THE BLAZING morning sun glistens off the majestic white cruise ship as seagulls soar and circle high above the docked vessel; their caws piercing the ears of the dozens of people busying themselves to start their work day. Like everything Mark Sharpe owns, the ship is gigantic and opulent. A modern-day Titanic littered with cutting-edge technology, having launched a few months ago to stunning reviews.

In a few hours, the first of the guests would be arriving at the ship dubbed “The future of travel.” The brilliant marketing executives with the cruise line had decided to unironically name the ship The Future. A twenty-story behemoth accommodating more travelers than most smaller cities, The Future is loaded with clean glass, steel, and white walls surrounded by screens, mood lighting, and devices to bring an industry stuck in the past into the modern era. Four 3D VR movie theater experiences, dozens of Pulsar-designed photo spots, spaced-themed dining—restaurants like the Astronaut Bar and Café where they serve drinks from the cosmos, or The Alien where they serve top cuts of rare meats with flying saucer tables and dinnerware. There is even a restaurant with a moon landscape to make it feel like the guests are dining on the surface of a giant space rock looking back at Earth in the style of the iconic Earthrise photo.

It doesn’t stop there—the outside is a labyrinth of clear tubes that transport guests all around the various decks via pods; they operate akin to elevators but are unbound by the pesky up-and-down nature of clunky early industrialism, but what really makes this ship feel like it has been plucked from the future isn’t the flashy guest attractions, it is the hundreds of P-7500s that run the ship. The robot orbs greatly outnumber the crew.

First Officier Emily Dubas, a stubby middle-aged Caucasian woman adorned in a formal white buttoned shirt, including four-striped gold epaulets on her shoulders, scans the dock from her perch on the deck as P-7500s load pallets of food and supplies. Emily had lost count of the number of P-7500s shortly after starting as there seem to be another few dozen with each voyage.

Heck, most of her job is just monitoring the robots at this point. The Pulse subsidiary behind the project had cut the crew down to a couple dozen essential people and brought the robots on to do most of the routine tasks. She counts herself among the lucky few who are still needed, but even she knows her days are numbered. It might be a year or two at most before the entire bridge of the ship is run by robots. She has a chance to be the robot overlord on the ship, but she isn’t banking on it, and the whole A.I. takeover leaves her with a sense of cold, eerie dread as no one seems to understand how anything works anymore.

As morning turns to afternoon, passengers arrive and the party starts. By four o’clock, they are on the open sea. Ten thousand passengers are almost all about to do the same thing: watch PulseFest from state-of-the-art VR theaters. Emily’s tummy begins to bother her. Perhaps from a day of overindulgence yesterday while the ship was resupplying.

As dinner winds down, the staff sets up the VR theaters for PulseFest. There are four theaters, and each theater has five hundred headsets. Soon, a quarter of the ship’s passengers will be immersed in the VR experience, with another two-thirds watching without VR.

Luckily for Emily, she had the early shift. Once the first few checkpoints are made, the automation and orbs practically run themselves, so she takes the night off from being on the bridge and sneaks her way into one of the theaters to help set up and then catch a bit of PulseFest.

Ronnie, one of the captain’s friends and a long-time crew member who finds himself chatting on the bridge every now and then, which is frankly above his paygrade, is hard at work making his way through the stadium seating, ensuring each seat still has a headset attached. Emily notices Ronnie’s eye contact. She always tries to be polite, so she gives a wave as Ronnie slithers over. She isn’t fond of him; he looks a little like an insect, gaunt and tough, similar to a ship cockroach he is always hiding in the dark and feeding below deck somewhere. Similar still to a roach, Ronnie would surely survive an apocalypse.

Ronnie: Hey Emily, been a few weeks since we had a little chat.

Ronnie is from somewhere in Brazil and his Portuguese accent is still noticeable, but at this point, his English is probably as polished as hers.

Ronnie: How is the family?

Emily realizes Ronnie’s sucked her in and she can’t avoid this conversation so she obliges him with some small talk.

Emily: You know how it is. Just getting a video call together is getting tough. My sister, Erma, her partner was actually in New York City over the weekend, but we never connected. I think their son Burt is just starting school.

Ronnie stops walking the rows of seats and clutches his hands over his heart.

Ronnie: The life of a cruise worker. I get it. Congrats to little Burt and if you didn’t get much family time, what did you do on your day off?

She picks up a VR headset and examines it as Ronnie gets back to his inspection.

Emily: Well, I went to see the Statue of Liberty, then I went to a mall, East River Plaza, to look at the new PulseBand. There was a police incident there, and they had a clothing store taped off. Apparently, a woman went missing.

