Story Concept: UNTITLED - Prt 2.1

FOREWORD: This is the sequel of the first part of UNTITLED. This ends in the middle of it, since it's not yet done (obviously). Basically same as the first one but aimed to explain some things and sort of try to conclude the story (which doesn't happen here). You might find some bloopers and continuity...

VISUAL

VOICE LOG – Eng. Raymond Wilson

::: ENTRY #1 - 735 hrs – (Monday)

Starting a new log. Figured I’d just start a new one for the mission ahead.

It’s been four months since we left Earth. I have to say I don’t really know why I signed up for this; Tight spaces, bad food and occasional attacks of claustrophobia… Although it’s good money…

We now have a visual of the ship. God, it’s huge! Even from this distance you can tell…
They won’t tell us what kind of a ship it is. All of the maintenance staff are to stay onboard Prius. I wonder what happened to Scientia? Obviously there’s been some kind of an emergency but this is not a rescue mission. They only sent a couple of dozen soldiers for a ship this big and no medical vessels. They’re clearly after something specific, not looking for survivors or anything like that. It’s not an investigation. No matter what is officially said in my mission report. “Investigation KCF/323m” it says.
The engines on Prius are working great. Had a glitch in flow circuit 7 but I just replaced it. It’s practically a new engine so there are no major conflicts to expect, unless they made a cheap version of it…
The ETA is 8:00am and we are to dock with Scientia at 8:12am. I’m to overwatch the docking process, make sure the machinery works for it, which it does…
Procedures...

::: ENTRY #2 - 802 hrs -

So, we’re closer to Scientia now. Just arrived to the ship and it sure is big. We have started the docking procedure and will make contact in about ten minutes.

::: ENTRY #3 - 810 hrs -

Contact. Now I’ll get back to other things.

::: ENTRY #4 - 822 hrs -

I think the receptor is loose on transistor 3. Having a look at it. Just logging that to the main maintenance network system…

::: ENTRY #5 - 845 hrs -

Fixed receptor and circuit control #243 for the coolant.
Note to self: wear gloves next time!



::: ENTRY #6 - 915 hrs -

I’m going to head up to the main deck and have a look at the door for mission operations… This, just to see if I can pick up on the status of the mission…

::: ENTRY #7 - 943 hrs -

Damn it! We had some kind of an explosion! I can’t get to engine room #2. The door for the corridor is all wrecked and I think the Fire door further in is shut. I could get there through the maintenance tunnel but if there’s a fire it may very well have spread to the tunnels, not to speak about the gases that may have got loose. Need a protective suite. The system should kick in and automatically take care of the fire… It’s taking a while though… Better call Johnson…

::: ENTRY #8 - 1055 hrs -

The system took care of most of the fire and the gas. Johnson had to manually cut one of the gas valves. Rick got hurt in the explosion. Still trying to figure out what caused it. I have left reports to command, they haven’t answered yet. I think they have their own worries. They seemed a little stressed in the MC right before the explosion. Maybe they messed up and caused it somehow?

::: ENTRY #9 - 1209 hrs –

This is what’s going on; We had a failure in the power core. We lost about 75% of the main power that runs the engines and the coolant for the engines. I’m not worried about the coolant being down since the engines aren’t running. The engine cores will stay stable, as long as there isn’t a leak… We’ve all scrambled all over the place to sort this mess out. No one has any idea how the hell the power core went down. Jackson and his guys are still looking into it. He said he didn’t understand it, that all was running perfectly. It was like a sudden peak but he didn’t know how that could happen.
So, Prius is down for the moment. We are able to launch shuttles in case of a really bad day (which this seems to turn out to become) and defend ourselves with a couple of turrets. We won’t have any main weapons or be able to fly away from here at this moment.
Command won’t tell us much more than ‘just deal with it’ and to make sure we get things running soon. They seem very worried.

::: ENTRY #10 - 1237 hrs -

Command is quiet. I asked them if they get a signal from the Engine SCT several times. They don’t answer. Jackson also tried to contact them and went up there when he didn’t get an answer.

