When the colonists wake up for the first time they find themselves aboard small outposts. The outposts are in bad shape and life-support systems are slowly failing due to disrepair and lack of resources. One of the first things you and many others will learn is that you have been lied to. The hour is much later than expected and you know nothing about the current situation, or how you ended up in that small cryobay. Your first order of business, however, is to survive. Your station is low on resources, oxygen tanks are almost empty, air-filters and other systems are falling apart and there is barely enough fuel in the cargo hold. Your only hope is the small vessel docked outside, but it is in an even worse shape than the outpost. If the engines still work, you might stand a chance, providing that they don’t tear the aging hull apart at the first opportunity.
The system is in ruins, your weak scanners told you as much. There is no trace of massive orbital shipyards or established infrastructure, only derelicts, bits and pieces of space stations, ruined modules and destroyed ships. You had already salvaged what little resources and spare parts they had aboard and they will keep you alive for a while. The logs you’ve managed to uncover tell a dark tale. War preparations, troop deployment, battles, and those are the ones that make sense. The other logs, they talk about conspiracies, underhanded deals, schemes and illegal experiments, you would rather not think about those.
You have managed to locate a small fuel refinery, but the solar panels of the cryobay simply cannot provide enough power to keep it running. You will need a suitable power source before you can start refining the ore into usable resources. It is ironic there are enough asteroids around Bethyr to build a whole colony from scratch, but without the refinery all they are is dead weight.
It’s been several days now and your search has finally paid off. The fuel is almost out, but the power supply module is in your sight. A working fusion reactor! You can finally put that refinery to good use. With enough fuel and air, you could attempt to reach one of the moons, look for clues, find some answers and maybe figure out how to get out of this mess, but first things first. The module is spinning out of control. Before you can dock, you have to manually stabilize it. You put on your pressurized suit and head outside, spare RCS canister in your hand. One mistake and it’s over, your alignment must be perfect. Getting hit by 800t of spinning metal would be equally deadly with or without gravity.
The waiting is always boring, but there is no way around it this time. The suit and jet-pack are both charging, since stabilizing the module took a lot of time. Your fuel is low and towing the module back, especially one this massive, might drain more than what you have, leaving you stranded. You had to plot the new course carefully. In a few minutes you will reach the optimal point along your current orbit, close enough to the base that even this meager amount of fuel will be enough.
It is almost time. You bring up the navigation panel and get ready to start the engines. Suddenly there is a burst of static throughout the ship, the image on your screen flickers and disappears as the reactor goes offline and the lights switch to emergency power. You are left weightless. You move towards the cargo hold, pushing against the walls. You have to reach the suit before something else happens. As you put it on and lock the helmet, you can hear muffled noises coming from the hull. You are being boarded! The doors of the cargo hold swing open and you brace against decompression. With a roar the sound is sucked out of the room and then you see it, a dark humanoid shape against the swirling clouds of Bethyr. The suit is different, bigger heavier and there is something in its hands. By the time you notice the other one behind him, it is too late. A bright flash, then pain and then… Nothing. You are waking up, the cold of the cyrochamber is everywhere. You remember. The figure, the gun, the flash and pain… You have a million questions. Who were they? Where did they come from? Why did they kill…
And then there is now only one question on your mind, the one that drowns out all others.
“Why am I alive?”
