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Jonny walked down the corridor, his steps burdened by an invisible force. His face was passive, and where there was usually manic glee, there was only a hint of curiosity–someone was trying to enter through the airlocks, and he was going to kill them. He had been nearly alone on the Aurora for decades and he was going to make sure it stayed that way. His lips turning down in a small frown, he corrected himself. He had been nearly alone on the ship formerly known as the Aurora for decades.
He grabbed his pistol from the holster at his waist with a perfunctory motion and pulled a lever on the panel adjacent to him, allowing the stowaway to enter the airlock. Waiting a few moments, he opened the door and shot a single bullet into the stowaway’s chest. They crumpled to the ground in a mess of frost and–Jonny sucked in a panicked breath–silver blood. Nastya Rasputina lay dead on the metal floor in front of him, mercury pooling beneath her, glinting in the fluorescent light. He stood there in mute shock, his heart skipping a beat. It had done that quite a lot in the past half-century, and Jonny knew that it was the universe pulling him towards an inevitable–no matter how often he denied it–end.
Despite Nastya’s return, the ship did not respond. Jonny speculated that it had completely forgotten the woman who had once been its love. In that moment, he knew that Nastya had been right to go, if not when she did, then soon after. The universe was calling for all of the mechanisms to join the dark, and there was no point in fighting the call any longer. He stood there, his arm still outstretched as it had been when he fired the shot. Eventually, Nastya stirred on the ground, slowly rolling into a sitting position.
“Hello Jonny,” she said. She sounded utterly exhausted.
Jonny lowered his arm with shaky slowness, re-holstering his gun. Nastya had been gone for centuries, and though he had missed her sorely and wished for her return for the majority of that time, he had finally readied himself to join her in the dark. And now that his mechanism had begun to slow, he knew that he could not stay with her much longer.
“They’re gone, you know,” Jonny finally mumbled, turning his head towards the rest of the ship. “Ashes and Tim and Marius and Brian and Ivy. It’s just me and Raph now. She’s piloting.”
“They will be back.” Nastya’s eyes widened in nearly-imperceivable worry and confusion. “I came back and they will too.”
“No, Nastya.” Jonny did not meet her gaze, but instead looked straight past her, his eyes fixed on the closed airlock. “They’re dead.”
Nastya’s eyes really widened this time as she leaned back, shifting her weight to her hands. She knew that despite the crew’s claims–and numerous examples–of immortality, death would claim all of them eventually, and she often found herself surprised that it never found her as she floated through the void.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” she said with measured sincerity.
The two did not move for several minutes, Jonny appearing lost, his eyes glazed over, and Nastya appearing deep in thought and worry. Finally, she pushed herself to her feet and stepped closer to Jonny. He turned his gaze to her and just sighed. Grimacing at the quicksilver staining her coat, she reached for Jonny’s hand and led him into the ship, passing through the empty kitchen, walking through the silent halls that were now completely foreign to Nastya, and finally reaching the living quarters. All of the doors, save two, were locked and closed and all facetious (and at times explicit) signs and messages were removed. Though not as strong as it was in the void, Nastya could feel the loneliness seep into her bones.
Nastya sat next to Jonny on his bed, gazing fondly at the mess that cluttered the floor. She could pick out several guns that had formerly belonged to Tim, some books that Jonny had obviously never returned to the library, and a book of matches that he must have stolen from Ashes at some point. With all of these remnants of the crew haunting Jonny’s room, Nastya could only wonder how long ago they left–no, died. She figured that their diaspora was gradual, one dying after the other in varying intervals, but morbid curiosity made her wonder who died first.
Returning to a nearly empty ship–one that she no longer recognized nor did it recognize her–Nastya found that she was no longer truly present. She was a ghost of the past–a ghost of Jonny’s past, reminding him of days long long ago with the crew of the Aurora. Though she missed her crewmates sorely and grieved for their deaths, she had been missing them for centuries upon centuries now, and though she had finally decided to return to the ship, she had expected everything to be different. She could not say that the current situation surprised her. Just by sitting next to Jonny, she could tell that he would be leaving soon, and though she was yet to see Raphaella again, she figured she was in a similar position.
“Do you have a destination in mind?” Nastya squeezed Jonny’s hand, relishing the feeling of his warm hand in her cold one.
“Raph’s set course for some shitty, backwater planet,” he said, some typical grit returning to his voice. “I’m gonna find the first bar I see and drink the place clean.”
“How long until we are planetside?”
“A few more days.” Jonny’s breath caught for one uncomfortable moment. “We’re almost there.”
“Would you like to get ready for bed?” Nastya did not know what time it was, but she could tell that Jonny was tired, and she certainly was as well.
