Work Text:
hello, captain
Jonas sits in the meadow, surrounded by white flowers.
The hazy sun is high above his head. Rays of light penetrate the smog.
He picks a single flower. It’s a cluster of tiny, pale petals. There are so many of them. Too many to count. They blur and mesh together.
The wind picks up and drifts the flowers’ scent around. It smells like machine lubricant and antifreeze.
is that for me?
The flower is lifted from his grasp.
always so romantic
Skin brushes skin, and a shiver runs down his spine.
when are you coming home?
Home.
The D.Q.O is his home.
It’s filled with strangers now, all looking at him with contempt, with concern, with fear. He searches for a friendly face and locks eyes with Kukrushka. She offers him a strange smile, and he is once again struck with awe.
Jonas still remembers finding her at that flea market as a lifeless doll and being overwhelmed with sudden, unbridled joy.
Now, she is a living, breathing soul. He is certain this is a sign that she is part of a greater plan – part of his greater plan.
A hand touches his arm.
“Majority rules. It’s time to go, sir.”
Jonas brings his gaze to Stella.
“To sleep, perchance to dream. I’m ready. Let’s do it.”
They walk together to the cold sleep room while she examines her notes.
“The process is fairly straightforward…”
He raises a hand to silence her.
“No explanation is necessary. 'Tis not my first rodeo, and you know that.”
She hesitates.
“I do, but the protocol...”
He swivels around and stands in her way.
“Do not cite ye old protocol to me. I was there when it was written.”
Stella gives him a sympathetic look.
“These new protocols have come a long way since your first mission. I just want you to be safe.”
Ignoring her concerns, Jonas turns around and quickly walks away.
“Come now,” he says, “time waits for no man.”
They were heroes – the first deep-space exploration team to leave Earth and its surrounding solar system.
Their task was to search for habitable planets in a nearby star cluster. They were going to greener pastures. They were going to save humanity.
Each crew member had a reason to go. Some wanted the recognition. Others wanted to explore the furthest reaches of the universe. A few were just desperate to escape from a dying world.
Jonas couldn’t entirely remember why he had wanted to join. All he recalled was that the successful journey would have been a one-hundred-year voyage. Fifty there and fifty back. An entire lifetime for the average human.
It was no surprise that the greatest scientists of his generation had gone through a myriad of ways to get them to their destination young and healthy.
Teleportation had seemed promising at first, but it was soon shelved. A jaunting incident on the Moon had solidified the banning of the technology. Although the body could move quickly over long distances, the conscious mind was a different matter.
Bending spacetime had been another consideration, but those who attempted this lost their minds. They spoke of a collective consciousness that wished to absorb their life forces. Many theorise this as humanity’s first glimpse of the Gnos.
Unlike the first two options, cryogenic technology seemed like the perfect choice. It had improved vastly over its first few decades of use. All sorts of people had been frozen for years and revived without any lasting issues, including the sick and the old.
If that were possible, a crew of able-bodied, specially trained cosmonauts would be fine.
Your hair was tresses of molten sunshine. When you faced the shuttle high on the hill, it created an illusion. It looked like fire shooting out of the underside of the rocket.
“I wanna go to an icy planet first,” you said.
You’ll melt straight through it.
You giggled, and your curls bounced against the back of your uniform.
“Are you calling me hot? You’re so lame.”
You tilted your head up.
“I want to see snow – actual snow, not that fake stuff in the academy’s bluehouse. I want to feel it in my hands. I want to watch it fall from the sky.”
There’s a moment of silence, and you let out a soft sigh.
“After we graduate, will you take me to one? Please?
How could anyone say no to that?
Jonas had been warned that the first second of cryogenic freezing was the worst. To prep the body for long-term cryostasis, it was blasted at temperatures colder than the surface of Europa.
This would last only a second, and then a fine, anesthetic mist would be spritzed into the air. One moment you’re in pain and awake, and then the next you’re numb and asleep. After that, the hypo needles would pierce key points in his anatomy and inject his body with organic glycol. That process lasted several hours as every vein and artery was filled with the jelly-like substance.
That had sounded fine in theory, but as Jonas settled into his cryogenic chamber, he began to feel a little uneasy.
The on-boarding psychologist had suggested that they all think of something or someone that brought them joy as it was being done.
That had helped up until Jonas felt that blast of frost. It had hurt like hell, but as he had been told, it was over almost instantly.
He waited for the sleep to take him, but remained awake and alert. It was only when he felt the dull throbbing all over his body that he knew something had gone very wrong.
