Chapter 1: Time and Time Again

There was a noise… as she come out of the haze of sleep, faster than she likes. Another noise….again… one eyelid opens, not wanting to relinquish the warm, dark embrace of sleep just jet.

It's the cat again… trying to get my attention by pulling things of my bed's side table…. must mean it's breakfast time then….. The one open eye drifts to the clock on the bedside table. 6:30 AM?! Seriously Sutekh?! On a Saturday?... A soft sigh escapes her, both eyes close briefly and then open again. Fine, I'm awake…won't get any more sleep until you get fed anyway. And with that she gets up, slowly removing the hand that lazily hangs over her waist so as to not wake her fiancé. I hate being such a light sleeper.

After the cat has been fed, she tries to crawl back in bed again, hoping for some cuddling and sleeping a bit later. But she just gets comfortable when his phone rings. So much for that idea… I hate it that he is always on standby. He gets up, dresses and kisses her goodbye before he is out the door. And so another Saturday alone starts. With her bed-warmer gone, she decided she might as well get up and face the day. She mumbles and groans at the thought as she gets back out of bed. Suddenly a little face stares up at her from her feet. "Woof", followed by blinking eyes and a wagging tail from the Jack Russel x. "All right, all right. Breakfast for you too."

The dogs are fed and let out, washing gets done and also the dishes; before she gets back to her studies with a cup of tea. Hours seem to fly by unnoticed, only breaking away from her work in order to sustain her body. That is, until the cat decides it's time for a break. "Aaaawww, Sutekh….. how am I supposed to work with you in-between me and the keyboard?" But she just lets out a sigh and pets him instead of moving him. "All right, I'll take a break." "Purrmew" he answers to his content at getting her attention. She gets up from her computer and grabs her small bag. "Don't give me that look! You were the one to insist on a break. Besides, the house needs a few things, like milk. You don't want us to run out of milk now do you?" The cat just looks at her, upset that his petting was stopped. She ignores him, ties back her hair in a braid, puts on a jacket and shoes and is out the door.

A short time later she returns with a bag full of groceries, puts it on the kitchen counter and starts to put everything away; blue bag still slung over her left shoulder, bag hanging on her right hip. She often forgets about the bag on her side when she goes out. Force of habit at always keeping it on her ever since it was stolen at a restaurant from having to put it down on the floor. Christine Kruger is a practical person, none of this poofy, under arm, uncomfortable fashion nonsense. Besides, too big a bag means too much clutter can accumulate. She is normal in almost every other sense, really. Long brown hair, hazel eyes, slightly taller than the average woman but nothing exceptional.

The sound of rolling thunder is suddenly heard outside, startling her with a jump. "Shit! Didn't notice that at all! …. The laundry!" she grabs a basket and runs outside. The weather forecast didn't say anything about rain for today, not even supposed to have clouds…..just my luck. At least it's just the duvet that's left. With her prize in hand, still dry; she looks up at the sky, angry at it deciding not to follow the planned weather forecast. But then something else entirely catches her eye and she stops dead in her tracks. "What…is that?" she manages to mumble out; as a strange swirling of dark clouds seem to form roughly above her, with lightning arching from one side of the swirl to the other, with a strange dark purple hue to them. Before she has a chance to decide that it's probably safer indoors, a purple lightning arc hits her from the centre of the swirl of clouds. Pain wracks her body, making every muscle contract at once and all she sees is a bright white light everywhere, and then…..nothing.

After she was sure that the pain has gone, she slowly opens her eyes. Hmm? Blackness? So… am I dead? Feels like I'm floating… but I can't see or feel much else… she slowly starts to move fingers, toes, arms and legs. A soft groan escapes her as her muscles complain. Ok, so all parts accounted for and moving without too much pain….that good right? Slowly small pockmarks of light start to pepper the horizon as her vision becomes more focused, covered by some sort of purplish haze. Wait…are those starts? How did I end up in space? Or is this the doorway to heaven? Am I in some kind of nebula? That can explain the purple haze effect…but not what the hell I'm doing here….how am I even breathing? Panic starts to grip her and she starts to look around frantically, but finds nothing more than the vast expanse of stars and purple haze in all directions. She got up and ran around in every direction, trying to find something, anything, to grasp, even just a clue as to what is going on.

