Pain, pain, was something that Dimitri had gotten used to. However, the pain that assaulted him when he began to regain conciseness was something else. It was the kind of pain that would blanket a man's mind in insanity. Blood pooled from all of the orifices on his head. The taste of iron in his mouth, comforting to his pain, addled mind. Purporting to the fact that at least he was not dead. Very much contrary to what his body and mind were screaming at him to be true. What some part of him wished to be true.

Time passed slowly as his mind started to come back to him. Dimitri's senses started to gain a modicum of usefulness again, and finally, with a push of will, he parted his eyelids.

What greeted him was once the pristine bridge of one of the last hopes for the human race, Epimetheus. Now glass was scattered across the floor, display panels smashed. Consoles baring their innards to the world. Naked wire and circuit boards spilling out from gaping wounds. The noise was deafening. No engine hum nor any other sound. Silence reigned supreme.

The most disturbing thing he could see was the floor. He was firmly planted on his ass. The ship seemingly being at a slight incline downwards. This being disturbing due to the fact of the silence. There was no thrum of the engine, yet there was gravity. The artificial gravity generator drew too much power to run without the reactor running. In turn, the reactor was connected to the engine, and even if idle, there should be the engine's rumble. Unless the reactor itself was powered down.

"St..at..us.." Dimitri was finally able to rasp out through his labored breathing. The ship's computer should still be running. Its power coming from a battery in case of an emergency. Reaching out through his cyberware as well to try and make contact with the AI.

All that greeted him was a small screen, not too dissimilar to the many he had seen before, from some startup corp's expansive cyberware ad campaign.

Initializing Status...

Putting the weird screen aside, for now. He tried again to reach the computer, "Epime..theus, stat..us."

Silence is the only thing that answered him. His mental calls were also left unanswered. The screen still was annoyingly in his vision. Which seemingly understanding his annoyance vanished. 'Probably some system rebooting in the cyberware.'

With measured motions, Dimitri was able to push himself up from his position. Much of the pain having disappeared. His ruptured organs and damaged muscle had knit themselves mostly back together. The lingering pain occasionally still shot through his extremities as nerves reconnected. Dimitri's usually very calm visage changed dramatically, rage billowing into his eyes as he lashed out. His fists turning a broken control panel into little more than a hunk of scrap metal. His chest rising and falling heavily. He tried to slow his breathing, trying to get his emotions under control. The cuts and lacerations on his fists gradually closed.

"It's not the time for this." Dimitri let out to no one after his final deep breath. "I would personally love to wring the neck of whatever executive thought that investigating random space anomalies was a good idea on a mission like this."

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

'Not that he is still alive anyways. Even from the grave they still find ways to torment me.'

Shaking his head, he made his way to the doorway to the rest of the ship. He mentally tried to reach through his cyberware to open the door. It remained stoically still, however.

'Typical'

The control panel to the left of the door is unlit, dead as the rest of the ship. Dimitri put the rising dread down in his being and got to work quietly, trying to open the door manually.

'There should be some access panel around here somewhere.' Dimitri ran across a small gap while running his fingers along the wall. Which denoted the panel's start. With a small push, the access panel popped open. Inside was a simple mechanism to open the door with. Antiquated to everything else on the ship but as he knew well. Sometimes the antiquated was the best solution.

After a few turns of the mechanism, the door parted open. Unveiling the dim hallway leading toward the stern of the ship. Dimitri leaned himself up in the doorway and stopped to take stock of the situation. The first thing he had to do was to get the power back on. Figuring out why the AI was off and where the hell he even was would come second.

'One thing at a time.' With some form of a plan forming in his mind, Dimitri walked down the hallway, one of his hands gliding along the wall to help keep his balance. Surprisingly past the bridge and into the corridor, there was a rather stark change. The destruction seemed limited to the bridge. To the degree of absolutely destroyed, that is. The corridor, although dark, was mostly untouched by the anomaly. Its starkly white sterile walls were seemingly spared from destructive waves of pressure. It remained mostly untouched except for a few deep furrows into the walls and floor.

The corridor stretched the ship's length, relegating this upper deck to the bridge and crew quarters. Dimitri's room was towards the back of the ship, as far from the bridge as reasonably possible. Being the sole crewmember meant he probably should have been closer to the bridge. Yet, a small part of him enjoyed being awake as long as possible when the AI woke him up. The dreams he seemed to go through any time his eyes were closed were something he wanted to avoid as long as possible.

About halfway down the corridor was the lift he needed. His destination is several levels down. Doors were on both sides of the corridor. Leading to similar cabins to his own. Yet, they stood empty. As barren as the day the ship was commissioned.

Dimitri arrived at the lift and got to work, opening it like the last door.

The lift was obviously dead, but with some finagling once inside. Dimitri opened a service hatch leading into the elevator's shaft. He was currently at the highest level of the ship. The engineering deck was several levels below where he was now. Swinging his way through the hatch, he grasped onto a ladder recessed into the shaft's wall.

'Thankfully, there is a ladder. It would be a bit troublesome to free-climb my way down.'

Though Dimitri had to admit it would have been a good bit of exercise, though troublesome. Working his way down, he arrived at the engineering deck. Having passed by several levels of storage and the lab deck. The gate to the engineering deck opened up easily enough. This time much of the interior did not match the other levels. Gone was the almost sterile environment. Replaced with bare pipes and electronics running along the walls. Panels for engineering officers to manage every little part of the ship's internal workings.

Thankfully, just like the corridor outside the bridge and the rest of the ship so far, the engineering deck had been spared from the worst of the anomaly. A few broken pipes and wiring denoting some sort of instance of the waves had occurred here, but this level had been saved the worst.

Dimitri took in the damage as he continued through the engineering deck toward the reactor. Some of the repair drones controlled by Epimetheus would take care of it once he got the power back on. 'The damage is at least not extensive.' This, however, was starting to gnaw at his mind. Frankly, Dimitri had a hard time understanding why he was needed at all on this mission. Humanity is pushed to the brink by machines and our own greediness. And here we are again, still suffering from those same mistakes. An executive long dead, too greedy for his own good. All for what? Almost putting an end to humanity for what? Some piece of data on whatever the hell that was. Dimitri really doubted that it was worth the risk.

Dimitri's mind wandered to the colony whenever it was established. Humanity should be able to start with a clean slate. The keyword there was should. The whole idea of the colony was to use frozen embryos to kickstart a colony. The care and education were supposed to fall to AI and robotics. While he was supposed to act as caretaker and the human element. Something Dimitri could only scoff at. He was more of a caged animal than a human. Though Dimitri had to admit he wasn't the first choice. He was the Only choice. His fists began to clench repeatedly as he thought of the past and the damnable AI teaching. His breathing became more and more erratic before finally calming down. Putting the thoughts of the AI and future colony from his mind.

'I am no teacher.'