Space Population: One
This short story was the first place winner at the EHS Stem Expo. It was written by sophomore Katherine Tran as part of Mr. Tilton’s class.
Dragging the tips of his covered fingers across the walls of the bottom chamber, Kobe steadily counted the minutes he had left until the sun would rise in New York; a place he had left to be launched near Earth’s outer atmosphere to continue his company’s experiment. The low rumbling of the sleeping corpses below him made his hair stand. He was scared. If he didn’t finish the feeding shift soon, then he would be their next meal. And without him, there would be three fewer workers on the ship. Two casualties were just too much.
His foot brushed against one of the bodies. A muddy red smear was painted across the white surface of his boot. He grimaced as he continued, but slowly, made his way to the cluttered center of buckets.
“Kobe, you have four more minutes.” A voice, most likely Tom, spoke from his earpiece. Kobe steadily brought his own bucket of cow meat to the floor before he latched empty ones onto his arms. The faint rays of the peeking sun alarmed him greatly, but he knew better than to panic. After all, Tom did just say he had four minutes left, or three, considering the time it took him to leave a bucket and retrieve the others. With that done, he began to walk towards the locked steel doors, albeit hesitantly and cautiously. “Kobe, you have two minutes left. If you don’t hurry- well, you know.”
Kobe chuckled to himself, possibly to avoid the fact that the dead bodies would soon awake. Knowing that it was not a time to laugh, he got to the door and knocked on it four times, waiting three seconds, and knocked again. It was a code the crew had made up, just in case the so-called zombies gained intelligence. The chamber was locked from the outside, and the only way to get in was by knowing the password (everyone knew it, of course). The door was opened immediately by another coworker, Hue. Hue was a Japanese man who accompanied them when he was identified as an expert rocket engineer. He knew little English but enough to get by and have conversations then and now.
Hue dragged the man by his arm out of the room. He had muttered something along the lines of hurry boy before they eat you. Kobe grinned at the man with a tired smile but obliged. He too wanted out of there. Before Hue could completely close the door, Kobe saw the bodies twitch and perhaps rise from their positions. Their mangled flesh hanging from thin strips and their bones protruded from their chests. They were corpses that rotted, and he was grateful that he wore an air suit that covered his face with a thin layer of glass to protect his nose from the unforgiving smell. Nonetheless, he knew they were probably crawling to the bucket by now.
“Hue. Be careful down here alone. You haven’t slept for a while, so I’ll send Rea down to cover for you.” Kobe made his way further down the hall that attached to the chamber and a ladder up ahead. The Asian man hummed in agreement, listening to the poundings and rattlings of the creatures on the other side of the door. Kobe climbed the ladder to the high bay, where Rea, Tom, and his Captain, Keurk, worked at their stations. “Rea. Hue needs a switch, you’ll do it?”
“Sure, I needed to test system one anyways.” She replied, pulling a tool kit from below her seat.
“You didn’t see any of those things move did you?” Tom asked, his eyes glued to the screen-board of the ship. His fingers working at a moderate speed on the small keyboard.
“Not during the feeding, but a little before Hue shut the door,” Kobe spoke, sitting in Rea’s chair and waving her goodbye as she made her way down the ladder. “By the way, why do we need to feed them fresh meat anyways? Aren’t astronauts suppose to have dry food?”
Captain Kuerk laughed boisterously before tilting his head to face him. “My boy, we bring them meat so they don’t force that door down before this experiment ends in the next two weeks.” He brings his head back to look outside the windows. “Good thing it is only the meat of the animals. They weren’t supposed to last this long, but with the two who had their accidents…” Kuerk became silent. “I bet they’ll last a few more days from human consumption. And then we can go home without these ugly beings.”
Kuerk was a positive man with red graying hair for his head and beard. He had dark eyes that seemed to gleam when he was laughing, and his thick Russian accent complimented his friendliness. He was wise and knowledgeable, and he was skilled in the leadership department. Kobe really liked him, almost as much as his own father. He was a role model that inspired him.
Kobe was pulled out of his thoughts as the lights of the ship turned off. Was there a malfunction within the ship? Maybe they had hit something.
“Call Rea,” Kuerk said, hovering over the windows to look at the outside of the ship. Tom hummed and slipped his belt off his shoulder and made his way to the ladder. The silent buzz of the rocket filled the air with tenseness. Kuerk stiffly shuffled away from the window with a frown. He made his way to the ladder as well. “Kobe. Take care of the ship, all right boy?” Kobe nodded and watched the taller of the two descend down the ladder.
It was quiet, much different from New York’s busy people and streets. He was homesick. He wanted to go back to his single apartment and have doughnuts for breakfast. Three months in space was honestly too long for him. It was an isolated area full of black matter and fiery balls of gas. He wanted to see the blue sky and the birds that flew through the clouds. He wanted to go have a cup of fresh steaming coffee. He wanted real food. And the more his thoughts went on, the more it began to spiral downwards in a pot of realization, and the longer he ignored the flashing red of the emergency lights; built in case something had happened down in the chamber of corpses. This was the third time it had been used.
