The captain sat in his chair gazing at the main screen, his thoughts far away.
He thought about all that had happened in recent days, about the decisions that were sometimes made, when someone couldn’t accept that what they had was enough. He thought about the implications of a few things Jain had said, and about the message his old friend had tried to get to him. He could feel himself fighting against the conclusion that he was slowly coming to, that perhaps the two were connected, fighting it as much by reflex as by choice. He knew he would lose.
He watched the freezing dark slip by, knowing that things were different for him now, that there’d been a fundamental shift in how he perceived things, and that he could never go back. He was deeply immersed in an unsettling scrutiny of himself and what he was trying to protect, so much so that he didn’t notice either his first officer or the ship’s doctor when they stopped by to see him, both of them troubled with reflections all their own. Each man lingered next to him for a moment or two before slipping away, leaving him be.
The soft, lulling sounds of the bridge soothed his tired mind a little, but not quite enough to let him rest easy.