2512 A.D….

This is how nightmares end, or perhaps begin, depending on your point of view. The planet in front stands as a shining jewel amidst the black void of outer space. Two massive oceans lay claim to about three quarters of the surface, with only small landmasses jutting out here and there. Brilliant clouds swirl around the behemoth sphere forming a beautiful tapestry of color and spectacle. Surrounding the planet, four small moons can be seen, serenely orbiting as they had for perhaps eons. As you've probably already guessed, this is not Earth. Than the hulking form of the spacecraft breaks the stillness of the scene, edging ever closer. It's centuries long journey, at last coming to an end, it's destination reached, it's job done. As it floats through the endless void, a single word can be seen on the side of it's withered hull…Traverse.

To be drifting in a state of consciousness somewhere between wakefulness and sleep, is at it's best, a strange thing. But that's exactly what I've been doing for; God I don't know how long it's been. I remember back when they tested these kinds of things out, people would always ask if it was possible to think and dream in suspended hibernation. Well I can tell you it's quite possible. I suppose I should really introduce myself, to whom I don't know…perhaps God, perhaps the other guy. My name is Jason Alejandro Chavez and as inconceivable as it might sound, I along with my crew, are all that remains of the Human Race. As we have come to understand it, the Earth went "bye bye" in a radioactive puff of smoke, taking some eleven billion people along for the ride. This is the end result of our supposed plan to survive. Being shuttled trillions of miles into space and find a new Eden. Than again we could just be fooling ourselves, maybe we're already dead and in purgatory of some kind. Hell the odds of us actually surviving the journey were something like ten million to one. Whoever is listening to this can stop me at anytime…

At that exact moment the Traverse is jolted by a massive gravity flux brought on by the ship's thrusters as they sputter back to life after decades of dormancy. The life support systems kick in as the A.I. computer comes out of sleep mode when it senses that the destination coordinates have been reached. The ship's consoles and interior electrical systems blink to life. The Traverse is back online…

The Cryo-Pods are bathed in red light and the rejuvenation sequences commence in order to bring the long sleeping crew out of frozen hibernation. A series of searing hot mists fire off as the temperature inside the pods begin to rise. Jason's eyes slowly begin to open as shards of ice fall from his eyelids. Several clear tubes that are attached to his body begin to inject a neon glowing liquid into his veins. This causes every muscle in his body to twitch violently as they electrified back to life after centuries of atrophy. The face mask he is wearing begins to pump gaseous stimulants into his lungs, causing him to take his first gasp of voluntary air in a very long time. After a few minutes the mask and tubing fall away as the hot mists also cease. Jason slumps against the glass hatchway, his labored breathing creating a fog shroud that quickly overtakes the clarity. He stands there, leaning against the glass, shirtless and dripping wet from the melted cryogenic preservatives that had covered him. Suddenly the glass hatch of the pod gives way and Jason falls to the cold metal floor like a stone.

The Commander, still breathing heavily, let's out a gasp of pain as his entire body tingles with the sensation of pins and needles. With quite a bit of effort he flips over onto his back and brings his hands to his face, his skin feeling cold and clammy. His vision is still quite blurry and his head throbs with a splitting headache.

"Son of a bitch." he whimpers as he slightly looks around stopping only when a wince of pain shoots through his brain "Ok either I'm still alive or I'm in hell." After a few moments he manages to raise to his feet, still very wobbly from his time in cryo-animation. Jason that spots that there is activity coming from some of the other pods as well as the other crew members seem to be coming out of there hibernation "That's it boys and girls, look alive." He stumbles as he leans on a nearby console. Wheezing a chuckle "We made it, don't ask me how or why, but we made it." Leaning over, the Commander rests his head in his hands as memories begin to flood back.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________

