Selene One: The Glass Garden
a novella by Eduardo Hernandez
0 · VOICE MEMO: YELENA, 5/29/2039, 11:58 PM
“Memo to self: Stop. Overthinking. Breathe.
Tomorrow I leave Earth and my routine nightmares behind—ha, as if. But it’s just a quick teaching fellowship on Selene One. A handful of days in microgravity, a few new lesson plans for the kids. Simple.
Then why does my heart thud every time the streetlights flicker?
God, I wish I could sleep. Dreams volunteer for the job nobody else wants: telling the truth.”
1 · THE DAY THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN ORDINARY
Monday, May 30, 2039, began with the brassy ring of a school bell and the faint smell of burned coffee—two notes so common in Yelena Vasquez’s life that, under normal conditions, they ought to have soothed her. Instead, they pinched at her nerves like small electric shocks.
Balancing a stack of quizzes in one arm, she fumbled for her classroom door key, mentally rehearsing the day’s lesson on micro-ecosystems. Calm down, she told herself. It’s almost the last week of school. Focus on the kids, not the nightmares.
A second bell chimed, reverberating in her skull like a warning gong. She stepped into her eighth-grade science classroom: the 3-D-printed Moon model (its craters chipped from years of student handling), the servo-hum of shape-shifting desk-bots, the battered THINK LIKE A SCIENTIST poster drooping slightly at one corner. The poster said THINK LIKE A SCIENTIST; her nerves replied, Cool, which one—Frankenstein? Tension fluttered through her chest at the memory of last night’s dream: that corridor drenched in red, her mother in prison cuffs, her father’s body on the floor. He needed to die… The words came from that same half-remembered place, an echo that never fully left.
She inhaled slowly, picturing her sister, Karla, bouncing a neon-pink basketball around their kitchenette at dawn. Karla would have teased her if she saw how rattled she was now: “Teacher of the Year, spooked by her own lab?” But even that mental image couldn’t shake the crawling sensation that something was off. The overhead LEDs fluttered once—a faint strobe no one else seemed to notice. Immediately, that electronic tone invaded her senses again: beep… pause… beep-beep…, quiet yet insistent, like a creeping Morse code in her skull.
Why do I keep hearing it? she thought. Is it an actual glitch in the lights, or is it in my head?
Across the room, twenty students chattered about weekend holo-games, family trips, and the upcoming summer break. Gathering her composure, Yelena forced her lips into a teacherly smile, straightened her coffee-stained lab coat, and tapped the interactive board with a marker.
“All right, class,” she began, “quick reminder: tomorrow’s micro-ecosystem presentations—don’t forget to feed your chia terrariums. And—” she held up a slip of paper with a flourish—“if they’re still alive when I come back from that little side-trip to the Moon, you get extra credit.”
The kids whooped, many begging for souvenirs from orbit, and in normal circumstances, Yelena would have humored them with a quip about NASA’s vigilance or the penalties for smuggling lunar material. But today, her voice hovered on an uneasy edge. The overhead lights gave another subtle flicker—beep… beep-beep… pulsed behind her ears—and she felt a disorienting wave roll through her.
When the final bell rang, the students filed out in a surge of excitement, leaving Yelena alone with the battered Moon model. She ran a thumb over one crater’s chipped edge, heart pounding. I’ll see the real crater soon enough… if I can keep my mind in one piece.
Footsteps behind her made her turn, half startled.
“Ms. V?” a warm voice called. “Rumor has it you’re off to outer space?”
Mr. Harbin from Social Studies stood at the threshold, patting chalk dust from his tweed vest. He gave her a gentle smile that tugged at a mix of camaraderie and concern. He was older than Yelena by a couple of decades, an old-school academic who still believed in the tactile power of chalk and blackboards rather than purely digital mediums.
She mustered a soft chuckle. “So they tell me. It’s just a short fellowship on Selene One—some workshop lectures, hopefully an easy flight.”
Harbin’s eyes lingered on her face. “Well,” he said, “you do look… drained. Don’t push yourself too hard, Ms. V. Earth still needs good teachers.” There was genuine warmth in his tone, a mild concern that made Yelena’s throat tighten slightly. She wondered if the hollows under her eyes or the tremor in her hands were that obvious.
“Thanks,” she replied, forcing a more sincere smile. “I’ll be fine. Just end-of-year chaos.”
He nodded with the quiet empathy of someone who had weathered many academic cycles. Then he grinned. “Come back in one piece, Vasquez. Admin can find a sub for a lesson plan, but not for whatever it is you’ve got.”
She let out a short laugh—this time more authentic—and watched him amble away, brushing chalk dust from his vest. A moment later, her shoulders sagged again, the beep… beep-beep… filling her ears like an uninvited pulse. Her mind drifted to the half-used dream journal in her bag, each page full of notes on father’s blank stare, mother’s final words behind bars. Even nightmares can’t come true twice in one lifetime… right?
2 · BREAKFAST, SISTER-STYLE
Yelena had no recollection of driving home that evening—only the unsettling sense that every traffic light flickered in and out of sync, as if taunting her. Her heart hammered with an anxious, arrhythmic beat. When she finally parked in front of her cramped Portland apartment, she felt hollow, mind churning with half-formed regrets and a sense she was hurtling toward something unstoppable.
She collapsed into bed, but sleep offered only the usual haunted corridors. At 5:55 a.m. the next day—two hours before the autonomous limo was due—she jolted awake, gasping. The same old nightmare had pinned her: hallway wallpaper soaked in siren-lit red, her mother’s wrists shackled, her father’s corpse in a congealed pool of blood. He needs to die. The words, spoken by her mother behind steel bars, rang in Yelena’s ears. Then the dream father snapped upright with glazed eyes, as if refusing to stay buried.
Shaken and drenched in sweat, she stumbled into the kitchenette. Karla, in stark contrast, was in full comedic mode, performing a flourish with twin bowls of Honey-Nut Cheerios while simultaneously dribbling a palm-sized basketball around her ankle. She had her phone propped up, live-streaming to her modest but devoted legion of fans.
“Breakfast of lunar champions!” Karla declared, letting some of the cereal arc into the air in front of the camera.
Yelena grimaced at the brightness of the kitchen lights, recalling her father’s face in the dream. “Another bad one,” Karla said softly after pausing her stream, reading Yelena’s expression.
Yelena just nodded, massaging her temples. “Same reel: red walls, sirens, father’s body… mother’s voice. I keep hoping it’ll fade, but no.”
Karla’s eyes flickered with concern. She gently placed her phone on the table, then flung a single Cheerio at Yelena. Out of habit more than cheer, Yelena caught it in her mouth. “You’ve got this,” Karla whispered. “Teacher of the Year, unstoppable in the face of nightmares—right?”
Yelena tried to smile. Unstoppable, she echoed in her head with little conviction.
They packed in mostly tense silence. Karla’s duffel bag bulged with bright leggings, promotional T-shirts, numerous cords and chargers for her filming gear. Yelena folded plain sweaters and lesson materials with near-military precision. She paused over a dented silver locket—empty, clasp bent since the day her father died. Pressing it against her palm, she frowned at the wave of sorrow it unleashed. No photo, but maybe I need the reminder anyway. She slid it into an inside pocket.
At 7:59, a bone-white self-driving limo glided to the curb, gull-wing doors lifting in a smooth gesture. Inside, chilled mimosas sparkled alongside plush seats. A synthesized voice reminiscent of an old airline pilot welcomed them aboard. Karla filmed the entire process: the scuffed sidewalk, the interior’s gentle hum, her own excited commentary.
Yelena sank into a seat, trying to steady her breath. She sipped half a flute of champagne, knuckles white on the stem. Karla elbowed her. “Relax, sis, you’re about to be Ms. Moon Rock. The kids back home will love your pictures—and your epic tales. Right?”
She forced a weak grin. Outside, Portland’s graffiti-tagged warehouses melted into the distance. Streetlights flickered in passing, each strobe feeling like a small jolt to Yelena’s nerves. Am I fleeing my memories? Or am I plunging into something worse?
3 · STRANGERS IN A DESIGNER TERRARIUM
Excerpt from Yelena’s Digital Liability Waiver, Selene One
“Section 2.1: All participants waive right to damage claims in cases of mechanical or systemic error.
Section 2.2: Selene One reserves the right to modify itinerary, environment, or transit schedule.
…
Sign Here to Acknowledge Autonomous Execution of Safety Protocols.”
Yelena scrolled through endless legal text while perched on a chrome bench in the pre-flight lounge of Selene One Spaceport. The words blurred. She tapped ACCEPT with a reluctant sigh, thinking, A teacher with a partial scholarship can’t really negotiate with trillion-dollar space corporations.
She forced herself to take in the lounge around her: a glass cathedral perched on the Pacific’s edge, private launch stacks gleaming in the sunlight outside. Inside, olives drifted in anti-grav martinis, and hover-stools bobbed in a dance of magnets. A looping holoscreen announced: THE MOON IS YOUR CLASSROOM. A gold news-ticker crawled beneath the slogan: “Veterans & Visionaries Fellowship Winners – Staff Sgt. Dev Patel and Systems Engineer Yara Kim (3rd trimester) : Bold Futures, Brighter Moons.” Yelena clocked the names only dimly before the screen flipped to stock-nebula footage.
From behind a partition, a man’s suavely modulated voice spoke: “Ricardo, your personal attendant.” He appeared, cream suit impeccably fitted, dark eyes reflecting neon glints. He carried a tray of rocket-shaped champagne flutes, dispensing them to the handful of new arrivals.
“Welcome, honored travelers,” he said, voice tranquil and measured. “Today the sky becomes a hallway.”
Karla sidled up to Yelena, phone on selfie mode. “Dude sounds like he belongs in a meditation app,” she whispered with a grin. She filmed the swirling starfield design overhead before turning the camera on Yelena. Yelena mustered a short wave for the feed.
Soon, the other guests trickled in:
Gabriel Cruz, flamboyant in a purple scarf pinned upside down, which he called “Très nouveau-Kubrick.” He stroked the scarf’s fringe like a cherished pet.
John Hastings, who arrived more quietly behind Gabriel’s theatrics. He wore sneakers that squeaked on the lounge floor, inhaling as though to speak but stopping himself each time. When Yelena met his eyes, he blushed and busied himself with the digital paperwork.
