Ankita Dikshit was an Astronaut and the Head of the cabin crew at the International Space Station (ISS). She was an American whose grandparents migrated from India a long time ago. She was regarded as the most talented and highly skilled person in resolving issues even by the chief technicians at NASA. She held multiple PHDs in various subjects related to astrophysics, rocket propulsion and spacecraft engineering.
It was another mundane day in the international space station, Ankita was conducting routine checks and monitoring the performance of the engineers. Robert, the Chief Technician of the ISS asked her,
“Hello Ankita, how are the stats looking, all good?”
“Hi Robert, yes everything seems fairly fine for now, we have got a couple of things to address at deck T-9. Looks like there has been a minor hull breach due to the impact of space debris.”
“Ahh, the usual, let’s hope that you can assign someone to fix it.”
“Yeah, I am sure that Clive will be able to resolve this in a few hours.”
Ankita assigned Clive and two other crew members to assist him in repairing the hull breach. She briefed them about the extent of damage and asked them to take a few precautionary measures as well.
Clive and his team got to work and performed a thorough inspection of the extent of the damage. Once they were done with the inspection, they began sealing the cracks and repairing the hull breach in a meticulous manner. They had to be extra careful while sealing the breach as there is a possibility of hitting oxygen or fuel lines which are vital to the ISS’s principal functions. As soon as they finished sealing the breaches, they heard a loud thud which shook the core of the space station. Clive wondered, what in the world could have caused this sound, he immediately asked Ankita what was going on. Ankita replied.
“Clive, get yourself and your team into the spacecraft right now! There is a large unidentified spacecraft which has forcefully docked [1] our space station to itself.”
Without a moment to lose, Clive and his team made it into the space station just in time. Right before the large unidentified spaceship began to move to tow the docked ISS in the process. Ankita’s mind was in a disarray, she was wondering, how in the world could any spacecraft be able to dock itself onto the space station? The ISS does not have any hubs that enable spacecraft of monstrous proportions to dock onto the station. Just as she was carried away by those thoughts, she and her team began feeling lightheaded. They began fainting one after the other. When Ankita realized that the result of this was due to some smoke which seemed to appear from the point of docking, she fainted.
The unknown alien spacecraft used the method of warp speed [2], to commute to its home planet, which was around 16 light-years [3] away from Earth. Soon as it landed on the planet, a group of humanoid figures wearing suits and helmets which covered their faces, got into the space station, took the unconscious crew of the ISS, and put them into cryogenic pods [4].
After a few hours, Ankita woke up. For a few minutes, her head began spinning erratically and she was not in the right state of mind. After a while, she gained consciousness and began to observe her surroundings. She found herself amidst a few cryogenic pods which were tightly shut. When she saw through the peephole of those pods, Ankita noticed that all the pods contained her team members who worked in the ISS along with her. She noticed that only her pod’s circuit breaker had malfunctioned causing it to trigger it open and set her free.
Ankita saw through the glass door which overlooked a long corridor. There were humanoid beings who looked strikingly similar to humans. The only difference was that they were much taller than an average human around 6.8 to 7 feet tall, and had pale yellow skin. Ankita was quite surprised to see the striking resemblance between them and humans.
Most of the Aliens were wearing jumpsuits and happened to be conversing with each other in a formal manner. Some of them seemed to be soldiers or defence personnel, whereas some of them seemed to be officials whose suits seemed to be more formal. As she was observing the surroundings, one of the soldiers noticed her peeking through the glass door and stormed towards the door. Ankita noticed this soldier just in time and moved away from the door before it shattered as the soldier stormed in with a firearm pointed to her skull. The sound of the door shattering attracted a few more soldiers who were in the vicinity who also stormed in guns blazing. Ankita remained speechless and stood rooted at the spot with her hands up in the air.
To be continued…
Glossary:
[1] Docked- just like how ships are docked at the harbour with an anchor, a space ship can be docked to a space station. Or a large spacecraft can attach itself to a space station. The docking process is used to carry, refuel or transport the spaceship or space station.
[2] Warp Speed- Warp speed is a theory of compressing and expanding the fabric of space and time to propel an object faster than the speed of light. (This is not a proven theory and is widely used in science fiction) You can read more at the link below.
http://www.spaceage.home.blog/2021/08/01/faster-than-the-speed-of-light-with-warp-speed/
[3] Light Year is the distance travelled by light in one year. For example, if the star Proxima century is 4 light-years away from the Earth, it means that the light from that star takes four years to reach the Earth.
[4] Cryogenic pods- These are pods which are used to store humans or any other organism in prolonged sleep or hibernation. (This is also a fictional theory which hasn’t been proven yet)
Space Age 