A new day has arrived upon the glorious world, the dark veil of night once again retreat from the inevitable invasion of the light. The black star filled canvas is gradually fading away, slowly giving place to a vibrant azure blue as the Twin gracefully rise from the faraway horizon.
The light embraces everything it touches, the sea, the land, the green branches on the top of trees. But it is not omnipresent, there are places that never see the light of the Twins, forever stuck in darkness. Here, it is damp, dark and ominous. The only light source are the glow from bioluminescence mushrooms or fungus every now and then. Sounds of dripping water and strange creatures can be heard echoing from seemingly every direction. Dark caves and caverns like these almost never see any visitors. This is of course true, obviously. No body with intact sanity and decent common sense will ever approach dangerous locations like these, never mind calling them home. They are always filled with all sorts of nightmares crawling about. Yet there are creatures that indeed do, quite a few in fact.
More came, again.
Deep inside a large cavern on the side of a mountain, many figures are shuffling around. Most are on the floor, either sleeping or resting.
They never learn to give up, do they?
These creatures tower over almost all animals and beasts. They are considered to be one of if not the top of the food chain, the ultimate apex predators. They are feared by many, hated by many, dreaded by many.
Of course not. If they do they would have never come here, again.
Dragons, gigantic lizard like creatures of mythical legends with wings on their back and can breath all kind of death out of their mouths. Not to be confused with wyverns which look similar to dragons but noticeably smaller. Wyverns have only two legs and a set of wings that also act as their forelimbs, while dragons have four limbs plus wings on their back. There are many types of dragon like creatures other than wyverns like drakes or wyrms. They all more or less share some similarities with each other, and have an ancient ranking hierarchy amongst themselves, with dragons of course being one of the top species.
So what shall we do with them? Go and bestow upon them a little welcome?
The dragons are absolutely massive, the smallest newborn dragons tower above most animals while the largest elder ones are comparable to hills, and if tales of legend are accounted for, mountains. Naturally, physical strength is out of the question, a single swipe of their tail can wipe out a whole village, cutting down a whole patch of forest and creating shock waves that can be felt from an incredible distance away. What's more, is that they are not simple minded animals like most beasts and monsters, they are intelligent, very intelligent. Capable of complex thoughts and speech with their own language. Some very intelligent ones can even conjure supernatural and mythical forces to aid them. They also have an incredibly long life span, almost to the point of being permanently perpetual, living for thousands and in very rare cases, tens of thousands of years. The longer a dragon lives, the more experience it gains, the more intelligent it is and the more dangerous it becomes.
No, we shan't gain much from but a small band of them. Plundering directly on their homelands would reap us much more rewards. Besides they give more resistant, much better entertainment.
With all of those impressive feats and attributes, it's easy to understand why dragons of all kinds are viewed by many as literal walking and flying natural disasters. Capable of wrecking and burning whole civilizations into ashes. Wherever they go, calamities follow. Many alliances and coalitions had to be made in order to face but a few dragons. And even then, victory is not guaranteed. Countless have risen to challenge their might times and times again. Most fell, very few succeeded.
We shan't make it in time anyway. They will be devoured by the hordes of those disgusting beast before we can get to them, again. Like many many times before. Tis' would be but a waste of time.
They are responsible for the destruction of an untold amount of civilizations, of countless death. They burn. They kill. They destroy. They steal. They hoard. Sometimes for food. Sometimes for shiny trinkets and treasures. Sometimes out of vengeance or anger. Sometimes for merely seeking entertainment out of boredom. And sometimes they destroy just for the sake of it.
But this time it's different.
To the dragons, all smaller creatures and their kingdoms, nations or even empires are but their play things, existing only for them to be destroyed on a whim. They stand unopposed in the world, very few can actually challenge them. So naturally, their superior complex are extremely severe. Only the wise and long lived elder dragons know better, but those are very few and far between. The young generations of dragons are especially violent, eager to flex their power to the world.