Time seemed to stand still, or move by unnoticed. After what felt like hours to her, her panic disappears and is replaced with her trying to reason what is going on logically, she folds her arms and sits crossed legged (not that there is anything to really sit on) and starts to think. Ok so I'm not dead it seems, or heaven as a waiting room. It looks like I'm in a nebula ….. somehow… somewhere … in space …. now what? As she concentrates on what is going on, a surge of energy starts to trickle through her nerves, slowly working its way from her head to her toes. What the….. as she looks at herself, seeing an outline of purplish, flaming energy lap up from her skin. Suddenly the purple haze that surrounds her starts to get drawn into her, she could feel it moving into her very being, stinging and burning as it goes, until it reaches her head. A flash of unbearable pain shoots through her, igniting every nerve ending in white hot pain. She grabs her head around her temples and curls into a foetal position, shouting "Stop it! Get out! GET AWAY! STOP IT!" but it doesn't stop. It seems to drag out over minutes until it finally subsides and goes away. She is left breathing heavily, her whole body covered in sweat and panting. She manages to open her eyes once again. The purple haze seems to have been diminished directly around her, but she is still in space and still alive ….somehow…. probably. Your not supposed to feel pain if your dead, right?

Once again time didn't seem to pass at all. Everything static and not moving. She tries to figure out what just happened, how this happened, but only comes up with more questions than answers. Heh,… at least the purple pain cloud thing seems to be over. She was alone with her thoughts for a very long time, she started to get hungry and tired. How long have I been here? Am I just hanging around in order to starve to death? Maybe if I sleep I will just wake up in bed at home and all of this was just some screwed-up nightmare. Yes, that's it! It's a nightmare! She quickly 'rolls over' to try and go to sleep. Soon, that all too familiar warm darkness envelops her.

When she wakes, however, nothing has changed. She is still hungry and still floating somewhere in space in a purple haze. Aaww come on! Seriously!... what am I supposed to do now?! She gets up and tries to start walking in one direction, any direction. But no matter how many steps she takes, it doesn't seem to get her anywhere. She keeps doing this for what seems like hours until her rumbling stomach stops her.

So, nowhere to go, nothing to eat or drink, and somewhere in the middle of space with nothing to do but starve to death… Just GREAT! That is if my blood-sugar doesn't dip and makes me pass out first…. Might as well enjoy the view…. she thinks to herself. She begins to look around, trying to see some of the constellations she knows, but none seem to be there. So she starts making her own pictures in the stars, until she notices a dark blip on her horizon. Hello? What's this? The blip seems to be moving and getting larger, turning and heading in her direction. She gets a swell of hope in her chest. Maybe I won't die after all. Maybe that's my way out of here! "Hey! HEY! Over here!" she starts to jump up and down, waving in the blips direction. Wait, how can I shout in space? They can't hear me. If this is space at all? By the time her attention is back on the blip, it's more like a streamlined bullet of a large ship, moving towards her at alarming speed. Wait! They don't see me! They are going to run me over! Shit! Try as she might to run/ swim through space, she's not getting out of the way fast enough. The ship suddenly stops in front of her. But before she has time to think anything of it, a jolt of pain hits her from some beam from the ship, and she is knocked out.

When she comes to, she has a splitting headache and she hears herself groaning. What just happened….again….. Gravity seems to be back, and she is lying down on something solid. Not a bed but close enough. She slowly opens her eyes to survey her new surroundings, letting her eyes adjust to the new brightness, only to be shocked at what she finds. She is in some sort of pod thing with what almost seems like an orange stained glass cover that she can only see a few shapes through and a light right above her. Then there is someone hovering over the pod, possibly looking at her. "Uuhm….Hello? W-what's going on? W-where am I?" Her voice sounded ragged and dry. She hears a reply, but it's not in any language she has ever heard. Then a small prick of pain on her arm, before the feeling of some kind of medication makes her sleepy, the rest is just a blur, and blackness surrounds her once more. From there on in, everything seems to be a blur, coming in and out of consciousness, barely registering her surroundings and figures standing around her; before a prolonged darkness seems to keep her in its hold, filled with nightmares and vivid visions of destruction and death.

