Alena followed him inside and quickly turned around. The flashlight on her shoulder swept through the wrecked room and illuminated the chaos all around them. Broken furniture, like desks and chairs, floated everywhere. Lots of rubble and broken pieces made it hard to guess what this room once had been used for.
“No immediate threats detected.” Alena reported and stowed the handheld gun. It looked like a normal pistol, but was a bit bigger and made of many metal plates that shifted silently. Niu had found it together with a few rifles in one of the many boxes. They didn’t have the chance to test the Keeper weapons yet, but Proto assured them that they worked with ?ther and could be recharged on the ship. If their effect was anything like the defense mechanism of the monolith on Terulos they would be a valuable, devastating asset against any living being.
“Yeah, I don’t get any readings from my G-Anomaly either.” Robin said, also looking around. “Ang’Tue, does the connection still work?”
“Yes, we get a clear stream from your camera.” The Eltaran’s voice crackled over the comm and somewhere in the background, Niu was complaining. “It’s dark like the ass of a Burlag. Can’t you turn on the light or something?”
“No, Alena’s scans were correct–the main power is offline. I can sense a little energy deeper within the ship but I assume it’s nothing more than a small backup for emergencies.” Robin said.
He noticed that the map in his Interface began to change as Proto made live updates based on the camera feed.
The room was huge but he realized that the panorama deck had been refitted to serve as some kind of office or control station. ‘Based on the number of screens and displays floating around, it seems like Krez’s theory about this being a command ship has some merit.’
“Any idea what has hit them?” Robin asked as he inspected the hole in the ceiling. It had a diameter of roughly two meters and the sides were smooth instead of sharp-edged as he had expected.
“Definitely something hot.” Alena said, “Do you see how the metal is folded inwardly? It also has a slight oily sheen to it, as if it had been heated and then quickly cooled down again.”
“Do you think of a laser?” Happy gasped, “I never heard of a laser with such a size.”
“I’ve no idea, I’m just describing what I can see.”
“I agree with Alena’s assessment of a heat-based attack.” Proto said, “Though Niu is right, there are no lasers of this size. While technically possible, the energy needed would be astronomical and the gain compared to a smaller laser minimal.”
“I don’t see a projectile or remains of a missile.” Robin said, “There is a lot of rubble however. Maybe it has drifted off by now.”
“There are no bodies either.” Alena pointed out, just as a loud announcement echoed through the dark ship. In the void without an atmosphere it sounded dull and far away, but Robin still heard it loud and clear.
“Attention! Time remaining for authorization: 35 minutes.”
“Authorization? Authorization for what?” He wondered.
“How would I know? But I don’t like it, we should hurry up.” Alena said and moved towards the burrowed door nearby.
“Agreed!” Robin nodded and helped her clear away pieces of broken tables.
Soon they stood in front of a pressure lock, not unlike the one he had activated to end his fight on Terulos.
“Can you open it?” She asked.
“I’ll give it a try. Go and check out the door on the other side while I work on this one.”
Robin slowly breathed in and out, then he tapped into his mutation and green lines appeared in his vision. They were thin, barely visible, and running through the walls around him.
“As I thought, there is only very little power left. I hope it’s enough to open the door.” He mumbled and inspected the few hubs where the power was connected to elements of the door.
After he had forcefully activated the pressure lock on the Hubble, he had spent some time figuring out how to get it open again. These locks were made for emergencies, in case of a hull breach–as had happened here, and needed to be repaired afterwards. The explosives had to be replaced.
But if he could reactivate the magnets in the frame, they would pull out the cylinders and allow him to push up the whole door manually.
After a few minutes, Alena returned and informed him that the other door was closed for good. Apparently it had been hit by whatever had melted the hole into the hull and it was practically welded together with the surrounding wall.
“Open the panel over there.” Robin instructed, not taking his eyes off the door. “There should be a compatible plug for the powerpack we brought. Get those connected, I need more juice to activate the magnets.”
He had identified the three hubs he had to bridge in order to open the door, but the little power provided by the emergency system wasn’t enough to get it running. Alena quickly took off her backpack and removed the panel on the wall next to the door. She fiddled around for a moment and then the green lines in Robin’s vision finally flared up.
