Earth was still relatively new in its membership to the cosmic community at large, so again the colonial swirlings infested the surviving leaders of humanity. Immediately upon learning of “The End of the Universe,” Lord Emperor CEO of EarthSights Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson (“Most Expensively Named Man on Earth,” self-proclaimed, proudly) called for/led the expedition to go past it and claim whatever may lay beyond. 

The Nelson-class Blueskin was not the first vessel to cross the ever-retreating cosmic horizon–the method for doing so had been perfected by Jeocolepian expansionists billenia prior, involving the consistent manipulation of dark energy to maintain a stable negative-mass field around the craft, harnessing the unusual repulsive properties of dark energy to simulate the expansion of the universe and propel the isolated “bubble” to its destination. A similar concept had been proposed by humans independently, but lacked the two most crucial pieces of the puzzle: first, the overclocking of the dark energy warp drive via antimatter annihilation to accelerate the process far beyond the speed of “natural” universal expansion; second, the constant psychic suppression via Advanced Sensor Array-linked Psychic Spacetime Smoother of the “quantum foam” spacetime turbulence, otherwise fatally magnified at such naturally-unintended speeds. 

(The inner workings of the PSS are a heavily guarded secret. It is at least currently believed outside Jeocolep that psychic manipulation on a quantum level is only possible through sentience, therefore the presence of an Etheric SuperForm–so the unit itself has been externally theorized to house an ESF itself, either removed from another sentient creature and implanted through theoretical Jeocolepian ‘soul’ transfer technology or somehow given a conscious ‘soul’ itself through an equally arcane and unknown process. Most are wise enough to simply use the little cube without thinking too much about it.) 

Now all it took for any species to take the journey to “The End of the Universe” was a purchase of the proper ASA/DW94/PSS trifecta and antimatter caches through an authorized resale planet like Datura, though after the first few million years, most of the excitement had worn off. Too many crews had come back after traveling several billion light years past the cosmic horizon and sworn it was nothing but endless emptiness, and even more had taken the trek and never returned. A trip meant catching up to the ever-expanding cosmic horizon, surpassing it, and then continuing to travel even faster so that the pesky known universe doesn’t push the fresh dark stuff out of the way. The return journey was much easier, the horizon reaching out to meet one’s vessel in a warm bright embrace… but a round trip still cost more than the purchase of most small planets, and the price only infinitely expanded the further one wanted to go and the later one waited to start catching up to that horizon. 

It just wasn’t worth the cost–or the risk. The thrill of crossing the “End of the Universe” only led to the depressing realization that there would probably never be a literal “End of the Universe,” merely a point past which both light has not yet reached from the beginning of the universe and past which several tens of billions of light years have been explored by Feronians and found to be absolutely empty–with no reason to believe otherwise about anything beyond that. Each civilization seemed to have to learn this painful lesson themselves, never taking another’s word for it, like children refusing to listen to the dangers of a stove until they’ve burned themselves on the eye. 

Now, humanity’s turn had come to touch the stove.

Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson and his crew were advised at length in all these points by Daturan Ambassador Ignrost Mow–but these blatant attempts to stifle Human exceptionalism were appropriately ignored (“We proud humans are in an arms race with the rest of the world’s sentient species over whatever exists beyond that veil,” Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson had explained, without ever explaining to the confused Mow why humans would race using their arms or what this had to do with the cosmic horizon). Still, Datura was more than happy to provide the essential Jeocolepian tech for the jaunt, furnishing them with a full brand new ASA-3 sensor array suite, a lightly-used PSS, and a newly refurbished DenWarp94 dark energy manipulation warp drive–all manufactured by the legendary GhikizanKo–along with as many antimatter caches for the DW94 as the suicidal idiots at ES could afford… all at an appropriate price, of course. The richest being in the galaxy dropped below the top ten thousand from this purchase alone, but Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson knew his sacrifice would not be in vain. He was carving humanity’s legend across all space and time–carving his legend across all space and time.

