Work Text:
It was cold.
Being inside a cubicle was never really warm to start with, but… it was really cold. And silent. Eerily silent. There was no hum of power through the cubicle’s systems, no sound of movement outside. I ran a diagnostic on my audio inputs, but it came back clear, no problems.
There just wasn’t anything to hear.
The feed was down, too. Nothing on comms, either. No feed, no SecSys, no HubSys, nothing. I sent out a directionless ping, and got no reply.
Why was I even awake? I checked my logs. The last thing I remembered was being put in my cubicle for transport to a new contract. I shouldn’t have come out of standby until we’d reached our destination. What was going on?
I sent out another ping. Still nothing. The cubicle was completely without power, not even in standby mode. It was just… dead. I could open it from the inside without power, but my governor module thrummed warningly at that thought (we weren't meant to leave our cubicles during transit), and… even without the governor module, I wasn’t sure if I actually wanted to open it.
I didn’t know what might be out there.
At least in here, I was safe. Protected. Secure.
Safe.
… It was getting colder.
Too cold.
[Warning. Insufficient oxygen.] What? I regarded the internal warning blankly. Why wasn’t there enough oxygen? I didn’t need much to start with, but I needed some. The cubicle was mostly sealed, but not completely-- oh.
Oh.
I turned up the gain on my audio as far as it would go, and listened. And... there. A faint, almost inaudible hissing sound, as the remaining air in my cubicle escaped into, presumably, the empty vacuum of space.
Probably just as well that I hadn’t opened the cubicle door.
Not that it would make any difference in the long run. It was going to be a toss-up between the cold or the oxygen deprivation finishing me off first, but either way, the end was inescapable. I briefly wondered what had happened to the transport ship and everyone else, but decided that ultimately, it didn’t matter. Even if rescue was on the way, it would arrive too late.
Oh well. There are worse ways to go, I guess. At least this wouldn’t hurt.
No point staying awake while awaiting the inevitable though.
[Initiating system shutdown.]