I still remember the exact moment I was told I had been selected for the mission. My hands were trembling, heart pounding in my chest like a drum. Years—no, decades—of dreaming, studying, sacrificing, all culminating in one sentence from my commander: "Congratulations, you're going to space."
Although i was happy i couldn't stop thinking about Osaka. The city that my parents live. Going far away from everything can be scary, but i knew that my parents were proud.
I thought I was ready.
Emotionally. Physically. Mentally.
But nothing—nothing—could have prepared me for what I was about to face.
We launched two weeks ago. The shuttle was sleek, quiet, humming with technology more advanced than anything the public even knew existed. I was one of four on this mission, but for this leg of the journey, I was alone. The others were already stationed aboard the mothership orbiting a distant planet. My job was to pilot the final supply module and dock with them for the remainder of the mission.
Two days. Just two days of solitude, guiding the module through quiet, empty space. At first, it was peaceful. Meditative, even. The cold, sterile hum of the ship contrasted with the warmth of my suit. I felt like I was floating inside a dream.
I remember looking out the main viewport, watching distant stars drift by like flecks of dust in the dark. Space has a way of making you feel insignificant, but not in a bad way. It humbles you. Reminds you that the universe is unimaginably vast, and you're just a tiny speck dancing in its currents.
But then, something changed.
It started subtly—barely a flicker in the flight controls. The module wasn't turning the way it should. The thrusters were firing, but the ship resisted, like it was being dragged against its will. I ran diagnostics—everything checked out. Fuel levels normal. No mechanical failures. But the ship wouldn't obey.
I tried again. A simple left yaw adjustment. Nothing. A harder thrust. The ship groaned, then jerked ever so slightly.
That's when I felt it.
Not through the controls, but in my gut—a sickening pull. Like gravity, but wrong. Not a planet. Not a moon. Something darker. Heavier.
I opened a secure channel and called the team on the mothership.
"Control, this is Nobita. I'm experiencing unexpected gravitational drag. Controls are responding erratically. Requesting immediate telemetry analysis."
Static.
Then a voice—crackled and distant. "Nobita, we're reading your trajectory. You're… you're drifting off course. Recalculating now."
Pause.
Then the words that chilled me to the bone:
" You need to initiate emergency evasive protocols. You're being pulled toward a gravitational anomaly."
I already knew. Even before they said it.
A black hole.
No one had seen it. It was cloaked in darkness, a rogue anomaly with no visible accretion disk, lurking silently between the stars. Uncharted. Unmapped. Waiting.
Panic surged, but I forced myself to breathe. Focus. My training kicked in. I rerouted all auxiliary power to propulsion, fired the thrusters in reverse, adjusted pitch and yaw manually.
It wasn't enough.
The pull was increasing. Like a cosmic whirlpool, it was dragging me into its center. My ship screamed in protest, metal creaking, systems straining. The stars outside twisted, bent by the insane gravity, warping into spirals of light and shadow.
I shouted back into the comm: "Attempting escape burn. Manual override. If I don't make it—tell my family—tell them I love them."
Silence.
I tried not to think about what would happen next. Tried to block out the theories, the horror stories. Spaghettification. Infinite time dilation. Total molecular disintegration. Death, if I was lucky.
I watched the clock. Forty minutes passed.
Then fifty.
Time… felt strange. I couldn't tell if I was conscious for all of it, or if minutes were stretching into eternities.
My fingers were numb. My limbs, heavy. My body began to… fade. Like I was dissolving into the ship. Into the void.
Then—darkness. Absolute and infinite.
There was no pain. No sound. No form.
Only nothingness.
I don't know how long I was in that void.
It could have been five minutes.
It could have been five hundred million years.
I lost track of time, of space, of self. My name—forgotten. My mission—meaningless. I was no longer a person. Just… an awareness. A soul adrift in the cosmic ocean.
Then I saw it.
A light.
Faint. Flickering. Like a candle in the distance.
I drifted toward it, drawn by instinct, by hope. The closer I got, the more I felt something—weight. Form. The sensation of being real again.
Then I gasped.
Air rushed into my lungs. My heart pounded in my chest.
I'm no longer Nobita Sato.