[Military research vessel Bai Ze: 13:27 UTC +11, Mid Level Dorms]

Warning sirens blared; both the lights and the markings on the walls changed from their respective white and blue to an ominous orange. In that instant, Jun and his twin sister Ai stood up from their desks and reached out for their weapons. They felt comfort in the distinctive hiss they heard as their armour exploded out of its concealment and locked into position around their bodies. It had them in protective isolation suits before their hands made contact with their guns, and they were out of the room in less than a second.

"No time to complain," Ai called out, as much to herself as to her brother, "We need to get to our lab."

Perfectly in step, the two flew through the corridors of the Bai Ze, passed below the familiar sign of an illuminated R&D underlined by the silhouette of an assault rifle, and took up posts on either side of the door. Jun stood to the left of the entrance as he consulted with the on duty AI for the nature of the unknown entity that had been detected in the atmosphere while Ai ensured that the influx of staff directed themselves to the correct positions in the room.

The doors slid shut, exhaling softly as the sealant found its purchase, locking all within the room. Silence weighed down the dimmed, inactive machinery; its silhouette an ominous skyline of black and amber. Separate columns of engineers and doctors spread out before the statuesque security officers, stoic in their anticipation of a worst case scenario. Seconds seemed like hours, but relief seeped into the room, heralded by the near inaudible blip, and small green indicator of a clean atmosphere that appeared in the upper right corner of their heads up displays. The lab was safe.

One of the doctors adjusted his lab coat. An engineer wiped the faceplate of her gas mask with a gloved hand. Movement returned and the various rustlings crescendoed as workers began heading towards various glowing monitors for an update on the situation.

The green light flashed red.

A single unidentified microorganism was detected in one of the test chambers.

"Seals intact," an engineer disclosed, "How the hell..."

"Torch it."

"No good."

"Radiation?"

"Ineffective."

Red zones spread in Jun's HUD, the bio-lab had produced a targeted antibody nanobot, but it would take time to produce, and the effects of the invading organism were currently unknown.

"Something is wrong here," Ai mumbled the obvious as she leaned over an information panel, "I'm detecting gravitational distortions."

"Too much mass?" Jun suggested, thinking that any teleporting microorganism would cause gravity some trouble.

"Not enough." she replied.

One of the doctors kicked a wall in frustration when the red zone had encompassed the entire facility. Suddenly, illumination poured from the ceiling, warning lights deactivated, red zones receded, doors unsealed, and the ventilation system pumped the bio-lab's remedy into the air. All would have seemed calm if the room hadn't shaken with the minuscule tremor that accompanied the firing of the Bai Ze's main cannons.

[Military research vessel Bai Ze: 13:40 Ship Time, Meeting Room 825b]

Jun, Ai, and a communications overseer sat, waiting to be debriefed. The meeting room was standard fair aboard the Bai Ze: small, but not cramped. A black, single legged table that seated all three comfortably sat in the center of the room. The misty, marble patterned floor could swallow a man whole, and the walls were two toned: ash below slate, separated by a band of alabaster that illuminated the room. Overhung by a gently sloped, vaulted ceiling, the trio awaited the filling of the fourth seat in silence.

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The man interrupted Jun's admiration of the architecture, "We're fucked."

"Look," the overseer responded to the disapproval emanating from the twins, "Only five minuets after the bio-hazard incident," he preformed a textbook shoulder check, "We lost contact with Earth."

"The signals were jammed?" questioned a skeptical Ai, "Or was it sabotage?"

"No," he was beginning to sound desperate, "Earth went silent, not us. Do you understand?"

Discouraged by the lack of a response he continued, "I'm telling you right now. Earth is gone, we're harbouring an unknown biological weapon, and nobody even seems to care!"

"So things aren't looking especially good right now," Jun attempted to calm the man down, "But, we were trained for unexpected setbacks. This is nothing."

"Unexpected setbacks!?" the overseer slammed his fist onto the table for emphasis, "Shit didn't just hit the fan. That would be too easy, no, WE ARE ONE, GODDAMN MILLIMETER AWAY FROM RUNNING OUT OF SHIT TO THROW AT THE FUCKER!!!"

The man would have been forcefully pacified had not Dung Qi, from the Bai Ze Intelligence Corps, strode into the room, ushering silence. He observed the three as they stood at attention while the door slid shut behind him; the curtain at the final act of a play. He motioned for them to sit down and maintained his position in the corner. With a gesture the wall behind him became a display screen for his presentation.

The footage was shot on a helmet cam, and it showed the soldier taking the space elevator up for a patrol when her squad was alerted to the mysterious organism. Not allowed to abandon their patrol, the guards could only wait until the elevator reached a platform. When it did, they raised their weapons and began a sweep of the lower observation deck. The atmosphere was below them as they worked, the void of space contrasted against the blue that was their home. The cam captured a view beyond the horizon, a view of eternity, a view of the black from whence humanity came.

The soldier noticed a green incandescence from below, and the footage slowed as she proceeded to investigate. Inverted raindrops of radiance rose steadily from below, in their wake a slowly tightening, all encompassing web. They spilled towards eternity until only white brilliance remained. Ultraviolet, infrared, it didn't matter; in that instant, the only thing visible on screen was an elegant brilliance as gentle as it was blinding. Finally, its splendor fading, the mysterious cocoon that had enveloped the Bai Ze faded back to a familiar black.

What the camera managed to refocus on was not, however, the eternity beyond horizons, but the glory of unexpected discovery. A cavalry charge, depicted in an ethereal blossom of vermillion and mauve created the sight of a prodigious nebula. Below, tendrils of clouds snaked away from the Bai Ze, revealing a new world, as yet undiscovered by humanity.