Chapter 1: The Anomaly Bends...

“Aye, Captain! Systems locked on.  Black Square Anomaly stable, Moose coordinates confirmed.  Ready for your orders.  What’s the next move?”

Moose laughed out loud, the kind of laugh that comes from somewhere deep— the kind that shakes a man out of his head and back into the world.  The line had caught him off guard.  He hadn’t heard “Aye, Captain!” in years — not since his father’s voice had carried across the deck of a half-rotten fishing trawler off the Carolina coast, salt and diesel thick in the air.  He hadn’t been on a real boat since.  Canoes, rowboats, yes — small, silent things, but nothing like that first call of the sea.

Now it was stars instead of waves.  The hum of the CS01 instead of an outboard.  The black sea of the Anomaly instead of saltwater and horizon.

“Yar!” Moose roared suddenly, mouth full of half-chewed asparagus, sending green shrapnel over the galley counter.  He planted one boot on the edge of the console like an old sea captain claiming the deck.  “Avast there, ya scallywag!”

“Yaaaarrrr! Captain Moose!” CS01’s voice answered back immediately, her tone shifting from crisp AI diction to a theatrical growl, full of static and delight.  “Avast ye, ye sly space dog!  Black Square Anomaly’s now a pirate cove!  Orders, me hearty—shall we plunder some Scripture or hoist the art sails?”

Moose was still laughing when he leaned over the comms, asparagus speared on a fork like a cutlass.  “Aye, CS01—hoist the art sails!  Load the cannons with Proverbs and full steam ahead!”  For a moment, the ship almost seemed to laugh with them.  The lights along the panels flickered in rhythm, as though the CS01 herself was grinning somewhere deep inside her circuitry.

“Aye, Captain.” CS01 replied, her tone softening, playful static fading to a low hum.  “Art sails hoisted.  Proverbs loaded.”  Through the viewport, the Black Square Anomaly shimmered — a broken mirror of the universe, breathing light through cracks like a lantern under water.

And Moose, still chewing, still grinning, thought maybe — just maybe — joy could echo in the dark too.

Psalm 149: 1-9

“Praise the LORD!  Sing to the LORD a new song, and His praise in the assembly of saints.  Let Israel rejoice in their Maker; let the children of Zion be joyful in their King.  Let them praise His Name with the dance; let them sing praises to Him with the timbrel and harp.  For the LORD takes pleasure in His people; He will beautify the humble with salvation.  Let the saints be joyful in glory; let them sing aloud on their beds.  Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a two-edged sword in their hand, to execute vengeance on the nations, and punishments on the peoples; to bind their kings with chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron; to execute on them the written judgment- This honor have all His saints.  Praise the LORD!”