crash. What in the living shits is going on? Aaron with knife clasped in hand frantically runs up the stairs out of the room. Arriving back in the control room, he hurriedly checks the camera panel again. Through the camera feeds in the second hallway, he notices the restroom hatch door is wide open and swinging off its hinges. A dark figure rushes past the camera at high speed. Jesus, Mary, Joseph, please help me. Damn, I haven’t prayed since my First Communion. Well, if there’s a good time and place for divine intervention, its now.
A faint scream comes from the end of the hallway gradually growing louder. Realizing the scream is moving in his direction Aaron quickly shuts the control room door. Backing up slowly, he turns his head and looks at the camera feed. Oh my god…Who is that…? The feed just outside the control room shows a man covered in layers of shit and sewage material. The man is missing half of his left arm, but the bone was still sticking out of the stump.
Then the man spoke. “Help, please…please I’m gonna die in here.”
At that moment Aaron recognizes the voice. I can’t believe it. Josh? Josh Patel? Or what’s left of him. Aaron grabs the intercom mic and quickly says, “Josh, what the hell happened in here while I was asleep?” The man falls over unconscious.
Aaron rushes over to the hatch and opens it. Christ, that smells horrible. Aaron pinches his nose, preventing himself from smelling the shit covered Josh. He grabs onto Josh’s leg and drags him into the control room. Aaron reaches down to feel Josh’s pulse but there was none. Quickly, running over to the medical closet on the wall, he grabs the CPR kit. Placing the resuscitator mask onto Josh’s mouth, he begins feeding him oxygen. After about 30 seconds Josh wakes, coughing up blood.
“You with me?” says Aaron.
Josh opens his eyelids gradually, “It was” clearing his throat after a heavy cough, “all…all his idea.”
“Leo’s?”
“That motherfucker” cough, “I should’ve never trusted him.”
“Fuck did he do?”
“One…he needed my help one night.”
“Man, you’re scaring me, what do you mean?”
“Christ, we must’ve been down there for two weeks at least…”
“Where?”
“Water.” Josh croaks. “I’ve had to drink my piss for the last two weeks.”
The water tank bubbles as Aaron fills a paper cup to the brim.
Josh’s disgruntled words cut from across the room. “Jesus, I had to eat my fuckin arm.”
Aaron, hands the cup to Josh, and in a couple seconds Josh drains the liquid from the cup. Josh places the cup down, then speaks. “He never told you, but Leo had a terminal illness. Some shit called Helmer’s Myopathy, I think. It weakens your muscles over time. You always saw him on that exercise bike, right?”
“What about it?” asks Aaron.
“Yea the guy thought if he worked out and kept in shape, it might delay the disease. But before we left for this trip, his doctor told him he had a good two months left, and that was best case scenario. Instead of dying on Earth for his family to see, he wanted go out on one last mission.” Josh finishes speaking, then spits out one of his teeth on the ground. He chuckles, “Fuck man, that must’ve been the fifth tooth I loosened trying to hit the hatch button.”
“Where in the fuck were you man?” Aaron asks aggressively.
Josh responds, “Calm down I’ll tell you.” then props himself up against the wall. He notices the red Ethylene Glycol cap has fallen out of Aaron’s pocket onto the floor when he went to get the water.
“Goddamn, that fucker probably siphoned 1500 ml into my mouth when I was in cryosleep. Just enough for a fatal dose.” Josh remarks.
“So that’s where all the antifreeze went?” says Aaron.
Josh takes a deep breath then exhales, “The night before we were supposed to go into cryosleep, he asked for my help fixing an apparent leak in the radiator, so I agreed. When we got down into the radiator room, he asked me to organize the chemicals in the storage unit while he got some tools. But this was just for him to waste time. While I was sorting the chemicals, he was up in the cryo chamber room pouring 3000 mL of that ethylene glycol into our feeding catheter tanks. You must’ve been asleep at that time, right?”
“Yep, I was out of it that night, had one too many tequilas from the kitchen.” Aaron responds.
“Well, if you hadn’t gotten shitfaced drunk maybe you would’ve noticed something was off, but whatever.” “So, after Leo finished setting up our poison, he came down to ask me if I was finished. I said yes and he said the problem could wait until next morning. So, we went back to the sleeping quarters. That next morning, he wakes me up early and said we would have to wait a bit before going into cryo sleep with you, about an hour, but not to tell. The radiator would need some extra fixing time apparently. And it was important we solve the problem before going into cryosleep.” Josh stops to itch his arm stump.
“So where…?” Aaron asks.
Josh interrupts, “Im getting there.” “While you were having breakfast that day, he snuck into the control room and fucked with the pod signaling systems, making it show green on both our tanks.” Josh shakes his head, “He made the system wake us up after about two hours of the cryosleep. Just enough time for all the antifreeze to get in our systems. Then moved me down to the sewage hatch on one of the life support carts. Weak bastard probably couldn’t even carry me.” “Anyways, so he opened the hatch, throws me in, then jumps in himself.”
“So that’s the reason you’re covered in shit, but why in there?” Aaron askes.
“Because” responds Josh, “It would mask the smell of our rotting corpses.”
“Oh,” “Christ he thought of everything didn’t he?” said Aaron. Josh responds, “Yep, next thing I knew after going into the cryosleep is I’m trapped in the sewage tank next to Leo’s rotting corpse. I couldn’t see shit in there, but I could feel the stiffness of his body and knew he had been dead for a while. I guess it had been a few days at that point. God, I was terrified. Still have no clue why he brought me down there with him. I reckon he just wanted to kill off someone else as well to fulfill his sick twisted desires. Just committing suicide would’ve been too easy.”
“Fuckin hell, you certainly have a story to tell once we get back.” Aaron responds.
“Yea, thing is.” Says Josh, turning his head towards Aaron, “You won’t be getting back.”
“Huh?” Aaron says, sounding confused.
Josh lifts his stump and pierces Aaron with his bone. He then removes his arm from Aaron’s gut, causing a large gush of blood.
“Why…why did you…” says Aaron, choking out blood and holding his stomach together.
Josh chuckles, the sound of his laugh ringing through Aarons ears. In a split-second, Aaron feels himself floating outside the shuttle. Then, just as quickly as he was outside the ship, he begins surging backwards towards Europa, the moon him and his crew were orbiting. Eventually the shuttle is nothing but a small dot in the distance. Unable to turn around but glancing backwards, he braces for impact on the icy celestial body. Suddenly, he feels freezing water all around him. Opening his eyes, he makes out a faint light from above the water’s surface. He begins swimming towards its, but the pain caused by his stomach makes too much movement impossible. I guess, this is how it ends then. Aaron gives up and floating there, begins to slip into unconsciousness. The light that is above the water’s surface begins to brighten. Aarons feels his body pulling towards it. Eventually, its brightness encapsulates his entire field of vision. Then suddenly, standing before him, is a fully healed Josh with arm outstretched.
“Did you see it?” Josh asks.
The words pierce through Aaron’s body like the vibrations from large subwoofers.
Aaron gasps, realizing he is still in his cryo pod and has just woken up. Was that a dream? Impossible. My brain should’ve been inactive during cryosleep. He grabs the handle and slides the door open. Emerging from the pod he stretches and yawns. Glancing over at his crewmates pods he notices the light is still green. What if it was more than a dream?