Star Side

Chapter 13

Stellar date (Earth Time): 01-28-2914

We let Naomi decide what to do next with Joshua.

She filled out the report to send back to Earth with red eyes. But as I helped her zip him up into a simple trash bag, which would disintegrate with time, and set him on the receptacle tray which would eject him out to space, she was dry-eyed.

"Are you sure you don't want...his ashes?" I asked. It had taken me a long time to find the courage to ask. If my husband had died, I'd want something of him to remain, and cremating wouldn't be all that difficult. We had the incinerator for a reason.

"No," she said. "I'd just hate on him for getting himself killed. He'll find more peace this way."

Levi, who watched the whole procedure leaning against a wall, closed his eyes.

As Joshua entered the trash container, where the air-lock would be released, I couldn't help the frightening thought of him somehow still being alive entering my head. But he'd been dead. I'd helped Naomi the entire time as we prepared his body for disposal. I took all the pictures, filled out all the witness forms, and cried when it became apparent to me that Naomi didn't have it in her anymore.

It had occurred to me that it would have been more appropriate for Levi to have done all that alongside his sister, being family, but he had kept a wide space from it all, as though afraid of something. And, well, I suppose I had a good guess of what that was.

The airlock clicked and disengaged with a sound like a vacuum cleaner. The bag with Joshua's bulk slipped out gently, as though scooped out by an invisible hand.

We watched in silence until the black of the bag vanished among the black space in the stars.

"Goodbye, bastard," whispered Naomi. "For making me love you and then doing this to me..."

I gave Naomi's shoulder a squeeze.

"Too bad we don't have any good booze, eh Levi?" I asked in an attempt to include him.

Alcohol was banned for us babysitters of extremely expensive space stations for obvious reasons. No point worrying about people drinking responsibly and not blowing up things when you simply didn't give them drink at all.

Levi flashed his straight-line smile.

My eyebrows went high. "No."

"Special occasions," he said.

Naomi groaned. "Levi."

"I did nothing illegal and ordered nothing illegal."

"Making your own alcohol is illegal, and for good reasons."

"It's only illegal in certain countries, and space is international waters."

"But the station—" she gave up with a loud puff. "To hell with it, where is it?"

Which found us in the white canteen where they had held my welcome party. The little cleaning robot had come out when we'd turned on the light, it's LED face blinking at the prospect of having something to do, and there it sat as Naomi, Levi, and myself made the saddest drinking game with a bottle of Levi's homemade moonshine—which, by the way, tasted nasty and burned even worse.

"What is this, one hundred percent alcohol?" asked Naomi, her face puckered in distaste.

"I don't have a damn distillery on board, just mix it with juice," said Levi, who'd already downed his first shot.

"What did you even make this out of?" I asked.

"Stuff."

"Levi."

"It ain't poison, I've tested it myself. Just get hammered already."

"Nope, I can't, I can't just swallow it. I need incentive," said Naomi.

"Never Had I?" I suggested.

"No," said Levi instantly.

"Tch, killjoy," so I went to find some juice.

Thankfully, the canteen robots were connected to the food stores, so I didn't have to go far. Which meant I got to hear Naomi ask Levi where all his daring of youth had gone. That same daring had gotten him stuck on this station in the first place.

"Maybe I've finally learned my lesson," he said, flat as old soda. I could hear some part of him disconnecting from us in his tone.

"Little late, don't you think?"

I cringed and wondered if I should just head back to my room.

But I didn't want to leave Levi or Naomi, not now, and Naomi was eyeballing the bottle of grape juice I had like it had offended her for not being in her mouth already.

So, I brought the juice, we threw back some drinks, and I did my best to curb the conversation away from catastrophic subjects.

Don't know how well I did, since my first question was, "Where you going to go from here?"

"Where would I go?" Naomi blinked at me owlishly. Her tongue was already beginning to sound a little sloppy.

Levi nudged my hand which held my drink with a pointed look. I threw it back, grimacing at the sour burn all the way down. It hit my stomach like fire. I wasn't all that into drinking, though the few times I had done it I'd regretted it. I hated not remembering how I'd gotten somewhere.

"Well...there's always Earth. Got to be more comfortable than here."

"My reason for coming here hasn't changed," she said, holding out her cup to Levi. Levi avoided looking at either of us as he filled it. "And I got no one back home who remembers me anyhow. Sort of comes with taking the job here."

"There's always Marcy and her kids," said Levi.
"Marcy's on her way out, she'd be dead by the time I got there and her kids don't know jack about me."

"Who's Marcy?"

"Older sister," said Naomi.

"Well, nieces and nephews, that's still something."

"Nah." But her eyes swiveled back on me. I could see the relation between her and Levi in her black eyes. There was a sharpness to them just like his, despite her round, soft features. "You?"