Paul’s eyes snapped open to the reality around him. Hazy at first, but it was clear he was no longer on the giant city-ship. His surroundings were compact, with slightly offset gravity, and a faint rumble droned beyond the tight metal walls. At one end of the room were a couple of pilot seats before a complicated control console. A starship, but an unfamiliar one, bearing no Tuyet Voi markings.

Sitting up, Paul noticed his robes were torn to shreds, face covered in smelly oil, chest armor had gashes like cross-hatchings, and specks of blood all over that likely did not belong to him. A jolting thought crossed his mind; quickly patting down his side confirmed his worst fear: his sword was missing along with the one he claimed from Ozcar. The gnawing shame of losing his most prized possession was amplified thanks to the splitting pain that throbbed the back of his skull.

With aching effort, he stood up grasping one of the worn brown pilot seats for support and eased into it. Through the front viewport stretched velvet darkness, distinctly space, but not a single sparkle of starlight to be seen- the Darkside, Paul knew. A section of the Umlenze galaxy spanning the length of one of its eight galactic arms, utterly devoid of visible light. Stars, planets, asteroids, and nebula storms inhabited the Darkside just like any other part of the galaxy, but they were all invisible to the naked eye; not only that, unknown cosmic forces scrambled most navigation equipment, leaving an untold number of hapless pilots stranded for eternity. No one escaped the Darkside.

But how?

Red flashing lights on the control panel interrupted his thoughts. A diagnostic hologram of the ship sprang up from the projector nestled between the pilot and co-pilot seat. Blue represented what was still intact; red defined damages. A wave of dread rippled over Paul’s skin. Most of the hologram was red: hull heavily scorched, circuitry exposed inside and out, one of the two engines disabled beyond repair, and a sizable chunk of the ship...completely missing. Remarkably, one engine was still operational and life support remained stable. Unremarkably, this hunk of scrap was going nowhere on its own.

A distress beacon needed to be sent out, regardless of how hopeless an effort it would be. Paul ran his hands over the controls to find the proper input. The array of lights, switches, and gauges were not exactly standard military- this was a civilian craft with simple universal controls. Bizarrely, a cursory look revealed every inch of the control console looked to be in pristine condition as if it had never been touched before. At last, he found the beacon and began broadcasting a coded military call for help. And that was it; not much else could be done.

Worrying about the Amani or pirates intercepting the signal was pointless out in the Darkside. Only the Tuyet Voi Empire dared to roam such dangerous reaches of the galaxy, and even they would only briefly dip into the outer fringes. Though, the fact that Paul had ended up in a small civilian ship meant someone else must have been brave, or stupid enough to try. Whoever that was, however, was not present. Perhaps the specks of blood belonged to this mystery person; Paul wiped some away to find it was still fresh. He looked around- the only other door at the end of the room was magnetically sealed to prevent decompression. Anyone on the other side was surely drifting through the infinite void by now.

Finer details were murky, but the last thing Paul could recollect was being lifted into the sky by some invisible force, hitting his head, and for the briefest of moments feeling cold metal against his cheek. Something had yanked him right off the ground into this ship, but Movaj was light-years from the Darkside, and there was no way this damaged ship had drifted so far on its own. The astrogation history would reveal more.

A list of events automatically recorded by the ship’s astrogation computer sprang up from the holo-projector. Several warp jumps had been made, each corresponding with a portion of the ship’s damaged systems. The pattern continued all the way to the Lolith system, which bordered the Darkside. One last jump was made after that, to Paul’s current position.

The mystery pilot was running from someone. Either their pursuers had lost their prey, or they were simply smart enough to give up the chase; any experienced pilot knew the Darkside was a death sentence. Paul was certain he would have made a different decision. The hollow sense of failure drained the nerve from his hands- had he been awake, things could have turned out differently. Have I grown so weak? A blow to the head. I’ve persevered through worse.

Thoughts drifted to Captain Doyen and the rest of the squad, all of whom had surely perished. Regret twisted Paul’s stomach in a knot. The terror they must have felt as they got swarmed by those mindless creatures...Paul could easily have ended up like his subordinates, but someone intervened. Did they think they were doing a good deed? And why only rescue one man? Whoever it was or whatever their motives were, their actions had apparently cost them their own life- for all the good it did Paul, now stranded alone on a dead ship.

Were there even any supplies? Schematics of the ship labeled a cargo hold and a tiny kitchen space beyond the single door leading out of the bridge. That entire section of the ship was gone, ripped away. Any food or water would be adrift in space.

Survival was a thought of growing severity; Paul feared he’d die of dehydration long before anyone even noticed his absence. What a pathetic way to die- after two decades of fighting, after countless triumphs, all to be brought down by basic human needs. This ship would be his coffin. Paul shoved such thoughts away; he would not perish so easily.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

There was one way. All Progenitors were trained in a particular meditation technique. Settling into a light trance would stave off hunger and thirst, and it would rejuvenate the body's energy in place of sleep; meditating for extended periods caused painful joint and muscle aches, but it was more than worth the cost in a life or death situation. Crouching down to his knees, Paul heaved a heavy sigh and placed his hands on his legs, drifting into the meditative state. Time would seem to pass more quickly, but he could remain alert enough should anything go wrong. At once, a warmth began filling his extremities and the sounds around him grew more acute: the soft hum of the engine, the flow of recycled air in the bridge, the gentle rattle of metal, the clicking noise.

