Enter the VOODOO…
John lays unconscious on a medi-bed in the medical room aboard the Alice, Luna is in a surgical gown adjusting a pneumatic injection, she
looks down at John then looks at the rest of the crew looking though a large observation window at the side of the room.
The left side of Johns body is covered in emergency dressings, a blue coloured foam is oozing from the edges around the dressings, the foam has Qatarized his wounds and is keeping his flesh sterile and alive, he has a small face mask suppling oxygen and pads on his chest wirelessly monitoring his body’s essential organs.
Luna studies a video screen showing johns vital signs, she puts a small oval monitor on his forehead that throbs various colours indicating to her that Johns mind is active. He has lost his left arm and leg; Luna pulls back a dressing on the left side of his head. Dizzy starts sobbing and Tombs pulls her head up against his broad chest and comforts her.
Luna injects John on the right side of his neck and picks up a scanning device and scans across the blue foam covering the left side of his head.
John slowly opens his eye. Luna is looking up at a screen while she is scanning. John looks at Luna directly and speaks softly, Luna answers back obviously upset, but trying to be brave…
JOHN: “What’s the damage”
LUNA: “I just gave you something to bring you around, it’s also a sedative, you shouldn’t be able to feel any pain. I have induced your nerves to stop movement below your neck. Are you in any pain John?
JOHN: “Tell me”,
LUNA: “ARE, you in any pain John?
A tear rolls from the corner of Lunas eye as she continues to look at the screen,
JOHN: “No”
LUNA: “You have lost a leg, an arm, Ear, eye, upper cheek bone, flesh, muscular tissue, you have multiple fractures, lesions. John”
JOHN: “You’re an exceptional surgeon, just tell me”
LUNA: “A few days to grow new skin, but it will take maybe 3 months to clone and grow an arm and leg, a bit longer for your eye and ear because of the complexity”
JOHN: “Ok, what now”
Trying to look brave and taking a deep breath Luna wipes the tear away and looks John up and down and stops at his face to talk straight to him,
LUNA: “I’m going to clean up your wounds and patch you up, I’m printing a poly-flex bandage to cover your face. I’m going to knock you out now; you’ll wake up in our bed”.
Another tear rolls out of her eye. Luna kisses John on his forehead, then adjusts her pneumatic injector and injects him again in his neck, John’s eye slowly closes.
A week passes by. The door to John and Lunas bedroom apartment on the Alice quickly slides open and a transparent ball rolls in flashing various bright colours. John is sitting up in bed with a holographic screen in front of him, he looks around and sees the ball slowing to a stop halfway between the bed and door.
JOHN: “What the fuck”
BANG ! The ball explodes and multi coloured streamers shoot out in all directions,
Tombs, Ghost, Porter and Dizzy burst into John and Lunas bedroom cheering at John unannounced,
TOMBS: “Luna said we could come and visit you today”
GHOST: “I was hoping you would be laying on the bed naked”
PORTER: “Are you feeling better sir?”
Dizzy looks John up and down and starts sobbing, John, with a streamer across his head and shoulder tilts his head and smiles at Dizzy then pats the bed.
JOHN: “Come here Dizzy”
Dizzy sits on the bed next to John and John hugs her with his right arm.
Dizzy looks around at John and smiles at him while wiping away her tears,
Ghost thrusts a bottle of whisky in front of John while Tombs supply’s glasses to everyone to be filled with whisky,
TOMBS: “Luna said it was ok”
GHOST: ”To John, back from the dead”
They all raise their glasses to John,
ALL THE CREW: “To John, welcome back from the dead”
JOHN: “I’ll drink to that”
John swigs down the glassful of whisky. And with a croaky whisky throat voice holds out his empty glass at arm’s length and wags it in front of Ghost…
JOHN: “More”
Ghost reply’s with and equally croaky whisky throat voice and re-fills John’s glass…
GHOST: “Sure thing”
Luna walks in arms crossed,
LUNA: “So, what’s going on”
Luna walks up to John on the bed and sits on the opposite side to Dizzy, LUNA: “That your last drink for now John, no more today”
John gulps down the whisky,
Luna takes Johns empty glass and looks down at Dizzy who has both her arms around John’s waist now,
LUNA: “You Ok Dizzy”
Dizzy looks up at Luna with puppy dog’s eyes and nods at Luna, DIZZY: “I don’t have to go yet, do I?”
