The gentle hum of Seamore's engines lulled Dae a bit as she raced above the ocean floor. The solitary blue point on her hud sat unwavering as the landscape flashed by in a whirlwind of color. That was one thing you could say about this death planet, Dae thought adjusting her course slightly, it was very pretty. When she reached the red grasses she slowed her sub, dipping lower and slowing her speed as she listened for the massive beast that had chased her before.
Everything seemed clear as she nearly drifted along, a few of the longer bits of 'grass' gently brushing against the underside of Seamore. The sound reminded her of someone gently shushing her, reminding her that bigger things lurked near here. Slowly but surely the seafloor sank, the red grass thinning and then petering out completely as pure sands dipped even lower into murkier waters. Dae popped on her headlights. Deep fissures flowed down into even more murkiness. The blue dot of Keen's last location was there, located further down.
Dae took a steadying breath and tilted the sub down into a wider part of the fissure, thankful that the sub was so maneuverable and easy to handle.
"Warning: maximum depth reached! Hull damage imminent!" Seamore warned. There was a slight groan in the metal and Dae jerked the controls backwards ascending a few feet until the crushing sounds went away.
"System check."
"Hull integrity at 98 percent." Xander answered nearly immediately. "Hovering near max crush depth."
"Of course!" Dae sighed letting go of the controls. In the distance, just hardly illuminated by Seamore's headlights was the round white shape of an escape pod. The murky darkness pressed around her little sub reminding Dae of just how small she was. How deep she already was, probably deeper than she'd ever gone underwater before.
Dae forced herself up and out of the sub, feeling the waters press around her enveloping her head to toe in a steady pressure. She floated for a moment, a deep unknown terror creeping into her mind. A deep breath in and she forced herself to swim downwards, deeper into the trench.
"PDA log: Andromedae Benninfield survivor of the Aurora crash." Automatically she saw a little flashing red light in the corner of her field of vision. Xander was recording for her. "So far I'm the only survivor I've seen. A ship named the sunbeam is currently in route to rescue us, but I did get an emergency broadcast from Officer Keen calling for a rendezvous point. The signal however, was corrupted. I'm currently swimming down to the distress signal coming from his lifepod." The lights of Seamore were just enough to show the bulbous white corpse of the downed lifepod. "I hope that everything goes well, but if not….I don't remember my family or if I even had one. I sustained a head injury in the emergency landing and seemed to have lost some memories. But….if someone does come looking for me. I'm trying my best. I hope to see you soon. End log."
Nothing looked too dangerous, but knowing this planet anything could happen. Once Dae got to the pod, she noticed half of it was twisted and warped. Ripped open. She shuttered wondering what wildlife had done that. She dragged herself inside, gripping the edges of the metal for support, and let out a soft huff of relief when she saw no bodies. Then again, she hadn't found Ozzy's body either.
She tugged herself back outside noticing a muted pale blue glow near the base of the ship. Swimming down further, feeling her lungs start to strain, she brushed the sediment off of the object revealing a pda. Dae quickly grabbed it and shoved it into her back pocket pushing off of the bottom to give herself some extra momentum in heading back to Seamore.
Halfway up there was a sudden burst of pain in her arm, and an immediate dizziness that assaulted her. A quick look had her stifling a scream and scrambling for her knife. A fish, if you could call it that, nearly the size of her forearm had wrapped thin tentacles around her arm and looked to be filling with a dark red substance. The main body looked almost as if it were a maggot. She managed to grab a hold of her knife and swung with careless abandon, cutting into the creature until with a pop and a slow curl of red it shot away back down toward the gloom.
"Injury detected." There was an immediate tightening of pressure on her arm, the nanofibers already sealing back over the four puncture wounds that were gushing blood. "Nearest medical assistance located in lifepod 5."
"I know." She ground out using what little oxygen she had left to make it to Seamore. The moment she fell into the sub she dragged a deep breath into her battered body.
"Fuck." She groaned, gently touching her arm. A sharp agitated throb pulsed up to meet her fingertips. "Fuck this stupid planet!" She hissed anger. "Fuck it's crazy murder fish, and the deep dark creepy ass trenches!"
There was a strange building pressure in her chest. In her head.
"I hate this place! Why can't I just find one person? Just one?" The next breath she drew was closer to a sob. "I'm tired of being alone and being in pain. I'm tired of being on my toes and dodging creatures who obviously want to eat me. Just….why can't things be easier? I want to wake up without feeling like I'm crusted with salt. I want to wake up in a bed! Not on a cold metal floor that leaves my back in knots. I want…..I want….."
