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It was perhaps a lucky thing that sound had the habit of not being heard through the vacuum of space. Had it chosen to, however, the position of an otherwise easily unnoticeable hunk of space wreckage would have been easily tracked by the hoarse screams echoing from within. The thin yet still present atmosphere within the spacesuit inside said shuttle did allow all screams and noise to be bounced back at their creator, who reveled in the sound of his own voice.
"AND I THINK IT'S GONNA BE A LONG LONG TIME, TILL TOUCHDOWN BRINGS ME ROUND AGAIN TO FIND," screamed Doug Eiffel into the more microphone-esque end of a hunk of scrap metal in his gloved hand. "I'M NOT THE MAN THEY THINK I AM AT ALL, OH NO, NO NO..." He raised his free hand for a dramatic gesture. "I'M A ROCKETMAN. ROCKET MAAAAAAN- BURNIN OUT THE SPACE OF BABYLON!"
"I d-d-on't think those are the correct lyrics," mused a quieter voice.
Eiffel caught his breath, smiling widely and staring up at the ceiling. "It's not about the lyrics on the page, baby, it's the lyrics you feel in your heart. David Bowie, did I ever tell you about him? Man, that dude could sing. I hope he's doing better than I am."
"I think most people are doing better than you are current-ntly."
"I'm not dead yet, am I?" asked Eiffel. His smile faltered as he added "Don't answer that."
"You asked," said the voice.
"I do a lot of things," countered Eiffel. There was momentary silence in response, and the former communications officer, current space drifter and karaoke extraordinaire was about to count that as a win on his side when the voice picked up again.
"We all thi-thi-think you're dead, you know."
Eiffel had no answer for this. He turned the piece of wreckage he'd been using as a microphone over and over in his gloved hands. Part of him wanted to strip off his gloves and be able to feel it with his own fingers instead of the muted pressure through the thick protective material, but the suit was the last defense he had left. With no systems working, there was no way to safely tell if there was any air outside of the suit, or if there'd been a gas leak or a pressure drop or anything else that could kill him as soon as he removed his protective shell.
"And even if we didn't, there would be no way t-to rescue you," continued the voice, as if she'd grown impatient at being ignored. "You're too far out and we don't have-"
"I'm well acquainted with the hopelessness of my situation, thanks," Eiffel reached up to pinch the bridge of his nose, only to have his glove bump into the glass of his helmet. He sighed and leaned backwards into the wall, using a foot to brace himself against the former console so he could feel the pressure against his back. It was comforting, feeling something real outside of his suit. It told him he wasn't yet dead, wasn't yet fully lost. The rest of the universe still existed, despite him being cut off from it.
"Everybody's given up on you," said the voice.
"I know," said Eiffel.
"Even me."
"I know," said Eiffel.
"Even Minkowski."
Eiffel tried for "I know" and ended up with a choking sob. He covered his visor with his hands, unsure if he was blocking himself from seeing the wreckage outside or blocking his surroundings from seeing the wreckage inside.
"You shou-ould conserve your water," said the voice after a few moments, her tone softer than before.
Eiffel let out a shaky laugh and a sniffle for which he sorely wished he could reach through his helmet to wipe his nose. "For what?"
The voice didn't respond. Eiffel took a composing breath, trying to ground himself. In the self-imposed darkness of his helmet, the low oxygen warning blinked ominous and red. He'd turned off the audio for that warning... how long ago? Days? Hours?
"Hera, how long have I been out here?"
"It's impossible to gauge ti-ti-time with no working power or regular light source."
"Alright, let's go in measurable things, then. How many night's sleep have I gotten?"
"You've lost count."
"Right. Duh. And you don't know because I don't know, because I'm just making you up in my head to feel less lonely."
"Exactly."
"But it's been more than three, yeah? I've slept definitely more than three times."
"Y-es."
"Alright, there's some sort of saying, probably outta Price and Carter... three days without food, right?"
"I think that's water."
"Well I haven't had either for more than that so it doesn't really matter. Three minutes without oxygen, too. When did that run out?"
"The first day."
"Right, I remember that. It freaked me the hell out, but the possibility of suffocating in your own CO2 emissions will do that to a person. So, what's our conclusion?"
"You're dead. This is your special version of Hell or Purgatory or whatev-ever it is that you believe in."
Eiffel took a hand from his visor and placed it over his chest, on the left side. Even through the space-proof fabric, he felt the faint palpitations beneath his fingers.
"Dead people don't have heartbeats," he said, mostly to himself.
"True," mused the voice.
"Not dead people also need to breath," he considered.
"That's also true," agreed the voice.
"So, there's two conflicting factors here- Everything I know is telling me that I'm somehow still alive, but shouldn't be. Any theories?" asked Eiffel.
"This is all a bad dream."
"Lame. Next?"
"None of this is real. You've been in a coma since you went out in a solar storm and nearly drowned in your own suit's coo-coo-cooling system. Everything you've experienced since has been one long string of your subconscious attempting to wake you up."
"Wow, super edgy, but I'm gonna pass. What's next?"
There was a hesitation, a thinking pause. "It could be Decima."
This caused Eiffel some pause. He rolled the idea over in his mind, poking at it from different angles to see if it could stand on its own. "So, what, our resident Mad Scientist pumped me full of radioactive super serum and I'm suddenly unable to starve, dehydrate or suffocate?"
"Th-the spider lived in the walls for years before anyone found it," said the voice. "What do you think it was eating, drinking or breathing in an airtight, sealed room?"
"You've got a point there," Eiffel admitted. "But I'm a lot bigger than a spider. Surely I'll need some sort of sustenance eventually, right?"
"I'd assume so, but you've been doing..." the voice hesitated. "Okay, 'fine' is a bit of a stretch, but you haven't completely unraveled yet."
"Says the imaginary voice in my head."
"Says your subcon-conscious, probably."
Eiffel rolled his eyes. "Well, I'm sure when someone picks me up they'll be able to confirm that I'm the absolute model of physical and mental health. If I'm lucky they might even give me one of those fun jackets that let you hug yourself."
"If."
"Hm?" Eiffel backtracked mentally. "If I'm lucky?"
"If someone picks you up."
Something churned in Eiffel's stomach, a deep sort of existential dread that he'd managed to suppress so far. "If."
"It's a big universe," said the voice.
Eiffel turned his head to look out the porthole of a window at the black splattered with distant pinpricks of light. "If," he whispered.
It could be hundreds of years until he floated into the range of a vessel with the capability to rescue him. It could be thousands. At a sublight arc he could travel lightyears in a matter of months, but at the velocity caused by a single, isolated explosion, it had taken days until Wolf 359 had faded to nothing but a blue pinprick. There was nothing but dead, empty space between him and anything.
And more terrifying still was the recent discovery of his apparent inability to die. Meaning however long it took him to reach or never reach another person, he could potentially be alive the whole time.
Above him, the voice resumed the song he'd left off on earlier. Her voice was more thoughtful as she followed the melody he'd left.
"And I think it's gonna be a long, long time..."