*A short story that never saw the light of day*

Even in space, things can go bump in the night

NASA told Doctor Diego Flores there was nothing aboard the International Space Station-Delta he couldn't handle. For the most part, he believed them.

But he didn't think any of the scientists with sympathetic hands on his shoulder knew what was lingering in the orbiting habitat. He had an eerie inkling clawing under his skin while he packed his desk.

"They cleared it all away," Doctor Flores assured his aunts that night as they licked their palms and flattened the thick, black cowlick over his left brow. "The Chinese recovery team cleared it all away. I'm going to be fine. The mess wasn't bad."

His aunts, two hunched women with stone-gray hair and long, wrinkled faces clicked their tongues in disapproval while tugging out the wrinkles of his shirt sleeves. They didn't say much more, but they didn't need to. Doctor Flores had years of their carping to help him fill in the blanks.

He didn't tell the aunts he had watched the recovery team snatch floating blood balls in the cupola on his Twitter feed. Off-screen, he imagined the drops collide against machines, careen away and collect into new blobs to float and smack against titanium decks and deteriorating carcasses in the zero-gravity graveyard.

On the feed, he watched with clenched jaw and tight fist against his chin as the Chinese removed the bodies and their debris. Leaves of peeled skin from the freeze-dried, cracked faces of the Helios II team joined the sanguine bubbles in the air.

"I bet they'll scrub that station shinier than mylar," said Colonel Wesaski next to him. She gave him a shallow smile while she picked the edges of the beer bottle's label.

"It looks like my cousin's fish tank," said Liu Liwei through the computer monitor. "It feels like I am swimming in mud. I push through rotting food, blood, feces, and guts everywhere. We should push ISS-Delta away. No more problems. Let other species from the future clean it up."

Doctor Flores asked one more time. "But how do you know Martin's remains weren't there?"

"Trust me. There is no wa—" The somber Chinese astronaut's image flickered and stalled. "I am sorry, Diego."

There should be no evidence anything horrific had ever happened on the ISS-Delta, Doctor Flores reminded himself on the march toward the shuttle. In the countdown to launch, Houston bid the minted heroes of Helios III God's Speed on their voyage to the abandoned station.

When their pod mated with the station hatch, Doctor Flores hoisted himself through the microgravity to peer down the deserted passageways of the ISS-Delta. He pulled his rigid body from node to node in the same way a rabbit moves when aware of a wolf.

Colonel Gina Wesaski followed at his heels. He could see the pilot's fire-red hair in his peripherals.

"So far, so good," he comforted himself, gripping the hatch with both hands. He flung his body toward the next opening where, just beyond, everything had gone to hell.

"Any ghosts?" The smirk was evident in her bite.

"Funny, Wise-Asski."

"Play nice, kids. Houston's listening," came the firm reprimand from the shuttle.

She struck a mock salute only Doctor Flores could see. "Roger that, mon Cap-ee-tan."

He ignored her and moved on, Wesaski making noises of the comically dead at his tail.

The walls were clean—with a sigh of relief, he failed to find a vagrant speck of blood anywhere. He had half-expected to be accosted with cream-colored bulkhead spattered with the remaining fragments of brains and skull like modern art on a three-hundred billion dollar canvas.

A thousand images of the disaster burned under his eyelids. He'd seen every clip, every angle, and every live stream of the wreckage. In all the footage, she never appeared.

Despite the evidence, whenever he closed his eyes, he saw the globs of human remains orbit the long strands of black hair that floated around Martin in gossamer webwork. A gold ring spun in slow motion nearby.

A chill ran down his spine.

She never appeared in any of the footage, but whenever he blinked, he saw her motionless corpse in the path of the splatter.

Doctor Flores opened his eyes wide and rubbed his arms through his sleeves. It was time to get to work.

***

The team began preliminary checks. All four members of Helios III took stock of the leftovers.

There wasn't much. Two others moved on so all who remained were Doctor Flores and Colonel Wisecracks.