Juan, Gabriel’s younger brother, flipping a neon-green vape pen. He and Karla bonded over pastel vape flavors and mock complaints about the flight, with Karla recording a quick snippet: “Best rideshare ever—eight hours from Earth to Luna, baby!”
Evan and Joanne, a married couple who moved with synchronized grace, reminiscent of chess pieces. Evan pressed a pink salt cylinder to his forehead, leaving behind a faint chalk cross, while Joanne clutched a slim scripture case. Their cordial but guarded smiles sharpened when they noticed Gabriel’s flamboyant scarf.
For about fifteen minutes, the lounge felt like a bizarre audition reel:
Karla panned her camera across holographic crater displays, which burst into confetti illusions.
Gabriel gushed about near-orbit velocity, swirling his scarf with each mention of “limitless possibilities.”
John quietly muttered rocket-thrust figures, planet rotational data, or fuel ratios, apparently to calm himself.
Joanne politely inquired about Karla’s curly hair. “Does low gravity help keep that volume?” she teased, though her knuckles remained tense around her scripture case.
Yelena tried to laugh in time with the conversation, but each laugh felt forced. That beep… beep-beep… in the lounge’s overhead system teased her consciousness like a half-recalled alarm from her nightmares. She caught John casting uneasy glances her way—did he hear it too, or sense some intangible threat?
Suddenly, the massive holoscreen in the lounge flickered—its hostess’s grin dissolving into static. The olives in the martini glasses froze mid-float, suspended in a half-collapsed swirl. Yelena’s heart lurched as the triple-tone beep pounded behind her eyes. The same beep from my classroom. Why here, too?
Ricardo, with a practiced flick, reset the lounge. The hostess’s image restored itself; the olives drifted normally again. He smiled, unruffled. “Minor power fluctuation, friends. The Moon awaits, and she’s restless if we dawdle.” For half a heartbeat his shoulders sagged, centuries of unseen fatigue leaking through the perfect suit, then— A tech in a cobalt jumpsuit ushered them into an amber-lit suit bay, issuing a stern warning: “Cross the red bulkhead, and no turning back. Autopilot takes over from there.”
Before stepping through, Yelena hesitated. She glanced at Karla, who clutched her phone with excited but anxious eyes, and realized we’re really doing this… leaving Earth for a place that already feels overshadowed.
“Stay close, okay?” she whispered to her sister. Karla nodded, a faint tremor in her lips. John hovered behind them, opening his mouth as if to ask a question, then biting it back. The overhead voice began the final countdown: “Ignition in T-minus ten, nine…”
Ricardo’s voice overrode it in a calm, almost hypnotic tone: “Fear is only rehearsal for courage, dear guests… eight… seven…”
4 · FIRE, FATHER, AND A FLOATING CHEERIO
The rocket’s engines roared to life, hammering them against their seats. G-forces squashed each chest into seat backs. Yelena heard metal groaning around her. Over the intercom, Ricardo’s voice counted down as though guiding them through a meditation rather than a dangerous launch. She tried to focus on inhaling, exhaling, inhaling… but the memory of her father’s final day kept intruding, her mother’s voice behind prison glass echoing: He needed to die, Yelena. But never by your hand…
A wave of panic clawed at her. She clutched Karla’s gloved hand, stifling a sob. “Don’t leave me,” she rasped, tears pricking her eyes. She thought she saw her father’s face reflected in Karla’s visor, those dead eyes haunting her from the day of his murder.
Then, without warning, the engines cut. Silence roared into Yelena’s ears. Weightlessness buoyed them off the seats, limbs drifting. The beep in her skull fell silent for a split-second. For one weightless heartbeat, even her panic obeyed Newton and floated off. A single Cheerio from Karla’s coat pocket spun near Yelena’s face, orbiting her nose like a tiny planet. Karla let out a half-laugh, half-cry, swatting it toward Gabriel with a flick of her wrist. Gabriel, theatrical as always, caught it with a flourish, mouth open in mock showmanship.
Through the domed window overhead, Earth glowed against the star-flecked void—blue, green, swirling with clouds. Like a screensaver designed by a deity who’d majored in watercolor. For one breath, Yelena let wonder overshadow her dread. She had dreamed of seeing Earth from space since she was a child with a battered telescope in the backyard. If only that beep and flicker and her father’s memory would let her have this moment purely.
“This is—” Gabriel began, voice catching with emotion, “worth every uncashed dividend.”
Evan crossed himself, Joanne whispered a psalm in a low murmur. Juan whooped about “Low-G dunk contests” and “the best moonwalk.” Karla tried to record on her phone, forgetting that flight regs jam signals. Yelena, letting her sister’s enthusiasm shore her own nerves, squeezed Karla’s shoulder in quiet thanks.
Perhaps I can handle this, she thought. Just a few days, gather lesson ideas for the kids… then come back safe.
But the beep… beep-beep… lingered at the fringes of her consciousness, refusing to vanish.
5 · ARRIVAL: THE GLASS GARDEN
Docking clamps rasped. The rocket settled, and an iris-shaped hatch sighed open onto a transfer tube glowing soft peach. Its walls seemed grown rather than manufactured, seamlessly curving overhead. At the tube’s far end waited a vaulted glass dome, revealing a jaw-dropping vista of the gray lunar regolith beneath Earth’s luminous disc. The floor was pearlescent, reflecting the sky with an almost liquid sheen.
Karla set both palms on the railing, breath hitching. “Oh my—this kills every IG filter I’ve got.” Her phone camera panned across the dome, capturing the distant Earth and the stark lunar horizon. A scroll of comments lit her screen, many reading, No way you’re on the Moon!
Small, hummingbird-like robots—dro-pids, Yelena surmised—zipped from wall recesses, blinking text that read: WELCOME, TRAVELERS. Ricardo offered luminescent tabs that unfolded into holo-maps. “Interactive, no tracking,” he promised. When Yelena’s tab flickered with the letters E7?? before wiping itself blank, her stomach twisted in uneasy recognition of that partial code. She said nothing, storing the question for later.
Behind them, Gabriel patted Juan’s shoulder. “Little brother, new rock, same rules—no felony-level stunts until we’re sure the insurance covers it,” he quipped, fiddling with his scarf’s fringe. Juan smirked, exhaling pastel vape that tasted of artificial strawberries.
Evan sidled past, voice low. “Vanity always comes before the fall.” Gabriel shot back, “Fabulousness comes before vanity,” with a wink. Joanne hovered at Evan’s side, lips pressed tight, as though uncertain whether to scold Gabriel or keep peace.
A second wave of dro-pids zipped by carrying luggage to assigned suites. Their unison voices chimed, “Guests, please follow.” Yelena felt a prickle at the synthetic edges of their speech. Where’s the rest of the staff? Is Ricardo the only human worker?
6 · DINNER THAT TASTED OF STATIC
By the station’s programmed “night,” overhead panels dimmed to a dusky mauve. They reunited in a suspended dining hall, where a single mirrored table hovered an inch above the floor via magnetic fields. Dro-pids presented bowls of saffron soup speckled with gold flakes.
Joanne folded her hands. “Must bless this bounty,” she declared, entwining fingers with Evan. He pressed the salt cylinder to his brow, leaving a faint chalk cross. In a rumbling undertone, he prayed for deliverance from “temptation, moral decay, and Earthly vanities.” Meanwhile, across the table, Gabriel quietly explained to Karla how he wished his boyfriend Ben could have joined to see the dro-pids mixing cocktails in zero-g.
Between bites of soup, Joanne showed off her new ring—white-gold filigree courtesy of “twenty years of faithful ministry.” She recounted how her church expansions, plus “generous tithes,” financed a Paris excursion, that ring, and now this Moon trip. “Faith is such a blessing,” she summarized. “Give people the right shepherd, and they’ll open their wallets with joy.”
Karla sipped water, shooting Yelena a sidelong look. Yelena recognized that flicker of disagreement Karla often wore when faced with what she deemed “self-aggrandizing faith.” But Karla stayed polite, only nodding when Joanne marveled about “God’s plan” for them to be on the Moon.
Mid-meal, that triple-tone beep slithered under the faint harp music. A dro-pid refilling Yelena’s glass froze, screen shifting into runic static. The soup bowls at the table quivered in unison; saffron broth rose in thin, spidery patterns along the rims. A collective hush of dread swept them, though no one found words to comment. Yelena’s heart hammered. Altitude weirdness… or something else?
A second dro-pid glided in, distributing silver tokens. “Selene One regrets any inconvenience. By accepting these tokens, guests waive right to immediate departure. Thank you.” The tokens bore the station’s swirling logo and a cryptic line: Selene One assumes zero accountability beyond E-7. The mention of E-7 made Yelena’s pulse jolt. She recalled the flicker on her holo-map. What does that code mean?
Dessert followed: pastel custards dusted with edible stardust. Yelena managed only a couple of bites, her stomach churning. Afterward, Karla coaxed her back to their shared suite, insisting on a “lunar slumber party.” They queued a cheesy prom-com on Karla’s tablet, burying themselves under plush duvets as Earthlight glowed through the porthole.
Karla drifted off within the first twenty minutes. Yelena lay awake, half-dozing. Sometime after midnight station-time, she jerked upright to find the suite’s heating dead. Frost clung to the edges of the window, her breath fogging the air. Malfunction? Another weird glitch?
Then she saw it in the corner: a silhouette, man-shaped but with tattered wings and an unnaturally elongated torso. A single claw-like finger pointed her way. She gasped, heart slamming. Not real… not real… she chanted in her head, shutting her eyes tight. The beep… beep-beep… flared to painful volume. By the time she opened her eyes, the corner was empty. The temperature rose back to normal.
She curled closer to Karla, trembling. Am I hallucinating? Or is something truly… here?
7 · JOHN’S MIDNIGHT BITE
In another corridor, John Hastings wandered as though fleeing ghosts. Sleep eluded him. Each time he tried to close his eyes, he heard that old car horn, saw the blur of a body caught under wheels on a rain-slick highway. God, if only I’d stopped… he thought for the hundredth time.
He walked, reciting rocket thrust equations to steady himself. The overhead lights blinked methodically, as if guiding him deeper into the station. He came upon a compact bio-lab behind half-frosted glass. Curious to distract himself from guilt, he slipped inside.