::: ENTRY #11 - 1252 hrs -

Jackson’s not back yet. He hasn’t contacted us. He brought a radio and I’ve tried to hail him. No one is answering from the top levels. Something is seriously wrong. Some people are getting weapons. Some say they hear things in the pipes(???) It’s like a sudden freak plague of paranoia has hit the crew. A gas leak of some sort? Chemical experiment…??


::: ENTRY #12 - 1407 hrs -

People have started to disappear. Ben was supposed to go to the cargo bay and get a case of C-canisters. That was 20 minutes ago. It doesn’t take 20 minutes to get a case of C-cans. Ransom has been gone for an hour. No one knows where he was seen last. Some of the rookies are gone. People say they hear things, some even say they’ve seen stuff, ‘weird’ stuff. We’re too afraid to go out of the engine control room. We’ve pretty much sealed up the doors. It’s me, Johnson, Stewart, Pete and a rookie named Frederic in here. We’re all armed with handguns and a couple of shotguns. We’re not supposed to have access to these unless of an emergency, and the only one able to unlock the locker for us is Reston from Security. But no one knows where he is so we hacked the locks. We’re engineers and technicians after all.
Francisco and his guy’s locked themselves up in Core control. We have a comm. link with them and they’re seven people in there. Three of them armed (not including metal pipes and fists…).
We’re planning to make our way to the shuttle bay, which is closer than the rescue pods. Ben went that way and disappeared. We’re planning to disappear too but in a way that doesn’t leave people wondering what happened to us… alive…

::: ENTRY #13 - 1430 hrs -

WE have discussed and voted the possibilities. Everyone’s for getting a shuttle and scram. The things that we hear in the walls are… It’s just sick. I’ve heard them now too. It’s voices almost… And it’s a very…convincing feeling. I don’t know.
We’re heading for the Shuttle bay.

::: ENTRY #14 - 1505 hrs -

This is madness! It’s me, Francisco and the rookie left. People disappeared on our way here…just disappeared. I don’t know where. Pete suddenly ran off towards the Nacelle sections. Stewart ran off somewhere shortly after that. Gilligan who was with Francisco fell through the floor… The floor just gave up, crashed in and Gil went with it… and…
People have just disappeared.
We’re in shuttle control. There’s no power to the shuttle bay doors.

::: ENTRY #15 - 1514 hrs -

We were planning to route some power to the bay doors but the shuttle is all messed up. The control panels are wrecked. The only one we know was here was Ben, but why would he do something like this?

::: ENTRY #16 - 1530 hrs -

We met Ben. He… It wasn’t Ben. He was all bloody and… His face, his voice… Not him. Just a body with his name tag. What came over him? We shot him. We had to, he assaulted Fred, hurt him pretty bad. Fred’s still on his feet but his left arm is broken. The way Ben was acting, like a madman hungry for… blood… we had to kill him.
We are thinking about taking suits on and space walk our way to Command or in worst case to Scientia. It all started after we docked with Scientia… none of us wants to board that ship with all that’s happened. But we have to accept that option in case command is as messed up as the rest of the ship so far. If docking with Scientia makes this mess on Prius, what does Scientia look like? I don’t like any of our options one bit. By the looks of it we’re screwed. But we have to get out.

::: ENTRY #17 - 1548 hrs –

Got to the airlock with the suites. We were followed. The corridors were pretty dark. Loosing power in some sectors on our way here made things a little more…creepy. We heard something behind us and fired off a few rounds into the dark.
But we’re here now, all of us. Fred’s pretty bad. It’s gonna’ be painful to get him into a suite. I think we have to leave our weapons behind. We only have these cheap ‘eco-guns’; exposed to serious sub-zero temperatures pretty much makes them useless… It’s also too unpractical to try to carry them with us in space anyway.

DEAD LIVES

::: ENTRY #18 - 1625 hrs –

We had to get on Scientia. We discovered severe hull damage on Prius during our space walk and there’s no way that ship flies home. We also noticed a fire in Command. Saw bodies. One body scared the crap out of me as it almost hit me flying around in space. The freaky part is that it seemed like it tried to grab me. What kind of shit is that!? It was still moving, in space! It was not human. Couldn’t be.
We’re on the big ship now, somewhere in a medical section. I think this is level 15 or 16. We noticed earlier that Scientia still had power going for life support and equipment and this place is pretty lit up.
We’re trying to get some medical attention to Fred. We’re going to leave him in the Regenerator for five hours. That should sort his arm out.

