The Stellar Spiral

21st September, 2300

“ISRC, this is Station Base. Requesting Captain Carol to initiate the launch sequence and raise IS Helios till around 10, 00,000 Kms from Earth. You are stationed there for 90 days, following which you can start the return sequence. Stay in touch & Good Luck..!”

“Let’s start the mission, Commander Julian..!” Carol said as she started the ignitions.

23rd December, 2399

Carol woke up with a start. She felt as though she had a very big dream. Even after waking up she had clear memories from her dream. As she put her foot down, everything seemed familiar. She checked the time on the clock and filled a glass with water. The same déjà vu feeling. Sensing something, she woke up. She remembered Commander Julian; her assistant was sleeping in the next room. As she opened the door & stepped in the corridor, again she remembered all the things.

“Julian…!” Carol almost screamed as she entered in “Get up fast…!! We are in a time loop..! We’ve been reliving this day every time….!” She said as Julian woke up. “Check our clocks. It’s 01:00 pm now. Our clocks are not moving ahead…! They are stuck at 4:00 pm..!” As Julian rose up, he remembered everything. The past occurrences, the things done in the previous loops, everything came out in his mind.

“I remember we tried to find a solution in the previous loop.” Julian said as he rose up. “Let’s get to the cockpit. I hope you remember how we came in this loop...”

“Yeah...I remember. The Cosmic Celestial Rings...” Carol answered with her knowledge from the previous loops, “narrow tubes of energy stretched across the entire length of the ever-expanding universe. These thin regions, left over from the early cosmos, are predicted to contain huge amounts of mass and therefore could warp the space-time around them. We accidentally entered the orbit while we launched ourselves 10, 00,000 kms from earth.”

“That’s right. I remember trying a number of methods in the previous loops. But all of them were unsuccessful. We have to find a solution in this loop itself.” Julian said as he entered the main cockpit of IS Helios. “These Cosmic Celestial Rings are in parallel orbits, each having its own different time. At the end of this loop, we’ll come at that point where all the infinite orbits meet. This will cause huge space and time wrap around it. It’s like getting caught inside a Blaprevick Hole, where space and time interchange themselves bending everything around it. We’ll vanish inside & probably all the loops will end here. We won’t be able to start the loop again. We’ll either vanish, or we’ll just emerge out nowhere.”

Now Carol slowly remembered some things from the previous loops. Back on Earth, in 24th Century, human population had overgrown extensively causing severe shortage of land and water. The option left was to live in space, till scientists find another habitable planet. IS Helios was sent in space with samples of plants in it, to check their sustainability and production of energy high above earth in space.

“Let’s move out of the orbit…” Carol said as she moved towards the steering.

“Wait…..” Julian said as he checked the entry logs in the Spaceship’s main server, “Did you check the date?”

As Carol checked the present date, she was shocked. “It means we are in this loop for….” “99 years. Time is running quite slow inside this orbit. As per the theory of relativity, 3 hours spent inside this Cosmic Orbit is equivalent to 3 years spent on earth. In one of our previous loops, we had checked this calculation. This is our loop number 33, so we are inside this loop for 99 years..!” Carol couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “All the loops are getting recorded in the Spaceship’s server. At the end of the loop, the server restarts, and so do we.” Julian paused for a moment, judging the different probabilities which can be tried out. “We have woken up 33 times till now, and all the things that we have tried are recorded here.”

“Let’s try and exit the Cosmic Orbit.” Carol said this as she approached the controls, “We’ll move away from the orbit as far as we could…..”

“Carol, please understand. We are inside since the past 99 years. If we exit out immediately, we’ll straightaway come under the clear time zone, and our bodies will immediately turn 99 years old, probably more than that. We’ll die instantly, as we may not have survived for more than 99 years in real life.” He pressed some keys on the keyboard. Showing her the screen, he said, “See this. We already tried this option somewhere in the past loops. We eliminated ourselves instantly, and landed back in the loop.”

Carol again got lost in her thoughts. As she thought something, she glanced at her clothes. She had been wearing the same set of clothes since the last loops. However, somehow, she felt those clothes loose. To cross check her doubts, she went and saw her weight. It had reduced and so was her Body Mass Index.

“These loops are taking a toll on her health…” she came and told Julian, who was still trying to find a solution on the time loop problem.

“Yes. Our bodies need to adjust to the time loops. Every time we start a loop, our bodies have to bounce back on the previous health, for which they require certain energy from our bodies itself. Even I have lost some weight” Observing his hands & legs, he said.

Carol was still not able to get a solution. They had still 100 minutes left, before the Time warp starts. Suddenly Carol got an idea. She ran to the computer and got info on the Celestial Orbits. Checking the information, she did some calculations. Confirming the results, she spoke to Julian, “Julian, these Celestial Orbits are made up of certain smaller time orbits which have their own individual frames of time. Why don’t we move the ship inside another orbit which has slower time rate as compared to the one we are now? This will help us buy more time and subsequently...”

“We have tried that...” Julian answered irritatingly, “We had tried that in one of our past loops. But unfortunately, we landed directly in front of our past. It became a Paradox, and we bounced back to the start of the loop.” Scratching his head, Julian said, “We have tried almost everything, including sending a message back to earth. But all the signals here are blocked inside the Celestial Orbit. Nothing goes out from here. Back there on earth, we are presumed lost, almost more than 90 years back.” Feeling depressed, he approached the Observation Glass on the cockpit.