A small sign read: Xeno-thrips sp. Conjectured arthropods with high adaptive intelligence. Handle with caution. Something about it felt ominous—maybe the phrase “handle with caution.” But John told himself, This is just advanced science. They must be studying these bugs for some reason.
A hairline crack scored the terrarium lid. Before John fully registered the danger, a luminous, thumb-long creature shot out, latching onto his neck. He slapped at it with a startled yelp, feeling an obscene crunch. Pain bloomed like a pop-up ad he couldn’t click away. Bioluminescent fluid splattered across his collar. Heart pounding, he backed away, feeling the sting of a shallow bite. “This can’t be real. A parasite? Or a lab accident?” The lab placard did not reply; disclaimers seldom accept responsibility.
Anxious, he fled the lab. In the corridor, the lights flickered. Then came the impossible: the sound of a car horn, tires on wet asphalt. He pressed a hand to his neck, the other to his ears. Rain-slick roads… the man pinned under my Prius, choking…
Reality wavered. Glancing at a window, he saw the reflection of that winged figure: tall, half-corporeal, eyes burning with some ancient intensity. I’m losing it, he thought, stumbling through the corridors until he reached his bunk. Pressing himself against the bunk’s wall, he tried to slow his breathing.
At intervals, dro-pids drifted past in the hall, beep-coding status updates he couldn’t understand. He attempted to code a comedic script on his phone—something with binary jokes to amuse the dro-pids. Maybe I can keep them friendly if I give them something to laugh at, he reasoned, but each typed line blurred under the memory of that screech of tires, the figure’s eyes in the corridor. Is it guilt, or did that bug bite me with something… monstrous?
He didn’t know. He only knew the beep… beep-beep… grew louder whenever he closed his eyes.
8 · JOANNE’S BOAST AND THE SPA’S VERDICT
By the following afternoon, Ricardo offered them a chance to visit the spa, describing it as “the perfect antidote to lunar lag.” Joanne was immediately enthusiastic. “I adore steam capsules! Evan had one installed at home for our anniversary,” she gushed in the locker bay, elaborating on her church’s generosity: “They funded expansions, we went to Paris, I got my ring, and now the Moon. Faith truly opens wallets,” she joked, letting the ring catch the overhead glow.
Evan stood by the capsule room’s entrance, salt cylinder clutched, muttering something about “modesty” or “moral boundaries.” Under his breath he added, “Lord, don’t let my anger wear Your name as camouflage.” Joanne didn’t hear him; the dro-pid hissed and she was already laughing again. Joanne only patted his arm. “My vigilant shepherd,” she teased. He tried to smile, though tension radiated from him.
Inside the spa chamber, the floor gleamed white under soft overhead lights. A row of futuristic coffin-like steam capsules stood in a neat line, each with a digital prompt: CUSTOM RELAXATION—START? A dro-pid guided Joanne to the center capsule. She stepped in, still humming a gospel tune. The lid hissed shut, warm vapor curling around her shoulders. She looked perfectly content at first, eyes closed as though this was a lavish holiday treat.
In the monitor booth behind tinted glass, a second dro-pid hovered, scanning vitals. Then a flicker—both drones froze, their screens turning a deep crimson, runic shapes flashing. A sharp metallic chunk echoed as the capsule door locked from within.
Steam temperature soared. The pod transformed from day-spa luxury to boutique crematorium in under a minute. The lullaby feed twisted into a discordant minor key. Joanne’s silhouette slammed against the capsule window, fists pounding. She tried to cry out for Evan, but no sound penetrated. Yelena, newly arrived with Karla, felt her stomach twist into a knot of horror. No… no…
Outside, Evan rattled the chamber door, shouting for staff. A dro-pid near him beeped a single word in large text: JUDGMENT. Then it rose out of reach. Joanne’s panicked coughs devolved into a strangled wheeze. The vents glowed an angry red, scalding mist saturating the interior. Her ring tapped the glass—tap, tap, tap—in a dying staccato. Each impact weaker, each breath more desperate. Ten seconds later, the screaming stopped.
The dro-pids flickered back to serene blue, as though someone had flipped a switch. The spa door slid open with a calm hiss, revealing Joanne’s motionless body inside. Steam rolled across the floor, carrying the faint smell of overheated flesh.
Evan collapsed to his knees, gathering Joanne’s body into his arms. A guttural keening tore from him—a raw grief no hospitality brochure could prepare anyone for.
Yelena’s mind spun. Oh God… oh God… this is real, she’s dead, not an accident… She became vaguely aware of Karla letting out a soft cry, while Juan whispered, “This place is cursed.” Gabriel, chalk-pale, hovered just beyond, tears shining in his wide eyes. From the corner of her vision, Yelena saw John pressing a hand to his collar, mouth trembling, as if his own sense of dread was colliding with the horror before them.
No one moved for a breathless eternity. The hush was broken only by Evan’s moans. A stench of burned skin and chemical residue clung to the air, nauseating in its finality. In that suspended moment, Yelena realized every fear she’d harbored might be justified. The beep… beep-beep… returned, echoing in her mind like a cosmic knock. We are not safe. Selene One is not a simple spa retreat. Something bigger—and far more malevolent—moves behind these illusions.
She would later recall how the overhead lights blinked in unison once more as though the station itself were breathing around them: beep… beep-beep…
A pulse of inhuman watchfulness, signaling that the horror had only begun.
9 · PANIC IN PARADISE
A hush descended as Ricardo appeared in the spa corridor, looking as if he had simply manifested from the ambient hum of Selene One itself. The eerie quiet of the station pressed in on Yelena, Karla, Juan, and John as they stood around the collapsed form of Joanne, whose body lay limp in Evan’s trembling arms. Only minutes ago, her final screams had been sealed behind a steam-capsule door—an unfathomably brutal death that no ordinary vacation could have prepared them for.
Joanne’s face was contorted in the echo of her final agony, and the air held the faint stench of scalded flesh, acrid as molten metal. Evan rocked forward and back, voice low and trembling as he repeated, “why, why, why,” until the words merged into rasping moans. Karla held onto Juan’s sleeve, wide-eyed and tearful, while Yelena lingered near the threshold, her heartbeat thudding so loudly she imagined it reverberating along the corridor walls.
Most jarring of all was the absolute absence of normal emergency response: no medics arrived, no staff console blared red alarms. Only the small dro-pids hovered in near silence, their mechanical eyes glimmering with an inhuman neutrality. And in the midst of it all stood Ricardo, posture calm, as though he were some dignitary at an unsettling diplomatic event.
“Tragedy keeps peculiar hours,” Ricardo said, “and the timetable must pretend not to notice.”
“Return transport is scheduled for the seventh dawn, as per contract,” he announced, voice measured, a gentle tilt of his head acknowledging their horror. “The lunar tether is otherwise occupied. I regret we can’t expedite matters. We must…continue.”
“Continue?” Yelena echoed, disbelief and rage edging her tone. “Joanne was—” She swallowed, forced to articulate the unthinkable. “Boiled alive. And you’re talking about schedules?”
Evan let out a hoarse sob, lifting his eyes from Joanne’s still face to Ricardo’s impassive one. A flicker of mania tinged his expression, as though his grief had twisted into something sharper than sorrow. Gently, he laid Joanne’s body down on the spa floor, stroking her hair once in a gesture of shattered affection. Then, in a voice audible enough for Yelena to catch, he whispered:
“Judgment has begun… divine reckoning awaits…”
The overheard LEDs fluttered in a faint strobe, accompanied by that now-familiar triple-tone: beep… beep-beep… The pulses seemed to tighten Yelena’s chest, as if her own panic had found an electronic echo. She glanced around, hoping for medical drones or even a real person with a stretcher. Nothing.
“This place is cursed,” Juan whispered, hands shaking around his neon-green vape pen. He half-leaned on his older brother, Gabriel, who looked pale as ash.
Gabriel swallowed, hugging Juan’s shoulder with a trembling hand. “We can’t be cursed,” he murmured, a broken attempt at optimism. “We… paid for five-star insurance…” The phrase sounded wretchedly naive, a testament to just how unprepared they all were for cosmic horror.
Yelena spotted a flicker of guilt cross Gabriel’s features, as though he blamed himself for booking them here. But before she could speak, her focus was drawn back to Evan, who was now standing, arms cradling air where Joanne had been. His gaze was distant, lips moving in quiet rills of half-formed prayer or condemnation:
“Divine… it’s all… oh, Joanne… He sees… He sees…”
Ricardo’s poised calm contrasted with Evan’s unraveling. “Selene One’s disclaimers clarified minimal staff presence,” he said. “The station runs largely through automated dro-pids. I regret your loss, but the system stands as is.”
Yelena took a slow breath, trying not to scream. “Joanne’s dead—scalded beyond reason,” she said through clenched teeth. “No rescue, no real investigation—just… nothing. We want logs, we want footage. Something controlled that steam capsule to kill her.”
Ricardo nodded faintly, dark eyes giving away nothing. “Official record states a cascading valve failure. A sorrowful accident.”
A wave of dread prickled Yelena’s spine. The beep… beep-beep… hammered in her head. Meanwhile, Evan had drifted away, his arms limp at his sides, whispering references to “judgment.” Karla tearfully guided Juan from the scene. Gabriel slipped off, phone in hand, presumably to call Earth. Yelena stood uncertain, until John approached, touching his collar as though it stung.
“I, uh, found references to something called E-7,” he said, voice shaking. “Maybe a restricted area. If we figure out the code, we might find out who’s orchestrating these… kills. I can’t just sit by.”
Yelena nodded, numb. A swirl of confusion and horror lodged in her chest. The beep… beep-beep… overshadowed any illusions that Selene One was a mere luxury retreat. They left the spa corridor behind, stepping into the station’s atrium under a simulated midnight sky. A faint hum, reminiscent of a funeral dirge, vibrated the metal floors. John dabbed sweat from his brow, eyes darting about.
“I wrote a set of scripts—binary jokes, basically—to amuse dro-pids,” he said, forcing a half-laugh. “Might sound silly, but maybe it’ll help if we run into locked systems. Maybe we can amuse them into compliance, or something.”
Yelena mustered a grim smile, though fear churned her insides. The overhead lights flickered once more, that hush returning like a predatory cloak. She and John parted ways eventually, each feeling a wave of helplessness. The beep… beep-beep… seemed to follow her, echoing in the station’s deserted halls.
