Where am I?
What is happening?
Those questions repeatedly resonate within my head. Saying that I am lost right now is quite an understatement.
I am floating, in the middle of nowhere.
My body feels light, as if all weight had all but disappeared from me.
I do vaguely remember what happened however.
I was on Athena, in the engineering bay. Arguing with someone when the station was falling to its doom. But my memory is so blurry right now. Why was I in there again? I can't remember.
I do remember that we were falling to the planet surface, fast. So could it means that...
Am I dead?
Is this heaven?
Everything looks like heaven. There's nothing around me at all. No ground, no sky, no nothing. Just a vast emptiness filled with bright light. I try to look around but can not figure out where the light are coming from. It seems to be coming from everywhere, from below, from above, from all around.
And the sensation...
I can not describe it. But it feels...warm. It feels comfortable. Everywhere this light touch, the sensation of ease, of relaxation spreads. My emotion seems to have been affected by it too. I feel strangely calm and for some reason, quite content. Feeling at ease with the current situation that I'm in right now.
I try to move my body around and feel the motion of my limbs. My skin feels a bit weird, it feels...distanced, somehow. Other than that, everything else is still functioning normally. Pain is nowhere to be found so that is good.
Really, where am I?
After getting my sense back together, I try to scan my surroundings with more focus. Again I see nothing but a vast open space seemingly stretching out to infinity. I try to wave my arms around, thinking it my turn my body around just like in the water. It does work surprisingly and I managed to straighten myself up.
As I was trying to ponder on what to do next, an echo of a voice suddenly come from all direction towards me. It caught me off guard and I was spooked slightly, but I immediately calm myself down and focus onto listening to the voice. I can't tell where it is coming from but I can hear what it's saying. To my surprise, I can understand it, it's speaking English!
[Who are you?]
The voice sounds very feminine.
[What are you? Where do you come from?]
"Who is it? Who's talking?" I ask the voice back. I'm not telling anyone anything until I know what is going on.
There was a long silence. No one speaks, neither I nor the mysterious voice.
[Where are all your souls?]
So it ignored my questions. And what do you mean "where is my soul"?
[What fascinating beings.]
"What do you mean? Where am I and what's going on?" I'm starting to lose my patience at this point. This voice have been asking so many confusing questions.
[Hm hm. This is going to be interesting.]
What do you mean "interesting"?
[You and your kin may be able to do it.]
"Come on. Show yourself, whoever you are! Stop playing hide and seek."
[Who I am matters not, strange ones. What matters is that you can do it. You and your kin can break the chain.]
Do it? Do what? And break what chain?
"What do you mean? What chain?"
[Break it down, tear it apart, destroy it, crush it. They can not stop you.]
This is really getting out of hand. Who can not stop us? Is someone going to stop us? From doing what? And what are we supposed to destroy? I am so confused about literally everything.
[Please, do it. I beg of you, all of you.]
And now it's begging me. I can hear the desperation in its voice as well.
Lady, we have yet to meet and you are begging me to do what now?
"I demand to know what is happening right now. And identify yourself, I'm not doing anything for anyone before knowing what's going on!"
[Please...set it free...set them free...avenge me...]
What is happening right now?
The voice becomes more distanced as it finishes it's last line. And then, silence.
"Hey, where are you going? What is happening? Hello?" I try to call it. But no answer came in return. No matter how long I wait.
And so, everything returns to what it was. Just me floating aimlessly among a bright nothingness.
.....ir.....r.....kup.....
I hear voices, again. It is extremely static, as if the voice is coming from a very old antique radio. But it's not the strange voice, this one sounds familiar.
...r...Sir.....
Is that...A-LAN? Is A-LAN calling me? Oh right he is literally and actually inside my head, of course that's him.
"A-LAN? A-LAN! Can you hear me?" I try to call out to my AI assistance.
...ir?...can....ou....
