Rated General for lack of explicit content
Characters and setting © Psion 2021.
All Rights Reserved

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A short flash fic I wrote for a weekly writing contest a group I'm a part of was holding. Missed the deadline but decided to post my writing anyway. Enjoy a short about Psion encountering some space horror for a late Halloween contest.

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Tales of the Insatiable Curiosity: Face in the Dark
By Stephen Landis
An Orion Commonwealth Story

Countless derelicts litter the endless darkness of space, dead ships adrift in the void to serve as a final resting place for lost crews. A scientist with my own exploration vessel and frequently chartered to observe and catalog strange phenomena at the edge of known space, I encounter derelicts more often then most. Yet the one I encounter now is most puzzling. A Corpa transport ship drifting aimlessly, the vessel seemingly abandoned except for one single lifesign. The Corpa had not been seen in this arm of the galaxy for decades, their species driven off by the combined power of the Sol Federation and the Orion Commonwealth. And yet here was one of their cargo transports with no distress message or sign of battle damage adrift ahead of my ship the Insatiable Curiosity.

Curiosity got the better of me as I hailed the other ship. No response as to be expected. Scanning the interior produced a deck plan and isolated the life sign in one of the transport’s rear cargo bays. Further scans showed that life support and power were fully functional yet parts of the ship were in darkness. Curious but it didn’t look like there was any sign of pathogens or radiation that prevented me from coming aboard.

Still, I was not prepared to leave everything to chance. Making sure the airlock bulkheads separating my ship from theirs were still sealed tight, I went and retrieved my multi-blaster, my pocket computer, and my sensor ball. After a second’s thought, I modified my sensor ball to produce a field of light on command before activating the little spherical robotic sensor array and making it hover above my shoulder. Linking both to my smart goggles, I put the pocket computer in my suit pocket next to my multi-blaster before heading towards the airlock.

Compared to the Curiosity’s airlock, the Corpa airlock slowly creaked open from a long period of disuse. The sound of metal scraping on metal caused my ears to flinch on reflex and did not fill me with a great deal of confidence. Stepping onto the alien ship after the airlock finally finished opening, my ursine nose was greeted by the musty smell of a ship that hadn’t had its atmosphere recycling system repaired in a while.

Standing in the dimly lit corridor, I quickly pulled out my pocket computer. “Light” I commanded automatically, the sensor ball bathing me in a large pool of light, as my gloved fingers brought up the pocket computer’s sensor functions. Running another scan of the ship’s air, there were still no dangerous pathogens and no airborne mold spores. Or at least there weren’t any spores that could harm me over a short period of time. More troubling was the hissing noise I was hearing from the far end of the main corridor. The far, DARK, end of the corridor running the length of the ship. Corpa trade ships were often cheaply made but even their vessels didn’t have those hissing pipes that were popular in bad human horror movies.

I pointed my pocket computer in that direction and ran a quick scan for biological signatures. Sure enough, the unknown lifeform was quickly heading in my direction. I looked up just in time to see a shadowy figure slither in the darkness just beyond my sensor ball’s light. For whatever reason, the creature did not come any closer then that. Lingering in the dark beyond my vision, the creature then rose up and UP till it was eye level with me. That was when the face emerged.

Six reflective purple eyes, each of them with the vertical diamond pupil of a feline, opened in perfect symmetry around a massive mouth of glowing teeth that glimmered in the light of my sensor ball. The face hissed at me, my fingers were around my multi-blaster before my brain fully registered the familiar weight in my hand. The creature hissed again, I fired a stunning bolt of electric energy from my multi-blaster and backed out through the open airlock behind me as the being fell to the floor in an unconscious heap.

Sensor ball still above my head and still shrouding me in light, I slammed the button to shut the airlock door. Still walking backwards, I listened to the metallic screech as the reinforced metal door shut itself. Too slow, far too slow, I could already see signs that the shadowy creature was starting to stir and recover from being stunned. Yet as it rose up, it would not come into even the dim light of the transport’s entryway. Whatever it was, it was deathly afraid of the light. Hissing at me from its shadowy refuge, the entity watched me disappear behind a mercifully solid bulkhead door.

Ambling back to the Insatiable Curiosity and making sure the airlock doors were securely locked on my side, I sat down on the bridge and let go of the breath I didn’t realize I had been holding before quickly breaking the link between ships and letting my vessel drift a few kilometers away. Even aboard a derelict spaceship adrift in the depths of space, the universe held many mysteries to solve. Entering the scans of the creature I had been able to take into the ship’s main computer and running them against the zoological database ended with a disappointing chirp and a brief message that there were no matches found. I had seen something that no explorer in the Orion Commonwealth had ever seen before. The only questions that remained were do I leave or try to observe this creature further. If so, how would I go about it without disturbing it or putting myself at risk...