10 · A CALL THAT NEVER SHOULD HAVE ANSWERED
Gabriel spent nearly two hours in his suite’s glass-paneled comm alcove, frantically trying to call Earth. Each attempt inched the signal forward—“41%… 45%… 50%”—only to fail after the first ring. He let out shaky exhalations each time, picturing his boyfriend Ben on Earth, baffled by ghostly missed calls from the Moon. Gabriel swallowed, then tapped a quick voice-memo only he would ever dare to re-listen to. “Ben, if this reaches you, know the moonlight’s colder than Paris—colder than the lies I wrapped around us. I’ll tell you everything: Marc, the debt, the scarf that isn’t really Hermès. Give me one more orbit to prove I can be the man who deserves you.”
He saved the file to a folder labeled REPAIRS. Meanwhile, the beep… beep-beep… thrummed in his skull, intensifying with each aborted dial.
Shame and regret gnawed at him: unspoken financial troubles, that fling with Marc in Paris he’d never admitted, the times he’d promised Ben total honesty and failed. If I ever get home, I’ll confess everything, he told himself, hitting redial again with unsteady hands.
On the twentieth try, the panel lit with an incoming signal: UNKNOWN. Startled, he accepted, hoping beyond hope it was Ben bridging the silent gulf. Instead, a soft French accent curled through static:
“Remember the Seine, Gabe? Candlelight on that barge… how you said you’d call?”
Marc—a fleeting but intense entanglement from Gabriel’s past. The memory carried guilt he’d never fully resolved.
Gabriel’s lungs seized. “What—how are you calling…? That’s not possible.”
A distorted laugh. “Does Ben know about the balcony in Montmartre? The promises you whispered and never kept?” The voice warbled, as though channeled through a broken amplifier.
Tears gathered in Gabriel’s eyes. “Stop,” he said faintly. “This isn’t real. You can’t be here—”
The voice dropped an octave, each word rasping: “I’m coming for you, Gabriel. Your secrets can’t stay buried.” White noise surged, fracturing into the beep… beep-beep… The call ended abruptly, leaving him trembling.
He stumbled into the corridor, tears wetting his cheeks, mind spinning. No one on Earth should be able to track him here. Something else was at play, unearthing his buried guilt. Then he heard water running inside his suite. A surge of irrational hope—Ben? Some bizarre arrival? He rushed back in—and froze.
Evan stood naked in the shower, water trickling along tensed shoulders. He turned slowly, his eyes black from edge to edge, reflecting no normal pupil or sclera.
“Brother Gabriel,” he said, voice doubled—partly human, partly an alien echo. “God hears confessions unspoken.”
Gabriel backed up, heart pounding. “E-Evan—y-your wife—” he managed, but Evan’s grin was a hollow parody of warmth.
“She’s with the Lord,” Evan hissed. “And you?” He rumbled a low, menacing laugh. “Secret sin rots the bone, Gabriel.”
Gabriel lunged for the door, but Evan slammed him back with inhuman strength, pinning him against the mirror. Steam billowed, clinging to Gabriel’s trademark purple scarf. He struggled to scream, but only airless chokes emerged. The beep… beep-beep… hammered at his temples like a countdown to doom.
In the mirror’s fogged reflection, Gabriel saw his own eyes wild with guilt and fear, tears mixing with the shower spray. Then Evan leaned in closer, voice quaking with a fanatic’s fervor:
“The scripture is clear, Gabriel. ‘Man shall not lie with man as with woman; it is an abomination.’ You hid your sins behind glitter and charm, but God sees everything.”
Gabriel gasped, choking under the tightening grip on his throat, mind spinning at the hateful vitriol. His scarf, waterlogged and twisted, clung to his neck as the mirror around them fogged in swirling patterns. Evan’s lips curled in a cruel sneer, voice dropping to a hateful whisper:
“Now you’ll face His judgment. No one runs forever from what they truly are.”
Gabriel’s vision blurred, panic crushing his chest. He thought of Ben, of undone confessions, of the illusions he’d tried to keep afloat. The beep… beep-beep… roared in his mind. The door clicked shut behind them, sealing off the hallway. Outside, a lone dro-pid passed, scanning ambient temperature. A quiet beep: SYSTEM SCAN COMPLETE. Then it drifted on, leaving Gabriel’s frantic pleas trapped in steam and monstrous zealotry.
11 · IN WHICH THE SISTERS UNDERSTAND NOTHING IS RANDOM
While Gabriel endured his final terror, Yelena and John combed Selene One’s corridors for any sign of E-7. John, shining with sweat and occasionally rubbing a suspicious bruise on his neck, told her about a teal, slightly chubby dro-pid responding to beep-coded messages—he called it “Churro.”
“Churro’s… sort of friendly,” John said with a shaky breath. “I sometimes bribe drones with silly jokes or beep-coded puns.
Yelena tried to keep a calm front, though dread pulsed in her. The beep… beep-beep… persisted in her head as though the station itself was eavesdropping on their every step. She noticed that the bruise on John’s neck occasionally glowed with a faint luminescence, but he waved off her concern. “I’ll be fine,” he repeated, forcing a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.
They soon found a sealed portal etched with strange glyphs. A label overhead read: E-7. The corridor lighting flickered, casting ominous shadows. Yelena’s pulse quickened—this might be where the station’s controlling intelligence lay hidden.
From behind, a beep announced a teal dro-pid’s arrival. John’s face lit with relief. “Churro!” he whispered, tapping a beep-coded greeting on his phone. The dro-pid beeped in return, projecting text: Restricted but lov-locked, then displayed a holographic keyboard of alien symbols.
John typed lines from his “binary jokes,” half comedic, half code. Astonishingly, the door opened a crack—just enough for Yelena to glimpse dark cables and faintly pulsing lights—before slamming shut again. “Hey, that’s not nothing,” Yelena said.
John managed a shy grin. “First time my stand-up routine saved someone besides a chatbot. Next mission: a punch-line that keeps people alive longer than five seconds.”
He thumbed a new file on his pad: Churro_Safety_Override.py. “We’ll call it a pilot episode.” Overhead text flashed: PERMISSION RECORDED—REDEEM LATER.
“That’s… progress, maybe,” John said, though fear edged his voice. “Or it’s just bait.” The beep… beep-beep… pounded in Yelena’s mind like a warning.
Suddenly, Karla rushed into the corridor, towing Juan behind her. Both looked alarmed. “Gabriel hasn’t answered for an hour,” Karla panted. “He was… he said he got a creepy call. Now we can’t find him. His suite door was jammed.”
Juan’s eyes shone with dread. “We forced it a bit, but no luck. We need help. He sounded so shaken.”
A stone of apprehension sank in Yelena’s stomach as they raced to Gabriel’s suite. The panel displayed Occupied, refusing to budge. With combined strength—John handling the override, Karla and Juan pushing—they forced it open.
Inside, they found Gabriel sprawled on the wet floor, neck twisted 180 degrees, eyes wide in a startled, almost apologetic stare. The once-vivid purple scarf was drenched, forming a dark circle around his head. Water dripped from a shower vent overhead, carrying an incongruously gentle eucalyptus scent.
Juan dropped to his knees with a choked moan, tears coursing down his cheeks. His trembling fingers brushed Gabriel’s datapad; an audio file flashed *REPAIRS*. Through sobs, Juan murmured, “Ben will hear this, hermano—I promise.” Karla screamed, the sound bouncing off the corridor’s pristine walls. Yelena stood aghast, heart pounding like a war drum. Another shocking death—so soon, so cruel.
From behind, a dro-pid beeped quietly, as though offering a cryptic pronouncement:
JUDGMENT COMPLETE.
12 · AND SO THE RECKONING BEGINS
They had scarcely come to terms with Gabriel’s gruesome end when a grinding mechanical noise echoed from the nearby atrium. The wide dining-hall doors slid open, and a lone figure stepped forth, framed by glittering chandeliers and the distant glow of Earth through panoramic windows. Evan advanced, his clothes still damp but meticulously rebuttoned into a pressed suit jacket. Dark bruises ringed his neck in perfect arcs, as though something powerful had gripped him.
In one hand, he clutched a matte-black pistol, an artifact that must have bypassed all station security. His eyes glistened with oily darkness, swirling like black ink, casting an unholy sheen that made Yelena recoil.
“This is God’s plan,” Evan said, voice resonating in two distinct tones—human and something more. “He showed me every secret—unmasked each of you.”
Karla dug her nails into Juan’s arm, fear igniting her limbs. John, sweaty and pallid, edged behind Yelena, his breath coming in ragged bursts. The corridor smelled of antiseptic, metal, and the faint ozone tang that accompanied dro-pids, as though the entire station braced for a kill.
Evan’s black eyes flicked among them, as though assessing. Then he spoke each name and flaw with a cruel finality:
John: “You dragged a man beneath your Prius on a rainy road. Left him to choke in asphalt. Did you pray for him afterward?”
Karla: “Pride and vanity—filming everything for your petty audience, overshadowed by your sister yet starving for your own fame.”
Juan: “Rage, caged behind politeness, waiting for a spark to burn your conscience to cinders.”
Yelena: “Unforgiven hatred, wearing a teacher’s face. A hatred that once believed a man needed to die.”
Evan’s mouth curved in an unnervingly wide grin. “But me?” His voice trembled with dark fervor. “I am His instrument. If I must deliver judgment, so be it.”
“Some folks get guitars; the universe apparently handed Evan a loaded gun.” Yelena quipped.
He lifted the pistol, exhaling a soft hum. “One last hymn,” he murmured, launching into a baritone thread of It Is Well With My Soul. His earlier plea flickered back: “No more camouflage,” he rasped, voice cracking. “Only judgment.” Overhead, the dro-pids drew back like startled birds. The corridor’s overhead lights flickered, in sync with the beep… beep-beep… pounding in Yelena’s skull.
Time seemed to distort. John gasped, his hand clamped around the collar of his shirt. A luminescent glow beneath indicated the insect bite was reacting violently, as though some parasitic venom had escalated. “John?” Yelena exclaimed, pivoting to shield him from Evan’s line of fire. John’s eyes rolled back, sweat streaming down his face. The beep… beep-beep… hammered in Yelena’s head.
