Inktober 2026 26
Inktober 2026 26, Zip
We watched it close behind us. Through the viewport the fracture no longer looked like lightning. It looked like a seam. Far back along its length the ragged edges were drawing together, tooth meshing with tooth, a line of dark links running away across the folded skin of space. Somewhere at its head a single bright slider hauled itself along, and the universe zipped shut after us without a sound.
Below decks, the Captain stood in the dim light of the hold, where three of ours lay on the slabs. The hero had carried them out of the wreck himself, one at a time, and no one had asked him to.
Three. It could have been more. It should have been none.
His hand shook as he drew the first zip, tooth by tooth, the same small sound the sky had made. Then the second. Then the third. Not out there. Not under that yellow dust, with the wreck for a headstone. Whatever happens, we take everyone home. Nobody gets left.
He rested a hand on each in turn. Then the ship hummed on through the dark, and the seam behind us finished closing.
Zip.