There was no way for him to alert anyone. His body was petrified. His eyelids and mouth had been frozen shut.
All he could do was lie there as the needles stabbed into his skin, and the glycol started sluicing into his veins.
Jonas lets out a sudden, horrified scream.
Stella jumps at the noise, dropping her clipboard. It clatters onto the floor as he falls to his knees and bursts into tears.
“What happened!? Are you...oh...oh no...not again...”
He curls up into a ball, unresponsive. It's like fire burning from the inside. His skin is frozen stiff and melting all at once.
There’s a clattering of utensils from somewhere above as he blindly searches the floor. She dropped the clipboard. Doesn’t she have a pen too? That will work. He just needs something to dig in there. He needs to rip out the source of the agony.
A few minutes pass, and the fire peters out.
When Jonas comes to his senses, he realises that Stella is stroking the top of his sweat-soaked head.
He shoves her away, and she nearly falls to the floor.
“It’s okay, no one saw you.” Stella reassures him while retrieving her clipboard, “I locked the door.”
That does not mean anything. Jonas knows someone must have heard the fuss he had raised. His reputation as a bold, fearless space explorer was well on its way to being destroyed.
He stands back up and inspects the room. Stella had hidden all the sharp implements. No matter what he does, she is always one step ahead of him.
“Alright,” Jonas says, placing his hat back on his head, “let’s get this done.”
“Will it hurt?” you asked.
It would have been so easy to make a joke here. You were still so warm and flushed.
Only for a second.
You adjusted yourself so you’re looking at the ceiling. Your hair was like a halo around the pillow – or a corona.
“One hundred years is a long time. Everyone we know - our families, our old academy friends…every single one of them…”
As expected, you were having second thoughts.
“Of course not!” you snapped with a shaky voice, “It’s just that...what if I wake up in a hundred years, and you’re not back here on Earth? I won't have anyone!”
It's heartbreaking watching you cry.
My love, don't you know that nothing in the universe would prevent me from returning to you?
Your kiss could have ignited a frozen planet.
One request, though, just one single thing.
”And what would that be, captain?”
Grow your hair out again. You look stunning when it's falling down your shoulders.
He has died.
This is purgatory.
The darkness. The cold. The numbness.
He is on an ice planet.
Howling winds whip around him.
He spent months trudging through the deep snow, trying to find...something.
Someone.
Someone important.
A sliver of gilded metal in the flurry.
He gets closer.
Every step is a trek but eventually, he finds
a figure, on an altar.
A beautiful goddess
with flowing, golden hair.
He prays to her.
Jonas sits in the meadow.
The hazy sun is high above his head. Rays of light penetrate the smog.
hello, captain
He turns around.
There is a girl standing there. She couldn’t be any older than fifteen. She’s wearing a Terra Space Academy uniform. Her eyes are bright and youthful. Her hair is tresses of molten sunshine.
are you calling me hot? You’re so lame
He shudders. The sun is out. Temperatures are at an all-time high due to greenhouse gases blanketing the atmosphere.
So why is it so goddamn freezing?
She floats closer and wraps her arms around him.
it’s okay, my love, I’ll keep you warm
i’ll keep you warm until you come home to me
They found Jonas still locked in the chamber of the stranded vessel.
He was the lone survivor of a freak accident. Every other crew member had passed over a hundred years ago.
Unlike his unfortunate crew mates, Jonas had survived the cryostasis malfunction, but it had come at a cost. There had been memory loss along with damage to his major organs, including his brain.
Despite this setback, Jonas became an icon of humanity’s willpower in the face of adversity. After a period of rehabilitation, he went on to take the helm of a far more successful voyage into space.
Over the years, his mental health deteriorated. It was thought that repeated bouts of cryostasis may have further exasperated his initial condition.
Eventually, Jonas was declared mentally unfit by the Space Federation and was assigned a steward to prevent him from making any rash decisions.
Then, he was released back into the cold void of space.
“How are you feeling now?” Stella asks him.
Jonas smiles at her and winks. There is no evidence of the massive mental breakdown he had suffered through several minutes ago.
“Ready to go forth into the wild, golden yonder.”
As she turns to prepare the cold sleep chamber for him, Jonas grabs her wrist.
“Do you think I’ll see her again?” he asks, his expression deathly serious.
Stella blinks.
“See...her?”
“The goddess. The girl with beautiful hair like...”
“...like molten sunshine.”
Stella's face softens. This is a story she has heard many times before.
“Yes, Jonas,” she replies, gently nodding, “I believe you shall.”
“Good, good.”
He exhales and closes his eyes, ready to return home to her.