A Call From Across The Universe (ONC Entry)

Chapter 01

"All available Viper Units, respond." A muffled, static-filled voice in my head roused me from my slumber. And yet all I saw was darkness, was I still dreaming? Had my eyes been damaged? Wait, no. That's not right. I think my helmet's circuitry is just shorted out.

A status bar appeared in the center of my vision: "Optical Error Code 31: Visual Feed Corrupted. Running Diagnostics and repair..." I felt like this part may have been a design flaw in the suit. It might've been quicker to just take the helmet off, but either I'd been struck by a sudden case of sleep paralysis or my suit's servos were also being rebooted.

"Yeah, now that I think about it, this enviro-suit definitely has a few design flaws. First thing I should do is ditch this cheap garbage, TerraNovus brand suits suck so much. I mean, they're cheap but... I'm basically frozen stiff while this thing is running a diagnostic. I guess I should be thankful that I'm not dead yet but still..."

"Don't freak out."

As I complained about my suit's design philosophy and started humming the theme of a competing brand, my suit's visual feed had resumed and almost immediately I felt the icy grip of dread clench around my heart.

In place of the dark void of unconsciousness. was a world of snow and ice, and a long, deep chasm which stretched out before me, threatening to pull me down below. The only thing that defied the laws of gravity which would've ensured my untimely death at the bottom of an icey abyss... was the seatbelt of my ship's cockpit.

"To all surviving Viper Units," the voice in my head had returned once more, "the expeditionary force has made landfall. Regroup with the nearest unit, or make way to the landfall coordinates. Stay alert, enemy forces may still be in the area. You are advised not to engage. Proceed with extreme caution, further orders will follow. This message will repeat."

Within my field of vision, information cascaded down, a set of coordinates. This information wasn't part of my suit's specs, these were my own personal augmentations.

"An augmented-human using a full-body enviro-suit? Isn't that like putting a hat on a hat?"

No. It's nothing like that. I mean, I just have a few modifications to my body for convenience. I am a freelancer after all. It's not nearly as bad as some other people who blur the line between man and machine. Besides, I've had these visual augmentations for nearly three years now, and I still haven't gotten used to it.

I took a deep breath, I may not seem like it, but I was actually quite terrified. Fortunately, another augment was suppressing my instinct to panic... for now.

"The second you start panicking in a situation like this, you've already signed your death warrant."

Right. So. Focus. I need information.

"Where am I?"

"How'd I get here?"

"Am I injured?"

"What happened?"

"Where's the rest of my squad?"

A brief survey of my surroundings told me that I was in the cockpit of, what was left of, my starfighter. Which happened to also be hanging over an icy cliff. In a blizzard. With no one else around. The dead silence of the machinery in the cockpit, and my futile attempts to turn it on, told me that the ship was in no state to fly either. Kinda sad actually, I hadn't even flown one mission with this new bird, and it's already had its wings clipped. There's something tragic about that.

Considering the damage to my ship and the fact that this model of starfighter is not really known for docking at this angle, or over a cliff, or in the middle of a blizzard; I could guess that I was most likely in a battle. Then again, that burned metal smell is probably a good indicator of that as well. Oh right, and the person on the other end of the line did mention that earlier.

I gave myself a quick pat down, my suit was fine and may be the only reason I'm still alive, even if the suit is pretty cheap. A diagnostic of my vitals (thanks to my other set of augments, I swear I don't have a mod-addiction) indicated that I didn't have any major damage. Although, curiously, it did note an anomaly in my brain scans. Seems like my memory recordings have been damaged along with-

"Wait, no, which memories in particular?!"

Frantically, I scrolled through my memory files. It wasn't unlike a holographic projection of files and folders laid out in front of me as I swiped my hands in the air. Several files were now broken and were in need of repair, with any luck they could be recovered but there were a few I didn't want to ever lose.

A file, labeled, "Violet." I opened it up, and I saw her face. Instantly, I felt relieved as I stared back into the eyes of a beautiful woman, she had more augments than I did but even though there was a huge part of the population who felt augments were unnatural, she made it work. She was augmented from head to toe, but you couldn't tell that just from a quick glance. Her eyes though. Her blue eyes with a touch of indigo... those were her most striking features. The files were fine, all of them. I could lose a limb, my name, everything else... except these. They were-

"Focus."

No time for a trip down memory lane, I could think about Violet later. Right now, I needed to focus on getting out of this.