::: ENTRY #19 - 1930 hrs –

Fred is healing extremely well. After only about an hour in the regenerator he said the pain was gone. The regenerator wasn’t able to do it’s thing for longer than about one and a half hours OR deploy painkillers so that’s a… Miracle? The arm is still all swollen and looking bad. We’re still keeping it in bandage to keep it still.
Francisco found some food in one of the counters, wheat crackers, cheese and some ‘spacy’ protein slabs that are on every space vessel in the verse. It’s not too much but we haven’t eaten for hours and we’re starving.

::: ENTRY #20 - 1957 hrs –

Fred randomly said; “This is not me” and mumbling something that I couldn’t understand. He needs a doc.


::: ENTRY #21 - 2010 hrs –

Francisco got hold of some weapons, a sub machinegun and a 8mm. We have limited amount of armament but it feels a little better to have something to defend ourselves with. Where are all the soldiers? They entered the ship not far from here. They have to be somewhere close…if they’re still alive.
I can’t help but asking myself; what happens if we stay on this ship for too long? I mean, the things that Happened on Prius has to come from here. It all started after we docked. We can hear scratching in the walls and in the pipes. And these ships don’t have rats onboard… if that IS rats, they’re big rats!
I think we’re gonna’ try to get some rest now.

We noticed during our space walk that this ship had several SCI-Modules between the nacelles that we didn’t notice when we approached with Prius. There are definitely labs on board. We are starting to guess that some kind of experiment went wrong. It would explain a lot. 23 marines and on huge science ship only points to some kind of ‘military-science-operation’…or something like that going on. Maybe they found something? …And the government wants it? I’m guessing…

::: ENTRY #22 - 2230 hrs –

Fred’s gone. Francisco and I fell asleep and Fred has disappeared. We both woke up to a loud rumbling, exploding noise and we can still hear rumbles and metallic noises around us.

::: ENTRY #23 - 2245 hrs –

It was Prius. Prius is gone. Something happened at the airlock and Prius got separated from Scientia. There’s a big-ass hole in the side of Prius. Some kind of an explosion, I’m sure. Damn it! What the fuck is going on? Maybe Fred became like Ben and… I don’t know…

::: ENTRY #24 - 2300 hrs –

We decided to find a way to anything that can take us out of here. We hacked into the secure networking system through a console. There wasn’t too much resistance in the system which is weird since this vessel has a high level security. We managed to download maps over the entire ship and again; this ship is huge. We are indeed on level 15 sector A. We know there’s a security complex right beneath us and we’re hoping to get some weapons from it’s armory since we have to make it through level 14 anyway to get to the shuttle bays and rescue pods. The computer told us that several corridors and passage ways are blocked off by rubble or fire indicating that there has been some amount of explosions or just someone really in a mood to wreck things…
We’re gonna’ make our way down through a hatch nearby. We still hear strange noises and we’re expecting trouble.
Let’s see where this is going…

::: ENTRY #25 - 2320 hrs –

Fuck this! We had to fight them. We thought we could get a better overview of the area from the streets… They’re everywhere! Fucking zombies and… We don’t have any ammo left. We locked ourselves up in a toilet in the Sec offices. I have a fire extinguisher as a weapon, Francisco a metal pipe…
We can hear them outside, slamming on the door… It’s just a matter of time til they get through.

::: ENTRY #26 - 2328 hrs –

We managed to get into the air-vent in the toilet. Crawled through to the main office of the security complex. Found a loaded assault rifle in the armory… It was open. There was a message written on the wall. “Try to launch the bots”. This sector has security bots. Metal walkers that can bring mayhem into any situation. A single one of them could clean the whole street out from those…things… if we manage to find one and activate it.

::: ENTRY #27 - 2340 hrs –

We just launched a bot. We had to take down a few of those things but we managed to get on the controls. The bot is making havoc throughout the corridor. Success! It doesn’t have unlimited ammo though.

