Blackness of Space

 

The space station was pitch black. Power was out. Backup power was out. What remained was just a residual crackle of electricity that barely lit up a few LEDs on the various panels on the walls. Still if you knew the place as well as this crew did, it was enough to navigate by.

They floated down the quiet corridors listening to the metal ping and pop as the sun heated the outside of the giant tin can they were in. Something had happened to the various wires in the main electrical sections, forcing the station into automatic lock-down. That closed all the windows shades with reinforced slats that protected against micrometeorites. While that seemed to be the safest option in the event of a power outage, it wasn’t the most practical.

Finding the nearest spacesuits they methodically put them on in the disorienting darkness. As another power saving measure, the built in lights on the suits wouldn’t turn on till someone was in them. As the first person finished clicking the last piece in place the room was suddenly flooded with highest intensity light. The automatic calibration of the light was directly proportional to the lack of other illumination in the room and while that might be appropriate mid-mission, it was painfully bright in the small reflective alcove that they were currently in.

After a bit of fumbling around with manual overrides the headlamp was set to soft glow and the ambient omnidirectional suit panels were set to chemically fluoresce. It was decided then and there that everyone would get into their suits, to set the brightness to lowest and then uncouple the last internal connection so the whole power-pack would still be in standby mode.

That would leave them the most total work time as one suits brightness was sufficient for the whole team since they would be sticking together. They could use the magnets in the boots to walk to their destination, but it would be faster to keep floating. Now there was enough light to do more than just navigate, they could launch themselves faster down each corridor.

That was almost a mistake. Half way down the third straightaway a clear gooey substance floated menacingly in the dancing lights of the lead crew-member. A quick reaction stopped them from crashing through it and they all stopped to get a better look at the situation.

Suits came off standby and the area was flooded with light. A hundred clear spheres of gel made the flashlights paint dancing patterns on the walls. The goo reacted to the new stimuli as black specks in the stuff all moved around to the sides that were facing the humans. Sinister lines grew from the pea sized spots that the black flecks had coalesced into. As the web of lines joined a force pulled the various blobs together into a single basketball sized shape.

In the center the clearness suddenly shifted to an opaque pink that twitched as though it was reacting to a hundred tiny shocks.