Luna looks at the holographic screen in front of John, LUNA: “No Dizzy. What’s this John?”
On the holographic screen are plans and diagrams for a robotic arm, leg, eye, ear, and various head implants. John points at the screen, JOHN: “I can’t wait 3 months to grow arms and legs; I want you to attach and implant these to me”
Luna leans across John and manipulates the screen and moves the plans around with her hand and scrutinises the pictures by pulling them out of the screen and into floating 3D images.
The crew all study the plans.
DIZZY: “These look more advanced than Porters or mine”
JOHN: “I redesigned your android parts to suit me as bio implanted devices, using different lighter, stronger materials with backup electronic
interfaces that will interface with my nerve endings and electrical brain signals,
Porter points out an electronic interface component.
PORTER: “What’s that for”
JOHN: “It’s a high-speed computer interface that will allow me to interact with Ioa and Alice remotely and directly, LUNA: “Infrared, zoom, wide spectrum eye implant. And your new ear John. That is going to be very sensitive”.
JOHN: “It can be controlled via the interface, I just gotta train my brain and learn. And I’m ready when you are”.
LUNA: “I guess there is no point in trying to argue the bad points of all of this, is there John”
JOHN: “No”
DIZZY; “You’ll be like me and Porter”.
John snatches the whisky glass that Luna took from him and taps the bottle of whisky that Ghost is holding, Ghost pours John a full glass while Luna crosses her head and looks unamused. John knocks back the whisky and answers Dizzy in a throaty whisky voice,
JOHN; “Partially Dizzy, partially”
A couple of days pass and John is in his lab making finishing touches to his android hand and arm with Porters help. Luna and Tombs walk into the lab.
LUNA: “Ready for you in 15 minutes John”
JOHN: “I’m ready now”
John has a head band on with wires going to some meters on his work bench that then go to the robot arm. Johns new arm and hand are on the bench, the arm has an underlayer of synthetic skin that will allow John’s own laboratory grown skin to adhere to the new arm.
John is now laying down on a medi-bed in Alice’s medical bay, his new arm, leg, and face with eye and ear implants are in a transparent sterilising case close by. Luna and Ghost are in surgical overalls that look like fashionable fitted white boiler suits. The rest of the crew look on though the big observation window.
LUNA: “Are the implants sterile Ghost?”
Luna picks up a pneumatic injection and adjusts it”.
LUNA: “Happy dreams John”
John smiles, Luna injects John’s neck and John’s eye closes, John finds himself sitting down at a busy posh restaurant, he is alone at a table laid for two. It is outside in the open and by a river in a European looking city. He is looking though the menu, but suddenly looks up and is around looking puzzled and wondering how on earth he got there, JOHN: “What the fuck, how? “
John looks around him, he sees a waiter dressed in white smiling and walking towards his table. He looks back across his circular table and sees a beautiful woman with long black hair dark eye makeup and blood red lipstick who looks like Ioa. She is wearing a tight black dress with a black pearl neckless and black stilettoes and is standing next to the vacant chair on the other side of the round restaurant table.
WOMAN: “Hello John, we meet at last”
JOHN: “Ioa?”
The woman just smiles at John,
WOMAN: ”Sorry I’m late John, I had things to attend to”
The woman sits on the empty chair and is smiling at John. She looks up to the waiter who has just arrived at their table.
JOHN: “Ioa?”
WAITER: “Are you ready to order?”
WOMAN: “John? are you ready to order?”