The process was successful. The Blueskin took its maiden leap, first catching up to the horizon, then surpassing it. The crew, some fifteen, all human by design, cheered uproariously. Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson frowned, his leathered and bald 200-some year old head-and-face impressively not looking a day over 125. “When we find something we want to stop and investigate–how fast will the horizon catch up with us?”

“It-it depends how far ahead of it we are when we stop, sir. It moves at the speed of light because that’s–that’s what it is.”

“Do I look like I brought a speed camera and a flashlight, Captain!?”

“N-No, sir, Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir–it moves at about 300,000 kilometers per–”

“English, Captain Bowman!” The Lord Emperor CEO’s veins popped and throbbed across his artificially-taut face, especially surrounding the second-generation Immortality Deck, an unsightly antique model with a tape-deck-form-factor protruding about a half-inch from the center of the forehead. (Generation 3 and beyond, through the current Generation 12, were fully internal units: but Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson did not trust anyone to properly remove the old model and upgrade it.)

“A-about 186,000 miles per second, Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir.” The out-of-shape Captain panted, reaching an aerobic state for the first time in years.

“We’re going to need to go a hell of a lot faster than we are now, men!” Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson boomed. “When we discover something incredible, I want time for a photo op.”

“Lord CEO, sir, we’re already moving at the fastest possible–” Lord Emperor CEO drew Peacemaker, his iconic and lovely vintage gold-plated Colt Single Action Army Revolver and casually executed Captain Bowman.

“Anybody else wanna call me by less than my full title and name and see what fuckin’ happens?!” Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson shrieked. The crew, in unified terror, shrieked, “No sir, Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir!” 

“Good,” Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnsoncalmly replied, nodding. “Now then–” but tragically, before he could give a riveting speech about the importance of respect and the unparalleled value of such an expensive and illustrious name, the Blueskin was drowned in ear-piercing wailing from its many speakers.

“Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir, the ASA3 is picking up something–it’s the right size and shape for a planet, but—but that can’t be right, or we’d be interacting with its gravity, which it seems to somehow lack. Th-the rest of these readings are errors or complete nonsense; I’ll keep trying–”

“God damn it,” Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson whined. “This is why we should have been going faster! Now we probably don’t even have time to explore this thing–”

“Um, that won’t be a problem, Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir–it’s keeping pace with us exactly.”

“Well where the hell is it!?”

“It’s directly beside us, Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir.”

“I don’t see a goddamned thing!”

“We’re past the point where light from the origin of the universe has reached, Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir, it’s too dark to see it.”

“Then shine our lights on it, Captain,” Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson scoffed, as if the command was so obvious it shouldn’t have had to be said aloud.

“L-Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir,” a sheepish young student intern chimed in after a great silence, “the Captain is dead.”

“What!? How!?”

“B-because, Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir, you, um, you–you shot him, sir.”

“Oh,” Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson replied, nodding his head affirmatively. “Hm. Very well then. Thank you, Linda.” (Her name was Gigi, short for Ginger, named for her stunning red hair: but she grinned and nodded, accepting that her name would forever be Linda, at least until he remembered it as something else.) 

Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson sighed and sauntered over to the Captain’s luxurious white leather chair, now a red-white-pink tye-dye sort of pattern from Bowman’s brains, quickly cleaning it with a silk handkerchief from the corpse’s coat pocket. He rolled the Captain’s body onto the floor and took the seat, sighing even more loudly to make sure everyone in the chamber had to hear it. When nobody reacted, he sighed a third time, this time stomping his little dress shoes angrily against the Flexiglass floor tiles.

“L-Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir?” Linda finally spoke up, the only one bold enough.

“Which button turns the goddamn lights on!?”

Linda swallowed hard and adjusted her spectacles, stiffly feigning confidence in her posture and stride to the captain’s chair. She had no idea what any of the buttons did: this was her second week as an intern and she was brought on to help with the intergalactic media relations team for the project for college credit, though her major was in Engineering for FTL Travel. She had a feeling that this answer would prove fatally inadequate, though, so she put on her best poker face and looked down at the panel like she’d grown up playing with it as a child’s toy.

