Aaaaand I am back with the next chapter of Lost in the Stars! I'm so grateful for everyone that's reading and following this story! Your support has meant the world to me!

Also, for the reviewer who asked, I can guarantee that there will be NO cheating/mixed couples in this story. (They had read my first story "War of the Worlds" where I experimented around with that a little bit). It didn't really feel right when I tried it and I will not be including it here.

You guys seem to really be digging the suspense/mystery in this story so I'll try to amp that up for you starting… now!

Chapter 8: Not Alone

Alvin's POV

Preparing for the trip shouldn't have taken that long. But I was taking my sweet time. The rover itself already came equipped with the tools we needed: Mars suits, flashlights (as the sun was beginning to go down), the only thing it didn't have was a gun.

While Simon was busy, I made sure to slip into the sleeping room and snatch the key from under my bed.

"Be careful." Brittany's voice made me jump and spin around to face her.

"Jesus, Brit," I sighed. "You scared me."

"Please don't do anything stupid. Not this time. For me."

"Don't worry," I assured her, walking past her towards the exit. "I told you before, I'll do what I need to do. No more, no less."

And with that I rounded the corner and left her alone.

Simon's POV

"Just don't provoke anything," Jeanette pressed.

"Look, Jeanette, now's not the time," I told her as politely as possible, checking to make sure all of the equipment was secured in the surprisingly spacious rover.

To my shock, she grabbed my shoulder and spun me around to face her. "Listen to me, dammit!" She bursted at me from frustration.

I sighed and crossed my arms. "Look, I'm sorry. But there's a lot going on right now."

"I just don't want to see anyone getting hurt," she insisted. "Promise me you'll stay neutral! We need to trust that Alvin wants to do the right thing!"

"Jeanette I can't guarantee anyth-"

"Promise me!"

I rolled my eyes, letting out a deep sigh. "Fine, I promise I won't start anything."

"Thank you," she said, stepping onto the steps out of the rover. "That's all I needed."

"But if he has any funny business going on," I retorted, stopping her in her tracks, "I'll do what I need to do."

Brittany's POV

Frustrated, insecure, confused, scared, helpless. I clumsily plopped myself into my usual cockpit seat. I was going to be monitoring Alvin's and Simon's mission through the camera feeds and guide them with the sound of my voice. Because what else am I good for, right?

I started to flip through the cameras inside the rover. I could see Simon fidgeting around with the suits, making sure there were no leaks I guess. I switched to the cargo bay cams, where I could see Alvin enter the room, looking just about ready to go. I found myself putting my paw on the screen longfully. He was so hot and brave-looking. I don't know what I would do if he didn't come back.

I tensed as I watch him take a good, long look at that cabinet in the corner. I could tell he was seriously arguing with himself over whether or not to sneak a small handgun onto the trip, just in case. And finally, he shook his head and moved on towards the rover, which prompted a major sigh of relief and relaxation of my muscles.

Alvin climbed up the steps to the side of the rover, opened up the small compression chamber, and entered.

Alvin's POV

Making sure to lock the double layered doors behind me, I took a deep breath as I entered the rover with the key to start it in one pocket and the key to the cabinet in the other for safe keeping.

I took a leap of faith by not grabbing a gun on my way out. Would I regret it? Only time would tell. I had no way of knowing what Simon had up his sleeve, but I decided that it would be best to stay as peaceful as possible.

He looked up at me, and I glanced back at him, but we didn't say a word to each other. I just turned my back to him and stepped into the front section of the rover, which was basically a round glass dome with the driver's seat, controls and instruments. I slid smoothly into the driver's seat, and admired the view from where I sat even though we were still just motionless in the cargo bay.

"Ok," Simon said, breaking the awkward silence. "Everything's checked out. We're good to go."

Without saying anything, I buckled myself in and strapped a headset around my forehead, prompting "the Smart One" to do the same. I looked up at the camera at the top of the dome, looking down at me and gave it a wide grin. "How's the view from up there, Brit?" I spoke into the microphone.

"It was pretty good until your ugly ass came into the picture, Alvin." Brittany's sarcastic response made both Simon and I laugh.

"You know what, I didn't ask you," I retorted jokingly, "so just shut up and drop the ramp."

