“Shit, shit, shit, come on Birdy! Not like this!”

Alcubierre engines whirled in rage. Taken to the brink by their own will to live. Attention claimed by gravity, their mortal enemy.

“Danger, Gravity Well. Danger, Gravity Well” The computer accompanied its lament with a symphony of blinking instruments. Its audience would prefer silence.

“Please, Birdy! We’ve been through so much, I know you can do this!” A scream no one could hear.

She pulled the yoke like Excalibur itself and just as in vain. No hero, no weapon could save her from the shapeless, ravenous hunger. Nothing consumes the canopy as stars flee for their own safety. The black maw opens wider, and wider still. The cosmos ages like a friend once known, missed only in their absence.

Time is all that’s left. Time is all that can be saved.

“Emergency Frame Freeze Initiated” Engines resign themselves, finding acceptance before their master.

“No… Please Birdy no…”

Hands release the stubborn hilt. They find renewed purpose in catching tears.

Nature abhors a vacuum, so silence takes its place. A witness to the cosmic tragedy. Its hands weighing on her shoulders and heart.

Drowning eyes float through the canopy glass. The black mirror seen, the black mirror shows. Recursive light permits the most personal of patterns. A ship, beaten and loved, held still in the arms of void. Cradling the doomed fledgling.

Then choking it.

“Hull compromised”

Silence took her too.