“Carve your name on hearts, not on tombstones. A legacy is etched into the minds of others and the stories they share about you.”

Shannon L. Alder

Although I wasn’t a doctor like Mason was, I did have veterinary training, which had prepared me for a lot of the animal deaths that I would face. And this wasn’t the only friend or family member that had died or that I had lost. But seeing a dead body is different. Some people say the worst thing is the blood or the wound of a murder/accident victim. But seeing Mason, lying there, blood pooling around his head, and arms akimbo, I didn’t find the massive gash on his forehead the scariest thing.

It was the stillness.

His sector, that I had been in only a few hours before, now felt cold. His chair was behind the desk, no longer would he sit in it and welcome me to his room. And now the room seemed sterile, something that I had never noticed when I had been here with Mason. Maybe it was because Mason distracted me from the fact, or perhaps it was because he managed to brighten it up with his jokes or enthusiasm.

I didn’t have time to grieve. There wasn’t time to break down, retire to my sector and deal with my emotions. It was so tempting- so unbelievably tempting- to turn around and go back to my sector, to drown myself in grief.

But I couldn’t. I owed it to Mason to give myself a kick up the ass and do something.

I turned back around to face his body again and ignored the feeling of my stomach clenching as I slowly walked over. Gently turning him over, so he was lying on his back I examined the wound on his head.

It didn’t take a detective to work out the cause of his death- there was a matching bloodstain upon the edge of the desk. And judging by the slightly indented part of the desk, he didn’t exactly trip and fall. No, it was clear that he was rammed quite forcefully into the desk- and since there were no other clues that would suggest a struggle took place, it was likely that the perpetrator took him unawares.

There were only two other people wandering this ship, Saskia and Allison. Dan, I assumed, was still hiding inside of the monitor room, confident of his bluff. But wait- if he was in the monitor room…

Whipping my head around I spotted the camera- in the precise position to have recorded the whole thing. Dan must’ve seen the entire thing!

With a final look back at Mason, I ran out the door, towards the monitor room.

* * *

It only took one good hit for the screen to go dark. The figure smirked and dropped the leg of the chair to the ground before surveying the room. Cracked screens and shards of glass populated the floor of the room, a lone swivel chair in the middle.

“You actually had me worried for a second there. If you only knew how close you were to screwing it all over… Shame that you won’t ever find out.”

The figure walked out the door, flicking the light switch as they exited the room.

* * *

I arrived in the dining hall to find a very smiley Allison, a frustrated Saskia, and a very unhappy Dan. Dan, I could see, had every right to be unhappy, his body pinned to the ground in an arm twist by Allison.

“I keep telling you-Ouch!” -He winced as Allison twisted his arm further-“I had nothing to do with it! I’d have to be a blithering idiot to even think of giving up my one advantage on board this ship!”

Before I could ask what he was talking about, Saskia looked over to me and sighed.

“This little shit smashed the live feeds- meaning we don’t have any way of using the security cameras at all.” She sighed, answering my unasked question.

“But how did you get him in the first place? Did you guys figure out the way to bypass the doors?” I asked, a little confused.

“It wasn’t hard to notice the light from the additional camera he had set up behind the monitor that he used to speak to us. And the only reason he’d go to the extra lengths to get an additional live feed apart from the security camera already installed,” she pointed to the camera in the corner, “Is because he wanted to cover all the blind spots as well as the door, to make sure we were really gone.”

I tried to keep the slight disappointment off my face for not being the first to call his bluff.

“So after you left- took your time by the way- I caught the prick as he scampered out of his rabbit hole.”

“I heard the encounter and went over to check it out, and that’s how we came to this situation.” Allison chimed in. “But we had to drag him back in here because he was heading for who knows what- not for food supplies I’m sure. I think he was going for a weapon.”

“Look, I refuse to have a battle of wits against an unarmed opponent- this is the third time I’ve said it- I was just going collect my induced sleeping device!” he yelled.

