Chapter Text
The low & surprisingly comforting sound of the space-ship moving through the vastness of the universe utilizing its Faster-Than-Light Jump is enjoyed by a man with a scar on his right eye, his hand passing through his never-so cold brown hair.
Behind him, a tall, grey-eyed, woman analyzes the multitude of computers & eletronics in front of her.
''How long till we get there?'' she asks, looking at the man in the chair.
He would gaze towards the woman, sighing, ''Well, Hyuna. From the TRAPPIST system to the Solar System... probably a whole day or two.''
Hyuna would bite her recently done nails, ''Not optimal, but it's what we have,'' she'd look away. ''Mizi is depressed in her bunker.''
''Go talk to her, that normally solves whenever Mizi is grumpy,'' the man said before chuckling.
The woman would cross her arms, biting her nails even harder, ''Yeah, but this time she ins't grumpy because Dewey ate her favorite Toucan cake.''
''It's about that girl... I forgot her name,'' he bumped his feet into the ground. ''The one from Proxima Centauri B? Right?''
''Her name is Sua,'' Hyuna said plainly. ''I'm not a big fan of her. After all, she almost stole Mizi from us.''
''What does this ''Sua'' even do? Is she like... rich?'' the scarred man asked.
Hyuna stared at the man for a brief moment before diverting her gaze towards the window, observing the vast amount of lights passing through their eyes, an phenomenon common in FTL travel.
''Sua's from a family of smarties. Her deceased mom used to work at the Supreme Senate, she even managed to contact Empress Máxima, that's how we discovered that there were uncontacted human in the SWEEPS System,'' Hyuna tilted her head, letting her brown hair fall to her shoulders. ''Her sister, Hia... I heard she was working for the Head of Grand Projects, something about LAMBDA. Haven't heard about her since.''
''But what about Sua? I want to know about her, not her family.'' The man pressed.
Hyuna would chuckle, only the little that the situation gave her, ''You're so annoying, Jacob,'' she'd sigh. ''If I'm not mistaken, last time me and Mizi talked, before she came back here; Sua was planning on going with her sister towards this LAMBDA thing, but cancelled it because Mizi proposed to her. Sua is sort of a big-brain too, just like her mom & sister.''
''All I'm getting here is that Mizi's an asshole for leaving her like that and you're an even bigger asshole for coercing Mizi into leaving her for us,'' Jacob would state, plainly.
Hyuna's eyebrows would lightly furrow, ''What? Face the reality, Jacob. Mizi is a soldier, she always has been, she doens't fit this peaceful life and pretending that everything is perfect,'' Hyuna would look away, gritting her teeth. ''And besides, we need her more than never now.''
. . .
Light creeped in on Mizi's dorm as the steel door opened, the cold air of her room hitting the face of Hyuna like an ice bucket.
The older woman walked inside quickly, leaning in on the wall beside the bunker-bed that Mizi layed on, holding her oversized pillow close to her body.
''It was your decision, Mizi, in which I am really proud of you for... I understand that it's hard, but... you know, you can't be all sad forever, can you?'' Hyuna said, almost coldly.
Mizi would dart her eyes to Hyuna, rubbing her hands lightly agains't the edge of her eyes to clean the dried tears, ''S-Sorry... I-I just need some time.''
Hyuna's hands shot to grab Mizi's, just like old times... even if it wans't out of friendship this time.
''Mizi... I know you... wanted to stay, you never expected that the tensions in the galaxy would rise so quickly. But the stakes are high here, its like seven years ago, remember?'' Mizi's eyes widened slightly upon hearing ''seven years.''
''The Grand Galactic War,'' Hyuna said, her words echoing through the almost empty room.
''It was there that we met...'' Mizi said, with a non-enthusiastic voice. ''I-I'm sorry for making you lose your leg...'' tears threateaned to spill from Mizi's eyes.
Hyuna chuckled dryly, ''You just love remembering me about that, huh?'' Hyuna sighed. ''That doens't matter, its in the past. What matters now is that you're here, with me, Jacob, Isaac and Dewey.''
The experienced lady's hand would squeeze the other one tighter.
''You're a soldier, Mizi. Our AF-1,'' Hyuna would delight Mizi with a bright smile.
''Astro Fighter-One... Y-You're right,'' Mizi would give a pained smile, her gaze almost delusional. ''I miss piloting my Fighter...''
. . .
The door that opened a few minutes past reopens, presenting to Dewey, Isaac & Jacob Hyuna and their old member, Mizi, to them.
''Guess you really didn't become a softie,'' Dewey said, chuckling.
The man in the middle, Isaac, would approach Mizi before hugging her and rubbing his knuckles ontop of her head, the movement was slightly more painful than Mizi would like, ''She's back! We definetely need to tell her everything that's been happening since she decided to dip.
