I scream and flail around. I force myself to curl into a fetal position—it’s comforting and keeps me from hitting any controls or screens.

I shiver and shake as I float around the control room. I should have strapped myself to the chair, but I didn’t think to. Dummy.

“I’m not falling!” I scream. “I’m not falling! This is just space! Everything is fine!”

It’s not fine. I feel my stomach in my throat. I’m going to puke. Puke in zero g is not okay. I don’t have a bag. I severely underprepared for this. I was stupid to think I could just talk myself out of a primal fear.

I pull the collar of my jumpsuit open and tilt my head down. I’m just in the nick of time. I puke out the entirety of “Day 9—Meal 3” into my shirt. I hold the collar tight to my chest afterward. It’s disgusting, but contained. Better than letting it float around the control room and becoming a choking hazard.

“Oh gosh…” I whimper. “Gosh… this is…”

Can I do this? Will I be rendered completely worthless from this point on? Will humanity die because I can’t handle zero g?

No.

I clench my teeth. I clench my fists. I clench my butt. I clench every part of me that I know how to clench. It gives me a feeling of control. I’m doing something by aggressively doing nothing.

After an eternity, the panic begins to ebb away. Human brains are amazing things. We can get used to just about anything. I’m making the adjustment.

The slight reduction of fear has a feedback effect. I know I will get less afraid now. And knowing that makes the fear subside even faster. Soon, the panic dies down to fear, which diffuses into general anxiousness.

I look around the control room and nothing seems right. Nothing changed, but now there’s no down. I still feel sick to my stomach. I grab my collar in case I need to puke again but it isn’t necessary. I hold it in.

The feeling of warm vomit squishing between my chest and jumpsuit is disgusting. I need to change.

I aim myself at the hatchway leading to the lab and kick off the bulkhead behind me. I float down and into the lab. The whole room is cluttered with random floating debris. I left things out on the table when I cataloged them. Now all that stuff is wandering around freely, wafted along by currents from the life-support air vents.

“Dummy,” I say to myself. I really should have seen that coming.

I continue onward to the bedroom. Not surprisingly, it’s also got junk floating everywhere. I opened most of the bins in the storage area to see what was inside. Now the bins and their contents drift to and fro.

“Clean me!” I say to the arms.