“Ah it was of noble intentions that you locked yourself in that room then, was it? For the good of your crewmates and all that is holy and good?” retorted Saskia, her scepticism obvious to see. “In that case, why didn’t you just bring it with you before you locked the doors?”

“No, you insufferable harlot- do you realise how difficult it is to wire a live stream and re-program the doors in such a limited time? I barely had time to record myself before shutting the doors!”

Someone was lying. One of them had the time to murder Mason and get back to the control room to erase all evidence, before confronting Dan. Dan smashing the monitors wouldn’t make sense- but I could tell that accusations with no evidence here weren’t going to help. And I wasn’t about to earn the ire of our female companions but accusing one of them of murder without any substantive evidence to conclude which one. But this petty squabbling wasn’t going to get us anywhere- and I wasn’t in the right frame of mind to ask everyone to ‘solve this matter with our words, not fists’.

My best friend was dead. The reality of the situation hit me like a brick wall. My rush to try and find evidence of the killer had pushed my grief to the back of my mind, and now the adrenaline that was coursing through my veins was disappearing, it left me feeling tired, and weak. I could feel my chest getting tighter, and my breathing louder.

I collapsed to my knees, palms flat on the ground, before sitting back and placing my head in my hand.

The others stopped arguing and looked at me strangely- but I didn’t care.

I.

Didn’t.

Care.

At.

All.

I was in a confined space with a killer and no one who had my back. This wasn’t the time to encourage everyone to work together, solving the mystery while keeping the bonds of friendship strong. Because this wasn’t a fairy tale- and life rarely gives you a neat little story where you can find a moral at the end. That’s because life owes you squat- it’s not fair, it’s not just, it just is.

But I sure as shit wasn’t going to be sitting back and making some lemonade from these lemons- l was going to make it back home, carrying the memory of my dearly departed friend with me. I owed him that much.

“Mason is dead, guys.”

It came out as barely a whisper. I slowly rose from the floor.

“Mason is dead.”

They were listening now.

“So shut up. And let him go- we don’t know who the killer is- but accusing anyone without evidence won’t help. Yes, locking himself in was bad, but there is a murderer on board. Everyone needs to just get back to their sectors and keep doing what they were doing. It’s not the best of plans, but does anyone want to volunteer another suggestion?”

I looked around at their faces, a mixture of taken aback, shocked, and surprised. Good. I could cry later, but right now I just needed to survive. The days of passive complaints and no action were over.

“What a surprise- no suggestions. And if the murderer isn’t going to politely reveal his or her self-” I paused “-then we’ve got nothing better to do.”

Allison pushed herself off the floor, yanking Dan with her. Letting go of his arm, she gave him a push that made him stumble forward a little before he regained his footing. Saskia had lost her expression of surprise, without breaking her gaze upon me- a look of grim contemplation now upon her face. But I didn’t stare back.

Dan muttered his thanks to me, keeping his head down as he hastily shuffled out the door. Allison gave me a wary glance but followed out the same way as Dan. But Saskia still had a look of contemplation upon her face, and clearly wasn’t going to move just yet.

I knew I had to check out the monitoring room, to see the damage for myself at the very least. But although I had put on a stoic and confident façade for the rest of the crew, in reality, I was tired. Very tired, both physically and emotionally. So I turned in the direction that both Allison and Dan had gone and left through the doors, leaving Allison in the room alone.

* * *

Somewhere in the ship, the figure shivered. It wasn’t the temperature, after all, the ship’s temperature controls weren’t something that was contained within the monitoring room. No, this shiver was a bodily reaction, an unconscious one, thought the figure, uncomfortably. Was it to do with that guy? The person grimaced as they tried to elucidate any sort of emotion as to the situation, but failed.

However, the figure’s wandering mind was snapped from its train of thought as they jerked their head around, their eyes adopting a frenzied fervour as they danced around the room. Unable to find what they were looking for; the figure left the room.

The figure didn’t know exactly why, but they knew what they wanted to see.

They needed a window.

Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies within us while we live.

Norman Cousins