It’s dark. Impossibly, unknowably dark. I float, suspended in the ether, drifting untethered across an endless expanse of nothingness. I’m weightless. Shapeless. Formless.

But something lurking in the corners of the darkness begins to emerge. It creeps out slowly, reaching its tendrils out to tug at me. A knowing. An awareness. A sense of self.

Where am I? What am I?

Consciousness creeps closer and closer, until it’s sticking to me, spreading and soaking me through, until I’m sinking under the weight of it.

It pulls me down. Faster and faster. Downward through the darkness I fall at a thousand kilometers an hour. Until Crash! The weight of my body seems to solidify all at once.

I’m alive, I realize.

“Hey, buddy. Welcome back.”

The voice brings me to the present, and I latch onto it, like a tether, as I try to reorient myself to the physical world.

I open my eyes, and the sudden rush of light and color flooding in all at once forces me to blink.

“How ya doing? Feelin’ okay? Maybe a little woozy?” The voice is warm, friendly, familiar. The person it belongs to leans over me, his brow creased with concern. I study his face. I know him, I realize, but I don’t know how I know him. I’m not sure I know much of anything right now.

He takes a step back.

“We had to give you a hard reboot,” he says, wiping his hands on a cloth. “Hope you don’t mind.”

I don’t mind. But I can’t say as much. While of my senses return quickly, almost automatically, speaking tends to take more time. The man seems unbothered by my silence, extending a hand and pulling me to my feet.

“By the way, you took some damage kinda around this whole area,” he says, using his hand to awkwardly gesture to his face.

I reach up, touching my face, and notice the tears, the dents, the patches of missing skin. That must be where the pain is coming from. I reach around to the back of my head, feeling the holes where there shouldn’t be any.

I drop my hands, turning them over to examine them. They, at least, seem largely undamaged.

“Don’t worry, we know somebody who can help you out,” the man says. “She was trained at the Institute, really knows her stuff.” He puts his hands up in defense. “I know what you might be thinking,” he says, “but she’s one of the good ones. I promise.” He gives me a reassuring smile.

He takes a few steps, looking around curiously, and lets out a low whistle.

“Looks like you ran into a mutt with some serious teeth out there,” he says, folding his arms as he examines the ceiling. “But this little ship of yours took it like a champ.”

My ship.

I look around and quickly realize that I’m still on Remus, inside the cockpit.

Disoriented as I may be, this isn’t what I remember it looking like. Charred black patches dot the control panels, and odds bits of material lie strewn across the floor.

“You’ve got a little bit of damage to the hull, but it looks like it’s mostly your systems that are the problem,” the man says, poking at a loose bit of wire dangling from the ceiling.

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I watch him examine a bulging control panel before inadvertently knocking it completely loose and catching it just before it hits the floor.

He grins sheepishly and sets the piece of twisted metal to the side.

“Where you headed anyway?” he asks, leaning on the dash.

But I don’t answer. It’s not just that I can’t. Even if I could speak, I don’t really know where I was going. Or why. I have just as many questions as he seems to.

Just then, a woman pokes her head through the door of the ship.

“Hey, Chatty Cathy, why don’t you give him space?” she says to the man.

“I’m just trying to help,” the man replies.

“You wanna help? Why don’t you come help with the ship instead of shootin’ your trap off,” the woman retorts. “There’s plenty of welding to do, and I only got two hands.”

The man rolls his eyes.

“I’ll be right there,” he says.

The woman looks skeptical but turns to leave, catching sight of me before she does.

“You’re up,” she says brightly. “Good.”

I try to smile, but based on her expression, it doesn’t exactly work.

She looks me over and gives me a nod before leaving again.

“Look, I’m not gonna pry. Your business is your business,” the man says after she’s gone. “But I’d love to know how a ship this size made it all the way out here.”

I would also love to know that, I want to say. But the words don’t come out.

The man fidgets with a switch on the dash.

“You know what I think?” he asks, looking at me knowingly. “HPM.” The switch snaps off in his fingers, and he covers it with his hand. “Blackout. It would explain the damage to your systems and the damage to, ya know—” he gestures to me, “—your systems.”

I try to consider what he says, but in my present state, the meaning is a bit lost on me.

“It’s either that or time travel,” he says with a shrug. “Those are the only two explanations.”

Suddenly, the woman appears in the doorway again, this time with a welding gun.

“Let’s go,” she says, shoving the gun forcefully at the man.

“Come on, Meer, you’re a better welder than I am anyway,” he protests.

“No shit,” the woman replies, “but the sooner we get these repairs done, the sooner we can get out of here.”

“Alright, alright. I’m comin’,” the man grumbles, reluctantly taking the tool.

The woman turns and looks at me.

“What about you?” she asks.

I nod. It’s only right that I help with the repairs to my own ship. I might even learn a thing or two from these people, whoever they are.

The woman smiles at me.

“Great! You can keep this one in line,” she says, clapping the man on the shoulder as we all head out the door of the ship.

“How you guys doin’ up there?”

Ramy leans over the edge of the ship, giving a thumbs up to the woman down below.

“Great!” she shouts up in reply. “Everything looks good down here. Boss says we should be good to go!”

The man gives her a salute.

“Aye, aye!”

The repairs to the ship’s exterior have been done for some time, but the man seems content to stay out of the way whenever possible. He has more questions that I could answer even if I could speak, but I can’t say I mind his company.

“Look, we’re in a bit of a…well, it’s kind of a…a tricky situation,” he says awkwardly as we climb the ladder down the side of the ship, “so we’re not gonna be able to get you all the way back to Beta.” His boots hit the ground with a thud, and he wipes his arm across his forehead.

“But we set your coordinates for Olympia Station,” he says. “You heard of it?”

I have heard of it, I nod.

“Good. Once you get there, you look for a woman called Shae,” he instructs.

Shae. The name is familiar, but once again, I’m not sure quite how.

“Now that I’ve seen what’s under the hood of this thing,” the man says, leaning against the ship with one arm, “I’m not so worried about you making it back in one piece.”

“Who’s worried?” the woman says, coming up and punching the man playfully in the arm. “Only thing anybody’s worried about is figuring out how to get you to talk less and work more.”

“Yeah, yeah,” the man grumbles.

“Hey, you take care of yourself out there,” the woman says to me, giving my arm an encouraging squeeze. She turns to the man. “Ramy, say goodbye to your new friend. We gotta scoot,” she says.

The man waves her off.

“I’ll give you to the count of ten!” she calls over her shoulder as she jogs back to her own ship.

“Guess that’s it,” the man says with a shrug. “Ship’s in good shape, so it should be smooth sailing.”

I return his smile, grateful for his help.

“But hey, you run into any trouble out there, you look for a ship called Chrysanthemum,” he says. “The captain has a bit of an attitude,” he smirks, “but she’ll help you out, no questions asked.”

He pauses, seeming to reconsider this last statement.

“Actually, do me a favor, will ya?” he says, his expression becoming more serious.

Anything.

“Check on her for me. If you get the chance, I mean. Just…see if she’s okay.”

There’s concern in his eyes. Worry.

I nod. I will.

His serious expression melts into a lopsided grin.

“Just don’t tell her I said so,” he says. “She wouldn’t take it so good.”

I try to return his smile.

With one last wave, he heads back to ship.

And I stand and watch as Lotus leaves.