Chapter Text
-Ozzy's log. It's the day of the crash. I don't know what the heck is happening. I'm scared and I'm not going outside. There are shadows in the water under the hatch but I can't tell if they're rocks, or aliens, and there's weird looking caves nearby.
He only knew about it because his shipmate was brave enough to get out of the hatch underwater. Not wanting to load her further than he already did. Ozzy, had waited for her to fall asleep to record a log of the events, which surprisinly, happened real fast. Did she hit her head during the fall? He hoped she didn't, or they would have trouble... more trouble than they already had. But in reality, he wouldn't be able to do anything even if that was the case, besides he had to get it out his chest.
-The Aurora was carrying everything needed to build the phasegate: mobile vehicle bays, bioreactors, propulsion cannons... It had a cinema. There-there was a zero-G gym. My cafe.
That was what hurted him the most, the lost of his dream. He wanted to cry, he wanted to tell what he had lived to someone. Thomas Sanders from the PRAWN bay, Ryely, Johann and Joseph, Rosa from accountance, that Berkeley Moron, some friend, someone. God, Were they okay? He only saw one of them getting inside a lifepod, and besides poor Rosa, he didn't even saw anyone else in the Lifepod deck. he just hoped they made it somehow.
-I don't understand how we're here now. I don't know why no one's coming for me... for us.
His voice cracked at that point and he decided to say no more. Trying to occupy his mind with something, he decided to count the emergency rations. They had food and water at least, but being Ozzy a chef and a person that had gone hungry, he knew that was not even enough food for two days.
His shipmate awoke pretty soon. She was only exhausted and not injured, at least, and he didn't blame her. There was just silence while they waited for a rescue that maybe would not arrive, and it became unbearable after half an hour. So, all that ozzy could do was to try to talk about something.
-I know pretty much everyone in the Aurora, but I had never seen you before.
-Oh... now that you say it, I don't know who you are neither, your name is...?
-Lawson, Osmund Lawson. Class A services contractor. But you can call me Ozzy.
The woman exclaimed a big "Oh" in response.
-So you are the famous Ozzy. I'm Marika Danylo. Sports facilities advisor.
It turned out she had been specifically hired for Alterra's zero G-gym idea and her job was limited to help programing robots with exercise routines and give one or two fitness classes.
-I understand know why we never crossed paths. I never stepped in that gym. Not that I didn't need it- he said laughing while seeing his notorious belly- but cooking for a hundred people took time. I enjoyed it a lot but still.
I-I never went to your cafe neither, I have a very strict diet and I had a very strict diet and was given acces to certain "commodities" in my cabin so as not to break it.
-A very athletic miss for what I can see.
-More or less. It was not by my own initiative. Alterra wants to incentive a certain "physical health" image for the people in their Gym. i would have killed for a good mac and cheese.
-Iish.
-I think it doesn't matter anymore, huh?
Both sighed, equally internally devastated. There it went the effort and sacrifice of many years. What was left? An uncertain future or not even that. It went more on the side of certain death. With this in mind, the woman laid her head against Ozzy's for a moment, and he allowed it without hesitation nor comments. They barely knew each other's name, but in that moment they were everything for the other.
Thye spent the rest of the day getting to know each other and disctacting themselves with whatever they could. Twenty questions, two truths and one lie, and any variation of Alphabet they could think of.
-Artichoke.
-Beans.
-Cocoa.
-Dumpling.
-Ozzy, we are playing plants.
- Weren't we playing foods?
-It must be you're hungry.
And yes, he was quite hungry. But both attempted to resist it as much as they could. Finally, supper time came and they could not hold much longer. The menu, a nutrition bar and a water bottle each.
-Bon apetit, I guess.
-Heh, it's better than nothing, no?
But even with her on "a diet" and he passing hunger in his youth, his resources didn't even last to the night of the second day. And yet, there were no signs of any rescue. Even tho, they decided to wait a bit longer. When it became evident by the end of the third day that help wouldn't arrive soon, if it did at all, they realized they would die if they didn't get more resources. They only had one option left.
To go out.
-I should go, Mari. I made you go last time, besides its my duty as a...
-Man?- Marika interrupted- Don't be sexist, Ozzy. I can do this.
-I was going to say chef, and I'm not sexist. It's literally my job to feed people.
-I know, I know. But we must be pragmatic. We both know I am in much better shape than you.
That hurt. But it was true, besides she was smaller and faster. If there was some danger outside, it would be easier for her to escape.
There were two all-enviroment suits folded at the bottom of the rations compartments. Ozzy had been quite a gentleman and contemplated that the floor of his lifepod was effectively made of floor while Marika took off her dirty sports clothing and changed it for one of this suits
- I won't take long.
-Ok...
But then something else happened. A thunder, a rumbling so loud he felt the oppression of an impact in his guts. What the hell happened? He had no idea but it was bad. If he felt it inside the lifepod, what did Marika felt outside?