There was a pause, and a quick jolt that rocked the rover, before the ground of the cargo bay in front of us slowly dropped on one end. When it hit the dirty red surface of the planet, swooping up a cloud of dust, it formed a large ramp tall and wide enough for us to drive off.

I winked at the camera above me and said, "much obliged."

"Just get out of here so we can have a break from dealing with you," Brittany responded.

With that, I shoved the key into the ignition and twisted. But it wouldn't budge. The key wouldn't twist. I looked at it in confusion before I realized I had tried to use the wrong key. Embarrassed and hoping Simon hadn't seen me, I put the cabinet key back in my pocket and tried with the other.

This time, to my great satisfaction. the engine of the rover hummed to life. Keeping my foot on the brake, I put the big machine into gear. A rush of excitement filled my veins as I felt like a little kid again dreaming about driving cool cars.

I looked up at the camera one more time to say, "I'll see you soon, love," before slowly lifting my foot off the brake.

She giggled through the headset as the rover rolled forward like an old tank. "Well I'll be seeing you the whole way through, lucky for me," she said as the front wheel tires began treading down the ramp.

As soon as the back tires had hit the ramp, Simon said, "Roger that, Brittany."

I eased the brakes just a little as the rover slid down the ramp. It wasn't long before the front tires hit the dirty surface, bouncing the whole vehicle on its suspensions, followed by the back tires. As soon as the whole vehicle was off the ramp, I shifted to a higher gear and pressed the gas pedal. The sudden outburst of speed with a viscous-sounding humming noise took me by surprise. "This thing really goes," I joked as the rover continued to accelerate.

"Alvin, set a course for North-East by East," Brittany instructed.

As soon as we were clear of the mountain pass, I turned the wheel to the right until we were headed straight for the location that the distress signal was coming from. The ride was somewhat bumpy but I didn't care. Driving the rover truly felt like driving a tank. A fast, futuristic tank. And it made me very happy in a sort of primal way.

Jeanette's POV

Fixing the landing gear was going to be busy work for the next few days. Busy work that I was very eager to procrastinate from however I could. The very minute that I had dug up a couple of replacement rotors, I decided to check on Simon and Alvin.

Wiping my hands clean of the grease as I walked, I made my way through the halls from the engine room all the way up to the entrance to the cockpit. In no real hurry, I typed the code into the door and pressed enter. It opened up for me with a swoosh.

As soon as I walked in I saw Brittany standing, her back turned to me, and the headset resting away from her on her chair. She hunched over and put her hands on her knees. I could hear her breathing heavily. "Brittany?" I whispered. Still panting, she mustered up what seemed like a lot of energy just to turn her head in my direction.

But before she could say anything, she collapsed to the ground with a thud. I gasped as she just lay there without making a peep or any movement. "Brittany!" I screamed and ran over to where she laid motionless and kneeled beside her. I began by lightly slapping her face to check her consciousness, but she didn't respond. I put my ear to her chest, and was relieved to hear that her heart was still beating and she was still breathing.

I jumped to my feet and pressed and held the button to speak into the intercom. My panicked words, "Theo and Ellie to the bridge right now! This is an emergency!" rang out through the whole ship.

I spun back around and knelt beside my unconscious sister once again. I picked her head up gently and said, "stay with me, Brit. You're ok. You're going to be fine…"

I just sat there for a moment holding Brittany tight, before Eleanor and Theodore rushed into the room together.

Eleanor saw Brittany in my arms and gasped. "What happened?" she exclaimed.

"She just… collapsed," I sputtered. "Please get her to the medical room right away."

Without wasting time, Theodore ran over to us and gently picked Brittany up and placed her on his right shoulder. With Ellie by his side, he carried her all the way out of the cockpit as fast as his legs could carry them. I watched them hopefully, until the door closed behind them with another "whoosh" sound.

I sat there on my knees for a few moments, completely still.

Then I suddenly remembered Alvin and Simon. Rising to my feet, I stepped toward the Motherboard screen, where I could see the rover chugging along the rocky terrain of Mars, making very great time with the help of Alvin's reckless driving. I picked the headset up off of the seat, fitted it to my head, and sat down where Brittany had just a few moments ago.

