Life As We Know It

by Eduard Joseph

and because of it’s size, it pulls vast amounts of space dust and particles towards the event horizon that illuminates the centre of the galaxy like a sun, when in actual fact there is nothing except a dark vacuum.

  The black hole at the centre of our galaxy was created during the big bang millions of years ago and was needed to create our galaxy. A supermassive star imploded on itself sending rubble and dust particles out into the space around it as it formed a supermassive black hole and singularity. The rubble and dust particles sent out by that event was the building blocks of our galaxy and millions of years later we now know it as the Milky Way.

  Then an interesting thought popped into my mind as I continued to spiral down to my unseen fate; life is possible inside a black hole. The black hole at the centre of the Milky Way had been there for millions of years which means that the space dust and particles – and even planets at the core of our galaxy that got sucked in millions of years ago might still be there inside the supermassive black hole. It might even be possible that the objects and planets sucked in millions of years ago may have undergone evolution and formed solar systems within the black hole circling forever towards a singularity it would never reach.

  It’s quite possible for whole civilisations to survive in a black hole and not even know it – seeing that I’m still alive. Who knows what else could survive or even evolve within the chasm of a black hole?

  It’s only then that I realized that I could no longer see the rim of the black hole or the stars beyond it. I was now totally engulfed by darkness without end, but could still feel myself spiralling down through space towards something, but what?

  The journey down into the abyss finally got a little rockier and turbulent – almost as if kayaking through a rough and turbulent ravine, but I couldn’t see anything around me until a brilliant light engulfed me and a gravitational pull jerked me towards the brilliance of the light and ejected me into space again.

  It took my eyes a moment to adjust and then I saw myself drifting away from a white hole – the exact opposite of a black hole; a point in space-time where nothing can enter, but that’s always spewing out light and matter. Until now, the existence of white holes were purely theoretical, but I’ve experienced one and can say with certainty that a white hole exists and is linked to a black hole.

  Is it possible that a black hole is not a death sentence as once thought, but rather the entrance to a natural occurrence similar to the theoretical wormholes of science fiction and that white holes are the exit in another galaxy, time or even universe?

  I tried to spin myself around to get a better look at my surroundings, but noticed that the space beneath my feet felt solid and that I was able to walk despite there being nothing beneath my boots. I stood and watched for a moment as the white hole spews out more light and dust particles with a centre beam piercing the space beyond like a beacon.

  Where am I?

  I was surrounded by clusters of stars and space dust that reached out as far as the eye could see – perhaps even into eternity. This made no sense – not even the theory of relativity could explain what I saw… I knew for a fact that space was bigger than I could ever fathom, but yet here I stood in the centre of the universe with billions of galaxies small enough to fit into the palm of my hand.

  I walked towards a nearby cluster of stars and realized that I was staring at the Milky Way which hardly seemed bigger than the palm of my hand. As I reach out to touch it, it expanded and engulfed the space around me until I could see a supermassive black hole to outer reaches of our galaxy – a black hole one hundredth the size of the supermassive black hole in the centre of the Milky Way. As I inspected the black hole, it opened up to reveal our solar system inside of it. I was right – our solar system was inside a supermassive black hole and we didn’t even know it. The sun was at the centre of the black hole with the planets orbiting it as if nothing was out of the ordinary.

  And then an idea popped into my head; maybe that’s why despite having the technology to see into distant galaxies we were unable to travel outside our own solar system – nothing escapes the gravitational pull of a black hole; not even a space rocket.

  It all made sense now. If there are intelligent life out there somewhere in the universe, this is why they never made contact with us – they’re afraid of getting sucked into the black hole we called home. It’s then that I remembered reading an article in Popular Science Magazine back in June by physicist Samir Mathar in which he suggested that our solar system or even our galaxy could be inside a supermassive black hole and we might not even know it. Despite spiralling down towards an unreachable singularity, life would go on as normal. Our solar system would orbit the sun and earth’s gravity would keep us grounded. If only Samir could see this…

  Despite the fact that I now knew our solar system was in a supermassive black hole, something else seems off… Mercury was missing and the sun seemed brighter than it should be. Earth also seemed like a desert wasteland from where I stood, but Mars was blue… why was the red planet blue?