They didn't sail here from the great water. They come from something that dropped from high above the clouds. I witnessed it myself.
This vast cavern is one of many caverns that exist in the labyrinths of tunnel systems within these rocky mountain ranges on this uninhabited island. And they are home to the dragons. They have been living on this island for millennia, only going far beyond into the distance land to hunt or to plunder. Living in isolation to the outside world all this time, they become arrogant and full of themselves, due to being invincible for too long. They however, do have the power and strength to back their arrogance up, they are apex predators after all.
Ridiculous, you are but a delusional whelp, youngster. Those tiny creatures can not fly, they can never fly.
They consider themselves as higher than all creatures and beings in the whole world, sparing a few. They treat smaller and weaker creatures as if they are bugs and worms to be crushed underfoot. However, they do acknowledge the strong. They do respect those that can stand on par with them. It can be said that it is their culture of some sort. Legend has it that there are some individuals in the distance past who managed to obtain the respect and even loyalty of dragonkins, by defeating them in combat. They will acknowledge those that bested them, and if demanded, submit as loyal servants of said individuals.
Let's just lay back and observe, I'm bored anyway so tis' some good entertainment.
But time is quickly changing. This stagnant world is about to be shaken to the very core. It is about to be reshaped. By events so influential and impactful it leads to the absolute destruction of the chain of fate and destiny itself, which has been enslaving this world for eons.
Pathetic and puny critters with their so called "expeditions", they never learn their place. They shall perish once again just like their brethren many times before.
A new age is about to dawn on this world. The natural order of predators and preys is going to be reworked soon.
Will the world change for the better or worse? Only time will tell.
Local hour 0734
Location Unknown
It has been twenty minutes since the airlock on floor number two opened. The two large bipedal figures have been busy carrying and reorganizing crates after crates of cargo in and out of the crashed station. They haul out whatever usable supplies that can be salvaged from the mess that is the pile of fallen over cargoes in the cargo bay. Their work was made much easier with the help of small cargo drones that were reactivated and repaired. The ground drones are useless inside since the station is listing on an angle but are helpful once brought outside. The few flying ones however are put to great use in the cargo bay since they are not affected by the station's condition. Together, the frames and the drones work smoothly and efficiently organizing everything into a small supply depot next to the station, with every types of items organized neatly into groups. The items are to temporarily stay here until the cargo bay is fixed or a more safe and secure storage is built inside the station. Then they will be transferred back in, leaving supplies outside is never a good idea.
Everybody had had another short discussion regarding their plan of action a while earlier. And they all quickly came up with many ideas. The most important task at the moment is to quickly establish a temporary base to hold out and wait until rescue arrives. This base will be the first ever human outpost on this alien planet, although it's creation is purely accidental. Everyone will need a place to stay, a place to rest, a place to store supplies, a place that provide safety and security. Once a head quarter is established, they can then use it as a forward operating base to launch various operations such as reconnaissance or search missions to locate and rescue other survivors. Athena itself is the perfect candidate for a base infrastructure, since the entire station is more or less intact.
There are several key essential problems that need to be solve as soon as possible. They are mainly sustenance, hydration, shelter and security. Sustenance and hydration are partially solved, they have enough supplies to last them for more than a month, if rationed they can double or even triple that time. They can also rely on Athena's hydroponic facility to produce plant based food. Water can be purified and recycled using the station's on board systems, which will give them the possibility to use the planet's own water, since Athena lies not too far away from the shoreline. Not to mention the extra supplies that comes with the two transports USSS Jamo and USSS Oriman. Their wrecks are both within visual range, situating at a short distance away from the crash site.