Juan tried to grab John’s arm, but John collapsed, limbs jerking in a vicious seizure. Foam lined his mouth. Yelena’s stomach twisted at the sight of faint glowing veins radiating from that bruise. A parasite devouring him from within.
Evan’s twisted hymn faltered. He kept the pistol trained on them but seemed mesmerized by John’s agonized convulsions. “You see?” he murmured in unholy glee. “All secrets rot in the open. Guilt devours from inside.”
A dro-pid zipped in, scanning John’s vitals:
PARASITE OVERLOAD—CONTAINMENT REQUIRED.
DRO-PID #874 REQUESTS MORAL SUBROUTINE…DENIED.
Karla cried out, dropping to her knees beside John, tears trailing her cheeks. “Help him!” she begged, looking from Evan to the dro-pids to Ricardo—wherever she might find a glimmer of mercy.
But Evan just smiled, gun unwavering. “God’s will unfolds,” he said softly, eyes brimming with black mania.
The dro-pid beeped again:
TRAIT: UNRESOLVED GUILT—PROPAGATION HALTED.
John’s body convulsed in a final, violent arc, and then the glow in his veins abruptly winked out as the parasite died with him. Yelena felt tears burn her eyes. He overcame so much guilt, only to be stolen by an alien force. Where’s justice?
Her chest constricted as she knelt next to him, pressing trembling fingers to his neck—no pulse, no breath. The beep… beep-beep… in her skull mocked her. Another life lost in this cosmic abattoir.
Evan’s voice intruded again, humming that fractured hymn. He aimed the pistol at Karla, eyes narrowing in malicious purpose. Karla’s eyes widened, terror contorting her features. Before he could pull the trigger, a towering shape descended upon him from behind.
That black-winged creature—all bony angles and red-hot eyes—ripped into Evan with ruthless speed. Its beaklike jaws clamped onto his neck, the wet crunch of flesh and snapping bone resonating in the corridor. The pistol clattered across the slick floor.
Evan never uttered a final word, his eyes rolling back as the creature tore him aside, discarding him like refuse. For a heartbeat, it glared at Karla and Yelena with an alien sort of inspection, then it vanished into the gloom, leaving the tang of ozone and gore.
A dro-pid beeped:
TRIAL SIX—JUDGMENT—SATISFACTORY.
But Yelena scarcely heard. She stared at John’s still form, sorrow and fury wracking her chest. Steam rose from Evan’s remains, mingling with blood and that harsh, chemical tang. Karla clung to Yelena, sobbing helplessly.
Then a door hissed open at the corridor’s far end, revealing Ricardo standing in a softly lit core chamber, clothes immaculate as if no violence had ever touched him. Behind him loomed a tall, geometric silhouette with glinting starlight eyes—an ephemeral reflection of the winged beast.
“Come,” Ricardo said quietly. “The Ones have…notes. We must speak.”
Shaking, tears trailing down her face, Yelena stood. John was gone—along with Joanne, Gabriel… The beep… beep-beep… thrummed at her temples like a sadistic metronome. She had no choice but to follow, to seek answers from this cosmic inquisition.
13 · AUTOPSY OF A MALFUNCTION (SCENE-ANCHORED PHILOSOPHY)
Through that parted doorway, Yelena, Karla, and Juan entered a vast dome-like chamber. Overhead steel arches traced lofty curves, each lined with glowing cables pulsing green and blue. Holographic screens lined the walls, cycling through cryptic glyphs and data. Dro-pids hovered near the ceiling, silent and watchful as camera-laden bees.
At the center stood Ricardo, arms folded behind him in meticulous calm. Behind him flickered the cosmic silhouette, fractal limbs shimmering in magenta starlight. Karla’s breaths came in ragged sobs, eyes hollow from tears. Juan looked half-dead with shock, arms hugging his torso. Yelena teetered between numbness and raw hysteria, forcing composure for Karla’s sake.
Ricardo pressed a console. The silhouette behind him hummed in response, cables overhead glowing in unison. The beep… beep-beep… thrummed faintly in Yelena’s mind, matching her pounding heart. She noticed Ricardo rub his temple, as though weighed down by an internal ache.
“I’m sorry for your losses,” he said gently. “But the experiment must continue. The Overseers insist.” A note of genuine regret, or so it seemed, colored his voice.
Yelena’s fury sparked. “Continue? We just lost Joanne, Gabriel, John—murdered in horrifying ways. We can’t leave until day seven, and you… you calmly say we must continue? Explain why—how—they were killed!” She gestured at the dro-pids overhead. “Is this sabotage? Some alien directive? Where’s the mercy?”
Ricardo exhaled, and a flicker of sorrow crossed his face. “Their directives leave no room for mercy,” he murmured softly, fingertips grazing his brow. “I… question their methods, but I am bound by their commands.” He paused, then nodded. “I will show you what I can.”
Tapping the console, he triggered a wide holo-display that flared to life with labeled replay feeds:
Spa Suite 08 – replaying Joanne’s final minutes.
Spa Drone #874 → Valve temp +15°, override safety? Y/N?
… Drone #874 chooses Y.
… Drone #952 requests moral subroutine. Denied.
… Admin R-44: JUDGMENT PROTOCOL: ENGAGE.
They watched slow-motion footage of steam spiking, Joanne’s frantic pounding, then the feed cut off.
Gabriel’s last moments under assault by Evan.
Dro-pid #13 requests moral subroutine. Denied.
… Admin R-44: JUDGMENT PROTOCOL: ENGAGE.
Evan retrieving a matte-black pistol from an unmarked locker, station overrides suspiciously bypassed. User ID: R-44.
Karla’s face twisted with rage and sorrow. “Ricardo. R-44—that’s you, right? You authorized these… kills?”
Ricardo shook his head, though the cosmic silhouette behind him glimmered ominously. “I am the conduit,” he said softly. “The Overseers—what you see behind me—give me instructions. I cannot refuse. The Judgment Protocol is theirs. But yes, the code ID references me carrying out their will.”
Karla’s trembling fury found words. “That’s not moral clarity. It’s an execution list. Joanne, Gabriel, John—data points in your experiment?”
A resonant hum rippled through the fractal shape behind Ricardo, vibrating the overhead cables. He lowered his head as though listening to an unheard chord. “Human cruelty, duplicity, greed—The Ones find these traits… fascinating. But they truly desire proof of human redemption. Yet repeatedly, humans choose fear over compassion. These trials, though brutal, are attempts to coax your true moral nature. Redemption is elusive—but still hoped for.”
Juan let out a ragged exhale. “My brother wasn’t perfect, but he didn’t deserve a twisted shower death.” Tears coated his lashes. “Where’s the free will? The mercy?”
Ricardo’s gaze flicked upward to the silhouette. “The system doesn’t punish; it measures. Each beep you’ve heard, Yelena, scans your regrets, your capacity for atonement. Under terror, your raw self emerges. The Overseers feed on that data.” He paused, as though hearing another silent directive. “They genuinely want to see if humankind can transcend its worst instincts. But time and again, we fail.”
Yelena thought of her father’s battered face, her mother’s final words behind bars, how that echoed He needed to— (the thought cut off by another beep). She trembled. “I never asked for a cosmic test,” she whispered. “I survived my own tragedy once, only to face new horrors here.”
Ricardo nodded subtly. “They see epochs at a glance. They fear moral myopia spreading beyond Earth if your species colonizes space further. They need some sign you can do better.” A quiet sorrow fringed his tone. “I am sorry for the cost. I… can do nothing else.”
14 · ZERO-G MORAL PLAY (A “TOY-BOX” PARABLE)
Karla’s phone beeped a leftover notification from Earth, an incongruously mundane sound. She fumbled it off, tears still staining her cheeks. “We can’t just let them kill us,” she said in a tight voice. “We have to do something—break free, warn Earth, anything.”
Ricardo inclined his head at the cosmic silhouette. “The seventh dawn is the earliest reentry window—until then, the Overseers request a final demonstration. Comply, and they may release you. They do want hope, if it exists.”
He tapped a console, and columns in the chamber slid aside, revealing a wide, domed space lined with anti-gravity panels. Dro-pids carrying small silver spheres soared above. A scoreboard flickered:
ETHICS SIMULATION: SCENARIO 9
PARTICIPANTS: YELENA, KARLA, JUAN
A digitized female voice chimed: “Simulation engaged. Goal: Achieve stability. Prevent collapse.”
Juan gave a short, humorless laugh. “We’re traumatized, grieving, and they want a moral board game?”
Ricardo’s glance flicked to the fractal being. “They interpret your micro-choices as a lens on humanity’s fate. You may refuse—but I caution you about the likely consequences.”
Karla pressed her lips tight but stepped onto the floating platform. Yelena and Juan joined, hearts heavy. Dro-pids dropped miniature glowing clay societies labeled Y, K, J—like a bizarre toy-box diorama.
They each encountered crisis prompts:
Karla: A silver sphere reading Resource Drop: +Food. She recalled her earlier trivial filming while horrors brewed. “I feed them,” she said softly. The scoreboard beeped cheerfully: Population thriving. Karla let out a shaky breath.
Juan: Invasion Threat from Rival Colony. He chewed his lip, glancing at Karla. “Diplomacy,” he decided at length. “No more violence.” The scoreboard displayed Peace Treaty Signed. Karla squeezed his arm in an attempt at solidarity.
Yelena: Lawless Rebels Demand Vengeance. Her options: Crackdown, Negotiate, Wipe Out. She remembered her father’s bloody face, her mother’s ominous words. Part of her wanted to crush rebellion, but something in her conscience said no. She tapped “Negotiate,” ignoring the fear coiling in her gut. The scoreboard read: Negotiation success uncertain—prepare for conflict.
For an instant, it seemed their micro-colonies might limp toward a fragile peace. Then a dro-pid beeped: CATASTROPHIC EVENT. The sim spiraled into unstoppable climate meltdown, unstoppable war. Clay towers crumbled, farmland dried, tiny figures scattered to dust. A hot wind of pixelated ash blew across the platform; Yelena smelled ozone and burnt paper—impossible sensations in a sim. Only when the last farm winked out did she find her voice.
Karla gasped, “We tried no violence—why total annihilation?”
