The portion of the screen that wasn't heavily damaged came to life.
"Hello? Captain O'Connor?"
It was an African-American girl. She looked young and acted kind of chirpy. Mark cleared his throat.
"This is Captain O'Connor. Who am I speaking to?"
"Wow, you're cute. Uh, I'm Cassidy Haas, crewmember onboard TransArk 18. Is this Mark?"
"Yes, that's me."
"Mark?"
Mark heard the familiar voice.
"The right side of our screen is damaged," Mark said. "Move to your right."
He saw Tim come into view. He blinked.
"Tim?"
She looked back at Tim.
"Wait. You two know each other?"
"It's a long story," he said. He smiled at Mark's face. "Hello, Mark! Is your father around?"
Gloom encased his face. He looked down.
"He didn't make it."
Tim frowned with pity.
"I'm sorry."
"We have a situation," Cassidy blurted out. "Our captain has been infected by an alien organism. It has taken over her body as a host."
"Let me see," he said.
"Switching to personal comms."
Her wrist lit up with the screen. She held it up and walked to where they were holding it.
"We've had a rough few days," she said. "This is a late development. The creature is using her as a host to communicate."
She walked in. She switched the view to her front. Mark gasped.
"Oh, my god," James said. "That's Sara!"
"Who said that? Show yourself!"
James moved in front of the camera.
"It's me! James Tanner! Sara is our friend!"
"Our close friend," Mark added. "We grew up on the colony together. I can't believe she's alive."
"Depends on your definition," Thelma said.
"Who's that?"
"Thelma Mansell. Psychologist. We've been questioning it, trying to figure out what it wants."
"Okay, hold on a minute," Mark said. "Someone start from the beginning."
"I've got it," Cassidy said. "When we arrived, we found a creature had stowed away on the ship and tried to destroy our life support systems. It's this weird black glob that likes to stick to things. Like a living spider web. It killed Tim's daughter, and now it has taken over Sara."
"Maria is... gone?"
"Aye, lad," Tim said.
"I'm so sorry, Tim."
"What's done is done. Sara is our concern, now."
"It took over her body to gain access to the ship," she said. "Sara got promoted to Captain, which is supposed to be your title, but we didn't know if your legacy survived. We had to assume the worst."
"You followed protocol," he said. "No harm done."
"The creature took over her body and her memories. We can't force it out, or it'll kill her."
"What does it want?"
"The Frag Drive," he said. "It's after our main engine."
"What does it want with it?"
"To go wherever it wants in the galaxy," Cassidy said. "Possibly the universe."
"To create more hosts," he said. "We can't let that happen."
"It won't leave Sara, otherwise," Tim said. "We don't know what to do!"
"Mark, we've got a problem," Vera said. "It's getting taller."
"What's going on?" Damien asked.
"Our ship crashed on the planet's surface. The Drax have us trapped in some kind of force field. They did something to the animals' DNA here. Everything designed in this specific area was made to kill us."
"We're like rats in a damn science lab!" Vera said. "It's all one big experiment."
"Mark, there's a pretty big problem with what you just said."
"What's that?"
"Um... you're not on Earth."
There was a brief pause.
"Come again?"
"Your transmission isn't coming from the planet's surface," she said. "It's bouncing off the moon."
Another pause.
"Hold on. We're running a local scan."
There was some beeping followed by a chime.
"Son of a bitch," James said. "She's right. We're not on the planet at all."
"My god," Aiden said. "They made this hellhole?"
"Then it's worse than we thought," Officer Tanner said. "Either way, we need help. It's hard to explain, but we're running out of time. You said there was some kind of black organism, right? Maleable?"
"Yeah. Why?"
He sighed.
"It survived."
"What survived?"
He looked around at the teenagers.
"What I'm about to tell you is highly classified. I shouldn't even know about it."
"Spill the beans, Dad," James said. "You know what it is?"
"Yes. The ship that was found floating in space a long time ago, the Drax ship. That's what it came out of."
No one spoke for a moment.
"You kept a live Drax on the colony?"
