I'm going to flip my normal procedure and post the notes first and then the script. The actual script, and not just a teaser and a link to the actual thing. The script is tiny for me, but it didn't need to be long.

I had the idea for this and just had to run with it. I did see that technically I met the specifications for the 1K Contest, although I'm not actually entering it. I just wanted to share this idea inspired by it.

This is a true narrative (I think), which I'm trying to do more of since I discovered this sub. The narrator's gender is both unspecified and irrelevant, which I don't think I've ever done before. I tagged it [A4M], although the M parts could be changed to F or A with very little editing and my full blessing is already given. It's just what I defaulted to when I wrote the story, and old habits die hard.

Repost for mixing up a { with a [ in a tag. Not sure if it breaks a rule, but it would drive me nuts.

The script:

It was a dream come true that I was able to go on a trip with just my crush and myself. It was for work, so that cut into the time I’d have with them, but it was the chance I had been waiting for all of this time.

Even now, as we watch the fire burning, and hold each other with almost painful tightness, I don’t regret everything nearly as much as I should. It’s just me and him. We weren’t supposed to be here nearly this long, but… well, sometimes things happen.

As we watched the fire burn so hypnotically and intensely, he just turned to me and said he was afraid of dying alone. I kind of knew this was coming. I told him I felt the same, my heart beating fiercely in my chest. I don’t think he was necessarily reciprocating my love, but it was good enough for me. Especially under the circumstances.

So as the fire burned, we made love. Well, at least one of us did. Maybe he did too, or I was just in the right place at the right time. Either way, it was incredible for me. The passion and love felt hotter than the roaring fire, even if that of course was impossible.

We held each other afterwards. He thanked me, and said he was at peace now. He didn’t feel like he was going to die alone. He was even okay with his inevitable coming death in general.

I told him that we still had months or even years of oxygen left on the space station. The ventilation system saw to that. The water was recycled almost indefinitely. It was food that was going to be an issue. The experimental ship that brought us here mysteriously crashed on re-entry and triggered an inferno that swallowed the planet. The ship, its crew and about eight billion other people were lost.

Now all that was left was a fire that never stopped burning as we looked down on Earth. And us, of course, as long as we could survive on our rations. Maybe we could expand the hydroponic gardens? I definitely had incentive to provide food longer and help give us oxygen to breathe. Or perhaps we’d take an easier way out as things turned worse. I’d like to think when it did happen, it would be together though. Just me and my crush. Maybe the fire would still be burning then, or at least the glow of the cinders. But my love for him would go on forever, and we’d still have plenty of time together before then.

I might even be able to get him to say he loves me before the end.

So I have mixed feelings about the end of the human race. It’s selfish, I know.

Still, If I had the chance to do it over again... I’d sabotage that ship’s engines every time.