Chapter Text
[A gentle click as the recording device starts, and the gentle sound of a storm outside can be heard along with a crackling fireplace]
Campbell
The source of the huge river is the clear spring. The fish twisted and turned on the bent hook. Testing, testing, 1...2...3...
[A click turns off the device, then after a moment of silence another click returns the sound of the rain]
Campbell
Right then, I believe I got it working again.
Ribeiro
Are you sure I have to record it alone? I think it would be easier to keep focus if you listened in.
Campbell
Not how it works, it won't help if somebody is listening to you
Ribeiro
Yet you can't tell me how it helps or what it is helping?
Campbell
It's hard for me to find the words to explain. It's just, easier to survive here if you take notes and do it alone. It's a lot like a diary, but it doesn't just help emotionally but also when we face those..... things again.
Ribeiro
Fine. I'll try my best to keep on track.
[The retreating footsteps and the sound of a door opening cause the storm outside to grow louder before quieting again.]
Ribeiro
So to start this off with some clarification, I work in a permanent research position at the CfA. This means I am an astrophysicist. I am not an astronomer and not an astronaut, but an astrophysicist. I get it's silly to make such a firm distinction between labels under current circumstances, especially when Astrophysicists is a branch of astronomy, but it matters a lot when you are in the field. An astronomer can point at the sky and name it, but it is the astrophysicist that will learn to understand it. Understanding what space is is far deeper than just the names an astronomer will label.
I specifically researched black holes, it's funny how many people have looked me in the eye and told me such nonsense about black holes, how they're "tears in the fabric of time" or some other science fiction bullshit. A black hole is just a bunch of stuff with so much mass it has a gravitational pull that even light itself can't get out. It also doesn't look like a dark spot, they're completely invisible. We created black holes in labs before to prove it, we just compress a bunch of atoms and bam, a black hole has appeared on earth. Eventually, the black holes entirely collapse as matter escapes then suddenly it simply becomes millions of atoms scattered about. I have to explain every time somebody asks me about my job, and rarely anybody will listen to me for too long because it is horrifying. How if you got too close to a black hole you would be stuck trying to escape as an invisible force pulled you in, then suddenly you just wouldn't exist anymore. People say it shreds you, but it's more accurate to say it separates every single part of you and scatters the atoms aimlessly into the universe. You don't even get that dying moment, you wouldn't even feel pain because your nerve fibres merely wouldn't exist anymore
[Ribeiro lets out a weary sigh. There is a rustle of objects before the scratching of pen on paper is heard]
I've rambled enough about my job now I guess. I'm sorry for going on so long, but it just feels nice to be heard. To be understood by you, sharing the memory of how I ended up here in this environment beyond the spiralling doorway. Although, honestly I think you might find it cool Riko. You dress like the type who would listen to me. At least, I think you dress that way, can we trust anything we see in this strange place? There's so much in this place that simply doesn't make any sense, and I am not entirely sure I can trust my senses. Although I guess we can never trust our senses anyways, we as humans are fundamentally flawed and cannot perceive anything how it truly is. Just like how we cannot see black holes, because technically we don't see anything but the light reflecting off of items. There is no way to trust our sense of reality, is it any different here? Should we trust what we see any more than we trust what we would see in our universe? Look at me, calling this a universe, that doesn't even come close to describing whatever this is, there is no real word to describe what this is. I wonder if somebody survives this will there be studies? Will we create words to describe this? It's funny how meaningless the labels we use to describe concepts like this are, and yet if you get sucked into something unlabeled there is no way to inform anybody because you'll always be searching for a label and—
I just said I've rambled enough, and here I am, avoiding telling you how I got here by rambling again.
I'm sorry I ramble so much, I promise if you were here to speak with this would be much simpler a conversation.
It also doesn't help that you said to describe my feelings as well as what happened when what happened was an event and a feeling at the same time. It's such a messy sprawl of feelings and sensations and perceptions all mixed in my mind, and I can't truthfully make sense of it. I don't know if I even want to.
The truth is while it was my job to study it, I always hated space, with its cold emptiness. It reminded me of when I would get sick and was too weak to stand up after a bath. I'd lay there in the tub, the now frigid water clinging to my clammy skin sucking the life out of me. I'd scream for help, but I couldn't be heard. Nobody was there to save me, to pull me to safety. I only studied for my PhD to try and understand that hatred of space so that I might eliminate it, only to find it grow as I learned how truly expansive the cosmos are. How even if there was extraterrestrial life it wouldn't matter because there is so much to look through that we may never find each other. That they could be dying as we speak, and we would never know because we'd be long dead before we had a chance to find the corpses.
