When Yarns finally woke up, his first thoughts were of home. Earth. His family. Whispers of his past drifted through his mind. His fifteenth birthday, when he and his mother had gone to Luna for the first time. His graduation at eighteen, and how proud he felt on the stage as he stared out into the crowd of family and friends. His time at the military cadet camp, learning marksmanship, map reading, and survival skills. He thought about how it all seemed so long ago, years, and sure, some of it was. But had it really been that long? His sense of time was deeply distorted.

  He rolled over on the emergency mat that Thomas had pulled out of the storage room for him. It was hard and thin, blue plastic covering an only moderately comfortable padding. His back hurt. Everything hurt, when he thought about it. Sitting up, his eyes, struggling to focus, lazily wandered around the room as his mind fully came to. He was on Sedna, that was right. Sedna, and here were his newfound friends, Shishone sitting off on his own picking at his fingernails with a knife, Allister and Yu talking with Thomas. He grunted and tried to stand, but his whole body was sore, and so he laid back down for a moment, just breathing.

  Life felt surreal to Yarns; at least, recent events did. It was almost as if he was in a dream – a nightmare, really – just wandering robotically from moment to moment, soaking in the horrors. He couldn’t even bring himself to shoot that thing in telescope center. It was as if his body simply wouldn’t obey him. And then, when those things had chased them, well, thankfully his body had listened then, at least. He held himself tight and rolled onto his side.

  Something told him he wasn’t making it out of this alive.

  Shishone caught his thousand-yard stare, and bent down to meet it. Yarns didn’t even register that Shishone was looking at him, lost in his own thoughts. When Shishone stood, some piece of Yarns’ brain picked up that the man was headed his way, but even then, Yarns continued to stare off into the abyss.

  Shishone crouched down beside him, before sitting down with a grunt.

  “You alright?”

  Yarns blinked, the fog starting to clear, if a little by force, and looked up at him and said, “I don’t know.”

  Shishone frowned and nodded sadly. “Yeah, same here. It’s been a lot.”

  “It has been,” Yarns said, curling tighter into himself, still spacey. “Do you think we’ll make it?”

  “I think we’ll make it back,” Shishone said, shrugging. “No promises from there.”

  Frowning, Yarns shivered. “I miss my family.”

  Something inside of Shishone softened deeply, some vulnerability exposed. He sighed, and said, “I do too kid. But that’s why we’re doing this, right? To get back to them?”

  “We won’t. We’re gonna die.”

  “Hey,” Shishone said, putting his hand on Yarns’ shoulder and giving it a squeeze, “that’s the thing about death, kid. You might think you’re gonna die at any given moment – but you don’t know you’re gonna die until it happens. So don’t stress it ok? We’re trying to get home, and that’s what counts right now.”

  Yarns pushed himself up onto his elbows, looking away. “I just have a bad feeling about this.”

  Now, Shishone laughed, truly amused. “Yarns, if you had a good feeling about all of this, I’d say you’d lost it. We all have a bad feeling about this.”

  He smiled at the kid, and Yarns, after a moment, met his gaze and smiled back. “Thanks Shishone. It’s been a real honor.”

  “Same to you,” he said. He patted Yarns’ shoulder. “Same to you. Now suit up, I think we’re about to make a break for it. Meeting in ten.”

  With that, he stood and stretched out, before offering Yarns his hand to help him up. Yarns took it and soon was on his feet, gearing up into his special operations armor. Shishone and the others were already armored up; there was no telling how long they had let Yarns sleep in, but no matter the time, he was thankful for it regardless. He had certainly needed it, restless as it had been.

  Once he clicked his armor into place, gloves on, chest plate sealed, greaves pulled up, he headed over to the group, who had taken up position near the corner of the room. Here they huddled by the door to the storage room. Thomas was talking.

  “For some reason,” he said, motioning for Yarns to join them, “the way the constructed the base here, many of the emergency hatches are in storage rooms, just like the one you used to get into the telescope room. Well, same goes for here. There’s a hatch at the back of the room through this door.”

  Shishone looked at the door, then to the door that led to the airlock and the rest of Sedna’s base. “That’s good to hear. Not like we could get out that way anyway.”

  Yarns’ eyes glazed over for a moment as he remembered the horde that was waiting for them on the other side of the blast door. He said, meekly, “Can they get us on the surface?”

  Shooting him an approving look, Thomas said, “Good question. They can, but they’re going to need to find a hole, first of all, and second, they’re going to need to find us. If we make a break for it with haste, we can make it off of this God-forsaken hellhole in one piece.”

