Sea Of Stars

Chapter 2

Being a space captain is boring.

You sit in a room all day, surrounded by hundreds of buttons that could make things much more interesting, but using them is forbidden unless it's an emergency, hey, didn't they say the Captain makes all the rules?

Well, that's a big fat lie.

Suddenly a button in front of Maxus began flashing. Leaning in he read that it was monitoring the condition of the ship's outer layer of metal. If it was flashing that probably wasn't good.

Maxus got out of his chair abruptly, a sense of urgency rushing through him.

His window seemed undamaged, thank goodness. But maybe the rest of the crew wasn't as lucky as Maxus. He swung open his door and started running down the wide hallways for an important inspection, nothing seemed internally damaged. That's good.

But the further he ran, his boots echoing loudly against the floor, the more he found himself imagining the worst. He felt as though he was trapped in his own mind, running and running without a reason behind it, just to calm his fear. He didn't even see Harrison James coming when he smashed into him.

A plethora of papers floated to the floor and Harrison rushed to gather them up.

Harrison dropped them into Maxus' hands and pointed to the front, which displayed a series of numbers followed by a paragraph follow up.
"This is a diagram of the ship from an hour ago. The outer layer was at 100% strength. Twenty minutes ago it started to decline, and ten minutes ago it reached 40%. Here, we are now at 20% strength, it's dropping quickly and according to the manual..." Harrison flipped a few pages and looked Maxus dead in the eye.

"If you don't get to a planet or moon before we hit 0% our ship will be in serious risk of imploding. The inner layer is prone to such. We could all die."

It bothered Maxus that Harrison had said 'you' instead of 'we', highlighting the fact that any deaths were exclusively Maxus' fault.

Maxus has been trained for this but like every other captain class pilot he didn't think he'd ever encounter it. And now...if Maxus didn't do anything nobody else would.

Maxus felt a pang in his heart thinking about all the kids that would have to give up on their parents, everyone would be dead and Maxus was the only person who could change that. This was the most important thing he had ever done and he felt like he could be sick.

"Harrison!" Maxus snapped.
"I..." he breathed in.
"I need your help."

The two rivals rushed back to the control panel, feeling of grim importance evident in their very auras.

"Novathrusters at full power." Suggested Harrison.

"We can't waste power." Maxus retorted.

Harrison James turned around to face him with an offended and bewildered expression, as if he were the captain, as if he were the strategist, as if he knew what he was doing.

"If we don't put them at full power we all die, Maddox!" Harrison grunted.

Novathrusters could potentially damage the outer layer, making it an obvious bad choice.

"Put your pride on the line and think about human lives!" Harrison slammed down his fist so hard the entire desk rattled.
"When I say lives it includes your own." He hissed as an afterthought.

Maxus' face darkened.
"I care about lives. I am planning carefully, to save the maximum amount of lives."

Maxus tightened his grip. Harrison didn't know anything- Maxus valued his crew's lives over his own, he glared with a mighty rage at Harrison who glared back. Neither men stepped down until Maxus nodded grimly and began pressing a few red and blue buttons in an order he had memorized in flight school. Novathrusters could work as long as they got to a planet really fast, so he prepared them for operation.

Laying on the floor was Maxus' sketchbook, Harrison bent down to pick it up. It was open to the same page Maxus had just drawn on.

"You don't have a wife, do you Maxus?" Harrison asked, looking at the woman in the drawing. Though he asked not in a nosey way, in a genuine question.

Truth be told, Maxus liked being called by his name instead of 'Sir', it made him feel more welcome and human.

"N-no. How about you?"

Harrison smiled in a warm way that Maxus didn't recognize on his face.
"Yeah, her name is Jade and I...really miss her."

Maxus had had no idea and this and it made him feel so bad, everything he had done he suddenly wanted to erase. Harrison James was a man with friends and family who cared about him, and Maxus should be one of them.

"We'll get to a planet. Have no doubt. It's my- it's my job to keep you safe, right?"

Maxus scanned the space around them for anywhere he could land and he saw in his peripheral a large purple planet that the ship had slowly passed by earlier, it was the one emitting sound.

"Harrison. How about that one?"

"Sir, we don't know anything about what's happening on it. There could be life, or maybe it's in a process of implosion- we don't know, Captain."

"...We don't have any other choice."
Maxus grabbed a large stick shift and began an attempt to turn the ship around. He could hear the metal creaking and that scared him more than he would care to admit.

Maxus breathed in and out deeply but it didn't calm his anxiety in the slightest. It made him feel like there was a present fear in the air, and there was. Anyone could feel it, it could make anyone second guess their choices, fear for their lives and wonder who would miss them.

"Harrison..."

Harrison James lifted his head from the sketchbook, curious to know what his captain was about to say.

"...Novathrusters."

Harrison nodded and pushed a few more buttons, the ship shook and grumbled for a second before speeding to a speed fast enough that stars seemed to zoom by.

Now, flying through the darkness of space it seemed undeniably silent in the large room. It was not a peaceful silence. It was a painful silence,  both men were likely wondering how their death would feel as they saw 9% flash on a screen.

Maxus put his elbows up into the control panel and covered his face in his hands. Nine percent. Nine percent. He was going to die, he was going to die so far away from his home. He was going to die without a family or friends or purpose and Maxus wasn't ready for that.

He hadn't become who he wanted to be, he hadn't fulfilled what he wanted in life and Maxus couldn't help but heave a few tears. He faced away from Harrison so that he wouldn't see his captain giving up, but Maxus could hear the shaky breaths of tears from him too.

"Whatever I did to you I'm sorry." Said Harrison, and that meant a lot to Maxus.

He would have said it back but he had to be a beacon of hope.
"This isn't goodbye yet."