Chapter Text
“Eppur si muove. And yet, it moves.” - Galileo Galilei
The ship took hours to fall.
Slow, almost peaceful, the heavy bough sank like a lazy feather through the air, and billowed thick clouds of smoke as it went. The hull seemed to drag behind it a grey stain on the vast ocean, spilled from gashes in a shell that creaked from the pressure.
The ship fell so slow, to a bystander a distance away it would look as if it were not moving at all. One would only see it floating there, a metal irregularity against its backdrop of water, suspended in motion. Only a faint tick from a pressure gauge inside betrayed it was falling.
It would be impossible for a human ear outside the ship to pick up the sound of one instrument among thousands of others, from behind layers of aluminum and bolts, ticking at a tempo ever so slightly different from ten others. It ticked nonetheless, quietly noting each pound of water pressing against its many metal shells.
Behind layers of wires and tubes, pistons and tanks and dials wrapped in panelled aluminum and bolts to hold it all secure, the ship’s lone passenger lay unconscious, tucked away in a chair built for impact and secured by straps meant to save his life. Just like his ship, Tango Tek lay completely still, suspended in his seat. Alarms and beeps fell upon deaf ears, blinking lights on blind eyes.
He was asleep, knocked unconscious. Tango’s own faculties failed him, but there were no warning lights for those, only a dull ache in his skull and trickles of blood across his forehead. He slept on, ensconced in his wired cocoon, safe in his little control-center capsule of light and air. The machinery diligently worked around him, whirring in hushed tones, tirelessly doing their job. Oxygen hissed steadily against his cheek. Perfect vacuum seals held steady. Tango was safe.
A new light flashed on, glaring and red:
WARNING: CRITICAL DAMAGE TO [ENGINES 1A, 2A, 2B]
Safe for now, that is.
Tango’s ship came equipped with ten thousand pounds of intricate machinery keeping it alive, including one system designed to survey and report damage to the ship. No one was conscious to see the irony in a machine tallying its own damage, counting the dead— like every other part that was spared, it dutifully did its job. A list of components scrolled past on a screen, red and glowing and making a racket, of course, like every other screen in the ship at the moment. Every part named on the screen would be deemed unrecognizable by a mechanic. Half the ship was scrap metal, now.
Of course, most of the ship’s functions were vital and so came equipped with their own unique alarm system for failures. Oxygen, water, pressure— all had their red bulbs installed, meant to catch the eye of their captain as quickly as possible. The red glimmer of bulbs and screens sticking out against grey must have made some designer somewhere very proud of themself, but the careful thought was pointless right now. The overlapping beeps and lights just became part of a cacophonous drone, all blurring into each other and trying to be the loudest and most important— it was madness to anybody who didn’t have a head injury like Tango did.
The console shrieked. He did not stir. The ship held him, asleep in her bough, collapsed limply in the pilot’s chair as if he were already dead.
The pressure gauge ticked on.
Darkness fell. The ship’s forward lights sputtered, then died. (A new red light blinked on the console.) Tango’s grey little pocket of air plunged into velvet blackness, deep beneath the foaming surface of an endless ocean, far below the meager sunlight that fought through the watery haze. The ship still was falling.
It would have a long way to fall before it hit the ocean floor beneath with a dull thud. It would be hours and hours before Tango jolted out of his chair, gasping for breath; clawing at anything he could reach for something to anchor his dull headache. It would be a long time before he’d survey the damage, take stock, scrape together what hope he had left. It would be days and weeks before Tango would cry to deaf ears, when he would realize no-one was coming to save him.
It would be a long, long time that Tango’d be alone.
The pressure gauge ticked on.
Tango slept, and he did not dream.