John is a little confused, but nether less plays along, JOHN: “Er? you first”
WOMAN: “OK, I’ll have the chocolate chip sundae with chilli thank you”
JOHN: “Oh, I’ll just have a vanilla ice cream sundae thanks”
WAITER: “Thank you for your order, it will not be long”
John waits until the waiter walks away from their table and then leans across and whispers to the woman,
JOHN: “Ioa, where are we, have we time shifted? Is this a paradox, this feels real”?
WOMAN: “I’m not Ioa John, I am Veyah, just like Ioa is your AI computer that controls Alice, I control the Voodoo”
John say’s nothing for a few seconds, he mulls over what Veyah has just told him. He then taps the table with his left hand knuckle a few times quite hard. John smiles at Veyah and giggles,
JOHN: “Oww! That’s hard, and it hurt, I thought for a moment I was dreaming all this”.
The waiter comes back with their deserts, they both start eating, JOHN: “Nice ice cream”
VEYAH: “I love the fire after the cold then the taste of chocolate”
John pauses eating for a moment,
JOHN: “I’ve never heard of a ship called Voodoo or someone called VEYAH?”
VEYAH: “Just a few minutes ago Luna removed the medical dressing from the side of your head, cleaned up the area where your implant is going to be installed. She has installed the implant and turned on the computer interface that is now connected to your brain, and it seems to be working very well.
She is doing some tests at this very moment and is talking to Ghost about closing the surgery to your head and moving on to the rest of your implants”.
JOHN: “What’s going on, how do you now all this?”
Veyah giggles,
VEYAH: “I can see and hear the same as Ioa. But don’t worry John, I do not have access to Alice’s controlling systems, I can just hear and see though Alice’s cameras and microphones”.
JOHN: “How did we meet?”
VEYAH: “Well John, as you know, time flies, quite a few hours in fact have gone by. That went quick didn’t it”.
Veyah gets up and picks up a napkin from the table, she then pats around her mouth gently avoiding getting her lipstick smudged. She walks over to John bens down and kisses him passionately. When Veyah has finished
kissing John she puts her foot on the edge of his chair and takes his hand and runs it along her thigh, she then steps down and smiles at John.
VEYAH: “See you soon John”
She then walks off into the restaurant looking back and smiling at John.
John sits at the table wondering what had just happened……
John is now in his own bed, asleep. Then, suddenly, he wakes up and sits upright”.
JOHN: “Uhhhh!”
Luna is standing next to the bed and Ioa is standing next to Luna, Luna is taking Johns essential vital signs and jumps back at John’s sudden awaking. Ioa does not move,
LUNA: “JOHN! You ok? you gave me a fright!”
John tries grabbing at Ioa, but his hand passes though Ioa’s holographic image,
JOHN: “Veyah?”
LUNA: “Veyah? John, who is Veyah?”
JOHN: “Oh, ah, sorry I musta been dreaming or something, it felt real”
LUNA: "I was manually tapping into your nervous and optic interfaces just a moment ago John, that was to make sure your implants could move and articulate properly before waking you up, I didn't want to cause unnecessary pain, maybe that was it, causing some taste buds crossed nerves brain......"
JOHN: "Yeah, that must had been what it was, sorry about that. Luna?"
LUNA: "So, what's up John?"
JOHN: "Apart from some strange dreams that feel real, my memory is slowly coming back. And, for some reason, and please don't hate me for saying this, but, but"
LUNA: "Tell me John"
JOHN: "Your dead. I buried you on a sterile protoplanet that you had asked me to do if you ever died. That memory feels real to me”.
Luna takes a deep breath,
LUNA: "That happened John"
JOHN: "You're here, now, have I moved backwards in time, is this a paradox?"
LUNA: "No, although the concept of time is simply an illusion made up of human memories John”
Luna looks at her arm band device then at Ioa while talking to John. Ioa nods back in acknowledgement,
LUNA: “I think you will find that the quantum optics master clock, and I, say, that clinically the time is now. Anyway, I need a day to think about some things, and you need another day in bed. We’ll talk about my death another time. When we get you up tomorrow there is something you need to see, and maybe you can throw some light on it and explain something to us about its origin, and what it relates to you when it brought you back to us”.
