[ WP ] The death penalty has been replaced by a one way trip to Mars .

Jack sat in silence against the cold metal wall of the ship's hull as they waited for their weekly nutrient pills. Conversation demanded too much effort; instead the prisoners saved their precious energy. No one would bother moving until the dispensary door unlocked and then until it unlocked again. It had been that way for years now. The massive prison ship that ferried these criminals gave no thought to excess, some say no thought to humanity, but the passengers aboard were commensurate to their stark accommodations. The entirety of the ship was automated. No need to pay or feed a crew and no need to risk mutiny. Aside from the bare basic oxygen recycler and nutrient pill dispensary, the prisoners had nothing aboard save their thermal insulation suits. All 97 remaining prisoners sat huddled together in various places throughout the ship's holding bay. It was the ship's only accessible room. 
 
 Jack eyed the others around him, most were breathing softly but many lay undistinguishable from the lifeless bodies that did not survive the journey. The majority of the dead fell to starvation, the rest to each other. Jack watched a man get his brain ripped through his eye sockets one day when the madness had begun to set in. It was months now since the crazy ones had all died out. Now it was just the sitters. The ones who never did anything.
