March 27, 2025-08:23- Hawaii
Everyone was already in the cafeteria while having breakfast; the group was having an idle chit chat among themselves doing something to make them appear busy. Margaret was awfully silently and was just quietly stuffing her mouth. The president was seated on another table and was stealing glances at Margaret. Everyone was pretending to be busy but was actually spying on the two. General Morris spoke up to try to clear some awkwardness in the air and said.
“Wade, are you sure you don’t mind eating standard military meals here in the cafeteria? After all, your meals at the White House must have been fancy.”
“LoL who do you think I am, Uncle? As if you have forgotten me and where I came from. I ate much more basic food back in my service days than what I cared to remember, this good stuff here is way better than that.”
“Well fair enough, I still can’t believe the dorky kid that always steals a can of beer from my stash back then grew up to be the man he was now.”
“Shhhh Uncle! Please be quiet… it’s embarrassing” Wade protested
Morris smirked at him and gave a shit-eating grin.
“Fine, enough of the teasing, so how was your particular injury?”
“I’ll have the lead removed in a month or two using those….” Wade leaned on General Morris’s ears and spoke some words that were hardly heard by the nearby people.
“Well, that was impressive, so when will it be made public by any chance?”
“We’ve had talks and it’s officially would be made public after the medical version would be proven successful.”
“Well, good luck then, your mom would be so happy that it would be removed she was always worried about that” General Morris said.
After having their meal, they got up and went to the laboratory. Secret service and heavily armed servicemen were following right behind them; Most were old buddies from the President’s military service days. They walked past a few corridors and wide hallways until they reached the designated lab.
“Wow, so many memories for so little time,” someone said in the background.
Everyone just pretended to not hear despite they knew full well what the guy said. The dense awkwardness urged them to do their work with a bit more focus. Computers were humming, data were being loaded, the software was being run, many works to do for everyone. Wade sat on a chair and was observing the team do their work in silence, after some time fiddling with the instruments; they hooked the black box to the computer. The computer scanned the black box and the security countermeasures had appeared on the screen indicating them to type the passcode. The President got up and he himself typed the passcode and did a hidden biometric scan that indicates that the FTL’s computer had acknowledged a total control of the files including the hidden ones that would be inaccessible by the first passcode that does not have the President’s biometric data.
The data was being processed seamlessly. Everything was moving fast and accurate up til the last encrypted data were opened. The team was relieved that it went well, now the only thing they had to do was to feed the decrypted data into a diagnostic software and had it viewed manually by the engineers. The process was the most time consuming since it was not fully automated and the file was large. The idea that they had come up with was to copy the latest files, a week before the incident occurred. It would then be fed to the software, an hour later and they found something in the activity log.
“This was it? How could such small detail affect the whole system, the only thing that was supposed to happen is the total device shutdown so how?” Perry said while rubbing his brow.
The error they found was a faulty resistor that resulted in a sudden flow of electricity that is allowed to power the drive which in turn caused the power input imbalance.
“Geez man, we’ll get to the end of this, relax, there’s still more files to read,” Hector said while patting Perry’s shoulders.
A few more hours and there appeared another error in the data, it appeared that the computer had a few lapses, it was the error in the coordinate input which a human operator had to input and then acknowledged by the computer, it seems that the faulty code was accepted by the computer regardless.
“Wow, someone’s getting fired,” Perry said under his breath.
“Well, technically he might not get fired after-all this here is fascinating enough and saved his ass in return.” Wade interjected.
“Can we look at the coordinate input?” Hector said.
Perry pulled out the set of coordinates that were used, they knew immediately it was all wrong, in fact, It never existed neither on earth or anywhere in the earth’s surrounding space, it was all different. They were completely baffled. They slumped in their seats lost in thoughts. The silence was broken when Wade asked for the CCTV footage. Everyone exchanged glanced and shrugged their shoulders and was puzzled by what Wade asked, they know the facilities had more cameras than human eyes and ears on the lunar site.
“I remembered that I asked them to install a CCTV camera around the FTL for security reason but actually it was all a joke directed to the high-level security on the lunar base, I remembered that I received an email about how they took my joke literally and did it and I somehow have forgotten about it up until now and I believe they linked it to the FTL’s main computer.” Wade said, this in turn brightened the mood of everyone and they immediately searched for the file folder inside the archives.
They were nervous, they were uncertain of what they will find inside the files. They slowly pulled out the videos. They seek to find the video of the day of the FTL’s disappearance. At first, it was all normal, people who were managing the facility and was walking around doing their task, nothing out of place, but then when they skipped to the time here the incident occurred, what they saw were bizarre, everything was darkness, complete scary darkness and a flash of light then reality began to bend then everything went normal. They saw everything unfold right before them and then the surroundings changed, they saw a foggy horizon and a beach but the crimson beach was not impressive compared to the two red and green moon in which illuminated the dusk seascape. They switched to the other cameras and it was facing a strange forest that is so similar yet so alien to their eyes. They continued to watch the footage when suddenly Margaret noticed something in the bushes.
