Them outsiders, us survivors [#SciFriday]

7. The SciFi Christmas Caption

Annie woke up on a bed, almost blinded by a strong white beam of light above her. It was a surgical light, as the one used by the Outsiders' experiments. In a fraction of seconds she stood up and prepared to run, until she saw Amy lying on an identical bed next to her inside this white-dazzling room with nothing more than two night-tables next to two beds with identical sheets under two surgical lights and next to two metal hooks. Annie then remembered everything, and came upon the fact that today was December 24th on Earth, a tradition older than the Outsiders existence, that didn't involve them and shouldn't involve them. She felt happy, even though she was convinced nothing special was happening, since they were on Jupiter's moon Europa, more than 30 meters below its surface.

Some minutes after, Amy woke up.

"Merry Christmas!" Said Annie, with a big smile on her face.

"Do you even know that since we left Earth that doesn't matter anymore, since it's a terrestrial holiday?" replied Amy, who had always disliked Christmas... She didn't see any point in being a good person one day of the year out of 364.

"Tell me a single intergalactic holiday, and I won't celebrate Christmas this year." answered Annie, challenging her sister.

" ... You know what I'm starving, let's get some food." was Amy's disapproval of such idea.

"Me too. How do you think food looks like?" Annie said, as she opened the door

She felt surprised to find that the door wasn't locked, although it shouldn't be, since they weren't prisoners, but after two years of isolation anyone can get used to repression. The girls headed to the end of what seemed to be an endless hallway expecting to find someone they could ask for food, but they didn't, so they went upstairs through some light-gray caracol baroque stairs on rock, just as the whole inside facade of the building.

The stairs ended up in a rough wall made of rocks somehow out of place. For the first time the almost human girls were thankful they had seen all those suspense and mystery movies in which there hidden aisles were revealed as the main character pulled certain books out of a bookshelf. So they started pushing every rock over and over again. Until Zed, who apparently had been following them and seeing their nonsense efforts, said:

"You'll never be able to move them... not even a little." The twins were baffled. Why should there be something blocked, if everyone seemed to be happy and free? Annie thought as her jitters started

"We have this tradition of breaking the walls that enclose the 3 entries of the great salon. Europa is well-known in several systems of this galaxy for its mystical powers, so those rocks have been conjured so that they won't move in at least 9 hours, using Earth's method to count time." Added Zed.

"Why?" Asked Annie as a way to remind herself she was no longer on the Outsider's mothership.

"When Europa was attacked by a group of assassins, before I had even arrived, looking for the purple hair of the princess that was thought to have divine powers and to hold the princess' strong aura, the king hired the best fighters and all people who knew how to take advantage of the planet's mystical properties, in order to protect his daughter. They all fought to death. Mica, who had been endured with the task of being next to the princess at all times, was tied up by the princess, who was a master of aura controlling powers, and failed to stop the princess from running away to see her beloved boyfriend. In a desperate attempt to stop her, Mica sealed the rocks that other fighters had put to avoid the assassins from reaching the royalty. Unfortunately, the princess had sneaked into this exactly same grand salon, and was killed be the assassins before the eyes of her boyfriend, who managed to avenge her, but at the end decided to commit suicide, and the rest of the assassins escaped. Mica was death by the time she was found, since she had used all her energy in that sealing. Eventually the queen died of depression after having lost her only offspring, and the king resigned left to his original galaxy, Andromeda. Therefore, every time Europa's about to encounter with Io, we do this in honor to the martyrs of Europa's greatest misfortune.