A-LAN's voice is becoming less static. I can hear him better now. At the same time, the light that surrounds me starts to increase it's brightness. Gradually to the point of being so bright I have to close my eyes and cover my face to not be blinded by it.
My mind becomes blank, the weightlessness sensation has all but disappeared. Now I feel like I'm lying flat on the ground, my body's weight returns to me.
Sir? Are you there?
A-LAN, never would have thought hearing your voice can be so reassuring.
Yeah, I'm here. I'm good. Just had a really weird dream though.
Hearing A-LAN's voice in my head, I slowly come back to my sense. Right now I'm lying on the ground, I can feel the cool metal floor underneath me. Smell of burnt plastic invades my nose. Sounds of electrical component short circuiting sparks all around, along with a constant barrage of warning noises coming from the speakers.
I open my eyes and the first thing I see is the gray ceiling of the station. Dashing my eyes around, I can see the various machinery, some have flashing red light, some have electric sparks bursting out of them. Reactivating my memmory, I remember that this is the engineering bay, and I was in it when the station was about to impact. I don't know how I managed to survive but I decide to put that matter aside. Right now I need to get out of this situation.
I try moving my body parts around, getting a feel for them. Surprisingly everything is still more or less intact. I feel slight pain in several spots on my limbs but other than that I can move them freely without much constrain. And I'm not stuck underneath anything either. I move my head around to have a better look at my current situation. The emergency light is still working and some monitor panels are still on, so at least some power is still up. The room has a few dents and cracks on the wall, alloy panels are everywhere on the floor, alongside some hopefully unconscious and not dead people.
I did some checks and your body is fine, minus some bruises here and there but overall you are in decent shape.
Ah yeah thanks. What of the others? And the station?
I ask A-LAN to update me some info while trying to get up.
Station is on the ground sir. And it's not in a million pieces. I'm not sure as to how that happened but most of Athena is still intact, along with USSS Jamo and USSS Oriman, USSS Latte had separated with the station and its location is unknown. USSS Antlion and USSS Crooker are also unknown. Everyone in this rooms seems fine.
I stand up, dust myself off and give my body an overall check. No severe damage, no signs of heavy bleeding, no broken bones, a few scratches and bruises on my legs and back, there's also a small cut on my cheeks. But other than those, I'm in good shape.
Are all the people in this chamber? Or are there someone else we missed while evac?
No sir, you and the engineers are the only ones on Athena. I've checked security while evac and I'm sure there's no one else. Marines and SF did their job well.
It doesn't take a genius to figure out that the whole station is lying on a diagonal angle right now. Everything has accumulated to one corner of the room, as a result of the listed floor.
Station status?
Athena is lying on a 37.4 degree angle, there are open breaches in sector 2 of floor 3, sector 1 of floor 1 and the main core on floor 4. All of which are sealed with bulkheads so the rest of Athena is still somewhat encapsulated, there shouldn't be any environmental hazard anywhere else on the station.
That is good. So we won't need to worry about breathing in potential toxic gasses. There should be a space suit station somewhere in here anyway.
I start to walks towards the human figures lying on the ground. Hoping in my mind that there won't be any casualties. I then spot a familiar shape, a bulky guy in an engineer suit. I quickly approach him and shake his shoulder.
"Hey, you alive? Hey, John, wake up." I end up repeatedly smacking his face. And it works. His eyes are opening up.
"Huh? What? Sir? What's going on?" He asked in a confused tone.
"Station crashed, and we're still in one piece, somehow."
I grab his hand and help pull him up. And as expected from his bulky figure, the guy's really heavy. But I'm not that weak, despite working all day in front of desks.
"Can I get a sitrep, sir?" John looks around and ask me. Confusion still lingers in his gaze.
"No idea how we lived, station is not pile of junk inside a crater. Couple of holes on it but thankfully those are still sealed by bulkheads. Two transport ships are with us, one broke off mid fall so no idea where it is. And we are the only people on Athena, all in this engineering bay, I think."
"That's strange. How did we survived?"
"I honestly have no idea, but we'll discuss that later. Let's get the others up."
