One in Twelve Thousandth Percent

Chapter 14:

Suddenly we're shifted and the scenery changes from the transporter room to a spot on Janus.

I switch the flashlight on. "Alright, girls. Standard room procedure." Immediately Misaki, Kazumi, Annabelle and I start to move and clear this room as if we've practiced this before. "What the hell, did you all take military training or some shit?" Cannon says, his team trying to keep up.

We look at each other as we keep going. I smile. "I guess you could say something like that." There was no need to tell him how the four of us spent countless hours playing online shooter games against others on the station.

We move with ridiculous precision through the room calling out clearly to each other until I give the final "All clear!" Then from an opposite corner of the room, I hear Misaki call out. "I've got power. Lights in a second." Then the lights come on. We immediately scan the room one last time then I move to a console.

"This used to be a storage room. Let's check to see if there's anything leftover. Cannon, I'm putting you in charge of Phoebe and the Fendan brothers. Go and clear us a path out of here."

Cannon scrunches up his face and is about to argue when Phoebe puts a hand on his shoulder and shakes her head at him. Rather impressed by our form and tactics, as well as my vast technical knowledge, the other three realize that I probably am a slightly better officer. Cannon sighs, rolling his eyes. "Sure thing, Craft." Moments later, they're gone. We continue to check the area. Nothing of particular value is in here. A few packs of rations and various scrap electrical components.

Cannon and his team come back. "Hall's clear. Let me know when you're ready to move on."

"Right. Ladies?" I look at them. They each nod. "Yeah, this room is pretty bare, Cannon. Let's go." We come out into the corridor and immediately do another cursory scan before moving on. Misaki looks at her scanner then around the hall. "Looks like the power is still on, but everything is in low power mode. Where should we head first? I'd suggest either the bridge or engineering."

"Let's check the engineering level. The science labs are also down there. There might be something useful. Stay frosty, team. And let's boot up the lights as we pass through each room."

A collaborative "Right!" resonates from everyone as we start moving. Misaki stops to check a wall panel. "I'd suggest against powering up too many lights. It looks like several sections are exposed to the vacuum of space. Force fields are barely holding right now. And too much power draw might interfere with that."

"Shit. Ok, thanks babe. Um... matter of fact, hang on." I go back and shut down the lights in the storage room we had just been in. "Better safe than sorry. Let's go."

With the station being in low power mode, the lifts weren't working so we had to climb down. That was always something we had taken for granted. The fact that in a lift, we could ascend or descend multiple levels quickly. From where we were, we needed to go down roughly twenty levels. That was fun.

Once we made it down, Misaki was the first to notice that something about the engineering level felt...off. Once we were all alerted to it, we agreed that it felt creepy.

And we weren't expecting to find the entire main engine room... gone. We walk up to where it was... supposed to be. All we saw was a force field and the Angel in the distance.

"Well, this explains the low power mode. The auxiliary engines wouldn't have been able to hold that kind of power output." I look at Misaki. "Good call, babe. Let's go see the science labs then."

The science labs were much more profitable though. We walk in and see several consoles flickering. Annabelle goes over to one, hits some buttons and the lights and consoles come on. "Well I'm glad that the science labs have their own generator." She starts checking files and running programs.