Infinity 1.0

-Present Time-

    I stared at the old woman sitting hunchbacked as she tend to a couple of healthy-looking rose bushes.  My heart leaped to my throat.  In my mind it was as if I just saw her yesterday, but my vision says otherwise.  She still looked beautiful in my eyes, although instead of the soft black hair I was used to, her hair was now as white as snow.  Her mouth, which used to curve mischievously, was creased and her eyes, which used to twinkle brightly, were lined with weariness.  Tears filled my eyes and I think I gasped out loud.  She glanced over to my direction, looking surprised for a second but after recovering, gave me a beaming smile.

    "Hey stranger!  I didn't know you were coming for a visit," she said as the phone rang from inside of the house.  She started to get up unsteadily and before I knew it, I was reaching out a hand to help her up. 

    "Let me get the phone," she told me, wiping her hands over the apron she was wearing.  "And Luke, could you put my gardening tools in order please?"  She smiled at me again before slowly making her way towards the house.

    I stared at her back while grief spread through me.  My name is not Luke.  Ever since I came back, it has been a conscious battle on whether I should visit her or not.  But now, seeing her up close and knowing for sure that I have already lost the life that I knew; perhaps it would have been better if I had stayed away from the very beginning.  Silly me.  Of course I couldn't help but see her.  She was, after all, the woman I had thought about daily for the past couple of years or so.

-Thirty Five Years Earlier-

    Leila stared at the three pink roses arranged by the windowsill.  Instead of smiling like she usually do, Leila felt gloomy.  Today is the day, she thought.  But a couple of years will pass by fast enough, she said to herself consolingly.

    Lorenzo, who was watching her from across the room, came over to her and held her tightly in his arms.  "Those roses are to remind you that I love you Leila.  I just want you to know that."

    Leila smiled tightly.  Soon Lorenzo, her husband, will be aboard Infinity, the spacecraft that will send him and four other people orbiting around the far regions of the galaxy.  It was hard to be the wife of such a distinguished man and while Leila was happy that Lorenzo will be embarking on a journey he had dreamt of and worked on for years, fear still clutched her heart tightly.

    Surely Lorenzo will be okay, Leila thought.  There's no reason to worry.  It isn't the first time that somebody will be launched into space after all. 

    That last bit was true enough.  The sudden advancement of their space programs had been so immense that it was almost considered a norm for space teams to go to the farthest planet in their solar system and back.  But still, traveling the edges of the galaxy was a whole new chapter altogether and like any new venture, there were also risks involved. 

    "As speed increases, time slows down, doesn't it?" she turned to look at her husband.  Lorenzo was not only kind and intelligent but also possesses such a handsome countenance that Leila's breath got caught up in her throat.  "When you return, you will still be young, while I have aged!"

    "Silly girl," Lorenzo laughed.  "You know as well as I that even though our spaceship will travel at the fastest humankind has ever achieved, no abrupt physical changes will ever be seen by the naked eye.  Besides, even if you have aged a couple of years and I have not, I will love you anyway."

    "When you return, our son will surely have aged," Leila said, pointing to the sleeping six-month old baby at the crib.  "When you return he will almost be a young man."

    Lorenzo looked at the baby who opened his lashes at that minute as if he knew he was being watched.  Even from afar, Lorenzo could see his own features etched upon the little baby's face.  "He will, won't he?" 

    When I return, I'll make it up to you little fella, Lorenzo vowed.  He thought of the days and nights he had spent working on the space center.  While he hasn't told Leila yet, he had already decided months ago that this mission will be the last he'll undertake.  People might think he was too dedicated to his job to resign and might even envy him for having such a lucrative career but to Lorenzo, family will always be number one.  Spending time apart from one's family because of a career was never worth it, at least to his eyes.

    "Are you sure you don't want to see me off?" Lorenzo asked burrowing his face on Leila's soft hair.

    "I'm sure," Leila whispered.  "I'm a crybaby, you know that.  Just promise me you'll come back.  And I promise you I will pray for you and the crew aboard Infinity every day, until the day you come back to us safely."

    "Of course I'll come back silly goose," Lorenzo said.  "I promise."

0-0-0-0-0

    The asteroids flew around the ship and Lorenzo couldn't help but look in awe at the sight before him.  Even after a year aboard the ship, it never fails to amaze him how different the view was from up there as against the view down on earth.

    Pierre, the unofficial photographer of the group, was snapping up pictures left and right. 

    "You could use the official ship cameras Pierre," Lorenzo reminded him for the hundredth time.

    "And I prefer my polaroids, thank you," the intelligent man, the youngest aboard the ship, told him again politely.

    The Infinity Crew composed of Lorenzo, Pierre, Maia, Chuck and Greg.  Like Lorenzo, Pierre specializes on the machineries on board, Maia and Chuck were a tag team on the controls, while Greg was the commander of the ship.  Lorenzo liked the young man he was working with.  There was something about his youthfulness that was a delight to see.  He could almost see him thinking of posting the photos on various social media sites have they had access to them.

    "Those are beautiful," Lorenzo breathed in as he looked over the young man's photos.  Of course not as beautiful as the ones I left behind but they will do, he thought, smiling to himself.

    Pierre, who was now sitting on his workplace looking over the photos he had taken hours before, was classifying the good photos from the bad.  He did this everyday to pass time but when he got to one photo, he frowned, peering at the captured scenery before him.

    "Lorenzo?" he called out after a few minutes of silence.

    "Yes?"

    "Could you take a look at this picture?"  Pierre slid the photo over the table.

    Lorenzo caught it deftly and looked at the seemingly pristine photo of faraway stars.  But a deep, black void at the right edge of the picture caught his eye making him doubt whether he was really seeing what he thought he was. 

    "Tell me that isn't what I think it is," Pierre pleaded.

    Lorenzo gazed back at the stricken young man.  "I think we should tell the others," his voice sounded shaky, even to his own ears.  "We couldn't be this close to a black hole and definitely not to something as big as that one.  It will be suicide."


To be continued...