We have to make it to the warp site. We have to make it to the warp site. We have to make it to the warp site.
I repeat the mantra over and over again inside my head, my internal voice echoing with each pound of an ever-growing headache. My eyes twitch from the lightheaded feeling and I only wish that the weight hadn't transferred to my legs, which I bet now have an even larger stockpile of lactic acid then I do - I did - in my lab. Obviously, that's not physically possible, I'm a biochemist after all, however, I need to keep my mind preoccupied, I need to divert my attention from the wound at my side.
I hear a scream and then a thud. Another one dead, but I can't look back. I don't want to say my life is more important or anything but under the dire circumstances at hand, empathy will only get you killed. It has before and it will happen again.
Suddenly, the lights flash before me - a reoccurring symptom due to the atmospheric pressure. My vision goes black and white spots dance before my eyes. Shaking my head, my migraine only worsens but the pain sharpens my senses and I keep on running. I run, but I only hear my own footsteps.
Glancing through my peripheral vision, I lick my lips within the exosuit. Surely, I must be seeing things, or rather, the case is, I'm not. The sight interface must have gotten damaged when the suit was breached from the acid attack but no matter how many times I try to recalibrate it, the interface shows the same thing. I'm the only remaining heat signature.
Great. Now I'm going to have to change my mantra yet again. Sighing, my helmet steams up but I can't stop now. I have to just keep swimming. Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming.
I almost laugh at how bad my new mantra is. It sounds like something from a show they aired on Earth a hundred years back or so but it does have a catchy tune to it. I can't laugh though, it's not that I won't, it's just that I physically can't. I haven't been able to since we started drilling. Now that I think about it, I haven't been able to smile since we landed either and that's not because I'm unable. It's just that ever since we got here, there's nothing being worth smiling about.
I suppose if you buy cheap you get cheap and we haven't learned that mistake, even after the destruction of countless planets, including our own. People did try to make amends though. They got all gung-ho about renewable energy for a while - it became a craze of sorts but crazes come and go whilst human nature remains the same. Greedy, fickle, envious... you name it. The renewable energy stunt didn't last long and when people discovered oil on other planets, that's where everyone flocked. Planets were destroyed one after the other but it's not like anyone cares anymore. There's enough of them to last us forever so there's no worry about scarcity, however, in order to cut back costs, drilling became cruder and cruder, if you'll excuse my pun, and that's what landed me in all of this sticky mess.
Fracking.
That's the technical terminology. The fastest and most cost-efficient way of extracting oil. It's simple enough. Drill a hole, pump in a ton of water and bam! You've got a fountain of fortune, otherwise known as an oil spring. Supply is easy enough to find but demand only grows larger day by day. How couldn't it? We're all just planet nomads now; we need the oil otherwise we'll just be floating around in dead space. Well, then again, that's pretty much all we do now anyway. We're just flying through planet graveyards, priming the life oil from each planet as we go by.
I cough and immediately regret it. The sudden jerk of my torso causes my stomach to contract and if there wasn't enough blood leaking out of my side, something I should ironically be thankful for as it's helping to plug the breach in my exosuit, minimising oxygen loss, there's now a lovely splatter of scarlet right in my line of site. As a biochemist I'm not too queasy from the sight of it, however, the stench is another thing. Having run out of rations a few days ago, my breath isn't exactly the best around and when you combine that with stale bile, it almost smells as bad as a decomposing denizen of this planet - something we fracked up not too long ago.
As soon as that happened, we realised that there should have been more funding towards SETI than oil stock because after the rotting bodies started turning up, the live ones weren't far behind and it seemed that we disturbed their centuries-old hibernation period. Within hours of the first alien siting, a whole swarm of them erupted from the very bowels of the planet causing the terrain to shift within seconds. The land before us collapsed and if we weren't lucky enough to fall to our deaths, we were suffocated and then eaten by the flocks of whatever secret the planet had been hiding for the last thousand years.
At first, we were killed just by the sheer number of them. They were curious at first, not dangerous, but with all of them swarming around you, it wasn't long before you suffocated to death. But that's when they got the first taste of human flesh, and then bone, and then desire.
We hoped there was safety in numbers but when they outnumbered us with at least ten thousand to one we could only rely on the warp pads for safety. Thankfully, there's only one more left. The first one we took about a month ago. That led us to the outskirts. The second we took a week ago. That lead us even farther out. The last one should take us - me - to the ship. That is, if I can last that long.
Each time we warped, the land got more stable and the aliens got father and fewer between but that didn't stop them from hunting us down. All I can do is pray that I don't keel over and die from their acid stings. One is enough, the blood pulsing out with each earth-shattering step, and by now I'm pretty sure that my trail of blood has led the whole planet towards me-
I almost burst into tears. I've been so preoccupied that I failed to notice the warp pad coming into view. As much as it hurts, I sprint the final distance to the pad before hurriedly jamming my fingers into the buttons to beam me up. This time I do feel a grin creep up onto my face but I let it. My vision goes black as my corporeal form transmits into the data cloud and then it clears.
But I hear a scream. I blink my eyes and I swallow my heart.
The aliens have made it onto the ship.
