Chapter Two: No Survivors

Darkness came quickly on this planet, and by the time it did, Shadow's fur was soaked with saltwater, and he was a bit bruised from running in with what the PDA called crashfish to get the sulfur needed for the repair tool from their pods. Sonic had stayed in the lifepod while Shadow went down to grab the materials needed, putting the items in neat little piles whenever the black hedgehog came back to unload what he grabbed.

Finally, after gathering everything needed, Shadow used the fabricator to make a repair tool. He used it to fix the pod first, welding the wiring back together in the electrical panel. Once it was fixed, the lights came back on, the sparking stopped, and the screen was green with everything active again. The PDA was now doing a full environment diagnosis of the planet they were on, outputting the results to the databank on it. Everything was working again except the damaged radio, which Shadow used the repair tool to fix next.

"Radio online. Broadcasting emergency distress signal." The radio said once it was fixed.

"Good, maybe it'll reach someone and they'll be able to get us off this water wasteland." Shadow nodded with a frown.

Sonic wasn't listening. He was reading what the PDA had just discovered about the planet they were on. His brows were furrowed in a worried frown as he read the data.

4546B Environment Scan

•Category 3 Ocean planet

•Oxygen/Nitrogen Atmosphere

•Extensive biodiversity

Safety Warnings:

•May support leviathan class predators

•Water contaminated with high levels of foreign bacteria

•Planet is beyond federation space, rescue unlikely

It is not recommended to explore this environment without hazardous material suits and extensive support apparatus.

Shadow had noticed the blue hedgehog's silence and went over to read what was on the PDA. He looked at Sonic with an unworried frown. "Hey, don't worry about it. If I know anything about your friends, it's that they won't stop looking for you until they've found you. We'll get off this planet. And with this fabricator, we can build whatever we need to survive until then. Don't worry about whatever bacteria is in this water… and I know for sure you're not scared of leviathan predators, are you? After everything you went through with the Biolizard and the Meterex?"

"No, of course not." Sonic frowned, turning the PDA back off. "You're right. There's nothing to worry about." His attention suddenly went over to the radio as he saw the red light blinking on it. "Hey Shads… I think we got a message."

"Hm?" Shadow frowned in confusion, looking back at the radio as well. Cautiously, he went up to the radio and pressed the receive button on it. Both hedgehogs listened as a message played with a roboticized voice.

"This is Aurora. Distress signal received. Rescue operation will be dispatched to your location in 9… 9… 9… 9… 9… 9… hours. Continue to monitor for emergency transmissions from other lifepods."

"I hope that was a glitch and it was trying to say rescue was coming in nine hours and not 999,999 hours." Sonic frowned.

"I doubt it." Shadow crushed that thought.

"So… we're really stuck here… alone… with no way of getting home… nobody coming to rescue us." Sonic's eyes were wide. It's not everyday Sonic felt like panicking, but there were rare moments. Normally he would do this privately, but his heart was racing too much to care about his rival being right next to him.

Shadow saw the panic in his companions eyes and frowned in concern. "Hey. Hey." He grabbed Sonic's shoulders, forcing him to look at him. "Calm down. It's gonna be ok. Your friends will come and find us. I'm sure of it. We'll be off this planet before you know it."

"... I hope you're right, Shadow."

…

The next morning, both Sonic and Shadow were in the water gathering supplies.

After all the materials Shadow was able to gather the day before, they were able to build a scanner, which Shadow used a lot of to scan nearby fragments of equipment to gather the blueprints for them. In his scans, he was able to get the blueprints for a seaglide, which he immediately built for Sonic, as well as two oxygen tanks for himself and Sonic, so that the blue hedgehog could join him in the ocean, harvesting materials without having to worry about needing to swim or rush to the surface for oxygen.

They had tried to swim a little closer to the Aurora to see if it may have any valuable materials nearby, but they immediately scrapped that idea after the PDA warned them of radiation detection.

Not only was the fabricator able to build materials and equipment, but it could also cook their food of peeper fish, garryfish, and boomerang fish, and turn the bladderfish into drinkable bottled water.

They were currently in the lifepod, taking a lunch break when they heard the beeping of the radio. The red light was flashing again, informing the hedgehogs it had picked up a new message. Shadow quickly stood up and played it.

"Playing pre-recorded distress call…" The radio said with it's robot voice again, until the voice of a distress man took over. "This is Ozzy from the cafeteria, what the hell guys?! They didn't warn us this might happen! Our pod was almost crushed by the seamoth bay on the way down, now we're hanging on the edge of a cave system and this grim-looking snake-thing's trying to eat through the hull! Come get us already!"

As soon as the message was finished, the PDA spoke up. "Signal location uploaded to PDA."

After looking at the location of the pod's signal, Sonic and Shadow shared a look, both thinking the same thing.

Was it possible that the PDA was wrong, and there was still life out there? There was only one way to find out.

The two hedgehogs quickly got together all the necessary equipment needed for the expedition to lifepod 17, gathering extra food and water, and building a high capacity tank for themselves just in case the pod was too deep for them to reach the surface for air on time.

Shadow went back down into the ocean to gather some more material to make his own seaglide and a pathfinder tool just in case they actually had to go into the cave system to find the lifepod. As soon as they had everything ready, they put on their rebreathers and jumped into the ocean.

"Ready?" Shadow asked Sonic.

"Ready." Sonic nodded as he fired up his seaglide.

Shadow nodded and fired up his own seaglide, and together, the two swam to the location of the signal the PDA had tracked.

It was a long distance to travel, and on the way there, they were able to scan a few fragments of a mobile vehicle bay and a laser cutter, but not enough to make full blueprints. To their surprise, they also encountered a pod of giant alien whale-like creatures the PDA called reefbacks. The noises they made were incredibly soothing.

