Outside the International Space Station, I hook my white EMU boots beneath two metal rails and stretch, eliciting a sharp crack from my ribs. This EVA is taking forever. Alone, my partner replaced by a stupid, silent robot. The AIM (Artificially “Intelligent” Manipulator) looms over me like a goddamn death trap, its laser welder extended. Twice now, I’ve caught it twitching in my peripheral vision. Like that! It did it again!
When I radio this damning evidence of robotic duplicity to Kasia, my mission commander, she says, “The AIM is not twitching, Sophia.”
“It twitched!” I crouch over a golf ball-sized hole in the Unity module, fitting a sheet of aluminum for the AIM to weld later. Kasia should be out here with me, sneakily holding my hand. “Maybe the robot is trying to communicate its evil manifesto? Those little jerks, side to side, long and short…”
“God, do not start speaking Morse code again. Just because it’s a binary language doesn’t mean computers understand—”
“Bep bep,” I say, “bep beep, beep beep…”
Kasia groans her adorable trill of a groan. “The way you can switch your brain into Morse-mode is creepy, nerd. You’re forcing me to carry around a reference sheet. And what is saying, I am onto you, supposed to accomplish? Are you trying to intimidate a robot?”
I’d learned Morse after watching Interstellar. (Just in case, as an astronaut, I too must communicate across the vastness of space.) Mostly, I use it to tease Kasia. We’ve made plans for me to visit her family in Poland once we’re back on Earth.
The planet floats above me, blue and white and luminous. Beyond it, the cosmos sparkles through infinity. God, I’ll miss it up here.
I glance at the robotic arm. Maybe it’s not so bad… I’m no Luddite. But relying on new AI feels unwise. Ceding control to a device incapable of communication, incapable of love. All anthropomorphism aside, it’s a lump of steel and code. I’m out here alone, all human contact indirect, fallible, impersonal. If something happened and I had to say goodbye to Kasia, could she truly hear my heart over the radio?
“…arm will remain inert until tomorrow’s scheduled weld,” she continues. “I powered down the AIM’s system after running its rehearsal.”
Flashing movement beside me. Not a twitch—an arc, slicing. Bright wound in space. The welding tip crashes into my back. No no no
Kasia screams over the radio.
The AIM thrashes, trying to dislodge me. Its AI brain must’ve started the weld protocol early. But I’m still crouched over the hole. An obstacle. The robot slashes at my backpack, blasting its laser. Overriding the approved power specifications, cutting.
Severed, my tether whips past my helmet.
Above me, the robotic arm swings back. A giant golf club, and I’m the white ball with writhing arms and legs. The AIM’s metal head smashes into my side, shattering ribs and knocking me away from the ISS.
Ass over teakettle, I tumble into space.
Blue black, blue black.
Strobing, disorienting. I’m somewhere ahead of the space station.
Blue black, blue black.
My zero-g training kicks in, and I counter-rotate my arms to cut the spin. Every movement ignites fire in my stomach. Something broken, deep and wrong. But I stabilize, looking back at the ISS as it slowly recedes.
My EVA suit lights are off. I try activating my emergency SAFER jetpack. Nonfunctional. Probably destroyed by the welder.
I’m going to die.
There’s no way to mount a rescue out here. Not by Kasia. Not by NASA. But I’ll still be able to speak to them, thank God.
“Kasia…” Is that my voice, so small and shattered?
No response.
“Houston?”
No response.
“Kasia, please…”
No response.
It’s the dead radio that ruins me. The disconnect, the silence, the unwanted solitude.
My heart pounds, thundering in the absence. My stomach twists like a sponge, wringing bile into my throat, burning. I sob, and the spasm hits my stomach like a sledgehammer. My consciousness slips
silent
drifting
space
alone
separate
minutes
grinding
emptiness, absolute quiet. No movement. Even the AIM’s arm has stopped, finished with the weld that cost me everything. Stupid robot… just trying to do its job, but at the wrong time. Faulty programming, incapable of real antagonism. I’m by myself in this godforsaken void.
I extend my hand toward the distant space station. Futile gesture, futile pain. All I love is out of reach. Kasia. The other astronauts aboard the ISS. Earth with its eight billion people. Gone. Life, humanity. May as well not exist. Might never have existed. Closing around me, darkness suffocating
disconnect
forsaken
unbearable
silenced
to die
hot, too damn hot. Acrid, stinking body odor. Sweat clings to my face, salt burns my eyes. Hard to breathe. Lightheaded, faint. Temperature regulator, destroyed. I’m boiling alive. Frog in a pot, baby abandoned in a bath too hot. Forgotten, helpless, cooking.
I’m the cliché “everyone is alone in death,” taken to extremes.
But no. There. A twitch of movement on the ISS hull. Not the stupid golf club. A white-suited figure, tiny. Flash, flash. Drawing my spiraled focus. Flash, flash. An EVA light. Rhythmic. Patterned. Communication
Morse
Kasia
Kasia
My brain ignites, switching into creepy Morse-mode.
“Listen up, nerd.”
Kasia Kasia Kasia!
“You aren’t alone.”
Blessed woman. She doesn’t equivocate, doesn’t try to pass me false hope. We both know I’m going to die. That’s not why she’s come. It’s her presence, simple. Her little flashes, sparkling. A cocoon of light, holding me. I feel her hand in mine. I smell her lavender lotion. I feel her cheek against my skin, her lips parting to speak. I revel in the electric way she whispers my name.
“Sophia”
Tension flows out of me, fading. Resentment about the stupid robot, dissolving. I surrender, an instinct old as time. Dying, my body quiets. Floating in beautiful unfeeling.
“I love you.”
Silent words like peace enfolding. My eyes close.
Maybe everyone is alone in death
but it matters to be loved in dying.