Next is shelter. They all agreed to prioritize the repair of the station and its various systems first and foremost. Since it is the safest place for the time being that offer actual protection against the outside elements and serve as a place for everyone to stay the night. It is also acting as their temporary command center. If they can bring Athena's point defense systems and missile pods online, which are mostly undamaged thankfully, they will have excellent defense and survivability will be significantly higher. Stations are almost always equipped with point defence and laser based anti munition systems to ward off torpedoes or missiles strikes. Sometimes important or strategic stations are equipped with some small missile pods or torpedo tubes that give them limited offensive capability. Military related installations are armed with a much wider and heavier array of weaponry, but Athena is a research station, not an orbital defense platform.
Accommodation is a tricky problem. Because Athena is leaning diagonally on one side, they will have to fashion flat walkways, ladders and floors out of what ever panels and materials they can find. They either have to construct makeshift rooms, stairs, ladders and platforms or remodel existing ones. A logical action since nobody wants to live in a place where a careless step can make you trip and slide all the way to one corner of the room, while inducing various forms of injuries.
One group of engineers tasked with fixing power have managed to bring the backup reactor online, although it can only work at roughly half of its capacity. They then split up to fold out Athena's backup solar panels, since they are relatively intact after the incident. The solar panels somehow held up and are mostly functional, with only 3 out of 8 panels lost in the crash. Stations are always equipped with these. In case if both the main and back up reactor cease to function, the solar panels act as a back up of back up to provide emergency power. After all, solar power is always free in space. With a stable power supply, they can slowly bring back online many of the deactivated functions of the station, such as water recycling systems and air filters. It can also act as a power source to run any additional operation outside.
Another group is moving on to patch up all of the holes and breaches the station suffers from the crash. Unfortunately some holes are simply too big to patch, so they salvage as much materials out of those rooms as possible, deconstructing components and taking off panels to use as materials for construction elsewhere. Then they seal all bulkheads and lock all doors connected to the rooms with those large breaches.
Now that all of the essentials are taken care of, the next priority is general situation awareness, information and recon. They need to know what's going on, where they are and what's around them. That means probes, drones, sensors, scanners and general surveillance. Athena's various radars, sensors and scanners are made to be operational in orbit, not on the ground. Which is why it's own recon ability is rather limited for the time being, plus quite a few of them are currently damaged. At least the area around the crash site are constantly monitored with the station's outside cameras but anything beyond the treeline a distance away is still unknown.
But thanks to Athena being a research station, built with scientific goals, things such as scanners, sensors, drones and whatnot are not hard to come by. There was a minor problem initially. The group consist of almost all engineers and one government official, no scientists. However, thanks to their time working with the science team, they do at least know a thing or two about some scientific equipment. And the decision to make dedicated recon station to launch drones is executed. For now, a few pieces of electronics, some makeshift landing pads, some monitors and screens set up next to the depot will do.
After getting some look around the beautiful landscape, Kansa goes back into the station and help with anything he can. He volunteered to join the team responsible for recon. He and some other engineers salvage and scavenge as much electronic hardware as possible, dismantle them and bring them outside. They then wire everything together and managed to create some sort of a remote communication and intelligent post right next to the supply depot, completed with a tarp roof and several makeshift pads for launching and receiving drones. From there they set up and launch some recon drones to get a better view of their surroundings. They have to do some tinkering by strapping and wiring scanning devices or cameras on the drones. The engineers were quite surprised to find out that their government official is impressively knowledgeable regarding electronic hardware.
The current utmost priority at the moment is searching and rescuing other survivors out there. Secondary objective is to explore and scan the surrounding environment. Most escape pods generally land somewhere near the place they got shot out from in orbit. Since Athena's trajectory is basically vertical, most of the drop pods are gathered within the vicinity of the station's wreckage. As there is a finite number of drones available and signal range are very limited for some reason, they will have to come up with an efficient way to launch drone operations. That means they will have to position the drones in a way that allow maximum operational range. Which is why some of the drones carry with them signal beacons and communication devices to extend range of control and communication. This will also allow other survivors out there to detect their presence and communicate with them, using the drones as relay points.