  “There’s a problem,” Shishone said. “We need fuel.”

  Allister stepped up to be with Thomas, putting her arm around his, and said, “I already spoke about that with him. He says there’s fuel pellets aboard the Starfall, as well as liquid fuel.”

  “There is,” Thomas agreed, nodding. “We can hook up a hose to your gunship and refuel its liquid reserves while we move fuel pellets aboard my gunship, and we’ll link up in orbit and split them. Should be enough for a few jumps.”

  Yu shot him a questioning look with furrowed eyebrows and an intense gleam in her eye. “Your gunship? I thought you were stuck here.”

  “I was,” said Thomas. “There’s an NRT gunship aboard the Starfall. Just one. It’s meant for close air support, but there was no way it could make the jump back to Dysnomia with the distance. But Sedna seems to have been speeding up. We’re in range for both gunships to make it back now. And two is always better than one. I was close to suiting up and making a break for it myself, before you all showed up.”

  “How are we gonna transfer the fuel pellets in orbit?” Yarns asked. “We’ll depressurize both gunships if we do that. And I mean, is the Starfall even still pressurized anyway?”

  Thomas rubbed his chin in thought. “I think the gunship is. When we put down on Sedna, we sealed the hangar, as well as the crew cabin and the bridge. I haven’t touched it, so barring any accidents in the meantime, it should still be pressurized. I think.”

  “What about supplies?” Yu asked. “We went through a decent chunk of our foodstuff on the way over here. Could we resupply from the Starfall?”

  He looked at her and said, “We can. But we’ll have to be quick about it.”

  “Then we should split into teams,” Yu concluded. “Shishone, I think you and Yarns should work on refueling the Harbinger. Allister, maybe you could help me move some supplies aboard it too. And Thomas, if you could cover us, I think we could all get off Sedna with some semblance of safety.”

  Thomas smiled at her. “That’s a good plan, Director Solarum. Is everyone on board?”

  Shishone and Yarns both nodded, but Allister spoke up now, saying, “Who is going with who? I would like to go with my husband, if that’s alright.”

  Yarns looked at them both, and said, “That’s a good idea. I think we would all prefer to be with family right now, if we could be.”

  “So it’s settled,” Shishone said. “Allister and Thomas, you two go together. Yu, Yarns, you’re with me. Let’s get off this fucking rock.”

  “Aye,” said Thomas. “Is everyone ready? Everyone do a weapons check.”

  They all cocked their weapons, inspecting the barrels, ensuring they were loaded, and then, at Thomas’s go-ahead, they all filed into the storage room and walked to the back. Here a ladder led to a hatch in the ceiling, a small port which Yarns couldn’t help but find strange hope in. It represented a chance.

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  “This place is gonna depressurize when we open that thing,” Thomas said. “So grab onto something.”

  “That’s a stupid design flaw,” said Yu.

  Thomas shrugged. “You’re not really supposed to use it unless you have to. And if you have to, it’s safe to say there’s a reason. Now everyone grab a rung of the ladder and hold on.”

  They all did so, gripping tightly to the bars. Thomas then ascended the ladder, and grabbed the emergency lever, looking down at them. “Everyone ready?”

  The group all nodded, helmets on, weapons holstered. Seeing this, Thomas pushed up on the lever, and popped the hatch. It flung open with serious force as the air in the room was sucked out into the vacuum of space, flinging with it papers and cans and other detritus. It was as if a violent gale had ripped through the place, slamming them all against the wall with the fury of a hurricane as the air evacuated the command center with an angry whistle.

  But then, all fell silent. The air gone, the command center open to the depths of space, there was nothing left but quiet anticipation. Thomas climbed out and slung his rifle from his back, flipping his light on and looking around. Sedna’s surface looked like exposed muscle with the way the sinewy tendrils overlapped and spread across every inch of its surface. He kept a sharp eye out for any of the creatures, but, seeing no movement, he turned down and waved the rest of them up the ladder.

  One by one they climbed their way out of the base, and soon, they were all bounding and bouncing toward the large, dark, blocky shapes that were the Starfall and its sister ship. On the surface, free of the maze below, they were able to make it in good time, all unbothered by the horrible once-people that infested the ruins.