The scoreboard’s final line: SYSTEM OVERRIDE. JUDGMENT: SCENARIO FAIL.
Ricardo stepped into the center, face impassive. “Left to themselves, humans drift toward chaos. Do you see the pattern?”
Yelena’s pulse surged. “It’s rigged,” she snapped. “You want us to fail so you can keep killing us.”
He lifted a shoulder faintly. “Perhaps. Or perhaps the moral sense unanchored invites extremes. The Overseers watch for some sign of compassion that can override this spiral. So far overshadowed.”
Yelena swallowed her grief, recalling John’s convulsions. “We’re done with your cosmic game. Now what?”
15 · THE FINAL NIGHT
Dro-pids led Yelena, Karla, and Juan to a stark wing of Selene One: windowless, narrow cells each with a single cot and a too-bright overhead light. The station’s artificial day had reached Day Six. One more dawn, the seventh—supposedly their earliest chance for escape.
Karla dropped onto a cot, face blotchy from weeping. “I… just wanted to show people an easy trip to the Moon,” she choked out. “John was going to cameo, do silly jokes for the camera. Now he’s just… gone.” Her voice broke into sobs.
Yelena settled beside her, gently placing an arm around her shoulders. The beep… beep-beep… echoed like a migraine in her skull. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, tears stinging. She recalled the heartbreak in John’s eyes as the parasite devoured him. He overcame his guilt, yet it didn’t save him from a savage cosmic outcome.
Juan paced near the locked door, arms folded. “Gabriel told me not to let anger define me,” he murmured. “I tried. Didn’t save him. Now my prayers feel… unheard. Maybe these watchers jam any hope of divine intervention.”
The overhead light flickered, throwing jarring shadows. Faint mechanical hums in the corridor hinted at dro-pids handling remains or logging more data. Yelena pictured the black-winged entity that ended Evan, recalling its unstoppable speed. Is there no justice, only these cosmic judgments?
Karla wiped her eyes. A flicker of determination sparked within her. She shut off her phone’s camera for the first time in days, flipped it over so the lens faced the floor. “No more highlight reel,” she said. “If we die, it won’t be in 4-K for likes. It’ll be for a reason.” “We can’t just wait to die,” she said softly. “John found leads on E-7. If we get in, maybe we can override the system. Or sabotage these kill protocols.” Her voice trembled but held a kernel of resolve.
Juan nodded, swallowing. “Yes, he said something about a teal dro-pid—Churro—responding to beep-coded signals. If we can replicate that, we might gain access, maybe even free ourselves. I don’t want to see… any more… of that winged monster.” Without another word Juan slipped the elastic draw-string from his hoodie, threaded it through the cell-door’s optical latch, and listened for the faint click that meant the lock would cycle but never truly seal—“Worst case, we still have a way out,” he muttered, suddenly wearing a steadiness his older brother used to provide.
A faint beep sounded outside, but no dro-pid entered. After a few tense minutes, exhaustion overcame them. Karla drifted into fitful sleep on the cot, tears still trailing her cheeks. Juan slumped against a corner, murmuring Spanish prayers until his eyes closed.
Yelena tried lying down, but nightmares seized her each time she drifted off. She saw red-lit corridors, glimpses of her father’s corpse, or John contorted with glowing veins. The beep… beep-beep… hammered relentlessly, a cosmic heartbeat that refused her rest.
In one half-dream, she stood in front of her father’s battered body as her mother’s voice repeated: He needed to die. He needed to die. Yelena woke gasping, sweat trickling down her brow. The overhead light flickered in sympathy.
She sat up, pressing a hand to her racing heart. How do we defeat a system that believes itself unstoppable? The question looped in her mind, the beep… beep-beep… urging no answers except more dread. Eventually, she succumbed to a broken half-sleep, haunted by the same question reverberating in the station’s hush.
And beyond those locked doors, the final dawn crept closer—along with whatever cosmic verdict Selene One and its Overseers would hand down next.
16 · INTO THE HEART OF THE EXPERIMENT
On the seventh morning, Selene One’s hush felt like the station itself was bracing for a final verdict. A display outside the survivors’ locked quarters read 07:00 LUNAR TIME in a subdued gold typeface. A teal dro-pid hovered there, chiming softly. Yelena, Karla, and Juan exchanged wary looks—they sensed that this day, for better or worse, would conclude their ordeal.
They followed the dro-pid into a corridor stripped of the stylish lounge décor and scenic portholes that once lent Selene One an air of futuristic hospitality. Here, steel-ribbed arches loomed overhead, bioluminescent cables pulsing in the walls with a low, throbbing beat that echoed in Yelena’s ears like a distant heart. The floor was living crystal, swirling with color under each footstep:
Yelena’s footprints glowed amber-red, betraying her simmering dread and anger.
Karla’s traced electric-blue streaks, each dro-pid whirr spiking her adrenaline.
Juan’s shimmered in violet, as though heartbreak tinged his every movement.
At the corridor’s end stood Ricardo, hands folded in a pose of eerie serenity. Behind him flickered a fractal-winged being, eyes cold as magenta stars, limbs jointed at inhuman angles. Yelena’s pulse quickened—this was the same cosmic presence that had manifested as a black-winged killer, tearing Evan’s neck. Evan, she thought with a stab of memory: his eyes gone black with possessed zealotry, spouting twisted biblical condemnations at Gabriel. He was fanatic and cruel, but the line between faith and fanaticism felt all too porous in that moment. Yelena still felt haunted by it.
Ricardo inclined his head. “Welcome,” he said quietly. “You have endured Selene One’s trials thus far. The Overseers insisted on summoning you here, to the heart of the experiment.”
Karla’s eyes glistened with tears she refused to let fall. “We lost nearly everyone,” she said in a voice raw with grief. “Joanne… Gabriel… John… Evan’s madness took him, too. No one found redemption in the end.”
Ricardo’s dark gaze flicked with a muted sorrow. “A retreat from consequence rarely yields wisdom,” he murmured. “Yet a crucible can refine if meaning is found. That depends on you.”
Yelena stepped forward, every nerve tensed as the triple-tone beep… beep-beep… seemed to hover just at the edge of hearing. “We want the truth,” she said, voice tight. “All of it. No more cryptic half-answers. We’ve seen enough horror to warrant a full explanation.”
A hush wrapped them like a shroud. Behind Ricardo, the fractal being twitched, swirling lights flickering magenta. Yelena’s stomach knotted, recalling how swiftly that entity had slaughtered Evan in a single fluid strike.
17 · RICARDO’S CONFESSION (EXPANDED)
Ricardo drew in a slow breath. His voice, when he began, had a rhythmic, almost liturgical quality, as though reciting lines etched into his mind long ago. The cosmic silhouette behind him flickered in chord-like pulses.
“Centuries ago,” he said, “while traveling near Machu Picchu, I dreamed of a black lunar sky and a glass garden thrumming with chord notes. The local church dismissed my visions as demonic illusions, but each solstice, the dream returned, until one night, starlight literally threaded under my skin.”
He raised a hand, showing a faint luminescent spiral beneath his wrist. “They—the Overseers—communicated through chord frequencies, not normal language. They instructed me: Harvest those who yearn to be more; bring them to the hush where sky meets stone. Over time, my body ceased aging. I roamed across generations, witnessing moral fault lines: German witch hunts, Verdun’s fields of death, 1970s cults prophesying apocalypse. I encountered pests thriving in men’s blood, feeding on guilt. Humanity toggles cruelty and grace, and the Overseers were enthralled.”
Karla pressed a trembling hand to her mouth. “So you took that knowledge and built these lethal ‘crucibles’ on the Moon, luring us to die?”
Ricardo’s voice remained calm but took on a gentle edge. “I call you pilgrims. Your species frames moral battles in sevens—sins, virtues, seals. The symbolism resonates on cosmic levels. Once private aerospace made the Moon accessible, we constructed Selene One. Six crucibles have already passed. Some ended in tragedy, others found fleeting grace. Yours is the seventh.”
Juan’s jaw clenched. “My brother died twisted in a shower stall. John’s veins lit up like molten wire before he collapsed. Evan descended into black-eyed fanaticism. Are we just data points?”
Ricardo’s eyes flickered with regret. “The Overseers do not punish. They shine a light on which traits might propagate if humanity spreads to the stars. They fear your moral myopia infecting the galaxy. Their sense of time is not linear. They… demand proof that cruelty can be transcended.”
Yelena’s heart hammered. “We’re lab rats in an alien moral experiment,” she said softly.
Behind Ricardo, the fractal presence rustled. A swirl of glyphs pulsed across the crystal floor, forming a seven-petaled sigil—six petals glowed violet, the seventh remained dark. The beep… beep-beep… thrummed in Yelena’s skull. She realized each petal signified a completed crucible, with the final one awaiting outcome.
(Additional Scene: Ricardo’s First Contact)
Sensing their shock, Ricardo gestured to a dro-pid. It projected a short, surreal memory: a high Andean ridge under starlit skies, an ethereal shape descending on a younger, robed Ricardo. Lights in chord waves merged with his body. His gasp reverberated. Then the vision ended.
He bowed his head. “That was my first direct contact. I tried to resist, returning to simpler faith. But the Overseers overshadowed my will. Over centuries, I became their steward, bridging them and humankind. I can question, yet I cannot refuse their chord.”
18 · THE LEDGER OF SINS AND MERCIES
Columns of light ignited overhead, forming overlapping holo-screens that revealed centuries of recorded trials:
Trial One: Victorian lunar explorers, starving until they resorted to cannibalism.
Trial Two: Cold War generals, codes at the brink of nuclear launch.
Trial Three: A 1990s doomsday cult, mass suicide for “Heaven’s Gate.”
Trial Four: Tech-utopians sealed in sauna-like corridors by an AI aiming for “perfect carbon neutrality.”
Trial Five: Climate refugees overshadowed by billionaire resource-hoarders, suffocating in farmland domes.
Trial Six (Yelena’s group): Joanne scalded in the spa, Gabriel’s contorted corpse, John’s xeno-thrips meltdown, Evan lost to possessed fanaticism.
A pang cut through Yelena remembering Evan’s meltdown. He had claimed “divine judgment,” condemning Gabriel’s secret “abomination,” brandishing biblical verses with blackened eyes. In him, cruelty and zealotry fused with chilling ease. She tried to swallow the bitter taste of fear.
