Thread: Fallen Star (TheWanderer and darkangel76)

Peter Simon was a loner. Cyro-sleep journeys meant you had to be. Your partner either had to be with you or you were a loner. While you slept and did not age through the long journeys, the rest of the Universe did. Loved ones left behind grew old and died. Hell, by the time you came out of Cyro-sleep, back home your Great Grandchildren could be adults! Cyro-journeys took a special kind of person. You had to be tough as nails. You had to be able to leave it all behind. It attracted all sorts of peoples. Criminals. Runaways. Those with nothing left to live for. Those who wanted to live forever. Peter had his reasons, just like everyone else. He hated waking up from Cyro sleep though. It left him feeling frozen to the core and drowsy and weak. If there was ever a time where he was vulnerable it was when he woke from Cyro-sleep. And that was exactly what he was experiencing now. ARGH! He yelled as he stumbled out of his Cyro-tube. He dropped to his hands and feet, naked, and dry heaved for a few long moments before he was able to lift his head up and look around. The Survival Lights were on, which meant they hadn't quite reached their destination yet Survival Light Mode through out the ship allowed for minimal usage of the ships vast resources. Just enough energy was being used to move the ship, light the passageways for the Awake Crew, and keep everyone alive. The Crew Quarters and Dining Areas had full lights - along with the Rec Room - so the Crew wouldn't go insane. Peter checked the clock. Right on time. He murmured. He was pulling security for the next shift. Three days worth of it. And then they'd arrive. A large crew had awoken with him this time, the skeleton crew meant to prepare the ship for arrival and the entire contingent to wake up. Shaking his head, he moved down the hallway. He was the first to wake up it seemed. He made it to his quarters and immediately got in the hot, steaming shower that awaited him there. It was the best way to wake up and get your muscles and blood flowing again after a Cyro Sleep. Once significantly warmed up, he slipped into his all black with red threading uniform that marked him as Security. Then, like he always had, he moved into the Armaments Room and checked on his Battle Suit and weapons. It was there that, as he checked his suit, warning lights flashed and something hard rocked the ship. The automated voice warned that the ship had been struck by 'unknown' objects and that there were critical failures in a dozen areas. FUCK! He shouted. That was not part of protocol. He quickly slipped into his Combat Suit. It could be fully sealed allowing him to survive in the vacuum of space if something bad happened. It would also protect him against explosions and the like. The head gear connected to his implants and gave him access to the ship. When he brought up the schematics he did not like what he saw. He raced to the Bridge but apparently no one else had woken up. For anyone else to wake up needed an override during a crisis like this. Chances of survival were better when you were in Cyro-sleep. The chambers could be jettisoned and picked up by other ships in the worse case scenario. This was the worst case scenario. He raced to the bridge, nearly losing his balance several times as explosions rocked the ship. He cursed again and punched in the Emergency Launch codes. Cyro-tubes were jettisoned into space. Only there was no hope of a passing ship anytime soon. Most of them would die, he knew, years down the line. The onboard lifesupport systems would fail. They'd burn up on entry or hit other space objects. But it was a better chance then staying on board a ship that was about to explode. Peter, himself, raced to the nearest Escape Pod. He barely took time to notice that the ones closer to the bridge were more secure then those elsewhere on the ship. He strapped himself in and reluctantly plugged himself into the Cyro-stasis pod inside the Escape Pod. He had no idea where he was and using it would allow him greater survival then staying awake while traveling through uncharted space. It would also knock him out so that if he did die he wouldn't feel it coming. He felt darkness claim him just as he felt the G's starting to pull on his body as the Pod escaped the doomed ship. He was unaware that he would be the last person off the ship and the only one to avoid crashing into the anything on his journey. The escape pod had an auto-pilot mechanism in it and guided him to the nearest planet when it realized there were no nearby ships in range. The auto pilot had no idea where it was in fact, so its protocol was to take its survivors to the nearest inhabitable planet. That planet could sustain the life on board the pod so it made its heading to it. But there were no star-ports or runways for it to land on. Not that that would matter though. The pods sensor arrays incinerated as it entered the atmosphere, unable to retract them due to damage suffered already. It lost all sense of heading and crash landed into a frozen expanse in the Northern Hemisphere of the planet. Peter did not feel a thing.