And so me and the chief engineer proceed to help and assist the other engineers who are still unconscious on the floor. Thankfully, everybody is alive, but all of us are injured somewhat, most are just like me with just scratches and bruises. There is one guy that got a piece of alloy panel stuck in his left thigh so we had to treat him with some first aid. The kit is easily obtained by just ripping it off the wall, as it didn't come off during the crash.
All in all, nothing is too severe and life threatening. We do a head count and count 13 people including me. Next we have a small discussion on what to do next and decide to get some important task done immediately. So we split up into different groups to do those tasks. After we are done, John and another engineer use power tools to crank open the doors.
We decide to split into three groups. Group one will head to the main technical control room and check on Athena overall condition, try to see which systems is still functional and fix the rest if possible. Group two will head towards security and check the outside condition of the planet's surface along with the surrounding environment, as well as checking for any hazardous breaches that A-LAN missed within Athena. Group three will go and check the various storerooms, supply room, suits rooms, armory,... Try to see if any of those can still be used. I will be going with group three.
With the mighty force behind the power tools, the slide door quickly gives up and buckle. As the doors burst apart, we begin our operation. After bringing the injured guy out and putting him down on a flat surface, we split up.
I follow group three and two to the front of the elevator door. Some engineer come up and crank open the elevator door while I wait. The same fate happens to the elevator doors just like the previous one and we quickly get inside. We open the top hatch of the elevator while some guys bring over a small ladder. One by one we climb the elevator shaft and use the power tool to crank open the door on every floor. The trip is a little bit difficult as the entire station is lying on a diagonal angle.
There are four floors total on Athena, with the first being on the top and fourth at the bottom. Floor number one houses the main dock, the station's bridge and various scientific facilities. Floor number two consists of the secondary dock for cargo ships as well as a multitude of storage facilities for various cargo. Floor number three is the station's living quarter, it contains private rooms, a mess hall and other crew related facilities. Finally the fourth floor houses all the engineering and mechanical facilities necessary for Athena's multiple function as an orbital station. My group's destination is the second floor.
As we walk through the barely lit hall way leading to the main cargo bay, I hear voices coming out from my ear piece.
"One here, main generator's busted, back up seems fine though. Expect incoming power in about a few minutes." that is the voiec ofthe chief engineer. He's with group one.
"This is Two, hurry up. We're in security and we need power."
"Hold on, working on it."
As group one and two radio each other back and forward, we enter the main cargo bay. I can barely see what's inside since it's so dark.
"Anyone knows what we have down here?" I direct my question to the engineers. One of them answers.
"I'm incharge of whatever happens down here sir. I have a list of a bunch of stuff in my head."
"Ok, so what are we looking at?"
Suddenly everything turns bright, all the lights on the ceiling and the wall turn back on, looks like they got the back up power flowing. We pause our conversation for a bit before continuing.
"We have about one and a half weeks worth food, there should be at least several months more in the transport ships if I remembered correctly. You mentioned there are two still docked?"
"Pretty much, yeah. Jamo and Oriman, Latte is gone. Probably crashed somewhere nearby. No info about the corvettes. Anything else?"
"We have lots of tools and some materials, a stock pile of meds for the sickbay, loads of suits and an armory. Oh and a mech bay with some mechs"
A mech bay? We can use it then. These guys are basically enlarged humans. They don't perform so well in certain combat condition but are excellent at doing labour and logistic works. Capable of doing all kinds of jobs from moving, load and unload cargo, building, constructions, excavation, basically a Swiss Army knife for logistic works.
"How many?"
"We have 3, one with construction tools."
Those will be extremely helpful. We will need to get those working as soon as possible, assuming that the crash didn't damage them.
There are 6 people with me currently, so I split the group further in order to check all storage rooms.
"Ok, we'll split out. Two go check foods, meds, tools and what not, two go check the mech bay, two will check suits and armory."
