InnerThought

Today I wrote a little Sci-Fi story about a space traveler, from another galaxy, who stumbles across a seemingly deserted moon base in hopes to find some signs of friendly beings. He only to find the reason no one lives there any more. The story prompt came from Rory’s Story Cubes that were rolled for May 9th’s Story a Day prompt. Seeing it is almost 12am I wanted to get it on record that I finished, but I’ll post the excerpt later once I can do some editing; at 1,650 words, I don’t have time before the clock ticks 12 to clean it up. I’ll update this post with it once I’ve cleaned it up.

[UPDATE: I finally got a chance to clean up the story and all 1,758 words can be found after the jump.

The console beeped indicating that there was breathable air outside the air lock. Klavel found it odd that no response came from any of his radio communications to the moon base, “but the base has breathable air,” he thought. Klavel wondered if his radio technology wasn’t compatible with this base’s technology but to have an unidentified ship land in the dock without alarms or people running about was really odd. Klavel wasn’t going to take his chances. He got in his space walking suite, armed his gun, and entered the air lock of his ship.

He cycled through the air lock and slowly stepped out of the ship, expecting anything, but what came; nothing. Not a single alarm sounded, nor did Klavel see a single person, or a space ship for that matter. “What has happened here?” he wondered as he cautiously moved towards what looked to be a door into the base. As he approached the door it shook slightly then nothing. After a moment the door slowly started to retract into the wall with a quiver that only means this door hasn’t been opened for a very long time. Even more nervous than before, Klavel entered and began studying what seemed to be a deserted base.

Klavel walked down the corridors with only the light of from a few dim lights every 10 feet or so. Klavel figured they were either a lot of blown out lights, or emergency lighting only. Occasionally on the hall walls, Klavel saw a screen with some images on the screen that rotated in a loop. Klavel spent 1o minutes trying to make sense of these images. It seemed to start with a silhouette of a winged creature with a long tail on a flashing red background. Though Klavel was alien to this advanced civilizations, he guessed that flashing red was not a good thing, just as it isn’t a good thing where he is from. After the image of the winged creature disappeared an arrow that pointed down and to the side appeared. After a moment an image of a circle with 12 ticks around the outside all pointing in toward a center with two varying size arrows pointing out from the center. The last image, before it started all over, was a picture of some finned creature with varying strips over the whole body.

Klavel thought about these images as he walked down the corridor. If only there were words explaining these images, but even if there were words he probably couldn’t understand them either. After a short walk Klavel found what he guessed is the command center. He entered a large room with screens covering the walls and dozen of terminals facing away from the wall covered with screens so the operators could see it by just looking up. Klavel looked at the nearest station and found a device with dozen’s of keys with symbols on them. Klavel had no idea what any of them meant. “This alien culture is truly odd. I wonder if I would be able to even communicate with any of them even if I ran into one, assuming it doesn’t take me for an enemy and shoot me.” This thought made Klavel shiver.

Klavel could see that those who occupied this room at one time left in haste, since there were things strewn about all over the room. Many of the chairs were overturned. Klavel noticed that on all the screens that seemed to still be working the same images that he saw earlier were flashing on these screen’s too, even the ones on the wall in front of him. The alternating white backgrounds with black symbols to the flashing red background gave odd lighting as Klavel could almost see with the white then plunged into almost darkness with the flashing red. There were still a couple of steady lights here and there but overall, this facility was in the dark.

Klavel figured that there was nothing to learn here and it was time to leave.  Plus the place was making him nervous. He began making his way back to his ship when he heard a scrapping noise on metal behind him, from the far side of the command room he was just in. He paused a moment and was about to turn to see what the noise was, but a thought crossed his mind in a moment.

“It seems all of the screen’s are displaying a warning of some winged creature, if I can assume that is what that image was. The former occupants of this base left in a hurry, and it’s been abandoned for some time. I think it’s time to go, especially since there is something lurking in here.”

