Part 6: We Always Want What We Can’t Have

Part One: We Always want What We Can’t Have

The sun’s rays from its very first twinkle till it arches over the first horizon of Thera* takes 8 minutes and 20 seconds. Which is very fast travelling and boggles certain minds. It’s lightening fast, or light speed, some might say.

Alternatively, the time it takes light from the sun to reach Jupiter is 35 to 52 minutes, which is equal to how long it takes certain working class people to generally wake from bed on a weekday morning at 6 am when they have had a late night and don’t want to wake up.

Among these people that do not want to wake up you can find certain members of the Whale’s Song 2.0 staff. The list is long and almost everyone wishes to sleep in. Not necessarily out of a desire to not go to work because the work, to be very honest, is not hard or, to be brutally honest, consistent. Many things are automated and the ship does not go anywhere for the human staff to actually have to do anything.

Top of the list sleeping in is Oscar, of course, but he maintains he is “not” staff and is still there for a holiday and sleeping in is what you do on holiday. Bottom of the list of people, and the one whose time it takes to get out of bed and be ready to take on the day at the speed of light** is the ship’s captain Otua Rood. Normally. Today is somewhat different. Unfortunately, her mornings have been somewhat different for some time…

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*Earth, just slightly rearranged. But you guessed that already.

** eight minutes and 20 seconds in case you had forgotten

The sheets were muddled on the bed as if a scurry of animals had burrowed under and pulled up every tucked in corner and then pushed all the sheets into a pile on the bed. The stuffed fluffy pillows were discard on the floor except for one flat and sorry excuse which still somehow had the position of power at the top of the bed. The dimmer lights were so dim as to actually be off. The adjoining bathroom door was open a crack and soft blue light escaped into the bed. The sound of running water filled the bathroom and leaked into the bedroom.

The large circular shower stall was foggy and water splattered and the shower was running. Sitting on the floor under the torrent of water sat the crouched figure of Otua Rood, knees to chest and arms hugging legs, body bare, long purple plastered to her face and back. Her shoulders shaking as sobs wreaked her body, the sound covered by the running water and the running water running away her tears.