The engines hummed and the starship drifted along through the stars. It entered into a small cloud of rocky space debris and solar winds, resulting in very minor turbulence reverberating through the cockpit. A tall cylindrical can that used to hold potato chips rolled off an upper shelf and clanged to the floor.

  “That makes no sense,” Tamiyo said, looking at the can. “How is someone’s hand even supposed to fit in that?” She looked back out the viewport. “And there’s also no way a black hole can just, disappear! Where the hell is it?!”

  This made no sense at all, the navigational charts were never wrong. Black holes can hypothetically disappear, but it’s a process that is supposed to take millions of years. Tamiyo was programmed with one of the most complex logic matrices available when she was manufactured, and it was heating up trying to make any sense of this.

  At least her scans made some more sense now. She had been scanning and rescanning to find the gravitational effects present from the black hole, but they weren’t showing any such effects. So at least she seemed to have been performing the scans correctly, which was some consolation. Regardless, she felt the need to investigate the phenomenon further.

  Taking manual control of the ship and queuing up every scan she could think of, Tamiyo put all sensors on repeat with maximum range and cautiously piloted towards the non-existent black hole. Gravitational effects, biology scans, electrical impulses, alpha, beta, neutron, and gamma radiation, Aether Dust, AM and FM radio, Tamiyo scanned for anything and everything. Drifting and drifting, nothing important was coming through. Various radiation readings were recorded and basic music stations came through the radio waves but she filtered them out, and continued her hunt to find any clues.

  How could a black hole disappear without a trace? Much about the universe was still unknown, but this occurrence just didn’t seem plausible.

  Solar winds buffeted the ship. Tamiyo continued scanning. She looked through the viewport, checked her scanners, looked out, checked again.

  Radiation readings, nothing irregular. Country Music and Space Rock. Filter. Looking out the viewport. At the edge of her vision, did she just see something blip on the Aether Dust scanner? Or did she imagine it? Hard to be sure.

  Radiation, Cosmic Viking Techno, more Country Music, check the viewport again. There! She hadn’t imagined it, another Aether Dust reading. She focused in on it, she was picking something up but it wasn’t large, she adjusted the scans to try to pinpoint its location. Cross-examining the rough location of the reading with the navigational chart, it was coming from pretty close to where the center of the black hole should have been. She pushed the ship forward, whatever was causing the reading wouldn’t be visible to her until she was almost on top of it, it was just too small. Cautiously, she continued, pushing the ship forward, closer, closer, and the Aether Dust scanner was picking up more and more.

  Relative to something of comparable size to her ship, she was moving extremely fast through space. She began to slow its forward momentum so she didn’t collide with whatever her scans were picking up before she could analyze it. The closer she got, the more intense her Aether Dust readings became. It began to affect some of her other scanners so she shut them down. She was starting to become nervous about what she might find.

  A silhouette shape started to form in front of her ship, very small to her eyes at first, but growing larger and more detailed as she approached. She continued to slow the ship, she drew closer to the object, and the Aether Dust readings continued to climb.

  The cargo ship came to a rest just before the object, it was hovering right before Tamiyo’s viewport, the details clear as day. It wasn’t an object, it wasn’t foreign space debris, it looked like a normal human man. But he couldn’t be a normal human, something was definitely off. To protect against the harsh environments of space, humans, non-human lifeforms, and even CIPHERS needed to wear protective suits. Without it, the unfiltered rays of the nearest star would cook the exposed skin, the super cold of space would cause the blood and all other fluids to boil, and the organs would rapidly expand. This man wore no such suit. In fact, it looked like whatever had happened to him had all but obliterated whatever clothing he had been wearing. Some simple scraps still floated around him, but that was all. He was unconscious, but otherwise looked completely uninjured. Tamiyo observed him with bewilderment and curiosity.

  The Aether Dust scanner was having a panic attack and looked like a massive fireworks display was popping off just beneath its screen. Tamiyo flipped it off and briefly had to wait for her eyes to adjust to the loss of illumination in the cockpit. She grabbed the helm and maneuvered the ship so that the mysterious man would be floating just outside the access hatch on the starboard side.

  Jumping up from her chair, she quickly walked to the airlock and sealed herself off from the rest of the ship. She donned a protective space suit kept in an airlock gear locker, double checked that she was sealed up correctly, and began depressurizing the room. Along with the depressurization, the artificial gravity slowly faded away, until Tamiyo was floating weightless in the airlock room. She attached a retractable cable on her suit’s belt to a padeye anchored to the wall. The wall screen indicated that the depressurization was complete, and Tamiyo slowly unlocked the exterior door. After undoing all manual locking mechanisms, she pulled the heavy door inward to reveal the unconscious man in the same position she had seen him several minutes prior. She maneuvered herself most of the way outside of the ship, but kept one hand on the doorway of the ship. Reaching out with the other arm, she managed to grab hold of the man’s wrist and pull him towards her.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Pulling herself back into the ship, he followed weightlessly after her. Once they were both past the threshold of the door, she slowed his momentum and then quickly closed the exterior door. She positioned him as close to the floor as possible so he wouldn’t slam down when the artificial gravity kicked in, then began repressurizing the room.

