Second Suicide: A Short Story (Kindle Single) by Hugh Howey

#
    I wonder,
sometimes, if this is not me. Holding a tentacle up in front of the mirror,
turning my eyestalk and studying these webbed ears, these bright green eyes
with their space-black slits, I become convinced they belong to some other. It
is a morning contemplation that, much like the gas from breakfast, eventually
passes by mid-afternoon. But when I rise, I feel it is in another’s body. My
brain is discombobulated from sleep, and I sense some deep gap between my soul
and my form. I think on this while on the toilet, until my bunkmate, Kur , slaps the bathroom door with his tentacle.
    “Always in a
rush to shit,” I shout through the door, “but never in a hurry to be first from
bed.”
    Kur pauses in his protestations,
possibly to consider this contradiction. “It is your smelly ass that wakes me,”
he finally explains.
    I flush and
pop the door. Somewhere, our spaceship home will turn my waste into a meal. I
like to pretend it will all go to Kur . Outside, we
jostle in the tight confines of our bunkroom as he takes my place in the
crapper.
    “What day is
it?” he asks, farting. Most of our conversations are through this door. Once our
shifts begin, we don’t see each other. Kur works in
Gunnery, and I moved up to Intelligence ages ago, after the conquest of the Dupliene Empire. The new job came with a superiority
complex, but, alas, not a larger bunk.
    “It’s Second
Monday,” I tell him. We are practicing our Native. Kur and I are both assigned to Sector 2 landfall. He will be shooting at the very
crowds I have studied, and on this planet they have seven days to a cycle
instead of twelve. Such confusions are likely why I awake feeling like some
other. You settle in the skin of an alien race, and by the time you feel at
home there, they are no more.
    Kur flushes. “Not day of the
week. What day ’til planetfall ?”
    I hear the
sink run as he washes his tentacle. Kur’s personal
hygiene makes up for much else.
    “It’s eight
days to planetfall ,” I tell him. “Near enough that
you should know.”
    He cracks
the door. His bottoms are still undone. “I dreamed today was the day,” he says.
“Very confusing. I was mowing down the pink cunts when your foul emanations
stirred me.” He screws his eyestalks together, suppressing a laugh or a bout of
gas. “Explains the cannon fire in my dreams,” he says.
    He laughs
and farts and laughs some more.
    I am
reminded of my own nightmares. They usually come right after a conquest. In
these dreams, it is suddenly the day of the next planetfall ,
and I don’t know my assignments. I don’t know the language or my targets or the
geography. I haven’t had these dreams in a long time, though. I feel prepared.
I know this planet Earth twice as well as I have any other. I am as ready for
this invasion as I have ever been.
    While Kur finishes dressing himself, I tap the grimy terminal on
the wall. A light in the top corner is flashing, twice long and one short: a
message for me.
    #
    To: Second
Rank Intelligence Liaison Hyk
    From: Sector
2 Supervisor Ter
    Bad news, Hyk . Mil from Telecoms Sector 1 has killed herself again.
As this is the second offense in a span of twelve sleeps, Mil has been
reassigned to Gunner Crew 2, Squad 8. Due to some shuffling in landing parties,
we need you to clean out your desk and report to Sector 1. We apologize for any
inconvenience. See Supervisor Bix when you arrive.
    - Ter
    Do not reply
to this message. All commands are my own and do not reflect the commands of my
Supervisors. Planetfall in eight sleeps and counting.
Have a happy invasion!
    #
    “Fuck me,” I
say.
    “Seriously?” Kur asks. He flashes his fangs and points to his
bottoms. “I just got the last button done.”
    “I’ve been
reassigned.”
    Kur’s joke hits my brainstump a moment later, too late for a retort. He
shoulders me aside to study the terminal for himself.
    “A new
bunkmate,” he says. “A girl. Maybe this one will sex me.”
    “I will miss
you,