Thrum

by Meg Smitherman

The crew of the Pioneer has been dead for a long time. I’m the only one left. We made it to our destination, and I’m the only one left.

The crew of the Pioneer has been dead for a long time. I’m the only one left. We made it to our destination, and I’m the only one left.

pause

I remember what we learned in training: the chance of death during stasis was small enough, they’d said, that it was worth the risk. This mission was worth the risk. Their calculations must have been wrong.

I remember what we learned in training: the chance of death during stasis was small enough, they’d said, that it was worth the risk. This mission was worth the risk. Their calculations must have been wrong.

maybe they (i.e government) knew the chances and went through with it anyway

eyes. Her red-brown hair is still glossy; I remember she’d washed it before we departed. She’d said she wanted to look nice after sleeping for several years.

eyes. Her red-brown hair is still glossy; I remember she’d washed it before we departed. She’d said she wanted to look nice after sleeping for several years.

That tiny number used to fill me with this vibrating eagerness, an aching hope, the need to see and understand and know what lay so far beyond us. Now, that number is the reason I’m going to die out here. Alone.

That tiny number used to fill me with this vibrating eagerness, an aching hope, the need to see and understand and know what lay so far beyond us. Now, that number is the reason I’m going to die out here. Alone.

we had the audacity to think we knew what we were getting into.

“You smelled it. The touch and smell pathways in your brain recognized it as a living thing. Does that not make it real?” This is basic stuff. Stoner Thoughts 101.

“I saw something in my room, in the dark.” His black gaze holds me, and for a moment I feel that I am a prisoner here,

Well you went on some alien guys ship without much of a question i fear you are a prisoner, if not clueless

“It’s a side effect of the frequency,” he says. “It’s unsettling, your brain essentially lying to you. Eventually, when you’re settled, you may be able to see the ship as it

Gaslighting at its finest?

The shiver down my spine is a humiliation, the sharp ache between my legs a betrayal.

Eww dude you barely even know this guy

it. I simply open my mouth to his and drink him in.

Ew dude

“Look,” says Lily, wrenching open her shirt. She is naked beneath, and between her breasts gapes a deep, angry wound. So deep, I see her heart beating through it, jagged edges of her ribs peeking whitely out through gore.

Maybe the stasis didnt kill them,something or someone else did.

“Yes,” he purrs. “Nothing will hurt you. None of it is real.”

Is he a hallucination lololol

No matter how many times you try to go, you always come back.

And then, finally, I was free to return. They wouldn’t try to stop me again. They should have let me stay with him. If they’d only let me stay. Mahdi was right. They should have locked me up.

Oh wow