Boy I remember it like it was yesterday. I was just coming back from a routine cargo run from Gavin Moon Base. I'd run freighter hauls from this particular base so many times that I could practically fly the route in my sleep. I had just landed in the Canaveral Docking Ports after spending nearly three weeks in space. That was the funny thing, it seemed that I was spending more and more time away from the Earth. By this time I was making cargo hauls and working on an almost non stop schedule. So needless to say I was keeping myself pretty busy, but I didn't mind, in fact I rather preferred it that way. People in general just seemed to pissed me off and it was getting way to crowded down there anyway, we were about to hit the eleven billion mark, some papers said. I lived in a moderate size condo in the downtown district of Century City, but I was hardly ever there. My work and my flying profession took up nearly one hundred percent of my time these days. The stillness and tranquility of space helped to sooth my mind, make me forget all about her. I was working extra hard at keeping myself occupied during this time in particular. Oh don't get me wrong, she was never to far from my mind, but being out here just seemed to take the edge off, ya know. Sometimes I would just spend literally hours thinking about how our lives could've been. In my mind, we were perfect together. Needless to say, she thought differently. It's like in that one moment, I just wasn't me anymore. I mean I know they say rejection is hard but nothing like this. So yea, she definitely kept me up nights.

I landed where I usually did, at the Canaveral Docking Ports on the Western Hemispheric Sector. They were a busy collaboration of several space and terrestrial hubs of incoming and departing flight craft of any and all kinds. Freight hauling, military transport and commercial travel all took place in these central zones of the aerospace skyways. I kinda chuckled to myself when I was taxing in, an old history lesson popped into my mind for some reason. Apparently this place used to be known as the state of Florida in the old confederation of linked territories known as the United States or some shit like that. This was before the formation of the United Global Council which effectively abolished all free standing boundaries of so called countries. This in turn transformed the world into a conglomerate of several large mega provinces, with one overseeing faction at the heart, namely the U.G.C., which was established around the year 2062 A.D. But than again I was about a year old when all this happened so, whatever. I always used to hear the old heads talk about the good ole' days of America. "I grew up in land of the free and the home of the brave" a lot of em' said. But like I said I was born well after all this bullshit, so I hadn't a clue as to what they were talking about. The U.G.C. was all I had ever known.

I was coming in from one of my many routine flights to several mining operations on Gavin Moon Base in the Sea of Tranquility. I was hauling a payload of nuclear charged Crystherium. Everything was business as usual, when I docked in hangar 7A-10. This hangar was only one of about twenty in the Johnston Port at Canaveral, with the Johnston port being only one of many in turn. I casually exited my spacecraft after doing my usual post flight check lists. In a holding pattern right next to me was a space freighter about the same size as the one I was piloting. Out of the center hatch pops an over weight and somewhat sloppy looking bastard who addressed me.

"Well looky what drifted in with the rest of the space junk. If it ain't Choke on mah Junk Chavez!" said the man.

I continued on with the rest of my post flight check off, examining the outer hull of my freighter. The docking techs were beginning to prep the ship for inbound inspection, carrying out the usual tasks of checking the fuel lines for space debris damage, outer hull integrity and solar radiation saturation. I immediately recognized the voice of the man addressing me and didn't even turn around to acknowledge him.

"Well if it ain't No Balls Havin Barnes, where you off to?" I said casually.

"I'm off on my seventh run to the Sea of Storms, delivering my fourth load of Crystherium.? said Barnes.

"Seventh run, impressive Barnes." I said.

"Damn right, what are you on Chavez, your fifth run? Or was it your fourth? Can't remember since your so damn sluggish with your hauls.? said Barnes with a deep throated laugh.

At this I nonchalantly turned around and raised an eyebrow "No Barnes this'll be my tenth run. Oh and if I were you I wouldn't be talking to loud about being sluggish. Maybe if you'd layoff the sweet packs, you wouldn't have to carry twice what you need in fuel."

Barnes frowned "Just because you were some hot shot pilot back in the Air Forces, don't mean your shit now. I'm gonna be the undisputed king of the space shipping lanes. You hear me son?"

"My record speaks for itself Barnes, ya know it's like I said before. You lack the one thing that'll make you a force to be reckoned with out here." I said with a smirk.

"So just what is that?" asked Barnes.

