Chapter Text
‘You never really think about how much your job really means’. Erin Wheeler had that thought running through her mind constantly. She was once known as the smartest engineer to ever come from Io. She'd designed high density alloys for space travel, modified refractors for the commune’s laser rifles, and even designed a hydroponic system that could carry water across the moon without losing energy. Then there was her magnum opus, the Waverider. A completely personalized space faring vessel, with a unique delta wave hyperactive drive. This drive was meant to help take Terrans to even farther places, at least until everything changed.
The day had started out just like any other day. Erin woke up and looked herself over in the mirror. She started at her chest, the one place something had changed. The small mounds poking through her shirt made her smile. Next, were her legs, shaving helped keep the hair away and she’d been on hormones long enough to see some softening of the growth anyways. The shape of her legs was a bit on the larger size, but that’s the trade off of all the crouching and walking she had to do in her daily life. Lastly, she turned her attention to her face. The small wisps of hair around her chin made her immediately grab her razor. Slowly and methodically she dragged the blade across her face, smoothing the surface. Once she was satisfied with her appearance, she turned to her kitchen.
To be fair, calling it a kitchen was very generous. The space was a small counter with a cold cabinet and a spigot for water. On top she had placed a magnetic heating plate that made it much easier to cook food, when she had food that needed cooking at least. Even with her “cushy” job as an engineer, finding fresh food of any kind was next to impossible. Luckily she found heating a synthcube up in a bowl of water made her feel like she was cooking, even when it tasted like absolute crap.
My trip into town today, better end with me getting a good meal. Erin thought somberly. She had been asked to come by the governor’s office to report on her current assignment. The long range delta space drive had been her pet project for over a year now. She recalled the long nights she’d spent huddled down in front of the chassis, tuning its resonance to capture the delta stream. She could feel the thrum pulse through her even now. Her drive was a part of her life she would never want to forget or part from. Which was one of the reasons why she kept lying to the governor. If they found out the drive was fully functional, the commune militia would strip it from her and use it to make war or something of the like elsewhere.
Her mind slowly thought of the war as she walked through the streets. The Accord was embroiled in a massive conflict with these plant creatures. They arrived to suck out your soul and fill your body with seeds to mass repopulate. She remembered a visual aid being shown to her during onboarding of the militia, a single red soaked vine skewering the neck of a terrified terran; that image haunted her to this day. It was honestly the only reason Erin had ever agreed to help the war effort. She was after all, a devout pacifist herself, never wishing harm to another living being.
As she approached the main square, the ships appeared in the sky with the blaring of alarms. The high pitched screeching caused her to throw her hands over her ears. Erin looked up to see a giant ball of vines slowly unfurling in the sky. Erin followed exactly what the Accord's emergency announcements told her. She sprinted home, not caring about the orders being directed that all military personnel report for combat. Erin was not a soldier, she was an engineer, she would not take a life, even one that would just as easily take hers. She nearly smashed her door to pieces as she charged through it.
She took only her jump bag, plus a personal item she'd never tell anyone about, and ran out her side door. Being an engineer had made her indispensable to the commune, which provided her much better living conditions than someone like her would normally have gotten. This meant she could park her spacecraft right by her hab. She climbed up into the ship, the alarms squealing around her. Luckily once she closed the main entry, the soundproof design of her ship blocked them out. She sat in the cockpit, placing her bag in the seat next to her.
She initiated takeoff procedures, skipping a few protocols to save time, and got in the air. Looking at the ground below, she saw hundreds of people running for their lives. People were shattering windows, breaking into homes, she even saw a few people looking in her direction. The faces she saw were not new to her, disgust, hatred, fear, but it still hurt her heart to know she was abandoning these people. Above, she saw the pods, the way those things would get to the surface to catch them. Each one of them fell to the surface like a meteor, but landed softer than a feather. If she wasn’t running for her life, the mechanism behind that would have intrigued her. She saw the local militia calling ranks and preparing their rifles.
“A lot of good that'll do.” She said just to get the thoughts out of her head. “These things are immune to those pea shooters. Should just be running like me.”
Of course, no one else could run like her. She had this ship, she had her gear, and she had her drive. That one thing is all she needed to increase her chances of escape. The soft pulse coming from the drive made her mind thrum. Her eyes closed and she waited. And waited. And waited. The pulse reached a crescendo letting her know it was ready, and she punched it.
Io was gone, the pods were gone, those poor Terrans were gone, and she was alone. As she sat out in space, somewhere beyond the Kuiper belt if her math was right, she thought about her next steps. She had a friend out here on a mining colony called Mertha Bay, Carly. Carly had been the only person she'd ever told about her uniqueness, that didn't immediately hate her. In fact it was quite the opposite. They’d formed a deeper connection than Erin had ever thought possible. Carly had been the one to procure the personal item sat in the jump bag next to her. Erin's heart had broken when Carly was forced to move for work.
She plugged the coordinates in, and set the Waverider on Auto. Sleep, she needed sleep. Grabbing a blanket and her personal item from her jump bag, she curled up next to her drive. Her eyes closed as the pulse beat in sync with her heart, or was it the other way around, did it matter? Not to her.
Two weeks. Two weeks of floating through space. Erin didn't want to fire the engines too much. Pulses and waves were her area of expertise. She knew that the less spacetime disturbance she created, the less likely she'd be detected. Her jump bag only had enough provisions for another week at best, luckily she began to see the mining colony coming into view.
About damn time. She thought. Hopefully there'll be a clean shower down there too.
She rested her hand on her drive. The soft thrum resonated through her whole body, making her shiver slightly. Every daily cycle she'd laid down next to this device. It was her one constant companion through this ordeal.
“Calling Mertha Bay tower. This is…” She choked for a second. “Aaron Wheeler.” The name stung coming out of her mouth, like she'd just eaten poison. “Requesting landing clearance, security code EN55290.”
She set the message to repeat and waited, back resting on her drive. The pulse calmed her anxiety from having to utter that name, and helped keep her from hearing the message itself. She got a return message very soon.
“Hailing Aaron Wheeler. Code accepted, proceed to landing bay 4.” The speaker quieted as she stood up. She settled into the pilot's chair and directed the ship down. As she approached, she noticed the sky was much cleaner than she thought it would be. She saw the mine and the colony proper below. The mine looked abandoned, but the city was full of movement. She flew toward the landing bays, and directed towards the one with a big 4 on the side. An area had been made clear for her to land. She saw some people coming to help her ship dock, they were moving these large cargo masses behind them. They looked like piles of hose, probably for refueling, she thought. She opened the entry ramp and prepared to exit as they reached the Waverider. Erin gathered her jump bag, carefully placing her personal item into the bag, and touched her drive one last time before leaving.
“Welcome to Mertha Bay.” A short man said, meeting her at the end of her ramp. He wasn't wearing the standard mining company uniform Erin had expected. He had nice shoes, clean purple pants, and a blue pilot's jacket. But what drew her attention the most was the strange object on his neck. It looked like a thin black strap with a single light on it. Fashion must really be weird out here. The other two bay workers all wore similar items.
“Thank you. I have just made a jump from Io and I'm low on provisions. Io has been invaded by those plant aliens the Accord has been warning us about.” Erin rattled the information off quickly, hoping to keep her mind away from what was happening at her home. “What is the situation here?”
It was at that moment Erin noticed that the refueling hoses were no longer there. Before she could turn to look, she heard a voice from behind her.
“Invaded?” The voice inquired. “I think a better word would be… protected.” Erin spun around her eyes locking on to the 4 purple orbs in front of her. “Just like you will be.” As the world faded to black, all she could think about was the pulse of her drive.