The Lunar Station Executions. Runner-Up in New Worlds Challenge.
Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say.
Was it merely grim imagination, then? Before the klaxons rang out, before the somber announcement, the crew aboard the Butterfly, hovering near the moon, heard something like a terrified shrieking. It drove them to the starboard window, where they massed around the glass and stared open-mouthed at the Lunar Station explosion. They watched parts of their coworkers, their friends, their family drifting through the abyss. Disembodied limbs and houseware floated slowly by, already crystallizing in the cold. Silverware, piping, and boots, mingled with arms and legs, thumping into the ship, a cavalcade of dull thuds. What faces the crew saw were tortuously contorted and rapidly collecting ice, making them nearly impossible to identify. That didn’t prevent the howls of grief, the crew who were suddenly sure they were alone in the world, their entire lives stripped of meaning. When the shock subsided, a shuddering realization passed through the remaining watchers. It could be their loved ones that were dead. It could be their spouse, their child, their lover who would now meander through the infinite – unburied and unrecognized. Panic welled in stomachs across the Butterfly. Then the speaker buzzed and the emergency broadcast began.