"Ya got no balls." I casually walked over and mockingly tapped the side of his face "Have a nice flight huh."

Without another word the fat freighter pilot taxied his space craft out of the hangar in a huff. I smiled from ear to ear as one of the dock techs laughed alongside.

"Hey good one Commander. So how did she handle?" asked the dock tech referring the freighter ship.

"She handled pretty nice Mike. Atmosphere Stabilizers were a little bumpy but other than that, she ran like a dream."

Mike just grinned and returned back to the work of post prepping the ship. I continued to gather up the rest of my gear and head to the assignment lane office, where I would pick up my next hauling job. Some people would scoff at the idea of me taking another run immediately after returning from this shipment, but I figured ,who the hell needed rest nowadays. Besides I was trying to keep myself as busy as humanly possible, for my own personal reasons. It was than that two men in polished gray suits approached me. They were dressed in the standard uniform of all Global Council Reps. The get ups were very simple in design, namely just a long sleeve over vest, a black shirt underneath and a pair of metallic looking gray pants, with combat boots. They also wore a ball cap style hat with the U.G.C. logo in front, which was to say the symbol for the Earth with the number one super imposed on it. I was doing a pre mock up check of my flight gear when I heard a voice cal out my name.

"Major Jason Chavez?"

I turned around to see the two men walking towards me. I narrowed my eyes a bit as I coolly set down my flight duffel "Retired Major, who wants to know?"

"I'm Representative Thompson and this is Representative Rogers. We're with the resource replenishment division under the science and tech post, United Global Council." said one of the men as they both proceeded to show their official council badges.

I gave a slight nod of approval as I took a more investigative glance at one of the badges "U.G.C. huh, nice. So uh, what can I do for you boys?"

"We have you listed as a Major in the Global Air Forces." said Rogers.

"Yea I resigned my commission a few years back. I'm a licensed civilian commander with government contractors now." I said.

"We hear your quite the pilot within the freight space lanes, hauling sensitive payloads. I'll come to the point here Commander, we've got a job offer for you." said Thompson.

I crossed my arms in slight suspicion "What kind of job?"

"Trust us, this is right up your alley, plus the pay will be well worth your time. We've got a new space station that we're ready to bring to full functional operation. We've got a full crew of engineers and scientists already picked out to both bring the station online and staff it fully. All we need now is a top notch pilot to get em' there. From your reputation and our own in depth research, we think you're the man for the job. So what ya say?"

I started to laugh it off, thinking it had to be a joke or something. Two U.G.C. reps approaching me out of nowhere to take up a mission to a newly developed space station. I searched their eyes for some hint that this was indeed a joke but all I got was stony silence accompanied by stoic expressions "You guys are serious?"

"Dead serious Commander, what about it?" said Rogers.

"Look man, I just came off a run, I haven't even stowed my flight gear for cripes sake. I probably got three or four more hauling runs ahead of me this month alone, I don't know if I? I began to say.

Thompson abruptly cut me off "We need an answer now Commander. More will be explained about the mission at H.Q. But right now we need a solid answer from you, yes or no. What's it gonna be?"

There was something about the demeanor of these guys that told me they were not joking around. I looked around me and saw the busy goings on in the hangar and took a long pause of introspection. Who knows what these people were offering, was it a chance that I could really afford to pass up? I looked back at the two reps and a reluctantly nodded.

I threw my arms up in abandon "What the hell." I said in a calm, I don't give a shit type voice.

Thompson grinned "Outstanding, if you'll follow us Commander. We have a transport waiting for you."

I followed the two men out of the hangar without really realizing what I was getting myself into. Was it a mistake, but if I hadn't accepted the job, I would've perished along with eleven billion others. But was it really worth it to be one of the only surviving Humans left, shot out into space, light years away in a completely alien environment? I guess these are questions I'll be haunted with forever? Who knows if I did the right thing, who knows.