Suddenly, Julian noticed something. “Carol…!” he almost screamed. “Look …you see this?” He pointed outside at a point. Carol looked there. Surprised, she couldn’t believe what she saw.

On the furthermost right, she saw a Star being born, with beautiful Supernovas around it. At the same time, at a point on left, she saw the same star exploding and creating another Supernova. It was like she could see the same star being formed and then dying.

“We are in the Time Dimension…!” Carol almost screamed. “After Length, Height and Depth, Time is a fourth dimension. In this dimension, we can view our past as well as our future. We can even try going backwards or forwards in time.” Realising something, Carol exclaimed, “We could use this Dimension to probably send a message to someone, most likely to…”

“Our Past…!” Carol shouted in excitement. “First, let’s check whether have we done this in our past...”

“We had done this, but were unable to send any signal anywhere, since we are caught inside this orbit.” Julian said, “I know somehow we can definitely send a signal to our past, using the Time dimension. My idea is to send a message to our past, almost 99 years back, the day when we entered the Cosmic Celestial Rings. This will reset everything, since we will not enter the orbits. Our mission was planned only for 90 days. We could finish and then return back to earth. However...” he stopped considering the fact, “We need to know how to contact. Even though we are in the time dimension, we cannot use it as no signals can go anywhere out. I dunno how can we make a contact to our past…”

As Carol observed the readings in their past loops, she came across a reading indicating the health of the plants they had for their experiment. Being a Human, since her body mass was getting reduced, eventually the plant’s mass should also reduce. But the readings were showing something different.

“Julian….you need to see this…” As Julian observed, even he was dumbstruck.

“The Plants are not reducing in mass. Why is it? How’s this possible?” Julian questioned on seeing the Plant’s health readings on the server computer. In spite of being time looped more than 90 times, all the plants indicated no decrease in their weight, as also in their overall chlorophyll & protein content.

“Let’s check them out. Maybe something’s wrong...”

With around 70 minutes left for the time warp to start, both Julian and Carol entered the main lab. All the plants were kept horizontally stacked one over the other in racks. Julian examined every single plant as well as the soil around them. No signs of losing the nutrition content, as well as no chlorophyll content were reduced. All the plants were healthy and intact.

Julian and Carol again observed the readings. No fault was found in the readings. They were absolutely clear.

“Julian..!I think I found what is happening..!” Carol almost screamed as she discovered something. “These plants are very intelligent! They are sending certain signals to their past to balance the energy outcome..! They are using the Time Dimension for their signals and by doing this, their past are actually using less amounts of chlorophyll for photosynthesis which is actually helping them to balance their energy meters, thereby keeping their cells intact..!”

“So basically they are continuously sending certain signals to their past, but HOW? Everything is blocked here..!” Julian said. They both then studied the entire structure of the Celestial Orbit in detail and finally found the answer.

“So they are using Wormholes…! A wormhole is a passage through space-time that could create shortcuts for long journeys across the universe. In this case the plants have found a Wormhole in these Celestial Orbits..! They are using it to directly send a signal to their past, so basically they are altering their past for saving themselves in the present…! Genius..!” Carol exclaimed, “I think they did find the Wormhole using their own signals..! Plants have a certain networking system for saving themselves. They always keep finding certain pathways of energy for their photosynthesis. Remember how a plant grows exactly in the direction of light? In this case, they found the Wormhole through their signals…”

“I have already started tracking their signals. That’ll help us find a nearest wormhole in the orbits...”

They finally found a Wormhole, about at 30 min. distance from their current location. With about 20 minutes left for the time –warp to start, they had to hurry up fast.

“Listen to my plan… We have a time gap of 30 seconds before the hole disappears. Using the Time Dimension, we can send a signal message to the Station Base 99 years back in the past, informing them about these Cosmic Orbits. Eventually, we will never enter the orbit & nothing of this will happen…! Everything will be reset…!” Carol explained her plan. Julian understood everything.

As they neared the Wormhole, Julian took the charge.

“Carol, hack the Station Base’s main server…! Note that the year should be 2300. Send in the warning signal to the base. Remember, we only have 30 seconds to do this…!”

With around 10 minutes left for the time-warp, Carol found the wormhole. Hacking the server, she sent the warning signal back 99 years when they had just took off from the Space Station.

21st September, 2300

Carol woke up in her Cubicle. Was that a big dream? Or was it real? She couldn’t remember anything. Stepping out from her room, she saw Julian coming out of his cubicle.

“When should we start the ascend to 10, 00,000 kms?” Julian asked her. Before Carol could speak, they received a message from the Station Base.

“ISRC, this is Station Base. Requesting Captain Carol to initiate the launch sequence and raise IS Helios till around 9, 00,000 Kms from Earth. You are stationed there for 90 days, following which you can start the return sequence. Requesting you to not raise your position as we have received information about the presence of certain strong magnetic fields directly above your location. Therefore, please stay away as far as you can..! Good Luck..!”

“Let’s start the mission, Commander Julian..!” Carol said as she started the ignitions.