  Slowly, the artificial gravity returned, and Tamiyo could feel the pressure change on the exterior of her suit. Once the wall screen indicated it was safe to do so, she removed her helmet and suit, before storing them in the locker.

  Tamiyo approached her newfound guest hesitantly, and began to inspect him more closely. Despite him being a small target to find when piloting the starship, that hardly felt like the situation now. While he appeared in all other physical characteristics to be a normal human man, he was much larger than any human she had ever seen. Without an accurate measurement, she couldn’t be exactly sure, but she estimated he was well over 7 feet tall. He appeared to be in very good physical shape, with a significant amount of muscle mass present, and based on her programming for medical care, she estimated from his build that his weight would be near 450 pounds. His hair was about 3 inches long, black at the root, but as it grew outward the color transitioned to a faint silvery gray-white. Now that the atmosphere was around him, she did notice that he looked a little worse-for-wear. No noticeable injuries were present, but he looked extremely fatigued; tired, drained, like a parent running on caffeine and willpower after their toddler fought a bad fever for three straight days. It also appeared that he may have been beginning to slightly sweat.

  Tamiyo let out a slight gasp after she placed two fingers on the man's jugular. While it was extremely faint, there was indeed a pulse present. She couldn't just leave the man laying here, she needed to find some way to make him more comfortable so he could recover. Hopefully she could get him to wake up, and he could tell her what he knew about the Mandachor Abyss not seeming to exist anymore.

  In the central room, Tamiyo prepped the simple couch as best she could with the basic pillows that were on board. Returning to the unconscious space man, she began attempting to move him to the couch.

  It did not go as planned.

  Tamiyo's design allowed for her to assist with moving heavy objects, and to help those with mobility issues move around even if they had put on some extra weight. But even with these features at her disposal, she was struggling. There was no possible way this man only weighed 450 pounds, he was much much heavier and Tamiyo had to put all of her effort into just lifting his shoulders off the floor.

  Slowly she began dragging his dead weight across the ship towards the couch. Suddenly her tiny cargo transport felt like it was a mile wide, because dragging this elephant-disguised-as-a-man was a fight for every inch. Tamiyo pulled, step, she heaved, another small step, heave-ho!

  After about 5 minutes of struggle, Tamiyo was proud of her progress and she was sure that she had made it most of the way to the couch. Until she looked behind her to see she was only a little over halfway of the 30ish feet across her journey. She sighed, her grip slipped, the man's shoulders fell from her grasp and the back of his head thunked onto the metal floor.

  “Shit! Fuck, dammit,” Tamiyo panicked a little. She walked over and picked up his ankles, pulling his legs to the side and rotating his body 90 degrees. Setting his legs down, she took a short break and contemplated throwing him back out the airlock.

  She crouched down, grabbed under his shoulder with one hand and under his hip with the other, and began attempting to roll him toward the couch. With great effort, she managed to roll him over once so he now lay face down on the metal floor. She crouched again, repeating her maneuver to roll him, and heaved him over again. She repeated twice more before finding herself exhausted again. She was at least somewhat closer to the couch now, but still had no real idea how she would be able to get him up onto the couch.

  Maybe she could wake him up and avoid all this. She felt for a pulse again, and it felt a little bit stronger now. She lifted one of his eyelids and was greeted by a dull green iris and a very large pupil, but nothing conscious appeared to be staring back at her.

  “Hello?” she asked hopefully. No response. She grabbed him under the jaw with one hand and shook his head back and forth slightly. Nothing.

  She walked over to the sink and filled a small cup with water. Walking back to him, she slowly dribbled water onto his face. He was now unconscious and slightly wet. She tried slapping him and it did her no good.

  Sighing, Tamiyo stood and decided to try moving him to the couch again. Grabbing him under the shoulders again, she yanked, heaved, and pulled the dense man several more feet. She was at the couch now and able to lean his torso up against it. Tamiyo put her arms under his and wrapped them around his chest from behind. She stepped up onto the couch in a deep squat and lifted with all her might. Up he came, she was doing it! She got his butt up onto the edge of the couch and she fell backwards with him falling on top of her. He rolled and down he went, back off the couch and onto the floor. She heard a deep clang as his skull hit the thick center metal leg connecting the table to the floor and looked over to see him face down under the table, one cheek smooshed up against the table leg.

  “Please don't be dead” she muttered. Feeling for a pulse once more, and she found it to be stronger than before. Tamiyo breathed a sigh of relief and decided he was as comfy as he was going to get. She threw a light blanket over him on account of him having no clothes on, and tossed a pillow on top of his head. If he stirred in his sleep, then he could lay his head on it if he wanted to.

  Tamiyo stood and walked back to the cockpit. Reconsulting her navigational charts, she analyzed what planets she could travel to nearby. The two closest planets had a decent level of civilization, the third closest was a gas giant, but the fourth closest planet looked like it may be a good contender.

  The navigational charts listed the planet under the name Nox, and about 50% of the planet’s surface appeared to be covered in a few dense forests. The other 50% was a mix of sparse deserts and several small oceans. There were no records indicating terraforming events but that wasn't irregular as the air appeared to be breathable. She found a section of the planet with seven small settlements scattered across the equator. Only three were listed as having rudimentary space ports.

  Pushing the throttle control stick forward, Tamiyo and her ship accelerated towards the small green planet, no longer traversing the stars alone.