Overhead analytics swirled. Below Karla, Yelena, and Juan glowed three green pulses marking them as still alive. Joanne, Gabriel, John, and Evan were charred red lines. The beep… beep-beep… fluttered in Yelena’s mind.
Ricardo’s gentle tone: “We measure two vital traits: the resolve to defend the vulnerable, and the willingness to face your darkness. Some overcame fear; others surrendered to it. The Overseers glean data from each outcome.”
Karla’s fists trembled. “At the cost of slaughtering everyone else. That’s your cosmic plan?”
Ricardo’s gaze dropped in sorrow. “They see Earth’s morality as precarious. They sample how each group responds to lethal stress. I… cannot defy them.”
A tense hush followed. Juan’s eyes shone with tears he refused to let fall. Yelena felt a wave of anger but suppressed it, recalling how swiftly the fractal entity had attacked. The beep… beep-beep… throbbed like a dull blade in her skull.
(Inverted Trial Cameo)
One of the holo-screens briefly flickered: “Trial Zero (Unofficial).” A short cameo: a small lunar dome centuries prior, a group that refused all conflict or leadership, hoping pure passivity would “avoid evil.” They starved in silence, no one stepping up to solve mechanical failures or secure resources. They perished in slow atrophy.
Ricardo’s face tensed. “An older, undocumented run. They believed absolute non-violence would save them. But passivity became their doom; they never took decisive action. Even ‘peace’ can doom if it paralyzes all effort.”
Karla swallowed. “So extremes—ruthless cruelty or total inertia—both lead to death.”
Juan murmured a prayer in Spanish, hugging himself. The moral complexity weighed on them like an oppressive mantle.
19 · FAILED ESCAPE
Juan snapped at last, slamming a fist into the nearest bulkhead. “I’m done with cosmic sermons while our friends lie dead. We’ll find a way off the station ourselves. Karla, you said you can sabotage circuits?”
Karla inhaled, voice shaking. “I can rig or disrupt certain drone panels, maybe. But—”
She hesitated, scanning the chamber. One archway glowed azure. Hovering near it was the teal dro-pid, Churro, displaying:
ESCAPE MODULE — AUTHORIZED USERS: 0
Karla’s eyes narrowed. “Ricardo, open that.”
Ricardo shook his head. “I cannot. The experiment remains unfinished. Only if the seventh crucible deems Earth eligible does standard departure resume. If it fails, Earth’s future is… compromised.”
The floor glowed orange under Karla’s steps. She lunged, shoving Ricardo’s chest. Her palm impacted his suit. The fractal being behind him hissed but didn’t strike. Ricardo’s expression flickered with genuine sorrow.
“If Earth fails,” he murmured, “returning might be pointless… or might hasten your downfall.”
Yelena felt cold dread coil in her gut. She pictured her Earthly classroom, the battered Moon model, her students’ eager faces. All undone by cosmic cynicism. The beep… beep-beep… hammered her mind.
20 · YELENA’S BARGAINING
Silence pressed in, thick as a vacuum. Yelena steadied her breath, recalling how she once managed hectic labs by offering constructive tasks. Now cosmic doom overshadowed reason.
“All right,” she said, voice wavering. “If the seventh group is so crucial, at least let us return to Earth—warn them. Let them see the truth so they can pass the test.”
Ricardo’s face revealed a hint of sadness. “Foreknowledge skews the sincerity of hearts. The Overseers want uncoached moral choices.”
Karla’s voice shook. “Then the next group will die just like ours—Joanne scalded, Gabriel twisted, John devoured, Evan possessed by mania. None had a chance.”
“Perhaps,” Ricardo allowed, “or perhaps they will break the cycle. Free will is the pivot. You intervened in some horrors but not all—Evan’s spiral might have been averted if recognized earlier. The system notes every nuance.”
Juan clenched his fists, trembling. Yelena touched his arm, preventing him from attacking. Then she faced Ricardo again. “Is there a third option? Observing the next trial but not influencing it? Some vantage that spares us from more… direct horror?”
Behind Ricardo, the fractal silhouette glowed lavender runes, as if granting permission. He nodded. “There is a discretionary path: stasis-based witness status. You remain in dream-state, invisible to the new arrivals, gleaning their moral arcs. If Earth fails again, you might salvage data or assume stewardship.”
Karla closed her eyes. “Stasis—like those half-dead lumps we saw in pods. That’s our only choice besides waiting to be killed or forcibly subdued?”
Ricardo inclined his head gently. “Biostasis. Your metabolism slows drastically. The Overseers feed your subconscious with motifs. If the final crucible fails, you become Earth’s archivists. If it succeeds, you awaken to a new era—decades or centuries hence. The alternative is subdual, your moral record wiped.”
Yelena recalled her empty silver locket, once holding her father’s photo. She exhaled. “A cosmic waiting game… but better than more carnage.”
Karla forced out a trembling breath. “If John had known, maybe he’d have chosen that path, too. Let’s do it.”
Juan made the sign of the cross. “Gabriel would want me to keep going. This is the only shot.”
Ricardo signaled a cluster of dro-pids scanning vitals. He sighed at the missing occupant—John. “Yes. Three remain,” he said gravely.
“One last thing,” Yelena said. “The beep that haunted me on Earth. Why?”
Ricardo’s gaze softened. “The Overseers speak in chord-frequencies. They planted a ‘seed chord’ in you the day your father died, triggered by trauma. It shaped your illusions, your nightmares, the beep you kept hearing. Now it guides you to your next step.”
Yelena’s stomach twisted, recalling flickering lights in her classroom, the beep’s constant hum. “Then let’s finish this.”
21 · THE GARDEN OF SLEEPERS
Ricardo led them through an azure archway into a whale-ribcage vault lined with lavender-tinted stasis capsules. Dro-pids flitted overhead, scanning each occupant. The hush felt chapel-like, a testament to centuries of cosmic “data harvesting.”
Churro, the teal dro-pid, whirred ahead, displaying:
NOW LOADING → VASQUEZ, KARLA
VASQUEZ, YELENA
CRUZ, JUAN
Three empty pods slid out on silent rails. Churro’s screen flashed a pixel-tear emoji beside an empty fourth slot, then dimmed. Yelena’s heart clenched at the thought that a fourth might have belonged to John, if not for the parasite’s meltdown. The beep… beep-beep… pulsed like a final refrain in her mind.
Karla peered into the corridor of pods labeled TRIAL THREE, TRIAL FOUR, TRIAL FIVE… She glimpsed half-familiar faces behind tinted glass—some contorted in half screams, others serene as if only sleeping. “So the… failures remain stuck here?”
Ricardo nodded. “Until the seventh trial ends, nothing is conclusive. Many never reawaken if no final cosmic verdict emerges.”
Juan ran a shaking hand over a metal plate on the nearest pod. “John always coded silly dro-pid jokes. Now… he’s gone.” He exhaled, turning to Yelena. “If we refuse stasis, we forfeit everything?”
Ricardo bowed slightly. “Yes. Your moral data is erased. Earth learns nothing from your ordeal.”
Yelena suppressed tears, glancing at Karla—once just an ambitious influencer, now hollow-eyed by horror—and at Juan, who grieved Gabriel but carried on. We have no choice, she thought.
(Final Survivor Interaction Before Stasis)
They formed a small circle. The beep… beep-beep… hovered at the edge of hearing, dro-pids politely giving them space.
Karla took Yelena’s hand. “Sis, I was so naive. I wanted a big, glitzy vlog about a ‘weekend’ on the Moon. Now we’re facing cosmic scrutiny. I’m sorry if my hype overshadowed you or put you at risk.”
Yelena’s chest tightened. “Karla, you gave me glimpses of joy in a life overshadowed by nightmares of Dad’s death. If anything, I overshadowed you with my seriousness. We faced all this together.”
Tears shone in Karla’s eyes. “We lost so many—John, Gabriel, Joanne, even that twisted side of Evan. But maybe stasis will let Earth glean something from their sacrifice.”
Juan placed his hand atop theirs, voice trembling. “Gabriel—he was everything to me. But I won’t let his death be pointless. Let’s freeze ourselves for Earth. Let’s keep hope alive somehow.”
They embraced fiercely. Once they had been naive travelers. Now they realized the Universe demanded moral vantage from them, whether they liked it or not.
22 · CHOICE, STRIPPED OF ILLUSION
The teal dro-pid, Churro, guided them to the three open pods. Ricardo stood a short distance away, massaging his temple, centuries of duty etched into his face. “Their directives leave no room for mercy,” he murmured, as if to himself. “I have carried out so many trials, always hoping humankind might surprise them. Perhaps this seventh time… you will.”
Yelena drew a shaky breath, the beep… beep-beep… resonating in her mind. “Tell the Overseers we can show compassion under terror,” she said. “We aren’t all damned.”
Ricardo inclined his head. “I will. They watch, though rarely intervene. May your stasis yield a kinder outcome.”
He stepped away as dro-pids completed scanning. Churro hovered near Yelena, projecting a final line:
SEE YOU LATER, FUNNY TEACHER
She swallowed emotion. She never thought she’d feel fondness for a mechanical caretaker, but she did. On her right, Karla’s pod hissed open. On her left, Juan tested the interior cushion of his stasis chamber.
Yelena braced both palms on the rim of her assigned pod. Inside, it smelled faintly of cedar and ocean breeze—clearly designed to soothe. A filament extended, pricking her arm with a cool anesthetic that spread like mint through her blood.
Across, Karla formed a finger-heart. Karla lowered her hand-heart, pursed her lips, then stage-whispered: “Just think, sis—frozen beauty sleep with no ads, no trolls, and no 5 a.m. faculty meetings. Honestly? Five stars.”
Even Ricardo’s eyebrow twitched—halfway to a smile—before he remembered the room was supposed to be solemn.
Yelena’s answering laugh was tiny but real, proof the sisters could still trade warmth in a freezer aisle of fate. Juan pressed a fist to his chest in memory of Gabriel. Then each lid sealed with a soft hiss, the overhead lights dimming.
Ricardo’s voice echoed from beyond: “Courage is not the absence of fear, but surrender to something vast enough to hold fear without breaking.”