There were five buttons aside from the touch screen interface, one of which had the image of a flashlight emblazoned on it. She subtly pointed to the button and nodded respectfully, knowingly, a brief flash of eye contact with the big man himself as if to say–“you figured this out on your own.” He gave her a slight hint of a knowing smile, and she felt her spirit return to her mortified body.

“Found it!” Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson proudly exclaimed. A quick press of the button did indeed turn on the “headlights” in the front of the ship, revealing a mirror image of the ship, heading at itself. “Jesus! I thought you said it was beside us, Bowman–”

“D-dead, Lord Emperor CEO Extra–”

“Oh, right. Uh, I can’t fly this thing. Somebody take over.” He rose from the seat and stepped aside, allowing Vice Captain Bergeron, a grey-haired young woman of unusually wiry build, to take the helm. “See if we can get a better look at this thing, slow down.”

“Yes sir, Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir.”

Various movements and maneuvers were attempted: the thing kept exact distance, never getting closer or further away, keeping perfect pace despite any and all of her adjustments. The ASA3, despite including the database of all Jeocolepian knowledge, could not identify a single element. The only reading that brought back any parsable result was one that couldn’t possibly be right: the presence of life on the planet. 

“May I make a suggestion, Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir?” Linda boldly enquired.

Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson considered for a moment, then replied, “as long as it is worth our time, Miss Lindor.”

“I hope and believe it is,” Lindor replied. “If this planet, this–thing–keeps pace with us, I propose we slow down to a total standstill and then launch a probe at the thing. If it stops as well, and maintains our stasis, the probe will either reach it and get us valuable information about its surface, or–if it keeps pace with the probe instead of us–it will move away from us with the probe, getting us a better look at it. If I get a good look at something, I can usually figure it out.”

Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson’s eyes went wide. “You are wise, girl. I was wise to bring you. In fact, you know what?” He again readied Peacemaker, blasting Vice Captain Bergeron at an angle her brains would not again sully the chair’s impressive white leather, and shoved her out of the way before motioning politely for Lindor to take the chair. She swallowed hard and did so, bowing respectfully before lowering herself slowly into its twice corpse-warm seat. “You are now Captain of this ship, and we don’t even need a Vice Captain, because you are the best of the best, Rhonda!”

“Th-thank you eternally, Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir,” Rhonda replied: beaming, terrified, confused, and excited.

They executed her plan. The first prediction rang true: the probe breached the ever-consistent gap between the still ship and the motionless monolith. The moment it touched the surface, it vanished.

“What the fuck happened to it!?” Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson demanded, pounding his ancient cybernetically-enhanced fist against the wall.

“We didn’t get any data,” Rhonda blurted, frantic. “It vanished before it could even report back to the ASA3. We can watch it on the ASA’s slow motion camera to try to–”

“Then fucking do it!”

She did. Even at one millionth speed, there was no indication of any collision, or vaporization, or impact, or anything else. The very measurable quantum instant that the probe made contact with the planet, it simply ceased to be. “This doesn’t make any sense,” she pleaded.

“Fire another probe, then.”

“That was the only one we have, Lord CEO Emperor Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir; it’s the only one our ASA3 came with.”

“Why does it only come with one!?”

“It’s meant to be indestructible, sir.”

“Then where the fuck is it, Rolanda!?”

An uncomfortable silence. Rolanda’s pulse pounded so hard her vision quivered as her eyeballs quaked with every frantic, fearful beat. It seemed to fill the room.

“I–I don’t know, Lord Emperor CEO Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson, sir.

“You’re smart,” Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson replied, walking up behind her and pressing the button on her formsuit’s nape which turned it from formal jumpsuit to lightweight emergency spacesuit. “You said it yourself, Linoleum–if you get a good look at something, you can figure it out.” 

Linoleum swallowed hard. She was launched into the reflective surface of the planet and suffered the same fate, popping out of existence instantaneously. The slow motion cameras showed just as much and just as little. There was no residue, no blood, no explosion, no “zap,” no anything–one moment the Captain simply was, and the next, just as simply, she was not.