Doctor Flores pulled at the pencil he kept behind his ear like Martin used to do, and ticked off the remaining items, listing them off to Houston. He could hear Wesaski doing the same only a few feet away.

"Don't you want to see the stars?" the soft voice whispered at his side.

Doctor Flores didn't have time for her jokes. He ignored her and continued calling out the contents of compartment MF75E.

"Don't you want to see the stars?"

"One two-meter cable. . . " he ground out through clenched teeth.

"Copy that, one cable," the operator responded.

"Don't you want to touch the stars?" she breathed into his ear.

"Six lengths spare tubing."

"Copy that, six lengths spare tubing."

"Don't you know what will happen when you hold them?"

Doctor Flores had enough. "Seriously, Wesaski. That's getting really fucking annoying." He continued. "Six lengths of yellow cabl—"

"Don't you want to squeeze them between your fingers?"

"What the hell is your problem?" Flores spun around to berate his childish crewmate.

No one was there. The room was empty.

Flores froze. "Wesaski?"

No answer.

"Gina?" He pushed himself to the middle of the deserted node.

The lights flickered. A shudder ran down his body so violently, he propelled himself backward.

"Gina!" he shouted again.

"Flores, is that you doing all that hollerin' down there?" Her response shot out through the intercom to his left.

He pushed the ship communicator to talk. "Where are you?"

"Node three. I couldn't focus with all the yammering going on between you 'n Hou. Figured I'd come back later."

He dropped his hand and hovered alone, Houston calling out to him in his ear. The contents of compartment MF75E drifted up and out, creating a mess of the air.

The voice in his com reemerged. "—do you copy, Flores? I repeat, last transmission interrupted—repeat. . ."

This time, when Doctor Flores blinked, the gaunt, pale faces of his aunts crept to the surface.

. . .How many times will you make us repeat ourselves, Diego? The spirits of the dead are in little boys' messy rooms. They hide under beds between dirty socks and lost toys all night long, thinking about how delicious little boy souls taste when they chomp chomp chomp on them. They'll pick their teeth with the bones they can't swallow whole. Only little boys who clean their rooms don't get visited by the dead because the dead have no place to live under tidy beds.

You don't want to see the dead anymore, don't you, my love? Your aunties don't want you to be scared anymore. Don't make us ask you to clean your room twice, Diego. The ghosts might already be there, waiting.

Doctor Flores snatched the items from the air and stuffed them back in the drawer. He would come back later. He needed to clear his head.

***

Strapped to the treadmill, Flores ran hard, stretching his aching muscles and cramped back. He could hear the laughter of his crewmates in the next node over. They were only separated by a hatch.

Through the small porthole, Doctor Flores studied the tiny lights peppering the black sky. He wondered if they were the last sight Captain Martin had seen. He wondered if she was stuck somewhere, still watching them.

He checked his watch.

Nineteen minutes left.

He pounded harder on the spinning track, pumping his arms, pushing himself in the final stretch. The porthole bounced in his vision. Sweat pooled into a massive blob on his forehead. Panting through the stale air, he grabbed the towel at his side and wiped his brow, continuing to swing his other arm in pendulous cadence.

A single red drop floated away.

He did a double-take.

Red?

It meandered around his head, moving lazily in the air.

He tightened his grasp on the blood-soaked towel in his fist.

The straps on the treadmill held him to the machine when he jumped away, jerking at the waist from the hold of the harness. Turning off the machine and settling back into position, he released the towel and felt his forehead, his temples, his scalp, his face—no lacerations. Droplets from his face flew off and into the air.

Blood.

Fat puddles of red covered his arms.

He swiped them off, hurling them into the air where they headed toward the hatch. His chest hurt, he was breathing too hard. He needed oxygen.

"Flores? What's wrong?" Wesaski sailed through the hatches toward him. "Aw, hell! No one's gonna want to be in here if you're gonna leave it a minefield." She swatted a sweat ball away.

