by L. S. Wood
The room again turned into a busy bee-buzzing beehive. “Commander Ivan, sir!”
“Yes, Gina.”
“Krista and I would like to be treated as equals with the rest of the crew, sir. We would like to participate in the lottery just as everyone else has to, sir. We feel it was our own stupidity to have become pregnant in the first place, and no one else should have to suffer because of our own selfless actions.”
“NO! They should be exempt like the commander said,” yelled Gina’s husband.
“No they shouldn‘t.”
“Yes they should,” shouted someone in the rear of the crowd.
“I will make all the damn decisions around here gentlemen. If the two women choose to participate in the lottery with us then so be it, they shall participate in it. It is their own personal choices, and I give them their own rights in choosing. Gina, Krista, you may do either. Which do you choose to do? Play like the rest of us or be exempt and leave with the lucky ones of the draw?”
They talkatively and openly discussed it in front of the others, and came to their own conclusions. Their loving husbands disliked them in choosing the lottery over not having to play the lottery at all as an equal to their fellow cosmonauts. “We choose to play the lottery, Commander,” said Gina to Commander Ivan.
“The decision has been made then gentlemen. Gina and Krista shall play as equals as the rest of us shall do in the lottery.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
Let the Lottery Begin
Commander Ivan took out the first batch of envelopes he had made up from his satchel for the first drawing. He placed the envelopes into the makeshift basket on the tray for his crew to select from, and shook the envelopes mixing them up. Everyone took their separate turn in fetching their first time chance of winning or losing envelopes from the tray. Everyone at first appeared to hesitate in opening up their lottery envelopes in fear, or was it in hopeful anticipation of what was to come for or of them, as they looked around the assembly room at one other. Then they quickly opened the envelopes in their hands to display the good or bad outcome awaiting them from within. “Winners, please go to the right as before, and the not so lucky ones please step to the left.” Commander Ivan did not want to say loser to anyone of his crew, even though left out in space to die by their own government made them all losers in this drawing.
Instantaneously losing all happy features, Gina lost the pleasant beaming smile she usually displayed on her all time beaming face of joy, the instant she opened up her first envelope. Her first envelope of luck had contained a blank note indicating she had lost the first drawing in this lottery. Slowly she moved over to the left of the room to assemble with the first set of unlucky drawing personnel.
Krista beamed from ear to ear with a sigh of relief and a smile so big a satellite could have flown right through it as her first drawn envelope contained a lucky enveloped winner. She joyfully floated to the right to be with the few who had drawn their lucky envelopes first. The drawing was far from being over, and everyone knew even the ones who were positioned to their right, still could, and just might end up in the unlucky crowd to the left where Gina was with a sulking looking face when the lottery came to its final fruition.
Commander Ivan’s first envelope contained a blank piece of paper, leaving him to be with the crowd to the left with the less hearty heart wrenching few who had lost their first attempt as well. He had lost, and down deep inside hoped he would be one of the unlucky ones of the lottery at first, so one of his younger crewmembers he now stood among like Gina might be able to return to Earth and fulfill her life, along with her unborn child’s life to their fullest.
He stood beside Chenco’s wife Gina and Chenco, along with Krista’s husband, John. Krista’s face looked disheartened losing her sudden pleasant smile as she looked over at her husband John standing in the crowd of losers to her left.
After marking down the winners and the losers, Commander Ivan brought forth the second container of envelopes to the table to be opened by all. This time the commander won his first chance to return back home with his envelope, and began instantly daydreaming about how nice it would really be to be back home with his family and friends all gathered around him once again.
Commander Ivan looked over in Gina’s direction and for a second time in a row of this lottery for life drawing, Gina was again in the loser’s circle unhappy with herself, the commander unsure for her to have chosen to play in this stupid but very necessary game of life and death.
“Damn it”, he thought disgruntled to himself! His daughter Britt was just about Gina’s age and had two little ones of her own to take care and able to love. Gina deserved to go home on the damn capsule to have her baby or babies back on Earth and look forward to a life full of happiness with them and Chenco. This damn lottery was not about going back home to live or not going back home to live. It was all about life and death.
He had prepared the lottery for life to enable a few to defeat the sting of death in space, and spared the slow agonizing death in running out of food and oxygen when the crucial time came to all. This whole damn lottery thing was just like playing that stupid old foolish Russian fools game of bravery, of Russian-roulette, to prove ones bravery or not, but in this damn lottery it was differently being played without a bullet or a gun. Instead, in this particular game of roulette, they were not using a gun, but instead were using these damn envelopes as their weapons, and the damn blank pieces of paper were their loaded bullets of death.
