Earth Year 2840. Unknown Sector.
The ejection sequence was violent as G force slammed Zeon against the walls of Lifepod 7
the claustrophobic cabin was illuminated only by flashing red emergency lights.
To his left was Ruby who clutched her harness with a pale face
Daniel and Chang were paralyzed in shock from the horrific image of Omar was still burning in their minds.
Captain Eva Diane furiously typed at the manual override console while the armored man stood perfectly still in the center of the pod.
"Atmospheric entry in two minutes,"
Eva barked with her voice trying to cut through the panic.
"Brace yourselves!"
Zeon forced his head up to look through the reinforced viewport
He saw that the U.N.S. Aegis was being swallowed by a massive rift that had torn through space.
The crack in reality glowed with a sickening violet light as countless colossal tendrils of pure darkness wrapped around the dreadnought and physically snapped the war cruiser in half.
"By the stars..."
Chang whispered as tears poured down his face
beyond the dying ship was a breathtaking planet with deep glowing blue oceans and sweeping continents crowned by glowing icy rings.
"Radar shows fifty lifepods made it out,"
Eva announced as her eyes locked on the tactical screen.
"We have a colony worth of survivors. We just need to make it to the sur..."
Before Eva could finish, a blinding flash of light consumed the viewport because the massive Drive Core went critical.
"That’s impossible,"
Eva breathed as her eyes widened in sheer disbelief.
"The core has a fail safe. It doesn’t overload. Someone or something had to manually disengage the limiters!"
There was no time to process the cause before the dreadnought detonated and sent a shockwave through the vacuum of space that turned the ship into millions of pieces of accelerated Debris.
Zeon watched in horror as a piece of hull slammed into a cluster of fleeing lifepods and popped them like glass bubbles while the tactical screen rapidly updated the grim mathematics of their survival.
Active Pods: 42... 31... 24... 17.
BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.
"Debris wave incoming!"
Eva screamed.
"It’s going to hit us!"
A massive chunk of the engine housing was flying directly toward them and there was no thruster powerful enough to dodge it so Zeon squeezed his eyes shut while preparing for the vacuum of space.
SCREECH!
But the impact never came because a low hum vibrated through the metal of the pod as Zeon opened his eyes to see the armored man pressing his palm against the hull.
Energy began to bleed from his ancient armor in a chaotic mixture of divine Light and the suffocating pitch black miasma of the Abyss itself.
It was an energy that defied logic and belonged to a survivor who had assimilated the very horrors they were fleeing from while the dual aura flared around him and enveloped the lifepod in a sphere of twilight energy.
CLANG! SCREEECH!
Massive chunks of debris slammed into the aura and were instantly turned into dust while the podrattled violently but the hull held firm.
"Who... what are you?"
Ruby whispered as she stared at the armored figure holding back a storm of debris without answering or turning his head.
"Atmosphere!"
Eva shouted while gripping her console as the pod began to shake and flames spread across the viewport.
they hit the outer exosphere of the ringed planet.
"The retro thrusters are offline! We are coming in too fast! Brace for impact!"