Daily Short Fiction 1. Romance in the Coldness of Space

I am challenging myself to write a piece of short fiction every day. This is the first! All I want to do is put a romance plot in a setting nor normally associated with romance. I like sci-fi, but sci-fi isn't very great at including romance or women, historically, while romance is a genre dominated by female writers and driven by a female target audience. I want to do this as an exercise in combining what I like about romance novels (feelings, intimacy, no need for saving-the-world level stakes or high stress all the time, etc.) and science fiction (creative freedom, exploration of the unknown, etc.).

Also, Rick and Morty crashing due to Justin Roiland being arrested has lead me to think about how I could write something similar, but better. Without writing flaws in the show I've noticed.

So this isn't a direct fanfic. But Josie is borrowed from/inspired by Beth and Summer from Rick and Morty, while Dr. Koerra is based on Rick Sanchez, Dr. House, and just the general vibe of "brooding loner snob science-obsessed guy Hollywood seems to think all autistic people are". And obviously, I don't want to do a Beth and Rick or worse, Summer and Rick fanfic, for obvious reasons! So I'm hoping to make their personalities a bit different. I want to soften my "Rick" character and show that deep down he's more sensitive, which is sometimes alluded to in certain moments of Rick and Morty, but is a concept explored more deeply imo in House, M.D. and Bojack Horseman. So I'm drawing inspiration from many sources for these characters, not just Rick and Morty.

Finally, the USS Sponsored Star, so that I can sneak in some capitalism satire.

This is just a writing exercise to get me writing something in terms of short fiction, or chapters of longer serialized fiction, every day. I want to see how many days in a row I can go before I break my streak!