"Guys… this is Jeanette," I said into the microphone.

"Jeanette?" I could hear the confusion in Alvin's voice. "Where the hell's Brittany?"

"Brittany's fine she just… needed a break," I assured him.

There was a pause. Then Alvin responded to me with, "I don't believe you."

"Look," I said, deciding whether or not to tell him the truth. "She just fainted. She's fine."

"I see."

"I'm sure she's fine, Alvin," Simon spoke up.

"I sure hope so… for your sake."

"Are you threatening me?"

Trying to stop this before it got violent, I interrupted, "calm down guys! Brit's going to be fine. Alvin you should probably focus on the path ahead of you."

"Alright, Jeannie," Alvin grumbled.

"Be on guard," I warned. "You're coming up on the spot."

Eleanor's POV

Though Theo insisted on carrying my sister himself all the way down to the medical room, it was clear to me that he was struggling. I did what I could to help him along the way, without interfering.

When we finally arrived, I had to put in the code to open the airtight door. A clearly exhausted Theodore stumbled through the opening and strenuously laid Brit's unconscious body face up on the bed as gently as he could.

Theodore slid to the floor, panting heavily.

I knew that it was my time to be the hero. That it was my time to be great. That the pressure was all on me to save my sister.

The first thing I did was check her pulse, which turned out to be dangerously low. "Theodore, get me a glass of water, STAT!"

Still clearly exhausted, Theo used his paws to pick himself up off the ground and jogged out of the room towards the kitchen.

Her breathing was becoming very scarce, so I automatically began CPR. As I pressed her chest repeatedly I sang the beat:

"Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Stayin' Alive, Stayin' Alive!"

I took a deep breath, opened her mouth, and breathed air down her throat. I put my ear to her chest, took another deep breath, and repeated.

She still hadn't snapped out of it, so I placed my hands on her chest again and, pressing harder this time, continued the CPR.

"Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Stayin' Alive, Stayin' Alive!"

Suddenly, her eyes snapped open and a a long, raspy gasp escaped from her mouth.

"Brittany!" I exclaimed as relief coursed through my body. As her breathing slowly became more regular, I threw a warm hug around her.

After a few moments of just laying down on the bed and catching her breath, she finally managed to murmur, "what the hell happened to me?"

I shook my head, tears of joy beginning to run down my cheeks. "I don't know."

Theodore suddenly charged into the room carrying a glass of water, and he looked almost as overjoyed as I was to see Brittany back in reality.

"But I'm gonna find out," I assured her. "Don't worry."

Simon's POV

We were almost there. The rover had kept chugging along like a tank, despite the harsh terrain that we were travelling on. The sun had almost set, leaving the great Martian desert a deep but dim red hue.

I had sat up from my seat in the back and now stood up just behind Alvin, holding onto the back of his chair, staring ahead of us as the rover rolled on through a rocky pass.

"Ok Alvin," I said, "We're basically there once we turn this corner."

Alvin didn't respond, even as we neared the end of the small cliff that stood tall to our right. He simply took his foot off the gas pedal, allowing the vehicle to lose speed. He then dropped it a few gears and squeezed the brake ever so slightly as he began to steer us to the right, around the edge of the mountain. The big machine had to climb a boulder as it rounded the corner, but it seemed to do so effortlessly.

Suddenly, just as we had made it around the cliff, Alvin slammed on the brakes. The rover came to an abrupt stop with a painful screech, snapping our heads forward and back and causing me to lose my balance.

There, just meters in front of us, was flying a giant American flag, tattered and worn, covered with dust. It flapped in the harsh Martian wind, looking almost defeated.

But it was what was behind the flag that caused panic. As Alvin rolled us slowly around the beat up American flag, we got a better view. To our left was some sort of green house, which looked like all the crops inside had died long ago. Except it, like all of the other buildings in this base that we had stumbled upon, towered above us as they were obviously meant to contain full-sized humans. They all looked rusted and unused for God only knows how long. At the center of it all was a large multi-story building that must have taken up acres. It was bulky, and very sturdy-looking, in contrast to the little huts that surrounded it.

There was no movement or signs of life. The whole place looked abandoned, rusted out, and in some places destroyed.

"What the hell could have happened here?" Alvin muttered as he pulled us up closer to the main building.

