No. 185

HMS Advance was 30 years out from Earth. Her entire crew was tucked into their hibernation beds and sleeping soundly through the 73 years it would take them to reach their destination. The entire crew, that is, except for one man.

Randal Whittaker’s bed had malfunctioned a little less than a year ago. He’d sent a message back first thing, but he wouldn’t expect the reply to find him for at least another 14 months. He’d tried everything he could think of to fix the bed, up to and including kicking the thing. Nothing worked, and now he was trapped on a one way flight, slowly aging, while his crewmates remained in stasis.

After the first month, he’d strongly considered waking his wife, Edith. He’d been as close as raising the red plastic cover on the button, but he couldn’t do it. It would have been spectacularly unfair to subject her to the journey.

And so he sat, alone, beside the starboard portal of the ship, watching the stars pass by, going slightly mad all the while.