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Suddenly the ship's emergency beacons flare up as a low siren like wail begins to echo through the inner hull of the Traverse. Jason, effectively snaps back into reality. A machine like voice than issues a warning over the speaker systems "Warning, less than eighteen minutes remaining on main power grid. Warning, less than eighteen minutes remain on main power grid."

2: Chapter Two

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For as long as I could remember, the sky fascinated me. Ever since I was a little girl, with my slightly slanted little eyes, I stared up at the clouds with all kinds of wonder. "Momma, how high is space? Or how far is up?" I remember asking my ma and her just hushing me up and telling me to go back to digi-coloring. I guess it's in my blood, you see my pop ran orbital tracks around Mars, for the big Terraform prep that they've been working on for God knows how long. The moment I saw him land for the first time, I was about seven years old. The rocket thrusters belching out, the roar of the engines. Yup, from that point on I decided I was gonna fly.

I joined the United Global Air Forces when I was nineteen. I applied and worked hard to gain my commission, but I was determined to make the grade, which I did. I gained the top spots in all mission applicable flights, but they were all atmosphere bound. The one thing I longed for more than anything was space flight. But it was the one thing that eluded me when I was in the military. So after a said number of years, I decided that if the Air Forces wasn't going to give me what I wanted, I would get it in the civilian sector. I was always a girl who got what she wanted. I had several meetings with outside freight contractors who told me that they could use a good pilot like me hauling several cargo runs to lunar bases. That it would give me more time in space than even the science sorties. In short, they would hire me in a heartbeat, not to mention the pay was really good. So I made up my mind, I was going to resign my commission to go after my dreams. I'll never forget that one day I walked into Colonel Cyrus's office.

I walked in my usual military style, with all the protocol and discipline I had been trained to have. I stood in front of the Colonel at attention, all decked out in my dress uniform.

"At ease Captain Chow." said the Colonel, his voice deep and hoarse. 
Colonel Calvin Cyrus was an older black man in his late fifties or so. Tall, with graying hair and glasses, not to mention more ribbons and medals than I had hairs on my head. He sat there behind his desk and just looked at me, an expression of concern on his face. After a moment or two, a small grin crossed his lips "You know I never noticed how tall you are for an Asian girl."

"Sir, yes sir…I get that a lot sir." I said in all formality.

"I did say at ease Captain." said the Colonel, a telling smirk on his face "I'll come right to the point Chow. You're a damn good pilot and I hate to lose you. I don't suppose there's anything I can say to talk you out of this decision?"

"Not a damn thing Colonel." I said with my own telling smile, taking the command of at ease to it's most extreme.

Cyrus just let out an impatient breath and stood up. Like he said, I was tall for an Asian girl, standing about five foot seven. But this guy dwarfed me, I would guess he was about six feet four inches. He extended his hand "Well than Alana, I bid you good luck out there. I know you've always wanted to see space, I guess it looks like your gonna get your chance in the freight lanes."

I shook the Colonel's hand with excitement "Thank you sir and I appreciate it." and at that I saluted and casually walked out of his office. I was well on my way of realizing my dreams…

The force of the stimulants being rammed down Alana Chow's windpipe was what jolted her out of her cryo sleep. Her eyes shot open as the hot mists spray her, the super cooled preservatives melting off her body. With the natural adrenaline returning to her muscles, she forcefully pushes the glass hatch of her pod until it gives way, the mask and tubing not even having a chance to fall away yet. Instead Alana rips the equipment away, willing herself to breathe on her own. Disoriented and with blurred vision, she stammers frontward and tries to get her bearings.

Jason comes over and aids her, steadying her balance so that she can stand fully erect "Easy there Chow, you've got cryo sickness. It'll pass, but you've got to it time."

Alana, still breathing heavily, looks over to Jason and struggles to form words "Are we alive, did we make it?"

"You bet your sweet ass we did. Don't ask me how." Jason says with a chuckle, which prompts the same response from Chow, who forms a wide smile.

She suddenly stops cold and wipes some cryo fluid from her face "I feel like absolute shit right now." says Alana, a weak laugh escaping her throat.