::: ENTRY #28 - 0340 hrs –

I have been asleep. It has been a long time since I made a log entry. So many things are wrong here. It’s Tuesday now.
Me and Francisco managed to launch the bot with some effort. The bot created a massacre in the street. It was an ugly sight but the thrill of the success made it beautiful in a twisted way. I got into a sort of shock after I watched it a while. Francisco was paler than a dead guy… I have never seen that much blood. Something went wrong. Francisco and I went out on the streets, followed the bot heading for the Green Office Sector thinking we’d be safe. We still kept a decent distance because we were afraid that we’d get jumped by one of the zombies. The grund was slippery of all the flesh and the blood.
The bot turned on us. It just suddenly turned and started firing its’ guns at us. Luckily we were able to throw ourselves into cover without getting hit. We got into the Car Hangar to our right. We made sure the hangar door wouldn’t open. These bots can remotely open hangar- or some bay doors big enough for it to fit through sometimes. We didn’t really check its’ setting except for the guns when we launched it. There was another bot inside the hangar. We could hear its’ metal ‘feet’ wander around at the end of the hangar. We didn’t want to take any chances and just avoided it. It knew we were there because we could hear the bleeping signals it sounds when it detects something as a threat…which we interpreted as us being the threat, just to be safe. It was pretty dark inside the hangar, as on a lot of the rooms around here. It seemed at first that the streets were the only sections lit up. We had to sort of sneak our way through the hangar. We got to the back offices, which did have lights turned on (which made us feel a lot more comfortable) and there didn’t seem to be any zombies or bots around there. Got some food from the kitchen. We thought we were pretty safe around there. We had made sure that the doors to this area were shut and sealed and we didn’t have any trouble doing that. Francisco and I were eating in the dining when we heard an explosion towards the end of the corridor leading to the street from there. “The Bot”, Francisco said… We ran out and saw a swarm of zombies coming at us at the end of the corridor. We were just about to run back to the hangar when another explosion came from that direction and another swarm of Zombies poured in through the doors. They were everywhere. Some of them even seemed to come through the ceiling. Francisco let his assault rifle blaze up in full automatic bursts. But there was no chance he could take all of them. I told him to save his rounds and find somewhere to hide. We both ran back to the bar, got into the back room of the bar and tried to barricade the door. We could hear them coming. We could hear the bot closing in. “How did they get to the bot”, Francisco asked. I found a hatch for the air vents in the ceiling and we managed to climb into it right as the bot fired a grenade through the door we just sealed. The bot seemed to understand where we went and started firing at us, bullets raining through the walls of the ventilation tunnel walls. We crawled as fast as we could to get away. We did, amazingly with only a few scratches. But it wasn’t quiet for long. I was ahead of Francisco, he following me. I could suddenly hear him cry out some curse and start firing his gun. “What the fuck is that”, he shouted as he fired. I looked back and tried to see what he was talking about but he just pushed me and screamed “Just go, go man, run!”. I “ran” as quickly as I could through the tight vent tunnel. Francisco followed, firing his weapon, short burst pretty frequently. I could hear the thing he hit. Can’t really explain the sound. We came to a ventilation hatch and managed to close it. I didn’t get a glimpse of what was following us. “What was it”, I asked Francisco. “It… I don’t know”. He was almost our of breath. Looked more freaked out than I was. Right then, at that moment, whatever it was, burst through the wall of the vent got its’ teeth into Francisco. I kicked and beat it with all my strength I had left. It let go and Francisco was able to turn and fire off a burst into the thing. It looked like it had been a dog…or something like that. We didn’t really stay to investigate. Francisco seemed okay and we moved on, quickly. We could hear them chasing us behind us. We didn’t look back but kept our ears fixed on their noise to get an idea of how close they were. They were getting closer. We finally got to a room in the security area of the Central Access point. The door to the security office was open and Francisco was just behind me when he got jumped and dragged back by one of the creatures. Several of them just burst through the hole we just came from and jumped over him ripping him to pieces. I had no chance to save him. I knew he was dead. His guts were all over the place in a couple of seconds and I just hit the close button for the door right as one of the things launched itself at me ending up slamming into the ooor.
I am alone now. They’re all dead. And I don’t see how I wouldn’t face the same fate. Prius is gone. And this forsaken place is no place for anything living. I saw their eyes. There is no life in them. No soul. No cause. Just…death…cold…evil.
I’m inside this small security area. Found a key-card and a pistol, fully loaded. What help is that? What will it change?
I am going to see if I can get into the security system. I could use Francisco’s hacking device though. But I’m going to have to manage without that now, don’t I…?

