Needledrop

8

Unknown

Wynnona

I stare out the window at the front of the ship right back at the void that feels like it's staring back at us.

"If the void is staring at you, make it uncomfortable." I say aloud after a minute of staring at the void, repeating what I'd muttered earlier.

"What?" Brett asks.

"Jake mentioned something about there being rules to this book, right?" I turn to look at the two. "I was talking with Athena earlier and she said that. I think it's one of the rules Jake mentioned." I explain further to them, trying to think of a way to make this void uncomfortable. An idea pops into my head when my eyes fall to Keya.

I start to frantically crawl under the control panel, looking for something I can attach my phone to. There is an old cord that will connect to my phone with a small iPod attached to it. I grab the skinny white cord and pull it out, the cord unwinding and reaching the seat in front of the panel. Unplugging the iPod, I plug in my phone and open it. There is this one extremely old song Keya loves. She breaks out into this ridiculous dance every time she hears it. I think it's called Walking on sunshine.

I find the song in my phone's music library and started to play it. The song comes through the speakers of the whole ship as the song starts to play. After years of living in the slums I managed to pirate all sorts of things. Shows, old books, music. Things aren't always in the best condition but it's worth it.

"Hell yes!" Keya shouts as she starts to jam out to the song, lip syncing the words. Brett starts to laugh and joins her. The two end up doing some strange, old dance to the song as I smile at them. When the song ends and I turn on the boosters to send us forward, there is no longer any resistance. I smile and kick us back into light speed.

The ship zooms forward, and it feels like it hits something, breaking through it like a hammer hitting glass. When I recover from the force of the hit, I look up to see nothing but darkness. Tiny white specks can be seen all around us but look like they are extremely far off in the distance.

"Where are we?" I ask aloud. Brett and Keya come to stand beside me, studying what's outside.

"I've got no idea." I tell them honestly. We are slowly floating farther and farther into the endless darkness when something hits the back of the ship, sending us flying in circles. I can't locate what it was, or see much, but when I try and get the boosters to work, they won't start up. The thing that hit us must have wrecked them when it hit us.

The white specks are moving. Whatever hit us was big, powerful. The hair over my right eye, the purple one, falls away as I run my hand through my hair. Now able to see out of both eyes I can spot an outline of what looks to be a giant space octopus. For lack of a better way to explain it. As the creature moves in the darkness, I spot a planet that was hidden behind one of its gigantic tentacles.

"Dayna, scan that planet and tell me if we can land there." I demand as I start to move as best I can with the main boosters on the back of the ship out of commission.

"The planet seems like Terran life will be able to survive on it. There are currently two other life forms there." Dayna tells me after a couple minutes.

"Hang on." I shout at Keya and Brett, making a beeline for the planet as fast as I can. In front of us is a large black tentacle with white spots all over it. The tentacle is swinging towards us, my instincts kick in and we move out of the way. I maneuver through the maze as best I can. We're slow but at least we can move. We are finally close enough to breach the plants atmosphere and land. The landing is nowhere near smooth, but I will say I tried.