The lagrange point from Jupiter to Io was always a busy place thought Rose, But still todays shuttle seemed busier than ever.
As the northern Viacom shuttle brought to you by taco bell reached the halfway point to destination it slowly fired squirts of liquid oxygen from tiny jets located on the outer surface of the shuttle. It turned slowly in the distant sunlight. Finally flipped head to toe from where it started it's main engine once more slowly kicked on to full power for the deceleration.
Rose commuted from Io's main habitat ring each morning on the gallileo shuttle. Soon she would be at work. Jupiters mines produced an inordinate amount of nickel, and there was always a brisk morning and night shift at the diner where she worked.
Rose brushed her uniform idlely before returning her gaze out the thick plexiglass. A sea of stars swam past her face.
"Everyone keeps ignoring me" she whispers, her attention only on her reflection.
The foreward airlock door was tightly sealed. It had to be to deal with the harsh constant pull of vacuum. But today it had taken enough stress, and a small microscopic crack that had been there since its construction slowly widened. It had done so for years undetected by the repair crews who conducted mandatory checks according to checklists constructed by the men who held the jobs before them. Over generations all talent or knowledge had been lost. The job was done to rote procedure and things were being missed more often these days. In 6 years the CEO of Viacom would be sued in civil court for 6 billion dollars, the papers of the day would agree it was a paltry amount, and the ceo's lawyer a shrewd negotiater.
Rose knew none of this of course, and where she to learn in the 60 seconds she has left to live it is doubtful she would be comforted by the justice finally done for her own impending death, and the death of 28 other passengers. The cockpit had it's own separate airlock.
With a harsh jolt everyone feels the air suck itself from their lungs, there is a brief explosive sound before the quiet and darkness hide the horror. Rose never knew what was happening as she was sucked from her seat and cracked her head on a piece of bulkhead, itself now floating free in space.
Seen from afar the scene is less horrifying. It appears to be a ship that has opened it's doors to spill pearls and priceless jewels among the stars. The corpses and other flotsam glimmer from a faint icy sheen imparted by the water freezing out from oxygen. And the man Rose was destined to marry meets her as a frozen corpse half a billion miles from home. An emergency rescue worker, Andy has seen bad accidents in vacuum before, but for a cosmic reason he can never understand, seeing Rose floating in space breaks him. A year from now he will down a bottle of percocet and end his own visions of horror. But for us dear reader this is the end. We turn our gaze from a man floating in the void, his shape obscured by a bulky suit, and further by a blue frozen woman in his arms.