Buttercup Effect

Divergence (1)

"And as CS-1 trek through the cave, on QE5-38, keeping their weapons drawn and flashlights on for even the slightest bit of alien contact, they encounter a fork, with two ways that cannot possibly be created from natural forces unle-"

"Cal is correct."  Delan Shings replied. 

Out of the corner of her eye, Matthew saw someone, who looked human and male, aim at them.

"We've been spotted!" Matthew screamed but calm. CS-1 took aim as fast as they could as they saw their target. 

They all fired. Being only one, the alien was shot quickly and disappeared in a flash, which was strange for an alien, but not before he had fired a couple of shots. Matthew noticed that he had been using a P90. Strange... the only way to get a P90 was from Earth, in Cosmic Syndicate Command. 

CS-1 heard many more footsteps, almost like an army. They saw ten more come from the left side who started firing. Cal noticed how many times they were getting shot, they should've died from them. Even the armor can't take over twenty or so bullets and here was the team getting shot by many. There was no cover. Cal also realized that his bullets appeared to take less effect on the incoming aliens. It took only a second after the aliens came from the left side that the team turned around to run.

Cal recovered after Louis said that. CS-1 ran back to the entrance of the cave, passing CS-2 along the way.

"Get back to the ship." Oma said, but more like shouted before Louis could as the team passed.

As they saw the light of the cave, shots were being fired from behind them. Bullets flew around them in the surprisingly wide entryway, it could fit two people side by side. When they finally came out, the two teams took cover behind rocks and trees to start firing at their enemy.

"We need to get beamed up now!" Louis shouted.

"Working on it sir, we are detecting a foreign starship coming toward our location, there is going to be a short delay as we pinpoint your positions." replied Matthew Sullivan from engineering replied.

The team soon saw bright lights around them as they fired. They hadn't managed to shoot anyone, but they just needed enough cover fire to get out.

"Welcome aboard the Voyager CS-1 and CS-2." said Sullivan

"You said there was another ship approaching us?" asked Jack Louis said as he and CS-1 threw off their helmets.

Sullivan seemed to remember, then shouted, "Full thrusters, let's get out of orbit."

The fourteen people on the bridge started navigating the controls on their consoles more quickly. Sullivan got to the Captain's chair and started using his controls as well. Cal jumped onto any empty console, with almost no reason at all. Unlike the other crewmates of the ship, he didn't have a designated role. While other people were on sensors, navigation, management, hostile engagement, and analyzation, he was trained to do all things, and was able to multi- task well. He decided to scan the ship and look for potential invaders and see if there were any internal problems. There was nothing out of the ordinary except for the slipdrive starting up, which couldn't start until they were out of orbit.

"We've come out of orbit sir!"

"Prepare the slipdrive!" Sullivan said or rather shouted

Just as he said that the ship shook and the lights went out.

"Slipdrive offline! We've been hit! Kinetic barriers and shields are still online! " said one of the crew members. "Mining lasers down!"

"I'm on it!" Matthew said, as she sprinted to the hyperdrive station, which was only a room away.

"The lining connector is disconnected. Shouldn't this be more stable?"

"Um... sorry, my fault. I'm working on a much more stable upgrade, but this technology is new to us. Especially because it uses foreign parts. One hit shouldn't have knocked it out though, we must've been hit hard." Cal replied

"This'll take a moment,  I'm putting it back on."

"I'm detecting a third starship in the system. It's firing at the ship that hit us." Cal yelled "Should we help them?"

"Our 'mining lasers' are offline idiot." Louis said.

"The Pods have weapons."

Just then, the ship took a more violent hit than from before.

"We're losing shields. The kinetic barrier is offline."

Within five seconds the crew saw different shades of blue and white light envelop them as they warped to Terra.