::: ENTRY #29 - 0357 hrs –

I have access to the surveillance account. It’s on always in the sec offices. I can’t see a thing in the monitors. Nothing. Just corridors, rooms… Funny. Wherever I go I see these Half Lives and the monitors show nothing. The camera for the streets are all out. I bet they wreck them as they go… No, wait… They seem to shut off… Or…

::: ENTRY #30 - 0403 hrs –

Calming down…
I just saw someone running through a corridor on Level 15 in the lower conference rooms… Somewhere in sector 7 I think… Definitely not one of them… Human.

::: ENTRY #31 - 0414 hrs –

Just went through some logs from the crew of the ship hoping to find something. Put in some search words; “Zombie”, “specimen”, “Freaky”, “test subject”, etc. I found tonnes; Many of them not really mentioning anything about what’s going on but a “Samantha Ellis” stands out from the crowd. She is, or was, a scientist around in the labs. One entry says something about a failed test on “one subject”.

::: ENTRY #32 - 0419 hrs –

Found a bunch of weird log entries of a Larmen Croel. “I am note me”, “I am someone else now”, “Life is vain”… Only stuff like that. It seems like a lot has been deleted from the main data base. I have traces from entries and messages but nothing that I can rebuild in order to get the words out of the fragments. I should check PDA’s lying around here. They might contain valuable information.

::: ENTRY #33 - 0425 hrs –

Ok. Got into Samantha’s message log. Something was definitely going on. This a conversation log…

Quote:
>FROM: Samantha Ellis
>TO: Frank Reilly

I can understand that some of the things explained may not sound sane, but I can ensure you that these things HAVE to be dealt with very carefully. If we overlook a single detail we may find ourselves trying to clean up a mess bigger than last time. I hope you understand this and will take the procedures necessary in order to maintain the safety and order of these premises.

- Sam
>FROM: Frank Reilly
>TO: Samantha Ellis

I will look into it as necessary. I’ll take care of it. The chambers are safe. There is no way that they will open unless the operator opens them from the control room. The rest of it: leave it to me.

- F

- - - - - - - - - - - -

>FROM: Samantha Ellis
>TO: Dennis Craig

Make sure you send someone over to check the seals.
I told Terrance to check the feeding program again. I think they’re resisting…

- Sam

>FROM: Dennis Craig
>TO: Samantha Ellis

Sam, I checked the seals already. They’re fine. Have you noticed that they somehow seem to get into your head? I know this sounds a bit funny but… Sometimes I think they communicate.

- Dennis

>FROM: Samantha Ellis
> TO: Dennis Craig

Just don’t look too long. Do the things you have to do and observe them from behind a one-way window. That’s what I do.

The #4 GC-chip is causing glitches. Fix it… please…

- Sam

>FROM: Dennis Craig
>TO: Samantha Ellis

I don’t know… I can’t help it sometimes, but to just watch them as… Never mind, we’ll talk about it on lunch.

Derek fixed GC4.

- Dennis.

- - - - - - - - - - - -





>FROM: Frank Reilly
>TO: Samantha Ellis

We won’t lock the sequencer this time. We have discussed it with senior staff members and concluded that there won’t be any lack of safety if we keep the sequencer open and free. I know how you might feel about this but I can ensure you that it will be fine. We have gone through it several times through the simulator and the maths ad up perfectly. We will also double the security staff during the process to make things safer for the operators that including you.
I’ve let Terrance know about this and told him to ‘polish’ the feeding program (I think we’re up to version 9.1.2 now). His last program didn’t actually have any faults, it was just the machines that weren’t calibrated correctly that caused the mischief…
Please prepare chamber #14 for processing at 11 am tomorrow morning. Also put Lawrence on Sectioning. He has good experience in that.