All that came to Ivan’s mind at that very moment was a story about a pirate he remembered reading about when he was a much younger man, a young teenager. It was a story of a man, a sailor, who had received an almost blank piece of paper in an envelope that contained a black spot painted in the middle of the piece of white paper, representing a message that indicated he was about to be a dead man in a short period of time. He was either going to be killed by another sailor and sailors or by some horrific deadly sword wielding spirit. He couldn’t quite remember the outcome of the message or the story to which it applied at the time, and it didn’t much matter anymore, seeing he stood there holding another parchment of blank colored paper without any writing upon it, and not one with a black spot on it, but it was all the same to him.
He looked sadly around the room to his fellow cosmonauts, looking for that lost jovial smile Gina had once shone brightly on her now so very frowning, enormously saddened face of fear and resentment for having to have been there in the first place, but it had been her very own choice.
He figured it must have been a bad spirit that had done the job of treachery for the black spot in the story, it being responsible for the killing of the victim or victims that carried its message out of fear of dying without hope that had caused them their sudden deaths.
A third loss in a row for Gina, this third loss took a tremendous toll on her, as she dawned the look of sudden death all about her in an extended fearful look of concern for her precious unborn children. In the fourth drawing she drew a winning piece of parchment this time, with a losing envelope going to Krista this time round who now looked as if a death sentence had been dealt to her also. Gina knew the feeling way too well! Gina’s expression did not show any change or variation in her facial expression or even the simplest of a detectable smile with the winning parchment paper.
All she could muster up on her face now was a sad look of sickness and loss, even though she still had a very slim chance if you could call it that of winning a spot on the space capsule with the remaining number of drawings left on the table to be drawn. If the numbers of participants did not attain their winning numbers in quick succession, the lottery was made so everyone would have a chance of winning or losing. If a crewmember was extremely lucky, he or she could be a winner in the first five drawings. If they were not, then it might take all twenty drawings to make up the winners’ list.
Ivan had put an extreme
amount of time into developing this special lottery of life and death game again even though he did not look at it as a death sentence for anyone at the time of creation. Now he felt as if he had made a game of death, and was again not happy with himself.
Commander Ivan looked saddened by the way which his lottery was progressing, and the extreme way its outcome was affecting his once loving crew. They were more mystified now of who would live and who would die, resentful of the ones’ who were winning, by the ones who were losing. He was not God for goodness sake, so why had he chosen the way of the lottery to figure out the ones to be saved and who would die aboard the unforgiving God forsaken space station anyway.
All he had had to do was to point his damn index finger at the ones of his crew he wanted to, and hand select the six lucky fellow cosmonauts who were to leave the space station. The ones hopefully who would send back help to the space she station to save them all, and that would have been that. He could have been one of the six lucky ones to leave with the others if he so chose to, but would not have done so having a heart bigger than the International Space Station itself.
By the looks of it, he was becoming the commander of a death vessel suspended in the twilight zone in outer space. Everyone left there trapped by the deplorability of their own past commanding officials controlling the government force back home on Earth in Russia. The damn fools who had now vanished from the face of the earth, according to the last reports received, and brought to his command by Commander Anderson with the last rescue mission. Ivan could still be one of the six lucky ones to leave if he so wanted to and that would be that.
The excitement of the moment took hold of him as he heard a little voice speak to him from deep within his subconscious. “You are not God, Ivan Khrushchev, for this is the one and only fair way to accomplish this mission. None of the crew can put the blame on you for you have tried in every possible fair way to be fair to them all. This is the only way to help anyone and everyone onboard including yourself if you win. Then, if you do win, what will you do? What in the hell will you do?” The little voice in his head then slipped away and went totally silent leaving his head swimming in doubt about everything he had done to make this damn lottery a just and fair one.
As the lottery slowly progressed forward like a person opening a very special gift, but not wanting the outcome to come to them too quickly and spoil the surprise. The looks of jubilation upon some of the faces of the first lucky winners quickly faded into very saddened looks of total dismay. There were still several more units of envelopes held bound and unopened in the lottery carton on the table, and not a single crewmember had yet clinched the winning number in winning envelopes to claim his or her prize in securing one of the available lottery seats waiting for them on the capsule.
What was going on, what was happening? Only a couple of hours ago, everyone was smiling and joking around about someone going home someday. Now the looks on the faces of his once happy crew made the commander wish he had just chosen the six to leave without this damned life threatening game of cat and mouse. The look of gloom and doom was on everyone all around. The lottery had finally eliminated all but twelve of the contestants who were now almost sick with excitement of winning or losing that one special seat they were just waiting to see come to them by chance of a picked envelope.
The twelve who remained were Gina, Gina’s husband Chenco, John, Krista’s husband, Krista by chance, the commander, Dominique, and six other crewmembers of the space station. One by one everyone took an envelope from the tray of envelopes on the counter. Each unit contained a different number of winning and losing envelopes, so it made the lottery last a lot longer than the commander had hoped it would take to finalize the mission of this very special winning or losing lottery.