"Yea girl we all do. But we'll have to save the bed rest and the showers till after we land." after which Jason looks around, a worried glance coming over him "Which is lookin to be about a million in one chance in itself right now."

Alana suddenly feels herself getting weak and she drops to her knees, to which Jason catches her and pulls her back up "Lana, Lana, you gotta get it together for me here. Now I know it's hard but you gotta shake this shit off. Look we've got less than twenty minutes of power left and after that this rig is gonna drop like a rock right outta the sky. I'm gonna need you to run some diagnostics. See if you can boot up any remaining auxiliary systems, maybe we can squeeze out some remaining power from the solar fusion cells. You got that?"

Alana just gives a little nod as she struggles to steady herself. Jason than runs to another Cryo Pod in which another crew member is held. He fiddles with the controls on the side. The computer's voice than breaks over the data streams "Oxygen system malfunction, thirty seconds to lung capacity collapse."

"Shit, c'mon." says Jason as he struggles to try and get the hatch open using the burned out control pad "Son of a bitch, the hell with it!" he says as he grabs a nearby piece of derelict pipe. Than with all his strength, he swings the object and shatters the glass door that encloses the crewman. Jason reaches in and severs the oxygen mask, tearing it away from the man's face as he gasps his first breath of air. The Commander pulls him out through the broken hatchway and lays him on the ground.

The young black man shivers and convulses as temporary shock sets in.

"Dubois, I need you to stay with me here! Your all right, you hear me. Now look I'm gonna leave you here for a minute, let you get your bearings straight, alright." says Jason.

The ship's main computer voices over the speakers again "Warning, only fifteen minutes and forty five seconds remain on main power grid."

"Dammit I know!" shouts Jason as he gets up to try and help others that might be stuck in their pods as well.

Dubois lays on the cold metal floor shivering, but beginning to come out of his shock "I…think…I'm…dead."

"Chow get those auxiliary systems up now!" yells Jason from a far off corridor, his voice echoing through the hall.

"Ok, ok" says Alana as she makes her way over to the main center consoles. Pulling up several holo-screens, she checks the ship's vitals and several readouts begin to display. Pouring over the information she brings up the screen related to the auxiliary systems and begins a re-boot of the solar fusion cells, trying to jump start any remaining power "C'mon baby, you can do it." after several attempts she successfully begins a transfer.

After a moment the ship's A.I. displays a new power readout "Thirty minutes of power remain on main grid."

"Damn, Skip, we only got fifteen extra minutes of power out of the auxiliary systems!" Alana shouts.

"It's fifteen minutes we didn't have before!" Jason's voice echoes from an adjacent corridor.

"Right, what do you want me to do now?!"

"Start checking the other Pods, I gotta start running some landing simulations!"

"Roger that!" shouts Alana, but as her eyes wander to main visual port, a stunning and breathtaking sight greets her eyes. There in all it's splendor and glory was a planet that shimmered like a diamond. This was Threshold One, christened as such by a long dead and eccentric astronomer, who perished in the catastrophe that left the Earth as a burnt out and radioactive cinder several centuries prior. It was this planet that Alana and her crew of the last vestiges of mankind had set out for, when they learned of Earth's tragic and unspeakable fate. In the most desperate of last ditch efforts, it was here that they marked as their ultimate destination. To somehow shuttle across unknown space, journeying more than eleven light years from their home planet for one last plight of survival. Threshold One was located in a solar system very similar to that of the late planet Earth. It was the second planet that orbited a star three percent larger than the Earth's sun. The planet itself was more than seventeen percent bigger than the Earth.

Alana stood in awe, but her stare was broken when the flashing lights of the alarm beacons reflected off the glass of the viewing port. She knew she couldn't let her commander down, she had a job to do.

 

3: Chapter Three

Images and shapes distorted in and out focus, a lexicon of weird sounds and strange colors assailed his ears and eyes. To say Joshua Dubois' senses were in complete chaos would be an understatement. He was in the thick of hibernation sickness and he wasn't showing any signs of recovering near as quickly as the Commander or co-pilot Chow. To be alive and breathing at all was the pinnacle of his priorities and for the moment he was no different than a newborn newly out of the womb.