. . .
The hurried steps of a man is followed by lighter and less elegant one's coming from behind him, the almost blinding lights of the hallways of the Supreme Senate building bothering the already tired taller one.
''Till... I still have to board my ship by evening and head to the Alpha Centauri system for my duty as representant of Humanity in the Galactic Federation affairs,'' The man said, looking at the gray-haired man behind him, the same would be carrying an rifle on his back, one that disposes itself with cutting edge-technology. ''You are walking painfully slowly, and I am afraid that you are aware that not being on schedule is one of my dislikings.''
''I-I know Iva- I mean, Senator,'' The boy would struggle to speak, already panting. ''My equipment is not the lightest.''
''That's to be expected,'' The dark haired-man said. ''Maybe you want me to drag you by the hand?'' the Senator asked, irony etched in his tone.
''W-What?! Of course not!'' Till said, his voice bearing venomous.
''Ah!'' a voice echoes, a surprising yelp from behind the two men.
Turning around, the Senator could immediately recognize the individual. The greasy, grey hair. Not grey like Till's, a shade of grey that presented the age of the man behind them.
''Mister Carl,'' the Senator proclaimed the name of the old man approaching him.
''Senator Ivan. I suppose you're well?'' the man asked.
Till simply shifted his gaze between the two influential individuals, taking note of Ivan's bothered stance.
''Of course! Even better after learning about the LAMBDA fiasco.'' he said, his words filled with poison.
Carl's eyebrows would fall, discouragement filling his pupils, ''Well, no need to be stingy, no?''
''I have to be stingy when you're the cause of Hia's & Unsha's going missing. And you better fucking find a way to discover what happened to them,'' Ivan said, not holding back.
Ivan would turn around, making sure his stylish toga didn't waver in the sight of Till.
. . .
In the cold research room, multiple papers and blueprints lay in the central table. In that table, many individuals once stood gathered, coming up with a way of putting the LAMBDA project in the map, to execute it.
Now, a single man stood there, hiding his eyes with his hands, his sweat cold and emanating the desperation and gloom of the situation he put himself in.
''Fuck... this is the worst month of my whole life,'' Carl said with a trembly voice, his old age and stiff limbs preventing him from turning this research room upside down in rage.
Rumble... rumble...
A sound outside made the man slightly flinch, staring at the entrance door.
Seconds passed, and no sound would continue.
. . .
A picture in a tablet would sit in front of Carl. Three researchers hugging each other while smiling brightly.
''Hia... Unsha... are you folk still around? Somewhere? Another galaxy mayhaps?'' he spoke to the two individuals in the photo, like they were supposed to be hearing him. ''Please tell me you guys don't hate me...''
Rumble... Rumble... Rumble...
The man almost snaps his neck, turning towards the noise coming from outside. A cold dread crept all the way towards his neck before he opened a drawer, picking his pistol from the cold metal.
Before he could even aim, the door opened, revealing a short stature'd woman, her pristine smooth black hair waving as she stepped inside. Those purple eyes seemed to pierced inside the heart of Carl to see his guilt.
''S-Sua? It's you... I-It's you!'' he elevated his tone, the relief prominent in his voice. ''Everybody's been searching for you.''
Unlike usually, Sua doens't have her soft and gentle gaze that Carl is already accostumed to, from the times the girl accompanied her sister to learn.
''That's comical. Because nobody had the courage to go to the LAMBDA wreckage to search for me,'' Sua said, her brows furrowing as her face scruched in anger.
She was there...?
The Research thought.
''W-Why did you went there? You knew it was dangerous,'' he said, sensing that something was wrong.
''You knew I was there. You knew damn well that I would go search for my sister, because I knew the cowards from the Incident Inspection Team would go through hours of bureocracy to even go look at the situation,'' Sua said coldly.
An long and ankward pause followed, the two individuals staring at each other.
''What was the LAMBDA project, Director? Choose your words carefully,'' Sua said, warning creeping on her tone.
Carl wiped his sweat before clearing his throat, ''It was a secret project... I was the head of its projetation and engineering. I-I can't say more, its still classified for more seven month-''
The man stopped talking, noticing Sua's pupils. Her eyes giving him an almost murderous gaze.
''Alright, alright!'' he said before taking off his glasses and settling his gun down, his hands trembling. ''We've been stuck in the Milky Way for millenia, ever since Humanity was born,'' he'd grab a schematic on the table, showing it to Sua. ''With the LAMBDA structure built around a black-hole, if everything went correctly... using the energy produced by the rotational black-hole & the event-horizon, we could fabricate a man-made worm-hole, one that could transport us to anywhere randomly in the universe. Essentially, it exploits the extreme physics across the edge of a black-hole to create an worm-hole, or, like I like to say, a Galactic Catapult.''
