A Millennia of thoughts - 3

“WARNING IF YOU CAN HEAR THIS MESSAGE YOU ARE WITHIN THE BLAST ZONE. EVACUATE IMMEDIATELY!” A robotic voice blares its message, echoing throughout the valley. Its loud sirens slowly sputter to static as they cease to function after the impact.

“THERE'S SOMEONE DOWN THERE!!” Yuris emotions get the best of her as she dives through the torii completely disregarding the robotic voice's warnings. She leaps, plummeting to the bottom of the valley, through the storm of dust and flames. Just as she's about to hit the distant bottom flames of bright purple spark to life around her. The light piercing through the smog and thick ash lit the area. Her descent slows as an invisible force that could only be created by her pushes back as she steps down on the charred ground. “Hello! Whoevers here I came to help!” Yuri frantically runs around through the smoke looking for the source of the voice. Her purple foxfire pierces the vale of smog that blocks her vision but only for a few feet before the smoke becomes too dense.

“WAR- WAR- WARN- WARNING… BLAST- Zone” The electronic voice powers down and the sirens cease their blaring. The smoke begins to slow pouring from the center of the crater. The wind now able to keep up whips it up and out of the valley like a blanket being pulled from a bed. Lying where the ruined building once slept was a chunk of a star shuttle torn apart and shredded beyond recognition. The only piece to survive was the reactor bay and the medical wing attached by a thin hallway.

“Someone came back… after.. So.. long…” Tears filled Yuri’s eyes as she approached the door to the medical wing. The charred and scorched ground crunched and hissed under her weight. The field generator was the next to go. It let out a blinding arc and the blue sphere surrounding the wreckage dissipated. All the maglocks on the doors disengaged as the power to the shuttle flickered. The dying reactor struggling to keep the systems alive was quickly fading. “After all these long years… I finally…” The door to the medical bay slides open. Struggling to pull itself through the bent metal of the hull it squeals as it drags along the floor. “Get to see you aga-” Yuri paused. No life radiated from the room, only silence. Just a single monitor glows in the darkness of the room. The lamps sprawled along the ceiling just hummed and flickered, struggling to burn and bring light to this eerie place. “...I knew it was too good to be true” As Yuri turned around to leave the monitor screamed to life. Through the static a voice became audible. A message playing on repeat.

“To anyone who may find this message. My name is Yuso. I have escaped from the radiance republic but my FTL drive was heavily damaged in the firefight. With no option left, I activated it with a blind jump plotted. The good news is I didn't jump straight into a planet or the center of a star. The bad news is I'm lost in space, orbiting this planet with little to no fuel and leaking O2 from multiple hull breaches. As a last resort, I'm going to put myself into cryosleep with no definite wake date to conserve resources. Most of the power will be delivered to the field generator to protect the main reactor and the medical bay so most systems including thrusters will be offline. I have no idea how long I'll be asleep for. My only hope is that someone one day will find me drifting.” Tears start to well up in the man's eyes as he speaks. Control panels dim and flicker in the background of the video as he gets more nervous. The groaning of the weakening hull can be heard in the background of the message. Saying nothing more the man wanders over to something in the background and steps into it. Steam pours out as the door seals shut and the video cuts to static again before repeating. Yuri looks behind her. The pod the man stepped into sits in the corner of the room many others followed, but they were all empty and the glass was shattered. A dim light pours from the tiny windows of the lone intact pod. It stretches across the room reaching out to grab anything it can through the darkness, the only sign of life remaining on this derelict remnant of a ship. A small control panel sits on the front of the pod. Yuri steps closer to read it.

“Ship reactor - CRITICAL, Cryopod Status - Not Optimal, Field Generator - OFFLINE, Wake Date - ERROR.” The panel continues to flicker as Yuri reads. A small voice speaks from the panel as she curiously taps on it.

“Critical power failure imminent. Inhabitant safety is not guaranteed. Wake protocol is highly suggested. Would you like to continue? ” Flickering once again the control panel removed all of its contents except for one single red button labeled, “Wake”. Already touching the controls Yuri accidentally accepts the Wake sequence. The pod's lights change from welcoming white to deep red. The loud hissing of the hydraulic locks scream throughout the room as they start to disengage from the pod.

“WAIT! Wait! I don't know what I did! Uh. Uh…” Running out of the room Yuri hides in the doorway of the medical bay as the room fills with steam from the damaged pods also releasing their locks.

“WARNING ANTI… WARNING ANTIMATTER CORE UNSTABLE REACTOR MELTDOWN IMMINENT. INHABITANT TEMPORARILY SAFE. DIVERTING EMERGENCY POWER.” The computer comes back online and the room begins to vent the steam pouring from the cryo pods. Through the smoke, a man leaps from the pod falling to the ground with a large thud coughing violently. Blood pours from his mouth, and he coughs harder, trying to grasp any air his lungs can find. The metal hull of the ship hums and groans as he stands and starts to run through the halls with a new sense of urgency. He sprints to the door in the far back of the med bay. Above the door lies a large monitor filled with static with the words “Reactor bay” displayed. A dim red light illuminates the hall just enough to make out the shape of the door. Yuri remains hidden from Yuso watching in awe as he drags open the unpowered door to the reactor bay and sprints inside. “WARNING REACTOR REACHING SUPER CRITICAL MASS. ANTIMATTER CONTAINMENT FAILURE IN APPROXIMATELY T-10 SECONDS. EVACUATE IMMEDIATELY.” Yuso fades into the dark corridor. Yuri curiously watches, carefully staying hidden in the shadows oblivious to the danger she’s in as she follows the man into the reactor bay. “CRITICAL CONTAINMENT FAILURE IN T-9 SECONDS. REALITY SHIELDING FAILURE.”

“Reality shielding?” Yuri turns to look out the med bay door at the crater once more. The lush Forest is gone and a city sits in its wake.

“Mam, are you ok? Hello?” The man sits shaking Yuri by the shoulders trying to snap her out of whatever she’s looking at.

“Uh. Yes sir, sorry.”

“No worries. Is this your shrine here?” He helps her up out of the dirt and brushes the gravel from her silver hair. The man points to a great Torii that’s being constructed atop the hill in the distance. The hum of the construction bots can be heard in the distance.

“Yes sir, it is. I just finished my training to become a shrine maiden.”

“Would you mind showing me around? I’ve never been to one before.” He smiled as he spoke. Yuri wanted to refuse but his smile pierced right through her being.

“Sure I would love to. By the way, you can call me Yuri.”

“What a nice name. You can call me –”