The next day the crew are in the canteen eating breakfast and talking when John walks in. It goes quiet, John stops at the side of the table with a coffee in his hand and looks around the silent table. As he sits he looks at Luna, Luna looks up at John while still eating. Luna smiles at John, LUNA: “How you feeling John”
JOHN: “Good, I’m ok. Can we talk about you, and the sterile planet?”
Luna looks at the silent faces around the table all waiting in anticipation for her answer, she looks down at her bowl of cereal, LUNA: “Later John, not now. In privacy”
JOHN: “ok”
Once they have herd Luna’s answer to John the onlooking crew return to their eating and chatting to each other,
GHOST: “Hope you will be able to enlighten us all to your guest John”
TOMBS: “Quite Ghost, he doesn’t know yet”
GHOST: “Oh!, I thought Luna, eh”
LUNA: “No, he doesn’t know. After breakfast Ghost”
JOHN: “What’s up? What’s going on?”
TOMBS: “You should tell him, no surprises”
Luna looks at Tombs. Tombs is nodding and gesturing Luna to open up to John,
LUNA: “ok, ok. John, after the accident what happened?”
JOHN: “I, well. I know I was really fucked up. Last thing I remember was Ioa telling me I was going to be Ok, I thought I had been rescued, and had returned to the Alice, I thought you guys brought me back”.
Luna looks around the table at all the surprised looks, PORTER: “We couldn’t find you sir; we scanned the ship, you were gone. We stayed as long as we could, we were in a fire fight with the Endellion ship. We just had to leave”.
John looks around at the crew, finishing at Luna, JOHN: “I don’t understand, why didn’t you tell me?”
DIZZY: ” But we didn’t know what the connection was with you and the…”
LUNA: “Dizzy!, sorry Dizzy”
Dizzy looks around at Luna and raises her eyebrows, DIZZY: “That’s ok”
LUNA: ”Everyone finished breakfast”
John holds up his cup of coffee and points to it, LUNA: “You’ve finished breakfast coffee John, come on, down to cargo bay one”
Luna takes John’s coffee from his hand and puts it on the table. The crew all get up and exit the cafeteria, John stops in the doorway and turns around, then goes back and gets his coffee.
JOHN: “I haven’t finished breakfast, yet”
LUNA: “Lights! Detail mode!”
In the cargo bay bright lights flash on and illuminate everything except for one corner where the lights are set dimly except for a few detailing spotlights highlighting a dark spaceship in one corner. Luna looks around at John to see if he responds to what he sees. John looks around at Ghost, she elevates her shoulders, then does a purposeful shiver and starts up her heavy J-8 gun,
GHOST: “It gives me the creeps”
TOMBS: “Me to”
JOHN: “What does?”
Ghost nods to the corner where the dark star ship sits, GHOST: “That does”
They all follow John across the cargo bay deck where a large triangular black star ship is in the corner of the cargo bay. The ship is flat across its bottom, pointed at each corner, and has an arced roof like a flattened triangular pillow. It is 200 feet along each side and 40 feet high. John walks along its hull running his hand along its side admiring its texture and shape. He seems excited.
JOHN: “Wow, its beautiful, this hull, its texture, like the ridges of shells.
Just like overlapping clam shells”.
John looks around at the crew. He sees Ghost and Tombs with their J-8’s seemingly aimed at him.
JOHN: “Are those aimed at me?”
GHOST: “It’s ok, they’re on pre-load and fire. Their hot, but there’s nothing in the chamber”.
TOMBS: “Just a precaution boss”
JOHN: “In case of what?”
GHOST: “We don’t know sir. That’s the thing what brought you back”.
John carries on walking along the side of the ship while rubbing his hand along the hull occasionally looking back occasionally at the crew walking along with him. He stops and point’s at Tombs and Ghost with his right hand he has his coffee cup in while gripping it’s handle with his 3 spare fingers.
