The Starship Aprilis: Nightmare

This blogpost is part of the A to Z Challenge which begins on April 1st. The goal is to post every day (except Sunday) in the month of April. Each blogpost will be associated with a letter of the alphabet. Check the A to Z Challenge page for more information.

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The Starship Aprilis was a common and unremarkable transport ship built on Earth, back when humans were still bipedal and mostly organic creatures. The ship travelled between the many human colonies that were established at the time throughout the galaxy and served as both a cargo carrier and passenger transporter.

The ship finally met its end when it was stuck in a crushing gravity field off of Taurus Baqara C, which killed all who were aboard and destroyed all the on-board data and most importantly, the ship’s log. Of the ship only a small section survived, which was discovered quite recently several million light years away, in a slow decaying orbit around a black hole.

The remains of the ship offers no clue as to what really happened to consign the ship to its fate. The only document that could be salvaged from the remains is a travelogue, believed to be written by an unknown crewmember. The travelogue offers a glimpse of what life was like for a traveller of the stars in those heady days, thousands and thousands of years ago. Most importantly, it gives us a glimpse of many different planets and what they were like during the time.

The following entries are excerpts from the travelogue. May you find amusement and enjoyment from reading them.

A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M

N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z

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Observers from Lepus Lupus and from stations around Lepus Lupus would later report that they saw the invading Earth fleet beam in, appearing like camera flashes in the night sky as they arrived. But as soon as they appeared, then they disappeared again in the same white bright flash.

The colonists from Lepus Lupus themselves did not know exactly what was going on. What they did know was this was the work of the their mysterious benefactor, the Qastas. For did they not promise them protection?

So Lepus Lupus was spared from the invasion and as for the invading fleet, they were transported back to Earth by a route many would later describe as “The Nightmare”.

The moment the Earth ships had beamed in, a Qastas probe stationed near Lepus Lupus would immediately shoot a high energy beam that would disintegrate its molecules and reassemble it somewhere else, in this case, Earth.

Unfortunately for the crew on board all these ships, the process of disassembling and reassembling of their molecules proved to be huge strain on the mind and many went insane. Even though the process took only several seconds, to the soldiers affected, it felt like an eternity of the worst extremes of human emotions.

In short, they lived through hell. And came back.