When they finally got to the location of the distress signal, their hearts dropped to their stomachs. The lifepod was on the ground. It's lights were down, and there was a giant hole on the side of it. There was clearly no one inside.

"Oh no."

"Well, the radio did say it was a pre-recorded message." Shadow sighed. "Come on. Let's see if they left anything behind."

The blue hedgehog sighed in disappointment and followed the red and black one down to lifepod 17. When they got inside to look around, there was nothing. Nothing but a discarded PDA. Sonic picked it up and discovered that there was a recorded log on it. He pressed the play button.

"Ozzy's log. It's the day of the crash. I don't know what the heck is happening. I'm scared and I'm not going outside. There are shadows in the water under the hatch but I can't tell if they're rocks or aliens, and there's weird looking caves nearby.The Aurora was carrying everything needed to build the phasegate: mobile vehicle bays, bioreactors, propulsion cannons... It had a cinema. There was a zero-G gym. My cafe. I don't understand how we're here now. I don't know why no one's coming for me."

Sonic's ears dropped down, Shadow remained silent.

"Come on." The black hedgehog finally said. "There's nothing left we can do here."

With his ears still down, Sonic dropped the PDA and followed Shadow out of the lifepod and away from the cave system, going back to their own lifepod. When they got there, they were surprised to see that the radio had picked up another pre-recorded signal.

"This is Lifepod 3, uploading our coordinates. We're plugging some holes in our emergency seaglide, so if we're late for the rendezvous, don't panic.Also, don't go home without us. Seriously. 3 out."

"I can't believe all these people put out these distress calls and no one came to rescue them." Sonic frowned.

"Humans. They're all spineless cowards when it comes to the unknown." Shadow huffed.

"Chris is not a coward." Sonic growled.

Shadow ignored him and put his rebreather back on, opening the hatch to the floor.

"Where are you going?" Sonic asked him.

"To the location of lifepod 3. Even if there's nobody there, they still could've left something useful behind… and if there's a PDA like lifepod 17 did, we can find out what happened. Now are you coming or not?"

"... I suppose it couldn't hurt." Sonic smirked and put his rebreather on, jumping in the water after the black hedgehog.

Shadow nodded and the two started swimming towards lifepod 3. It didn't take them long to get there as it was surprisingly close, just on the other side of the kelp forest. But just like lifepod 17, lifepod 3 was on the ground with a hole on its side.

Shadow picked up the PDA left behind and played the last recorded log.

"You really think it'll carry two of us?" The woman from the distress signal asked.

"Your regular seaglide tows a mass of 80kg at over 30km/hr. The power cell I rigged to this one should double that." Answered a male crewmate.

"You think there's something out there faster?"

"I'm sure. And that's assuming it doesn't overload three meters from the lifepod."

"You're calm about this."

"I'm seeing the engineering problem. If I stop seeing the maths I'll be terrified."

Sonic looked at Shadow sadly when the recording stopped. "I don't think they made it."

"I don't think so either." Shadow shook his head, then noticed a compartment on the floor they had missed. "What's that?"

Sonic frowned and went up to it. He pressed a button, causing the compartment to open and a flashdrive popped out. It looked like it could hook up to their PDA, so he stuck it in and the PDA's voice spoke out.

"New blueprint, acquired."

"A blueprint for what?" Shadow asked.

"Let's see." Sonic said back and opened the blueprint tab, looking through it to see what was new. His ears perked up and his eyes widened a bit excitedly. "A compass!"

"Fantastic. Feel like that will come in handy a lot around here."

"Absolutely."

Suddenly, the PDA started speaking again.

"Warning. Local radiation readings suggest the Aurora's drive core has reached critical state. Quantum detonation will occur within 2 hours."

The hedgehogs were silent, until Sonic gulped and looked up at Shadow. "Does… does that mean the mothership is gonna blow?"

"... I believe so. And with it… more radiation will pollute these waters… we won't be able to survive it without a radiation suit."

"But we don't have radiation suits. Nor do we know how to make them."

"... That's what worries me."

…

Two hours later, after gathering more resources, scanning more flora, fauna, and fragments for blueprints, and building a grav trap to start catching food more easily, the two hedgehogs were tired as they sat in their lifepod, relaxing after a long day of surviving.

"It's been two hours since the PDA warned us about the Aurora threatening to explode." Sonic said to Shadow.

"I know."

"Think it'll actually do it?"

"Undoubtedly."

Suddenly, they heard what sounded like thunder coming from outside. They looked at each other in confusion before the PDA spoke up.

"Emergency. A quantum detonation has occurred in the Aurora's drive core. The reactor will reach a super critical state in T- 10, 9, 8, 7…"

As the PDA started counting down, despite how incredibly dangerous it would be, Sonic and Shadow's intense curiosity and excitement pulled them up to the top of the lifepod to watch the explosion. As soon as the PDA reached a broken 1, the ground and seemingly the air around them shook immensely, the Aurora exploding in a red hot fiery ball, metal and debris flying from the ship, the waves crashing against the lifepod. The two hedgehogs held onto each other, crouching down low so that they wouldn't be blown away. They could somehow hear the amount of radiation that was pooling into the ocean from the explosion, sounding like a crackling static.

At last, it stopped, and everything calmed down. Sonic and Shadow stood back up, letting go of each other as they stared in awe at the destruction that used to be the Aurora Alterra space cruiser. If anybody had been still alive in it, they certainly weren't now.

"Oh my god." Sonic gasped softly, releasing a breath he had been holding.

"For your convenience the radiation suit has been added to your blueprint database."

"... Thanks… I guess."