"Who knows," I said. "But now I guess we know where several trillion dollars of debt came from."

"For real," Alvin chuckled. "Why didn't NASA tell us about this place?"

"That's a good question. Jeanette, are you getting all this?"

"Yeah, I see it." Jeanette responded.

Alvin slowed us to a stop just a few feet in front of a very large door that led into the main building. Without waiting for him to shut off the engine, I walked to the back of the rover and dug out a components of my Mars suit.

Alvin soon joined me in the awkwardly silent endeavor of getting our suits on. We both had not said a word until our dome helmets were on and locked in.

"Can you still hear me?" I said.

He looked at me and simply held his thumbs up.

"I can hear you fine," Jeanette said through my headset.

"Ok," I said. "Alvin, you bring the motion detector, and I'll carry the flashlight."

"Affirmative," he said sarcastically.

We exited the rover's belly cautiously. The sun had almost completely set, meaning my light was about to come in real handy.

"Alvin, if you pick up any movement on that thing at all, you need to tell me right away. Ok?"

"Nah I thought I'd keep it to myself," Alvin snorted, rolling his eyes.

Ignoring him, I flipped on my flashlight. The beam of light powerfully illuminated any object I pointed at, seemingly from an endless distance. I shone it on the door, which partially reflected it back at us.

Without waiting for me, Alvin walked up to the door and knocked on it twice. Piles of dust rained down off of the door and covered Alvin where he stood, but other than that nothing happened. Alvin shook his head to get the filth off his helmet, and looked up. The door was coated with the traditional "NASA" logo.

To our right was a numbered keypad, obviously there to enter a password.

"It's too high up for us," I grumbled.

"No such thing," Alvin said, confidently walking underneath the pad.

Before I could say "don't do it," Alvin bended his knees and took a big jump, barely managing to grab onto the top of the pad and hang there.

"We don't know the password," I said, rolling my eyes.

Alvin looked at the pad carefully. "You can tell which numbers are used, they're less dusty," he said. "Looks like 1… 3… 7… and 8!"

"You'll still never guess the combo," I snickered.

Alvin, ignoring me, typed four digits into the pad. To my surprise, the light over us turned green and the door began to slide open. Alvin hopped down less-than-graciously and turned around to still see my eyes wide. "17-38," he said matter-of-factly. "Figured whoever ran this place had to have had a sense of humor, or at least been a Fetty Wap fan."

I shook my head in disgust of his luck and instead turned and shone my light into the now-open doorway. The room was massive, bigger than our ship by itself. Inside, as my flashlight revealed, sat at least four rovers side-by-side.

"It's a garage," Alvin said in disbelief.

But these rovers were different. They were beefed up with extra-thick armor. They had front bumpers shaped as plows. They had spikes sticking out of them from all angles and turret guns on either side. Each one had at least one bunker on its flat top with a turret.

"These guys were packing," I said, shaking my head. "Jeanette, you still seeing all this?"

"Yeah, I'm still with you guys," she managed to say through her obvious amazement.

Alvin and I walked in. I flashed my light all around as we walked, but we still could find no signs of life. We could see a hatch on the other end that presumably led into the main building. I went ahead of Alvin, who still had picked up no movement on his tracker. I was moving with haste towards the hatch, but Jeanette's voice stopped me.

"Simon, go back! Go back! I think one of the doors to the rover was open."

I hadn't even noticed I was in such a hurry. I wasn't expecting much, so I nonchalantly turned around and directed my light in the direction of the rover to our left. The blood curdling screams of Alvin and I could have been heard for miles. For lying in the doorway, disfigured and mangled, was a fleshless human skeleton. All that remained of him was the handgun that he clutched in his right hand until his dying moment.

AND that was chapter 8. Really, truly hope you guys are enjoying this story! I know I enjoy writing it!

If you liked this chapter and you're getting into the story, PLEASE take the time to let me know in a review. Those reviews are what keeps this story going. Also, if you haven't already, make sure to give it the fav/follow so you can get the alert whenever I update!

And, as always, if you have some concerns/questions/advice, I'd love to hear that too. I am always open to ANY comments you guys give me, as long as its constructive.

Next chapter will be dropping soon so stay tuned!