It was mission run day. Zlata stood on the spaceship platform wearing a tight black rubber catsuit. She had tied her hair in a ponytail and left her hands and feet exposed. The mission she was about to undertake would change the way humans see contortionism forever. A black hole had been found close to the space station, and several soldiers and astronauts had investigated, only to be sucked in, stretched like noodles and broken into the hole. Now the world government wants to send the world’s most flexible woman to survive the stretch, and see what lies on the other side. As she was lying and stretching herself in the waiting room, Zlata recalled her training for this mission. For months she started her day by taking a thermal gel bath. The gel made her body softer than it was and ready for bending without warmup. Then she would lie still and let the gel soak into her bones. A team of specially trained scientists would carry her on a stretcher to a compression machine. It would knead her, fold her, and smush her around like dough in positions that would crush a normal human. But Zlata could take it, she is the world’s most flexible woman after all. After being removed from the compression machine, her ankles, and wrists would be tied to ropes, and her body would spread into elastic oversplits, bone-shattering backbends, and rubber-bodied knots. Then she would carry out exercises for being an astronaut while contorted like a rubber woman. Now she was sitting in her waiting room. She was lying on her stomach, and as she yawned her legs gently hung over her head, nimbly touched the floor and lay alongside her face. She curled her spine so that her bottom pressed comfortably against her lowest back and turned the pages of a magazine using her toes. Then she grasped one ankle, and put the other leg on the floor, then kept on moving it until it lay against the front of her chest. She smiled and tried to forget about the dangerous mission she was about to take. “Excuse me, Ms.Zlata?” A voice interrupted her incredible stretch. It was the captain of the ship. “It’s time” He said. Zlata sighed, untangled herself and gracefully walked to the airlock. A technician fitted her with a tight-fitting oxygen supply pad on her face, and set her in the airlock. She stood at the door leading out to space and watched. Finally, the door opened and Zlata felt herself carried into space. She experienced true weightlessness for the first time and for a minute floated around like a feather through space. Then she saw the black hole. She made a final prayer, and pushed off towards it. As she floated over the black hole she felt a very tiny tug at the tips of her toes. She looked down and saw that her hips and legs were further from her upper body than normal. The black hole was sucking her in! Zlata felt her heart race, as her spine stretched, and her body became like a noodle, long and thing and flexible. She could feel her brain sending signals of fear. Then she felt herself land on hard ground. She could see her feet and legs a few metres away, but her waist was several metres long and tangled up. She heard popping as her body stretched into normal shape. The weightlessness returned and she felt lighter than ever. A great feeling came to Zlata’s spine as it folded and allowed her head to touch her lower back. The squeeze through the black hole had made her spine even more bendy! She spread her legs into a forward split. Then without using any hands, she raised each leg up to make 360 degree oversplit. She laughed. It all felt so easy. She stood up, and began to curl her spine backwards until her shoulders pressed firmly against her butt. Then she slowly lowered her upper body to go between her legs and position upright. She rested her elbows on her knees, and smiled. Then suddenly the black hole disappeared. She felt herself getting sucked out into space again. The astronauts and soldiers on board looked in shock to see the world’s most beautiful woman contorted in a bone-breaking position with ease. Like a snake, Zlata bent, twisted, and flexed like an elastic all the way back to the rocket. When she landed she said : “Mission accomplished.”