The silence that greeted her ranting was vast. For a long moment she wanted nothing more than to sink into oblivion.
"Okay." She muttered shifting to sit properly in her seat. She guided the sub upwards heading up through the rippling dance of scattered light. She crested the surface and watched as the edges of the waves lapped at Seamore's edges. She tugged the PDA she found and looked it over.
It looked like one of the temporary PDAs that the fabricator could make in a pinch. Ones usually for messages or quick storage of logs. Dae sighed and tapped into its archives and found only two things. She tapped on the one named Crew-log first.
"To all crew - If you are reading this then you have followed the automatic distress signal broadcast by this lifepod's onboard computer, contrary to my orders. I have been forced to evacuate. Your orders are to disregard my safety and attempt to reach the designated rendezvous co-ordinates at the nearest landmass. I hope to see you there."
The message was short and sweet, with Keen's voice revealing tension and stress. Even so his message was steady and reassuring. Dae took a shaky breath trying to hold herself together. She quietly clicked over to the other stored data.
"Keen! This is Aurora. Come in." A stately voice that Dae hadn't heard before had her jerking slightly. The distant sound of engines struggling to keep pace could be heard and she felt her mouth go dry. She knew that sound.
"This is Keen, lifepod detached okay, planetfall in 30 seconds!"
"The computer has identified a landmass at the attached coordinates! I want you to regroup the crew there!" It took her a moment but she recognized the voice in a hazy sort of way.
"Captain." She muttered in recognition.
"Understood, but-" Keen was promptly cut off.
"They're your responsibility now, don't let them down!" The Captain called out, his voice strained a little now. Like he was fighting something.
"Captain, you need to evacuate!" Panic and fear put a sharp edge into Keen's voice.
"Negative, you'll need the ship in one piece if you're going to contact HQ on the long-range. I'm attempting a controlled descent."
There was a long moment where there was only the sound of the straining engines and the man's own labored breath. Then an explosion, loud and high pitched and sounding not at all mechanical.
"Captain?!" Keen's horrified yell just barely made it through the sounds of the explosion, then abruptly the broadcast turned to static. The recording ended moments after.
"What was that?" Dae asked herself, looking to the sky. "That didn't sound….no...it was probably just some malfunction when we tried to slingshot off of this planet." She muttered to herself. "What a brave man." Tears stung her eyes but she quickly wiped them away.
Dae tilted the sub until she found the Aurora, still burning, in the distance then tilted west a bit.
"That way." She muttered coaxing Seamore into a sprint.
"You are injured. Nearest medical assistance located in Lifepod 5." Xander interrupted.
"I know."
The horizon was nothing but blue skies and clouds. Nothing remotely looking like land in sight. Perhaps the computer onboard the Aurora was wrong, but the Captain had sounded so sure.
Seamore skipped and crashed into the waves, jolting her every second. She hissed at the ride but refused to dip fully below the surface. She had to see if the land was real. She needed to find the survivors and let them know about the Sunbeam.
Nothing and more nothing. Just more sky and clouds. Her arm throbbed with each pitch of the sub, but still she raced along her teeth grit and jaw aching. They had to be there. They had to be.
"You are injured. Nearest medical assistance located in Lifepod 5."
"I know, Xander. About how far are we from the Aurora Crash?"
"Roundabouts one Kilometer."
"I should be able to see it by now." She said hope starting to die in her chest.
There was a flash of something. Just the briefest flash of something brown, but she found herself sitting forward scanning the horizon like a hawk.
There, in a low hanging cloud that seemed to be shifting out of sight, was the flash of an island. Green vegetation and small mountains rising up from it.
"There's….no way. I should have been able to see that." She gasped her heart hammering against her ribcage.
Yet, as the wisps of cloud fully cleared, there ahead of her was dry land. The rendezvous point in all its glory. Keen was there. The other survivors were there and they were going to get off of this death planet once and for all.
"You are injured-"
"Xander can you shut up for one second! I'm trying to have a moment here!"
"Open wounds increase chances of infection-"
"I'll deal with it in a bit." She snapped a bit harshly. "Just….let me have this."
A few minutes later she eased Seamore near the shore, making sure to leave room so he wouldn't be beached. Joy, pure and hopeful, danced through her veins.
"Rendezvous coordinates reached." If Xander's voice sounded off she ignored it.
"Right!" She cheered. "Let's go!"
