Waning Hope (Nihilian Effect)

Epilogue

"Discovery, what's your status? Over."

A jade and azure sphere hung ominously over the moon's pale landscape, dominating the star-riddled sky. The smaller of the twin moons, Gemeth, became eclipsed as it passed between the two larger bodies. With its bulbous figure and already small mass, at that distance it appeared to be no more than a stone thrown into space.

"Roger, Obrien. We are approximately four hundred paces from the target. Over," Nal replied. His own voice resonated within his helmet when he spoke. Staring up at the planet, he squinted in a futile attempt to spot the city of Obrien, the location of their mission control base.

"Roger, Discovery. Proceed with caution."

"Nal, I am detecting several sets of tracks about thirty-four paces in front of us," Levin said from ahead of him. His sing-songy voice glitched ever so slightly when he pronounced his s's.

Tearing his gaze from the sphere, Nal continued to follow his partner, having taken the rear to allow Levin to scan the terrain unhindered. Nal unintentionally counted his steps as they drew nearer, as if the android could have been wrong.

"Incredible," Levin said once they reached the tracks. A high volume of wide tire tread imprints crossed the landscape, disappearing behind hills in either direction. "To think that these are several millennia old, untouched for centuries."

Nal peered down both directions. "This should lead us right to the target," he said, turning to Levin. The android's glowing blue eyes were intense set against the moon's stark, gray terrain. "Lead on."

Traversing the lunar surface was a time consuming process due to the moon's lesser gravity. Each step resembled a slow hop hindered by the awkwardness of a spacesuit. Nal envied Levin; with the android had been upgraded with radiation plating, negating the need for a suit. Levin walked with ease after having regulated the output force of his steps for the moon's gravity, while Nal bounced after him.

When they neared at the target location, Nal's breath caught. They topped a hill, and an old-world facility sprawled before them, consisting mainly of larger domes linked by cylindrical tunnels. They had spotted the structure as they flew toward their designated landing point, but seeing it up close was thrilling. While the structure alone was inspiring, it was the ambition of the people who had aspired to build something so large on the moon that impressed him. He and Levin had spent months just in preparation for the mission, with the plans for the mission having been in the works for years beforehand; he could not imagine how long it would take to accomplish such a feat as building a base of this size.

The first section they came to had a collapsed tunnel that was disconnected from a dome on one end. Fire or explosions had blackened the otherwise all white exterior. The tunnel joined a smaller dome—which was unreachable due to the destruction—to what appeared to be a storage or hangar bay, the door of which lay scattered in mangled pieces in front of the wide opening.

Everything within the bay was in ruins. A pile of charred and bubbling plastic crates sat fused in a back corner; some of their contents had leaked or burst, now in a state of frozen ooze. The support beams were bent and buckled. One wall held a hole bursting outward large enough that Nal and Levin could have walked through it side by side. They did not. Instead, they surveyed the destruction from beyond the bits of discarded door, deciding to err on the side of caution and avoid it for now.

At the disconnected end of the collapsed tunnel, they found a door to one of the larger domes. Nal activated his head lamp and stepped up onto the frame to peer through the door's porthole. The air inside sparkled with dust in the light of the lamp. Cupboards and counters lined one side of the chamber; some of the doors hung ajar or had fallen off. Silver packets of what he guessed were food stuffs lay strewn about the paneled floor, and two tables sat in the middle of the room surrounded by curving chairs. Beyond that, the chamber was too dark to make out any further details.

Nal leaned away from the door and, grasping its handle, gave it a twist. It did not budge. He tried again, giving it more force, but still nothing.

"Do you want to give me a hand here? I think you might need to use your plasma saw attachment," he said as he stepped down. Levin did not reply, and when Nal turned around, the android was not there.

Nal examined the area, turning his whole body to get a full view from within his limited visor. "Where did you go, Levin?"

Nal spotted footprints in the lunar soil leading toward some of the other structures. Following the path, he weaved through shards of thick glass amidst the skeleton of a structure that contained pots and trays holding brown plants laden with ice. One snag of his suit on a shard and it would be all over for him. Their vessel was half a league away, as would be any chance of survival.

Coming around a corner, he found Levin staring at six rough slabs of stone, each about a pace and a half wide and three paces long, aligned in a row at his feet. The android did not acknowledge Nal when he approached.

"A-are those graves?" Nal asked with hesitation. Names were scratched deep into the center of each slab, as if carved with rock. He leaned forward to get a better look. "Druger, Peji, Tui, Eire—"

"Two of them are empty. I scanned them." Levin said. He turned from the stones and stared at Nal with his piercing luminescent eyes.

"Obrien," Nal called without breaking eye contact. "How many crew members were up here? Over."

"Unknown, Discovery," the director replied. "Whatever records there may have been were misplaced or destroyed during or before the Lost Years. Over."

Levin returned his focus to the stones. Electronic or not, his voice sounded breathy. "What do you think happened? Who would have placed them here, and why would two of them empty?"

Nal could only shake his head. Whatever had occurred on this base, these people had died and then been buried by someone, but he could not find any tracks leaving the area other than their own. There was no historical information about the base or its crew, only rumors that had been passed down by word of mouth over the centuries. Nal and Levin were the first to step on the surface of this moon in over two thousand years.