Solipsism

Jack: Fangs and Claws

I have stood here for minutes. Minutes and minutes. I'm not crying. I wish I could. I'm not screaming. I wish I could. I'm standing, and I'm alive, but I'm deader than I've ever been. My hopes…my dreams… are all dead. But this should come as no surprise. I already knew that inner deadness to be true; it has been my constant companion. Yes, my hopes and dreams were already long gone. They disappeared when she disappeared. And yet I now have the privilege to experience the pain all over again and it sucks, big-time.

Fuck.

My breath is coming in short little gasps. My chest hurts. My forehead is beading up with sweat. My eyes are open but I'm not focusing properly. Could this be a heart attack? How strange, I've not thought of it before. I know that inflicted violence in all sorts of flavors can not kill me everlastingly, but what about a massive myocardial infarction? If my heart muscle was catastrophically damaged by disease, would it heal?

I discover that I have no idea…

I shrug it off. This is simply not the time to have a heart attack. Besides, someone's relying on me. I'm on a mission. I have a job to do.

I no longer feel thirsty. I no longer feel anything at all. All I know is that I no longer want to be in this room. I walk out, get my bearings, and head towards engineering.

I no longer have a desire to sing, or even hum. I think back, just a short time ago, really, and it seems like it was a different person who'd decided he needed some water. It was a different person singing that cheesy Christina Aguilera song. That person was unimaginably and profoundly happier. He seems like a stranger to me now. I don't have anything in common with him. I can't imagine what it's like in his head, or what it's like to be happy enough to hum a tune.

Not only is he a stranger to me, I don't like him. I want nothing to do with him.

It isn't long before I find myself in engineering. And what a shock.

After all the empty rooms and echoing corridors, engineering is alive with visual and audible stimuli. It's chock-a-block filled with buzzing and humming equipment and consoles. My eyes are dazzled by the sight. The TARDIS has been busy…

Difficult as it is, I discard my previous fruitless line of miserable contemplation and begin doing what I came to do – a thorough survey of the facility. Easier said than done; it's been a long time since I was on the Newhope and I'm not all that familiar with interstellar Jump drive tech. That being said, as I walk around on my inspection it seems to me the ship's matter-antimatter assemblies and power plants appear intact and fully viable.

This is curious. And confusing. I had believed, really convinced myself, that I would find problems here. Big problems. Why else would the ship have ended up like she did, lost in space, if not for a catastrophic failure in engineering? But I see neither hint nor whisper of failure. I'm able to ascertain with reasonable confidence her tachyon field injectors are undamaged.

As far as I can tell, this bird should fly.

So why…? I'm still walking around when I see something that nearly makes me faint with surprise. It's out of the corner of my eye, because I've not been paying any mind to them, but what catches my attention is one of the section's escape pods. It's activated; meaning its exterior panel lights are blinking. Blinking rhythmically. Like it's occupied. Like there's someone inside.

Now isn't that odd?

I walk up to the pod and stare. There's no way to tell who or what is inside: there's no little window in the escape pod like they sometimes show on Star Trek. I try to make some sense of the life support panel but I'm at a disadvantage, I don't know what the various indicators are indicating. Respiration rate? Heart beat? Brain activity? Growth of fangs and claws? Could be anything...

But I'll tell you what is pretty clear: how to open it. There's a big sort-of clip-looking-like thing. But it's not manual; it's an electronic clip, a virtual clip, you might call it, just designed to appear kind of analog; it's some clever engineer's bit of a joke. I touch it. Really, that's all I do. I touch it. Honest. Just barely with the tip of my spacesuit-gloved index finger.

And then I pull my hand away in alarm. Suddenly the panel lights are going nuts. I step back in apprehension and take a deep involuntary breath as the escape pod basically splits apart with a loud creaking-cracking fracture-like sound – similar to something you might hear in a truly terrible science fiction movie. Adrenalin explodes in my chest, getting me ready big-time for fangs and claws.

But inside the pod, John Hart's eyes flutter and then fly open. I see his pupils constrict sharply. I can't begin to describe the look on his face. It is not a pleasant one.

"Oh no! Not you again!" he growls at me. "Didn't I tell you to leave me the fuck alone?"