Building fury over the injustice of losing his beloved Captain Linebacker, Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson demanded they fire upon the planet for its insolence: lasers, since physical matter seemed to be no match for the thing. There were no more living souls on board brave (stupid?) enough to question the order. He opened fire, insisting (against all automated warnings) on maintaining the pulse laser indefinitely. Predictably, within about fifteen seconds of prolonged pulse-lasering, the housing overheated and rendered the weaponry permanently inoperable.

The mirrored planet at first appeared unphased, but Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson noticed a tiny ball of shimmering, mercurial thing slowly approaching the ship–a tiny offshoot of the planet, from its mirrored appearance and baffling readings. The orb grew in size as it approached: first it seemed to be merely a trick of perspective from a rapidly approaching threat, but as it breached the gap, it gradually became apparent that the thing was instead gaining mass at an astronomical rate upon its very slow approach.

Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson walked up to the front Flexiglass viewpanel of the craft, marveling at his own reflection as it warbled closer and closer. Its surface rippled more and more aggressively, like water in a kettle about to boil over. Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson watched his own horrified, ancient eyes as their distorted reflection slowly morphed into so many countless, nay, endless mountain-sized pupils bubbling from the surface of the planet–no, the being–like buoyant pearls from bubbling oil, looking right at him, right through him. The ASA3 had been right–this planet-sized thing and its quickly-growing-to-planet-sized-offshoot were very much alive.

The Lord Emperor CEO made eye contact with one of the thing’s many shimmering golden irises and froze, realizing all at once that his immortality had reached its end before he had even reached the ripe young age of 300: if the probe could not communicate more quickly than this thing could “vanish” it, there’s no way the third-gen hardware of the Immortality Drive could jumpstart the quantum backup process for his mind in time to preserve even a single thought or memory for a replacement body. 

Extravaganza Grandiloquence Quincy Roosevelt Stonewall Johnson’s life flashed before his eyes: all the people he’d backstabbed, betrayed, executed, every one of his unspeakable and unforgivable sins. These happy memories gave him the strength he needed to swallow his existential panic and secure his legacy. He sent out a FTL SpaceNet distress signal, then encoded a warning in a spacetime knot with the DW94’s heavy text feature, his gnarled half-nanotech hands shaking with every frantic press of a key. As the final heavy characters were quantumly embroidered into the static spacetime knot, the entity’s presence overcame the Lord Emperor CEO’s very ESF.

When the Blueskin made contact with the thing, the Blueskin no longer was. 

—---

When bounty/treasure hunter Red Nax’s CMZ began to near the origin of the FTL distress signal, he was disappointed to find absolutely nothing. His ASA3 returned not a single reading–no debris, no dust, no traces of fuel or radiation, no irregularities… just empty space. Aside from the initial distress signal, the only indication anything had ever occupied this tiny corridor of space was the heavy text.

“Must’ve been a prank message, Captain,” Orvebean First Mate Gaabob grumbled.

“When a distress call alone costs more money than god, and a single character in heavy text uses up an entire antimatter cache!? Use your brain, ‘dipshit’!” Nax replied, proud of sprinkling in the Old English derogatory curse. “Something out here is seriously ‘fucked’: I just ran a quick origin on the signal, and this bad ‘daddio’ was originally sent from outside the cosmic horizon.”

“We’re outside the cosmic horizon!?”

“Nah, it’s more than caught up now. But, they were past it when they sent the signal and wove this heavy text, and that’s what worries me.” Nax picked at the base of his oversized green mohawk nervously, an omen his crew had not seen for years. “Every poor bastard knows there isn’t a damn thing past the horizon, and the comp’s saying they couldn’t have been that far in when it was sent… not even a billion light years.”

“Well, you’ve got your answer, Nax,” Gaabob shakily replied, swallowing hard, his soft round body quivering in spite of himself. “The ASA’s finished decoding the heavy text.”

“And it says–!?”

“EYES. -LORD EMPEROR CEO EXTRAVAGANZA GRANDILOQUENCE QUINCY ROOSEVELT STONEWALL JOHNSON”