Chapter One
The Serpent and The Hole
Dr. Varissa DeGennaro awoke with a start as the spaceship Beowulf rocked beneath her as if it was under fire from another ship. Varissa, a thirty year old Italian-American Archeologist and college professor from Earth-2 who had a doctorate in Earth-1 History, jumped to her feet. She stood at 5'4, 130lbs and had an olive complexion. She wore her long brown hair in a ponytail and kept a vigorous workout regime. Her body had perfect curves accentuated by her work uniform, a tight white jumpsuit that seemed to have a shine to it. All of her co-workers wore different colored jumpsuits of the same style.
She made her way out of her sleeping quarters and placed her hand on the panel next to her door. Nothing happened, the normal scan that would lead to the door opening did not activate. The room was dark with a flashing dim red light letting her know the ship was on auxiliary power.
Varissa used her hands and raw strength to push the sliding door open and entered the dark corridor of the sleeping quarters section of the Beowulf.
Every door of the passage stood open. She ran down the corridor looking into each room and calling out for her shipmates and found them all empty. The pattern of the flashing red lights changed. It was now flashing red in a series of three flashes and then a green flash then back to red. She didn't know what that meant. Varissa reached the end of the corridor and found herself again faced with another automatic sliding door that would not open with a palm scan. She forced the door open and made her way into the empty mess hall and kitchen. She passed through into the empty med bay and lab.
She began to panic as the ship rocked again, the floor slanting to the left, almost knocking her off her feet. She held onto a counter and made her way out of the lab and into the cryochamber. Again she found herself alone. Where the hell was the rest of the crew? She ran through the chamber into the warehouse where the Beowulf kept all of their scavenged finds from Earth-1 and other lost planets which once held civilization.
She had taken the job with Hawkins Salvage and Recovery to not only make easy, good money but also for a chance to visit Earth-1 and other formerly inhabited planets across the known galaxies. She had always been a very curious individual. She had just finished her second year teaching Earth-1 history at Lucent University and had joined the outfit during her summer break to help pay off her student loans and other debt. She had visited several planets that first summer but unfortunately not Earth-1 due to a tragic accident that occurred the year before. A group of students on a field trip to Earth-1 aboard a ship called the Grendel had collided with the interstellar city of Solaris. Over fifteen thousand people lost their lives that day and new stringent restrictions and red tape were added to permits on visits to Earth-1 by the New World Senate. Because Hawkins Salvage and Recovery was ran by a couple that didn't like to always play by the rules and were always looking for loopholes, legal or otherwise, the Beowulf had avoided Earth-1 until said loopholes could be found and exploited. This summer they had done just that.
Varissa was excited that she was finally going to get to visit Earth-1 again, she had been there herself on a field trip in the tenth grade and had dreamed of returning ever since. In fact, that visit was what gave her the passion for learning about and eventually teaching the history of Earth-1. She had thoroughly enjoyed her first Summer with Hawkins, visiting so many different galaxies and "dead" planets even when that meant one or two weeks in cryosleep while the starship crossed vast distances at warp speed. It was the only way to avoid certain medical anomalies caused by traveling at such speeds when not in the protective casings of the neuro cryo chambers. You literally had to get a small hard drive chip implanted in your brain for the cryo bed to jack into during these deep space travels to keep a constant appraisal of each shipmate's neural activity and vital signs. Before this medical technology had been implemented these types of travels had been hypothesized and later proven to cause what experts called "space madness." In one extreme case a pilot stricken with space madness deviated from course and locked himself in the cockpit of a large commercial passenger vessel traveling to a vacation planet in the Xion galaxy. Instead of taking the two thousand passengers on board to their destination he flew the ship into the gravitational pull of a dying star. No one survived. So, Varissa did not mind the stretches in cryo sleep compared to the possibility of going insane and slaughtering her shipmates. It seemed like a fair trade off.
But now she found herself without any shipmates to travel with or slaughter regardless. The warehouse was also without life. Rows of large boxes and shipping containers lined the warehouse floor. She ran through each row calling out the names of crewmates and friends.
No one answered.
The ship rocked again, this time so hard it knocked Varissa to the floor and containers fell around her. She barely rolled out of the way of a large wooden crate that was out of place amongst the metallic containers around it. The odd crate was from a different time. It hit the floor with a crash, the wood exploding and the contents spreading across the floor not far from where she lay. She gasped as she saw over a dozen glowing red and green snakes begin to writhe and slither in all directions. The largest of which stared directly at her and began moving towards her at a supernatural pace. She screamed, jumped to her feet and ran out of the warehouse. She glanced over her shoulder as she ran and saw the large serpent following close behind her. She decided to make a run for the cockpit and hoped that their pilot Warlock Rollins, a grizzled, scarred black retired Universal Coalition Marine in his 60's wearing his gray Hawkins jumpsuit, would be waiting there with answers for her.
