Episode 1- A trip through the Void

It's been twenty years since humanity finally perfected interstellar space travel and began exploring the vast regions of undiscovered space on an unprecedented scale. Some were ecstatic to know that it was possible for man to gaze upon the night sky, not from the earth, but from the bay window of a ship that floats in deep space rather than in the water.

Others preferred the ground and breathable air.

But there wasn't a huge rift between those who advocated space integration and those who were direly opposed to living life anywhere other than planet Earth.

In fact, the scale tipped more in favor of intergalactic progress. So much so that eventually, people began to adopt the "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" mentality and started looking for entry level jobs in the space industry.

Micah Quinton was a tall, well-built man with stark black hair and sheepish eyes of a deep brown. He too, had been one of those people in the early days of space integration. Presently, however, he was taking in all kinds of odd jobs that required him to journey into foreign galaxies for prolonged periods of time.

The most recent gig he found involved going to the Andromeda galaxy next door to acquire an exotic metal called DD-9, which was the prime material involved for building durable spacecraft. Extraction Units had become quite commonplace since there was no end to the demand of valuable materials.

Micah himself, owned an old extraction model vessel which he called The Sturdy Geezer since it was one of the first ones ever built but still got the job done like it was built yesterday.

Micah didn't really have much a reason to detest his decision to man this expedition until just a few moments ago. Actually, he rather enjoyed watching the twinkling light show near the edge of the galaxy and was perfectly confident in his ship to grant him safe travels.

However, in just a fraction of the time it took for Micah to turn his head away from the window, an ominous thing appeared. It didn't take him long to realize he was looking into the infinitely swirling event horizon of a black hole. The intense vortex consumed light from the surrounding stars, swallowing planets and debris and anything else that was brought in by its immense gravity.

Micah could only grapple with this horrifying turn of events by shouting incoherently into the intercom to gather the other four members of his crew.

Fortunately the captains desperate tone alerted them of the severity of the situation and they decided to make their way to the bridge, though their haste had more to do with the damning sounds of the emergency alarm than their captains panicked attempt at speech.

"What the hell, Micah?" Jubilee said as she entered the room hurriedly followed by three others.

The alarms blared in the background, resonating through the entirety of the ship.

BEEP-BEEP-BEEP. IMPENDING DOOM IMMINENT. BEEP-BEEP-BEEP. IMPENDING DOOM IMMINENT.

The words echoed throughout the hull repeatedly.

"Who the hell designed the alarm system?" Geno shouted with contempt.

"Holy shit. Is that..." Truin started as he stared out the window but cut himself off in disbelief.

"I swear to god that wasn't there a minute ago." Micah said with conviction and fear.

"It literally appeared out of nowhere." He said again.

"What do you mean 'it wasn't there a minute ago'? Why didn't it appear on the radar before we approached it?" Geno said with panic.

"It just popped up out of nowhere, what more do you want me to say?" Micah insisted.

"That's impossible. We would have detected it from the last star system!" Truin replied, still astonished at the display.

"Impossible or not doesn't matter. We have to get the hell outta here pronto." Jubilee shouted over the chaos.

BEEP-BEEP-BEEP. IMPENDING DOOM IMMINENT.

Micah could hear the tiny screams of his subconscious as he took in all that was happening around him. He tried to seem level headed and made a desperate attempt to hide the fact that he was shitting bricks.

Then Xavier, a young man barely the age of nineteen who was usually quiet and soft spoken, raised his voice for the first time in front of his crew mates.

"What the fuck!" and he scrambled to the nearest analog station.

"Ahh....dammit it all!" Xavier said over and over again as his fingers, moving at close to light speed, interfaced with various buttons and dials that might've seemed like a bunch of flickering lights to the untrained eye. "Why God, why??"

"I gotta agree with Xavier on that one. But gods got nothing to do with it!" Truin exclaimed as he too, hurried into a control seat.

All hands were on deck as the sheer pressure of the situation put emphasis on the deafening cries of the alarm and panic overwhelmed the crew as they felt the ship being sucked into the black hole.

"This is it. I came out here to make a quick buck and now I'm going to be turned into a cosmic noodle." Truin said hopelessly while still trying to configure an exit strategy.

But there was none.

Suddenly, time slowed down to a fraction of a second and the crew witnessed their own deaths as their bodies were slowly pulled in either direction, and the specters of the crew collapsed into each other in the spatial warp.

The large and mostly empty extraction ship failed to reach its destination. The black hole devoured everything and everyone aboard the extraction ship.

Not even the bricks were left behind.

—

Somewhere in the never ending expanse of the stars, a large, bright spiral was continuously regurgitating bits and pieces of

the universe through a stream of unidentified mass.

The origin of this space geyser was unknown but, of the bits and pieces that happened to be falling out of this peculiar anomaly, a large, clunky space craft emerged from its interior.

Aboard the rusting vessel were five unconscious crew members.

In this distant and unknown star system, the extraction ship floated past foreign constellations in desolate and eerie silence until the familiar hum of a space engine slowly encroached upon the sleeping vessel.

"Captain, theres a ship!" Said a lieutenant on the nearby space craft.

"Fly us in closer to see what that is." Said the captain.

The ship accelerated slowly towards the dead craft.

"I can't believe it! That ship looks nothing like anything I've ever seen. Look at the shape of it...it looks ancient."

"The writing on its side is english." The captain said upon close inspection. "E-U2."

"Then it's definitely from earth..." confirmed the lieutenant. "Wait does that say...'sturdy geezer'?"

"Ahh, what is it doing out here? As far as I know this quadrant has never been explored before. Otherwise we wouldn't be on this expedition." This boggled the captains mind as he tried to wrap his head around it.

"Main Stream, search through records of previous expeditions to this quadrant." At the captains request, a screen appeared above the control panel he was standing at and opened a visual record log.

"There are no previous voyages made to this quadrant." A voice came through the ships speakers.

"Sir we are approaching the unidentified vessel." The lieutenant informed.

The approaching craft was vastly larger than the humble junkyard hoopty that lay motionless before it. This ship donned sharp and intimidating edges while brandishing two gigantic cannons at either side of its silvery hull. As it crept closer, the extraction ship looked like a small satellite in comparison.

Suddenly the computer pulled up a window on the intangible screen which showed five distinct green dots huddled together in close proximity of one another. The dots flickered on and off on screen.

"Sir...the scans are indicating signs of life on board!"

The captain stared at the screen intently with caution in his eyes. "Gather the men. And prepare to board."