The habitat ring wasn’t as bad as Chevallier had expected as she looked about upon arriving. There was no gravity as its rotation had long stopped, tables and chairs in the mess hall floated in a messy and disorganized manner while Chef Bailey assessed the damage done to the galley and kitchen equipment. Dr. Kostelecky had her hands full, treating the wounds of crew personnel as she pushed floating debris amongst the darkness out of her way. The Poniga that were still aboard diligently moved their hands about, offering Kostelecky medical equipment and dressing lightly-wounded personnel with bandages, EVE’s flickering hologram helped ease the language barrier.
Chevallier received a communication from Hudson and his team, and they made progress in clearing out the debris that was blocking access to the bridge, an area of the ship that made the crew uncomfortable talking about in the aftermath of what happened.
Chevallier found out why immediately after she arrived. An emergency shutter had dropped from the ceiling, sealing off the main entrance to the bridge from the rest of the ship, a sign that the bridge had been depressurized. Chevallier smashed her fists on the shutter, cursing loudly with each thump. She lowered her head in misery.
“I’m sorry, Chief,” Hudson said to her. “Didn’t realize it was that bad.”
Chevallier pushed her anger aside deep within her mind so that it might remain hidden from the rest of the Hammerhead teams. “Have a small team perform a space walk outside of the main bridge and collect any bodies you can find.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Chevallier hit the shutter once more, to release the last lingering bit of her anger that wouldn’t get bottled up with the rest and then turned away to return to the docking bay. A small thud echoed, prompting her to stop and slowly pivot back around with her magnetic boots. Her helmeted head moved around, searching for the source of the thud. As she did that a second thud was heard. It came from the shutter.
Chevallier’s eyes opened wide, her breathing accelerated, and her feet raced back to the shutter as fast as her magnetic boots would take her. Her fists crashed against the shutter again twice in a quick succession. Two thuds replied.
“Hudson, get back here!” she cried, and poked her thumb at the shutter. “Cancel the space walk, let’s get this shit opened.”
A plasma cutter flared on and moved in a circular motion along the thick metallic shutter creating a long red circle in its wake. Chevallier heckled the Hammerheads to speed up their job as they continued to cut a hole into a doorway that was not long ago believed to have led into a decompressed bridge.
The cutting stopped as a full large red glowing circle was made, Chevallier along with three hulking combat armor bodies pushed against the cut section of the shutter, until an opening was made. The large metallic hulk flipped and spiraled into the bridge, crashing into Foster’s captain’s chair, tumbling aimlessly after it hit.
Her HUD reported safe conditions, amongst the ruined computer equipment and sparks flaring down from the ceiling along with wires and ruptured plasma conduits. The source of the decompression was discovered, the windshield had shattered, it caused her last bit of hope to fizzle out and turn back into despair.
But only briefly.
Blue light shimmered before the damaged windshield. Chevallier stepped over and examined it with her HUD, a psionic barrier.
“I wouldn’t touch that.” It was Williams.
She spun around and saw his battered body rise from the floor next to the cut shutter entrance as the rest of the bridge crew slowly floated their way up from Foster’s office down below. They were alive, every one of them, covered in soot and blood, but alive.
Nereid was the last to emerge, her glowing Voelika shone brightly in her hands, and its glow was in sync with the ripples from the barrier that covered the breach. Foreign chants left her lips the entire time as her eyes remained shut, and her feet on the ground despite the lack of gravity.
EPILOGUE
ESRS Carl Sagan, Nereid’s quarters
SA-139 orbit, Sirius A system
June 21, 2050, 12:42 SST (Sol Standard Time)
It took almost a week for the Carl Sagan to arrive in orbit around SA-139 due to the extreme damage done to its engines. During that week, transports worked nonstop transporting personnel and equipment on and off the ship to assist in repairs. The habitat ring was one of the first areas restored as it received the least amount of damage. Tolukei and Nereid had used the last of their gifts to strengthen the aft overshields as the solar flare raged behind them during their escape.
An escape Foster had a tough time writing in her logs and reports. By all accounts they should be dead. Tolukei and Nereid had no power left in them to conjure a barrier to protect them from hull breaches, a hull breach Foster clearly remembered happening seconds before she blacked out only to awake in her office with Nereid standing in the middle like a deity performing a miracle, chanting away, and saving their lives.
Three weeks after the Carl Sagan arrived in orbit, repairs throughout the ship had neared completion, while science and exploration teams slowly began to spread out throughout the system to establish outposts, and return the Poniga to their home worlds, along with assistance from a few Hammerheads. Small pockets of Marduk’s soldiers had remained scattered in the system but were in the process of being hunted down or captured day by day. They also provided assistance to the Undine on their world, liberating them from their slavery while EVE accessed data from her captured copy and learnt how to disable the time dilation bubble.
Foster rang the door chime to Nereid’s quarters and was granted entry. To her surprise she wasn’t anywhere in sight. Even more surprising was the fact that her quarters looked exactly how it was presented to Nereid after repairs had been completed, the bed was untouched, the personal computer still had its plastic protective wrapping around it.
“Nereid?” Foster called out to her as she ventured further in.
“Over here,” Nereid’s voice beckoned from the bathing area.
Foster hesitated before opening the door, hoping she wasn’t going to walk into an extremely awkward situation as she heard the shower water running. The doors slid open splashing a small wave of water on top of Foster’s boots. Nereid had flooded the area with shower water in a strange attempt at transforming it into a pool.
Nereid sat up right on the floor of the shower stall naked, soaking wet as if it was a normal thing to do. “What the hell . . .” Foster groaned while covering her eyes.
“Is there something wrong?”
“I can see a few things.”
“You told me to make myself at home. However, your ship is . . . dry.” Nereid stood up, having realized that with the door now opened, all the water she had flooded the place with had slipped out onto the floor in her quarters. “And you know that clothing is still a very strange concept to me, it was giving my skin a rash. This is the best I was able to do to make myself at home.”
“On that note.”
“It’s time isn’t it?”
“The Carl Sagan will be spaceworthy in a few hours. With Marduk gone and the time dilation disabled from your world, you can now return to live life as a free person.”
Foster heard Nereid become hesitant for several seconds. “The more time I spend with your crew, the more I remember the life McDowell had, and what it was like to be human.”