- F

>FROM: Samantha Ellis
>TO: Frank Reilly

I really don’t believe that this is a good idea. We have all the time we need to do additional tests and simulations to make sure that everything runs perfectly. The hardware could be upgraded and Terrance can make a version 10 out of the program. Safety is first… you said it yourself.
These are the results from the last simulation:

[ information concealed ]

As you can see the test result is anything but perfect. If this will be the result from a real processing procedure we will have a serious situation at our hands.
Please tell me that you can rethink this. I know your position in all this and I know that we all have to do what you tell us, but that doesn’t mean that you might be wrong.

- Sam

>FROM: Frank Reilly
>TO: Samantha Ellis

Look, I know the results from the last test. I was there myself. Everything has been changed for this one. All the faults registered during the simulation have been dealt with and instruments upgraded to make sure they will withstand the reasons causing faults. The things we weren’t able to change we’ll just do it differently so that we don’t have to use a M-Trimmer. This will only have a minor effect on the final product, not mess with the procedure itself. The M-Trimmer was only there for the balance at the first place anyway, and we can compensate with the software without any problems.
I know it’s very marginal and all the smallest details have to be considered and handled with caution, but as I said, we went through it, and we have it figured out.
Just trust me.
It will all be new.

- F
:End quote.

Supports my ‘test-gone-wrong’ –theory.

::: ENTRY #34 - 0448 hrs –

I don’t know what to do. I have no idea. I’m tired.

::: ENTRY #35 - 0517 hrs –

I searched the database on ‘Frank Reilly’. It seems like there’s pretty valuable information in something called ‘The Vault’. I don’t know why I have to do this. It feels like I have a responsibility to somehow…solve this… I don’t know. I could get a hold of something in there. I just know that… That it’s important. It’s like someone is hiding something and if this ‘something’ is revealed to the public it will go down… And this feels important.
I don’t make sense anymore. Sometimes it feels like something is trying to get into my head. Like something is trying to force itself and take over me…

::: ENTRY #36 - 0525 hrs –

I went to the back office of this security area… The room that has an (now) open window to the Central Access point. They’re swarming around there. The window shield was closed so I opened it… And it didn’t take long before they started to beat and throw themselves at the window. It seemed that it would only take them a minute to get through so I closed the shield again and got back here. I won’t go that way. There’s a ladder shaft back there in a room closer… I looked down (stupidly) and didn’t see anything, just heard some noise and figured they’re probably there too and closed the hatch.
Seems like there’s only one way to go; The Vault. The map shows it’s just further down the corridor ‘east’ of here. it’s close. The thing is that it has a very tight security. I’d guess the security personnel are gone since they’ve been gone at every other place I’ve visited.