“Great! Prepare to push the door upwards.” He said and concentrated on the first of the hubs. He forcefully lowered its resistance and soon they heard a loud clank when one of the cylinders was pulled back into the frame.
Another two clanks later, Alena was finally able to move the door. She pushed it upwards with ease and held it there until Robin disconnected their powerpack. With a rumble, the door locked in its position.
“Nice work.” She complimented.
“We’re lucky that there is no gravity on the ship or we would have needed Patience or Sevatian to move that thing. It’s heavy as shit, believe me!” Robin said and stored his stuff just as the next announcement came.
“Attention! Time remaining for authorization: 30 minutes.”
“Let’s hurry up.” Robin said and pushed himself into the corridor.
***
Relying on the map in his Interface, Robin guided Alena as they drifted through dark hallways, steadily pulling themselves along the walls. The flickering lights of the occasional emergency signs pointing to the nearest exits or the hangar gave the scene an eerie atmosphere.
Luckily the backup power was enough for controlling the basic doors, so they didn’t have to take out their powerpack every time.
Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
While they were on their way towards the bridge, Robin and Alena made a quick stop when they passed by a door with ‘Escape Capsules’ written above. Inside were six human-sized pods all neatly lined up, waiting for someone to enter.
“No one left the ship this way. So, where is everyone? A ship like this must have had a huge crew with dozens of people.” Robin asked in confusion but Alena only shrugged.
They left the room just as the next announcement informed them that the countdown had fallen to 25 minutes.
Apart from the remodeled panorama deck, the ship was pretty much comparable to a normal Apex Nova, with many small and big offices and enough bunks to house lots of personnel.
When they finally arrived on the bridge, Robin, Alena and the others back on the Relentless Stride were completely confused and had more questions than answers. The bridge was as abandoned as the rest of the ship. They didn’t find any people–neither dead nor alive, no signs of a fight and no indicators that anyone else had come aboard before them.
“It’s like they got hit and everyone just left even though the ship successfully sealed the breached command room to avoid further pressure loss.” Robin mumbled.
“Well, someone at least turned off the power before they fled. Which in turn had disabled the artificial gravity and made leaving only harder.” Alena added as she looked around in the huge command room. “What’s that?”
Robin followed her gaze and noticed a small pad that was embedded into the captain’s station. It showed the image of a hand and its frame was blinking rapidly.
- The frame’s light is red (91%)
“A hand scanner? Strange…” Robin wondered, his helm made a clunk when he absentmindedly tried to scratch his head, “But I feel like I’ve seen that kind of setup once before. Proto, does such a scanner belong to the basic equipment of UAS ships?”
“No.” The AI responded, “But there are many possible upgrades that would require secondary means of authorization.”
While Robin was giving the pad a closer inspection, the announcement came again.
“Attention! Time remaining for authorization: 20 minutes.”
“Maybe the pad is needed for this ‘authorization’?” Alena guessed, “I mean, it’s pretty obvious what they want us to do.”
“Yeah, but don’t touch it. We have no idea what will happen if it doesn’t like your hand.” He said and pushed himself away from the seat to drift towards the door, “Also, I don’t want to be here when the countdown runs out. Let’s give the hangar a quick visit and then hurry off, okay? Let the Eltaran figure out what has happened here.”
Robin asked Proto to place a small widget with the countdown in his Interface before he took off.
- Timer: -17:22
“Come on, there isn’t much time left.” He said and fired off another Echo Pulse, “We need to go back the way we came and then go down one level.”
So far his senses had remained mostly silent. However, halfway down the corridor Robin suddenly felt a slight itch on his right arm. He used the steering nozzles to rotate mid-flight and concentrated on a spot between wall and ceiling right above him until a cluster of green lines formed in his vision.
“Okay, that’s new…” He said as the energy source followed his movement.
They passed another emergency sign that cast a faint light into the hallway, enough to see the stairs to the lower deck in the distance.
“What is it?” Alena asked, realizing that he sensed something.
“Not sure yet, but something small is following us. Over there.” Robin pointed at the ceiling.
“In the corridor above or in a shaft in the ceiling?”
“Can’t say. I only sense a small energy cluster moving above our heads. Maybe some kind of little robot?”