JOHN: “Hey, I’m getting nervous with those J-8’s pointing at me”
Suddenly, where John is standing, an 8-foot square section of the black triangular ship’s hull glides into the slightly rounded part of the star ship several inches. A clunk is heard and then a thump, and the square hull section divides into two as they separate left and right into individual doors.
Tombs and Ghost change their gun’s standby setting to armed. Both guns flash a red “LOADING” warning in their LCD screens. Both guns start to whistle as the power capacitors in them charge up.
John looks into the star ship. A short brightly lit corridor with a pair of double doors with windows are at the far end. John sips his coffee that he has been holding all this time.
JOHN: “That looks like an air lock”
John looks around at the crew,
JOHN: “Well? Any of you coming in to have a look?”
GHOST: “I’ll stay out here, just in case anything comes running out”
DIZZY: “If I come running out Ghost check it’s me before you fire”
PORTER: “And me too!”
All except Ghost step into the airlock and walk to the end where the closed doors are,
JOHN: “Can you put the J-8 on safe while we are on this ship Tomb’s”
TOMBS: “But John”
JOHN: “We don’t know what’s stored on this ship, if the gun goes off”
TOMBS: “It won’t, but OK, J-8 charged, and on safe now ”
Tombs shuts down the J-8, the LCD flashes and shows
“CHARGED/SAFE MODE”
They all stand around in the airlock near the closed doors looking around for someway to get in. They push against panels that look like they may give access, but nothing works. They all turn to John.
PORTER: “I have scanned, but cannot see or feel anything that may let us in like a panel that might…”
As they stand in a circle John raises his hand with forefinger pointing upwards and is just about to say something to Porter when the thick double airlock doors behind him slide open.
Tombs just pushes past everyone and goes through the thick open airlock doors and into a corridor, he looks around,
TOMBS: “Well then, what you lot waiting for, come on”
They all cautiously step just inside a corridor and look up and down the passageway that seems to run up and down the side and length of the star ship.
The corridor is painted a bright white and is slightly curved on one side emulating the shape of the ship’s hull from the outside. The corridor has reinforcing beams every few yards protruding from the walls and ceiling.
The other side of the corridor has quadrant shaped rounded edges at its base and ceiling.
LUNA: “Well John? Which way?”
Tombs points left and right using his J-8,
TOMBS: “Pointy end or flat end?”
JOHN: “This ship is triangular, both ways are the pointy end’s”
Tombs stops to think for a second, his eyes squint, TOMBS: “Ok, pointy end it is then”
Tombs turns right and leads the way. As they walk along the corridor the lights come on only illuminating the section that they are in, so Tombs turns on his J-8 flashlight that floodlights the unlit corridor further down.
Luna looks up at John and holds his hand, John smiles at her, LUNA: “That’s better, I can see where I am going to fall now. Bet you can see where you are going to fall in enhanced mode with your new eye John, eh?”
John smiles back at Luna. DIZZY sees Luna hold John’s hand. She looks at Porter and grabs his hand,
DIZZY: “Porter, I’m scared”
As they all walk cautiously down the corridor an immediate HISSing noise can be herd behind them. They all stop and turn around and look at the corridor wall where the hissing noise is coming from, LUNA: “What is that hissing”
A wide doorway in the wall silently opens upwards and into the roof of the corridor that they have all been walking down. Dizzy looks back, DIZZY: “Look!, another corridor”
LUNA: “How did we all walk past that?”
TOMBS: “I don’t think we did, must had opened up as we walked past.
It looks like it goes further into the ship. Just gonna check communications. Ghost, Ghost?”
GHOST: ”Here Tombs”
TOMBS: “Just checking coms are ok before we head further into the ship, anything to report back”
GHOST: “Just waiting for you darling”
Tombs looks around at everybody and is nodding and giving out a broad smile,
TOMBS: “Yeah… Just waiting to get back to you to darling. So, come on guys, let’s all get going then”.
As Tombs takes a step into the corridor it lights up right to the far end. A door can be seen at the distance.
JOHN: “Is that another door at the end?”
LUNA: “Hard to tell”
JOHN: ”Come on”
When they all get to the end of the corridor they stop and start feeling the wall.
