Prometheus

Chapter 10

It had been a while since Shaw and David had arrived at the Engineer station. No evidence of activity had been detected and Shaw was growing impatient. There was little to do on their ship besides take periodic rests in the cyrosleep chambers in attempt to retain what was left of her sanity. She had also built up a sort of dependance on the Engineer stasis mixture as it had made her feel incredibly energized after using it. The nanobots effectively replaced and recycled all of her cells on a continuous basis while sleeping and during consciousness. She had noticed a positive side effect of not needing to relieve herself as normal human systems would. This also proved that the current amount of stasis fluid on the ship would be indefinitely sustainable so long as a majority of it was not lost from the chamber and her system.

Her plan of isolating the snake-like creatures was still in the works. She had thought of moving all known creatures into the weapon room but the process of physically moving them was not yet formulated. She would have to place them inside a sizable amount of slime which she did not want to touch again. A proper tool for the job may be found on the weapon wall but more dangerous experimentation would be needed. For the time being she had kept her distance from them and watched every corner in case one tried to interact with her.

Conversations with David were rare due to his system going into sleep mode regularly as the core computers overheated from lack of turbidity fluid. Minor repairs were done by Shaw which entailed filling the area surrounding the cores with stasis fluid and binding the leaks with sealant. It increased his operability time slightly but nevertheless overheated.

Time had come when Shaw could no longer wait for exploration of the station. Their belief of some non-violent Engineer meeting up with them seemed far too improbable. With protests from David ignored she began suiting herself up.

"Testing, over." She said into her helmet mic. Her suite no longer with a compressed backup of oxygen.

"...should not go. ..o may regret th.." David replied over coms.

"Working. Here we go." She said out loud to herself in front of the ship exit door. She took a deep breath in and let it out slowly.

With basic knowledge of the glyphs painstakingly extracted from David earlier, she opened the door. She was greeted with the familiar sound of deafening silence. The walls of the large docking room were similar to the inside of their ship. It was damp and cold. There was very little white light from small electrical plasma sources along the walls. She looked down and realized that a metallic ramp was now attached to the exit. It was smooth and about ten feet in length running to the foggy floor of the room. Part of the automated docking sequence. She cautiously stuck one foot out and with her heel tapped the surface of the ramp. Considering it safe and with her weapon pointed ahead, she began walking down the somewhat steep gradient.

The dense fog extended directly ahead to the only doorway in the room. Her heart rate sped up at the unknown beneath. Shaw explored the fog with her leg and found the bottom to be solid and just up to her knees. She advanced a few steps before freezing in place unsure of how to proceed safely. She thought of firing the alternate fire feature which was the energy concussion blast downwards to clear a temporary pathway although it came with the possibility of alerting any unwelcome guests. She concluded the risk was necessary as she did not want to injure herself so soon and rendering the mission a failure.

Taking a few deep breaths she selected the alternate fire glyph and took aim. Squeezing the trigger the weapon released a charged green blast outward. The fog was pushed forward and rose high into the air and with it remains of dead Engineer bodies. She screamed and fell back onto the ramp. The fog began refilling the cleared path covering the dead bodies. She got up and was determined to cross the distance to the door. Firing the weapon again and again, bodies were sent flying in all directions. She made it without issue.

At the door, she noticed the glyph panel was destroyed. Evidence of it possibly shot by stray fire as the charred decal was not directly centered on it and numerous decals lined the walls close by. Before the fog reclaimed its space below, she noticed one of the engineer suites resembled a female form by evidence of breast plates on the bio-suite.

The door was not fully shut and there was a two foot gap at the bottom hidden by the fog. Firing the weapon at the gap she looked under to get an idea of what was on the other side. More dead engineer corpses. Many missing limbs. Large human-like skulls strewn about. She crawled underneath barely fitting through. She got to her knees and was faced with a long corridor. It was a scene of complete destruction. Walls blown apart, scorch marks everywhere, holes the size of her head potted the ceiling and walls. A few engineers were melted to the wall from extreme heat and explosions. Clearly a place of a huge battle. From what she could make out, the engineers were killing each other. No signs of alien creatures from what she had seen previously. Exploring the accessible areas of the station seemed a daunting task and she did not know where to start.

"David? Do you read? Over." She said still standing in place a watchful eye ahead.

"Copy. Anything of interest so …?" He replied.

"Death and destruction. Apparent infighting between the engineers."

"Lovely."

"I've also discovered that there are possible female engineers in the mix."

"Fascinating. Keep me up..." He cut out.

"You can still hear me right?"

"Affirmative, Mum. Don't worry about me. Focus on the miss..."

"Right. I'll call in soon."

She moved to the first room on the right and found the door frame to be melted to the wall. Her weapon wasn't capable of cutting through metal like Davids' which was back on the ship. Walking forward a bit more she came to a thick glass window. Peering in she saw a small room that had machines and chairs all piled in the middle bound together by melted material. The walls were black and remains of a burned engineer was on the floor next to the door she couldn't get through. Nothing of great interest to her seeing as everything was damaged beyond all repair.

She proceeded down the hall careful not to trip over the bodies. The second room on the left was blown out. Wall and door unable to be found. Inside nothing salvageable. Piles of black metal. At the end of the hall was an entrance to a large elevator. Bodies had been stacked on top of each other on either side of the hall in front of the elevator door. All of them were garbed in burned robes with hoods. They were riddled with holes, beneath their skeletons visible.

Shaw looked at the glyph controls for the elevator and found many symbols she did not recognize from David's teaching. It had seven glyphs representing each level of the station vertically. She pressed the first one. A loud crash and metal grinding came from behind the door before half of it opened horizontally and the other moved slightly then jammed in place. It had a circular interior and one dead engineer was sat against the far wall its head missing. Stepping inside she doors attempted to shut behind but failed to do so. The elevator began to ascend with loud mechanical protests. As it did, the fog drained out revealed a large multi-barreled weapon on the floor next to the body.

Bending down Shaw tried to pick up the weapon but it was far to heavy and awkward to hold for an extended amount of time. She gave up and inspected the engineer. It had the normal bio-suite on but more equipment including large boots and gloves. Must be military she thought. The elevator came to a stop before coming even with the floor and the open doors began to shut slowly. Shaw panicked and quickly pushed the engineer's weapon along the floor to the door where it halted the process. It seemed to hold the doors open effectively. She then climbed up through the small opening onto the second floor.

Similar destruction on the floor. To the right a massive window had been smashed and opened up into a room. She stepped through, glass shattering beneath her feet. Along the far wall were tall chambers. She counted twenty of them. All shot to pieces except one. Glass littered the floor. At the bottom of the damaged vertical chambers were skeletal remains. She continued down the line until arriving at the furthest undamaged one. In front of it was a similar robed body. A small one handed weapon in its skeletal grip. Shaw looked inside to find a naked human male connected by numerous cables and suspended in a light green fluid. He was tan skinned and seemed to be kept alive by the machine.

"David?"

"What is it?"

"I've found a live human."