*VLog- Day 136*

The static faded as a man with dishevelled dark brown hair pushed the loose frames of his glasses back up on the bridge of his nose. Behind the black spectacles were intelligent grey eyes which stared steadily into the camera lens. His chiselled jaw clenched before he cleared his throat and began speaking.

"Dr Rui Ozai recording from my laboratory on May 14th 2031 at 11:01 UTC. Today will be the 43rd physical test of the T.M.A." Without any explanation of his acronym, the Physicist stood aside to tap on his computers' clunky keyboard. Each keystroke seemed to reverberate in the large room. The camera glimpsed a spherical metal device on a raised platform behind him for a moment before he shuffled back into the camera's frame.

In a very bored tone, the man explained, "Using calibration 17. F and amplifying the output from 3% capacity to 5%. Without further ado, initiating Test number 43 in 3, 2, 1..."

His countdown ended as the mysterious device emitted a shockwave of high-pitched screeching. The ear-splitting noise unsettled the dust and loose paperwork in the room, sending them into a whirlwind. The Doctor garbled something incomprehensible as he lurched for the console's keyboard. Suddenly a blinding burst of white light swallowed up the sound of his screams and every object in its circular field. The illumination extended well beyond the platform before fading out just as quickly as it had begun.

In the eerie silence and darkness that followed, the camera's red recording light was barely enough to discern the aftermath of the once fully furnished lab. Faintly the camera filmed where seconds before computers, desks, and equipment stood, now nothing remained but a few scraps of paper still swirling to the ground.

The concrete floor and ceiling were carved out perfectly in the centre of the room. Almost as if the orb of light had gobbled them up whole. All the computer data, the Physicist, and the device had vanished into thin air. Nevertheless, the camera continued to record the darkened shell of a room until its battery life was utterly depleted.

*End of VLog recording*

~

A sleek looking conference room filled with scientists, high ranking government officials and generals watched the black pixelated image on a giant television screen. The meeting room was utterly silent as the recording inched into its second minute of the aftermath.

"43 is his lucky number," a small voice murmured, what was meant to be an internal thought. Due to the lack of noise in the room, her quiet voice sounded like a shout in contrast. All heads turned to the tiny woman in her white lab coat. The inquisitive looks from the entire room forced her head downwards, and she stared intently at the mahogany table.

General Silas Robertson was eyeing the lady scientist with a glower before turning his attention back to the room. "Lucky numbers aside, the question here is what on earth was he working on?"

Silence punctuated the packed meeting room once more. "We've spared no cost in funding UNSEP's* next starship... and here we have video evidence of the lead scientist working on whatever the hell a T.M.A. is?"

*The United Nations Space Exploration Program (UNSEP).

"T.M.A. is not mentioned in the original schematics. Would anyone care to explain, or has Ozai gone rogue?" The voice belonged to the grim-looking head of the national treasury Yurick Van Der Meulen. The word rogue had everyone side eyeing each other, it meant something else entirely. Traitor.

The scientists in the room typically appeared uncomfortable during their monthly status update. Yet some seemed more skittish and paler than usual.

"Why not ask Ozai?" One of the fresh-faced scientists asked nervously as his eyes skimmed over the government officials' faces. Doctor Reid may have looked twelve, but his paper on jet propulsion engines was groundbreaking. If M.I.T. had an honours degree, he would have won it but instead, he secured a coveted spot to UNSEP before the ink on his degree had even dried.

"We would if we could." The head of UNSEP, Dr Johnny Chen, spoke, a glimmer of sadness marring his typically brisk and authoritative tone. "This recording is the last known sighting of Rui."

"He's been missing since May?" Feelings of shame and horror washed over the faces of Dr Ozai's colleagues as they wondered how such a major thing like the lead scientist disappearing slipped their notices for so long. The room descended into a chorus of murmurings.

"Enough!" General Robertson yelled while slamming the wooden table with a closed fist. The room was hushed once more. "We need answers. Now you all worked closely with the late Ozai. What was he working on?! What is T.M.A.?"

After another hour of relentless questioning and General Robertson's threat of follow-up one-on-one meetings, the meeting concluded. Either the Science division of UNSEP were masters of a poker face or simply unaware of the unsanctioned pet project.

