“It’s beautiful,” he told himself. With nothing but hope in his heart, John finally swayed into the surreal, cosmic place he had always dreamt about. His heartbeat was so elevated at the sight of it that he wasn’t even afraid of the darkness which now engulfed him.
At that moment, he seemed more satisfied and content than he’d ever been.
John was just trying to contact his team, but out of nowhere, he heard someone whisper his name, followed by radio static. This petrified him — no one alive knew his name.
He suddenly felt as if he was left alone in the abyss, in the orbit of the biggest planet in the solar system. Jupiter.
Hysteria hit him. He thought he sensed something in motion and then he noticed how far along from the space shuttle he had come. He certainly couldn’t recall using his air thrusters. Yet he was almost miles away from his satellite.
Nothing seemed to work anymore for some reason. What seemed like a journey of a lifetime had turned into a strange ordeal.
“John, can you hear me?” As he was going to respond, his lips shut in the spur of the moment, and he could feel a tremendous amount of force, like gravity, sucking him into something gradually.
He told himself how it was all in his head but he could feel someone’s presence behind him. Someone was staring at him from the void.
Shivers ran down his spine because now, he was doubting if there was any truth to the stories of those who failed. He had told himself how something like this wasn’t possible. And then… something grabbed his leg in the middle of nowhere.
John was now in shock, surrounded by danger. He could feel its grip growing stronger by the second. All his efforts of resistance seemed to be in vain now, he felt as if he was no longer in control of his own body. When he managed to look below his feet, he couldn’t see anything.
Before he knew it, a dark, diabolical, icosahedron shaped body was now there, in the middle of his face. It stared into his soul and started crushing his leg.
His screams echoed as he felt his gut sinking and his knee splintering. He could feel his bones ripping and his blood was now floating, in front of his eyes.
He was losing control of his senses, contemplating his fate. Some demonic force was overpowering him and his very being. He was bleeding profusely now, but he tried to get rid of the ungodly force with efforts that proved to be futile. His vitals slowly began to fail.
His captain was now making all possible efforts to locate. Suddenly, there was a lull. In that brief moment, the crew felt a rather loud pounding voice followed by the cracking of glass.
“A mission Uncle SAM just can’t seem to pull off… crew of 17 dies due to 3rd unidentified celestial body, whilst on their 3rd attempt for reaching Jupiter. Coincidence?” reported the New York times some 30 days later.
– Jasmann Singh Narang, K.R Mangalam World School, Vikaspuri
I like this!