It didn't take long for them to find other survivor out there. Within the first ten minutes after sending the drones and probes, they receive multiple signals coming from everywhere. Some in the ocean near by, some deeper in land. Most of them are bunched up into groups but there are occasional stragglers here and there. They all immediately contact each other via the network of drones, leading as many as possible back to the crash site.
"My god, I've never been so happy to hear voices from my earpiece." a marine's voice is heard coming from the audio port of the communicator.
"So are you ok out there? How many of you are there?" Kansa ask while eyeing the screen displaying visual video feeds of the various drones.
"Aye sir. No cas. We have 14, 5 grunts and 9 egg heads. Met up with another group a while back."
"What did you just call us?" A faint female voice can be heard screaming at the back.
"Right...er... One of the balls is approaching you from the...north west, I think. Judging by the suns position in the sky. Just follow it back to base."
"Aye. We have a base here?"
"Ah yeah. It's Athena, still intact mostly. We're at the wreck site."
"But I thought it crashed?"
"Yes, it did. It's hard to explain 'cause we don't know either, it's still in one piece somehow. You'll see once you get here."
"Roger."
Conversations like that happen constantly throughout the next hour and a half for the recon team. They were met with the same question every time. Everyone were surprise about Athena, asking about its almost undamaged integrity even though it fell several hundred kilometers from orbit.
Several drones are sent toward the ocean, it doesn't take them long to catch some distress signals and bump into other escape pods. The survivors quickly take out the emergency paddles available in their pod and follow the drones as they lead the pods to the beach where Athena's wreckage is.
Gradually, people starts to appear out of the tree lines and various silhouettes are spotted on the horizon toward the ocean, led by flying ball or disk shape drones. Those silhouettes are the pods that are dropped into the ocean and are currently moving towards the nearest beach to the station. Everyone were waving at each other from far away and cheers when they meet face to face. They shake hands with each other, some even hug.
"Good seeing you again, sir." One of the marine get off one of the beached life pods and ran toward his squad commander who was with four other marines. They all salute each other.
"Seems like I was right. We couldn't find you and Athena was falling fast, we had to bolt it. Looks like you went with the other."
"God damn, Oswald. Thought you didn't make it." Another marine speaks up behind the squad leader.
"Glad to see you, Os"
"Me too, Jin. Fancy suit gave me a guy with a broken leg, he was under a vending machine, had to carry him out to a pod." Oswald look back toward the beach and spot two people carrying the person with broken leg out of the pod.
Over at the beach, Johnathan is being shouldered by one of his colleagues.
"Can't believe we survived that. Like what just happened?"
"Don't ask me. None of us know whatever the fuck just happened. Be glad you're still walking and talking."
"Well I won't be walking for a while that's for sure."
"It doesn't look too bad. Just go get med up and you'll be good in a week, max."
"Those vending machines in the mess hall are so damn heavy."
Many people gather up at the communication tent, waiting to get a fill in on the current situation.
"Good to see that everyone is alright." Kansa opens up first as he shakes hand with the group of people.
"Like wise, sir. I can see that you are not doing too bad yourself." replied a tall man with an assault rifle strapped to his back. Kansa guess he is one of the marines.
"Alright, Ian how many people are there now?" Kansa turns around toward Ian who is still monitoring screens showing some of the drones visual feed.
"We have rescued a total of 32 people so far. Plus the 13 of us and we have a total of 45 people." Ian answers while still having his eye glued to the screens at the same time tying some stuff down into his personal PDA.
"So how many are left?" Kansa asks the technician.
"Let's see. The staff, then the crews, the jarheads, you and your escorts. Probably fifty or so people left still out there." Ian puts down his PDA and switch his gaze from the screen to Kansa. "I just hope that they are fine out there. Some could even be making first contact already."
Kansa was a bit confused by the last line. It took him a few second of raising his right eye brow and staring aimlessly forward before he hears a voice in his brain.