This time Commander Ivan opened his envelope first before the others had a chance to, maybe out the excitement of the hour. He had won fair and square. He won the first seat on the space capsule returning back home to Earth. One of the last twelve contestants left. Everyone cheered for him as he bowed before everyone with a friendly gesture of acceptance, as they cheered happily for him.
He looked in seventh heaven for being the first winner in the lottery without just taking the first seat by his own authority of position as commander. In his mind, he was now one of the luckiest men alive on Earth in space, or at least one of the happiest men alive. He could not wait to see his loving family and have their warm loving arms wrapped once again around his love starving self. He could only imagine in his mind the special welcoming home party he would be receiving from both family and all his many friends on his return to Earth. He could not wait to walk on solid terra firma of good old Mother Earth once more. He could not wait to see and smell the scents of Earth. He longed for the smell of its flowers, trees, and its many assorted grasses and hays once again as if he had never smelt them ever before. He could not wait to smell the difference of the changing seasons from autumn to spring to summer, and back to winter. He longed for the smell of his wife and family members for everyone had their own distinct aroma about them. He could not remember a happier time in his entire life than right now.
Krista looked and sounded relieved as she sounded out a sound of relief when she opened up her last envelope next, and found the second seat on the space capsule to be her own. She could now have her baby born back on Earth in a hospital equipped with all of the most necessary equipment they needed if she were to have her baby by a Cesarean-section birth. Earth, she thought, a place where she could raise her family in peace and comfort, or at least she thought she could at the time of her winnings.
Krista’s husband, John, opened his lottery for life envelope next. He instantly began to cry from months of built up emotion with his envelope still clutched between his shaking fingers. Krista grabbed the envelope from his hand as she began to cry happily right along with John as she read the good news. She hugged him with all her might. They both had won the second and third seats aboard the space capsule returning back to earth together as a husband and wife team. They could now have the life they had always dreamed and talked about for so long. They were now given the chance to raise their family together back home on his father’s farm in Russia where he had grown up. To have a child on a space station in outer space was not part of their original planned mission now everything was going as previously planned, and right for a change they hoped. To die in outer space along with their new newborn son or daughter was not part of their long-term goal as parents or cosmonauts.
Dominique was next in line to open up her envelope of fate. The expression on her face said it all. Her face went from a frozen hard cold frown of staring out into dark open spaces, to an ever-bright smile in pure confidence. Her beautiful eyes instantly misted up with great joy from the outcome of her draw. It was amazing, four winners in a row! She just knew the next draw from the envelopes had to be one of a loser, but it was not. She, too, as the other three had luckily picked an envelope with the winning element of happiness written on it. She glowed like the dawning of a bright new day when the sun comes cresting up over a darkened mountaintop to bring the freshness of bright new light upon the darkness of a dreaded night from the previous day of gloom. The pure attitude of delightful cheer in her lovely facial expressions glowed full and bright of enchanted gratitude with nothing but happiness adorned all through her pleasant smile. She was the lucky drawer of seat number four on the returning space capsule. The stressed excitement of the lottery churned wildly in her stomach to the point of vomiting, but she held it all back with opening her envelope. She knew her destiny was to die in the scrap metal heap she was living in, and could not believe her winning seat that would change her life forever.
The massive tension of playing the lottery of life was rapidly growing with intensity of leaps and bounds with strength with every passing second. There were only two more lucky seats left available on the craft of freedom available on the counter somewhere. As t
he contestants readied themselves to open up the last of the remaining envelops, some of the losing crewmembers slowly began to dwindle into the quietness as they slowly walked or floated away from the drawing room in thoughtless gloom. The few lucky ones still in for the long haul of the lottery experienced upset stomachs, almost to the point of wanting to void themselves whatever they had left in their stomachs from their earlier meals. With the first four envelopes already opened and showing winners, everyone knew each envelope from now on would surely be a losing one if the odds stayed the same as the last several stacks of lottery for life envelopes had been for the others.
When Gina opened up her envelope, she saw her entire future life pass before her very eyes. She had second thoughts now about the envelope she was about to pick up. In addition to picking up the losing envelope and eliminating her from the contest, she bickered in her mind to pick up the one envelope to the right of the one she had first wanted to choose. Why had she not slipped her hand just a little further to the right in this last draw? The envelope she left behind just had to have one of the last winning messages held secretly sealed within its folded flap. She sank in limpness to the floor on her knees in a heap and began sobbing openly for everyone to see and hear her cry. She did not mean to make this thoughtless display of sudden grief to take hold of her, but the sadness in her melting heart experiencing one of the last of the losing envelopes caught her totally off guard with the losing draw.
Chenco went to her and bent down putting out his caring arms to surround her, and to comfort her in her loss. She was so upset; she did not even know he was there to comfort her. She was numb to his touch, just knowing she was supposed to be one of the few lucky cosmonauts to be going home before the lottery even took place, or she might have opted for the free pass she and Krista had been offered right up front before the lottery took shape.
