Time is a peculiar thing.

I’ve been orbiting within this capsule around Sagittarius A for… well, I’m not sure how long.

Not because I don’t keep track of time, no, no. I’ve been here for eight earth days. At least that’s what my time piece says.

But outside of my eleven-hundred square-foot pod, it’s been millennia.

It was supposed to take fifteen years of my life, but I guess we haven’t quite reached that, now have we?

We’ve always known that black holes are strong enough to warp time, but we never knew the magnitude. There were sixteen failed experiments before mine; some of them were my dearest friends. But their names have been long forgotten, and only mine remains. For now.

My view has been the same every one of those days, until now. They warned me it would come, given that the Milky Way’s black hole has been leaking for thousands of years.

Outside of my window, I can see the navy back of my jump suit. The collar is sticking up, I should probably fix that. But who else is here to judge?

Behind the inverted image of myself, I see the solar system to my rear layered over the deep ebony of Sagittarius, almost like a thin layer of fil over a black background. The stars are swirling, lines of light all conceding to a single point like a twisted caricature of the perspective paintings from the fifteenth century.

But today was different. Today, it seemed to be moving, more than usual at least. The trouble comes from the blue tinge of the scene before me. I know I’m moving closer to the black hole, and though it may take seconds or years, who knows how long it will take for me? I’m sure that’s one of the reasons they’ve sent me out here.

Time is a peculiar thing.

I never met my grandchildren, and I barely even knew my daughter. She had taken her first steps just a few days before I left. Oh beautiful Melina. My mind and heart stretch in agony knowing that I never got to walk her down the aisle on her wedding day. But her grandchildren told me stories of her, how proud she was of me. I don’t think I could say the same about myself. You could imagine my surprise; I had only been on board this capsule for two days before I met my descendants who had been alive longer than myself.

They were supposed to deliver me supplies every week or so. On their calendars, it’s every hundred years. On mine, it could be as short as a few minutes or as long as a day. There’s really no way to tell, but I can’t complain.

After Dr. M. Nelson discovered how to use moscovium to make the antimatter-gravitonic engine, humanity has been able to travel across galaxies in a matter of seconds. I enjoy the visitors, but they never stay long. I had a gentleman come back once; Paul, was his name? We chatted for but fifteen minutes.

He dropped off some supplies, left, and came back just a few hours later. He was in his early twenties his first visit, but was coming up to a century in age the second time around.

He told me that those fifteen minutes cost him fifty years back on Earth Prime, as he called it. His wife died young, leaving his children in the hands of his sister-in-law. They were proud at first but, well… it’s hard to love an absentee father. When he came back younger than his own children, they looked upon him with nothing but pity. He managed to live through his whole life again, met another woman, settled down, had more children… but he wanted to come back to make sure I knew what these visits cost people. Asked me if I thought I was worth the trip, then assured me I wasn’t.

Of course, I never saw him again.

After each visitor, there was a surprising jump in technology. The first space suits, like my own, were large and bulky. Over time, they became slimmer and slimmer. Nowadays, humans have bred space survival technology directly into their genome. CRISPR was the catalyst, I believe. I was never a biologist.

Now humanity, or what’s left of it, has shimmering silver skin and golden eyes to protect themselves from cosmic rays. They can apparently metabolize oxygen, so they have no need for ambulatory tanks or space suits.

When first I was seen as a hero and pioneer, I now believe I am seen as a museum piece. These post-humans have snarky tones and speak strangely, like a foreigner trying their hand at a native tongue. They ask about my equipment, then poke and prod at it, giggling.

Time is a peculiar thing.

But now I must watch my time come to a close.

It started with the capsule jerking forward. The floor to the window, which was exactly three paces from where I stand, is now stretching off over the horizon. It reminded me of driving through Montana as a child, with its endless roads buffeted on each side by everlasting cornfields.

I put my hand in front of my face; flourishing it away from me causes it to move faster than I can perceive, yet bringing it towards me is like watching a jellyfish swim through molasses. Both instances take the same amount of time.

The blue tinge over the window begins to bleed out, coating everything in my capsule. I sigh; it is time to alert the others.

As I walk to the cockpit, the right side of my body is stretched and contorted like poorly made stereoscopic film. The left is shrunken and nubby, like a reflection in a funhouse mirror. I move normally, as if everything is normal.

Sooner than I had originally anticipated, I break the glass and pull the black-handled lever. Some of the shards fly to my right so quickly they puncture holes in the side of the space craft. Others remain airborne, leisurely moving towards the event horizon like seedlings off a dandelion.

Time is a peculiar thing.

I take the fifteen steps back to the bay window to watch my demise. The blue is now seeping over every portion of the vessel like water stains on an old textbook.

I stare at the onyx eye of Sagittarius and my own back simultaneously. Even in the stain of blue, the spot remained blacker than night.

The shuttle jerked again.

In front of me, the star formation behind me began to blur. The swirling light-vortex around the black hole begins to slow in my perception, an untainted white amongst the blue-like foam lining wave crests on the open ocean. But I can see what is beneath.

Time is a peculiar thing.

First my hand begins to itch, and it slowly works up my arm. One by one, my atoms are ripped from my body. It is surprisingly painless. The space suit leaves as well, displaying the inside of my arm like a cross-section straight out of a biology textbook. I was never a biologist.

I see this view from behind as well, watching my own demise in first-person and third-person at the same time.

Time is a peculiar thing.

I can feel the itch spread to my nose, and I know my time is almost up. As this tingling sensation reaches my brow, I look forward behind me just in time to see the silver-skinned post-humans arrive in their finest gravitonic ships. They seem to be celebrating. Celebrating what? My success? My death? The end of a bygone era? Or is it a farewell for the last remaining true human, a neolithic caveman in their eyes.

It hasn’t even been two weeks.

Time is a peculiar thing.

Time is a peculiar thing.