Suddenly, the darkness starts to ebb away slowly. She ventures to open her eyes again, only to find herself upright, but in another pod of some kind. At least this one had clear glass. She was in some kind of room with metal walls and floor, but it had odd shapes and dark corridors, and she couldn't even make out the room completely. She wasn't as hungry as she was before, but that had nothing to do with where she was now. "Hello? Is someone there?" she tried, hoping the response will be better than the last time she tried to talk. A machine like whirr responds to her inquiry. Looking down the open corridor, a light from a flashlight started to come her way out of the darkness. Relief flooded her whole body "Oh, thank goodness. Someone's found me! Can you get me out of –..." her sentence is cut short as the source of the moving light comes into view. It was some kind of robot, with smooth grey coverings, strangely bent legs and a flashlight-type head, holding an odd weapon with three fingered hands. It moved in front of her pod and made that funny whirring sound again; and then just stood there, looking at her. She was suddenly very afraid of what was going on, and didn't make another sound. Just frozen with fear like a dear in the headlights of a car.

A few moments passed of just staring, or at least she thinks it might be staring; until she heard strange footsteps from that same corridor. What she saw was even stranger and scarier than the machine in front of her. A tall, silver being came from the darkness. It had a large chest with a bulge on its back coming up to its neck, dinosaur-looking head with spikes pointing backwards at the top of its head and some things sticking out from its jaw on either side, and three claws on its hands and two on his feet; but it also looked part machine, with blue glowing eyes and an almost mechanical arm. She just kept staring, not saying a word, her heart racing in her throat and a knot forming in her stomach. Every inch of it seemed to exude confidence, authority, danger and demanded respect. This being motioned for the machine to leave and stopped in front of her pod, looking at her with almost murderous intent.

When it started speaking however, it had a strange flanging voice, but she didn't understand a word of it, and just kept staring at it in fear and bewilderment. It seemed to notice that she was not replying, and was now looking at her as if it was impatiently waiting for an answer. Did it ask a question? What should I say? Do I need to say anything? Should I say anything? She pondered to herself and then, swallowed down her fear and answered in a shaky voice "I-I….don't understand." The being gave a growl and seemed to be losing its patience with her. This only made her more afraid of it. She curled back as far as the pod would allow. It reached out a hand,… claw,….. talon,…. whatever; to the pod and typed a few things on what she assumed is a console next to the glass. Then, when it spoke again, she could understand it! A translator! Awesome! But what it said and how it said it made her little bit of hope disappear in an instant, replaced by unwavering fear. "So tell me human, how did you end up in a Prothean ruin, in a Prothean stasis pod?" distaste and venom seem to drip off his words. He sounded male from what she could tell, but that was only a fathom of a thought at the back of her head. He called me human, so he knows what I am and it means there are other beings in this universe, but what does he mean Prothean ruin…should I even answer? He looks real angry and dangerous….. just….. tell the truth….maybe he will let me go…..Oh…I hope he lets me go… "I-I don't know….what you're talking about….. I don't- I don't know what or who Prothean is…. I just want to go home, please." Her voice was shaky and ragged, both from fear and a terribly dry throat.

He initially seemed pleased at her answering, but by the time she was done, he seemed to be fuming with rage, letting out another growl at her. "Don't play games with me human! Or I will rip you to shreds and feed you to a varren. Now, what were you doing in a Prothean stasis pod!" he seemed to want to lunge at her, but before he could, a calm female voice came from the corridor.

"I sense she is speaking the truth, Saren. She knows not of what you speak. She must have come there not of her own free will and have no recollection of what brought her there." The calm, neutral voice stated, as she came from the dark corridor. She was blue skinned, wearing a strange, long, black dress that showed way too much cleavage, and a headdress with curving spines around her head.

