Invictus

I. Introduction

**Warning**

**Warning**

**Suit pressurization compromised. Oxygen levels at 42 percent. Seek refuge immediately.**

All falls silent.

As I float aimlessly through the boundless confines of space, the harsh reality of my own mortality slowly starts to settle. How did it come to this? We had done everything right; our trajectory was sound, and we had predicted that no environmental abnormalities would affect our mission. And yet, here I am. The lifeless bodies of my counterparts drifting apart in the endless void of space, which would now become their eternal mausoleum.

Immediately, I begin to search for the breach in my suit. The very fact that I could not hear the natural hiss of escaping oxygen, due to the vacuum of space, only deepened the feeling of terror inside me, which I was forcibly trying to repress. Get a grip, Chris. Do not cave into fear now. Suddenly, out of the battle with my anxieties, I remembered: The damn depressurization sucked you straight out of the window. Check your armpit. I checked, and there it was: a tiny hole, no bigger than a pinhead; and yet, this pinhead was the sole factor of what could become my end. And so, I pulled the adhesive from my kit, and made quick work of the breach, buying me precious time.

As I looked up, my heart sunk in horror: throughout this struggle, I had failed to realize that I was unwittingly drifting further and further away from the debris of our shuttle, carrying any hope of my survival with it.

Oh god.

Oh god, no.

Immediately I urged forward towards the wreckage, as if a swimmer would from one end of a pool to another, but it was to no avail. Gravity was working against my efforts, and I was not equipped with any sort of propulsion. I was doomed to fall away from any hopes of saving myself.

**Warning**

** Warning**

**Oxygen levels at 38 percent. Reduce consumption immediately.**

Immediately I could feel a cold shiver of dread crawl up my spine, like a snake slithering towards its prey. We had always trained for a situation like this, but we were cocky. We were the astronauts of NASA, bold and ambitious, as if our missions were ordered from the Lord God Almighty himself. But not once did we ever believe that we would find ourselves fighting for our own survival; and not once did I believe that I would be trapped alone in the cold, dark confines of space. And so, I struggled intensely as I tried to fight the harsh reality of that conclusion.

Eventually, I reached a point of some sense of calm. No point of resisting now. I reached towards my Velcro armband. Beneath my mission parameters, I had brought along a photo of my family; worn and battered from the many missions I had gone upon, but the only piece of home that I could take with me. There I was, beside Samantha, my wife, Jackson and Savannah, our children, and Ben, our Siberian Huskie. I reached out to touch their faces, as if they were there with me. I felt so alone. I so desperately wanted to be home with them; to be able to hold my wife, and look into those bright green eyes that I fell so madly in love with. To be able to see my kids grow into the lives I so very much wanted to provide for them. These thoughts kept raging within my head until one recurring thought rose from the others. How did I get to this point? Where did it all start? 

I suppose it started all those years ago, when I was just a kid. If I could only remember...