Emuna

Title of Story: I, Neutrino

Author Name: Emuna Singman

A (few) sentence(s) of context for I, Neutrino: The difference between subatomic units and neutrinos inspired me to create this piece about a girl grappling with her recently-prescribed isolation. Neutrinos exist on their own, while quarks always bond to make protons, neutrons, and electrons.

Trigger warning: Major character death

Transcript:

Lilias’s emeralds snapped open. How did she get here? Where was she? Hold on…which way was up? Lilias’s eyes might have been open, but her mind took its sweet, caustic time orienting its young mistress.

Orientation complete blinked some subconscious part of Lilias’s mind. Only then did Lilias chance a glimpse.

The inkiest of darkness, punctuated by snakes of vivid fog—nebulae—and chips of deathly-still light—stars. A thingamabob of mosaic mirrors floated nearby—a satellite.

Oh, outer space. SO HOW COULD SHE BREATHE?

Lilias’s hands instinctively reached around. Oh, she was in a hollow sphere.

Huh, fancy missing that.

But how much oxygen did the sphere hold, and how much had she already used up? Lilias hyperventilated, only realizing too late that doing so would only exacerbate the issue at hand.

Lilias dug out her phone, only for hope to wilt as quickly as it had germinated. No service.

Oh, right. Phones need transmitters.

Maybe she should have slept to conserve oxygen, but how was it possible to sleep in an environment where the air threatened to suffocate? Her heart fluttered violently against her sternum as she braided her dark curls, imagining that she was bundled under her own duvet…

Nothing doing. People generally didn’t suffocate while settling down for the night. Lilias supposed that all she had left was to curl up and contemplate the meaning of her life.

She could no longer embrace friends or family. Some people said that she would get to make new friends. True as that may have been, and however much she appreciated their concern, she didn’t need to lose all her current friends in order to make them anew.

Maybe somebody caring and trustworthy had already set up a search party…

Lilias, on grounds of hope, I punish you, came a voice deep within.

It’s true, Lilias thought. Who would have thought of looking in space, let alone for somebody as run-of-the-mill as Lilias?

Quarks travelled in pairs, and Lilias wouldn’t have minded slow death by hypoxia if it meant that she had a loved one sharing her sphere.

She was truly a neutrino. Alone.

"Maman, Maman!" cried Lilias. Blood pooled in her lower eyelids, spilled over, and drew crimson down her drawn cheeks.

A languishing heart acknowledged the young neutrino with nothing but the fading beat of a-LONE, a-LONE, a-LONE…