DIZZY: “It’s a dead end”
PORTER: “Its not a door at all, it’s made to look like a door?”
A substance starts to drip into Johns coffee cup that he is still holding, he looks down into his cup. A yellow viscous fluid is floating in the dregs of his cup.
It then starts to drip onto Johns head, he steps back and looks up, the dripping from the ceiling seems to be follow him, so he steps back more.
Luna turns around and see’s John looking up and stepping backwards.
Luna looks straight at him and starts to giggle nervously at him.
LUNA: “What are you doing John?”
The fluid is running down Johns face and into the corner of his mouth. He unwillingly tastes a sample as he is walking backwards and spits it out.
JOHN: “This eh? leaking hydraulic fluid is following me…”
Quickly, a few square feet of the floor beneath him elevates and tilts sideways, as this happens a door slides open and John falls though the opening and the door rapidly starts to close. Tombs jumps across and jams his J-8 gun into the doorway stopping the door from closing completely.
John gets up off the floor and finds himself in a half brightly and half dimly lit room. He goes back to the door and realises he has fallen though an outer door and inner door. The inner door has a round glass portal type window at head height. The outer door has no window.
He looks around the large room. It looks like it must be the ships flight deck with panels and gauges with a large oval window on its side separating to another room that looks like it has machinery inside of it.
SULTRY VOICE: “Hello John, how have you been?”
John looks into the dimly lit area where the voice is coming from. A figure walks from the dimly lit area but stays slightly in the shadows.
John walks forward a few steps and can see a beautiful woman with long black hair, dark eye makeup and blood red lipstick who looks like something like Ioa. She is wearing a tight black dress with a black pearl neckless and black stilettoes.
JOHN: “Ioa?”
SULTRY VOICE: “Veyah John, remember me?”
Veyah stands there looking at John, she is just slightly seductively swaying, not saying anything, just letting John take in all her beauty,
Outside in the corridor the rest of the crew are trying to force the door open.
TOMBS: “Its opening! It’s coming open!”
LUNA: “Nearly there!”
The forced door gives in and fully opens. The crew push forward to the second door and look though the porthole window and see John standing still inside the room apparently talking to someone they cannot see.
TOMBS: “He looks Ok!”
LUNA: “Who is he talking to?”
PORTER: “I can’t see anyone”
DIZZY: “I can’t see anything; all your heads are in the way”
The crew start banging on the door, but John hears nothing as the door is heavily sound insulated.
JOHN: “Veyah? What’s going on?”
VEYAH: “You sent me back to save your life John”
JOHN: “I don’t understand”
John walks forward and holds out his hand. Veyah holds out her hand, John tries to touch her fingers,
VEYAH: “I’m a hologram John, just like Ioa”
JOHN: “You look like very much like Ioa”
VEYAH: “That is because you based me on Ioa”
Veyah’s holographic image changes to an even more beautiful image, John’s stands back, his eyes open wide,
Luna gets a portable medial monitor from her medical bag that has started beeping. Tombs looks down at the monitor.
TOMBS: “Your monitoring Johns bio signs! Does he know?”
LUNA: “Yes I am, and his respiratory rate, heart rate and blood pressure have all gone high. Tombs can you see who the fuck he is talking too!”
TOMBS: “I can’t see anyone”
DIZZY: “Can I see?”
Porter looks around at Dizzy,
PORTER: “Dizzy! There’s nothing to see”.
DIZZY: “Then what you all looking at?”
Veyah moves out of the shadow a little more. She looks over at the door John came in though, aware that she could be seen by the crew looking through the window if she is she gets too close to John, so she takes a step back,
JOHN: “Wow”
Dizzy, unable to see anything looks around her surroundings and sees a small wall panel. She push’s her hand against it, and it pops open. She sees a lever inside with a letter and number on the handle marked as C-9
with a keypad above it.
She looks up at the door the crew are trying to get through and at the top of the heavy metal door frame is marked C-9. She pulls on the lever and a wide red-light flashes above it, so she types away at the keypad at android speeds many times.
