The latch of the collision pod releases, and I press against the lid forcefully with both hands, pushing it the rest of the way open. I pull out one foot and then the other, looking around the bridge of the ship as I climb carefully out. My vision is slightly blurred, but even so, the ship—or at least the bridge—looks like it’s sustained surprisingly little damage. I guess there’s not a lot of loose parts to go flying in the event of a collision, and from the looks of it, you’d almost never know anything happened.

I walk around the bridge slowly, hoping to conjure up some memory of what happened, how I ended up in this situation.

“Chrys?” I call out tentatively. “Hello?” But there’s no response.

I fumble with a few of the control panels, trying to see if I can get anything to turn on, but the displays are all unresponsive. I take a seat in the command chair and rub my temples. I’ve never been on this side of a crash, and trying to determine my next course of action feels surprisingly difficult. I close my eyes for a moment, trying to concentrate. The last thing I remember is…is…

But a wave of nausea comes over me, and I find myself unable to think about anything other than keeping my last meal down.

The emergency locker, I suddenly remember. There should be a pre-programmed holographic program inside that’ll help walk me through emergency repair procedures. Maybe it’ll help me figure out what to do about this headache too.

I head into the hall and find the emergency locker just past the doorway to the bridge. I pull out the med kit, the holographic projector, and what’s hopefully enough MREs to last me until I can get the dietary synthesizer up and running again. I drop the MREs in the canteen before returning with the rest of my supplies to the bridge and setting up the holographic projector on the dash.

“Hiya! I’m your Standard Emergency Protocol Holographic Interface. But you can call me SEPHI,” the hologram announces, flickering to life.

“Cool,” I say impatiently. “Can you help me fix my ship?”

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

“I’d be happy to take a look,” SEPHI answers cheerfully. “But first, what should I call you?”

“Let’s just focus on the ship,” I say, pressing on my temples to try and relieve some of the pressure in my head.

“Oh, come on. Don’t be shy,” SEPHI urges.

“Look, no offense, but do you maybe have another setting?” I ask, trying, unsuccessfully, to suppress my annoyance.

“Sure, I do!” she chirps. “To select another interface, you can upgrade my software for the low price of—"

“I have to pay to change your interface setting?” I interrupt. “Talk about extortion.”

“Enough about me,” says SEPHI, breezing over the topic. “Let’s talk about you. What seems to be the problem?”

“My ship is, uh—” I look around. “—busted,” I say. “I think I was in a crash, but I’m not really sure.” I pause, trying to recall what exactly happened, but give up and shake my head. “Anyway, nothing works,” I say.

“Nothing?” SEPHI asks.

“Nothing.”

“Well, no wonder you’re in such a bad mood!” she says.

A hologram with a sense of humor, huh?

I open my mouth to respond to her remark, but I kind of had that coming.

“I guess you could say it’s not my day,” I grumble.

“Never fear, SEPHI is here!” she continues brightly. “Let’s start by identifying your ship model.”

“It’s a MASSA-50,” I say. “Pretty standard.” Only a few modifications that you don’t need to worry about, I think to myself.

“Well,” says SEPHI, “the good news is that the MASSA-50 comes equipped with a preserved independent life support function. Lucky you!”

Yeah, lucky me. I roll my eyes. I guess I should be grateful though. At least I’m alive.

“The bad news,” says SEPHI, “is that I can’t seem to interact with your ship’s systems. It could be due to a malfunction, but on this model of ship, that’s highly unlikely. Is there any chance you sustained damage from a high-powered microwave weapon?”

I think to myself for a minute.

“You mean like a Blackout?” I ask.

“Exactly!” SEPHI answers. “It would certainly explain all the trouble you’re having.”

It would explain a lot of things, I realize.

“Let’s run an inventory of all the tools, systems, and other features on your ship, and then we can get down to work,” SEPHI says.

Obnoxious as she may be, she’s actually pretty useful. Knowing what’s wrong is always a good place to start, and I’m pretty sure it would’ve taken me a lot longer to figure it out on my own. My mind has been hazy ever since I came out of the pod.

“First things first,” SEPHI says. “Do you know the number one priority in any emergency situation?”

“Turn off the hologram to save electricity?” I ask sarcastically.

“Very funny,” SEPHI replies.

I smirk. Maybe she’s not so bad after all.

“The number one priority in any emergency situation is to signal for help,” she says. “So let’s get that distress beacon activated!”

I nod and haul myself to my feet.

“Sounds like a plan.”