Beneath Burning Skies
Posted on Thu Oct 23rd, 2025 @ 1:14pm by Lieutenant Junior Grade Jack Hunter
Edited on on Fri Oct 24th, 2025 @ 4:58pm
1,308 words; about a 7 minute read
Mission:
All Our Yesterdays
Location: Passenger Transport Shuttle Cyclops
Timeline: 5 Hours Before Arrival at Empok Nor
Jack Hunter settled into his window seat on the Danube shuttle transport Cyclops. He watched as the Aquarius gradually became a small blue dot against the vast canvas of space. The hum of the shuttle’s engines was steady and comforting, and the gentle vibration through the seat made him feel at ease.
As the shuttle went into high warp, he pulled out his dataPADD and began to review files that had been sent to him regarding the USS Pioneer. Engineering files, personnel profiles, etc. All was available to him.
After a while, Jack found it harder to focus. The words on the screen began to blur together, and his eyelids grew heavy. He placed the dataPADD down on the empty seat next to him, right next to his duffle, and leaned his head back against the seat. The endless stars outside the window seemed to pull him into a state of relaxation, and before he knew it, sleep overtook him.
A few moments later, Jack awoke, jolted by a violent shudder that rocked the shuttle. The hum of the engines had turned into a deafening roar, and the cabin was filled with the sounds of alarms and the shouts of panicked passengers. He instinctively reached for his seatbelt, secured it tightly as the shuttle lurched again, this time more violently. Looking out the window, he saw that they were plummeting toward the surface of a planet. It was a planet he didn’t recognize. The shuttle’s descent was uncontrollable, the ground rushing up to meet them at a terrifying speed. The atmosphere now began to touch the nacelles. Sparks and fire started to surround them like a violent fire ready to engulf… hungry.
He looked toward the surface again and this time the ground was almost upon him. Hunter’s heart pounded in his chest as he braced himself for impact.
BOOM.
The crash was brutal. The shuttle slammed into the ground, the force of the impact throwing him forward against the seat in front of him. The seatbelt broke and Jack fell in between his seat and the seat in front of him. Jack then turned so he could see across the shuttle and saw bodies scattered throughout the cabin. Blood everywhere. Metal groaned and twisted around him, and the cabin began to fill with smoke.
For a moment, everything was a blur of pain and noise. Jack struggled to free himself from between the chairs. His ears ran, and he was disoriented. He finally managed to free himself, get up, and head outside through the one exit that hadn’t been damaged.
When he stepped outside the scene around him was one of utter devastation. The shuttle was in ruins, pieces of it scattered across the landscape. A few survivors, some injured and bloodied, had managed to also escape the wreckage and were huddled together on top and at the base of a nearby hill above the wreckage site. Hunter made his way toward the group. As he reached the top of the hill and joined the others, the sight that he saw sent a chill down his spine.
Below was a city. If it could still be called that. The buildings were crumbling, many of them on fire, and the streets were teeming with hideous, mutated creatures. They moved in jerky, unnatural ways, their twisted forms illuminated by the flames. It was as if they had crashed into hell and found the army of demons ready to invade the mortal plane.
Just then, as Hunter and the others were shocked, in awe, and otherwise perplexed at where they were, and how’d this all happened in the first place, one of the creatures, a larger and more grotesque than the others, spotted the group of survivors on the hill. Its eyes glowed with an unnatural light as it let out a roar, its gaze locking onto them.
“Run!” someone shouted, and the survivors scattered, fleeing in all directions.
Jack saw the survivors fleeing. The direction ahead of them was nothing. It was just open, barren, and flat. Going in that direction was suicide. He took his chances and turned back to the shuttle, the only one to do so.
Jack made his way back inside the wreckage for any sort of protection. He moved around trying to avoid bodies, fire, and debris when suddenly the hull bucked and crashed inward as of the monsters crashed through the wreckage, sending twisted metal and flames flying in all directions. Jack fell back and his left foot was caught on a piece of debris as he stumbled.
The creature was on him in an instant, its rancid breath hot against his skin as it bared its jagged teeth. Jack looked around for anything to grab on to defend himself but no luck. The creature loomed over him, ready to strike. And then, out of nowhere, time stood still as a voice cut through chaos.
“Jack.”
Jack turned his head left and right to find the source but couldn’t find anyone. He finally looked up and saw him. A figure he was all too familiar with. It was his identical brother, William. William stood over the creature as if he was its master controlling it. A sentinel in the night protecting its sovereign. William looked just as he did the last time Jack saw him, a little over ten years ago, on the day they fell out and never spoke again.
William’s eyes were calm, tranquil and focused as he gazed into Jack’s eyes. There was a solitude, an isolation in those blue eyes.
He spoke once more. “Jack…come find me.”
William closed his eyes softly and faded away like he was sand in the wind.
Then, Jack woke.
His eyes snapped open, his breath ragged. The shuttle was still cruising smoothly through space, he was still in his seat, the dataPADD still on the empty seat next to him, right next to his duffle.
The stars outside the window are just as tranquil as they had been before. It had all been a dream. A vivid, terrifying dream. He could still feel the remnants of panic through his veins, his heart pounding in his chest. He took a deep breath, running a hand over his face and hair to wipe away the cold sweat that had gathered there. The dream had felt so real, so immediate. He glanced around the cabin, saw that the other passengers were calm, some of them sleeping, others quietly reading. No one else seemed to have shared his nightmare.
Jack leaned back in his seat, trying to shake off the lingering unease. He couldn’t afford to let his mind play tricks on him. Not now. He needed to be focused, alert, ready.
Jack grabbed the dataPADD and tapped it as it revealed the time. The dream ate up a few hours of his trip. As he looked out the window, he saw an increase in ship and smaller craft flight activity.
The shuttle’s intercom crackled to life, the pilot’s voice coming through with a calm announcement.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we’re on final approach to Empok Nor. Please ensure yourselves and your belongings are secure and prepare for docking.”
The shuttle made its descent smoothly toward one of the docking bays and secured itself. The passengers began to prepare themselves for disembarkation.
Jack took a deep breath and was glad to stretch his legs and get a bite to eat.
As he got up from his seat and grabbed his duffle, he heard it again. An echo within his ear canal,
“Jack…come find me.”
A Post By
Lieutenant Junior Grade Jack Hunter
Assistant Chief Engineering Officer, USS Pioneer
RSS Feed