Sir this planet contain intelligent aliens.
"Oh, right. We are not the only one on this planet. How did I forget that?" Kansa slam a palm on his forehead.
"Yeah. I pray that the local folks are not aggressive. We haven't had that much time studying their behavior."
While Kansa was having a conversation with Ian, more people gather at the communication tent. Some drones also come back and land on the ground where two person were waiting to do some check up with the haphazardly installed makeshift devices on the drones. From afar, several more shapes appears out of the treeline.
"We've just got a group of six more people. We are 51 strong now, sir." Ian returns to his duty with the screens and communication devices.
"Hm? Oh, right, thank you. Er...keep looking, you are doing great."
He gives Ian a thumbs up then turns back to face the group of new people, no doubt filled with questions.
"Right, here is the current situation. Athena landed roughly two and a half hours ago. We are still in the process of turning the semi wreck into a livable structure, for now it will act as our temporary headquarter on this planet, at least until rescue comes." He addresses the crowd of people. His voice resonate within the earpieces inside each of their EVA suits.
"Wait, I remember there were some stubborn folks down in the engineering sector when the thing was deorbiting. How are they still alive? Did they escaped?" One person within the crowd raises a question.
"We didn't evac, we stayed back and tried to reduce the crash from a planet buster strike down to a rough landing. And as you can see we did the job well, way too well. Please don't ask how, we all are just as confused as you are, but there's no time to figure that out. The task will be left for later. There are more urgent matters ahead of us. Erm, ok, so here is what we have done and what we need to do."
With the arrival of survivors, there are more manpower available for the many tasks up ahead. And so another meeting is initiated through the public communication channel to discuss the next step to secure a solid foothold on this alien world. The crews and teams send in reports of their accomplishment for the last few hours.
Construction is progressing splendidly, they have managed to repair most of the station's systems and have brought them back online. Power is no longer a concern since the back up reactor combined with solar panels are providing more than enough energy to run the whole place. Water filtration and air filtration is also back online running at almost full efficiency. Accommodation and living space is also no longer a problem. They have remodeled and readjust almost half of the rooms and chambers inside. There are now enough living space for at least dozens of people, if they share room of course. Another great news is that the SCV mech frames that was damaged from before has been brought back into action, all thanks to chief engineer Johnson Galter and a couple of his colleagues.
Security can also be checked off the bucket list, five out of eight point defense turrets are now up and online covering all angles around Athena, with one more being repaired and hopefully coming online soon, the other two are too damaged to repair. They are still trying to bring back the laser anti munition system and the missile pod but for now their defense is more than enough to deal with what ever faunas or floras this planet has to throw at them. If any creepy crawlies dare to approach Athena, be it by air or land they will be met with hails upon hails of 40mm rail-assisted teflon-coated tungsten PDC solid rods leaving the muzzle at Mach 6. These PDC guns are meant to be used in space combat but they work just fine down here on the ground. Able to spit 3000 rounds per minutes to shoot down incoming missiles and torpedoes, even military warships can be turned into beehives against these, nevermind alien creatures. Suffice to say no biological lifeforms can stand against the overwhelming might of modern ballistic technology. And once the missile pod is brought back online, behemoth and even leviathan class creature would have a hard time going against Athena. Still, they don't have unlimited ammunition, each PDC turrets has roughly 2000 rounds total separated into two 1000 rounds magazines for each guns and about 20 small missiles of various types. Nevertheless, that is enough firepower to ward off a small attack fleets, the survivors can rest easy knowing that their security is very much ensured.
Reconnaissance and rescue for survivors is doing rather well. The surrounding area is being scouted out and all the data is being cross-referenced with Athena's databank in an attempt to find out where they are. Currently they need more scouting from the drones so it will take quite some more time until they know where they are on the local world map. The drones are continuing their duty to diligently map out the geography. On the other hand, they have managed to find and rescue many survivors, bumping their population up from 12 engineers plus one government official to a crew of 51 people strong, including scientists, marines, ship crews, more engineers and station staffs. They now have more than enough man power to operate the base and execute many crucial objectives to help improve their survival. One of which is to check the wrecks of the two transport ship that luckily landed very close by to Athena.