"Oh my God…oh my God." was all he was able to slightly wheeze out in his current state as he lay on the cold metal floor of the ship.

Only a few feet away, Alana Chow frantically checked and monitored all intact systems of the now critically drained Traverse. She brought up a holo-screen showing all the cryo-pods on the above deck and shook her head in puzzlement, as almost none of them showed any signs of activity "What the hell is going on, they should've all been brought out of cryo-stasis by now." Dubois slight groaning distracts her attention momentarily and she marches over to where he is still on the ground, giving him a slight shove with her foot "Get up Dubois, the Commander needs us!"

The stricken scientist looks up, his expression distant as he still has failed to fully register what is going on "I think I'm gonna go back. Yea, back to sleep, it's safe in there."

Chow kneels and forcefully raises the man to a sitting position "Dammit, Dubois listen to me! We are all going to die if you don't get a hold of yourself!"

"Die, I…I thought I was already dead." he says sheepishly, his limbs starting to tremble."

"Oh for God's sake, look at me, look!" she hollers, locking an intense stare with the man's eyes "The ship has reached the Shiva System, we're alive Dubois. You, me, Commander Chavez, all of us are…" she pauses for a moment and thinks carefully about her choice of words "Well the three of us anyway. I hope to Heaven I can speak for everyone else, but listen! We have to stay focused, the ship has only about thirty minutes of power left, the planet's gravity already has us and we can't maintain altitude for very long. If you don't get up and shake this off, all of this will have been for nothing. We would've traveled all this way just to burn up in the last few kilometers! Now I'm gonna go and check the rest of the cryo-pods. The Commander has already started landing simulations, now your gonna heave your black ass up off this floor and start a diagnostic cycle of the Cold Fission Reactors, it's what operates the stasis pods. Can you do that?"

Dubois seems to come more to his senses and realizes the dire urgency of the situation after Alana's "motivational" tirade. He swallows hard and after several seconds nods his understanding. Chow returns the gesture, slightly taps the side of his face and bolts off to the upper deck to check the status of her still unaccounted for crew mates.

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Jason hurries along his way through a darkened corridor, his boots clanging against the metal grate floor as he runs. His mind racing a million miles a second as thoughts of urgency, tragedy, loss, pain and most of all anguish pour over his thinking. The waves of images of people, places, things; the constant banter of ghostly voices become all to much for the moment and he stops dead in his tracks. With cold sweat dripping down his face, he grips the side rails of the corridor and breathes deeply "Get it together Chavez, you've still got responsibilities here. The Earth maybe dead, but your not…focus damn you!" After a few agonizing moments, the stalwart commander composes himself and continues on to a doorway at the end of the deck and enters. Inside is another array of consoles and control monitors, all of sophisticated demeanor. Slowly he sits down at the main counter and flips a few switches, sparking the long dormant computers to life once more. The switchboards, dials, buttons and levers all blink several colors in a dance of digital synchronization. Jason exhales several nervous breaths "Traverse mainframe, run statistical simulations on possible landing patterns and report."

A holographic screen pops up, showing the many landing cycles of the Traverse. A second later the mechanical voice of the computer pipes in "Running simulations now…"

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Dubois wipes his brow and rubs his eyes as they run over the many complicated systems of the Cold Fission Reactors cryo management apparatus. The entire system is a series of slender tubular cylinders arranged around a central operating core. The hyper accelerated coolant chemical compounds, which were responsible for the crew's long cryogenic slumber, were supposed to be closely monitored and equally distributed by this central system, ensuring maximum efficiency and safety of the cryo-freezing process. Dubois gains access to the central operation core by ducking low underneath and sliding himself under the computer mounted distributors. The sight that greets him, sends his own blood into spastic chills.