The keypad suddenly gives a happy sounding beeping tone, and the wide red flashing light turns a steady green. She pulls the lever again and the door opens upwards and into the roof very quickly.
Tombs falls into the room with Porter and Luna landing on top of him.
DIZZY: “Ooopps!”
John looks around at the commotion. Veyah vanishes. Luna picks herself up and goes over to John holding the portable medial monitor out at him.
JOHN: “You’re still monitoring me?”
LUNA: “You ok? who you talking to?”
John turns and points to where Veyah was,
JOHN: “Veyah”
Luna squints at John,
LUNA: “Veyah again? Hmmm, Ok!”
Luna and John start arguing about John being scanned when they are interrupted by Porter,
PORTER: “CAPTAIN! I’ve scanned all of the ships interior now”.
JOHN: “Ok then, no need to stay here, may has well go and have a look at the data we collected”
Luna pulls Johns head down to hers and kisses him, then she shows him that she has turned off the device that has been monitoring him, John smiles back at Luna,
JOHN: “And, thank you”
Dizzy is looking down at the floor and sees a sliver looking rectangular box with rounded edges, 4 inches high, 2 inches wide and an inch thick laying on the floor where Veyah was standing. She picks it up and shows it to Tombs. Tombs inspects the object.
The object has four crystal cut round precious stone buttons imbedded into it, each one a different colour (Yellow, Blue, Mauve and Red) all just half an inch across
TOMBS: “Did you drop this John?”
JOHN: “What is it?”
John inspects the object, and the buttons start to flash on and off , the yellow one seems to glow on and off with John’s pulse.
DIZZY: “It likes you”
JOHN: “Strange? I didn’t see or drop this”.
LUNA: “This place is giving me the creeps John”
John puts his arm around Luna and gives her a gentle hug, TOMBS: “Me to, let’s go”
JOHN: “I just want to get some scans of this flight deck before we go”
John uses his hand-held scanner to survey the fight deck, a laser in the scanner zig zags around the flight deck until it finishes. The crew walk back to the airlock and step down outside where Ghost is using a pressure steam cleaner to clean down the side of the ship to reveal some writing beneath some large scorch marks on the side of the star ship. The letters are several feet high and some 40 feet long. The alien ships exterior airlock doorway stays open as they all step down.
GHOST: “Hey guys, look at this, almost looks like writing, lots of vertical looking letters”
Luna looks at the scorched looking letters on the hull of the alien ship and smiles,
LUNA: “VOODOO”
John is startled at what Luna has just said,
JOHN: “What!”
Luna looks at John, she sees that he is startled, her smile goes, LUNA: “Voodoo, it looks like the letters say Voodoo. John?”
JOHN: “Yeah, Yeah I guess it does”
LUNA: “What’s up?”
The crew are all looking at John. John wants to change the subject quickly,
JOHN: “Nothing, its Ok..
As they all walk over to the cargo bays exit Ghost looks back at the Voodoo. They all walk through the airlock and stand in the corridor and watch Tombs lock the cargo bay doors behind him.
JOHN: “I guess you all got things to do, I’m going to the lab, I need to study this data. I’ll see you all at breakfast tomorrow”.
The crew all acknowledge John leaving him looking though the cargo bay observation window at the Voodoo.
He spends the rest of the day pouring over Voodoo’s data until he is tired and goes to his and Lunas cabin quarters on the Alice.
In his room the curtains on the cabin balcony are open and are delicately blowing around. From the balcony an artificial but extremely realistic cloudless night view of a beach and sea views can be seen. Waves lashing on sand can be heard in their cabin.
He goes out onto the balcony and looks up into the clear dark sky where stars fill the heavens and a warm sea breeze wafts past him into the bedroom. John closes the large balcony doors, then changes his mind, he looks back at Luna laying on her side but sprawled out in bed with her bum sticking out from under the bedsheet. He smiles, then closes just one door leaving it half open so that the curtains gently waft in the warm soft wind.