I opened my eyes to the sight of red lights flashing around me. For a moment, I thought
I was reliving my memories-until Ariella's voice broke through the haze.
"You're finally awake. I thought you were dead," she said, her tone louder than usual.
"Did we survive?" I croaked, my throat dry and my body weak. I tried to move, but my
limbs felt stiff and drenched. It wasn't until I raised my hand to my face that I noticed the mask covering it. Blood. My hand was coated in blood.
Panic set in. I yanked off the mask and stumbled out of the pod, only to be greeted by a horrific sight: blood. Everywhere. The floor of the compartment was slick with it,pooling around the base of the pod. My stomach churned.
"What the hell happened here?" I demanded, my voice shaky.
""It was an emergency," Ariella replied, her voice devoid of its usual edge."You were badly injured when all our engines exploded as we hit the singularity."
"How am I alive, then? Shouldn't everything have disintegrated?" I asked, struggling to process her words.
"I don't know what happened," she admitted."For the scale of destruction, I'd say we were extremely lucky. I had to eject everything that was burning, but somehow we survived with most of the rations and facilities intact. Except for the engines, of course."
I took a deep breath, trying to piece things together. Then it hit me. "Wait... the blood pool. You used it, didn't you?"
"Yes," she confirmed.
My stomach dropped. The blood pool was a last-ditch medical procedure-an extreme measure reserved for near-fatal injuries. The highly corrosive liquid dissolved damaged tissue before releasing a regenerative agent to rebuild the body. Even with advanced technology, the survival rate was abysmal: less than seven percent.
I glanced at the pod again, the blood now congealing on the floor. "How bad was it?"
"Both your arms were severed at the shoulders. A large shrapnel shard was embedded in your abdomen, and both your legs were impaled by rebar," she said, listing the injuries with clinical precision. "It was fortunate your head was protected by the pod's upper casing. Otherwise, you wouldn't have made it."
I swallowed hard. "And the pod? It's destroyed?"
"Yes," she said. "But I was able to control the onboard medical systems remotely. I-"
"Hold on," I interrupted, suspicion creeping in. "You've always said you can't do anything without my permission. How did you-?"
"Don't question me right now," she snapped,uncharacteristically defensive. "I saved your life, Captain. Let's leave it at that." I didn't press further, though unease lingered.
HQ must have programmed her with a failsafe in case I refused to follow orders. It was too convenient. I'd deal with that later. Right now, I needed answers.
"Where are we?" I asked, rushing to the deck. The windows revealed nothing but an
impenetrable black void.
"Are we still inside the anomaly? Did the shields fail?"
""That's what I've been trying to figure out,"Ariella said. "We crash-landed, but I can't pinpoint our location. Every sensor on the ship is down. The shields are partially operational, but I had to divert most of our power to stabilize the core."
"Crash-landed?" I repeated. "On what?"
"I don't know," she admitted. "The external sensors are nonfunctional, and the ship's
buried in some kind of soil. I can't determine if the environment outside is hospitable."
I clenched my fists. "So we're trapped."
"Not entirely," she said. "But if you want to leave, you'll have to cut through the ship's
upper hull. It's buried, and the escape hatch is inaccessible."
"That's going to take forever. The hull's made of riverbeterium," I muttered, already
dreading the task.
"Yes, but at least the air supply isn't an issue. The core is still functioning and can
refine the atmosphere into breathable oxygen indefinitely."
"Well, that's something," I sighed, relieved I wouldn't suffocate."What about food?"
"The rations will last a decade, at least," she said. "And the core will keep running for millions of years if left untouched. Energy isn't the problem."
"Great. So I'll die of boredom instead," I muttered, heading toward the Bay Area."I need to survey the damage, see if there's any way out."
"Be careful," Ariella warned. "If there's a breach, put on a suit immediately. I can't guide you with the sensors offline."
"Don't worry. I'm not planning on dying just yet," I said with a dry chuckle. "Besides,
maybe we got lucky and landed on a planet with an atmosphere like Earth's."
"Don't be ridiculous," Ariella scoffed. "The odds of that happening are infinitesimal. If we landed somewhere habitable, I'll convert to a monk."
Her sarcasm made me smile despite everything. "Careful what you promise, Ariella. I'd pay good money to see you as a devout Al."
"Don't get your hopes up," she retorted.
"Now, stop joking and focus. The sooner we figure out where we are, the sooner we can plan our next move."
The sun technologies were able to make a breakthrough, basically harnessing a anti matter plasma engine for power, effectively ending the energy crisis in an instant. It was highly effective and contrary to what others expected, which was a major explosion a million times stronger than nuclear didn't happen.
" I should look around to sort everything out. Even the Bay Area is a mess, with everything falling off the shelf. Maybe I can find a hole to crawl outside." I chuckled.
" A breach is not a laughing matter; put on a suit in case that happens. I can't guide you because most of my sensors are down."
" Fine, maybe we could be lucky and get a place identical to Earth's atmosphere instead of landing on a fucking asteroid." There was a lot that I didn't know, and with endless possibilities, the asteroid landing was much more plausible.
As I waded through the mess in the Bay Area, the thought lingered in my mind: against all odds, what if Ariella was wrong? What if we really had landed somewhere miraculous?