Disclaimer: I do not own babylon 5, Battlestar Galactica, Star Trek, Half-Life 2 and all other sci-fi genres involved EXCEPT for the name and space vessel IDS Conundrum. Do not use ids conundrum without my explicit permission.
Life. It was the worst experience Alexander Rodgers had EVER had. Every time he went for a girl, the girl went for his worst enemy, or was actually a lesbian. Every time he got a job he didn't like, but had high pay, the pay would ALWAYS go down to abysmal levels and the job he wanted would get high pay and lots of vacancies. He was actually tempted to kill himself sometimes, but that would acheive nothing.
One day, he came home from another futile attempt at getting a high paying job with Harrods in London. His qualifications were excellent, but al-Fayed decided that he was a douchebag and sent him packing. He shut the door behind him and clenched his fists, his knuckles cricking and screamed in utter frustration.
"Life SUCKS!"
"Well what do you expect? What you are trying to do, is not what you're destined to do." Alex jumped in fright as an unknown voice came from behind him. He spun around and tensed, girlishly going into a karate style pose, even though he knew nothing of the art.
"Stay away and get out of my home," he said feeblely, "I'm a First Dan Black Belt at errr... er, ninja!" It sounded stupid. However the person he saw didn't look like a burgler, an alien or even his nemesis. In fact, they just looked... human.
"Greetings," said the stranger, who was a man dressed in white, "I am Commander Brooks. I am here to take you to your new life. I'm sorry we are taking you so early, but after what we've discovered, we knew we had to replace our old commanding officer quickly." Alex looked on, his expression lost and contorted in confusion. Then he spoke.
"Eh?" The man calling himself Brooks sighed.
"Guess we'll just have to show you the easy way," he pressed a small blemish on his clothing and a beep sounded, before he spoke to no-one, "Brooks to Conundrum. Initiate transport." Alex was starting to think this guy was crazy, when a blinding white light caused him to slam his eyes tight shut. He tried to cover them with his hands, but he couldn't bring himself to move them. When the light died away, he slowly opened his eyes and gasped in total surprise. He had been in his dark front hall at home. Now he was in a bright, white room with a high ceiling. It was utterly blinding. He looked around, stunned. There were several other people in the room, all dressed in white, though some had draker shades than others. They were all scurrying around several computers on the walls of the room. A couple were sat at integrated computer desks. But beyond these desks was a sight, a sight Alex never thought he'd see.
Earth. He was looking at Earth. Alex stared wide-eyed through the row of rectangular windows.
"Uh... Wha...?" He stammered. A light laugh came from behind him. Once more, Alex turned around and saw Brooks. The darkness of his front hall had made the man seem dim in skin tone. Now he noticed that the Commander was black. That wasn't a problem of course, but it caught him off-guard.
"We've had that sort of reaction quite a few times." The Commander spoke. By now Alex was starting to get used to the unlikely situation, enough so he noticed that Brooks was speaking with an American accent. Taking a deep breath, Alex said the first questions that came to his mind.
"Where am I? What do you want from me?" Brooks smiled.
"You are on board the Inter Dimensional Ship Conundrum... and we want YOU to be our Captain.