White Space Season 2

from Blake’s reserved silence, and whatever answers or horrors might be only moments away, but because of her journey down the hallway which was wrapped in majesty from both sides.
    The long hallway, though edged in alloy was mostly glass, including the floor which made her feel as if she were spacewalking, surrounded by stars. Earth’s giant, blue marble hovered larger than dreams a hair to her right.
    They reached the hallway’s end and a solid wall disappeared. Blake stepped through the fresh aperture and gestured for Sarah to follow.
    She stepped through the open door and gasped.
    The gardens were gorgeous, earning her awe despite just leaving a hallway that had her swaddled in the eternity of endless space. The gardens were almost like a different world, with butterflies diving through the air by the hundreds. Thousands of vibrant flowers smeared the room in every shade and color. Tulips, mums, poppies, lilac, peonies, lilies, and roses were bundled in clusters, erupting throughout the gardens in patterns that should not have been possible. Flowers that shouldn’t grow together — especially at the same time of year — defied logic as if to prove beauty won at the end of the day. Fountains of orchids rained over the head of a giant alloy statue, looming high in the corner; not quite a man, but something else that Sarah didn’t understand, though most of her felt like she should.
    Blake sat on a long, stone bench, facing the wide window wrapping Earth in a circle. He patted the seat beside him.
    Sarah sat.
    Blake continued to say nothing as he stared out at the massive garden with Sarah silent beside him. Finally, she was noticing how steady her breathing had finally become.
    Blake, as if reading her mind, asked, “Relaxed?”
    Inexplicably, she was.
    She nodded.
    “Then I’ll be right back,” he said.
    Blake left, leaving the opposite direction they’d come. She didn’t turn to see where he was going, since she could see nothing but more garden in every direction, anyway. Sarah wasn’t worried, or alone for long. After what felt like two or three minutes, she saw Blake coming back, from yet another direction.
    This time he wasn’t alone.
    Beside him, holding his hand, was Emma.
    Emma’s eyes widened, and a smile spread across her face.
    “Mommy!” she cried, running through the garden toward Sarah.
    My baby is alive!

    TO BE CONTINUED…

::EPISODE 12::
    PRELUDE — Warren Conway (Age 31)

    Ten Years ago …

    Warren sat in his office, surrounded by black, his favorite room nothing but shadows, but for the bottled, blue glow of his monitor bleeding from the screen as he stared at the children lining the wall, backs to the concrete and bodies bathed in the spotlights raining down from the ceiling of an otherwise dark laboratory basement.
    The children were called forward one by one and asked to stand on a square. There were six, ages ranging from 7 to 11, three boys and three girls, dressed in shorts and T-shirts, as if in gym.
    But this wasn’t gym, though it was an exercise — the most recent exercise in Project Eleven . Warren was seeing a climax from 14 months of relentless testing.
    The first child to center a square was male, Number 741, the numeral highlighted by a large, red sticker on his chest.
    The boy waited, eyes flitting nervously at something in the darkness off screen, readying himself for the next part of the test. Suddenly, as a second spotlight revealed his challenge, the boy’s eyes widened.
    The computer screen’s picture split in two. The other image displayed, through a second angle, what the boy was seeing.
    A girl, Number 744 on her shirt, was in a glass box, half-full of water. Above her, a large pipe poured more into the box, controlled by a large red handle on the valve — out of reach since the girl’s hands and feet were bound.
    “Help!” she cried.
    The boy looked at his instructor off screen. “I can’t do this!” he pled.
    “You can and you will,” a man’s voice sharply insisted.
    “No, I can’t! I failed my last two tests; I can’t!”
    “Then Number 744 will die,” the man said. “And it will be your fault.”
    Warren was mesmerized, even though he’d seen the video twice since Blake brought it to him that morning.
    He watched as the water continued to spill, rising higher, up to the girl’s chest. Instead of focusing his thoughts on the handle as he should have, the boy squandered his energy arguing with the instructor.
    “Please, turn