That was Mark. Dominic took a seat.
"I told your father it needed to be destroyed, but he wouldn't listen. He said it could be useful. It had properties that helped with DNA replication. Reverse engineer it, and it could cure any disease. Human life could live twice as long as the normal lifespan, maybe even longer."
"Let me repeat. You kept a live Drax on a colony with millions of people?"
"It has been on the colony since before I was born. It was kept in isolation away from the colonists. No one was supposed to touch it, not even your father, until he was at the age to give the order."
"The order of what?" James asked.
"Of whether it should be used or destroyed."
Mark laughed.
"Let me guess. He was going to use it."
"...Yes, he was..."
Mark punched the wall. Cassidy winced.
"Mark, I'm as upset as you are," Aiden said, "but we've got a problem. We're about to drown in Drax shit. We don't have much time."
"You said we're on the moon?" Mark asked.
"Yeah."
"Can you see us?"
"No. We're on the dark side. We could come check it out."
"Please do. Give us a visual of what you can see."
Cassidy looked in the room.
"What about Sara?"
Mark cleared his throat.
"I want to help her. I really do, but we can't if we're dead. We need to know what we're dealing with."
"We're on our way," Tim said.
He looked at Cassidy.
"You flew the ship before, right?"
"Hell yeah, I did! You want me to do it again?"
"If you would be so kind, Cassie."
"Of course, sir. Right this way."
They went back to the bridge. Damien saw the worried look on Tim's face.
"Are you okay?"
"There's more of those creatures out there," he said. "If they take control of Mark..."
"Then we're in deeper trouble," Cassidy said. "Come on."
They took their places on the bridge. Officers sat down at their consoles. Cassidy initiated the Frag Drive.
"Take her in steady," Tim said from the chair.
"Aye, Captain."
She mimicked Tim's Irish accent. She didn't do well.
"I'm Irish, not a pirate," he said.
"There's a difference."
He exhaled through his nose. She maneuvered the ship closer to the moon.
"Still pretty dark," he said. "Infared scanners, please."
"Initiating Infared vision."
The screen changed. Everyone on the bridge looked up at the moon. Most of it was blue except for one spot that was red. It was a small, red speck.
"Magnify," Tim said.
They zoomed in until the speck was now a giant red dot.
"It's measuring two-hundred klicks in diameter," someone said. "Scanners are picking up traces of Oxygen, Carbon, and Nitrogen in a controlled atmosphere."
"It's a giant petri dish," Aiden said. "Called it."
They were looking at a mirrored version on their broken screen.
"They created an artificial environment," Mark said. "Just to study us."
"Don't feel special," Officer Tanner said. "That's what the Drax do. Observe and intervene whenever they please. That's what got us in this mess to begin with."
"And we're about to be Drax bait," Aiden said.
"Can't you just fly out?" Cassidy asked. "Your Frag Drive still works, right?"
"Yeah, but the rest of the ship doesn't," Vera said. "There are multiple structural failures. We're also missing part of the front of the ship. It's not getting off the ground."
Cassidy paused in thought.
"Tim," she said. She turned in her seat. "If they could get enough energy going through their Frag Drive, it might be enough for them to teleport the ship outside of the terrarium. To maintain the surface area of that interior would take a massive amount. They're sure to have something on the moon that generates said power."
"Tampering with their electrical systems could encourage them to show up in the middle of our rescue," Officer Tanner said.
"Then we'll really be in a pickle," Thelma said.
There was a low rumble outside. Mark looked through the flapping tarp covering the hole in the side.
"What if we tapped into it directly?" He asked.
"What do you mean?"
"This place generates storms," he said. "It rained a few days ago, and now there's thunder."
"Thunder means lightning," Cassidy said. "They're instantaneous amounts of energy. That could work enough to charge the Drive. You'll need to tap directly into it with some spare cable, if you have any."
"There's not much," Vera said. "I used most of it to fix our comms system, but there should be enough to run a direct line."
