Quick A/N: Back to Arusheri business, ladies and gentlemen. This is set right after episode 22 but before episode 23.
Disclaimer: MF is not mine. If it were, I'd make Arusheri canon since ep1.
Warnings: Possible spoilers if you've just started watching MF.
Supernova
There were thousands upon thousands of people aboard Frontier—the same number of lives upon which humanity's fate rested. However, despite this seemingly sheer number, they all shared similar lives. They all shared the same path, dreams and hopes. For what could they do except keep on moving forward until they find their own Eden?
A father, waving goodbye to his young son and his wife as his other hand clutches the handle of his briefcase.
A single mother, collecting the day's rations and running errands early before her 6-year old daughter wakes up.
A couple, hand in hand as they share take-out coffee whispering sweet nothings to each other.
A pregnant woman in her second trimester, rubbing her burgeoned tummy, wary as she sits down on a white picket bench.
A young schoolboy, looking dazed as he crosses the street. His mother just called him but he could not understand what she was saying through her pained sobs and cries.
It was true.
No matter where we go, our endeavors remain the same—we are born, we grow up, we fall in love, we give birth and then we wither away.
Everybody's lives came to a halt as a familiar news announcer went on air. A voice that everyone obediently listened to every time she speaks.
Good day, everyone. An announcement from the Frontier Government:
At 23:00 Frontier Standard Time, the sky displays as well as main lights for the whole fleet will be switched off allowing everybody to observe the remnants of supernova G1.9+0.3 as we approach the constellation Sagittarius via the X Sagittarii star's path—some 1,076 light years from our current position.
The supernova was first identified in A.D. 1985 from Earth and was subsequently made public almost a decade later in A.D. 2008. It was estimated to have exploded sometime in A.D. 1868 relative to Earth's time.
Viewing areas will be setup along the main towns throughout the fleet and Island-1's coastline. Let's all share this once in a lifetime event.
***
A pair of tawny eyes observes space's eternal night sky lit up by the massive stellar waste of a star that gasped its final breath. Orange flares radiated outwards and at its center were wisps of blue-like flames that melded with a bright yellow and white-hot core. Behind it were stars that continued to sparkle and shine unaware of their doom.
"Even stars die, huh?" His voice was low, almost raspy.
"Mm," comes her soft reply. She turns her gaze towards space like all the other people aboard Frontier who were awe struck muttering words of praise, disbelief and joy.
There is a moment of silence between the two silhouettes up in a lone balcony.
Then she asks, "But don't you think we share the same fate as these stars?"
She smiles and he could make out the azure of her eyes and the glint of her pink-blond hair under the faint light.
"After all, aren't we created from stellar waste ourselves?"
"These stars," she continues in her determined voice that he always admired and tried to live up to, "…they keep on burning for billions of years and even after they can't go on no more, they try to tell us, just like this one that, I was here, I was once alive in this vast galaxy."
He stood there, watching her for the longest time until her words sunk into him and he couldn't look at her anymore.
Because it hurt.
It hurt looking at the most important part of his life that he knew he couldn't keep for long.
He pulls her into a tight embrace, almost crashing her lithe frame onto him as he wonders—does the universe shudder in pain and weep in remorse every time one of its stars die?
He says nothing as he breathes in her scent from the crook of her neck.
He feels her hands slowly wrapping around his back.
"That's why, Alto…"
A bead of something wet and warm slides down his shoulder.
Followed by another.
And another.
"That's why, I will sing. Until I myself…"
Wither away.
Fin.