Then I simply had no other choice but to do post-doctoral research and then ended up teaching for a time, then eventually, I ended up in the CfA in a permanent research position. It seems silly to talk about it now if I hated space why did I stay? I could have taken the time to learn something else, but it would have been a waste of time honestly.
One night I went back to my apartment, cooked my dinner and watched YouTube on my phone before going to bed. It was just like any other night, lying in my bed staring into the darkness, then suddenly that darkness changed. I couldn't place what was wrong, I was so comfortable and yet a growing unease filled my chest. Slowly I realized that the darkness has little spots of light, so distant that they couldn't show me my surroundings but so bright that reached my vision. That was when I realized I couldn't feel my blankets or my bed. There was nothing, be these specks of light all around me. Stars, I was surrounded by stars. Floating in the vast open world of space, and as it came to me I was completely frozen. Like a dear in headlights, I was unresponsive as I stared out into the stars.
After a while, I grounded myself enough to try and get my bearings. I couldn't see a ship, or any planets, quite honestly I didn't even recognize the star systems around me. How did I get here? I couldn't have flown here, just getting to Jupiter takes 6 years, there is no way a human could survive long enough to get wherever I had found myself. How was I breathing? How was I even alive? I was in my pyjamas, and I could I feel breathe with no impediment. Normally there is no gas for you to breathe, so given the chances, I must have been in an area where nitrogen was abundant, though it only takes two minutes maximum to go unconscious without oxygen. Three until enough brain cells are dead to cause irreparable brain damage. People claim that time slows down when you die, and you perceive things faster, but we did studies to show that was fake, but if time wasn't slowing down then what was happening now? How was I still awake? It must have been four minutes by then, maybe even four. I looked to the stars, trying to understand how I'd got here, and place the events in order.
But as I stared out at these unknown stars, I realized something, the stars weren't there anymore, they'd died millions of years ago. Meaning not even the stars could see my plight. That sent me right back into the spiral, thoughts running wild as I saw the stars but they could never see me. I tried to ground myself again, to find sensory in the temperature or move my arms quickly to feel the air push against my hands, but space isn't like that. Space isn't cold nor is it hot, it has temperature, it has no air, there was nothing. As my mind screamed out into disorganized chaos, that sudden thought was so perplexing it shattered my fears. There was no air. There was no gas at all, yet I could still feel my breath enter my lungs, the sensation of gas in my lungs. If I couldn't feel it in the air, but it was clearly in my lungs, and I was still awake, then something was deeply wrong. Something beyond any reason of our world. Then as I felt fear slip away replaced by this boiling rage that could only be described as spiteful determination.
Then, I was in my bed again. Whatever thing that did this, shunted me back where I belonged. At the time I thought it was just a dream, that it was okay and I could just go back to my life. I was wrong.
I went through the day, and when I came back to my apartment, I heard a noise from my bathroom. A quiet consistent "tap tap tap" that drew me to find the source. I assumed it was a busted pipe, but instead when I opened the bathroom door I was met with pure darkness. Not like a lack of light, no it was more than that, the darkness had mass. When I reached for it, I could feel the darkness. I took a moment, my mind was utterly blank. It's hard to explain why I did what I did, I don't think there was a train of thought for it, I just did it. I reached for my work bag and pulled out the knife intended to make me feel safe walking home at night, then I carefully sliced through the shadow. It responded, opening a gap big enough for me to fit through, and I just walked it. I paused for a moment, then suddenly all at once my thought hit me again, and I whipped around to see it closed behind me. I tried to slash it open again but to no avail. I remember struggling, screaming, sobbing, begging even. I wanted back out, I would have done anything to get out, but now that I think about it I wonder... Why did I even want to leave then? I didn't have anybody to come back to. After I transitioned my family wanted nothing to do with me, I had no real people to call my friends, and I don't even think my coworkers liked me. So why did I want back into our world? Was it that I knew beforehand how much danger I was in or was I just afraid of the unknown? Maybe I just hated having my choice ripped away from me. I don't know, it's all conjecture at this point.
[Ribeiro sighs, the sound of pen on paper finally stops with the sound of fabric rustling as she stands.]
Either way, I am done with your records Campbell, I hope you're happy.
[With a final click, the record ends.]