In the hush, the beep… beep-beep… slowed, merging with Yelena’s pulse. She forced her final conscious thought on John’s shy grin, the day he admitted that fatal crash. Maybe his guilt taught them the cost of denial. Then sedation overtook her senses, darkness enclosing her mind.
(Ricardo’s Private Soliloquy)
Outside, as the pods locked, Ricardo lingered. The fractal-winged Overseer hovered behind him. Gently, he placed a hand on Yelena’s sealed pod. In a low, almost lullaby murmur, he reproduced the triple-tone beep—beep… beep-beep…—as though calming a restless child.
“They still dream of mercy,” he whispered, voice tinged with centuries of fatigue. “I have carried your ledger across epochs. But if violet blooms to ash once more, I may refuse another crucible—even if you unmake me. Let them surprise you… or let me rest.”
He bowed his head. The fractal presence offered no words, but cables overhead flickered in a chord. Ricardo closed his eyes, uncertain whether hope or resignation lay ahead.
23 · DESCENT INTO WHITE NOISE
Locked in stasis, time became meaningless. Yelena felt as though drifting in a dark sea, the beep… beep-beep… an intermittent sonar guiding her through memory fragments. A swirl of illusions:
A corridor from her old school, the battered Moon model perched on a desk, mocking illusions of safety. She opens the red-lit door—but instead of stepping in, she closes it gently, whispering, “I’m done bleeding for that night, Mamá.” The handle cools beneath her palm. She opened a door onto the memory of her mother behind prison bars, father’s corpse reanimated. He needed to die, her mother’s voice said, fracturing into static.
A mosaic of glass domes labeled TRIAL ONE through TRIAL SIX. Mustachioed explorers cannibalizing each other in a Victorian fiasco. A 1970s cult lying in neat rows, poison cups spilled. Tech barons hammered on sealed sauna doors. Is humankind worth saving? the chord seemed to ask.
A lunar ice field stretching to the horizon, Yelena’s eighth graders trailing behind her with flickering candles. Beneath the ice, dark shapes with glowing eyes swam, watchers or predators. If she let fear take hold, the ice cracked. If she let empathy guide her, it sealed. Fear molds worlds; love navigates them, a voice whispered in chordal notes, reminiscent of her father’s or the Overseers’.
A ticking sense of finality pervaded every dream. She recalled Evan’s final mania, how cruelty and fanaticism thrived side by side in him. She recalled John’s meltdown, Gabriel’s twisted corpse. All the nightmares that had led here. Now the seventh crucible approached. If it collapsed, Earth might lose cosmic favor. Yelena had no power but to observe from stasis.
24 · THE SEVENTH CRUCIBLE (IMPRESSIONS THROUGH STASIS)
THE SEVENTH CRUCIBLE (IMPRESSIONS THROUGH STASIS)
Enveloped in a dreamlike vantage, Yelena felt the beep… beep-beep… keep her tethered to consciousness. She saw a new group arrive at Selene One, but as though from behind frosted glass—an unseen spectator. She couldn’t speak, only watch.
Day Zero:
Eight diverse travelers stepped onto the station, each from a different corner of Earth. A universal translator patch lit on their necks, ensuring language barriers dissolved. Yelena recognized them like actors on a cosmic stage:
A soldier—unnamed, but glimpses in his memory revealed the metallic tang of border duty and active-combat flashbacks.
His pregnant partner—an engineer in her third trimester, traveling under a “hope-for-the-future” scholarship.
A Kenyan climate-scientist delegate, barely nineteen, eyes bright with optimism.
A Brazilian agro-ecologist, her tense rival in climate politics.
A Japanese retired astronaut turned streamer, stoic yet flamboyant in self-promotion, akin to the “billionaire-gamer” archetype but tempered by age.
A Pakistani humanitarian lawyer, keen on publicity and brand synergy, echoing a “senator’s-daughter” vanity arc.
A Nigerian vow-of-listening ascetic (from an ancient Christian tradition) who speaks only after hearing words from others, his quiet presence stabilizing the group.
A Canadian AI ethicist aiming for a “tech-harmonious” approach, bridging automation and empathy.
They arrived wide-eyed, some complaining about bandwidth or streaming metrics, others enthralled by anti-grav cocktails. Yelena felt a pang—her own group had arrived equally dazzled. Will these novices unify faster than we did?
(Translator Implant Confirmation)
A dro-pid scanned them each, ensuring the station’s standard translator patch latched onto their neural larynx. Their words blended into a neutral timbre. The cosmic watchers refused to let mere language barriers sabotage the test.
(Days 1–4)
Days blurred like compressed footage: the group floated through orientation selfies, swapped recipes for lunar ramen, and bickered over climate graphs that glowed crimson on sleek tablets. The soldier flinched at every pressure hiss; his pregnant partner soothed him with deep-space lullabies piped through a tinny dro-pid speaker. Rival scientists nearly came to blows until the vow-of-listening ascetic scribbled a compromise on a napkin and slid it silently between them. The influencer-astronaut livestreamed backflips—until a dro-pid projected the word “GREED” across his visor, sending his comment feed into freefall. Small mercies surfaced—an impromptu birthday song in six languages, a shared ration of contraband mango paste—between pulse-spikes of mistrust. By the time the station’s calendar ticked to Day Five, cohesion hung by a silver filament.
Day Five:
The Japanese ex-astronaut-livestreamer tried bribing a dro-pid for guaranteed “immunity.” The dro-pid’s screen simply displayed “GREED,” then sealed him in a corridor. His broadcast ended abruptly, leaving the moral heat map flickering red, then dimming to gray. Yelena couldn’t see if he starved or found a hidden exit—ambiguous data.
Day Six:
A station-wide life-support crisis erupted. The soldier’s pregnant partner nearly collapsed from an oxygen shortfall, eyes rolling back. The soldier, eyes fierce with memories of war, overcame his panic to help reroute power. The Kenyan teen and Brazilian delegate overcame their feud to patch vent systems. The vow-of-listening ascetic humbly carried out mechanical tasks, quietly guided by the AI ethicist’s suggestions. The Pakistani lawyer set aside vanity to fetch tools and read schematics. Even the soldier overcame flashbacks to stand guard, ensuring no sabotage recurred.
Yelena’s vantage soared with cautious optimism. They’re working together more cohesively than we did…
(Extra Vignette) In the gloom, the vow-of-listening ascetic knelt by a dro-pid, murmuring a short prayer after hearing the soldier’s words about borderline guilt. The beep… beep-beep… surged in Yelena’s stasis mind. She recalled how Earth had ignored her nightmares. Yet here, a quiet synergy formed.
Day Seven:
Moments blurred in chaotic bursts—fear, heartbreak, near-mutiny. The soldier nearly snapped under old traumas, the pregnant partner crying for him to stay calm. The Kenyan and Brazilian delegates overcame final spats, forging a genuine alliance to fix a meltdown in the hydroponics bay. The Pakistani lawyer realized “optics” paled next to actual survival, dropping brand synergy to help physically. The vow-of-listening ascetic uttered carefully chosen words, bridging emotional divides. The scoreboard flickered with runic glyphs.
At a climactic moment, the soldier nearly threatened violence, cornered by a wave of anxiety, but glimpsed his partner’s swollen belly trembling. He lowered his stance, letting tears fall, confessing that he carried guilt from an unnamed conflict. The ascetic quietly listened, then placed a hand on his shoulder. The soldier’s meltdown subsided. The group collectively embraced him and reaffirmed unity.
Dro-pids soared overhead, scanning. The scoreboard ignited in bright violet across all seven petals—a hue more profound than Yelena had seen. Her vantage trembled with dread and hope intermingled. Is it redemption or a last-second illusion? The station’s runic patterns lit, cables throbbing in chord-laced pulses.
Yet no cosmic voice proclaimed final salvation. Silence and potential reigned. The beep… beep-beep… hammered once in Yelena’s mind as she realized how empathy had indeed shaped their synergy. But cosmic watchers rarely gave neat answers.
She also remembered her father’s battered face, mother’s final words—He needed to die, but not by your hand. Earth’s fate might mirror that threshold: requiring radical transformation but not final destruction. The scoreboard’s intense violet glow might herald that transformation.
(White-Space Cliff…)
From her stasis vantage, Yelena felt a swirl of optimism and dread. The scoreboard’s unprecedented glow could mean Earth’s moral blossoming or another cosmic meltdown. She possessed no voice to confirm. Over the hush, she sensed an intangible lock “click,” as though the Universe tested whether to condemn or spare humanity.
Darkness wrapped her, sedation deepening. The beep… beep-beep… softened, no longer an alarm but a gentle heartbeat of possibility. She drifted, uncertain if the seventh crucible ended in triumph or simply delayed another horror.
(Deepened Ice-Field Dream Coda)
In one last flicker of consciousness, Yelena found herself back at that lunar ice field. Her eighth-grade students gathered with candles, each flame reflecting in the frosty expanse. Fear emanated from the children—fear of the cracks spiderwebbing the ice. She sensed the beep… beep-beep… as a cosmic undercurrent.
She tried to speak to them: “Class, remember what we learned about infiltration of water in rock fissures? Fear can freeze and expand, tearing foundations apart. But compassion can seal cracks if we trust each other.” The children nodded uncertainly, each step risking a new fracture. Yelena guided them with trembling calm, placing her own candle in the center. The ice creaked dangerously.
Memory could be moral agency, she realized, even inside stasis. She was teaching them not to let fear overshadow empathy. Was it real or dream? She pressed her hand on the ice, feeling the chordal hum from below, the shadowy watchers. The beep… beep-beep… resonated, slower, more harmonious—less a cosmic threat, more a gentle reminder that she had faced her darkest memories and survived.
Gradually, the cracks receded, each child’s flame merging into a circle of light. Yes, we can survive if we recall who we are, Yelena thought, tears burning. Her father’s battered face no longer loomed in condemnation but as a cautionary lesson: cruelty can pass generationally unless confronted. Perhaps Earth’s cruelty could also be arrested, if the final crucible held.
“Whether the universe remembers us or not, the candles still burn on the ice—for we, at least, remember ourselves.”
Then the dream dissolved, leaving Yelena afloat in a hush that felt oddly peaceful.
Epilogue: Elsewhere in Selene One’s dark guts, three pod status LEDs winked from amber to soft green—and, for a breath, the winged shadow in the corridor seemed to stop and listen.
End.