Her voice seemed to calm him down a bit, but he still gave a low growl. "Fine! Prep her for examination and experimentation. I want to know of any and all of the abnormalities in her system the scans picked up earlier. We will get answers one way or the other. And while we're at it, see how she responds to the indoctrination." Saren barks at the female figure, but she seems to remain undeterred.

"Very well, Saren. It shall be done as you ask." The blue female replies. With this, the one called Saren turns and walks out of the room, followed by the female figure.

"Wait! What's going on! I don't want to be some guinea pig!" Christine shouted after them, but they didn't even look back at her. The machine stepped forward again, pressing a few buttons on the pod's controls, and all too soon, medication floods her system again from a pinprick, making her sleepy. "No! I won't!" she yells at no one, banging her fists on the glass as hard as she could, but to no avail. "I won't….be….used…" her limp body finally drooping over in the pod as the anaesthetic takes effect.

From this point on, time seemed to blur again between unconsciousness, nightmares and blurred but vivid visions of death and destruction by machines. Sometimes she imagines she wakes up partially on an operating table in a lab in pain, being poked and prodded and cut. And there always seemed to be some kind of humming or buzzing noise at the back of her head.

Some many blurred moments later, she slowly came to from the anaesthetic, her mind still foggy; but her eyes opened slowly to the light of the room she was in before. That humming still at the back of her head, but she decided to ignore it. Slowly she starts to look around, not wanting to tip anyone off that she is awake yet. A lone machine stood at a console, with its back to her and its weapon on a table near her. Suddenly all her memories come flooding back on what had happened, but she clamped down on the panic rising in her chest. Ok, think Christine, THINK! Panic won't save you. Right, what can I work with, what do I have…. And it's only now that she realises she is in some sort of hospital gown. Great…not even wearing something useful. She starts to feel around her in the pod for any edges, buttons or seams. She eventually finds the seam of the glass lid, but it wouldn't give. Dammit! Will have to break the glass before the stupid machine hears me, and then hope I can out run it or find someplace to hide…..or find a way to deactivate it…. Oooohhhh I hope it has a stupid power button somewhere obvious….riiight, with my luck…..ok, glass first then stupid machine….. Ok. F=MA, and F is larger if the area is smaller, so….elbow….with full weight behind it as fast as possible…..here goes nothing. Not a lot of room for momentum in here, but I can't just sit here! She calms her thoughts, and focuses all her fear and panic from before into pure rage and determination, pulls up her one foot to push on the pod wall behind her, and thrusts forwards with all her strength and weight, with her right elbow to the glass. She suddenly feels a tingle of some strange energy deep inside her, and it feels like it spreads across her whole body. She roars with effort and kicks herself forwards.

*CRACK, CRASH*

She quickly stumbles out of the broken pod, bits of glass in her arm and hair, a few scratches here and there but her arm took the worst of it, adrenaline keeping her from feeling much pain right away. She looks up to see the machine has already turned around and was looking at her and then the pod, and then back at her. Before she even thinks about the weapon on the table, she lunges at the machine, tackling it to the ground, acting purely on an instinct she never knew she had. As soon as they hit the floor, she starts to force her hands into the area around its neck, pulling at all the exposed wires she can get a grasp on. The machine gives a whirr in response and pushes her off it, but not before she pulls some vital wires and pipes out. She quickly spins around, back on her feet, but stops. The machine stays down on the floor, convulsing and making even stranger whirring and electronic noises, white liquid pooling on the floor below it; before it stops moving altogether and its flashlight head dies. Her heartbeat and heavy breathing is all she can hear, her vision tinged with a hint of purple and green around the edges that fades almost as fast as it appeared, until it hits her that she somehow managed to kill this machine. Or well, deactivate it... whatever. Sheer joy and relief creeps into her, but before she cries out from happiness, she gets a handle on her emotions. She still needs to escape somehow. On a table on the opposite side of the room, is her clothes and bag. She quickly gets dressed after pulling out the few glass shards in her arm and grabs her things, then walks back to the console the machine was using.