WHAT MATTERS MOST

::: ENTRY #37 - 0557 hrs –

I managed to get to the main doors with my key-card but the doors here didn’t accept the key-card. It really didn’t matter. The doors opened for some reason. With my gun ready I took a couple of steps back. I was certain that ‘they’ were there, getting through. A thousands of thoughts running through my head; Do they know how to operate door panels? They haven’t shown signs of that kind of intelligence before. Maybe they’re learning, or finding a way to use the brain of the bodies they possess? The passage way to the Vault Entry was fully lighted up. It was pretty much open and clear. Some barrels and crates piled up at the left wall. A computer terminal, small table, a couple of chairs and a coffee maker. I checked the ceiling, the floor, the corners… Nothing but a red arrow pointing down at the floor, drawn on a wall that was a part of another room merging out of the right hand wall. Slowly walking inside, really wondering what was going on. After a couple of steps the doors closed again. Had a really bad feeling…something telling me about a trap… I noticed the bay doors for the Security Bots on my right. Sealed=safe? Then the lights went out. Completely black. The adrenaline kicked in and I took a couple of leaps to my right where I’d just seen a wall of the corner of the first bay door. I could hear the bay doors open one by one and the famous metal steps starting to march towards me. Flashlight beams lighted up the area. Covered by the wall I stayed there knowing they were after me. But… The red arrow? I looked down right in front of me and saw a hatch left slightly open. It was a like a lid left a little on the side of the hatch… Took it off and jumped down. The Bots saw me or maybe figured out where I went. Could hear their machine guns rumbling and the bullets hitting the floor that I was crawling under. I just went for it, hoping that the hand drawn arrow was a good sign… I crawled…somewhere. Didn’t really pay attention of where I was heading. But I didn’t go far. Took a right at some point and found another hatch above me leading to lit up room… I listened, and tried to look around without touching the lid before entering. Seemingly a safe room I climbed up. Found myself inside a fully lit up, empty, security observation room with doors too small for a Sec Bot. There were two dead bodies however, giving me the creeps. There was an smg beside one of them. More guns. Nothing with enough punch to take out those Bots though. There was something funny about it. All the screens had a written message showing up; “Get upstairs”. ‘Well I’m pretty much on my way if I got it this far, eh…’, was my not-out-loud spoken answer.
There was a surveillance area with screens showing video surveillance covering the entire passage. The Bots standing, all facing towards where I was at. Obviously I was inside the Sec Area of the passage. The map on my PDA shows that there’s nowhere else to go, even though it doesn’t show a lot of those shafts I crawled through. The window shields were shut and locked, thank God. For some reason I actually thought about opening them…
The map ‘told’ me I needed to get to the lift at the end of the passage. There was a door at the end of the ‘SEC’. It was a short run, just a couple of leaps to the lift. But I didn’t know if it was down. If it was up I’d had to press the button and wait for it, giving the time for the Bots to get to me and ‘undo’ me. No way. Ok… I figured maybe I could find the controls for it in the SEC-room, and I did. I sent it down, got a look at it through the cameras and noticed there was a bunch of crates piled up on it. One of them happened to be a weapons crate with an ‘empty-and-to-be-processed’ stamp on the side. Conveniently… Cos’ these crates are pretty much bullet proof…sort of. So if I’d send it up and run to the lift and jump into the crate, maybe I’d manage to escape the Bots…? So, I made sure the security door in the SEC-room would open, testing it a couple of times, hit the ‘send up’ –button and ran our, launched myself, under fire, on the lift and tried to open the crate… It was locked. Empty and locked!? This lift was very slow, and one of the Bots got to the lift. I took cover behind the crate and the Bot opened fire. The pressure of the metal-spewing machinegun salvos started pushing the box and I actually had to struggle to keep myself on the lift. But I made it. I got a scratch from a bullet on my leg, but it’s nothing. I am upstairs now inside a small cleaning cabin to hide and rest… To calm down.

::: ENTRY #38 - 0612 hrs –

I fell asleep. With all the rush of the adrenaline and all the fear, I don’t understand how I could fall asleep. Only for a couple of minutes though. I woke up by a series of ‘bangs’ on the door to the cabin. Setting my SMG on full auto and my finger on the way to the trigger to fire a long salvo through the door I halted… “Get out! It’s safe up here… I think”. A human voice. A speech. Talking thing. I couldn’t really believe it. Couldn’t really trust my ears. “How do I know it’s…that you’re safe… Not one of them”, I asked. “Do you hear them have conversations?”, he replied. He did have a point there. But with all I’ve seen… My trust was gone. At the same time there was a sort of a thrill and a ‘grey joy’ inside me that I wasn’t alone anymore. I still waited, unsure, battling with my mind. Having my inside struggle. “Prove it”, I said. Then I heard gunfire. “If I wanted you dead, I could’ve fired through the door with this. Ok?”
I unlocked the door carefully with my weapon ready. I met a normal looking face, investigating it for a minute, just to make sure. “I know, this place makes me freaky too”, the man said. A soldier. “Probably one of the crew soldiers, not Marines or any United World military”, I thought. He had an emblem on his shoulder; the same symbol that is painted on the ship. “Jack”, he said and pointed on himself. “Ray”, I answered…
I asked him if he knew something about this. He didn’t. He assumed someone messed up. He said he had seen me through the security cameras in the surveillance room up here, that he just got here too and found the Bots act the same way. He also found it important to get to The Vault. He needs information. Won’t tell me what kind of information at the moment. He seems pretty distracted, like he’s thinking on a thousand things at the same time.
We’re here now in the surveillance room.