I quickly grabbed one of the dead swans and carried it gingerly back to my sleeping quarters, where my research equipment was also stored.

Placing the poor animal onto the surface of my workbench, I pulled out my record book which diarised the drug trials and experiments that had been undertaken during the mission. A quick check of the biotag indicated that the subject SWN354 had only been trialled with the drug for enhancing mental capacities.

The clinical details on the Consumer Medication Information Safety sheet of the drug indicated that it was a relatively new drug, and was being tested for a private company- not for the general public market like most trial drugs aboard exploration missions. This meant that the owner or inventor of the drug had paid a stupendous amount of money in order to pay the academy to test their drug, but also to keep the results private. The drug claimed to increase docility of the animals by affecting the amygdala, the section of the brain linked with fear and aggression. This would theoretically reduce the animalistic instincts of the subjects, the idea being that it would reduce the effort needed to tend to unruly livestock or to placate the animals.

The only possible side effects of the drug, according to the datasheet, was an increase in melatonin- making the animals sleepier, and in extreme cases; causing a lapse in brain functioning, aka brain death. But the swans died from self-induced drowning, suicide, an effect listed nowhere in the information sheet.

The coincidences were stacking up. Firstly, the reportedly ‘dead’ crew member, then the unexplainable suicide of swans. All at the only time during the mission where there was zero possible contact with mission control down at Spacca.

But this wasn’t something that I was going to share with the rest of the crew- panic levels were already high enough without the unexplainable suicide of our avian friends.

Someone had engineered this, and since they had orchestrated it all to occur during the time of complete radio silence, it was clear that they didn’t want any warning or information to leave this ship. We were on our own, and with an entity that didn’t want any details of this flight to make it back to Earth.

We had to survive for a little more than 60 hours.

Staying in my sector was theoretically safe, being only accessible to myself and those under my permission to enter. But I had some pretty compelling evidence- specifically three pieces of evidence- to tell me that the security on board this flight might not be as inaccessible as we were told. One of us could just wait until we were asleep and then kill us all without anyone knowing a thing.

The solution, of course, was to have a partner and take night shifts. But that again left the apparent problem of who to trust?

I carefully removed the swan from my workbench and walked outside my sleeping quarters and around the other to the opposite side of my quarters, to the cremation chamber attached. After depositing the bird and starting the machine, I walked back into my residency area and dropped onto my bed.

* * *

A figure paced around in the darkness, shoulders tight with tension, their walk hurried and hands fidgety. However, if one could see the eyes of the clearly agitated person in the dark, one would notice the juxtaposition between the body language and the lifeless, inattentive gaze.

Suddenly, the pacing stopped, and the figure’s head whipped around to stare through the long rectangular window that stretched along the entire corridor, out into the darkness.

Slowly approaching the window, the figure outstretched their hand. But as the intercom sounded the hand quickly jerked back.

“All crew members to the command centre- I repeat, all crew members to the command centre.”

With one last look through the window, the figure turned away and walked back down the corridor.

* * *

“- I repeat, all members to the command centre.”

That was the second time in the past 24 hours that the intercom had rudely awakened me. And this time, although it was only a nap, it was even worse because 1, it was Dan, and not Mason, waking me up. And 2, it didn’t take a genius to realise some shit was gonna go down.

Grimacing, I arose from the bed and stretched. Maybe a few mission days ago I would’ve cared enough to change my clothes, but surprisingly, finding out that someone can sneak into your room and kill you while you sleep is a bit of a downer.

The layout of the ship was such that we each had our own sectors, 5 in total naturally. There was also the Dining Room- where we collected our meals, the control room – for monitoring the cameras as well as additional controls for docking/launching procedures, and the engine room. The Engine room wasn’t generally open, and could only be opened by remote control from Spacca, or with the confirmation of all crew members. This was a contingency for worst-case scenarios- scenarios like this- where a single member would not be able to access the engine room and modify/sabotage the ship in any way on their own.

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Opening the door to the dining room revealed Saskia to be the only crew member seated in the Dining Room.

“Have you got any idea where that pompous prick is?” she snarled.

“If you haven’t seen him either…” I started.

The door burst open as Allison stormed in, followed by Mason, less aggressively.

“We’re in trouble” Saskia finished for me.

As if on cue, the broadcast screen that was usually reserved for Spacca communication flashed, and a loading screen filled the screens with the words

Of course. SV syndrome strikes again.