The scientists trailed out of the room, visibly exhausted from the interrogation. But one, in particular, followed closely after Doctor Chen. They fell into stride together as he heard her high heels clicking against the tiled corridor.

"Why didn't you tell me? When I asked you about him last week," she whispered, conscious of being overheard by the others that were trailing after them.

"You know how he got; we all thought he had a breakthrough. He locked himself in that bunker for seven months once." His weak deflection made her instantly see red. There were too many secrets in the organisation she'd given up friends, family, joy, basically any chance of a life and untold hours of sleep for. They'd all been working tirelessly for years on this project, and it was beginning to take its toll, both emotionally and physically.

"We both know Rui's paranoid about security. That was a private and heavily encrypted network; how did they even obtain this footage? Just who else is the Government keeping tabs on?"

"Please, Doctor Ash, don't delude yourself into thinking any moment is private. It may have taken months, but they cracked his firewall, as they may well do with yours." His whispered words made her stop dead in her tracks. It was more who was delivering the thinly veiled threat that surprised her. She'd always considered Chen an ally, until now.

Spinning on her heels, her poor choice in footwear echoed down the lengthy tiled corridor. She cursed herself, loathing the shoes and the fact that she hadn't come up with a witty rebuttal. Instead, she'd turned tail, her usually impressive I.Q. eluding her. Shortly after arriving at her office on the 15th floor, she immediately unstrapped the offending heels and threw them into the overflowing wastepaper basket. She felt like an utter fool; after all, she'd only worn them in the hopes of seeing Rui and showing him just what he had been missing. Of course, it was juvenile, but she had thought the same of his attempt at ghosting a colleague after their ill-decided entanglement.

Sitting at her desk, she slipped her aching toes into some comfy loafers and slumped in her leather chair. The office suite was large and encompassed an impressive view of the City. It was kitted out with a mini-fridge, ensuite and couch, which was fortunate considering she spent more time there than in her apartment. Nevertheless, it had been a full two weeks since she'd been home, and the horrid state of her office was proof.

A silver frame on her desk stared her in the face; the picture was of the entire Science Division at a Fundraiser Gala two years prior. However, that hadn't been why she'd gone to the effort of printing the picture and framing it. The reason was Rui's arm casually draped around her shoulder. His wide dimpled grin stared at the camera while she gazed at his profile, which made the photograph so special to her.

'Late Doctor?' Her mind dwelt on the General's rather bleak description of Rui. So he hadn't been ignoring her after all, he was... Even her thoughts trailed off, unable to bring the word to the surface as tears welled in her eyes. He couldn't be... Though people like Rui never really died, truly visionary Scientists like himself were immortalised by their creations/discoveries just like Tesla and Curie. Still, the echo of his breath on her lips, his skin against her fingertips, it all felt so vivid. He was real; he had to be alive. How else would the mere thought of him make her feel awake for the first time in days?

Reeling with muddled thoughts, she powered down her Workstation for the first time in weeks and swapped her coat for a casual cardigan. The commute through the City felt strange, her favourite Sushi bar was now an artisan Cafe, and roadworks littered the City streets. A previously One-Way street was now dual-laned. The world was changing around her so quickly it was staggering. She was stunned to see that Christmas decorations framed the Cities Library and mall districts. So it's that time of year again; where did the time go?

A flash of last Christmas struck her, and she paused dead in her tracks on the cracked sidewalk. Rui's words rang in her mind clear as day as if he was speaking to her directly; she could clearly imagine his dark grey eyes twinkling with enthusiasm.

"The problem always was and always will be time. Even if we achieve space travel at the speed of light, it's not enough. By the time our fastest ship could ever reach the outer rim of our galaxy, even if our crew is in stasis pods protecting them from the effects of speeds, no human could survive; even then, everyone they knew would have died of old age. Integrating time travel into the ships engine core would eliminate the issue of time..."

Suddenly Dr Evelyn Ash knew exactly what T.M.A. stood for and what Rui had been attempting to achieve.

"Rui, you son-of-a-bitch, did you actually try to do it?"

~

Author's note: Hiya, So I'm trying my hand at Sci-Fi, let me know what you think? Interesting start to a story or meh?