He nodded and pulled off his boots, making his way across the room to his dresser. “I wouldn’t go into the engine room if I were you,” he said, the hint of a chuckle seeping into his words. “We’ve been trying to maintain this ship for the past 400 years and it’s a fucking mess down there.”
“Well, I guess I will just have to stay here then.” Nastya shrugged off her coat, throwing it into the corner and making a mental note to wash it the next day. “Throw me some pajamas.”
Jonny rifled through a drawer, brandishing an old set of pajamas that may have even belonged to Nastya originally and tossed them to her. As she changed in to them, she figured that they definitely did belong to her at some point, given that they weren’t too small. Nastya climbed into the bed, throwing an arm over Jonny.
“Could you turn off the lights?” Jonny asked the ship, staring at the lamp above his bed.
“Yes, of course!” The ship replied in a voice that Nastya could not recognize.
Rolling closer to Jonny, she listened carefully to his breathing, attempting futilely to ignore how the ship did not sing to her.
Jonny hurried off the ship as soon as it landed with a surprising urgency, holding nothing but his gun and a deck of cards. Raphaella opted to remain on the ship, favoring experimenting in her lab over going planetside. Though Nastya could never read her as well as she could read Jonny, she could tell that Raphaella was just as forlorn. She rarely missed an opportunity to observe a foreign planet.
Nastya grabbed her gun and a portable computer before she left, figuring she would be spending an awful lot of time in whatever bar Jonny decided to terrorize and she had no intention to get caught up in any bar fights.
The planet was exactly how Jonny described it: shitty and backwater. The streets were covered in litter and the houses were dilapidated, displaying more holes than windows. The bar was not difficult to find, though, as it was the only fully intact building in the town they landed in, testament to the town’s priorities.
Jonny led her in, quickly making himself at home up front and ordering a bottle of the strongest alcohol they offered. The bar reeked of tobacco smoke, cheap liquor, and the stench of numerous unwashed patrons. The patrons yelled at each other, each louder than the last in order to get their point through over the din of the bar. Jonny seemed to revel in the chaos. For the first time since Nastya returned, she saw a glint of glee in his eyes. He was obviously calculating how good the violence would be if he started a bar fight.
Nastya made herself at home in the corner, ordering a vodka and sipping it slowly as she researched the planet on her computer. As she expected, there was nothing special about the planet, save its history of violence and civil unrest.
She watched as Jonny interacted with the patrons, goading them on with pointed insults and drunken banter. She kept her hand on her gun, knowing that a full fight would break out at any moment. And of course, one did. A tall woman jumped up from her chair and swung her fist at someone who had tossed an insult at her. Quickly, everyone in the bar, save the bartender was part of the fray, fists and furniture flying. Nastya did not flinch when someone fired a shot; her instinct told her it was Jonny, but everyone there was so violent, she could not be entirely sure. Gunshots rang out, replacing the dull thud of blows, but Nastya paid no mind.
She paid no mind until she heard a familiar cackle response to a gunshot. She looked up from her screen to see Jonny shot clean through the heart, his eyes filled with indescribable joy. His body crumpled to the floor, falling behind a table, safe from trampling feet. Though Nastya waited a few moments to see if Jonny would get back up, she could sense that he had found his end. And as five minutes passed, then ten, then fifteen, and Jonny had not gotten up, she knew that he was truly gone.
The fight had ended, and more bodies were on the floor than standing. Tucking her computer away, Nastya waded through the corpses and found Jonny in the corner. She pressed a kiss to his forehead and with gentle fingers, closed his eyes. She knew that he would not want to be taken from where he fell, and so she left him in the bar, surrounded by the dead, his body still and his blood going cold.
Nastya entered the ship, making her way down to the lab to find Raphaella. Raphaella stood, hunched over a table, experimenting with some organic substance. She looked up briefly as Nastya entered, offering her a small smile before turning back to her work.
“Hello, Raphaella,” Nastya greeted, leaning in the doorway.
“Hello,” Raphaella said, her hands busy with a scalpel. “How did you like the planet?”
“It was quite awful.” Nastya took in a long breath. “Jonny’s dead.”
Raphaella placed her scalpel down with care, her eyes clouded with sadness. “I guess that means it is finally time for me to do my last experiment.”
“Which is?”
“I am going to fly the ship into a black hole,” she announced, though her wings did not flap behind her as they usually did. “Are you okay with me taking the ship?”
Nastya’s face turned into a melancholy smile. “Yes, I think she would have liked to be part of such an important discovery. Take care of her, Raphaella.”
“I’m flying the ship into a black hole, Nastya. But up until that point, I will make sure the ship is in peak condition. You aren’t coming, are you?”
“No, I think I will stay on this planet for a little while longer. My end will come eventually.” Nastya turned and left Raphaella’s lab. Before she exited the ship, she pressed a kiss to the door in front of the ramp, and for a moment, Nastya could swear that the Aurora hummed.