Chapter Text
"What's two plus two?"
The woman stirs, squeezing her eyes closed, wincing at the feeling of sleep trapped there-
How long was she out?
Where was she?
She could feel something soft bedding, most likely, but whenever she tried to investigate further, her body simply refused to move. Concerning to say the least. Even if her mind is yet to catch up to the panic, she should be feeling.
"What's two plus two?" The voice tries again, now sounding directly above her. She flinches actually flinches. She's moving! The voice didn't sound entirely human, way too emotionless to be anything but a robot. Strange.
Now she's gotten some feeling back, she tries to answer, "whhht?"
She meant to say what, but it seems her body isn't fully ready for something as complex as talking. She groans, turning to the side, feeling the distinct pull of tubes and wires inside of her. She groans again, more disgusted than annoyed, hoping the robot would get the hint and get them out.
"What is two plus two?"
The question was beginning to piss her off now. It's four. She knows that it's not her fault she's lost the ability to talk.
Another sound breaks her out of furthering her rant to herself. It didn't sound like the robot. What it did sound like she couldn't tell, only that it was distantly familiar.
A smashing of metal and wires gets closer to wherever she is lying. Once again, she tries to feel panic but finds herself calm. Maybe she's just used to this. Getting trapped in a room full of darkness, unable to move, might be the norm for people like her.
Whoever she was.
She pushed that thought away.
"…uh- pe'ple!"
A voice! A mans voice now. Not the pestering robot.
The sound spurs her on, a surge of energy finally giving her a chance to try and sit up. She recognises this voice, and she knows him. Maybe he could tell her what the fuck is going on-
Whack!
A hand smacks the side of her face, the contact is so jarring she throws herself back. Big mistake, she soon realises as her body doesn't hit the floor for far to long. It gives all the wires and tubes inside her body the chance to violently rip out of her all in quick succession.
Crash!
She hits the floor, the cold metal floor, directly on her back, smacking her already pounding head onto the floor with so much force her eyes snap open and a gasp leaves her mouth unprompted.
Now, every sense she had was attacking her. All at once.
Ow.
A series of curse words leave her mouth. They don't sound english. Even though she thinks in that language. Is she bilingual? That's something. It didn't make the pain any better, but it was a nice distraction.
Another good thing was that she could see now. The half formed shapes came together slowly. The ceiling came together, made of the same offending material she had bashed her head into, and the oval bed she must've fallen out of. Though there were two more situated above and below her.
One must be the home of her violent companion.
Speaking of which, the man who she suspects is the person who attacked her is now clumsily making his way down the ladder going to the roof of this building, various strange gibberish leaving his mouth as he does so.
The man half climbs half falls down to the bottom while she tries once again to sit up - it works!
Despite how muscular her pale arms look, they aren't the most stable, so she finds herself backing up and leaning on the white walls of their prison. Watching as the man debates with himself on how to approach her.
"ppppppeople." The man spits out, more in an attempt to test his speech then to start conversation with her, but she feels the need to respond nonetheless.
"J-" She coughs abruptly, trying again, "Jst, ooone perssn"
It's close enough. He should be able to get it. Which he does from the way his trembling body huffs with half formed laughter.
The mans hair is covering most of his face, a thick beard obscuring his neck. She feels disturbed by this, not in the way she should be at seeing a random man, but the feeling of seeing someone you know get a bad haircut.
She has to have known this man.
They spend a moment just staring at one another. Until she dares to try and speak again, it takes a few tries and a couple of times just spent making weird noises like offbeat singing before she gets something legible out, "Where are we?"
Okay, she has an accent. Russian, her brain supplies. And the man sounds American.
More useless information.
Maybe he knows something?
"Hoping…you would know?" The man struggles, slumping down by the ladder. Now they're lying on the floor on opposite sides of the room, with no idea where they are.
Another Russian curse falls from her lips. The other guy here might know. It's the only shot they have now.
"What about'hm?" She points to the other man who's above her. How she knows it's a man is also unclear.
Realisation dawns over the mans face, and he's rushing up to the ladder to find him.
Not wanting to be left behind and also not wanting the man to have as much of a rude awakening as she had, she follows behind desperately. Pushing off the weird orange jumpsuit slash sleeping bag, she only now noticed she was inside.
