Wonder

By Bryan Fowler

          Jaycinct the Bold gazed in wonder at the swirling planetary debris that surrounded the ever moving, ever evolving wormhole that was her immediate destination. “Was it worth it,” she thought? “Make the slightest mistake and I'll become an infinitely long piece of spaghetti”. Scratching her many tentacled multicoloured carapace she pondered for a moment. The dangers were great surely, but the rewards too were impressive. “Lets do this thing,” she thought, “but lets do it right”.

          Taking over complete control  of her interstellar ubercraft she began to design the complicated many faceted formulae that would she hoped allow her to navigate the perilous approach. Mind and machine were now completely integrated and the spacecraft effortlessly performed the complicated manoeuvrers that brought it to the very edge of this primordial passage to another universe.

          “I wonder if the time is right? thought Jaycinct, and without conscious thought she performed the complicated quantum calculations that corrected the time fluctuations that were an integrated part of this cosmic passageway. Reality blurred as they hurtled through the ever evolving space portal; atoms and galaxies were as one in this place that existed between time and space. And then after an infinite time, or was it milliseconds the craft erupted into real time and space.

          “So far so good,” exclaimed Jaycinct as she performed the mental calculations that passed back control to the spacecraft allowing it to follow their preplanned course to their destination. Now completely relaxed she lay back on her gravity bed  and watched the approaching orb growing larger and larger until it completely filled the viewing wall; she felt the faint vibration as they entered the atmosphere, and the antigravity thrusters that would guide them to their ultimate destination burst into life,“I wonder if I’ll be in time?” thought Jaycinct as she emerged into the car park of the Jolly Roger; but then she saw the bright lights; and heard the babble of happy voices, and the clink of glasses, so full of extraterrestrial joy she vibrated her way over to that wonderful door marked BAR