Chapter 1

He woke up with his alarm clock blaring, an annoying high pitched alarm that could drive anyone mad. He told himself, once again, that he needed to get a new alarm clock, but he knew he would forget later anyway. a He got dressed in his usual work attire,a dark navy blue uniform bearing the TEC logo, a triangle with the letters TEC inside it. His name was Jason Woods. He was the Superintendent of Security. He touched the holographic panel to open the metal shades on the window. His room looked out into the vast empty void of space, the planet Ares 4 taking up much of the view. The space Station he lived on, The New Horizon, had been built orbiting the newly colonized planet as the new headquarters to the Tritec Extraction Corporation, a massive mining company specializing in deep space mining.
He touched the holo panel next to his door, and the heavy metal door slid open into a hallway. He made his way to the tram, just as it arrived. and got on board. The New Horizon had a massive tram system to allow access to all decks of the station. After only about a 2 minute tram ride, he arrived in the security sector. He walked out of the tram, heading towards the security office.
“Hey Jason!” Somebody said, joining him as he walked into the station. It was Thomas, Jason’s friend who also worked in security.

“How was the weekend? You resolve the issue at the business wing?”
“Finally got it all taken care of, they wouldn’t believe me when I told them the radiation from the Gravity generators was harmless. Once people have an idea in their head, they won’t let it go. Finally convinced them though and they promised the vandalism would stop.”
“That’s good.”
They arrived at his station. Another voice spoke out from behind them.
“Hey Woods, Tom.”
“Hello Jade,” Jason responded.
“You know, I was thinking, we really haven't been able to hang out in a while, you know? I was thinking we could all go out to dinner tonight?”
“Sure, I don’t have any plans.” Jason said
“Me neither.” replied Tom
“Alright then, meet you at the Grand Plaza later after work and we can decide where you want to go.” With that, she walked back to her security station.
“Well, I’ve got work to do as well, so, talk to you later” Thomas said as he started to walk away.
Just then, another female security officer, Miranda, spoke up.
“Superintendent Woods, we have an unidentified craft entering New Horizon’s airspace at dangerous speeds. They haven’t responded to any attempts to communicate.
“Let me check the radar.” he said. He selected a choice on the security holographic panel, and a radar came to life. Sure enough, there was a blip on the radar coming steadily towards the station. He opened a communications channel to the ship.
“This is Jason Woods, Superintendent of Security at the New Horizon station, come in.”
Nothing.
“Could their communications apparatus be damaged?” someone asked.
“No,” Jason responded, “the comms channel has connected to their ship successfully.”
He tried again.
“This is New Horizon Security, slow your speed immediately and respond.”

Again, nothing.
You could now see the ship through the window in the control room. It was a large ship, big enough to cause substantial damage if it collided with the station...
“They’re going to crash into the station!” Jade cried out.
He tried again, this time sounding slightly panicked.
“This is New Horizon Security, slow your speed immediately or we will be forced to consider your intents hostile.”
Once again, no response.
The ship was approaching fast now.
“Dammit, respond or we will be forced to destroy your ship!”
There was nothing but static.
“Maria, activate the mass drivers and prepare to fire!”
“Yes, sir” she responded as she went over to the defence systems panel.
“Come in, now!” He was definitely panicked now, as was most of the staff of the room.
“Carl!” he said addressing an officer in the room, “issue a level 5 alert to the station. Alert everybody to stay out of any large, open areas like the mess hall and plazas, you know what I mean.”
“Got it sir, on it right away” he replied.
Alarms began to blare within the station. The alarms didn’t go off in the security room so the officers could still communicate without the noise.
“Are the cannons ready?”
“They’re not responding!” Maria replied.
“Damn it!” Jason yelled
“Let me see if I can get it.” He ran over to the panel and started frantically selecting options on the screen.
“What the hell!?!” He was in a state of complete panic now, but slowed down to think a minute.
“Okay, he said, I have an idea” He selected some more settings on the panel as fast as he could.
“It’s almost on top of us!” Somebody yelled.
“Got it!” Jason called out. “I had to restart the system.” The cannons began to activate.
By now the room was in a complete panic. He could only imagine this was the state of the entire station.
“Open Fire!” Jason yelled and the Mass Driver Cannons began to fire at the incoming ship. But it was already too late. The entire station shuddered violently, and everyone was knocked off their feet. Almost all of the security panels turned a deep red color, indicating malfunctions. When it all stopped, everyone remained still for a moment. Lights in the room were flickering. The ship had collided directly into the station.
“Everybody okay” Jason asked.
“I’m alright” Jade responded.
“Me too.” Someone else said. This went on until everyone was accounted for.
“How is air containment in the damaged portion of the ship?” Jason asked.
“I’m reading massive damage in the residential sector, but air containment appears stable.”
“Good. Jade, Anthony, grab a PACS and a rifle, we’re going to see what the hell just happened. Send in a team to search for survivors.” A personal air containment suit (PACS) is a suit that allows air to enter, but automatically seals when entering a vacuum. They walked over to the supply closet, each grabbing an assault rifle and putting on a PACS. They opened the metal door into the hallway and began to make their way towards the tram. The station had more doors than necessary in the hallways and each room had a door capable of sealing itself in case of an air containment emergency. People were wandering around looking confused and scared. We stopped a few times to assure everybody they would be okay. We finally reached the tram station.
“Great. The tram system’s offline.” Ryan said.
“We’ll have to follow the tracks.” The tram systems are designed so the rails are on the wall of the tram tunnel, allowing access to the bottom of the tunnel without harm from moving trams above them. They climbed down into the tunnel and began to make their way towards the residential sector. It was about a ten minute walk in the tunnel. When they got to the residential sector, they climbed up the ladder onto the tram system. There were still a few people wandering around, but it was mostly empty. They left the tram system and headed towards the Grand Plaza. They finally made it to the large metal double doors leading into the Grand Plaza. They were now locked due to the automatic air containment system. The Grand plaza was an incredibly large area, consisting of a large circular room with a fountain in the middle of it. But the reason it was so impressive was the height of it. It spanned 100 floors up into the residential sector, the cylindrical walls consisting of balconies from apartments.
“Ready?” Jason asked.
They both nodded their heads. He unlocked the door and opened it. The air from the hallway they were in instantly left the room as it was vented into the Grand Plaza. They walked through the doors into the plaza.
“Holy-” Ryan started.
“Oh my god.” Jade interrupted.
The damage was immense. The ship had smashed directly through the plaza walls about 75 stories up. Debris from the crash was strewn everywhere. Steel beams and pieces of twisted metal lay on the floor, crushing the fountain in the middle of the plaza. Jason wondered what could have caused the ship to lose control like it did. Or, was it terrorism? No, he thought, this was an inefficient way to attack something. It would have been considerably cheaper just to bomb the station. Maybe they had abandoned the ship for some reason? They would soon find out, he thought.

