Astrophysical (completed)

Chapter 15

Cassie did feel better a day later. She had spent the whole twenty-four hours in bed and relaxing, but every now and again when she turned wrong or moved too quickly and some small pricks of pain would afflict her. She was on her feet though and soon after it was determined to be safe enough, she and SA began their search for Channing's hideaway.

The surface of the moon they were on was cool and slightly hard. The atmosphere was breathable, unlike Simera which was a pleasant change. Cassie also enjoyed the cool air instead of the blazing hot sun and even took the parka from the ship to travel with. SA had found a small robotic cart to bring with them to carry supplies and emergency tools, but otherwise, their travelling stayed light.

Because of the speed they were forced to follow so Cassie wouldn't be pained, the going was slow, and halfway through the day, they had barely covered a couple of miles. The bluish-greenish surface was not exactly interesting except for the small nooks and caverns that lay in some of the rocky cliffs. Every now and again SA would extend to higher ledges to look in but so far none of them showed any sort of life. The first day they set up a small camp point and rested until morning, feeling discouraged by their lack of findings.

On the second day, they still did not find much of anything that indicated any sort of life on the moon. Cassie at first thought this was odd, but SA informed her that most moons couldn't support the vast amount of life forms typically found on planets. He knew of at least four though in the universe around the Sovereign space Sector that would, but with the lack of water and biology humans wouldn't survive here. Minus the gravity and the ability to breathe, it reminded Cassie of her own moon.

Again, the second day turned up no such luck of discovering anything and again the journeyers rested with disappointed. At this rate, SA calculated that it would take three more days to cover to planet's surface, but to view and check out the caverns they might stay another day more just to verify their conclusions. Cassie agreed even though she was wanting to give up already and moving on to the next moon.

Luckily for her though they didn't because on halfway through the third day, they found what they were looking for.

Cassie was feeling very much recovered now from the crash and there wasn't any pain coming from her chest or back, but an overall weariness of traveling fatigued her. This is what caused her during a moment's pause to lean against the rocky walls. As she did this, it shifted under her weight which caused her panic and drew SA's attention. They watched as the wall appeared to push back a little, scraping with a terrible noise along the surface. But it stopped seconds later and revealed a square cut out of the floor.

Both SA and Cassie were surprised but excitement began to creep into their minds. SA quickly went over to it and quickly discovered that it would pull out of the ground. Once removed they saw a long dark staircase leading further down into the surface and with lights suddenly emerging from SA's palm, they began to transcend down the stairs. It was slow going because the stairs were uneven in length, but otherwise they ran into no issues.

At the bottom of the staircase, they came across a steel door which with some struggle they opened. Inside SA ventured to find a sort of power source and moments later lights that hung along the ceiling of the cavern lit up the room.

Indeed, this looked like someone's living quarters. The room was only about six hundred square feet and held a small wooden framed bed with thin mattress but no sheets. There appeared to be a small desk on the opposite wall and books and papers were lying on it as well as scattered in piles around the room. The only other thing in the room was a large sort of cabinet that had power which suggested potentially a supply cabinet, but nothing was in it.

Cassie quickly walked over to one of the books and picked it up. It was heavy and was dusty, but after she brushed off the layer of dust on the cover, she could discern no longer what it was for. The book was red in colour but the strokes on the cover meant nothing to her. They were just random scratches. SA who had begun to stock the cabinet with their own supplies paused and watched her, noticing that she was staring so intently on the book.