When the thing didn’t stop following him after some time, Robin smirked and activated a skill. Immediately the green lines in his vision became more detailed as his focus sharpened. The thing was too small for him to quickly identify separate nodes to manipulate, so he simply targeted the whole robot and willed all its electronics to increase their resistance.
The result was as immediate as it was disappointing. The robot slowed down for a brief moment, as if suddenly walking through thick jelly, before it continued to follow him undisturbed.
Robin grunted and even though his head complained under the strain of his mutation, he sent another command. To his delight, that actually did work. As soon as he lowered the resistance, Robin saw the green lines starting to spin.
‘Did the thing stumble right now?’ He thought with a laugh, ‘I need to test it again, when we can actually see the thing.’
Just as they reached the stairs and turned right to float down, Ang’Tue contacted them. “Be careful, we just checked the map and there isn’t a hallway above you! Whatever it is, it must be within the ceiling.”
“Roger.” Robin said and then suddenly grabbed the railing to stop moving forward. He first fired another Echo Pulse and then closed his eyes to concentrate as he tapped into his mutation. For a few long moments, he just floated there, not moving at all. Alena waited for him further down the stairs.
“It’s gone.” He finally said and pushed off the railing, “I don’t like that. We should get out of here sooner rather than later.”
“I agree.” Alena said and pointed into the darkness in front of her, “I can see the entrance to the hangar over there. It’s just a few meters.”
“Let’s be quick.” Robin said and pushed off the railing with force.
A moment later he unceremoniously slammed into the huge door to the hangar and a dull bang echoed through the corridor.
“Sorry, I didn’t manage to brake fast enough.” He awkwardly chuckled, catching Alena’s angry glare.
After a quick inspection with his G-Anomaly, he took out the powerpack again and connected it to the board behind the panel that was hidden nearby. He first scanned the next room but couldn’t detect anything, then he just overloaded the whole keypad that locked the door and moments later the door slowly slid open.
- Timer: -11:10
Proto had to make some major changes to the map again. The hangar was much bigger than that of a normal Nova and filled nearly the whole lower deck.
Alena, weapon at the ready, moved in first. Robin followed behind her.
“At least we now know how the crew managed to escape.” He mumbled when their flashlights revealed the expansive room. There had to be space for at least three small ships, but none was there anymore, so the hangar looked deserted. Just a few crates and machine parts Robin didn’t recognize remained, floating just above the ground.
“Not all of them got away.” Alena whispered and pointed towards a body a few meters away.
“Shit.” Robin cursed, “Can you see, what has killed him?”
The dead figure wore a basic military space suit and a helmet with an opaque visor. Robin couldn’t see any blood or open wounds. But Alena was the one with the enhanced vision, maybe she could make sense of it.
They moved forward slowly, warily watching their surroundings. Robin practically spammed his Echo Pulse but didn’t get any pings.
“His suit seems to be intact. I can’t see any signs of extraneous influence. Cover me for a minute.” Alena said and nudged the corpse with her food to flip it around.
While she continued her examination, Robin observed their surroundings. He didn’t sense any noteworthy energy clusters but he spotted something else.
“There is another one.” He said and pointed at a body that was stuck between two crates.
Alena quickly flew over. It was another human figure in the same military spacesuit.
“No signs of violence either.” She said after a quick inspection, “I’ll take off his helmet so we at least learn his race, then we get the fuck out of here.”
“Roger.”
Robin saw her fidgeting with the helmet and suddenly a memory popped into his head.
“Burn in Plasma!” He yelped, “Stop! Leave him be. That is–”
It was too late, Alena just managed to open the visor and jumped back in fright. “Damn it!”
With horror and disgust they watched the red and smoking mess that once had been a face.
“It had a kill-switch, like the people that attacked us on Terulos.” Alena grunted, “How did you know?”
“Yeah, fuck.” Robin cursed, “I just remembered where I had seen that hand scanner before. The interceptor from those guys on Terulos also had one installed and I put one and one together…”
“What are these people doing here?”
The silence in the huge hangar pressed on their nerves as they just blankly stared ahead for a moment, frozen mid air, not knowing what this was all about.
“We shouldn’t be here. You need to get out of there! Go!” Ang’Tue called them, breaking the spell and shaking Robin and Alena into motion.