My name doesn’t exist so I don’t exist so this story doesn’t exist; don’t pay attention to my egregious tale. Solar day 3250 or 3309 maybe 3015, the date doesn’t matter; we had passed through a solar storm that had damaged the Point Breakers antimatter drive. We were sitting ducks next to a G type star, stars that commonly attracted other ships.

“I’m going down to the engine deck” I tell Niki “that flare caused an out of sequence reaction that escalated in the active drive we’re switching to forced plasma”
“Ok” she says, “then I’ll have to switch over the functioning drive program on the main controls.”
“See you latter” I whisper
“See you” She whispers pecking me on the cheek, twirling on her heel, swiping her hand over the door release panel, and dashing out and down the hall, leaving me staring after her for a moment after she had departed from the room. I shake my self focusing, I pull on my carbon weave engineering jacket, impact gloves, magnetic boots , sling my tool pack over my back, and step out of the room I pause at the frame to close the door behind me. As the synthetic polymer door closes my memory fades...

And waxes again in the engine room, I hear a muffled voice, then a muffled “hey, can you hear me?” I turn to my radiation suited comrade in the airlock, who has a quizzical look on his face, I gesture to my head an ear and shout into the microphone on the headset in my suit “barely, my receiver needs to be adjusted!” he nods. Proceeding back out the airlock doors into the suit room I unmagnetize my helmet’s seal and pull it off I take off my head set and pop open its protective casing. I take a minuet screw driver from my tool set at my side I use it to adjust the frequency coil, placing it back on my head I say, “Can you hear me now?” I hear a chuckle then a
“You watch too many old propaganda clips” from my comrade
I say “Yes, but they reveal allot about the past”
“You and your past it’s the present we should be more worried about” he says
“Ah, but if you do not remember the past you are doomed to repeat it” I say, stepping back into the airlock
“You got me” he says as he slides his security card into the airlock control panel I step up beside him and slide my card in to the second slot on the on the control panel
“Air-lock activation sequence activated clear Air-lock doors” a computerized voice announces, the doors behind us slide closed, with a shhick they lock we wait as the room is depressurized and finally the engine room doors slide open.
“You ready the plasma engine I’ll start the removal” I say as we start the work on switching the damaged engine out.

Let me take a moment to explain, you see, the Point Breaker is a small research vessel and does not have backup engines directly integrated into the design of the hull so if the primary engine were to fail it would be stranded. But because this is a research ship it has extra equipment that can be salvaged to replace the damaged engine. The engine has to be removed because only a few planets and colony mother ships have the equipment to repair an antimatter drive also only two people were working on it because we had a small crew. But what happened next I regret the most because it changes everything.


The alarm sounds, I can’t hear in the vacuum but I can see the reflective red warning light flashing by the airlock doors
“Code five warning!” I shout, alerting my partner to the alarm. I sprint to the airlock doors with him just behind me as I press the close and pressurize buttons on the control panel, with him sliding in between the doors just before they close. As soon as the chamber closes and starts to pressurize I rip off my helmet, I feel a twinge in one eye where a vessel burst due to the change in pressure, jumping out of my suit and, as soon as the doors slid open, running to the com panel down the hall nearly falling over when the ship suddenly lurches beneath me, magnetic grapple?, I think. My mind racing I press the activate button on the panel and shout

“Engineering to helm, status report!”

“We’re under attack by an alien battle curser, of varcratieon design!” from the helm room, a com officer replies, the reply terrifies me, dark thoughts of what has happened to ships attacked by those reptilians swarm my mind. My friend finally untangles himself from his suit and sprints over “What’s happening?” he says out of breath
“We’re under attack from a Varcratieon battle curser ” I say,
“That’s bad” he says gasping for air a little “there’s an arms box down the hall”
“Guns blazing?” I ask
“Why not?” he says
“You got a point” I say
He starts off down the hall, I sprint after my comrade, we stop at the arms box, I punch in my security number and press my hand to the scanner panel
“Access granted” a computerized voice announces the door unlocks with a click I grab the handle and pull it open. Inside I grab a laser rifle and a plasma rifle I hand the plasma rifle to my friend, just as I hand it over the ship lurches again.
“Let’s split up” I say, “We can engage them from multiple sides”
“Tactical” he says, and we part ways.
Walking down a corridor, rifle ready, I round a corner I quickly jump back around the corner spotting a few varcratieons down the hall spinning around I fire several blasts down the hall. crouching behind the edge of the wall gun ready, shooting blindly around the corner I sprint across the hall, into the cross fire, still pulling the trigger of my weapon and hoping it hits something I start to dive side ways, into a slide, as I push off I feel a thin searing pain run across my leg, my momentum carries me past the corner of the wall, and to the other side. I look down a thin horizontal slash has cut through my pants and into my lower leg, I sneer in pain as deep crimson blood starts to pool on the wound. I push my back against the wall and lay my rifle across my legs, before I have time to react, a varcratieon rounds the corner. I hear a zzat and feel a slight sting in my neck, toppling over my vision starting to fade I reach up feeling something on my neck I pull a brightly colored dart clatters to the floor the last thing I hear is my weapon clattering across the floor kicked from my hand.
When I wake two varcratieons hold me at each side, dragging my legs, blood dripping from the gash on my leg leaving a long red-orange smear down the corridor, I droop my head and close my eyes. When I lift my head again the cargo bay is coming into view as I look I see a hole marked by burnt, twisted, and broken metal where a new docking port was apparently added by our new ‘friends’. They are lining people up I look down the line, many injuries, and a few missing people; dropping me on my knees at an end of the line up my carriers walk away. I raise my head high with a defiant glare in my eyes as an official looking varcratieon walks by I give him an offensive old earth hand gesture that only a human would recognize, he walks on. I hear a Varcratieon addressing another in their click growl language then it clicks, the dart, they’re taking prisoners not killing people determined to not become a slave or a ransom I pushed up with my uninjured leg, standing, I swing my fist into the face of the varcratieon next to me, letting the impact-resistant gloves do their damage, without time to lash out again a plasma shot rings out, grazing my side, producing a pain felt in the surrounding tissues, my face twists in pain as something hard connects with the back of my head knocking me to the floor. I feel a hard clawed foot press against my back and a deep white stabbing pain fills my mind as talons are buried into my back and spine far off I hear Niki yelling I try to move, I try to call out in protest, call out to her, I try to see, I try, I fail I can’t focus my eyes my legs feel numb and I manage a moan through it all. Time passes, left for dead; unable to move I try not to die I do not succeed.
But I do not die normally just part of me dies leaving me behind with this story, haunting this ship haunting the galaxy, searching space for retribution forever more searching for her.