Author's Notes: I cannot begin to describe how disappointed I am with myself for not updating sooner. I've been working on two chapters constantly for months and I always seem to let myself get distracted with a million and one things. Hopefully I'll have more content uploaded more frequently. Thank you so very much to everyone who's read, reviewed, watched, and waited patiently. Enjoy!


Episode 3 - Part 2: Paranormal Activity

She stared at her terminal watching nothing but the login screen to the Swollen Eyeball Network's server. The screen was nearly blank and it allowed Ghost Kitten to glance at her own reflection. A young girl in her late teens with chocolate skin, deep amber eyes and long, straight black hair returned the gaze. If what she'd heard was true it meant that there was proof of alien life and the Eyeballs were keeping a lid on it. If Mothman had proof then the Eyeballs were obligated to investigate seriously and share their findings with the world. Sure she'd heard rumors about Mothman and that many of their fellow Eyeballs thought obsessed was an understatement. Perhaps he was even deluded. But you shouldn't ignore something so important just because the person saying it is annoying... should you?

"No..." she said out loud to herself. "I guess exceptions can be made. After all that's why my left dad..." Hanging her head with a roll of her eyes, she reached to her keyboard and began to type. The Eyeball login disappeared and she perused through some of her files. Her forte was hunting ghosts, but perhaps it was time for a change. A little extraterrestrial investigation would prove both a welcome distraction and a new challenge.

"I, Cassandra Gates, will present proof the Eyeballs can't ignore by independently verifying some of Mothman's findings and correlate it with outside data! Huh, that's odd... I've never talked out loud to myself before..."

Five hours and three energy drinks later light could be seen creeping through the crack between her blinds and the window. A few birds whistled and sang from outside to accompany the rising sun. Her eyes were bloodshot and dark circles had formed beneath them, but so far she hadn't found any independent information to substantiate even one of the claims Mothman had made in his filed reports with the Network. She brought her hand up to rub wearily at her eyes, sighing loudly with frustration.

"Maybe I'm looking too closely at things directly associated with Mothman's supposed alien... I'll try looking at more randomized phenomena, but first I need a break..." With that Cassandra queued up a few downloads and got from her desk, stretching her arms high into the air and feeling her bones pop in a few places.

It would be over an hour before she returned, stomach now full of breakfast and her form wrapped up in a towel with a second gingerly drying her long black hair. It was several minutes before she realized there was a blinking light on her screen; a message was waiting for her. Cassandra hastily dressed herself, taking a moment to wrap her dam hair neatly in her towel before punching the key to open the awaiting correspondence and soon found herself reading aloud.

"'Cassie. I have some new readings you might be interested in. Give me ring when you get this, you know I won't be going anywhere any time soon, Yuri.' Huh, I wonder what he's got for me, figured he'd be too busy."

Sitting down at her desk again, Cassandra paused long enough to stretch her arms high again, unable to keep a yawn from escaping her. Sleep would be nice at this point, but she'd already decided to skip classes for this. She'd have to make the most of it. Tapping a few keys brought her chat program to life. It always made her paranoid using unencrypted method of communication, something that had rubbed off on her from her estranged father, but her friend had insisted it was safe and especially made it easier to talk.

She clicked on her friend's username to see he was still online, no doubt waiting for her to respond. Then a video box flickered to life and a young man with auburn hair cut very short, along with stubble on his face turned towards her. He had to be in his early twenties by the looks of him. The young man sported a deep blue flight suit, a mission patch on the arm bearing the letters 'I.S.S.', along with a name embroidered over the chest pocket: TERESHKOVA. His brown eyes lit up at the sight of her and the young cosmonaut gave a toothy grin. When he spoke his voice held a thick Russian accent though his English was still quite good.

"Cassandra! Dobroye utro. It is good to be seeing you again! You must have god message, yes? I did not expect to be hearing from you so soon. Do you not have school to be going to?"

"Hey Yuri, yeah I got your message. I decided to skip classes today, working on something kind of big. My grades can take it. How's it going up on the space station?" Cassandra smirked teasingly at her friend on the screen. The young cosmonaut chuckled and slowly brought a hand up to scratch his stubble covered chin.

"Ehhh, it goes. Though let me guess: you finally caught ghastly ghoul, mm? Or perhaps you found real vampire?" Yuri grinned cheerily and Cassandra stuck her tongue out at him.

"Shut it you, or you'll be laughing out of the other side of your face!" She replied in a playfully threatening tone. Yuri laughed and shook his head.

"Da. I am shaking in my moon boots. Though really... what is it you are working on?"

"It's got something to do with space, actually." Nodding matter-of-factly, Cassandra gave the most indignant look she could muster.

"Really now? I never thought I would be seeing the day where Spooky Cassie Gates would look to the heavens and study something real." The Russian laughed but quickly held his hands up defensively, the motion drawn out by his weightlessness. "I am only joking with you, of course." Cassandra peered at him before finally noticing that her friend was at a funny angle, only now realizing he was floating.

"Yuri, I thought the new space station had this prototype artificial gravity generator?"

"Eh? Oh, well of course it does. But we turn it off now and then to do zero-G experiments. Besides, who would be wanting to come to space only to have it feel like Earth all the time?" Cassandra didn't have a rebuttal to that one. "Well, since you say your current project is on space, then you will be very interested to see what I have."

Feeling like her hair was dry enough she tugged the towel free and let her damp hair flip down about her shoulders and behind her back. Cassandra huffed and blew a few stray strands out of her eyes. Meanwhile Yuri had rummaged through a few folders and fiddled with a nearby terminal, cursing to himself in Russian.

"Kusok der'ma... Ahhh hah! Uspekh! Here Cassandra, look at this." Yuri pulled a large photograph from one of the folders, allowing it and the rest of the other files to float about around him. He held the image close enough for the camera to se. A section of space was displayed on the image, the stars alight around most of the frame.

"This is the important thing you wanted to show me, Yuri?" Cassandra laughed, pointing a finger incredulously at the screen and peering at her friend as if he'd finally lost it. "You haven't gotten into your commander's scotch again have you? It's just a bit of sky, no big deal." Yuri shook his head and snapped his fingers.

"Nyet, look closely... in the center. Do you see?" Cassandra sighed and squinted her eyes, studying the image closer. Again it looked just like stars, all twinkling with their radiant brilliance. All except in the center. Except the center. The center. The middle of the image was dark.

"Yuri, why is that spot in the middle blank like that? Shouldn't we be seeing stars there? Is something wrong with your imager?"

"Nyet, this is what I was thinking first. But after taking more pictures in succession it can be seen the void spot shifts... None of the station's instruments could get readings. If I had not been looking out the window I never would have known it was there." Yuri shook his head as he replied, hitting a few keys on his own terminal. After a moment images sprang to life on Cassie's screen. The scrolled through them, the station's camera catching the same patch of stars, though each frame the ripple of darkness shifted further right. It took her a moment to begin to truly come to terms with what she was seeing.

"Y-Yuri..? Does that shadow have... shape?"

"Da." The cosmonaut smiled broadly and nodded his head with excitement. He sent over one last image that looked as though he'd drawn an outline around the blank field of stars. "A spacecraft! The profile is very unique. I have been checking databases of craft for the last two hours and so far it is nothing like anything known. My data is incomplete, there is likely to be designs classified from public record but... Cassie, I think this is an alien ship!"


Stay tuned for the next addition to Episode 3. Part 3: Sucker Punch. Also, so you don't have to look it up, Yuri says 'Good morning!' and calls his computer a 'piece of shit'.