The console was some sort of orange holographic interface, in a language she didn't understand, again…. So much for trying to find a map of this place. While she is investigating the console trying to make anything out, her hand hovers over the controls and a quick spark jumps between her hand and the panel below, holding her in place for a few seconds. When her mind catches up to what just happened, she pulls it away quickly, first shaking her hand in pain, then staring at it. Nothing but a few scratches from the glass, and some white liquid from the machine. Odd…. She thinks to herself; but she knows she doesn't have time to wonder down here. It's only a matter of time before someone will notice she is gone. Grabbing the weapon on the table, she notices it at least has a basic trigger, but nothing much else she can identify. If she had to guess, it looked almost like a futuristic shotgun. She just hoped the safety was off, venturing forwards as quietly as she could down the hallway from which the Saren guy had come and gone. The hallways were mostly dark or dimly lit, even the metal corridors were black and oddly shaped, not like the typical rectangular hallways she is used to and felt like they were pressing down on her from all sides.

As she moved, she realised that at every junction it was like she knew which way to go, didn't know how, just a feeling that her escape is in that direction. She also managed to slip by a few machines unnoticed when they turned away from her. I never thought my liking of sneaking up on people and scaring them would be this handy. Eventually she came to a few doors, not doors like she knew them. More like bulkheads from Star Trek with a green, circular hologram in the middle. On a whim she presses it, and it opens. So that's how doors open around here, good to know. But before she takes 5 steps into the next corridor, she freezes. Another of those machines was standing in the corridor in front of her, looking at her. It then pointed its weapon at her, making a few whirring noises at her. Almost on instinct she just ducked down, and then pushed up just as quickly, angling her head into the machine's flashlight one. It staggered backwards, firing a few stray shots, before she turned her shotgun on it and fired at its chest. It collapsed on the floor with another whirr, and then went limp with a new pool of white liquid starting to spread beneath it.

Shit! Ow! Note to self, no head-butting machines she thought to herself while rubbing her head. Someone probably heard that. Got to hurry now….stupid, stupid! Always check the hallways both ways before you waltz in like an idiot! She started to jog down the hallways and corridors as much as she could, adrenaline fuelling her pace, until she came upon another door. But this one had a red holographic panel, and didn't open when she touched it. Dammit! Must mean it's locked! Now where to! I don't have time to backtrack! As if to confirm her haste, she hears the clanking of machine feet on the metal floor plating some distance behind her. Then there is the sudden grip of panic in her throat, but before she can act or even suppress it, a jolt jumps between her open hand and the door panel it was still hovering over. She instinctively pulls back, and then looks at the door as a few small sparks jump across the panel, turning it green. What the…. No time, figure crazy sparks out later, save myself now! She quickly hits the door panel and runs in the direction she believes is the fastest way out of here, not even trying to hide anymore. They know she is out now, all she can do is hope she doesn't run into any more machines directly in front of her before she gets out of here, wherever here is.

After what feels like hours of running and ducking, but was probably only a few minutes, she finds what looks like a giant hanger with insect-like smaller ships, all stacked in rows along the hanger's length. How big is this place! This hanger seems to go on for a kilometre! But before she has time to gawk further, shots ring out over her head, and she ducks behind some nearby crates. Dammit! Got to stay focused! She quickly peaks around the corner of the crate, to see that there are three machines heading her way, weapons at the ready. "Ok, element of surprise gone, outnumbered and out gunned." She looks at her surroundings for anything she might use to her advantage. Across the walkway from her she spots one of those small ships, with an access ladder down its one side. "Steal a ship I have absolutely no idea how to fly? Why not, I've done nearly everything else that's impossible today." She shoots a few random shots over the crate in the direction the machines are coming from, which made them take cover behind some crates of their own, managing to cripple one. This was the gap she was looking for. She leaps from behind her crates and rolls across the walkway to the access ladder next to the ship; and then scrambling up it as fast as she can. A sudden jolt of pain shoots through her left shoulder, as a bullet goes right through her, making her yell out in pain and almost losing her grip on the ladder. But she only slows for a second, then forces herself into the ship, using the adrenalin in her system to dull out the pain and press herself on. "I will not stop! I will not go back!" she kept repeating like a mantra.