"What in God's holy name?" he says as a mass of smoldering wires and electrical chips greet him. Sporadic sparks fire off and Dubois fumbles to get a grip on the situation. Panicked, his hands push past the mass of severed wires until he comes to a row of digital gauges. He manually inputs several commands on a small keyboard and the gauges fluctuate wildly. Joshua's eyes dart back and forth as he processes the gambit of information. When the gauges stabilize, the scientist's heart sinks "Oh my dear God no. This can't be happening."

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

The long and narrow chamber stood in stark and eerie silence. The range of cryo-pods lined both sides of the hallway like structure, the glass hatches of the pods partially iced over from within. Their occupants, still and lifeless…the menagerie of tubes and wires connecting to the bodies still intact. The face masks pumping nothing but cold dead ice particles. It was clear that these people would not be coming out of cryo-hibernation. The very chambers intended to keep them alive, now served as pseudo coffins. The cryo chamber, had been transformed into a space fairing mausoleum.

The echoes of scurrying footsteps could be heard just outside the chamber as Chow makes her way to the forefront of the corridor, slightly out of breath from the trek over. The eerie silence causes her to narrow her eyes in suspicion. She checks the pods one by one, her panic escalating with each passing second "What the hell is going on, why aren't they waking up?" She continues to frantically check controls on several of the pods, but to no avail "The rejuvenation systems aren't responding." Alana pauses, she becomes hysterical for a brief moment "We don't have time for this, the ship is running out of power! Wake up, all of you!" At a loss, Alana begins to break down, she leans against one of the pods, her back sliding down slowly "Don't you understand, we made it, we're here." she says in a moaning whisper.

Her comm piece goes off and Dubois' voice can be heard on the other end "Dubois to co-pilot. Alana, do you read. We may be the only ones who survived. Most of the accelerants failed to reach optimum super cooled temperatures causing catastrophic failure in two thirds of the Cryo Pods. Without sufficient cold temperatures, the preservatives calcified. There must've been some kind of electric blowout in the central core shortly after we left. We're the only one's who made it through the hibernation stasis. Everyone else didn't make it."

In the heat of despair, Alana buries her head in her hands and silently begins to sob "How could this happen." she whispers. There was a stinging ache of unfairness, that circumstances would come to cull their numbers so soon after fate had already taken billions on Earth, centuries prior. But she had not witnessed humanity's mass exodus into the afterlife, and the death of those that surrounded her somehow hurt more than the holocaust she never saw.

Than out of nowhere she hears a faint tapping coming from one of the nearby pods. This jostles her out of her pain ridden sulking and Alana immediately goes to investigate the noise. Walking cautiously, she hears the tapping getting steadily louder as he nears. Her footsteps slow and methodical, Chow suddenly stops until she is in front of the pod in which she believes the strange disturbance is originating. With baited breath she looks through the ice encrusted glass, at first seeing nothing. Than a face bursts through the foggy mist inside and gently mashes up again the hatch door. Alana jumps back in fright, but soon realizes, she has found a survivor "Dubois, one's alive down here!"

"Who is it?" asks Dubois through the comm.

"I think it's the mechanic. I think it's Kincaid, she's alive!" shouts Alana.

The woman in the pod quickly fogs up the glass hatch, strands of her damp blonde hair falling into view. Alexia Keri Kincaid, Flight Engineer and Mechanic of the Traverse, weakly lifts one of her small feminine palms and presses it up against the glass in a silent plea for help. Chow quickly overrides the auto release of the hatchway and moments later Kincaid tumbles out of the pod. She is caught by Alana, who tries to steady her, the preservatives quickly melting off her body.

"Kincaid…Kincaid can you hear me?" asks Chow.

Alexia's eyes slowly move up to meet Alana's, even her face muscles not having enough strength to twitch.

"It's ok, it's alright, I've got you. We can save the meet and greet for later. Dubois, I'm coming back up!" she shouts.

The red alarm beacons still flashing the ship issues another time warning "Warning, warning, less than nineteen minutes remaining on main power grid."

As she struggles with Kincaid, Chow looks up and pleads with an unseen hand "God help us."