  On closer inspection I saw that the sun was giving off radiation in layers as if breathing and I remembered reading once that the sun gets hotter by 0.6% every hundred thousand years. A fiery ball of death was slowly turning to ash in the outer flames of the sun – a ball that used to be Mercury.

  How is this possible? I asked myself, how long was I in the black hole for this to have happened?

  The solar system expanded again until the surface of Mars was visible; it was green and lush and had vast oceans with floating cities built in the oceans – cities with skyscrapers and hover-cars and it’s in that instant that I realised that I’ve been stuck in the black hole for much longer than I thought.

  The life I knew and everyone in it had long since died and mankind left behind the barren world we called earth as the heat of our sun intensified and swallowed my home forever. Everyone I ever loved was gone forever.

  Mars decreased in size and the solar system came back into sight and I watched as hundreds of space vessels left the surface of Mars as solar flares from the sun burned earth to a crisp and finally reached Mars. The sun shed one last layer of heat, fire and radiation and imploded on itself; sending debris and dust out into space. Something must’ve happened. The sun wasn’t supposed to die for another couple of million years. Perhaps a man-made weapon or experiment that went awry and caused the sun to die?

  My attention was drawn to the small, yet real space vessels to my left and I watched as a blue wormhole opened and the vessels all entered before the wormhole closed.

  The solar system contracted and decreases in size until the entire Milky Way was visible again along with the other 100 billion galaxies that makes up our universe and I found myself wandering through space-time browsing through the various galaxies of inhabitable planets until I stumbled across a galaxy known as GHG-454. It expanded all around me until I saw a solar system fairly similar to our own; it had a massive ball of green gas in the middle while four smaller planets orbited the peculiar sun.

  A worm hole opened to my left and the small space vessels all exit and descended into orbit around a blue and green planet. Space expanded all around me until I found myself standing on the surface of the strange, but yet familiar planet.

  I reached out to touch the tree next to me and it was real – so were the sounds of frogs and crickets that echoed through the forest. I decided to remove my helmet – the air was breathable.

  I walked through the forest until I came to a clearing and a city of skyscrapers and flying cars were visible in the distance as the green sun set in the horizon.

  I’ve travelled through space and time and ended on a planet thousands of years from my own lifetime in a faraway galaxy on a planet similar to earth. Though it’s foreign and new and I have no idea how I got there, for some unknown reason I knew it was my home.

  A child came running up to me and hopped around me like an excited mosquito as she called out to her father. It was only then
that I realized that I was in a children’s play-park.

  “Daddy, look!” She called out as her father came over, “It’s a spaceman!”

  The man laid a protective hand on his daughter’s shoulder and shielded her behind his own body as he looked me up and down.

  “Are you lost?” He asked.

  “Where am I?” Was all I could get out.

  “Brighton County.” he said, “Are you alright? Do you need me to call anyone?”

  “What’s today’s date?”

  “Monday 4th November.” He said.

  “What year?” I asked with dread.

  He seemed baffled, but finally said, “7949.”

  Those words drained the life out of me and as my knees gave way underneath me, he rushed over and held me upright.

  “Are you alright?” He asked concerned.

  “I think I need to sit down.”

  He helped me over to a nearby bench and I sat down as the curious little girl watched from afar. The man sat down next to me and scrutinised my space-suit.

  “You’re not from around here.” He said.

  I didn’t know what to respond. I was questioning my own sanity. Less than an hour ago I was on a mission with Anna and the others and now I’m in the year 7949? I gazed out at the purple and red sky over the setting green sun in the distance as I tried to wrap my