"...What?"
He slowly brought his gloved hand to the display, his fingers dragging with difficulty across the surface, as if trying to touch the number. It made no sense—and at the same time, it made all the sense in the world.
The air inside the suit was filtered, odorless, but it had a taste—a dry taste of clean plastic, with metallic notes reminiscent of the bottom of a forgotten spoon. A pure, yet unnatural air. Almost too aseptic.
The screen changed. And then... it began.
A soft, delicate, ridiculously tranquil animation. In the background, a surreal green field, of radioactive tones, where trees undulated with movements that defied physics. Bubbles floated as if alive, translucent, containing goldfish swimming with ceremonial slowness. In the background, an impossible, translucent white city hovered in the sky. All in the damned style of a forgotten utopia—the Frutiger Aero, nightmare version.
Music began to play. Clean, crystalline notes, with digital harp timbres and artificial flutes, dancing in soft layers, like an elevator ride to insanity.
Lines of text began to appear, the AI sweetly explaining something brutal. "Attention: The Elias black hole is 11.7 billion times the mass of the sun, which means it distorts time. Do not exceed 5 minutes on any planet/moon."
"💡 Extreme gravity distorts time."
"🕒 Near massive black holes, time moves slower."
"⏱️ For every 1 second here, hundreds can pass on Earth."
An equation formed with ridiculously graceful visual effects, in soft shades of blue and lilac:
"Time on Earth ÷ Time on Moon = Dilation Factor"
"4,646,000 hours ÷ 38 hours ≈ 122,263"
🔁 In other words, time outside passes ~122,263 times faster than near the Elias black hole.
His throat went dry.
His jaw clenched.
A dull echo of accelerated heartbeats pulsed inside his helmet.
The sound of his own breathing seemed choked.
But the damned display continued, while the goldfish floated on the screen along with soap bubbles, to the sound of the damned antiquated song, a table appeared out of nowhere:
🧑🚀 1 Second on Elias IIIa ➔ ~34 Hours on Earth. (Every blink you made was 34 hours on Earth! ✨)
🧑🚀 1 Minute on Elias IIIa ➔ ~85 Days on Earth. (It's like you took a nap, and Earth lived a whole soap opera! 😮)
🧑🚀 1 Hour on Elias IIIa ➔ ~14 Years on Earth. (Just one of your hours, and Earth had over a decade of adventures! 📅)
🚀 TOTAL: 38 Hours on Elias IIIa ➔ 530 YEARS on Earth. (Centuries have passed... Earth changed EVERYTHING! 😱)
"No... No... NO!!!" He slammed both hands onto the monitor, frantically swiping them across it, desperate for more answers, but the glove hindered him this time. "DAMN IT, GO ON!!! 530?!"
He punched the screen in despair, his hands trying to break through the digital lie.
But the display wouldn't yield. The music played on. The bubbles danced. The fish swam. The city smiled in silence.
"GO FUCK YOURSELF, YOU MOTHERFUCKER!!!"
CRASH.
The sound of the impact against the monitor echoed through the small chamber, muffled, as if swallowed by the padded room of a space asylum.
The display cracked.
"YOU SON OF A BITCH! WHAT THE HELL IS 530?! IT DOESN'T MAKE SENSE!"
And then—the hatch in front opened.
A breath of new air flooded the room, but nothing changed. Nunes felt a sudden pain in his left forearm. An electric spasm. As if he'd punched it... in another reality. He looked up.
On the other side... Another white room.
"But..." He trembled, a feeling of something profoundly wrong coursing down his spine. "There isn't another room... And I didn't press the button for the door to open."
He turned, tried to open the hatch back to the ship, trying to disguise the hysteria in his voice on the radio. "Ketlen...? Ketlen, are you there?"
"Oh yeah? So, I'm the problem?"
Ketlen's voice came through the radio. Her voice was hoarse, trembling, holding something back that he hadn't yet identified.
He frowned, speaking back:
"Ketle-"
"Tell me to my face, then."
She spoke again—and it wasn't to him.
"Damn it, Ketlen. What the hell is this? Are you having trouble there?"
Then he himself answered. And he heard it.
"YOU." The voice was tight, hatred burning. "Are the problem, you crazy bitch."
The room lights flickered for half a second.
"Oh... okay."
"KETLEN, ANSWER ME, DAMN IT!!! WHO'S THERE?!"
No one was listening to his call. But yes, on the other side.
"Alright, Nunes. I've always been a problem anyway. It's fine."
"KETLEN??? IT'S NOT ME ON THE OTHER SIDE, DAMN IT!!!"
"What I'm going to do now is simply erase a mistake that never should have existed."
"NO!!! WAIT!!!" He himself screamed.
A gunshot. Loud. From the other side of the door.
"KEEEETLEEEEN!!! DAMN IT, KETLEN?!" He tried to open the door multiple times. "WHO'S THERE?"
But the radio continued.
"Ketlen... KETLEN, YOU MISERABLE BASTARD! WHY DID YOU DO THIS?!"
It was him. Crying.
But suddenly...
Terror.
"AAAAHHH!!!" he screamed loudly, desperate. "GET OUT, GET OUT, GET OUT!!!"
Before the call dropped, he swore he heard an animalistic growl:
"SQUEEEK!"
It wasn't a monster. It was the weight of an unbearable burden, materialized by evil. And it was on the other side of the door.
"What the hell..." He ran.
When he passed through the new hatch...
"What the...?" He took a step forward, doing a 360 around the room, but before he could breathe, the door behind him slammed shut with a heavy thud.
And on the cursed screen... the same figures, explanations, tables. But now...?
"Fish Bubble Bubble \ Bubble Bubble \ Bubble \ Bubble Bubble Bubble \ Bubble Bubble Bubble Fish \ Bubble Bubble"
"Current Earth Date: October 8, 2558."
"Time elapsed on Earth: 531 years."
He gawked... Another year...?