Madness, adrift in space

"Press the red button"
Said the voice inside his head.
The Commander's bloodshot eyes
flicked down from the screen to the console,
back to the screen again.
"No." he said aloud to no one.
The rest of the crew in cryo-sleep,
all except him.

"Press the red button"
Said the voice again.
He had played this game for weeks,
with almost no sleep,
and it was time for him to give in.
His hand hovered above the button.
Just a momentary hesitation
and then the voice again.
"Press the red button"
The Commander did as he was commanded.

"SELF DESTRUCT SEQUENCE INITIATED.
EMERGENCY LAUNCH OF ALL LIFE PODS."
The Commander grinned
then a bright light and the voice
was no more.

Black.
Jerry blinked
to make sure his eyes were open.
He could barely move
and thought for a moment
"Am I in a coffin?"
but then he noticed
specs of light in the distance.
Space.
He started to scream.

His eyes were finally dry
from crying, yet he still whimpered.
He didn't know how long
he had been awake.
It could've been hours,
it could've been days,
staring into that abyss.
Jerry wondered briefly why the stars
seemed to fill the sky on earth
but in space they were far between.

Starvation and dehydration had set in
as the life pod's systems slowly faded,
along with the last little bit of hope
Jerry had held onto.
The cold nipped at his skin now
making his hair prickle and stand on end.
He opened his eyes and there was a face.
At first he thought it was his reflection
in the glass but it was a woman.
Her skin and hair white as alabaster,
her eyes a piercing blue.
She was naked and her breasts were firm
nipples hard and in dark contrast to her skin.
She scratched with long nails
at the glass as if trying to get in.

Jerry recognized her as his wife
who had died back home.
"Angie my angel." he said with a smile.
"I knew you'd get your wings."
Her lips moved with silent words
"What? I can't hear you!"
She beckoned him with her hand.
She was telling him to come out.
Jerry had known about the emergency hatch release
above his head but never thought of using it.
Not till now.

He squeezed his arm up
past the tight confined space,
wrapped his hand
around the red handle
and pulled down.
There was a pop as Jerry's eardrums burst
as the pressure disappeared.
Then the air was sucked out of his lungs,
shriveling up like raisins in his chest.
His eyes bulged out of their sockets
and within seconds his skin began to freeze and crack.
The pain was immense but he made one last effort
to push off from the vessel towards his love
as she dissolved with the last seconds of his life.
His corpse forever floating,
forgotten in the darkness between stars.