“K-Kobe!” Tom had shouted from the second bay, panting heavily. “Kobe! Come help! Rea accidentally cut through the electric wire to the first battery storage and it unlocked the door. We need help pushing it close until Rea can fix it.” Kobe blinked once then twice. His mind was wrapped around his words before his jaw dropped and his legs turned into jelly. He tried to jump out of his seat, being pulled back by his belt. He shakingly took off his belt and stumbled forwards to the area of the ladder. He grabbed both sides of the ladder before jumping down, using his boots to glide smoothly down the side poles. He jumped off the ladder and ran to his teammates who were working hard to keep the zombies inside the chamber. Kuerk held onto the door, using his shoulder to force the door into place. He seemed like the perfect obstacle until the door banged loudly from the other side; an attempt to escape the small room. They human-eaters could probably smell the freshness of their blood, which was why they were pushing so aggressively against the door to get to the group. “Don’t just stand there! Help!”
Tom and Hue were on either side of Kuerk, using their body weight to slam against the door as well. Rea was placed below the circuit box, using her tools to fix the cut wires. Kobe rushed towards the trio and brought his hands to the surface of the door to push. He could feel each vibration from the opposite side, banging and banging. Tom, who was on the nearest side of the door’s entrance shoved his body to the point where he slipped on the handle, allowing the door to peek open and a dirty wounded hand made its way through and took a hold of Tom’s hand. A head came through the same crack, lowering itself towards the fallen man.
“Hey! Oh my god- no!” Tom screamed, pulling at his arm to free himself. The corpse bit into the surface between his thumb and pointer finger, and finally let go. Kuerk managed to shut the door again, however, he kicked Tom’s body away from the rest of them.
“We need to go back to the high bay and lock the ladder entrance before Tom becomes one of them.” Kuerk heaved, his cheeks flushed from the strain of holding the door.
“N-no. W-we can’t- We can’t leave him here!” Rea cried, dropping her tools to crawl to Tom who had stopped moving with eyes closed. Rea placed her hand on his chest, tears falling down her face like a small waterfall.
“Rea, get away from him and head up the ladder! You guys too, Kobe and Hue.” Kuerk shouted, his grunts making it impossible for Kobe’s eyes to stray away. Hue grabbed Rea by the arm and pulled her up, however she stripped away from his grasp.
Bang! Bang! Bang! The sound was much louder now.
“And you captain? We can’t just leave you here.” Kobe said, eyebrows furrowing at the thought. Kuerk just smiled over his sweat and with a wave of his palm, Kobe knew that he had to get his teammates out before Kuerk had no more energy. He turned towards the others but screamed when Tom twitched and suddenly sat up. His eyes were pale and he had a crazed look upon his features. He quickly leaned towards Rea as she threw herself back. Unfortunately, Tom had bit into her neck, leaving her on the floor and getting on his knees to crawl towards Hue. Rea’s blood oozed from her neck, merging with the small puddle Tom’s injury had made earlier.
“Run!” Kuerk cried as he left his position to ram into Tom, toppling him over the floor. Tom bit Kuerk’s shoulder and he cried in pain. “Go!” The door he had left, opened to a swarm of rotten corpses, rushing to get a bite out of the old man. Kobe stood there in a stupor and possibly glazed over eyes. Hue was the one to pull him to the ladder, allowing the youngest one (Kobe) to climb first. The monsters had finished with Kuerk and leaving him on the floor in his own ripped flesh and blood. Rea joined the rest and rushed over to the two. Hue followed Kobe to the high bay and paused for a few seconds before watching Kobe climb out of the room.
“Prepare the seal entrance lock,” Hue commanded, to which Kobe had pulled on a circular thick layer of metal attached to the entrance by hinges. He held the seal up halfway, waiting for the Asian man to climb up as well. The zombies were a foot away from Hue, who hadn’t gotten far up the ladder. Each step he took up seemed to be a minute getting slower and slower until Kobe realized that Hue was hesitating.
“Hue, come on!” Hue gazed up at Kobe, his black eyes, as dark as outer space, held guilt that Kobe wasn’t sure of. Those hues seemed to hint at something that no man could possibly understand when they were pressed with fear and remorse. The corpses towered over each other and were now inches away from Hue. If he did not get out faster- Kobe didn’t even want to think of it. The man reached the entrance and climbed out halfway, only to mutter a soft sorry and a phrase in Japanese while reaching for the handle placed in the middle of the seal. His face displayed sorrow under the flashing red of the emergency lights.
“They’re too close now.” Were his last words to Kobe before he pulled down the handle and leaped back into the hole.
Hue had sacrificed himself for some stranger that he barely knew for three months.
Kobe dropped to his knees, his eyes dry and his lips were chapped. He sat there for a few more minutes, unsure of what to do. He slowly carried himself to the captain’s seat and dropped himself into the thin cushion before placing his body in an uncomfortable fetal position. He was alone. The only real living thing on this ship. He was alone.
Kobe sat there with a distant look. The flashing red had finally stopped and the second battery powering the ship had turned on, the bright lights were lit and the screens were back at the high bay. Although the ship was functioning again, he could not go home. The monsters had a three meal course and would now live for who knows how long. He could not manage the entire ship by himself and steer his path back to the planet of Earth.
Kobe was alone.