Sweat. Translucent perspiration.

Despite being hot from the effort of his run, Doctor Flores froze from the cold rush of dread. The dark hairs on his arms rose.

It wasn't real. He needed to pull himself together. "Sorry. Got carried away."

"Time's up. My turn. Ass off the tread-y or I'm kickin' you back to our good Mother Earth." She unhooked his straps and pushed him away, using her towel to grab the remaining moisture from the air.

Arms and legs dangling, he went sailing backward, bumping against the bulkhead.

Wesaski strapped herself in, clicked around the monitor, and pushed off in a light jog. "Staying for a show?"

He looked up as she turned to wink at him, swinging her thin hips in loose shorts. Taking the hint, he pushed himself away and joined the rest of the crew for burritos and Sriracha.

As he turned away, the stretch of Martin's tight spandex leggings blared bright in his mind—he remembered jogging behind her on Earth. The slow sway of her full, rounded backside lulled him into a trance.

Dirty thoughts? We have never been so embarrassed in our lives, Diego. Dirty thoughts? Do you know who likes dirty thoughts? The dead. They get stronger when they smell dirty thoughts coming from little boys. They sniff them out like dogs and sniff sniff sniff, they snatch you up because they love the smell of a dirty, stinky, rotten soul.

No wonder they come to you. You must be delicious with such a disgusting mind.

With the sudden loss of his appetite, Doctor Flores let his dinner roll around in the air.

***

Flores didn't say his prayers before bed like his aunts had taught him to. Instead, he closed his eyes and dreamed about Captain Martin.

The papers on his desk sat in piles of dead weight—they existed in perpetuity on the corner by his gooseneck lamp. He ignored the alarm on his watch and snoozed it for the third time.

When she draped her arm across his chest, pulling him back into her, he couldn't ignore the smell of her lavender soap. He rested his head against her breast—her heartbeat pulsating in his ear.

In his dream, he made a joke he couldn't hear. She laughed on mute, throwing her head back and snapping forward to say something he didn't catch. A styrofoam cup hovered in the air behind them. Her gold wedding ring was inside it. The ring floated up from the depths of the cup.

He ricocheted to consciousness, bouncing off the dreams and memories as he grabbed at strands of reality.

Sleeping bag. He was in his bag, nestled in his sleep station, strapped safely to the wall. Wesaski mumbled somewhere above him.

On the hesitant return to his cocoon, he noticed a sparkle. The diminutive star inside the air-tight belly of the ship drifted closer and closer.

He stared at it and waited for the glimmering celestial body to come within reach. He heard the distant murmurs of his aunts in his head, but he ignored them—just as he always did.

It inched along and came into focus.

It was a ring topped with a simple diamond—a simple ring for a simple woman who had never wanted it in the first place.

He remembered how often she'd drop it in the styrofoam cup in her locker and leave it there for days and days.

"Do you want to touch it? Do you want to touch the stars?" whispered the voice in a purr so close, Diego wondered if the words were coming from his own lips.

"Martin? Is that you?" he whispered into the node.

"Grab it," the voice returned. "Don't you want to feel the stars?"

The ring halted when the rock collided with his nose.

"Touch it. Touch the stars. Hold them."

Naughty boys touch things that don't belong to them. The devil knows the evil things they do. The devil lives in little boys' dirty thoughts.

"Touch the stars with me."

Such a bad boy you are, Diego. Touching things that aren't yours.

"Martin? Where are you? We've been looking all over."

"Touch the stars."

The dead follow boys who touch what's not theirs.

Diego reached out and grabbed the ring, squeezing it in a tight fist.

***

NASA's Twitter feed erupted with activity. On the live streaming video, hundreds of late-night witnesses saw the bright light flash and consume the space station module. Before the sixty-two seconds of broken connection, the viewers captured Doctor Flores reaching out toward the porthole with a stranger's shadow behind him.

It was quite a shame Doctor Diego Flores was never heard from again.