Splash-Down

by R J Dent

1

Clarkie was dead and I didn’t know why.

          I lay strapped into the contoured plastic-padded couch and gazed expressionlessly at the dull grey metal walls of the capsule, as it fell silently back to Earth.

          Next to me was Clarkie’s empty couch. Next to that was Davies, strapped into his own couch.

          The body of Major Simon Clark, our instruments officer, was floating around somewhere in space, drifting in whatever direction it was made to go, the gasses and heat of space slowly breaking it down into millions of microscopically small pieces of matter, until it had become a part of the environment that had helped to destroy it.

          That’s a pretty callous thought, I know, but I’m still in shock and not thinking straight.

          I look over at Davies, but he won’t look me in the eye. He blames me for Clarkie’s death – even though Clarkie killed himself; even though I tried to grab him as he floated away from the capsule. Me, not Davies. He was too busy playing with his computer.

          I miss Clarkie. He always made me laugh when training got too arduous. He was a natural clown, always doing something stupid, risky or funny. Davies was the opposite. Dependable Davies was what I privately called him. The three of us were – or so I thought – a great team. We complemented each other – Clarkie’s exuberance, Davies’s dependability, my attention to detail in the overall plan. We were all experts in our chosen fields, but could operate fluidly as a single unit. There were no personality clashes.

          Our unit was the obvious choice for the next space flight. We got it too. Our mission was to fly to the moon, land, collect a few rock and dust samples, then fly back to Earth. Simple.

          Everything had been fine until re-entry. One of Clarkie’s duties had been to go outside and retrieve the film cassette from the mapping camera. It had to be done before we jettisoned the main body of the craft. Clarkie had really been looking forward to this part of the operation. He enjoyed space walks. We suited up and climbed into the air-lock. I had my 70mm camera with me to film Clarkie’s space walk – so that he could show it off back at base. I filmed Clarkie putting the nylon harness on, then I attached one end of the thirty foot tether to the harness and the other end to one of the securing pins located inside the air-lock door. I patted Clarkie on the shoulder and after he’d nodded he was okay, I signaled for Davies to open the outer hatch.