Keisha had no idea how long they slept but she was sore and moving felt as though concrete had been injected into her joints. They were thankful the toilet in the captain's rooms was able to work with gravity only and used a small amount of their dwindling water supply to get ready for a new day. She repacked her bag and found some room for the alcohol they had pilfered the night before. "So today we get to the cargo hold." She said.

"No, today we find out if we can make it to the cargo hold." Fiolas corrected her. "The thing could be miles away, and that's if we get the beacon going again. One problem at a time remember? Beacon first, cargo hold next."

"OK. Beacon first." She agreed. "The beacon is located in the cockpit so we'll need to get there, the window was completely smashed in so it's probably safe to say those creatures will be there. You're the better shot, and I'm the better electrician, so you take the plasma gun and watch my back while I gather the wires and materials we'll need to get the thing going again."

"Sounds good, where are you going to get everything put together? Do you need any tools or anything?" he asked.

Keisha thought for a few minutes, "I need a hand wielder, a multi-tool, some electrical tape, and a really big table."

"Anything else?"

"Time." They nodded at each other. "The hand wielder and table should be in the mess hall, the multi-tool and tape should be in a repair kit off the hallway." She said.

"Lead the way, sir." Fiolas cinched his pack tight and the two of them worked on opening the doors. The doors made more noise getting open than the entire planet had ever heard in the last century and they closed them behind them again. Keisha took the lead and they walked down the narrow hallways to the cockpit, stopping only to grab the repair kit. After a few minutes of twists and turns, they came to the doors. The doors had a dent from where the huge branch had pushed through.

"The captain is waiting for us beyond that door," Keisha said. "You ready?" She asked Fiolas. He nodded yes and as they opened the door the branch dropped to the floor empty.

"One of the creatures must have taken him." She whispered. Fiolas nodded and looked like he was going to be sick again. She flashed her light between the cramped quarters and saw small creatures similar to the ones who had taken the leg. They were everywhere and ranged in size from her fingernail to a small cup. She motioned to Fiolas and he dimmed his light to see where they were going. When their eyes adjusted to the low light they were able to see the creatures moving outside the window and piling on top of each other in a huge mass.

Keisha shuddered, "Watch my back? It looks like they're only interested in easy meat." Fiolas nodded affirmative and she turned her light back to bright and connected it to her vest so she could work with free hands. She stood on what used to be the captain's seat and unscrewed the panel where the beacon was kept. Keisha was a quick worker and disconnecting the panel from the ship wasn't as difficult as she thought it would be. The front panel had a screen that would give an approximate direction of the cargo hold. Fiolas pulled out the plasma gun and kept scanning out the window for anything bigger that could pose a threat.

"It's a good thing we were on an older ship." She whispered.

"Why's that?" he asked.

"They made these ships more compartmentalized which makes it easier to disconnect things. The newer ships with all the A.I. built into it, it's not so simple. Everything has to be at least a little connected. This would have taken hours if we had taken a new ship." She grunted as she disconnected an auxiliary battery pack.

"Do you need any other cords to connect this battery to the beacon?" he asked.

"Yeah, there should be a converter in the controls under here." She mumbled as she was now underneath her controls and started stripping wires and taking a converter out that would let them power up the beacon without creating a short fuse. As she was working she felt something in her hair tickling her and without thinking she brushed it away. The tickling feeling returned further down her back, goosebumps went up and down her whole body and she slowly got up.

"Keisha, be very still," Fiolas said gravely. "Turn around, I'm going to sweep it away, and then we're going to get out of here." Keisha couldn't even nod, she just slowly turned around and then felt a huge smack on her back and saw a creature the size of the palm of her hand and hairy like the one under the trap door, curl up and die on top of the control panels she had been dismantling. The smaller monsters stopped their journey to the big pile and headed towards the hairy dead thing on the control panel and they watched in horror as they covered it and began dismantling it.

Fiolas grabbed Keisha's arm and pulled her back into the passageway. "Did you get everything you needed?" Keisha was on the verge of panicking and trying her best to get her breathing under control.

"Yes." She said forcefully.

"Ok, this way." He took her hand again and dragged her through the ship. Keisha didn't pay much attention to where they were going as she kept feeling the ghost of that thing on her. He stopped suddenly and started prying open doors. Keisha helped without thinking. They went in and firmly shut the doors behind them. Keisha ran around the room shining her light in every corner and under the table where the three of them had eaten every meal together.

Ghosts of memories came to her, times of safety and warmth. While the three of them hadn't been particularly close they had still had some good times in the month getting here. Late-night games, tall tales from the captain, reading reports sent over by Klokos I. She remembered thinking how superior she felt towards Fiolas then. How he was a year older than her, but a grade behind her. It was his first mission after taking a sabbatical and she had made sure to remind him of it as often as she could.

"It's safe Keish. The doors shut tight enough to keep the air pressure, those things aren't getting in here." Fiolas led her to the table of the ship's galley and flipped on a lantern he had found in the repair kit.

"Ya know, for being a second-mate, you're pretty good at being in charge." She said as she got to work on the beacon. "Thank you, for having my back out there."

"Of course." he said, "You would have done the same for me."

"I hope I would. I'm not so sure Fiolas." She stopped and looked him in the eye. "I'm so sorry for how I treated you before we landed. I felt so superior being younger, but higher-ranked and I didn't treat you as well as I should have. I'm sorry." She shook her head and started gathering her tools, "I can't think of a better person to be trapped with."

"Do you know why I took a break in the middle of my training?" he asked. Keisha nodded no.

"I had to take care of my grandma so I took a sabbatical from the program after getting high honors in all my classes. After she passed, I came back but I was behind. My professors all put in a recommendation for me, which is how I got to be on this mission. While I was caring for her, I read as many books about space navigation I could get my hands on." Fiolas looked as though he was holding something back. "She was my biggest supporter." He shook his head, "She always told me that I needed to have a job that kept me going into the future and that she was so glad to be a part of my past. She was all the family I had and it was an honor to be with her in her last year."

"Sorry, I didn't know," Keisha whispered and pointed to a wire she needed and Fiolas handed it back to her. "I just," she stumbled over her words, "I just assumed you were held back. It happens to a lot of cadets." She kept her eyes on the beacon.

"Most people did," Fiolas said.

"You must have been close with her to stay back a whole year." Her tool slipped on the back of the wire and Keisha cursed under her breath.

"We were very close. I lost my mother when I was young and she left her home on Earth and came to live with me on Klokos I. Her name was Jessica and she lived a wonderful and long life." Fiolas moved the lantern to give her some more light as he talked. "Do you have any family back on Klokos?"

"I won't by the time we get back," Keisha said. "I am an only child and my parents are old. They signed me up for flight academy as soon as they could. They were the generation that saw the first successful colonization and had waited to have kids until Klokos I was stable enough to support it. They wanted me to see all the stars and planets I could. After I left for this mission they chose to go back home to earth for their final resting place. It's just me and the stars now."

She successfully connected the power source and started securing it together. "I think that should do it." A red light on the screen blinked into existence. They watched it blink on and give off coordinates for a few seconds.

"Good work commander." Fiolas laughed at her. "Ready to get off this planet?"

Keisha laughed right back at him, "Lead the way, Navigator!"