With his mind made up he continued down the hall without looking for the source of the scrapping sound. He walked calmly till he felt he was out of view of the command center and then started jogging. He heard a sound behind him of scrapping on metal again, but now the sound came at a more regular rate, like something was following him. Klavel started to run. The sound now came faster and after a moment of running at full speed he heard a deafening screech from behind. Involuntarily Klavel looked over his should as he ran and saw what look like the winged creature from the screens hobbling towards him on clawed limbs. Klavel ran faster.

Klavel sent a signal to his ship from his suit’s computer system to prepare it for a quick departure. He rounded a corner and could see the hanger where his ship was awaiting him. Due to the size of this creature and the tight fit of the halls, Klavel was able to put some distance between himself and the creature, that is till he ran straight into the sliding door separating the base to the hanger. The door must have slowly closed after he entered, and at the speed he was running it didn’t have time to open for him. Klavel bounced off of the door and landed on the ground several feet from the door. The monster screeched again.

Klavel jumped to his feet and spun to see the monster almost upon him. Without thinking Klavel pulled up his gun and fired right at the creatures head. He may have aimed at it’s head, but with the speed of drawing the weapon and firing, Klavel hit the creature’s shoulder where the wing connected to the back. If he thought the first screech from this creature was deafening, he was wrong. It screamed out in pain and opened it’s mouth and spit out fire in attempt return the pain Klavel seemed to have caused. The blast of explosive air with fire shot Klavel backwards and into the hanger. The door had sufficient time to crawl open since Klavel ran into it. Klavel tried to get up quickly but found it quite hard to move since his suit had melted and shrunk in the heat blast from the monster and as his suit shrunk it hardened.

His boots weren’t fused in the intense heat so he hopped as quickly as he could in the low gravity of the hanger towards his ship. The monster was having troubles getting through the door and kept sending streams of fire through the door after him. Though a few strands licked at Klavel’s back and legs, it didn’t have the explosive nature as it did in the enclosed corridor since the hanger was so large. On the last fire blast from the monster Klavel was given more range of motion as his suit not able to handle the heat any longer and fell off his body, but then the intense fire seared the calf on his left leg making him drop to the ground in pain.

The monster screech again thinking it was winning. Klavel slowly scooted around on the floor so he could aim his gun at the monster again. Using all the concentration he could muster, Klavel took aim at the monster’s head and fired. Once again he missed his target slightly, but this time it was closer as the shot went right down it’s throat. The monster froze in mid screech and then it’s head fell to the ground lifeless. Klavel heard a loud popping sound and could see flames emitting from the monster. Klavel dropped his gun and then gripped his left calf in pain as his adrenaline pump died down. Even though he was in great pain Klavel was also relieved that the monster wasn’t chasing him any longer. He may have to live with a limp for the rest of his life, but he would at least live. Klavel laid a few feet from his ship’s air lock in ball rocking back and forth in pain when the ground rumbled. He looked up to see the fire coming from the monster’s corpse had caught the walls on fire inside the base. Klavel didn’t want to find out what was causing the rumblings and with great effort, crawled into his ship.

He initiated the computer take off system to get him out of this terrible base once and for all. As the ship lifted up off the ground an explosion rocked the hanger and the door the monster was wedged in, and the wall around it, exploded and crashed against the wall just behind his ship with monster chunks flying all over the hanger. Klavel dragged himself into the pilots seat, armed his weapon system, fired at the hanger doors that trapped the air in, and overrode the auto take off system and accelerated his craft as fast as he possibly could without crashing in into the door as his ship rocketed out of the hanger. The explosion that chased him out of the hanger sent shrapnel out into space in a spray that ripped gouges into the hull of his craft and propelled him towards the planet the moon was orbiting.

Though Klavel still could control his ship, many of the systems were severely damaged and he couldn’t make it far without repairs. Grateful he was still alive, Klavel wondered what awaited him on this planet he was hurled towards from the explosion since his ship didn’t have enough crucial systems to prevent him from having to perform an emergency landing on the planet he would later learn was called Earth. Klavel enabled auto pilot, slumped onto the floor and began the slow process of taking are of his cooked leg.