Words To Die By

Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say.

Jennings grunted sourly, staring at the poster beside the airlock door, and reread the words yet again. The poster was the only thing decorating the bare 20’ X 20’ airlock used to execute prisoners. “The warden was truly a twisted bitch,” he thought. She had even pasted one of those ‘have a nice day’ yellow smiley faces beside the word scream. Jennings waited for death. It was close now. Any moment the airlock door would open, and he would be ejected into space. Three years he had spent on Kranock 9, this death row prison, convicted for the murder of his wife. Thirty-six agonizing months waiting for all his legal appeals to fail, and lead him to this moment. His wife was dead, murdered, and he had been blamed for it. It didn’t matter that he was innocent, that the frame job was perfect, the judge and system corrupt. All that mattered was his joy, his life and his future, had been snuffed out in an instant.

A warning Klaxon began to sound, and he heard a clang through the airlock. “This is it,” he thought, and took a deep breath. He knew holding his breath wouldn’t save him, but he couldn’t help trying. He didn’t want to die. He waited, reading that stupid poster again without really thinking about it. He finally let out his breath, and shuffled his feet a bit. He wouldn’t turn around. There was a little window in the back of the airlock, where the guards could watch him be ejected into space. He felt like they were stalling … waiting for him to turn around. Waiting to see a look of hope on his face that he wouldn’t be executed today. Then, the bastards would open the outer door. He wouldn’t give them that satisfaction. He stared resolutely ahead. Time passed, and his stressed mind wandered. He realized he was thinking of how he liked waffles more than pancakes, when he snapped back to the present. Was he already dying, and this was just a delusion of his oxygen starved brain? He hoped not. He hoped that waffles wouldn’t be the last thing he thought of before death. And how long did it take to die in space anyway? Would it hurt like hell, or would he just stop feeling and go unconscious? He tried to stop thinking about his imminent death and focused on his anger.

The prisoners here at Kranock 9 fell into two categories. The first, were the ones who had given up and were ready to die, ready to meet their loved ones in whatever came after this life, while the second were the angry ones, the ones who wanted revenge or justice for why they were in here. Jennings fell into this second category. He wanted whoever had killed his wife and framed him to pay. If there was a way to reach out beyond wherever he went after this life and get revenge … he would find it.

“What was taking so long?” He unconsciously fidgeted, fighting the urge to look back through the window. He knew the guards were watching him … he could almost feel their eyes on the back of his head. What if his lawyer had gotten some last minute stay of execution order and that’s why it was taking so long, he reasoned with himself? What if...NO! He squashed the faint hope of life growing in his chest with the hard boot of reality. He was going to die. There were no more appeals. He was tired of waiting and ready to get this over with. “Screw it,” he thought, as he turned around to check the window, bracing himself to feel the outer door open at his back. It didn’t open on him, and there were no faces in the window. Surprised, he cautiously approached the small window that looked into the prison’s airlock control room. There was no one at the controls! “What the hell was going on?” he wondered? Were they hiding to just mess with him? “This was too much, they couldn’t just let him die with a little dignity,” he fumed, and started pounding on the inner door. Nothing happened. No one came. “Ok, this is some sick shit,” he grumbled to himself. He looked around the empty airlock for something … anything to use - use for what he didn’t know, but this was total bullshit. He had prepared himself as best he could to die. He was standing in the DAMN EXECUTION AIRLOCK, for God’s sake. He shook himself and tried to think. The warning Klaxon was still blaring from inside the prison. He thought it was going off to state that the outer airlock door was about to open, but maybe something else had happened. Some emergency that had pulled the guards away. “Yeah,” he thought, “that made sense.” When they returned, they would laugh at him, push the button and eject him into space. “Great, just great,” he sighed and watched through the window.

Forever passed.

Suddenly a figure appeared holding a weapon and looking around the room. It was a woman in combat gear. There WERE no women in Kranock 9. She saw him looking through the window of the airlock and she rushed over to the control station. “This was it,” he tensed. “Was she ejecting him or freeing him? Why would she free him? Who was she?” The inner airlock door slid open with a metallic squeal and the familiar stale smell of the prison met Jennings’ nose. He was drenched in sweat. He hadn’t realized he was sweating until the cooler air of the prison hit him. He moved quickly over to the poster by the airlock door, shredding it with a perverse satisfaction. Then he cautiously walked out of the airlock, and into the control room, as the woman held the weapon pointed at him with a steady hand. She pulled off her combat helmet with one hand while lowering her weapon in the other. He thought she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Maybe it was because he hadn’t seen a woman in three years other than the warden, who honestly didn’t qualify as a woman. Maybe it was because she had just saved his life. Maybe it was due to her long blond hair that curled at the ends, framing her oval face, and highlighting large golden brown eyes that looked like they saw the world in a different way. Or maybe it was just because it was his wife who was supposed to be dead. Yeah … that was probably it. Smiling she moved to the exit of the control room, weapon extended, ready to shoot anything that moved in the prison. “Coming Honey?” she called out over her shoulder at him. He shook his head in stunned disbelief, “What the hell is going on?” he stammered. She turned to look at him, her face flashing through too many emotions for him to read all of them. He was able to catch love, pain, regret and determination as the more prominent ones. “I will explain everything when we get out of here,” she said, “Just know I love you, but we have to move now.” He paused to think for a minute, feeling a sense of happiness for the first time in three years. “Yes, dear,” he teased grinning, and followed her out of the control room to a different future than what he had expected this morning.