It takes way more physical effort to climb up those as first assumed, but eventually, they both manage to hall themselves up. The bed was the same as theirs, oval and orange, but it was more sunken and lacked the excessive amount of wires.
He must not have needed them as much as-
They both pause, almost exactly at the same time. A husk of a man stared back at them. More mummy looking than human, skin flaking and falling into the white sheets.
Something hollow makes itself home in her chest, as if someone took the air right out of her lungs and refused to give it back. She closes her eyes and doesn't open them until the other living man begins to move again.
With nothing else to do, they both silently decided to keep moving out of this horrific prison.
She knows these people. Not just the man above her but the one lying cold behind her. How long was he there? How long was he dying until the computers gave up on him? Did they even try to save him, or did they immediately move on to keep the rest of them alive?
So many fucking questions invade her mind that by the time she throws herself out of the ladder and into the next room the tears clinging to the corners of her eyes aren't only caused by the pain.
Without much thought, she wipes them. When she open them again the man is already darting through to the next doorway.
"Wait!" She yells, pushing through the ache to chase after him.
It takes a few tries, a couple of breaks needing to be taken and an increasingly painful sore throat but she does stop him. By stomping her feet on the wires being dragged behind him sending him flying backwards.
He stumbles. Turning back to face her with a look of bewilderment.
"Wait," She repeats, breathless, "Stop running."
The man frowns, "We need to find the other people."
"There isn't-"
How did she know that?
Same way she knew Russian or that the dead guy was her friend. She just knew.
"There isn't anyone else."
The frown deepens, "You don't know that."
Desperation is evident in his voice, he needs there to be more. She can't even find it in herself to be annoyed at that. She hated the idea of being completely alone like this; even if it wasn't completely alone.
She shakes her head - noticing the matted greasy hair flying from side to side so long that it was touching the floor - there has to be something that can do, "The robot! Ask her."
In an instant, a beeping sound erupts, similar to opening an old computer up, "What's two plus two?"
"Four." They respond at the same time, annoyance clear in their voices.
"Correct…what is the cube root of eight?"
She lets out a half strangled scream, pulling on her hair, "Eat a bag of dicks." She hissed.
"Incorrect."
"Two times e to the two-i-pie." The man tries, so they're smart? Or at least he was, still, she knows that's two so she must be competent in maths then.
"Incorrect."
But it was?
This computer is an idiot.
"два" She tries, if it didn't understand complex maths then what about foreign languages?
"Incorrect. What is the cube root of eight?"
So it's stupid. Fuck them. She gives in, "Two."
"Correct. What is your name?"
That makes her pause. What is her name? She couldn't remember. She turns desperately to the other man only to find him with a matching expression of horror.
Neither of them knew their own names.
The man begins to pace, running his hands up and down his beard, "This was some coma right? Memory loss's common it has to be that."
"Yeah, yeah. It's that." She finds herself agreeing. Taking account of her surroundings carefully until she stops.
Empty space. Space. The actual real life space was staring out in front of her. Not some weird poster or projection but space, "Oh, my God."
It's hard to say how long she spends staring into the void but it feels like an eternity.
At some point in her mini breakdown, the man joined her standing shoulder to shoulder staring into the void as if they could change what it was if they begged hard enough.
Without word they tear their eyes away, moving further into the ship with the fervour of two people running for their lives.
They don't stop. Not when they pass the weird projection room, or the science lab room or the engineering room, - even though she was fascinated with equipment lying the walls - or the rooms that looked sideways for some reason.
It only when there's no more energy for the both of them to use up that they stop.
They've almost gone full circle now, ending up in what seems to be the pilot station, chairs and buttons all wiring and blinking at them. Turns out she's not a pilot cause none of this makes a single bit of sense to her. Her companion attempts to figure out how to go home for a while as she tries to avoid the sight of empty space glaring at her until he eventually gives up and slumps down near her.
"What do we do?" The man whines, choked and broken.
She finds herself shrugging. What could they do?
"Nothing…I guess."
"That can't be it." The man was determined, she'll give him that.
Might as well test out the robot once again, it obviously listened to them at least a little bit.
"Hey, Hall." The lights whirr, "Status of the crew mates?"
"Dr. Ryland Grace, stable and moving."
That's him! She could remember it now. He's Grace.
