The Epherium Chronicles: Embrace Read Free Page B

with her hand to loosen it. She set it on the ground. As she looked up toward the ceiling to check the angle, she screamed.
    Restal turned and moved as quickly as his magnetic boots would allow him toward the cadet. “Kristin, what is it? Are you hurt?”
    Her scream turned to a sob, and she pointed to the dome’s ceiling. Four bodies of the station’s crew were motionless and pressed against the wall near the top of the dome. Restal could tell by the coloring of their skin and faces that they died when the dome lost its atmosphere.
    “Keep it together, kid. We expected to see this. You need to calm down and focus. We can’t help them, but we might be able to help the rest of the crew,” he explained, trying to calm her down, but inside he was just as scared as she was.
    Kristin nodded slowly and stopped sobbing. “Yes, sir.” She moved to continue activating the remaining lamps. Restal grabbed one of the active lamps and angled it to get a better look at the four bodies. Along the walls, he could see more cracks in the dome’s super structure. When this part of the station lost atmosphere, they probably were pinned to the wall and wedged in tight. Whatever happened must have happened fast, and he doubted they suffered. The uniforms were all similar, but he could definitely see a distinctive black and red layered flat top haircut on one of the bodies. He knew immediately it was his friend, Max. Restal sighed deeply, set down the light and moved closer to the telescope pad.
    “Justin, come in,” Restal solemnly called into his comm unit.
    “Aye, Skipper, we just entered the hydroponics dome.”
    “Well, we found four poor souls in the survey dome. One of them is Max.” Restal paused for a few moments and looked over at Kristin. “Kristin’s pretty shook up, but she’s holding together. Any sign of the impact crater?”
    “There is a huge hole in the center of the dome. We’re moving around all the debris so we can get access to the entry point. Radiation levels have increased but are still tolerable for the suits. I wouldn’t recommend long term exposure though.” Static began to crackle over the comm as Justin spoke. No doubt due to the increased radiation, Restal believed.
    “Any sign of the remaining crew?” Restal asked.
    “It’s strange.” Justin sounded very confused. “Most of the plants and furniture seemed to have been sucked out the hole where the impact occurred, but there’s a lot of dark residue around the entrance from the survey dome. It could be blood, but I would have thought that any blood from the crew in this dome should have been sucked out with the atmosphere. It would have vaporized outside. This would only happen if someone came in after the atmosphere was expelled.”
    “That could be our other two missing crewmen that were in the crew quarters during the strike. I imagine the other two were killed during the impact. Get me a visual on the impact crater and send a team out the hole to look at the communications array,” Restal instructed and he looked back toward the crew quarters. “How did those two crew members get to the other dome without a suit?” he thought to himself.
    “Roger that, Skipper. I’ll take Nate’s team with me to the crater and send Vince and Tommy’s groups out to the communication array. Chase and Cadet Tiris are collecting some of the residue for analysis and identification.”
    Restal watched his own intern continue to activate the remaining lights. “How’s he holding up?”
    “Tough kid,” Justin replied jokingly. “He’s keeping it together pretty well. Okay, we just reached the impact crater. It’s about four meters wide and looks pretty deep.” Restal could hear rustling over the comms as Justin moved to the edge of the crater. “That’s strange. The walls are almost burned smooth. Pretty weird for a meteor hit. I’m going to disengage my gravity boots and use my suit thrusters to get a look.”
    Restal felt the hairs on his