“Hello, fellow crew members- I assume by now you’ve at least realised that I am not with you in that room. Perhaps some of the smarter among you may even be wondering how I’ve taken control of this screen to communicate with you. Well, suffice to say, you wouldn’t understand exactly how I’ve manually overridden the coms channel- all you need to know is that I can do it. Because that’s exactly what I’ve done with the doors to the control room.”

Allison’s palms slammed down onto the table with such force that I felt my seat vibrate from underneath me. But her voice was the more sinister action of the two, coming out in a calm, measured fashion- bellied by the icy expression on her face and clenched jaw.

“What have you done to us? And what are you planning to do?” she questioned him.

“I paused there, to give one of you the chance to respond. My sincerest apologies to any of you who didn’t figure out that this was a one-way video stream- no cameras in the dining room remember?”

Saskia ground her jaw.

“But it’s a simple task to infer that you now assume that I am the traitor- which is not the case. I have merely assured my safety – and now you have to worry about one less person who will stab you in the back. One final assurance to you- I have no means of locking or unlocking your private sectors, the only reason I was successfully able to deadlock this one was because of the public nature of the room. Toodleloo then, my fellow crew members. Do try to survive- I wouldn’t like to have ‘entire crew killed on first flight’ in my future bibliography!”

The screen went black immediately, leaving us with the reflections of our angry, curious and downright murderous expressions.

There have been moments in human history where people have banded together in a particular type of unity transcending race, sex and relations. Often this has been after a motivational speech- such as MLK Junior’s “I Have a Dream” or perhaps JFK’s “We Choose to go to the Moon”. But at this moment I could tell that we all shared the same dream, as we looked at each other as brothers and sisters- choosing to take out our combined anger/annoyance out on Dan not because it was easy, but because it was hard.

Allison smiled sweetly at all of us (I was beginning to feel a sort of PTSD arising from her smile) and told us that she was going to try and find some tools that might help in the ‘opening’ of the door. Mason went to find some sedatives that might work to incapacitate someone, and Saskia went to grab her rock hammer in case things went south or “If my words aren’t enough to vent my anger”.

That left me sitting there, feeling useless. I didn’t have any special gear that would help in this situation unless I could somehow entice him out of his hutch with some animal food… unless… 

Quickly I checked the food dispenser in the middle of the table. After countless years of space explorations, Spacca had the automated systems down to an art. Rations were dispensed at regular times and could only be dispensed by fingerprint authorisation of the recipient. So there was no extra snacking- from your meals or someone else’s. And there were two things odd about Dan’s video message- firstly, what was the point in advertising the fact that he was protected? It would’ve been much more logical and safer to only lock the doors and let everyone figure it out slowly, gaining valuable time in which no-one knew where he was. And secondly, there was no need for him to purposefully to us his capabilities as to locking or unlocking private sectors. It might have been an attempt to decrease his perceived threat level to ourselves, but that was too simple a reason, and counter to the antagonising nature of his video message.

No, he was pulling off an extraordinary bluff- not about his ability to lock the door, I had no doubts there. This was a bluff about him staying ‘protected’ in the control room for the remainder of the flight. He wanted everyone to retire to their sectors eventually and hope that they would be protected there- because this would allow him to sneak out sometime after meal time and take a ration of food back into the control room where he would be safe again. And it wasn’t that he could hold out for the remainder of the three mission days – he stated so himself, with this last increase in speed towards Earth;

“You’d not make it without rations- and you know as well as I do about the metabolic strain this type of space travel takes on the body…”

He had the same weakness as the namesake of his protected turtle strategy – the unprotected head that comes out of the shell to eat! We didn’t have to break open his door- we only had to wait for him to walk out of his accord!

Just to confirm, I pressed my thumb against the sensor of the food dispenser, and a red flash and buzz proved my point. No way he could’ve snuck extra rations inside with him outside from the allotted mealtime ones.

Triumphantly I pushed the doors open and went to inform the other crew members of my deduction, Mason first, as I felt that he would probably be the most thankful and easiest to talk to.

Approaching his sector, however, there was a distinct lack of security as compared to the last time I came- the door was left entirely open.

Perhaps it was some intuition or sixth sense that made me slow down and take a few deep breaths. Or maybe it was a sign from the universe to turn around and go back the way I came.

Because, just like how I found the birds, a body was strewn across the floor.

Even though the body was face down, it was obvious who it was.

I turned around and threw up in the corner.

Mason’s head lay in a pool of blood, his body lifeless and still in the centre of the room.