  Standing in the darkness, the lonely shine of the far away sun barely touching the surface of the planet, they took a moment to gather themselves at the base of the Starfall. Here, Yarns looked up at it, fully taking in the ship’s massive scale. It had to be the length of a football field and a half, and as tall as a three story building. Its seven landing feet were huge, dug into the vines though they were. It made the Harbinger, which was parked beside it, look like an ant.

  Thomas turned to them, saying over the shortwave, “Allister, Yu, come inside with me. Yarns, Shishone, there’s a fuel port near the ramp with an emergency siphon hose. Should hook up to your ship. Get on that, and let’s get out of here.”

  The two men nodded, and Thomas turned away. He walked up to the Starfall and pressed his wrist to a small port on the side of the underbelly of the ship, and at his behest, a ramp slowly yawned its way open, pushing down into the vine. Yu and Allister followed him as he walked up it, leaving Yarns and Shishone to siphon fuel.

  Shishone approached the ship, found the fuel port, and unhooked its covering with the manual release. Within was a long, retractable hose, a set of buttons, and the main fuel cap. He motioned Yarns over.

  “Take the hose,” he instructed, “and plug it into the underside of the Harbinger. There should be a cap near the wing, you’re trying to lock this part of the hose with the seal. You’ll have to twist it.”

  Yarns nodded, taking the hose and slowly crunching his way across the vine to the gunship. The hose was barely long enough; they’d set down some thirty yards away from the Starfall. Luckily, though, it just managed to reach. Yarns looked under the wing and found the port, unhooking it and letting the metal panel slowly flop open. There was a cap on the hole, which he removed, and then, he plugged the hose into the fuel port.

  After giving Shishone the signal over the radio, Yarns felt fuel begin to flow through the tube. It was viscous and thick, and would take a while to fully fuel the Harbinger, he realized to his dismay.

  As the ship fueled, Allister and Yu stepped off of the Starfall lugging crates in the low gravity toward the Harbinger.

  “Where’s Thomas?” Shishone asked.

  Allister responded, “He’s inspecting the gunship.”

  They carried the crates over to the Harbinger and set them down, Yu saying, “How are we gonna get these aboard?”

  “The airlock on the bottom,” Shishone said. “We’ll need someone inside the ship to do the transfer. Yarns?”

  Yarns nodded, before realizing that Shishone probably couldn’t see him. “On it.”

  He crawled under the ship, popping the airlock open, and then, inside, cycled it so that he could get into the ship proper. Thankfully it was still completely pressurized, though the air had grown even more stale.

  “Can we get fresh air in here?” he asked, sealing the airlock behind him.

  Shishone called out over the radio, “I think the O2 generators and carbon scrubbers will hold us just fine until we get back. We need to go soon, there’s not much time to do an air resupply."

  Disappointed, Yarns said, “Alright. Well I’m ready to start loading.”

  “Good. Yu, Allister, start loading crates into the airlock,” Shishone said.

  They did so, and Yarns began to cycle them into the gunship. One by one he loaded them, before Yu and Allister went back to get more. They were small crates, and easy to carry in the low g, so they were loading up pretty efficiently.

  Shishone said, “Yarns, check the fuel gauge in the cockpit.”

  He stood from the airlock door, sealing it after bringing aboard a few crates, and went to check the gauge. “Three quarters,” Yarns replied.

  “Good, I – oh fuck!” Shishone cried. “We need to go!”

  “What, what is it?” Yarns called back.

  “They found a hole. And they found us.”

  A cold sense of dread passed through Yarns as he understood. “What do we do?”

  “Yu! Get aboard the ship. Allister, get your husband out here, we’re gonna need him. Then you get aboard his ship. He and I will finish up out here.”

  Yarns headed back to the airlock and helped cycle Yu through it. She pulled herself into the ship from her prone position and sealed it behind her, looking at Yarns with fear in her eyes. He wanted to say something comforting, but truth be told, he felt much the same.

  They both rushed to the cockpit where, from the window, they could see Thomas rushing out from the Starfall’s ramp and ushering Allister aboard. Then, he and Shishone exchanged some hand signals, before they both shot a look toward the bow of the massive ship, and raised their weapons.

  Then, Yarns could see it. A horde, a massive, undulating grouping of those creatures, all crawling over each other angrily as though they were one living organism combining into a tidal wave of nightmares. Shishone began to fire his weapon, and so did Thomas, who backed up onto the ramp and waved Shishone to the Harbinger.

  Firing at the creatures did little to stop them. A few fell from their ranks, and they slowed a bit, though it was insignificant in the grand wave as the horde continued to climb over the sinew of Sedna toward them. Shishone leapt with each step, hurrying toward the gunship.

