Chapter Text
A loud crash thundered throughout the ship as I stretched out my sore limbs. Well — I tried to stretch out, but a strap across my torso held my arms to my side. I blink through the pain of the bright lights above me and look for the source of the crash. Nothing around me looks familiar. There are tall walls on all sides of me, and a ladder to the furthest right of the room. Looking to the right made me realize how far up from the ground I really am. There was a good 20 foot gap between where I was and where the ground looked to be. There was.. Movement coming from beneath me, but it wasn't any kind of normal movement, no, there was something— off about it. Like things were floating when they weren't supposed to be. Oh, come on, who am I trying to convince? Things don’t just float.
Oh my god things are floating. Things are floating and my feet are not touching the ground. I try my hardest not to scream but being alone in a floating room… sometimes abnormal things happen. After I let out a very dignified scream and common sense finally floods back to me. It took far too long for that to even occur, but as that one English saying goes, beggars can’t be choosers. I never understood that saying. If you beg long and hard enough you’ll always get your way, you just have to hold out longer than your opponent. Where did I hear that from—?
“—A real good Strattegy you have there, huh?” my classmate Hans teased as he sat across my books scattered across my desk. I had already meticulously placed every one of my books in such a manner that allowed me just enough room for my pencil and paper to sit on the little desk space left uncovered.
“I’ve told you ten times Hans, my last name isn’t just some pun, it's a title. It’s what people are going to know me as when I finally—”
Hans cut me off with a scoff, the little Nervensäge. “Oh yes, how could we ever forget. Little miss Eva will graduate top of her class and graduate with honors. She’ll leave all of us in her mud.”
I didn’t even flinch at his words. He never complained with anything new anymore, always just using the same phrase that I had it to get out and they didn’t. It's not even my fault, if people would just pick up the books once in a while instead of making plans to bum around all day. Nothing good ever comes out of people who bum around, they always end up at the same tankstelle with the same boss and same employees who hate each other's guts. The content isn’t hard to understand either. We've been studying the same material to get ready for collage that it should be basic common sense by now what we’ll be learning each year. If he can’t grasp that concept by now a diploma will not be anywhere near his future.
I look back up at Hans who was now leaning over further onto my desk. His eyes were narrowed in the way they do when he's angry at being ignored. I wasn’t actually ignoring him, I was just thinking about him in a negative sense. Stupid boy can’t even tell the difference.
“Its not my fault I actually do my work,” I say waving his words off like they meant nothing to me. Which, in all honesty, they didn't mean anything. “Maybe you should stop drowning Miss Schneider out and actually learn the material that we’re going to be graded on.”
I watched Hans roll his eyes like I just told him that The Aufhocker was standing there in place of our teacher. He’d probably enjoy that and believe that there wouldn’t be any more work until we found where our missing teacher went. Actually, until they found where our missing teacher went, I’d want no part in that mystery.
“I don’t drown Miss Schneider out, she does that herself!” Hans defended himself as if that would change my annoyance of him. It didn’t. “All she does is go on and on about how important it is that we do our work.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Hans was actually trying to defend his lack of work by using the fact that Miss Schneider calls out his lack of work. I don’t understand how he wasn’t held back multiple times.
“If she yells about it so much, how come you still don’t pay attention and do your work? Common sense says she’d stop when she realizes you don’t need a reminder every single day to turn it in.” I said before I realized how monotone my voice sounded. I didn’t mean to sound like that, it was just natural. My parents keep telling me that I have to fix it if I want any kind of hope in the future. I don’t understand what my voice has to do with my profession, and besides that, bosses always have to sound in control of situations. They wouldn’t be a good boss if they showed that they had no control of situations.
“Whatever,” Hans said with an annoyed look on his face. His eyebrows bunched together in the way they do when something disgusts him. Apparently today, the thing that disgusted him was me, though most days that's the case. You get used to it after the third eyeroll of the day.
There was a pounding in my head and when I looked up again I found I was no longer in the classroom. Instead I was back in the tall room with the long ladder leading up. Things were still floating all around me, but I had more balance and more common knowledge than when I first woke up in this unknown place. I stood up on the bed, hooking my feet between two slabs of bolted metal, so I could get a good scan of this place. There was a ladder at my feet, clearly meant to give me an easy way down when gravity was available, and there was a rack of suits in my line of sight. They were Russian-made Orlan-MKS2 spacesuits. The spacesuits that everyone agrees are the best suits in existence. They had a single pressure valve and were specifically designed for easy exits and entries, especially when alone. Alone…
I can’t be alone. That can’t be possible. If I really am on a ship, nobody would send me alone.
When choosing a crew for space travel, it's important that there is a group that fulfills every sort of job needed. There should always be someone to man the controls and know precisely what each connects to and why it is important to the mission. There should be someone handling the outside of the ship, going on space walks and manually checking the materials of the hull of the ship. The last most important role is the scientist. The one who can make quick calculations and who can give the best answers on what changes to make to have the most successful trip. Even with the differences in how each role contributes, every role works together in some way. One thing has yet to leave my mind, just where do I fit into this?
I'm not the scientist, thank God, thank God. Math was not the class I was most confident in, and the thought of doing math under severe pressure made my hands shake. The other roles would have to wait until I am more than a few hours awake, I feel like a newborn wolf staggering all over the place. Even just standing here I was swaying so hard that the slightest change would send me straight to the ground.