The Director would settle the schematics down.
''And how are they supposed to come back? If they are randomly placed in an spot in the universe, they aren't guaranteed to be placed anywhere nearby civilization... you made the riskiest gamble machine ever,'' Sua pointed out.
''Well, that is what I've been trying to figure out, I thought that maybe if we stabilized the energy production and output enough, or used a smaller black-hole, we could aling the worm-hole in a more preferable position.''
Sua gritted her teeth, her boots hammering agains't the ground, ''Then why the hell did you put them in the wormhole?!'' she exclaimed.
''I-I didn't! I swear! I never ordered the research team to enter the worm-hole. All they were doing is turning the machine on and off for testing purpuses,'' Carl defended himself.
''Either way, something happened! How the hell do we fix this machine so we can find them!'' Sua pressed.
''S-Sua, you yourself said it! It's too risky to enter the worm-hole without further advancements. The machine was also wrecked, completely destroyed, no chance we fix it until the next four years, bare minimun.''
''I don't fucking care! You'll fix it even if I have to force you to,'' Sua said, approaching the man and pointing her finger towards his face, like it was his judgement and damnation, to work on that machine again.
A sigh is let out by the older man, ''Look, Sua. I know Hia is your sister. But the at the end of everything, we don't even know what happened. They're not stupid, Sua. They wouldn't get into that worm-hole, they are prudent.''
He would sit down, passing his scrawny hands on his lower back, making a face after feeling the pain of his back-problems.
''It probably was a fleet that we are unbeknownst of for now. They attacked them, and well... p-probably captured them, hopefully. The UNE has a lot of grudges and it wouldn't surprise that these aliens would want to take it out on innocent researchers,'' Carl would say, his voice low and depressed.
''That's bullshit... They entered the worm-hole, I'm sure of it,'' Sua said, closing her fists.
''And how would you know that? You're just a kid, Sua. I'm tired of reasoning with you,'' Carl would say plainly.
''I know... Because I saw what was on The Other Side,'' Sua said, her eys all too much credible.
The Director would rise from his seat, tilting his head in confusion as his eyelids lowered, ''What... What are you talking about?''
''After Mizi... left me, I went there, on the wreckage. One of the claws of the structure was still intact enough for me to land on it,'' Sua gulped before staring Carl in the eye. ''I didn't last four minutes before I started getting dizzy and fainted.''
''That's normally what happens when you are in a wrecked machine that posseses nothing to protect you from a black-hole's radiation,'' Carl would affirm.
''The right claw still had its Life-Support systems online, it was still working. But that ins't the important topic here,'' Sua said. ''After I woke up, I wans't at LAMBDA anymore, nor anywhere near the Silent Horizon black-hole. I was at a dark and foggy place, it was a planet... I'm pretty sure, its atmosphere was thick and purple. There was vegetation.... and.. and.''
Sua's ramble then was suddenly interrupted.
''Look... Kid. You probably were hallucinating because of the radiation or whatever, or maybe you didn't even go there and just had a bad dream in your ship, it happens when we're mourning. I am mourning too, you know?'' Carl would say.
''No, I was there! I felt it! I know it wans't a dream! Specially because-''
''Can you just shut up? Please? I'm stressed, all of the backlash and bullshit from the disaster fell on my shoulders,'' his tone would grow as he spoke. ''I'm not retrying, and I'm definetely not going to try to rebuilt that machine to reopen that portal, one fail is already enough, I lost two of my best researchers and my reputation is smithered to ashes. And yet you're here, trying to reason with me on my area of specialty.''
''So that's what Hia was to you? Just a researcher?'' Sua said, her brows furrowed.
The man would slowly walk towards the exit, stopping for a second to respond to Sua.
''Of course not. But in this branch, you should expect something bad to happen. I'm not the first Director to have disasters occur in their projects, but I'm sure hell getting the most backlash from it.''
. . .
''Looks like nobody listens to you, Sua. Did you not see his tone? Even him is annoyed by you. Must be why Mizi left you, no?''
A voice echoed in Sua's mind, along with it, black tinted legs crawled from Sua's coat, exposing themselves.
. . .
Sua's right hand would shoot straight, aimed at the Director, his head.
''Fuck you...'' Sua whispered, her tone filled with fury.
. . .
Carl would bring his hand to his nose, noting the dark-red liquid that pooled from his nostril. Before he even noticed, the biggest headache of his life commenced.
. . .
Sua's finger fully closed, the apparently invisble weight across her palm and deinty fingers suddenly vanished...
. . .
Pop!
. . .
Today, the research-complex had an unusual tint of dark-red on its walls. Brain matter would be splattered across the equipment and the ground, and Director Carl's body lays limp on the ground, his head missing.
Sua fled the scene immediately.