One night, at exactly midnight, I heard an unexpected alarm. A ship was arriving, but this ship was transmitting a distress signal. Triton Station had one shuttle stationed there and I ran to the shuttle. The message attached to the distress signal said that the ship was rapidly losing air and that they needed help. I wasted no time.

The ship was dark; the only light came from the day side of Neptune, but I piloted the shuttle closer and closer. The ship was completely dark. There were no running lights and no indication of anything approaching life, but I continued onward. As I drove the shuttle around the ship, I saw a horrible tear in the hull that went across all five decks of the ship. There would be no survivors unless they were suited or they were trapped in an airtight compartment somewhere.

It was a bulk carrier. It was a common enough ship even today. It contained five decks and a spine to which cargo containers were attached. The only difference between it and a modern FTL ship was the massive fusion tanks on the tail end of the ship. Modern ships replaced most of the tank space with an FTL engine. I drove the shuttle around until I found a hatch where I could enter the ship. The only good hatch was on the spine. I set my coffee on the copilot’s seat and went inside to look for survivors.

I floated through the spine of the ship and watched for any signs of life. There was air there, but as I walked forward of the spine the hatches all had red pressurization faults. All five decks were airless. Since I couldn’t get to the main hull of the ship, I walked aft. That is when I saw her. “I’m from Triton Station. I am here to rescue you.”

She was young, probably in her early twenties, but dirty and disheveled. And she stank like a bad environmental plant and lack of showering. “Everyone else is dead,” she said.

I took her by the hand and put her in the co-pilot seat in the shuttle. “I’ll take you back to Triton Station,” I said. “You’ll be safe there.” She was too shocked to say anything else, so I just let her be silent. She had just lost the rest of the crew of her ship.

Dr Emily was tapping her Tablet and looking up stuff while I talked. I knew she was not just taking notes. “What are you looking up?”

“Just reviewing your log for the incident,” she said.

“Oh?”

“But…,” Dr Emily started to say. She must have thought better of
it. “Just finish your story.”

Alison sat in silence on the way back to the moon’s surface. I thought I saw a tear in her eye, which was only natural since there were no other survivors on her ship. However, the tears were there for another reason.

I pulled the shuttle into the dock and went toward the airlock and motioned her to follow me, but she wouldn’t move. “Come on in,” I said. “There is food, clean clothes, and showers.”

She gave a sheepish look and then stood up to reveal a circular wet spot on the co-pilot’s chair. Her face turned red as she looked down at her seat. “Um,” she said, “I have trouble getting to the bathroom.”

I sighed and we left the shuttle. Once in the passageway, I stooped down and caught a cleaning robot that was rolling along the corridor and took it back into the shuttle with me. I dropped it on the co-pilot’s chair and returned to the passageway.

The girl stood there waiting. “I will take you up on that offer of a shower and clean clothes.”

“Of course,” I said. I took her to my quarters where the only working shower in the small station was located and motioned her inside. I went back to my bedroom and opened my drawer to look for something for her to wear. I was a bit larger than her, so I just picked a t-shirt, and some shorts for her. The shorts would obviously be big on her, but she cinch the belt tightly around her waist. I slipped into the head and set the clothes on the sink. After that I slipped out.

She finished soon after I left. I had never met a woman on Earth who took such short showers, but she was from a space ship and water is scarce, especially on a slow boat traveling between the empty gulf between the stars. When she came out of the head, the T-shirt and shorts looked quite large on her, but she smiled at me.

“Thanks,” she said.

“Are you ready for dinner?” I asked.