Atlas stirred awake to a crackle of static. Not the familiar, calculated hum of EVA's startup sequence but broken noise, sharp, ragged like tearing fabric in his ears.
His vision blurred, red light pulsing overhead in a slow, relentless rhythm. The ship groaned like an old metal beast in pain, a deep, reverberating vibration through the walls and floor.
"EVA… report," he croaked?
Nothing.
He blinked hard, smacked his dry lips. Blood. Metallic. His head pounded as if split by some invisible hammer. A line of warm fluid trickled down the side of his face he touched it. Red.
"EVA, systems check. Now."
Finally, a response glitching, stuttering. "Sy…systems… critical. Nav... offline. Eng…engine failure. Communication unresponsive."
The words sank into him slowly, each one like a stone dropping into an endless void.
He looked around.
The cockpit was half-lit in warning lights. Half the console screens blinked error codes, the others were black or flickering with distorted images. Smoke lingered faintly in the air.
The scent of burnt circuitry clung to everything.
He reached for the override, keyed in the emergency wake protocols. No effect. Tried again. Still nothing.
"EVA," he whispered, "where the hell are we?"
Static. Then a weak voice: "Unknown. Star chart correlation… failed. Coordinates… not on map."
A cold knot formed in his stomach.
He unstrapped himself and stood on shaking legs. A distant pop echoed through the ship a pressure pipe rupturing somewhere behind the walls. Nothing fatal… yet.
Atlas moved through the corridor toward the bridge window. It took more effort than it should have. Every muscle ached.
The viewport opened, revealing… nothing. Not nothing in the abstract way, not a poetic void.
Real nothing.
No stars. No nearby celestial bodies. Just pure black. A blank canvas where even the stars had gone silent.
"What the hell…" he breathed.
EVA's voice returned, quieter. Multiple subsystem failures… Gravity stabilizer at 62%.
Oxygen levels stable.
Life support active. All propulsion offline.
Atlas let out a slow, controlled breath. Training taking over. Panic would come later. Right now, he had to survive.
He moved to the auxiliary terminal, manually ran diagnostics. Power was leaking from several sections. Emergency reserves were online. Fuel reserves… negligible.
He was adrift.
Adrift in the dark.
…Kael?"
The voice startled him. EVA. But it sounded… less broken. Almost concerned.
"I'm here," he replied, staring into the infinite black. "And I think we're lost."
He sat down in the pilot's chair, rubbing his temple. "Start a log. We need to track everything from now. Every minute detail. We're on our own."
A soft beep confirmed EVA had initiated the ship's old emergency log protocol.
Outside, the void waited.
No answers. No beacons. Just silence.
And Atlas Kael, suspended in the middle of it all, the last pilot of the Valkyris-9.
Alone.
And not yet afraid.