Two people are floating in a spaceship nearer the moon. Lehya looks out from the panel and sees darkness everywhere. I will finish the check and come back soon, signalled Prakhyat, before floating out of the ship. A long chord extending from the exterior of the spaceship held him in space. Lehya was now alone and began feeling gloomy. The trainees followed the training program's protocols religiously. Every twenty-four hours, one of the trainees takes a turn to check the exterior of the spaceship for damage. The other trainee is required to keep running the scans and check for anomalies.
Lehya was bored after staring at the screen for a long time. After what seemed like hours or maybe, minutes, she turned to face the screen after hearing a beep. A message had popped on the screen.
It read: “Important Maintenance Notice: Required to agree immediately.” Lehya could not understand it. What maintenance? She mused. It must be something for the spaceship. She went through the maintenance manuals to know more, but nothing was mentioned about agreeing. She felt it prudent to wait and consider Prahkyat’s say on this before agreeing.
Suddenly, a loud alarm was blaring through the ship. She checked the reason and found it was raised by the Maintenance Notice. The taskbar started blinking and displayed a countdown of 30 seconds. Lehya got more confused and decided to wait until the last 10 seconds to check if the countdown affected the ship’s vitals or programs.
Within five seconds, the situation worsened. The console began displaying error signals from the outer chamber. Another window popped up with a message: "Contamination: Close the Crew Access Hatch." Noticing that the countdown was still at 24 seconds, Lehya quickly glided over to check if the crew access hatch was securely locked. Finding it intact, she returned to the console and looked for an ignore button but couldn’t find one.
In the next ten seconds, the gravity field within the spaceship fluctuated. One moment, Lehya was floating, and the next, she dropped to the floor of the ship. Deciding she had enough of the chaos, she opened the Maintenance window and clicked "Agree."
Everything began stabilising in the spaceship. Whew, that was strange, sighed Lehya and went to check on Prakhyat. She found the safety and the crew access hatch locked and the chord had been pulled in. Shocked, Lehya began to reprogram the manipulator system in vain. Some unknown code was bypassing her command. Dejected, she ran to the console activated the exterior probe and searched for Prakhyat.
She finally located him on the external tank attachment system. She communicated with Prakhyat, but there was no response. She desperately tried speaking to him,
“Opening Cargo Bay, respond with affirmative.”
There was no response from Prakhyat. Suddenly she was surrounded by negative thoughts and was drowning in them. As abruptly as it began, she came out of it quickly and took the risk to open the cargo bay. Prakhyat manoeuvred towards it and was soon inside it.
She quickly activated the body scan for him and waited until it said he was clear to be let in. To her surprise, the scan results were not clear. It showed an alien life form attached to Prakhyat. Worried, she did not open the safety doors and remained indoors. She tried communicating with him,
“Do you read me? Respond with affirmative if you feel fine.”
There was no response from Prakhyat. It was as if, he was dead. Lehya was terrified. She did not know how to react. She tried communicating with the base station. The ship’s transmission signals were being intercepted and hence never reached the base station.
At this point, she was shaken out of her reverie with a message. The scan result popped on the screen. Lehya was surprised it was clear and absentmindedly opened the door to let him in. Prakhyat stole upon her and acted as if he was about to strangle her. Lehya got scared but eventually understood the prank. Prakhyat was grinning from ear to ear. Lehya acted as if she was about to punch Prakhyat. Then, she updated him on the events in his absence.
Prakhyat suddenly froze for an instant. Let us scan the ship for alien life, the events point to the presence of such a thing on the spaceship.
Lehya asked him “What happened when you were out?”
“Nothing, I just held on to the tank attachment system and waited for you to find me,” replied Prakhyat.
“Weren’t you scared, I would not look for you?” Lehya said.
“Why will I? I assumed you remembered how I found you,” replied Prakhyat.
“What? When did I get lost?” Lehya questioned.
“Don’t you remember? You are kidding, right? You also experienced a similar thing, but I let you in quickly, I knew you out for a short duration and was sure you would be clear. So, I didn’t run a scan like you,” Prakhyat explained.
Lehya was quite confused. She could not remember going out or getting stuck outside. Her head began to throb, and she was feeling uneasy.
“Didn’t you follow the protocol when you let me in?”
“No, I think that’s nothing to worry,” Prakhyat replied.
“Prakhyat please run a scan on me. I feel weird,” pleaded Lehya.
“Ok,” said Prakhyat and sent Lehya out of the bay area and sealed the door.
The screen blinked with numerous messages seeking approval
“Important Maintenance Notice”
“Error: Unknown genome detected”, etc.
This troubled Prakhyat, prompting him to run a scan on Lehya. While he waited for the results, Lehya suddenly grinned and said, “So, did I outdo your prank?” She laughed, clearly enjoying the moment.
“Oh! I was worried for a few minutes,” Prakhyat replied, relaxing his shoulders. He opened the door and let Lehya walk in.
At that instant, several things happened simultaneously: the scan results indicated the presence of alien DNA in Lehya. Shocked, Prakhyat turned around just in time to see Lehya remove her visors, revealing her face.
It was a horrific sight; she had no face at all. Lehya had been dead for quite some time. Her mouth twisted into a smile as she spoke in her sweet voice, but her face was grotesquely decayed.
“I definitely outdid you this time,” she laughed hysterically before collapsing.
Prakhyat was paralyzed with shock; he couldn't move or speak. He tried to recall the protocol for dealing with an alien presence on the ship, but his mind was blank. Absentmindedly, he touched his visor and realized that he had opened it unintentionally. He turned towards the main control panel and began the self-destruction sequence. Although his mind felt numb, his training kicked in, and he quickly pressed the button to initiate the self-destruction.
In those final moments, his life flashed before his eyes, and he finally understood the crucial importance of following protocols.
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