THE TELEPORTING RING (SCI-FI CONTEST)

THE TWIN CRESCENTS

The space is an expanse of dim darkness with a million shining dots, but it appears considerably more intimidating from where she is floating.

Big gaseous balls levitated and stationed themselves in the sky, revolving at such a slow speed that a person can only regard them as fixed. Those stars aren't just white as they appear; they have sprinkling black and golden specks hidden beneath the bleach blanket.

Kiara, a female astronaut, is lost in this oblivion of space. Rather than fighting the feeling, she seems to be lost in a deep, comfortable slumber.

She is wearing a jaded grey space suit which has two pointed cones attached to the backpack of the suit. Fire igniting at the feet of her suit suddenly extinguishes, leaving her entirely to the beauty of a low gravity space.

Gradually, she nears the planet Saturn, that though considered to be made of gas looks completely solid from the distance she is at.

Suddenly, she opens her eyes, they are entirely green, unlike a regular person's. "I'm getting close to the rings, Cook," a robotic voice mutter from within her. The gasoline at her suit's feet begins to re-ignite, allowing her to take control of her trajectory. Moving onward, gaseous particles materialize in front of her eyes, which finally turn normal.

These particles are gigantic in size, making her dizzy. They have a gloss on them and resemble intricate abstracts in blue, orange, or green. As she passes them, her head tilts to admire yet scrutinize the particles.

***

A dark, big laboratory with walls designed out of pipes, with monitors placed all over the room. The outer space is visible at the screen of most of these monitors and some humans sitting at their desks or stats, or written information displayed on the other monitor screens.

With an earpiece in her ear, a lady is standing in front of one of these monitors.

In the gloomy room with an entire wall dedicated merely to monitors illuminating the big outer space as a dark glittery void, the lady has lost her own self. She is banging her head at a table.

"Ok, gather yourself together Cook. It's the ring. You know it. You have a lot of your robots to it, but not anymore! You know those rings have some sort of teleportation ability. Just find out what they do", she mutters to herself, trying to uplift her own morale with promising words.

She reconnects with the earpiece, "Activate the satellite. I've lost connection with her."

She then continues to speak once finished listening to the person on the other side...

"Yes, I'll monitor her through that satellite. Those satellites are spread everywhere and we are pretty sure those rings surrounding Saturn are no folklore. They do have teleportation powers. In the past few weeks, I lost at least twenty astronauts to those rings."

On listening to the person on the other, she starts becoming a little furious. However, taming the frustration, she speaks, "sir, often, I have spotted material flying at the other side of the planet. And I know those materials from the bodies of the robots I made. So, yes, I know what I'm doing."

Again, right after the person on the other head finishes. Losing her calm composure bit by bit, she accosts, "sir, this is no joke! I have to bag the results in this trial. My life is already a hazard right now, Zenith no longer behaves normally and my daughter is a total mess to handle. This is the only thing that can bring some positivity to my life. I believe something bad is about to take place. And I have a premonition that I'll succeed in this discovery. Maybe then my life would start taking pace. Please let me use the resources, I need this."