Ronnie is checking two or three seats with each sentence and takes pause at the mention of the missing person. Emily doesn’t even know what he is looking for; some type of dirt or grime maybe, but he doesn’t seem to be finding anything. Whatever he is doing, it’s second nature to him.

Ronnie: Did they find her?

Emily: I don’t think so.

Ronnie: I hope everything is okay. Did you get anything at the mall?

Emily: A stomachache from eating too many bagels.

She grimaces and rubs her tummy. Something rumbles inside, and it feels almost like a kick.

It can’t be a kick.

She couldn’t be pregnant as it has been far too long since she has had an intimate relationship. She must have picked up a tummy bug at the mall.

Emily: Speaking of that stomachache, I haven’t been feeling great the last few hours. I think the bagels are still bothering me.

Ronnie: If you want to tap out, I got this.

With her stomach turning like the bagels are about to come back up, Emily staggers back to her crew quarters. It’s quiet. With the festival about to start, everyone from the crew is either watching the livestreams or seeing that the guest experience goes off as planned. She dashes to the toilet and buries her head, dry-heaving but unable to get the blockage up.

Worst bagel of my life…

After 20 pained minutes, she makes her way to her bed. Something does kick her stomach from inside. This time it is unmistakable. She wants to go to the medical room, but the thought of traversing across the ship overwhelms and paralyzes her.

PulseFest plays over every holoscreen on the ship, and the throbbing beats assault her ears as she tosses and turns. She fades in and out; sweat soaks her clothing and pillow. Each time she comes to, white light flashes, followed by a tunnel fading to black with trance-inducing bass. With everything she has, she tries to get up, but the wet bed sheet tangles around her legs and trips her, sending her to the floor.

Lying on her back unsettles her stomach acid, and the feeling in her tummy moves up. Searing pain, her throat is burning, and she rubs at it with one of her hands.

From the floor, she reaches with the other hand for her PulseBand. It’s on the nightstand, but she can’t find it.

Emily crawls toward the bathroom, wet twisted still tangled around her. She tries to cry out for help, but no sound follows, and even if it had, it wouldn’t have been heard over PulseFest. Her blocked throat can’t even manage a sobbing noise to communicate the sense of impending death.

Save me!

It’s only Emily. Alone. Fighting for her life.

The pain in her throat intensifies. Her chest throbs, and her eyes sting from the sweat pouring from her forehead. She manages to make her way to the cool floor of the bathroom, still unable to scream for help.

Her throat feels like it is expanding, and the burning has turned to unbearable asphyxiation. She claws desperately at her throat, trying to puncture it. Her fingernails dig in deep. She can feel the blood begin to pour, but no relief comes.

Please… help!

She thinks the words. She tries to will it into speech. Instead, some pained gurgles are all she can muster. The urge to get somewhere dark and damp takes over. Emily has lost control. Something else is guiding her. 

Blood trickles down her neck from the scratches her fingernails left, but at least she can wheeze out a breath this time. White light begins to flash again. Time is starting to disappear. A glance back reveals a mess of blood on the floor.

Lying by the bathroom door and fighting to not fade from consciousness, Emily finds more grit. She rises to one knee, and the sudden rush of blood to her head causes the brightest white flash yet, and it overcomes her.

In the darkest corner of the room, the pile of a person who was once Emily lies in a heap and shakes. A hair of consciousness remains, just enough to feel the pain but not enough to react to it. Her eyes roll back as she puts her energy into focusing on what is happening to her insides.

Her mouth leaks pink foam while blood from the neck scratches soaks her chest.

Something begins to emerge from one of these scratches. The scratch grows to a small tear, and a tiny white head begins to push through; the head is no bigger than a thumb, with bulging eyes and wrinkled skin. A tiny talon penetrates the skin near the hole the head created and rips a slit, like a knife cutting through paper.

From the hole in Emily’s neck, the rest of the creature slides out, a bloodied, wrinkled mess, falling to the ground. As it tries to find a dark place, it lets out a tiny scream, revealing savage needle teeth.

The tiny worm-human hybrid monster sits in a crouch like some primal animal. It bobs its head up and down, stabilizing its body with its front talons for the first time.

The head gives many quick darts back and forth, up and down, acclimating to the environment.

It's head tilts to the side, then the worm-monster screeches as it pounces on Emily’s stomach, latching on for nourishment as the bass of PulseFest continues to thump. These are the final moments Emily remembers before the darkness wins.