No one dies here. Nothing changes here. The
only souvenirs we can obtain are ourselves---
worthless, abandoned, neither missed nor sought in
any effort to effect even the most casual rescue.
Most of the time, we huddle around fires
that burn slowly on the few sticks of kindling
that we can find buried in the ice;
seems that so much is actually preserved by the ice.
We lap at the drip from icecycles that provide
sufficent water and nutrients to continue
our existence, such as it is. The skies are
always dismal gray: this planet's star cannot be
directly observed, but only inferred from the
dimness of the day which is different from the
dimness of the night. Yes, our trans-port was
not of the trans-starboard class. We complained, and
often, about the stiffness of the seats, the hardness of the
beds, the constant turbulence and the lack of
celestial views. The food was flavorless and bland; the
drinks were not mixed well, and weak; the
stupors in which we sought a respite from this reality
were only temporary, while the hangovers hung over us for
such extended durations; and no headache pills from the
infirmary, or do they still call it sick-bay? All of the crew,
including the pilot, were manufactures of the Row-Bot class
(trans-starboards never, ever, deploy them for passenger
service). Our pilot was apparently unable to process
sufficient physics to divert the ship from its drop into---and
skid upon---and crash against this planet, its ice far more
titanic then our vessel (never, ever book passage on a
trans-port class). We are apparently unable to process
sufficient metaphysics to explain the presence of our
mangled corpses---mere cadavers now---which no
decomposition can eradicate; each maintaing the
hysterical posture of its ejection upon the ice.
Starward