The PACS had automatic gravity boots that allowed the user to cling to surfaces in zero gravity, as well as small jets in a metal plate by the anke that allowed for controlled flight in zero gravity as well.
“Let’s see if there’s an access hatch into the ship from here.” Jason said. “Thomas, this is Jason in the Grand Plaza, can you shut off the gravity here?” A moment of silence, and then
“You want zero G in the Grand Plaza? Give me a sec. How’s the damage in there?”
“The Plaza is destroyed, along with several apartments as well. I don’t know if anyone’s hurt, but medical will be on that soon enough.” he replied.
“Okay, gravity is now deactivated.” Tom said. As he said this, the gravity in the room shut off, and pieces of debris started to gently float in the room. The team’s gravity boots held them in place.
“Thanks Tom, I’ll contact you later if we can get into the ship from here.”
“Ready to jump?” he asked.
“Ready.” Jade replied.
“Yeah, me too.”
He and the others jumped up off the floor of the plaza and towards the ship 75 floors up. He was careful to use the jets to keep himself in control from crashing into the floating debris. After a 15 second flight, they reached the ship, clinging onto it using the gravity boots.
“Hey, look!” Jade called out. “It’s the TEC logo!”
“Hmmm,” Jason thought. “This is a company ship.”
“Well, where do you think it came from?” Ryan asked.
“No idea, we weren’t expecting anybody.”
“Look,” Jade said, “here’s an access hatch.” Sure enough, there was a circular doorway on the side of the ship. Jason was trying to figure out where the ship could have come from. They hadn’t been expecting anybody, so why was it even here, let alone crashed into the ship? He was very curious to go inside and figure it out. They used the panel next to the door to open the exterior access hatch. This led them into an airlock. The door closed behind them, and air filled into the small room from vents in the wall. The interior airlock door activated, and they walked into the ship.

Chapter 2
The hallway inside the ship was mostly dark, most of the lights were broken and the ones that remained were flickering on and off.
"the control room will be this way" Jason said The trio walked through the corridor toward the cockpit. In places, the wall wa buckled, wires jutting out, some sparking as they made contact with the metal wall.
"Wait, do you hear that?" Ryan asked.
"What?" jason responded.
"Not sure, but I definitely heard something. Sounded like it was coming from behind the wall."
"Well, keep an eye out for anything."Jason said. He didn't say it, but he had a bad feeling about the ship. They followed the hallway through several more doors until they reached the double doors leading into the cockpit. He knocked on the door loudly.
"Hello? Open up, this is security." as he expected, no answer.
"Ready your rifles, I'm opening the door." he selected the open option from the holo pad next to the door, and the door slid open.
"Oh my God!" Jade exclaimed.
"Holy s***!" Ryan also yelled out. Jason was stunned by the bloodbath in front of him. Three, or maybe four bodies lay mangled in front of him. He couldn't even tell how many there for for sure. Blood was splattered all over the walls, and a lot of it. The. Bodies were missing limbs, and thief torsos were cut to shreds. He thought he was going to be sick.
"What the hell happened here?" Jason asked.
"Well, no wonder why they wouldn't stop the ship. " Jade said.
"Okay, Ryan, contact security and tell them what's going on here. Jade and I will try to find out where the hell this ship came from. Ryan left the cockpit to contact security. Jade and Jason went over to the control panels.
"Okay, according to these reports, this ship, the Stargazer, is an executive shuttle from the TEC class A mining vessel, the Elysium.
"Ryan!" he called.
"Yeah?" Ryan answered back.
"Tell security to contact the TEC ship the Elysium. That's where this ship came from."
"Got it." he said.
Jason just had a thought.
"If these people were murdered, the murderer would still be in the ship. Let's get the hell out of here and seal it up for now. We can get a team to check to out later."
"God, you think?" Jade asked. "I didn't even think out that."
"Ryan, let's go, we're getting out of here." he said. They left the same way they had come in , jumping back down to the floor of the plaza, and leaving the plaza altogether.
(All I wrote so far, how is it?)