In the end, I go with the same engineer I was talking with to go check the suits and armory. We are in an alien world, there's no telling what kind of threats we are going to face from here on out. All dangers varies from toxic or unsuitable environment, to hostile fauna and flora. And now, possibly hostile intelligent aliens, which are even more dangerous in my opinion. We know very little about this planet so it's best that we prepare ourselves. Which means we are going to need a way to arm up, and have protection against the environment.
"The armory is a small store room for personal defense weapons, mostly used in case of any emergency situations, such as right now. The suits room contains all sort of scientific and environmental suits. There should be some EVAs there in case there are breaches on the station."
As we are walking towards the door that has "Armory" labeled on it, the blaring emergency sounds along with all of the emergency beacons shut off. Seems like they have managed to deactivate it. That is much better, I can't stand another minute just hearing those annoying warnings on the speakers.
"By the way, I'm Ian McLugger. You can call me Ian." The young engineer turns to me and speaks.
"Oh, right. We haven't introduced to each other yet. I'm Zackirian Kanza, but you can call me Zack if you want." I politely return his introduction with mine.
"I'll just call you sir, sir." He replies
After the brief exchange, we stop at the reinforced door. This is an armory so of course the door is made to be thick in order to prevent unauthorized forced entry. Ian takes out what looks to be a keycard from his pocket and shove it into the panel next to the door, then he puts his hand on the geometric scanner. After a few seconds, an audible "beep" can be heard and the door slides open, the lights on the inside automatically turn on revealing racks of firearms and what I assume to be ammunition crates.
After a glance, I can estimate there are about a few dozen or so pieces of firearms. I have a little training when it comes to guns so I can recognize several different types of weapons. Most are pistols and SMGs but there are a few ARs lying around. Upon closer inspection I spot something interesting.
"There are smart guns here?" I ask in a surprised tone while taking a look at one particular assault rifle.
"Yes sir. There are a few smart guns along with smart ammunition here. The military themselves is the one that supplies this room." Ian answers while opening some metal crates.
Smart guns, or homing guns as many people called them is a kind of weapon that is capable of shooting homing bullets. Basically bullets with ballistic status similar to a regular bullet but they can lock onto targets and chase after them, similar to a homing missile. These kind of weapons make things like covers meaningless as the bullet can be shot around the obstacles and still hit it's target behind corver.
"Wow, fancy. I guess can see why they put this here though. This station's value is way too important. How's the ammo?"
"There is enough here to last us for quite a while. Rescue should be arriving before we run dry so we shouldn't need to worry."
Right, so we have a mean to defend ourselves should the need comes. But how many of us are proficient enough with firearms?
"You guys are civilian engineers right? Any of you know how to shoot?"
Ian turns to me and answer with confidence in his eyes.
"I myself am quite familiar with all sorts of guns, sir. In fact it's my hobby, I'm from Texas in case you don't know. Some of my fellow colleagues also know their ways around guns as well. Can't say for the rest of us though. Are you familiar with firearms, sir?"
"Yeah, I did receive training long ago, and I do visits shooting ranges every now and then. So I'm good."
After that, we check every weapons, every ammo crates, magazines, multiple types of different grenades and list them down. Next we proceed to the suit storage room. Several suits are all over the floor but none of them are too damaged to the point of unusable. We managed to retrieve about thirty or so suits. And listening to the chatter on the comm, it seems like group two have some updates.
"This is Two, some updates for you guys. Athena is on the ground."
"Yeah, no shit Sherlock." voices of complaint come in as responses.
"No, I mean. We land on ground dirt, with some stone and sands. There is grass and greenery at a distance away though. And our position is higher than the rest of the...erm...forest? It seems."
Forest? So there's flora on this planet. Obviously, it is a habitable planet so the existence of flora or fauna is not a surprise. I decide to ask him some questions.
"So we're on some sort of a hill, right?"
"Yes, sir. I can see the ocean on the western side of Athena, several clicks away. There is a mountain formation in the distance deeper inland on the eastern direction."