Maybe nothing happened and Marika would be back in any moment. But one, two, five minutes passed and Marika didn't return. And it didn't matter in the good shape she was in, it's not natural to hold your breath for that long. Knowing her shipmate might be in danger, Ozzy didn't even put the all environment suit on, he went outside the hatch without it.
He felt cold immediately and his lungs howled for air just for sticking his head out. He didn't want to go outside but couldn't stay inside doing nothing.
It was then when he saw it. A fluorescent world in the sea of darkness. Glowing plants, glowing fish. What he thought was a floating island but soon realized it was a jellyfish twice as big as a blue whale. It was so beautiful, so terrifying.
He went out in little trips, longer and longer each time, testing how long he could hold his breath. But no matter how much he searched, he didn't see Marika. And even worse, he saw something shining in the seafloor, close to that weird cave Marika had signaled before. It was not a fluorescent glow like everything there, it gleamed. He picked it between his fingers, feeling his heart sinking while he did. It was a golden heart with a graven "M". The same one he had saw in Marika's neck all those days he had spent with her.
Maybe she made it to the surface... But it was a 100 meter deep swim! Or maybe she got inside that grim cave... Without diving equipment? He didn't want to accept it, even if his brain couldn't stop rationalizing it. It was in that battle between heart and mind that someone, or rather something, took the chance to take him by surprise.
A snake, or something that looked like it, over 10 meters long came out of the rift in the ground. Both of them locked sights upon each other... Or they would have if the snake had any eyes. Even tho, Ozzy knew that thing was following him with its non-gaze. He stayed still for a moment, certain that if he moved he would be mauled by the creature, but that was not his only problem. Air. He felt his airway collapsing for the lack of it and soon the rest of his organs would follow if he didn't get back to his lifepod. Divided between drowning in his stillness or moving and being probably devoured by the creature, Ozzy chose the one that was not a 100 percent certain death and skedaddled as fast as his oxygen-deprived body could.
Damn! It had been close. The snake did lunge towards him as soon as he moved. But he had made to the lifepod on time. Nevertheless, he couldn't avoid crying. Not because the scare but because the loss and guilt. He held into Marika's necklace, being already sure of her fate, but he couldn't even mourn for two seconds when he realized his situation was much worse now.
-¡No! Go away!
The snake was still there, just outside his lifepod. Ready for him to go out to turn him into its snack.
He stayed there, curled up, still, hoping the beast would stop circling around, but hours passed, the night became day but the creature was still there, and he was, unable to go out, unable to sleep because of the dread, of the hunger and weaker due to the lack of everything, what was he supposed to do?
He didn't know when he fell asleep, but when he woke up, it was dark again. He didn't saw the snake through the hatch anymore, and tho he didn't have any idea of what the plan was now, specially without Marika, he wanted to know if it was prudent to go out. So, he peeked through the diminutive window of the exit and...
-I think it's gone.
This cracked on his face.
He fell from the impression, adding another bruise which was surely and already long list since planetary fall. The crystal was not fully broken but it was threatening with doing so, tiny jets filtering seawater. To top it off, he couldn't stand up immediately because something was ramming the lifepod. It was the god-damned snake! It never left and now was trying to breach through the hulk. Best case scenario, he would drown. Worst? Well, the chef would be cooked.
-No! No!
That's how it ends? Was he going to die alone in a desolate alien planet in the most surreal way possible? No, it couldn't be. There had to be something he could do. It was then when his sight focused something in the wall of his pod. The emergency radio.
They tried to make it work once but they were not sure if the message actually went through, and the only other thing it was useful for was to play static from time to time. It had probably been damaged with the fall, but he had to try something. Anything. He pushed all the buttons, tried to put the antenna on its place, he did anything and everything until a dim light turned on.
- Recording distress signal- said the machine. And Ozzy started screaming at it, with hope of being heard.
-This is Ozzy from the cafeteria, what the hell guys?! They didn't warn us this might happen! Our pod was almost crushed by the seamoth bay on the way down, now we're hanging on the edge of a cave system and this grim-looking snake-thing's trying to eat through the hull! Come get us already!"
He said "us" like if there was any chance Marika could still be alive somewhere. He said "come" like if someone would actually come to save him. He knew the possibility was practically null, but he didn't want to embrace death without a fight.
But he could hear it and feel it too. The sound of metal from his pod being crushed by that monster's fangs. The water filtering from the hatch, splashing on his face. A long minute passed, then five, then twenty. And Ozzy just stayed there, waiting. For rescue, for his death, he didn't know which anymore. And then, the metal finally gave in, and water that was just dripping before started flooding the lifepod.
It was the end. The end. There were no chances of surviving. His leg was cut by the hull's rupture, metal entering his skin. He could already see the snake's head going inside the hole while water kept rising and rising. He couldn't help but scream, it was a human instinct after all, and in between screams, the oxygen from his pod was running out.
He just hoped to drown before the snake could eat him, surely it would be less painful.
But then, the snake retreated, suddenly attracted to something else. Thirty seconds passed, he had not died yet. One minute passed, he had not died yet. How was he not dead yet?
And, suddenly, a head peeked through the hatch. A clearly human head.
