The black hole was like a great hole that pierced the space in front of them. Nothing could get away from it and within their space station that was monitoring it since ages could only prepare themselves for another uneventful workday. This was a monitoring station built for scientific purpose and one of the first things that humans tried to discover and understand was this enigmatic phenomenon in the center of the galaxies. The station was round like giant ball that had hid its artificial gravity by rolling itself fixed in the space. One point though was always fixed towards the hole like it was always gazing at it without blinking.
- Anything to report?
- No, Jason.
It was the same routine everyday on the station. As they was trying to catch any kind of anomaly within or around the black hole but often nothing would be discovered. Jason had been the chief commander on the station since ten years ago and he wanted nothing more to get away from there. It was the claustrophobic setting of it all but the all the same routine every day.
Once there was an occurrence that bewildered him that happened within the hole. Just for a moment the station think they had monitored some kind of reflected light within it. But as a sane and rational individual they all knew this could not have happened. Besides that nothing could happen out here.
-Please tell me if you can find anything interesting.
-Shall do, Linda replied.
The crew was all time small. Beside him and Linda there were only five others on the station. But there was often only two at their stations at any hour of the day. This time it was their turn. The others were in their resting rooms probably sleeping. Often it was the only joyment to get this far out in the space unless they didn’t want to play another round of card games. Needless to say but the time anyone had on the station was often very short.
Suddenly it came a beep from one of the screens in front of Linda. This was something very unusual.
-What was that? Jason asked.
-I think I am picking up something here. Let me zoom in.
And within seconds they could see something coming out from the center of the hole. Two white tentacles came rushing towards them. As the distance between them and the hole was huge they were shocked to recognize the speed and the force the travelled towards them. But also the length of them as it looked they could go on for an eternity without snapping.
As they drew closer Jason and Linda pushed the fire alarm button as an incident like this was never ever thought of. In fact an alien contact has never before been done unless you counted in simple life forms like one cell organisms since space exploration started for real over five centuries ago. Mankind started to assume we were all alone in space. But this thing seems to have a will or a purpose as these tentacles was not set in motion aimlessly. It didn’t take long before the others woke up and came in to the main bridge room. One of them said:
-What is that?
-I have never seen anything like this before and I t seems to come right at us, Linda said.
One of the shakes his head in disbelief and asked:
-Do you have any idea what it is Jason? You have been here the longest of us.
-Honestly I have no idea what this is. I have only got a glimpse of it before but not like this. Prepare for impact. Whatever it is I got a bad feeling about it. As everything else in nature, either you are the hunter or the prey. And right now we seem to be sitting ducks in a cage.
And with those words the crew went silent as they knew there was some truth within those words just uttered. The tentacles had gone a good way towards them by now and somehow they must have accelerated. Again when they watched out again towards the hole they could now see what was after them. A huge eel-like creature had come out from the black hole. This creature with no eyes or visible mouth was just sitting there halfway out from the hole. It certainly had more than two tentacles but none of the others was putting their attention towards the station.
-I can’t believe what I am seeing right now, Linda said.
And then they heard the sound they didn’t want to hear. KA-KLANK! They had been hit by something heavy and hard. But not even some occasional meteorites would shake the station as this was doing. The tentacles had taken a fixed hold of the station and pulling it towards the creature. The crew was all thrown down the floor by the immense force. Quickly they were able to get on their feet again but only for a short time. As the station had stopped rotating weightlessness in the station had incurred.
-What does it want? Is this the end for us? Jason wondered.
One of the more heavily built engineers asked Jason:
-Do we have any kind of defense on the station? Just anything? This is ridiculous not being able to do anything in a situation like this.
-We have never seen anything like this before. This station have monitored this hole for over a century and explored space longer than that. This is first signs of any kind of alien life forms at all. What should we have prepared for exactly?
-No emergency exists or plans at all?
-Nothing! Jason replied.
He tried to calm down and little later said to them:
-There will no help for us. Let’s all hope this will go quick. Being this near the hole was nothing the station was built for. Let us try to calm down because we are about to witness something no one else have seen before.
Halfway towards the black hole the gravity from it was showing it strengths as the hull started to creak. It was evident that this station was never built to be this close to the hole at it was only a matter of time which would the final straw in which the station would collapse. As they still could see through the window towards the hole and creature they know really understood the scale this two entities were about. Then one of the automatic alarms started.
-WARNING! HULL BREACH!
And within the station section by section was beginning to shut itself down. Soon there would be a lot of breaches as the whole station started to crumble by the pressure. Even the air in the bridge started to become even more troublesome to breath. As the station came close the eel-like creature head it was bumped towards its center. Something in front of them opened and the saw a great opening of bright light which blinded the crew which saw it through the window. Slowly the station was drawn towards the bright light and little by little the station vanished. And as soon as the creature had shown his ugly head he quickly went back into the hole again. The whereabouts of the station was never heard about again but it was rumored it managed to get to the other side of the hole.