"And the atmosphere?"
"No toxic gasses or substances in the air, up to 26.7% oxygen however. Not a problem to us but expect large fauna and flora. We should be able to walk outside without masks."
"No, all of us will walk outside with EVAs on, there are unknown bacteria and micro organism floating in the air out there. Until the egg heads give the thumbs up I won't take any chances. Lest yall want to get infected with some alien deceases like the Anlka incident." The chief engineer is actually giving out some very sound facts.
"Oh hell no, nobody wants another Anlka. One is enough."
I leave the engineer in their chatters and switch my connection to the other pairs in group three to check on their progress.
"Others on group three, status?"
"All supplies are accounted for over here. Should last for a good bit. We should collect the suppies from the transport ships too. There's more in there." That is probably from the first pair who were assigned on checking foods and supplies.
"Same here, how's the mech bay?"
"Two units is still in good condition, third one needs some repair but there aren't any major problems."
"Ok, get em going and come haul all of these crates out. Then open the secondary dock and see if we can get on the ground from there. Oh and before that. Everyone on group three get over here and put these suits on, you heard what John said, right?."
"Yes, sir."
I switch my communication to open channel.
"This is group three, we are opening the hangar door on the cargo bay, See if we can reach the ground. We'll haul the supplies out and once you are all done, come put these EVAs on and then go outside to meet us. And don't forget the injured guy."
"Group one copy."
"Group two loud and clear."
After that, me and everyone else on group three put on the EVA, then the two logistic mech frames come and haul all the food, supplies, weapons and ammo out to the airlock. We leave some of the EVAs in front of the elevator so that the rest of the engineers can put them on later.
"This is two to three, camera feeds show the hangar door on the cargo bay indeed touches the ground, you can probably get off the station from there."
"Thank you group two. Keep us updated. Oh and also, have we received any signals yet?"
There should be dozens of distress signals coming from all of the drop pods by now.
"No sir, there's nothing, not a single signal."
That is strange. Very strange.
"Strange, and ours?"
"Sent, broadcasting on every possible frequencies."
"Ok, keep us updated."
"Yes, sir."
We haven't had anything coming from group one for a while so I decide to ask them.
"Group one, status."
"We are trying to fix up the main generator. Surprisingly it's not too damaged and I think we can fix it, we are sending some guys to the cargo bay to fetch some tools though, so leave some for us."
"Copy that."
And so I proceed towards the large airlock that separate the inner cargo bay with the exterior door. I signal the engineer who is operating the control panel for the door to open the airlock.
Warning beacons start spinning while flashing orange light on the top of the airlock along with warning sounds coming from the speaker, indicating the opening of the airlock. A few seconds later, some mechanical hissing sounds can be heard as the large and heavy airlock door slide to the sides, revealing the exterior door that separate us with Sarir-B. Me and the two mechs carrying crates steps into the airlocks. With the same procedure as before, the giant airlock door closes behind us and the chamber depressurize.
I do one last gear check to make sure that my EVA is tightly sealed. I look up to the mechs and both pilots inside the cockpit give their thumbs up.
"Ok, we are green, suit is sealed. Cockpits are tight. Go for it."
Through the reinforced window on the main door, light from the two stars shines brightly onto my white suit. It is so bright my visor has to tune down the shade in order to protect my vision from the glaring light.
I can see clouds adrift among the blue sky. I can even spot flying creatures moving about, dashing from one side of the window view to another.
With one final warning sound from the speakers, the mechanical component of the giant door in front of me spurs into life as it pulls the two heavy pieces of rectangular metal to the sides. Daylight invades through the gap in the middle of the doors as they slide further apart.
What has happened so far has been too surreal to be true. No idea how I survived but here I am, standing in front of the door that will lead to this whole new world. What lies in font of me? What will happen from now on? What awaits us out there in this alien world?
Through the opening of the doors I can see a glimpse of the ocean, of the blue sky, of white clouds, of green forest...
And...What was that strange dream all about?
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