Making this a blog post and not official page since it’s kinda a more conceptual thing than actually complete. I have more planned, may or may not finish it in the future.
The earth date was December 31st, 2999. A great conference hall bustling with spectators and reporters geared up with cameras and tachyon transmitters, both having traveled several lightyears to attend. The crowd talked endlessly to each other, observing the massive transparent aluminium window at the end of the hall. It presented an endlessly starry landscape of space, dominated by a massive spherical distortion. Not to further in the distance was a stream of transport ships going to and from a city-sized space station, silently orbiting around the the distortion. The crowd’s chatter faded out as a well-dressed man walked up to a podium set up right in front of the window. He cleared his throat and leaned over towards the microphone.
“It has been centuries since humanity had finally breached the neverending expanse of space, achieving what our ancient ancestors could and could not imagine: Technological and medical marvels, skylines that towered miles into the sky, weapons that allowed us to tame any enviroment. These achievements need to be forever recorded, and that is what we are all here for, no? My dear compatriots, on the eve of the twenty-fourth century, we present humanity’s greatest technological marvel: The Immortality Station!”
Suddenly the window changed to a different screen, presenting the station more in focus. The crowd applauded and cheered.
“This will be a slice of our golden era, a station several square kilometers large to house replicas of our finest megacities and architecture, all the way down to furnishing, transportation, infrastructure, and so forth! A comprehensive armory of the greatest our military has to offer in both land and space! The finest of our blossoming robotics program, from service androids to combat droids, each to emulate daily life in the megacities! Lastly, and certainly the greatest, a detailed digital library of all of our events and discoveries, from human matters to xeno discoveries!”
The crowd continued to applaud and cheer, their voices resounding prominently off the hall walls.
“One of those discoveries is going to be the most decisive part in the Infinity Station’s mission! The key, my friends, involves the black hole we all observed before! When the earth-clock strikes midnight and 2400 begins, the station will maneuver into close orbit of the black hole, allowing it to travel through time. One minute for the station will be around one year for us, you see. We will send this slice of our golden era to the dawn of 2500, where we’ll likely see a similar conference! From there, who knows what they will do with this incredible museum? Historians could get a physical replica of how life was a century ago, in absolutely perfect condition no less! Perhaps this era could inspire the future generation to begin another golden age? Only time will tell my friends, and that station will have all the time in the galaxy!”
The crowd exploded into a roar, cameras flashing and tachyon transmitters displyaing images faster than light speeds to every home in every colony humanity had established. The man continued smiling and waving as the window suddenly changed to a massive clock, ticking down from twenty-nine minutes. The crowd chattered and cheered and struggled to get close to the man as he walked down from the stage, a few more threatening men in suits keeping the onslaught at a distance.
Fifteen minutes left on the clock. The armada of cargo ships was streaming continuously out at this point, every worker struggling to get every last weapon, vehicle, or piece of furniture onto the Infinity Station.
Ten minutes. The stream of ships had horribly thinned out. Only a single cargo ship moved towards the station. From its cockpit, a pilot dressed like every other cargo pilot noticed the comms panel light up, receiving a transmission from the administrator ship. He quickly tapped the screen.
“What the hell are you doing? We haven’t checked your cargo yet!”
The pilot spoke in a scratchy voice.
“I don’t think we have the time. Our ship had some engine issues along with a mix-up with the cargo we were supposed to deliver.”
“I said, get back here now!”
“I said, we don’t have any time! Last thing I think Mr. Jack wants to hear is about how his museum is incomplete, no?”
“But…”
“Listen, I’m gonna save both of our asses from him and just have droids deliver what we need to where it needs to be, got it? I’ll get right in and out, he’ll be none the wiser about this little slip-up.”
“…Fine. We’re keeping this between us though, right?”
“No problem sir.”
With a quick tap he closed the comms.
Seven minutes. The ship landed in the now desolate cargo bay. The cockpit hatch popped open as the pilot hopped out, banging his fist on the side of the ship.
“Let’s get this all unloaded! You have one minute!”
The back hatch of the ship dropped open as three others rushed out, quickly unloading various boxes onto the cargo bay floor. The first was a lanky looking man with short black hair, wearing a large coat and baggy pants almost covering his work boots, hefting along a box that seemed too large for his stature. The next was a long brown-haired woman with a visibly strong build, wearing a tank top and cargo pants with combat boots, shoving along a large wheeled platform with a few cylindrical tanks stowed upon it. Last was a man with a bushy gray beard who wore a simple shirt and pair of shorts to reveal the fact that he had a robotic leg and arm along with an eyepatch, carrying a few bags over his shoulders and dragging along a small. They moved too and fro, unloading a small pile of containers, bags, and boxes all onto the platform. When the female placed the last box on the platform, a robotic voice resounded through the hangar bay.
“Five minutes until close orbital entry. All personnel, please clear from the station.”
The pilot turned to the lanky man.
“James, hurry up and do your thing.”
James nodded and hurried over to him, opening the door to the cockpit while taking a metal circuit-board looking device out of his jacket. He quickly pried a panel off from behind the joystick and quickly hooked it up. The ship’s engines roared to life as he scrambled out. It slowly hovered upwards, sealing all of the doors automatically, then shot out of the hangar bay. A few moments later, the ship combust into flames, a mess of debris, electronics, and a single charred corpse all sent flying in different directions. The pilot sneered at the sight.
