text: So, Neomi. What can you tell us about the voyage? It was nothing special. Just a week aboard a transport vessel. I think we where shipping cardiac bulbs, but i don't know for sure. The crisis... Now that i said it out loud i realize how prophetic that names is. Anyway, the crisis was an old junky, but it was still pretty reliable. The AI running the ship was an old Atalanta that loved dad jokes. Yeah, that serious, no nonsense attitude of most AI is just in the newer software. The crew considered of myself, the technician, the amazing captain Wannerham and a cranky pitface called Sulfur Mckaline. And how did it begin? With a voice in our heads. A strange, calm voice. "System error detected, please run diagnostics" There is only one thing that talks in your head. The warp drive. F*cking magic. Of course everyone looked at me, so i floated over to the engine room. The... Most people have never seen a prometheus alcubierre drive before. Could you discribe it? I'm an engineer, not a wizard. I, sorry, now one knows how those deathtraps work. That's true, but can you discribe what it looked like. I'll try. It's basically a big, black ball. In front of it, there are these glowing, flying lines that form statistics, pie charts and numbers. No idea what any of them mean. Around the ball there are also these wheels with glowing edges. That's how I saw something was wrong What was wrong? The top right wheel was shacking. Now, normally you can just look at the perfect satisfying motions, but this was going back and forth and wiggling. Amongst the holograms, there was also a small flashing pink light with some scribbles underneath. I just did what the voice had asked me and pushed the big holographic button that said "run system diagnostics" Suddenly, everything was flashing pink and droning sirens filled my ears, but only for a moment. And then? :( What? That's what the drive showed me. Al the holograms where gone, except for a big pink :( . In my mind i heard the voice again. Still completely calm. "Your machine has ran into a problem and needs to be repaired. We're collecting some error info, then we'll repair it for you. A technician is on there way" And how did you feel? Nervous. I moved like everything was made of nitroglycerin. From down the hall came the voice of the captain. "Everything still in one piece?" "No idea" i yelled back. I thought I would explode or something. Well... I didn't know what would happen. After a minute of just staying still there, i slowly moved to the bridge. At least I intended to, but i noticed something strange. The leak, right? I guess it was. I didn't look like a conventional leak though. The wheel that had been wiggling was now twitching. Faster than it could feasible move on It's own. Then it started growing and shrinking. Pulsating. Like it was breather or something. I don't have a better analog. If you've never seen what dark matter does... The pulsing spread to the other parts of the warp drive. That horrible sound began What sound? Like spacetime ripping at the seems. Like an organic version of radio noise. Like thousands of cthulhu hornets stuck in a jar. Like... The air shivered, rived and twitched. Everything shivered, rived and twitched. And you just stayed there? Oh no, that all happened in a split second. When it finally registered in my brain, i started booking it down the corridor, but that was hard. The corridor expanded and twisted and tumbled and went mad. Or i went mad. Who knows. When I finally made it out of that hellhole, i saw the captain, trying to figure out what was wrong. I just rounded the corner as a burst of quickly expanding, writhing shit was thrown out of the latch a had come from. Wannerham was a great captain, but only for simple travel. Not emergencies. He froze. I tried to drag him with me, but he wouldn't let go of the grip. (Long pause) Should we continue this another time? No... No, i want to get it out of my system. I eventually gave up. I know it's heartless, but i just didn't know what to do. So i left him there and draged myself to the cafeteria. Before I left, i just saw his limp body being torn apart. Now he was a part of the exploding and reassembling mess that was once the bowels of the ship. And what did you do then? I was afraid the oxygen might start leaking into outer space, so i grabbed a space suite and put it on. Stupidity kept me sane. "I was in control" I was never in controle of that situation. The engine room was at the bottom of the ships ass, so i went to the exact opposite room, the cockpit. And Sulfur and Atalanta? Atalanta was offline. As for Sulfur. No idea. Probably already dead. I wasn't going to check. As i floated into the big glass room, i could hear something exploding. It came sweaping through the halls. A bright burning. Right as the color shifting, twitching, tongues of flame shot out if the doorway, I heard the voice again, with the words that probably saved my life. "Temporal safe switch activated" i had no idea what it meant and prepared for the explosion. I opened my eyes and there it was, bright as the sun. Yet you survived. How? You see. The explosion never came. I'm losing you. It was there, but didn't come closer. It still moved, sure, but very, very slowly. Like those slow motion cameras. I couldn't believe it. I waited for my life to flash before my eyes... But nothing came. I couldn't move. Well, i could, just very very slowly. The only thing that happened fast was my mind. It must have been 5, 10 maybe 20 minutes, but it felt like an eternity. Just floating there. On one side, an eldritch abomination of flame and twitching rubble. On the other, a pane of glass shielding me from The horror of deep space. And how did you end up docking at the phobos space elevator? This isn't the ended of the insiedent. Oh no, far from it. Phobos was still 3 hours away, and the ship wasn't moving anymore. I couldn't do anything but wait. But i had forgotten about the technician. Wasn't that you? No, the other technician. Remember the pink screen of death. The voice had said "A technician is on their way" i think they arrived. I saw something coming through the flames. When the flames had consumed about half the room, i suddenly saw a white face, looking back at me. Then, at regular speed, the black cloud the head was attached to truw some black powder at the flames, which started retracting. It dove back into them, leaving a seemingly solid tunnel trough the fire. Then thousands of thin strings appeared between the lose parts of the ship. The thing came back and solidified a black, human arm, gave me a thumbs up, saluted me and disappeared. Disappeared? Yeah. I blinked and they where gone. And then? Time starded passing like usual again. The flames quickly retracted into the hallway. Then it was quiet. I managed to get Atalanta back online. Don't ask me how. She immediately scanned me and tried to liven the mood a little with a stupid pun. I don't even remember it. I was in shock. Catatonic maybe. I just got her to take me to the nearest colony. And you made it out unscathed. Mostly unscathed. (Neomi takes of her boot and puts her foot on the table) Oh god It's not as bad as it looks. For all you shittertens who are only listening, get a tv. But also, my foot and a bit of my leg is narld and warped like the smudge tool in photoshop. I can still walk on it, and it's working as intended. Just a friendly reminder of that one time i almost exploded. This story is from a worldbuilding project on r/operationbeagle.