There are a myriad of different supplies, new equipment and scientific instruments in every resupply trip. Which means more food, more materials, more tools and possibly more weapons. With the increased manpower, two teams are dispatched to check out USSS Jamo and USSS Oriman and retrieve any usable supplies from both ships. USSS Jamo bears within its extensive cargo bay an assortment of foodstuff, kitchen supplies and strangely large farming supplies for both maintaining and building new hydroponic facility. Effectively tripling the total supplies of food, which can now easily feed a hundred souls for almost two months. USSS Oriman contains electronics, new machinery, maintenance supplies, cleaning supplies, scientific instruments, tools and a fairly decent cache of weapons plus ammunition. People are also suggesting many plans regarding the two wrecked ships and their use. Due to them hitting the ground not much harder than Athena, both ships' hull and systems are fairly intact. Their systems might need some repair but ultimately they are both functional. They are rather spacious, their cargo bays and rooms can potentially serve as storage or more accommodations for people. Their weapons and defensive systems are also somewhat intact, each sporting two point defense turrets, a perfect addition to bolster Athena base's defense.
However, there are several very important specific instruments contained within one of the supply ships that they badly need, now more than ever. And those are the 3d printers. There are a variety of printers that are scheduled to be delivered like organic printer, plastic printers and especially metal printer. Their original purpose was to aid the station staff and allow them to print tools or components on the spot without the need of relying on supply trips. But now, in this dire situation, the printers are going to be critical to the base's survival due to one reason: automated additive construction and manufacturing or AUCOM. The concept is based on the used of 3d printers. Basically, 3d printers are used to print components then robotic arms and drones assemble the components into finished products. This construction methods can be multiplied exponentially, by using 3d printers, robotics and drones to build more printer, more robotics and more drones. By using one to build two, using two to build four, using four to build eight and so on. The entire process is almost completely automated and requires minimal manual work. Workers and engineers only need to provide some inputs, some designs, some blueprints and some overseer, the rest is handled by the machines. As long as there are enough materials, AUCOM system can overtime, expand itself into a formidable manufacturing titan capable of churning out an impressive amount of product in a very short amount of time while requiring next to no manual labor.
There are a lot of building and construction work needed to be done, also there aren't enough tools laying around. They are going to need the printers if they want to increase their chance of survival. The thing is, the printers and the rest of the material supplies lies within the belly of the third transport ship, USSS Latte, of which location is currently unknown. The ship was in the process of docking with Athena when the incident happened, as a result it did not connect tightly with the station and got separated right after it entered the atmosphere. Locating the wreck site of USSS Latte is also one of the objectives of the drone fleet currently scouring the land looking for survivor and mapping out the area.
With more pairs of hands plus an extra SCV unit working on the site, Kansa can slow down and relax himself. Sitting on a box behind Ian's chair, holding a hot bag of instant coffee in his hand and directs the various operations of the now collectively named Athena base. As he put the bag's tube into the mouth piece of his mask, the scent of coffee instantly calm him down. All that have transpired so far has been the most difficult and stress inducing chain of events ever in his entire life. Yet somehow he is managing it, enduring it and bringing it under control. Slowly but surely he comes to term with his current situation. It was not an easy task, with everybody looking up to him and asking for directions, for orders. At first he was confused, almost to the point of panic breakdown, but he managed to hide it all under the veil of his stoic face, something that he had learned throughout his training as a member within the political world. To him, it was a challenge, he had never had this many people depending on his leadership before. They all automatically expect that he is their leading figure, if only they know how inexperienced he is when it comes to anything outside of his controlled training and educational environment. Nevertheless, he is getting the hang of it, using the knowledge he had learned to coordinate everyone into a rather smooth system. A-LAN too has been of great help, receiving, filtering and updating information to Kansa while giving out advises from the AI's vast storage of information. A-LAN assists him in giving out directives that would produce the most amount of efficiency. Kansa has never been more appreciative of his AI.