“Three minutes to orbital entry. All ships, please depart immediately. Engaging radiation and stress shielding.”
The starry void slowly was blotted out by massive encroaching slabs of metallic shielding, both colliding with a deafening thunk. The pilot turned to the rest of his crew.
“We’re all set now. Let’s get a move on now, we’ve got fifty-three minutes!”
The group hurried towards one of the doorways leading deeper towards the station. The first of the doors automatically opened, but a second interior one refused to, a panel next to it flashing the message “Maneuvering procedures engaging. No access.” The pilot glanced back to the rest of the group.
“Marie, you’re up.”
“Yes Captain!” He stepped to the side as she reached into one of the bags, pulling out a handheld plasma cutter and pair of gloves. She moved towards the screen, firing up a stream of plasma from the cutter, moving it towards the edges of the screen. She deftly moved it around the edges of it and, with a strong tug, pulled it right off the walls, revealing a jungle of wires. With gloved hands, she dexterously searched through the mess, rearranging and unplugging a few wires. She pulled out a PDA from her pocket and hooked it up to the door, typing away. A few moments passed and the door suddenly hissed open. With a grin, she disconnected her PDA and shoved it back into her pocket, tossing the plasma cutter back from where she retrieved it.
“Good, but next time we need to be a bit faster. Let’s keep moving.”
The captain and his crew moved through a short corridor until they entered a small suburb stretching forth into an ever-expanding city. Each of the suburbs had a hover-transport parked out front and an automated android family, each one going through the motion of their pre-programmed average human life. Just over the roofs of several smaller houses were several dozen skyscrapers, each one bustling with the sounds of traffic both on land and zooming between each building. The captain turned to his crew once more.
“James, where to next?”
He brought out a PDA of his own and began scrolling through it.
“Yes um… According to the schematics, the city center should have a lift straight to the command center.”
The group suddenly felt the station slowly jerk.
“Think you can commandeer one of those transports?”
“It Should be no problem, I have a program to help us with that.”
Moments later, they were flying over the simulated city, observing the replication of life from the skies of the station. From this distance, without seeing the droids’ obvious plastic skin as they wandered about the city, it almost looked real. Pulling in closer to his destination, carelessly crashing into and shoving aside a parked craft as he made his descent. Everyone unloaded quickly, rapidly taking every piece of equipment out of the trunk and hurried to the entrance, which was sealed by a few massive slabs of steel.
“Marie, can you handle this?”
She quickly swiped the PDA from James’s hand, scrolling through it for a few moments before handing it back.
“No can do captain. The thing is internally locked on a timer, won’t be open till it exits orbit of the black hole.”
“Fine then. Herman, you’re up next then.”
All of the crew except for the eyepatched one quickly moved several meters away behind a nearby building. Herman lugged some of the larger crates towards the door. After creating a nice stack of them, he took a drill from one of the bags, and drilled a fine hole in the bottommost crate. He next procured a spool of thin wire, sticking one of the ends in the crate and wheeling it back to where the rest of the crew was hiding. Lighting the fuse, the sparks ran all the way up towards the crate, resulting in a massive ball of flame and a shockwave the rest of the crew felt. As the smoke cleared, all that was left of the door was a smouldering hole. The pilot grinned.
“Good work as always!”
“No problem Drake.”
They hurried through the molten doorway into a rather nice looking reception area, decorated with a few artificial plants and a nice collection of furniture to house its would-be guests. The elevator opened automatically as they approached, the party easily entering the machine large enough to house around twenty people. Drake smacked the highest button on the panel and the door closed as it began to ascend rapidly. Moments later after the elevator made the all too familiar ding, the doors opened to a fairly large control center. Dozens of room-high computer towers dominated the walls, each of them having a console and monitor attached. At the end of the room against a window which looked out to the radiation plating sat what was obviously the command center. Marie and James hurried over to it, Marie quickly getting to work on one of the terminals as James hooked up his PDA to another. Herman simply sat atop the wheeled platform, resting against a few of the boxes, while Drake grinned, walking past each individual tower.
“Absolutely perfect… How much do you think a single one of these will be worth in fifty years?”
“More than enough for all of us I presume.”
“That’ll be just around enough for what I need! Along with a few souvenirs from here as well… How’s the progress coming you two? I want to browse what our prize has in store fully!”
Marie held up a single finger as she knelt below the terminal, removing one of the panels. James’s screen suddenly flashed green.
“Managed to crack the codes to the data archives. Here,” He tossed his PDA to Drake. “Just hook it up to any one of those data towers and you’ll have unhindered access.”
Marie held up her hand again. “James, get me another one of those PDA-things, I’ve tapped into flight controls. Just need to re-write it’s orders.”
He pulled another from his jacket and handed it to her. She plugged it into a tangle of wires all tied together with a simple string and tapped in a few lines of code.
“We’re all good here now, this thing is set to de-orbit in around forty-five minutes from now!”
Drake plugged the PDA into one of the towers. The screen lit up, welcoming him.
“Great job everyone. Now if you excuse me…” He scrolled through a few menus, selecting a menu that displayed several images of expensive and dangerous looking spacecraft. “I’m gonna go see what we can borrow from here once we get all of our money.”
Fish Stories 
Stunning story there. What happened after? Take care!
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