[b]Low Akheron Orbit[/b]

Twenty-four hours of being awake was uncomfortable, but not particularly difficult. Twenty-four hours of being awake in an already uncomfortable suit, in a cramped capsule, with limited air supply, and a need to stay completely alert at all times was difficult. Kassner had made it through those twenty-four hours, and was approaching the twenty-fifth. He'd been around Akheron over fifty times now, and was just about sick of the damned rock. Mission control checked in a few times an hour, just to make sure he was still breathing. If they took much longer, he reckoned he wouldn't be. 

The astronaut wasn't sure how they intended to rescue him. To his knowledge, the other space programs didn't have much but missiles and satellites. Bill figured the Taiben wouldn't be too far behind the rest of them in space capability, if there were any still out there, let alone ones that could stop screaming and killing long enough to inflate a balloon.

Kassner closed his eyes a moment, exhaling and slouching in his seat. He just wanted to relax a moment and forget about space, planets, and moons, about being in a tin can circling the last star in the universe. 

He had a daughter back home, just a few years old but still able to tell when something was bad, if you gave her a chance to look at your expression. Bill wondered how she was taking it, or his wife. What did the program tell them? Daddy's work got extended, he won't be home for a couple more days? Your husband's craft malfunctioned, and he's stranded in space, but don't worry, we're asking the Sanctians for help? Did they speak to his family at all?

Would the last thing he said to his family be "I'll see you soon?"

"Control to [i]Gödel[/i]. How you holding up, Bill?" The voice was faint in his ear, but he heard it well enough. Not much else to hear, other than his own breathing.

"I'm all right," he mumbled back. "Just getting some shut-eye before the next mission, sir."

"You're sleeping, Kassner? Wake up." Control got an incoherent mumble in reply. "Bill, wake up!"

His eyes opened slowly, and he brought an arm up to his watch. Fifteen minutes had passed; just eleven shy of a full loop. He let his arm drop and his eyes closed another moment. 

"I'm all right, Control. Fell asleep a couple seconds, nothing more." His throat was dry, but his voice sounded otherwise fully awake. He opened his eyes again and sat up, checking his watch once more before resuming his staring out the viewport. It wasn't for another moment that he realized his O2 meter was near empty, and he was on his last breaths of pure O2. Kassner was about to unbuckle when he noticed it, a mountain range a dozen kilometers away. His lungs started to burn. The capsule had passed that mountain range half a hundred times, but something about it seemed off. Was he hallucinating? Roughly six kilometers away now. The capsule was much too low.

He flipped the switch for the RCS and spun the capsule around, orienting the single remaining rocket thruster in the few seconds he had to spare. The viewport was now facing the direction he had come from, and he was flying blind. It was set, with seconds to spare, but the astronaut hesitated. He couldn't stop another tumble before his oxygen depleted. The burn would have to be just right or he wouldn't be able to get the tank swapped out with all the spinning. And Kassner couldn't be sure he wasn't actually high enough.

Bill shoved the throttle, and the craft slowly flipped, given no time to accelerate to more than a half-rotation per second. He braced himself, lungs afire as he waited to see if the burn was long enough. "Control," he began.

And when he saw the mountain range pass underneath him, he unbuckled, tossing his spent O2 tank aside and plugging in the new one. Bill gasped for breath, the fire in his chest slowly fading. Control finally got back to him.

"Yes, Bill?"

"I'd really like to talk to my family before I die up here."

With a deep breath, he finished: "Over."