  “We need to let him in,” Yarns said, turning to Yu. She nodded, and they both hurried to the airlock hatch, waiting, hoping.

  Shishone called out, “Yarns! There’s an underbelly turret. Get on it!”

  “But!”

  “Now soldier!”

  Yarns shifted, unsteady, but looked to Yu who said, “Go. I’ll let him in.”

  Then, he hurried to the cockpit and sat in the gunner’s seat, spinning up the system just the way Shishone had taught him. The underturret was controlled by a small thumbstick on the controls and had a camera on it that fed right to the center screen on the console. It blinked to life, and Yarns spun it around to look at Shishone, who was being trailed by, and caught up to by, the mutated masses.

  He took a deep breath, his heart racing, his palms sweating, his head pounding. This switch, that button, and it was good to go. He flipped up a small plastic covering that protected a red inset button on the console, and pressed it. The cannon roared to life.

  Using the thumbstick, he guided the bullets behind Shishone, the flash of the muzzle’s heat distorting the screen. A hail of long, lethal bullets rained forth from the turret, mowing down the oncoming mass and slowing it down substantially. With each bullet, two or three of the creatures were ripped apart mercilessly, and if the ammunition counter held true, they had plenty of bullets. It was working.

  Shishone approached the bottom of the gunship, taking a moment to decouple the hose and quickly seal the port, before he hastily crawled into the airlock. Yu cycled him through, and he sprung up from beneath, crawling his way to his feet and running into the cockpit. Yu trailed behind.

  “Good shooting Yarns,” he said, slipping into the pilot’s seat. Yu took the copilot’s chair, and together they spun up the Harbinger’s engines. The whole ship hummed to life. “Keep firing!”

  Yarns did so, angrily, fearfully, holding down the button and using the stick to maneuver the cannon just so, so that any of the things that got ahead were quickly put in their place. Shishone flipped a few switches and tested the stick, before going to pull up the landing feet.

  They were stuck in the vine.

  “Fuck!” Shishone cried. “God dammit! They’re stuck!”

  He tried to free the gunship, but it had sunken down into the sinew enough that it was proving difficult.

  Yu looked at him, sweating, with wide, anxious eyes, and said, “Shishone. C’mon.”

  “I’m trying,” he retorted, yanking up on the stick.

  “Shishone!”

  “I’m trying!”

  Just then, from the side of the cockpit window, they could make out the blue thrusters of Thomas’s ship. So then, they had made it, Yarns thought with some relief. At least one of them would. His heart began to sink in his chest as he realized he couldn’t hold off the masses forever. Even the ones he did hit seemed to get back up eventually. It was only a matter of time.

  He felt tears well up in his eyes as his mind, again, drifted back to thoughts of Earth. Of home. Of family. Of things he would never see again. Despair began to consume him.

  But what he didn’t see, not initially, was Thomas’s gunship doing a hard right bank and coming back around. It angled its nose down and came in for a strafe. Shishone and Yu watched for a moment, in awe of the speed and audacity of the pilot as the ship came incredibly close to Sedna’s surface and began to chew through the mass abomination with its turret.

  Yarns, seeing this, felt his heart stop for a moment, skipping a beat.

  Shishone tugged at the controls again, yanking, forcing, pleading with the ship to get unstuck, and just as the creatures were about to crawl over the ship like ants on a dying insect, the feet ripped free and they jerked violently skyward.

  He pulled the ship up as Yu loaded coordinates in for a jump point, and with thrusters blasting at full, Shishone, Yu, Yarns, followed by Allister and Thomas, all escaped Sedna with their lives.

  Once they were leaving orbit, the two ships met, flying side by side. Shishone looked out of his cockpit and into the other, where Thomas flashed a thumbs up, and Allister, in the copilot seat, breathed heavily while clutching her chest.

  Over the radio, Shishone said, slapping the console, “Good shooting! Good ass shooting!”

  “Thank you,” Thomas said. “Good flying.”

  Shishone laughed, his heartbeat finally starting to slow. “Thank you.”

  “Where are we jumping to?” Yu asked, ready to input coordinates into the nav system.

  Thomas said, “We need to get you some fuel pellets first.”

  “Okay,” Shishone said. “But then?”

  Allister now spoke over the radio, her voice trembling, but her confidence spiking. “Then? Then, we go to Dysnomia. We go to Xiao.”