Once she was in the ship, the inside reminded her of a fighter plane cockpit. She jumped into the seat, and started pressing buttons on the holo-interface. The glass hood closed and it started to make sounds like an engine starting. "Yes! Now move you futuristic insect plane! MOVE!" and as if on command, the ship jerked backwards, tearing itself free from whatever docking clamps were on it. Although she quickly got an idea of where forwards, backwards and sideways motion controls were for the ship, her movements were anything but fluent; hitting crates, walkways and other ships in the hanger, as she made her way to where she saw a big door. "That has to be my way out. Now how do I shoot it open?!" she fiddled with a few other controls, shaking the ship in erratic movements, until she hit one that made it shoot. "There you are my pretty!" she exclaimed happily and angled the ship as best she could and started shooting as she sped towards the door, blowing a hole in it. Without even thinking if the hole was big enough, she just rammed her way out. Some sparks flew from the panel in front of her, but she was out.

"Whoohoo! Han Solo, eat your heart out!" she screamed out in the cockpit, but her joy was short lived, as she was met with the emptiness of space in front of her. There seemed to be a nearby star, but she had no idea if there was a planet she could land on, or if this thing would even survive a landing for that matter. She glanced back at the ship she just escaped from, expecting them to follow her. It is only now that she sees the true size of the ship she was on. "Holy pool noodles! That thing is Mahusive!" The ship was about two kilometres long, and looked like a giant black tick, with lines of red lighting along its length. "Well, there is no way I'm going back to that. Rather die by my own hand out here than be a guinea pig in there. Now, let's find the warp or hyper drive or whatever this thing has to go faster. Don't think this thing has air for long distance travel." Having made up her mind, she moves her ship in the direction of the closest and brightest star, and sets about finding the FTL drive button, how she knew this she had no idea, but as long as it worked, she doesn't mind how. After some more fiddling, the console bleeped at her with an image of the star, and she pressed it; instantly making the stars streak past her. As the distance between her and that ship grew, the humming at the back of head stopped and she began to relax; only to be reminded of the pain in her now shot shoulder, blood starting to drip down her fingers by now. She carefully pulls her arm out of her jacket to get a better look at the wound. Luckily it was a small, clean hole; only going through flesh and no major arteries punctured and already cauterised thanks to whatever the bullet must have been, but her movements had reopened the wound. She rolls the jacket sleeve inwards and uses it to tie around her shoulder, trying to put some pressure on it and stop the slow bleeding. I guess I have a little luck, could have been much worse.

When the stars stopped moving, she was in a star system with a brownish planet below her. She took a few minutes to marvel at the view and speculate if it was at all habitable. Suddenly streaks of plasma shoot by her ship from behind her, a few making impact and bringing down what little shields she had left after her crash exit. "Can't I get a bloody break?!" yelling at the now pursuing fighters, she quickly angled her ship towards the planet below her. "Please, please have a breathable atmosphere! And you insect thing, just hold together!" she tried her best to make her movements erratic enough that she wasn't an easy target, but she could feel the ship struggling after the strain she already put it through. She almost imagined a trail of smoke following her. "It's now or never! Kammmmikazeeeee!" as she sent the ship on its path of no return.

The fighter buckled as soon as it hit the atmosphere and started showing burning red streaks along its sides, but remarkably holding together. "That's it! Hold together! Backwards thrusters! Nose up! Slow down, slow down!" the ground was racing towards her way too fast, she was bashing buttons desperately to get the backwards thrusters to fire. The ship jolted again, and she saw a piece of the nose fly off, just as she found the button for thrusters. Her decent started to slow, but she was still too fast. She could now see the ground below in some detail, it looked like a desert. Please hit a dune, please hit a dune, pleasehitadune! She pleaded in her head as she curled her arms over her head and curled up in a ball, bracing herself for impact.

*CRASH*