Clicking?

Paul jolted his head back expecting to see a piece of the ship falling apart, but there was nothing. Standing up, he followed the sound underneath the control console and found a silver rectangular block, stirring…by itself. It vibrated with intense warmth, reminiscent of the Obelisk found on the city-ship. Suddenly the device jumped out of his grasp into the air and split in half vertically- a spectacular holographic stream of data emerged, filling the entire room with the unmistakable vibrant purple and green swirling arms of the Umlenze galaxy.

Millions of stars and planets floated, overwhelming to the eyes, each heavenly body like phosphorescent specks of dust. The galactic core like an orb of light, the vast icy azure nebulas of Rayds weaved in and out of the Umlenze’s sparkling arms except one: the Darkside looked cleanly cut from the rest of the galaxy like a severed limb. It was all there; Paul suspected that every star was accounted for. He had certainly never seen something so beautifully crafted in his life.

Without warning, everything vanished, sending Paul into a brief panic until something else appeared. This time it was a singular star system: one large white star with seven planets orbiting around it. Each orb displayed their unique appearances: an oceanic class covered in colossal typhoons that likely raged across the surface year-round, one so rich with heavy metals that the entire planet shined, and a blood-red gas giant looked like a blazing jewel; the rest looked to be well-settled terrestrials: clouds, great cities, mountains, all could be seen in perfect definition. Paul examined them with hands behind his back as if his touch might shatter them.

One planet beckoned for attention as the display showed a series of grids and brackets pointing and hovering around it. A set of glyphs appeared above as if to display its name, but the writing was alien; the same from the city-ship.

There was no telling the planet’s name or even its star system. Closer inspection found it was mostly made up of rolling green plains and mountain ranges on one side, yellow and red deserts on the other. Paul pulled up astrogation charts stored on the ship’s computers. Cross-referencing star charts to the map would take days, potentially weeks without drone assistance. Not that it mattered, being stranded and all.

The holographic map disappeared, the silvery device snapped back together and fell to the ground with a clink. Paul picked it up; it was not much bigger than his hands. Turning over and feeling along its impeccably smooth surface, the only impurity on its flawless rectangular shape was a symbol etched in the center. It looked like a crosshair with four different badges for each quadrant: a star, hand, mountain, and a squiggly pattern that shared the qualities of a letter. A coat of arms?

Wanting to open it again, Paul turned it over on all sides, meticulously running his fingers carefully along the edges, but there was nothing. The silver rectangle appeared to be little more than just that. No latch, no hinges, not even the faintest seam tarnished the surface. Frustrated, he opted for brute strength and began trying to pry it open from all directions, but not surprisingly, that went nowhere. After another half hour of trying, he finally set it down, resigned to defeat.

Several days passed, or so Paul assumed. Much of his time was spent deep in meditation where time became convoluted. The vision he had seen on Movaj played over and over in his mind. Fire danced about in the chaotic amalgamation of screams and shadowy figures. But no matter how hard he tried, there was no discerning what it meant.

Visions always meant something.

Usually, they came in the form of a warning when someone dared to plot against a Progenitor. Sometimes, Progenitors with powerful bonds could even communicate telepathically, though this required extensive training and intense concentration. The rarest visions manifested from pure unconditional love. If two Progenitors ever got married they practically became the same person, able to know every emotion each other felt. Paul had no experience with those kinds of visions, and he did not much care.

Connection was weakness, independence was strength.

Intermittently the map would open and close. Driven by a combination of boredom and the desire to succeed, Paul would flick through astrogation charts in a vain attempt to locate the single system among the countless others in the galaxy. Then when the map closed again, he’d try to pry it open as if to surprise the device, or he would simply return to meditation. How did it get here anyway?

It could have belonged to the ship’s original owner, or more likely, it came from the crashed city-ship since the silver metal resembled the hull. But Paul didn’t recall picking up anything. Was it possible the device followed him somehow? He shook his head; those were the thoughts of a mad man. How many days had it been? Surely a week had passed.

Thoughts drifted away from the map and onto his cracking joints and terribly sore muscles. Hunger and dehydration started to set in too; meditation could only stave off physical needs for so long. More time passed, days, weeks. Time had lost its meaning. Forced to spend more effort sitting in a meditative state, Paul’s joints protested viciously along with his stomach and dry throat. His whole body was cold and frail.

Paul began to wonder if he could find a way to boil the leather of his boots. During his time in the academy, they learned survival techniques, including the passable nutritional value of leather. The lack of water to boil and the thought of being found dead lying next to a partially eaten boot was enough to dissuade him.

With desperate and painful effort, he eased himself back into his meditative position yet again, but a loud beep went off and Paul scrambled to the central console, ignoring his aching body. Red lights flashed all over the dashboard, indicating the various system failures and the aggregation of damage done to the ship, but a lone green light pulsed for an incoming call. A little orange man appeared from the holo-projector. He had cheery eyes, wore plain clothes, and had a smile across his face.

“Looks like you could use some help,” said the orange figure.