Now that he has time to relax, sitting there and sipping coffee, his mind drift back through all that have happen thus far, particularly the strange incident and whatever that happened shortly after that. How did he and the crew survive the crash? What caused the incident? And what was the strange dream he had where he talked to this mysterious lady? Everything has been too surreal, too strange. He has noticed a few unnatural details in this missions and is trying to make a few connections, brainstorming the information with his AI but he couldn't make out anything useful. Though he did come up with some theories.
Suddenly Ian shoots up from his makeshift chair, intercepting Kansa's internal meeting with A-LAN. His expression was that of surprise mixed with excitement and concern.
"What? Come in again." There seems to be some communication problem, Kansa can hear the cracking from the earpiece from behind Ian.
"What is it, Ian?" Kansa puts down his coffee cup and approach the young Earthling Texan.
"Sir, we found the Latte." Ian turns around and excitingly states.
"Really? Where is it?"
"It's further inland, much further than those two over there but not too far. It crashed in an open hill somewhere south east of the base. East south east to be exact, and the distance is roughly six to seven kilometers." Ian point his hand to the Oriman and the Jamo, then towards the green treeline, indicating the vague direction where the wreck of the Latte laid.
"Hm, we can reach it within the day, and we have enough people for a rescue trip."
"Yes, sir. Let's just hope that the crew is fine and the high tech equipment onboard are not too damaged."
"Crew?" Kansa is a bit confused.
"Aye, sir. The Latte's crew were still within their ship when the incident happened. Looks like they went down with their ship."
"Are they ok?" Kansa asks in a worried tone.
"I hope so. The Latte is a Contina class supply transport ship and they are not designed for atmospheric flight."
"Yeah, we can only hope. Alright, I shall organize a search and rescue part-"
"RRY...NEE...HE...PLEASE..." The blur of cracking sounds on the communication piece is suddenly replaced with a broken voice. Whoever is talking on the other end is in some sort of hurry.
Both Kansa and Ian nervously wait while Ian adjust the signal frequency to get a clearer communication line.
"I have a very bad feeling about this, sir."
"Yeah, me too." Kansa replies
After a while of fumbling with the controls, Ian manages to clear up the transparency of the signal. His hand shakes lightly as he turn on the earpiece.
They are immediately greeted with the sound of what seems to be muffed blast from automatic weapons, some incoherent yelling in the background and sounds of loud banging. Looks like the crew of the Latte did somehow survive and is locked in combat with something. But what worries them most is the voice that follows.
"...CO...N...SO...ODY...IF YOU ARE OUT THERE, WHOEVER YOU ARE HURRY UP AND GET YOUR ASS OVER HERE. WE NEED SUPPORT AND WE NEEDED IT YESTERDAY. DAMN THINGS ARE ALL OVER THE PLACE AND THEY ARE TRYING TO BREAK IN." A loud and panicked voice is shouted out of the communication device, with the sound of combat getting louder in the background.
"This is Athena base, we hear you. Are you the Latte's crew? What's you situation?" Kansa calmly speaks to the panicked voice on the other side.
"We have a base here? Thank god. There are tons of...alien biters or whatever trying to claw their way into our ship. We have two KIA and two wounded here. Currently barricading ourselves inside the cargo bay, don't know how much longer we can hold. Please send back u- OH SHIT!" The voice is immediately followed up by a few gunshots, then a short few seconds of static before cutting off.
Kansa and Ian look at each other in utter silent and disbelieve.
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"Exploring the unknown reaps both reward and punishment. Like a double edged blade, it can brings you either riches or death, sometime both."
-Zackarian Kansa-