“What’s that?” Margaret said.
“What do you mean?” Perry replied.
Margaret was curious about what she saw and requested Perry to review the video in the last 15 seconds and ask to pause the video the moment Margaret gave the signal. After she signaled Perry and he paused the video, a still image of a pale humanoid creature hiding behind a bush was revealed. They zoomed in on the video and saw it’s pale complexion and large red eyes as it stared right at the object in front of it, but the feeling of the people in the room that saw it was completely different, it was scary they can even imagine the creature was staring at them. The image was eerie to look at; they had a hard time processing the things they discovered and were too overwhelmed that some of their colleagues fainted and was immediately given first aid.
“Honestly I regret asking for the high-end cameras, this is creepy,” Wade said. All of them nodded in agreement and kept quiet.
They continued watching the footage for hours, it was already night time when they noticed another activity, this time more of the pale creatures were hanging around the FTL engine and was curious, due to this they saw the details of the creature’s appearance. They wore tattered garments made from some sort of fibrous material. They looked like humans aside from the pale skin and red eyes and severely balding head that still had few strands of hair. They were also malnourished judging from their skinny appearance that revealed their sunken ribs and cheeks.
The scientists deduced that the creatures around the FTL engine were all male and were on a hunt and were nocturnal given that they have pale skin and will probably suffer from sunburn at daylight. Some of the pale creatures were leaving the site and later on brought crude tools made of wood and rough stones. They proceeded to hammer the engine but to no avail did the engine yield. Suddenly the pale creatures sensed something, they were panicking and everyone picked up their weapons and ran to the bushes and hid as if they were hiding from a larger predator. They waited for hours inside the bushes and later came out to hang out at the engine. The first light of dawn came and the creatures proceed to retreat into the forest but something happened that the pale creatures didn’t expect, same as how it initially got there the FTL warped and after a few minutes it was on the ocean a small explosion occurred and the video was terminated. President Wade’s hands were shaking as he sips his coffee in fact everyone was also feeling the same except General Morris who appeared to kept his cool appearance but inside his mind were nerve-wracked. Wade stood up and said.
“Okay everyone, I know how you feel, calm down we’ll sort this out. This is exciting and scary at the same time but in order for this to be settled, we have to fix the engine. Damn, I didn’t realize how many mugs of coffee I have drunk today just to swallow all those crazy things I may even dare say crazier than surpassing light speed travel.”
“We just discovered another world, how cool is that?” Wade added.
“Mr. President, I want to propose an impromptu meeting with everyone here,” Hector said.
Hector’s proposal was given a go signal by Wade; he explained some theories about things that happened. he explained that in order for the FTL to work, it had to bend space and time in a singularity then the coordinates would be fed to the computer in which everyone nodded. He said that the incident may have resulted due to the unrestricted flow of power; he proposed that by limiting the singularity inside the inner ring of the FTL, it would exist in two realities and the singularity can be walked into just like a portal but the coordinates had to be used in order for it to succeed. He also discussed that the reason the engine returned was due to the computer that had sensed something was not right and the failsafe activated and fed the ocean crash coordinate which was proven true after a more thorough digging was conducted.
But right after the meeting ended, a man wearing a suit came over to the president and gave a salute, he informed Wade about three dead pale humanoids that were found floating around the area where the FTL was retrieved. The bodies were picked up by the navy after a follow-up operation. The people who were very much aware gave each other a knowing nod of fear.
The man in suits was puzzled by the looks given by the President and the other people inside the lab.
“uh Mr. President, are you okay?” He asked.
“Morgan, we just struck into something scary and interesting and yes we know the creature’s existence” Wade replied.
The man was agent Morgan who was in the special investigation team that was formed after the incident. He introduced himself to the engineers and scientists and proceeded to ask for the data that were collected so far, they were tasked to continue the investigation and assist the development of matters related to the said incident. Before President Wade left, he asked Morgan for the autopsy report to be given to him the moment it was done. Everyone was exhausted and retreated to have a good rest in their rooms. President wade was the most bothered person of them all, his mind full of thoughts that he had no idea how to get rid of it. The burden of the incident was outweighed by the thoughts of Margaret’s red face, shaking his head he asked around his buddies for a cigarette in which he lighted up.
“Hey, you! I thought you don’t smoke?” came out a booming voice from General Morris.
“I only smoke when I’m anxious but not every time I had anxiousness brood over me.” He meekly replied as he cupped his head with his hands. General Morris pats his shoulders and gave him a smile.
“But your Momma ain’t gonna like her son smoking so gimme that, if you want to release those feelings take a nice warm bath and a run at the park or a gym okay. Wade obediently gave half of what’s left of his cigarette to his uncle. Also, I knew what’s in your mind, go just do it he said and gave him a wink.
Despite being the most powerful person on Earth, his mother is still more powerful.
Thanks for the chapter.