Varissa's heart pounded as her footfalls echoed throughout the empty ship and the glowing red and green serpent remained steadfast behind her somehow keeping pace with her athletic gait. The cockpit door was within sight, standing slightly ajar. She reached it, forced the two sides apart, and squeezed through. She turned and began using all of her strength to push the sliding door shut. The snake was getting closer and closer. The auxiliary power lights blinked faster and faster, strobing red and green as if keeping rhythm with each beat of her pounding heart. The snake reached the door and reared back to strike. She gave a final shove and the door slammed shut in the nick of time. She felt the serpent pound against it. Varissa leaned back against the door, out of breath. She slid to the ground, staring in disbelief as her eyes fell upon the empty cockpit and what filled the window beyond. She cried out, hopeless.
The Beowulf was being pulled into a black hole.
She had only ever seen video of one and she couldn't deny the beauty of the total destruction she now faced. She looked to the controls, knowing they were already too close to escape the devouring giant's pull, but needing to try anyway. The controls were destroyed. Sparks flew from every panel. The entire command deck was in disarray. The pounding outside the cockpit door stopped and Varissa rose to her feet. She slowly walked to the window and placed her hands on the glass as the ship rocked again and again.
The Beowulf had entered the event horizon of the black hole. Varissa's fear of isolation, her fear of the glowing serpent, fear of death began to fade. A peace fell over her as the glass around her fingers began to crack and spider web. She heard a crunch as the hull of the ship began to weaken and break apart, saw plumes of vapor as the air was ripped from the ship. She saw the cockpit reflected in the glass, saw the door behind her open and the serpent slither into the room.
It wouldn't matter. She would be gone before it could reach her. In an instant the entire cockpit window exploded into a million scintillating pieces which were instantly sucked into the black hole's event horizon. Varissa followed. The world exploded into noise and chaos. She felt her lungs being emptied as she flipped over and over and each time she flipped facing the ship she saw the glowing snake somehow flying towards her. It opened its large mouth, flashing a set of large fangs. She flipped again and faced the black hole, flipped again and faced the snake which was almost upon her. Again she flipped and saw the black hole. She felt her life leaving her. Flipped again and the snake was there, inches from her face. In an instant it struck at Varissa...
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Varissa exploded out of bed, screaming. She heard a whoosh as her sleeping quarter's door opened and a very handsome man who appeared to be in his late 20's or early 30's with the physique of a model, 6'3, blue eyes and neat blonde hairwearing a silver jumpsuit, stared at her from her doorwaywith a blank expression.
Of course, he only appeared to be in said age range. In reality, he was only eleven months old. He was a fully functioning android with an evolving AI interface created by Lubdan Gallagher, Hawkin's resident scientist and engineer. Lubdan was a young Irish ginger. He was a genius who graduated high school at seven years old and college at fifteen. Now twenty two years old, he was tall, lanky and PROUDLY weird as hell, he even elected to wear a pink jumpsuit with orange seams to add to his quirkiness.
Some of the employees aboard the Beowulf assumed Lubdan had designed and created Talos-16 to be his boyfriend and or lover and teased the gay young man mercilessly.
"Are you distressed Dr. DeGennaro?" Talos-16 asked in his monotone yet soothing voice.
"Just a bad dream T," Varissa replied.
"Would you like a hot oil massage? Lubdan finds that a hot oil massage calms him after distressing events," Talos said.
"I'm sure he does T, but no I'm okay," Varissa said with a smirk.
"Very well. I am to inform you we have arrived at our destination. We are currently orbiting Earth-1 and will begin a scan for artifacts shortly. Would you like to join the rest of the crew in the lab?"
Varissa turned and faced a panel on the wall of her quarters. "Open window panel," she ordered. The gray panel began to rise revealing a window that looked out on a breathtaking scene. They were indeed orbiting Earth-1. She glanced down in wonder at the desolate planet that once housed and introduced the human race to the vastness of space. The pictures of Earth-1 from space in the times before it became uninhabitable were beautiful, so much blue and green, but now the oceans had mostly dried up and the majority of the rock was awash in a constant dust storm. Lightning streaked across the brown cloud covered atmosphere of the once vibrant planet. Varissa felt a slight sadness at how such a beautiful planet could die simply because some humans let politics, hyperbole and propaganda convince them that climate change was fiction and pollution was not a danger to their future. Too many men and women with their own agenda's viewed the future as an afterthought, something to be left for future generations to deal with. They would put it out of sight and out of mind and concentrate on the 'All Powerful Dollar.' Wealth and greed killed Earth-1, a lesson the United Earth Government on Earth-2 had learned from and would not let happen again, or so she hoped. "It is still beautiful in it's own way, don't you think, Talos?" Varissa asked.
"Lubdan says beauty is in the eye of the beholder," Talos answered. "That it is what is on the inside that matters. Earth-1 is filled with dust storms and devastation, therefor is as unappealing as it appears from space. That did not answer my question regarding the crew meeting, however."
"Yes T, I'll be there shortly, thank you," Varissa replied.
"You are most welcome, Dr. DeGennaro," Talos said. He excused himself and made his way to the lab.
Varissa, stared down at Earth-1 below, the fragments of her nightmare already fleeting, but one thing still stood out to her and sent a twinge of dread through her body. The glowing red and green snake that had stalked her. What did it mean? Varissa scanned the planet below one more time, sighed and turned to leave her quarters.
"Close window panel."
The panel slowly closed and Varissa left her quarters. Her door whooshed shut behind her as she made her way towards the lab and her shipmates.
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