Chapter Text
“What we’re seeing here on the monitor, experts are calling it: Astrophage. Star-eater.” Very original, who got to be in charge of naming that, I wondered. I look back down at my never ending stack of ungraded essays, red pen, long gone cold black coffee, and half eaten toast. I’m getting nowhere, why do I insist on working in public.
“Ha, what’s next, the black dots are gonna come abduct us and what, do weird alien shit, probe us with sunlight?” A stranger at the bar quips unbelievingly to the waitress, she ignores. “I just don’t know about all this stuff. They’ll change the story in a week, mark my words.” I roll my eyes and take a swig. Idiots. People had a habit of making scientific discoveries into entertainment. You know what’s not entertaining, convincing the public of impending mass extinction.
It’s all I could think about recently, those little black dots had the whole world in a frenzy, a good indicator for its importance. I see them crawling across the screen. Everyone knew it by name now, but nobody understood what it meant.
Tap. Tap.
A hand knocks the table. “Knock, knock,” an unfamiliar feminine voice hovered above my booth.
I jolt from surprise, almost knocking a few ungraded essays and silverware off the table, “And you are?” My brows furrow and my eyes meet a redheaded middle aged woman, holding a small stack of clipped papers in her hands. She was the opposite of inviting, carrying herself with importance.
“Eva Stratt, Petrova Task Force, and you are Dr. ████ ████ ” Direct, straight to the point. I like her style. She sits down opposite of me.
“Petrova Task– Um, yes? That’s me. How did you find me?” I confirm through my confusion. Petrova? Like… the Petrova line?
“Alternative Solvent Models for Extremophile Biochemistry in Non-Terrestrial Environments,” she lays down her stack of papers on top of my hands, “you wrote this, yes?”
My stomach drops to my feet. How? That was years ago. And I’m in a coffee shop, how did this woman find me? I clear my throat at the unexpected recall of my work. “Again, how did you find me?” I read the title again in front of me, then up at the TV in the corner of the room. A sea of black dots swimming against the surface of the sun. “And why do you need me?”
“We’ll have plenty of time to chat on the way.” She doesn’t break eye contact, making me all the more nervous. On the way to where? What the hell is going on! She stands up from the table walking towards the door as if I’m supposed to just follow.
“Going?” Who is this lady? And why am I going to listen to her orders? I couldn’t help myself, that damned curiosity. I pull out some cash and leave it on the table before going to follow Stratt. “Excuse me ma’am,” I awkwardly jog towards her to catch up, “but could you please tell me what’s going on?” I say as I catch up behind her. She turns back to me just before reaching a black car with heavily tinted windows.
“Stratt is fine,” she strode a bit further before I started to see the others. Two other black vans and three burly men standing near each car, just watching. Stratt stops, “Dr. ████, we’ve discovered an ecological phenomenon with the capability to survive on the surface of the Sun. Is that an ‘alternative’ enough extremophile for you?”
I froze, she really did know who I was. She may have not read my thesis, she’s too busy for that, but somehow, whatever I wrote years ago had finally caught up to me. I should have known the controversy wouldn’t just blow over. It didn’t for him, why would it for me? “Listen, everything in that is theoretical.” I point to the papers she took back from me.
“Then you’re in good company,” she opens the door, gesturing for me to get in. God, she really knew how to weaponize silence. And damn, why is it working? I look into her eyes and take a deep sigh to steady my nerves. I look back at the cafe, who knows when I’ll be back, if I’ll be back.
“That sounds reassuring” I begrudgingly slide into the backseat.