SisterSuns

As the man floated past a seemingly endless array of spinning bodies, eclipsed stars and vast gaseous nebulas, the beauty of what he witnessed thinly insulated his psyche from the true nature of his plight. The facts surrounding his solitude had become intangibles. An attempt to comprehend the events that led him into his current environment caused his spirit to flat line.

The small part of the man’s mind that was lucid and still operated outside the existential had communicated with his physical senses and determined that he was floating. A brief conversation with his ocular nerve had disclosed that during the continuing, slow, multi-axis rotations, fire and wreckage may have been briefly spotted before shrinking and disappearing into the void. As a minority stakeholder in the man’s consciousness the lucid part attempted to sound an alarm but the amygdala was nonplussed.

“At least inventory this situation,” the lucid part of the man’s mind thought, “oxygen, survival, a plan… ” 
These motions were very quickly denied by the rest of him.
“It doesn’t matter anymore” thought the prefrontal cortex. 
“Did it ever ?”  the temporal lobe responded.  
The cerebrum voted and Broca’s area issued a statement, “It is what it is.”

In response to the verdict the rest of the man’s body relaxed. His eyelids closed.

The vast majority of him accepted the mandate that his current situation simply was. There was nothing to more to discuss and no choices to be made. 

A sole holdout was left screaming. His ears could only hear the steady, enervated rhythm of his heart.

Captain Jack Struck tried his best to see clearly through the stabbing shadows. Hypnotic aural sequences of some sort of alarm pulsed through the semi-darkness between the rock walls and the low ceilings of the subterranean spaceport. At this moment he was unsure of whether his lack of clear vision was caused by the near darkness or by something else. It seemed to the Captain that, perhaps, his coup d’oeil may be faltering and he knew that he must now act with extra caution.  

He felt his way along the colder and colder stone pausing when he heard or thought he heard another being. The last thing he wanted or needed was a confrontation. He had no explanations. He had no insight.

The thrusters of a small smart ship roared to life.

Blue and red lights reflected on the Captain’s face as he stared straight through the instrument panel and into deep space.

His mind was an inapproachable galaxy, a vast exiguous dispersion of mass that at this moment felt as dense as it did empty.

Engaging the auto-pilot without a destination wasn’t as tricky as he thought it would be. He did not buckle himself in, he did not open or close his eyes. Everything he knew was shrinking behind him and only maintenance lay ahead.

You took your hits with the bruises on the soles of your feet
Well who’s to say if they’re deserved?
But you’re turning reckless now
I heard you saying through your teeth, that you’ll take them down first

But I saw you flinch, when the doctors got the claws in you
I saw your smile start to crack
It’s not so funny when you’re sunk and there ain’t nothing you can do
And your options are all dead ends

When there’s no way out
I’ll let you build your home with me till the clocks run down
When your lucks run out
Call me and I will come and fix you get your feet on the ground
When there’s no way out
Call me and I will come and bury you all safe and sound

And all this time you’ve been drifting out with the tide my friend
But you can have what’s mine if it helps you stay afloat
If I close my eyes I can’t watch you drown anymore my friend
But I’ll tell you lies if it helps you sleep at night
And the more we fight, the more we don’t get right
And the more we fight, the more we don’t get right

Heard they broke you
That you gave in
That you dropped
And the fight had left you
But don’t you worry
Makes no difference
From the start
Your options were all dead ends

When there’s no way out
I’ll let you build your home with me till the clocks run down
When your lucks run out
Call me and I will come and fix you get your feet on the ground
When there’s no way out
Call me and I will come and bury you all safe and sound

Safe and Sound – Electric President 2010

The alien transports fell through thick scattered clouds towards the autumnal surface of a forested continent. As the planet rushed up and the transports began to swoop, thick raindrops streaked across the transparent viewing portals and were transformed into brilliant diamonds by the thick orange rays of sister suns. The two transport shuttles landed near a densely wooded alien base camp.

With a show of gentleness and dignity, two human captives, a man and a woman, were taken from the shuttles and escorted into the base. The woman arrived on a stretcher and the man arrived unshackled and quietly. They were taken to a large wood paneled room with wide doors at one end that opened into a tranquil deciduous forest. The aliens moved the woman to a bed and quietly left the room. After a while the man lifted the woman and placed her into a wheeled chair. With what seemed to take all of her determination the woman pushed her chair through the doors and onto a covered veranda. The breeze was cool and as she breathed deeply the woman looked tired.

The woman and man remained outside, still and breathing. The air of this planet was good and a luxury not available for the last several torturous months aboard the alien spacecraft. They watched the sister suns take turns illuminating the brilliant colors of the falling leaves, alternately sharing their rays with large scattered clouds. When the youngest of the sister stars faded beyond the trees the man took the woman inside and placed her back into her bed. He sat beside her until he slept.

When they awoke a steady rain sang through the trees. The woman was peaceful and intent. The man was practical and heavy. As the morning hours passed the woman became quieter, laying on her back with her eyes closed. When the man would bring a straw to her mouth she would open her lips and drink. She would gently nod when he whispered into her ear. The rain kept on all day.

Overnight a chilly wind began to creep into the forest. In the morning the sister suns walked across the blue sky and the man watched the woman leave his side and join them.

Day 127 – After this sleep cycle Debra and I will be transported to the planet surface. I am assured by our captors that the surface is habitable. Debra has sustained massive injury and I do not expect her body to last long without the life sustaining machinery aboard this ship. She has made her decision to pass on with her feet on solid ground rather than remain in limbo aboard this spacecraft. I will continue to be brave for her and will remain by her side until she is with us no more – after which I will make my escape and hopefully find a way to rejoin our children back on earth. The story of Her bravery and sacrifice will echo through the galaxies forever.

Day 100 – It has been 100 days since our abduction. Life aboard this alien spacecraft never relents in its weirdness. The merciless experimentation of my wife by the aliens continues unabated. I am still unsure of what they expect to learn by their constant cutting and probing and am confused as to why I have been spared their experimentation thus far. So far their morbid curiosities seem to be focused on the female human species. I have been given free access to most parts of the spacecraft but still have not managed to infiltrate the laboratories where the most intense experiments take place. We have been sustained by substances resembling earth food but lacking both the flavor and satisfying texture of even the cheapest most common staples found on earth. Most of Debra’s sustenance has been delivered intravenously in the form of a strange whitish liquid the contents and makeup of which I have not yet been able to ascertain. Morale is expectedly low but our training is still serving us well and we are waiting for any opportunity to escape. My hope is that Debra will recover from her wounds and gain enough strength to make escape possible. I will not attempt escape without her and will spend my time gathering as much intelligence about these beings and will hopefully be able to determine what they are attempting to accomplish and perhaps gain the key to save the human race from a similar fate as what we are currently enduring.