I originally started posting this story over a series of posts on another generic forum, and realised I should actually blog it so it has a home, without interuptions from other posts, so here we go....
The beginning:
Mist rolled inexorably through the trees, blanketing the area in moist silence. The old hardwood forest was muted in pale shades of gray, beads of water pooling on the fern stems.
A pair of deep green eyes peered from the undergrowth, swivelling in terror, a muddied face grimaced, wrinkling the tear tracks, as she bit her lip. Her pale hand gripped the automatic pistol, white knuckled, as the mud and water seeped into her clothes.
The bullet graze on her rib burned, the water inflaming it rather than quenching its fire. She tried to quieten her breathing, and almost hicupped as the fear coiled tightly in her chest. A twig snapped nearby and she froze.
A figure, covered in green cloth strips and fern leaves, slid out of the mist, sniper rifle slung on their back. The mist had been her saviour from this hunter, except now he was tracking her.
The Hunter's silenced pistol drifted left, then right, the barrel a gaping mouth of death as he covered the tree boles. He knelt and examined the ground briefly, fingering the soft earth and a broken fern frond.
The young woman swallowed, her thumb inching up to touch the hammer of her pistol, her hands shaking. She would only have one chance.
She aimed the barrel at the Hunter's chest and prayed that she could cock and fire in time. She lifted her thumb to pull the hammer.
THWIP THWIP
Blood and brain matter splatterd on the undergrowth, skull fragments and gore dripped on her...Her eyes widened as the Hunter's body toppled forward and his blood flowed down her cheek.
She gasped in breathless terror as a hand from behind reefed her up out of the undergrowth. She spun to face her assailant, and dropped her pistol in shock. The smiling face of her lover looked down at her, his eyes filled with concern.
It was impossible. Joseph was dead.
"You should have cocked your gun as you were running my love, he almost had you Sarah"
His words rippled through her, the warm tones oh so familiar.
She buried her face into his chest and sobbed. Then she punched him. Hard.
"You're supposed to be dead!"
"We will be if we don't move, come on!"
Joseph leant down quickly and pulled the sniper rifle free, and handed the silenced pistol to Sarah. Together, they moved deeper into the mist, warily scanning the forest. Sarah nervously clenched her fingers around the pistols, the rough grips pressed painfully into her palms.
She couldn't help but look up at Joseph's face, it really was him, but she couldn't ask anything, not now.
Right now they had to get away. Sarah pushed up against a tree trunk and peered around the rough bark. Three figures moved silently through the fog. Sarah dropped to the ground and aimed her pistols, as Joseph knelt, rifle aimed.
The figures shimmered in the mist, not knowing their lives hung in the balance. They stopped, thier voices muted by the damp air, before heading away from them.
Sarah let her breath out slowly, as Joseph lowered his rifle.
She slowly holstered her automatic, and leant her head against the cool moss of a tree trunk. In despair Sarah sank her arched fingers into the moss, she closed her eyes and tears welled as her fingernails scraped moss off the metal surface...the hard Xenofibre, cold beneath her fingertips.
Her eyes snapped open and she pushed herself away from the treebole. The metal exposed was dulled but not corroded, she held her breath, her eyes climbing upwards to the mass of vines and foliage above.
A large bulk of growth sat in an un-natural shape, and Sarah shivered. Joseph moved up behind her, his hand on her shoulder making her jump.
"You found it" he whispered, Sarah could only nod mutely. A lost BIOSEC craft the legend was true, their mission was a success.
If they survived to escape...
"Come on, we have to get inside...do you have the strength to pilot it?" Joseph looked at her concernedly.
"I...I will just...have to" she whispered
"That's my girl...where is the palm scan plate on one of these things?"
Sarah looked up and frowned, if the overgrowth was this size it could only be a BIOSEC fighter, it was too small to be anyting else. If that was a leg instead of tree trunk, well then the cockpit would be in the middle of the tangled mass above.
The Leg Access hatch would have to be near where she had leant against it. Sarah pointed near the exposed metal.
"Somewhere there" she said,
Joseph set to scraping the moss from the BIOSEC leg as Sarah held onto the silenced pistol, scanning the mist, she grimaced from the pain in her side, her green eyes flashing amber yellow briefly.
Sarah couldn't help but steal glances over her shoulder at Joseph as he diligently scraped the lichen and moss off the dull metal surface. His calm demeanour was familiar, the intensity of his gaze the same, but she had seen him struck down by a hail of bullets this morning.
A morning so far in the past it felt like last year. Their mission had been simple, recon the forest and ascertain any impact scarring from a craft from outer space. The ion tracking equipment would have let them know, but they had been ambushed at their hotel.
Their attackers had materialised out of the crowded street and opened fire before speeding off. Her last image had been Joseph's bloodied face lying on the pavement before she had fled before being questioned.
Sarah shook her head, she had pressed on with the mission, out of a need to finish what they had started and in doing so, given their shadowy enemies another chance at killing her as well. Entering the forest with the ion tracker had slowed her down, making her an easy target for the mystery sniper.
Her need to rest had been her saviour, if she hadn't stopped to take the pack of her shoulders the bullet would have killed her, instead it had lanced through the detector and her side.