"Perfect. Mark, you need to attach it to something tall. A pole, or maybe a tree. Lighting strikes at random, but it favors tall, metal objects that give off electromagnetic energy. If you tie the comms system in with the Drive directly, it might be enough to create a magnetic field to attract it. It's your best shot."
"We can rip out some pipe in the walls," Vera said. "Tie them together. Make our own lightning rod."
"Yes! That should work," Cassidy said.
She could hear the thunder the second time.
"We better hurry," Mark said. "The clock is ticking."
~~~
They took apart pipes, the medical equipment, and used any form of adhesive and cloth that they could to tie together. Within a few minutes, they had the worst lightning rod that anyone had ever seen.
"It might look like garbage," Vera said, "but it only needs to work one time."
"The cable is in the containment chamber," Aiden said. "It was still clear of Drax goo. Doesn't look broken or anything."
"I've pre-programmed the coordinates," Officer Tanner said. "We're ready to go."
"Everyone ready?" Mark asked.
Some of the teenagers grabbed the "rope" with them. They pushed the makeshift pole out and started hoisting it up.
"Come on, that's it!" James encouraged.
The metal creaked but stayed together. It began to rain outside.
"Give it all you got! Pull!" Aiden said.
They tugged until it was standing upright. They tied it off to random parts of the ship, the main part being the base of the Captiain's chair.
"Okay. You need to go into your rooms and don't open the door," Mark said. "When the ships goes into space, there will be plenty of air until they send help. We'll be fine."
They started going to their rooms. Most of them had left the bridge when there was a loud *snap* with some creaking. Mark looked back. The wind blew against the pole. One of the support lines slipped, and the others snapped. The chair broke off and skidded after the falling pole.
"No!"
He ran to catch it, but it was gone. The cable snapped off the pole and whipped in the wind. Mark pulled it in and held it in his hand. Aiden looked at them.
"What now?"
He gripped the cable in his hand.
"I can fix this," he said. "You guys need to go get ready."
"What are you going to do?" James asked.
Mark looked up.
"I'll find something else. Just go. There isn't much time. I'll be right behind you."
James and Aiden left, but Vera stopped. She looked at him.
"You're not coming, are you?"
He shook his head slowly. He knelt down and whispered something to his wolves. They whimpered. He scratched behind their ears. They moved to Vera and stood by her sides.
"They'll follow you, now," he said. "Take care of them."
She nodded. "I will."
She left with his wolves. He looked up and took a deep breath.
"This is so stupid," he said to dicourage himself from going. It didn't work.
He put the cable in his teeth and grabbed the jagged edge of the exposed shell. He climbed up. His fingers struggled to maintain a solid grip on the wet surface. He looked down and saw the Drax gloop rising even higher, nearly reaching the bridge. He kept climbing. The rain made it difficult to maintain a solid grip, but he somehow reached the top without falling.
He took careful steps walking across the top. The wind whipped through his soaked hair. Thunder boomed around him. He felt shivers from the cold rain. Gusts threatened to throw him to the ground in a perilous fall. He looked at his ring.
"One more time, old friend," he said.
He summoned the ancient weapon. He took the cable and wrapped it around the wolf's head on the sword's guard. He thrusted it into the air.
"This is what you want!" He shouted. "Come get it!"
Thunder roared and clacked in anger. It was too stubborn to give it to him right away.
"Come on! You won't win! I might be gone, but there are others! They will stop you! Accept your fate as I have accepted mine!"
He saw a flash of lighting nearby. He felt goosebumps. He swallowed his fear and looked up at the rain colliding with his sword. The hair on his neck shot up. He cried unto the gray sky.
"AD ASTRA!"
He felt it before he saw or heard it. The ions in the air formed a jagged pattern that connected in a broken sequence. His eyes were filled with white, and his body collided with the energy a fragment of a star's. It traveled down his sword through the cable. It ignited the Drive like a sleeping ember thirsting for Oxygen. His body was fire. He knew it was his last moment. In that moment, he felt like he was that bright light. In that last moment, he had traveled to the stars.
In that moment... he was one of the stars.