"Engineer Olesya Ilyukhina , stable and moving."
Ilyukhina, she liked people to call her that more than Olesya, she was Ilyukhina an engineer.
"Captain Yao Li-Jie, deceased."
Yao. He was they're leader. He was her friend.
Oh, God.
Ilyukhina gasps, the abruptness of it shocks her. She brings her hand over her mouth but it does little to cut off the gasps clawing at her throat.
A hand, Grace hand… it was the only one it could've been, is placed firmly on her shoulder. She glances at him, and he has some unreadable expression on his face - he remembers him too - as if asking for permission to comfort or fall apart as well. Who knows?
She lets out a shaky breath, and Grace leans towards her. Together, they take in the hopelessness of where they were. Trapped and almost completely alone.
Almost.
They had each other. That was something. It didn't give them answers or even very well done comfort, but it was something real.
So, they might as well start at the beginning.
She steels her expression into something calmer,
"Nice to meet you." Ilyukhina holds out her hand for Grace to take, "I'm Ilyukhina, an engineer, apparently."
Grace's eyes widen before he realises what she was attempting to do, "Grace, a scientist apparently. Pleasure is all mine."
They break apart, only slightly. Resting her hand on her side, Ilyukhina notices the small red drops of blood falling from where the tubes had been placed in her arm-
"Olesya Ilyukhina?"
In her shock, Ilyukhina falls off of the side of her couch with a loud thump hit, doing nothing to help the growing migraine she had been nursing for the past few hours. She makes a mental note never to drink again, one she intends to ignore as soon as possible.
Stumbling through the dirtied hallway, Ilyukhina fumbles with her keys, opening the door with a flourish once she manages to get it open.
"Yes?" She asks momentarily, stunned by the sight of three people standing in her flats entrance, "Is there a party I wasn't aware of happening?"
Only one of the people reacted to her joke, a small cut-off chuckle from a messy, haired blonde looking extremely out of place compared to the others.
"Olesya Ilyukhina?" The other man repeats, sunglasses covering up his expression. He was probably a body guard, even though the woman did not seem like she needed one with how tall she stood.
It's not hard to figure out what this is about. But she finds herself strangely calm about the whole situation.
"I am her she is me." Ilyukhina smiles, trying her best not to focus on that fact she probably looks hungover as fuck right now.
The woman in the middle decided now was her time to finally speak, her voice thick with a dutch accent, "A week ago you volunteered to take a blood test to find out if you're legible for the project Hail Mary mission, is that right?"
"Yep," She nods, whistling at the speed, "You people are efficient, are you not?"
"We have to be."
"Yes, yes end of the world and all that." She waves her hand up to the sky half-heartedly, "I am guessing I have been selected?"
"You have," There isn't a single trace of sympathy in her voice, "I am Eva Stratt head of the project I've come to collect you."
Ilyukhina finds herself smiling, she likes this woman, "So, when am I leaving?"
"Now."
Without another word, Ilyukhina sends them a thumbs up and leaves to go grab the suitcase she had prepared for this very moment, dragging it behind her and to the door. Both Eva and the other man turn to leave into some unmarked car almost immediately, while the other man stays behind to watch her, calculating.
"You're surprisingly okay with all this." The man states.
"Why wouldn't I be?" She shrugs, "I signed up for it after all."
"Still, having everything all prepared, not even taking a moment to say goodbye to your house." The man is frowning like he's looking at some maths equation he can't figure out.
Still, she didn't think it was that weird to be prepare for something like this. She might be impulsive but she knew what she was signing up for when she took that test and she's not going to back up now, "I like to be prepared and it is all very exciting."
The man seems to relent, "It is, the amount of scientific discoveries made in this past week is life changing, too bad it's for this."
"Are you the scientist then?" She notices the mans confusion, "for the trip up there-"
"Oh, god no," the man interrupts, "Well, I am a scientist - just not that one."
Ilyukhina nods, a little disappointed, "Too bad, you seem like good fun. It would've been nice to have you up there."
"Thank you?" The man says, like he cannot decide whether or not to be offended by this.
"Even so, I am glad to be working with you…"
"Grace."
"Grace," She chuckles, project Hail Mary and their lead scientist Grace, funny, "Well, you already know who I am. Let's go save the world!"