The next few minutes were a haze of mad scrambling, mud, tears, and blood, then the cool mist. She stared at Joseph again, trying to replay his death in her head, to splice together the two faces in her minds eye.
It was him though, his scent so familiar.
Or was she trying to tell herself to believe, she didn't want to grieve if he was standing in front of her.
A small hand shaped depression was slowly revealed on the dull metal surface, under Joseph's careful scraping. He paused and glanced at the hunched form of Sarah, his eyes narrowed briefly. She glanced up at him as his face broke into a smile, his gaze changing in an instant.
She smiled wearily back before pushing herself to her feet. Sarah approached with a thrill running through her skin. This was why she was here, this was what they had sacrificed so much for.
Sarah bit her lip and looked at Joseph, who nodded encouragingly. Slowly, she reached her hand out to the cool palm plate and pressed it.
A flash of amber light and Sarah was gone, a stunned Joseph looked wildly around, but she had disappeared.
***
Darkness pressed in around her, cloying, thick and tangible, liquid night spilt into her lungs as she opened her mouth to scream. No sound issued from her throat.
She was dying.
Amber light swelled from her eyes, piercing the stygian dark and suddenly the pressure drained away.
A cold mechanical voice echoed in the small pool of amber light surrounding her as she pushed against the metal floor, swaying to her feet.
*authority verified, bio scan confirmed, virus neutralised*
Sarah rubbed her eyes, she felt dizzy and knelt suddenly to counter her falling over.
"Where am I?" she groaned
*Biosec antiviral X-1 craft, welcome aboard Sarah*
She flinched at her name, staring up into the beam of amber light, her eyes flashed the same colour and the beam winked out. The darkness lifted to reveal circular room with a under cold blue light filtering from the ceiling with several unreadable glyphs.
They shimmered and became the word "QUARANTINE" A door hissed open next to her, warm yellow light beckoning from the hallway.
Sarah rose unsteadily to her feet, putting out her hand to stabilise herself, the cool metal seemed to burn for a second before her mind registered cold. She entered the light and walked up the hallway, blinking lights and instrument panels on the walls flickered in her blurry sight.
The cold metallic voice echoed again
*External virus threat detected, initiating tactical response*
She winced as the words seemed to pierce her head
"Wha-What threat?" she stammered
An entire wall panel blinked gold and became a screen, showing a high angle of the jungle below. A targeting reticule zoomed the image onto Joseph's emotionless face.
"Jospeh?" her voice sounded strained in her ears.
The screen went white and a dull roar vibrated through her chest, sending her crashing to her knees.
*Virus neutralised*
A smoking crater was all that was left of her lover. He'd been killed, again.
"No!" she screamed.
*Your negative does not compute Sarah* the voice actually sounded confused
"Why, why did you kill him" she screamed
*He was already dead, infestation had reached critical levels*
"Infestation, what the hell are you talking about, who are you?"
Sarah stared around wildly as the silence stretched, she moved forward and paused in front of another door covered in blue glyphs. They too shimmered and she could read the word cockpit.
"Answer me!"
*I was calculating a response based on your current chemical readout of fear and anger. Your emotions may hinder a genuine understanding of my response*
"I"m angry! Not stupid!"
*Anger injects a chemical into your brain reducing your I.Q for a period of -*
Sarah slammed her hand against the door making a dull thud
*My estimate was correct, you have caused yourself pain and still have not come to enlightenment of your current situation, please enter the cockpit*
The door hissed open and revealed a moulded chair sitting in the circular room only as wide as her arms could stretch. Sarah hesitated, wiping tears of frustration from her eyes, she clenched her fist and stumbled forward to slump into the chair.
It wrapped around her, moulding itself to her form, warmth seeped into the chill in her bones, and her heart slowed. Sarah sighed, and the door lowered slowly, plunging her into darkness, she closed her eyes and let the image of Joseph's face linger before it had disappeared in a white flash.
The room hummed and golden light flooded under her eyelids, forcing them open. She was rising up a tube, which ended in muted green tones. A bank of instruments was revealed as the chair settled into place with a click.
A sleek teardrop canopy was completely covered in jungle growth, small patches of lighter green mixed with black foliage covered her.
*Welcome to the cockpit Sarah, please initiate take off sequence*
"You still haven't told me why you killed Joseph!"
*The virus had reanimated his corpse, he was not alive, so therefore I did not kill Joseph, only the virus and the container it was operating, your lack of knowledge is concerning, searching for a possible reason in my databanks*
Sarah sat in the silence that followed, her mind racing at what the voice had said, her gaze wandered over the instruments. The dials and screens were as the crumbling old manuals described, what was readable at the time. She had prepared for this moment if it had come to pass, and now that she was sitting in the cockpit of a lost spaceship, there had been no mention of an annoying AI interface.
*A possible reason has been discovered, it has been 947 years since this craft was powered down, the knowledge may not have been preserved with your people, but this is only extrapolation, not data*
"My people?"
*The Xenechs, yes, knowledge has been lost, a course of action has been plotted, I will pilot us to the X-1 Dock*
"Wait I -"
The rest of her words were lost in a blinding flash of white light and bone shattering roar
