Site-113.

Chapter 5. The purity of the blessed machine.

So apparently 15 people died today. 10 d-class, 2 guards and 3 scientists.

They were all ejected into the "atmosphere" and suffocated.

How? Well, short story is the aquarium blew.

The longer however, my plan is to figure that out. But I can't get through this blast door without deactivating the emergency systems. Not to mention, I should find a spacesuit, so I don't suffocate like those poor sods did.

Repairs were already underway when it came to fixing the aquarium but there were still possibilities that there were breaches yet to be closed.

I made my way over to an airlock before getting into a spacesuit. The helmet let out a hiss as the airtight seal enclosed itself around the neck of the suit.

Allright. I suppose it doesn't really matter if I look at the crime scene from the outside or the inside, so I'll take the road 'round back. There'll probably be fewer crewmen working outside than inside, and I won't have to compromise the rest of the facility by opening the blast doors to the aquarium.

Outside the airlock I immediately spotted the pool of water lying on the asphalt outside the aquarium glass. There were already some maintenance workers hard at work repairing the bulletproof glass and metal beams, as I had expected.

I made my way over to the hole in the glass to inspect the damage. The hole looked about the size of SCP-682... But that's strange. Sebastian keeps a hawk eye on that anomaly, there's no way it could have broken out on its own.

Unless... Something helped it escape.

"Did any of you see what caused this?" I asked one of the repairmen.

The man seemed bewildered at my questioning. "Huh? You... What did you say?"

I reiterated the question. "Oh, right. HEY WADE! YOU SEE THE THING CRASHING THROUGH HERE?"

The man screamed toward another repairman on the inside of the building. His voice bordered on the volume of ear damage, so I reflexively turned off my intercom.

"Jesus, dude, you don't need to yell, we have microphones in here for a reason."

"Wade" turned to face us before answering on the intercom with a much more acceptable volume of voice.

"Yeah man, there was like, this huge lizard thing, man. I'm telling you dude, it was like, massive, man."

Is he high?

"Well... Thank you for your answer, wade."

I stepped off the scaffolding and looked around the area again. Shreds of glass were riddling the ground outside the facility, along with a sizable pool of water, from which it seemed most had drained into the red sand of mars.

I looked to the red desert stretching far beyond out to the horizon. There were no footprints I could see... However, there was one peculiarity. There seemed to be a crater out in the desert which was not there yesterday.

Hmm. This investigation just got much more complicated. First order of business is to check out that crater, I suppose.

I looked toward the left side of the facility where a sign pointed toward the hangar. If I'm going to venture out all that way I'd certainly not make it on the suit's oxygen containers alone. A rover should supply me with all the oxygen I need though.

I had begun driving out toward the crater when I spotted something rather warm on the rover heat-camera. It seemed to be in the shape of a human, but due to the nighttime environment I could not see them with my naked eye.