“FRED!” Siton yelled as he slowly drifted away from the WACS 3 in his escape pod. The only answer he got in return was a reassuring smile saying ‘I got this’ as his friend turned away and ran to the nearest escape pod he could find.

“WARNING! CO-ORDINATED LANDING ABORTED DUE TO IMINENT IMPACT! CRASH-LANDING PROCEDURES ACTIVATED! PLEASE LIE DOWN IN THE SPACE PROVIDED IMMEDIATELY!” The onboard pod AI warned him.

“Shit,” Siton muttered under his breath. He looked around trying to find the area in question, but he wasn’t used to the lack of gravity in the pod and just ended up shooting himself at a wall. After a few precious seconds spent stabilizing himself he finally was able to get a good look at the capsule he was now trapped in.

It wasn’t very large, roughly three meters tall, one and a half in length and one in width with an approximately oval shape. The far wall consisted of black polymer cushioning laid out in horizontal bumps in the rough shape of a body. Whereas, in contrast, the side walls were filled with a plethora of buttons he had no idea how to work. These were probably the manual controls, if all went well, he shouldn’t have any needs for them. And of course, behind him was the pod door consisting mainly or reinforced alloys he knew nothing of and a small sturdy window at eye level. What he knew though is that he should stop wasting time looking around and lay down in the padding area. Or at least as close to laying down as you can without any gravity.

Once he was in place and had straightened his body, a few straps shot out from the side of the wall and tightly bound him to the padding. They then proceed to secure his head and extremities, probably to prevent any whiplash upon impact. When that was all done the rest of the padding tightly wrapped itself around his limbs and body to provide extra protection against the Gs he was about to pull.

Now fully secured and unable to move, the only thing Siton could do was to look out of the tiny window and stare at the ship as it got progressively smaller. The seconds ticked away horrendously slowly as Siton’s adrenaline pumped brain had lost all ability to create movement and was forced to witness all that was about to go down.

“CAPSULE ANGLE ADJUSTED! BOTTOM THRUSTERS ACTIVATED! FULL THRUST! COUNTERACTING CURRENT VELOCITY!”

Siton felt that. Literally. As soon as those last words were spoken, he could feel everything that was soft or liquid within his body try and shoot out of his feet. His vision slowly started to darken around the edges, encroaching upon the rest of his eyesight. His consciousness started to slide out of his grasp along with the rest of his vision. He tried his hardest to remain conscious but that was a task doomed to fail from the beginning. He had never received any training in that area, and even trained professionals probably would have had a hard time staying awake too. And so, as an announcement blared once more, Siton’s consciousness slipped away into nothingness.

“Ugh, my head… What the hell happened?” Siton’s head throbbed in pain as the sound of his voice quietly echoed within his surroundings. For the life of him, he could not remember what had just happened. Confused, he tried to trace his actions step by step to figure out why his head hurt.

He woke up late, stayed in bed for an hour looking at his phone, then he went to the bathroom and showered, ate lunch, played games all afternoon, had dinner, then Fred contacted him to play games…

‘FRED! Shit, what happened to him! Is he okay?’ Siton though as all of the memories came flooding back to him, ‘This was all so surreal, did any of this even happen?’

“Okay, first things first. Calm down,” following his own advice Siton slowly breathed deeply in and out in a pattern until he felt his mind to be under control again.

“Then find out where the hell I am. Actually, cross that out, second step open my eyes.” He hadn’t realized it, but his eyes had been closed ever since he woke up.

Opening his eyes Siton let out a groan as this caused another spike of pain within his head. Although his vision was very blurry, he could tell he was still in the escape pod, but most importantly he was on solid ground again! Woo! Gone are the days spent in a flying lifeless hunk of metal larger than the very town he was born in.

‘Focus,’ he had no idea where he was, not even the fuckin planet, although it probably was Mars, Earth was gone after all. So, he waited around a bit, waiting for his sight to come back into focus. He used this time to run over the events of the day again and to free himself from his restraints. The padding hadn’t come off by itself as the straps had but luckily it didn’t seem anywhere near as rigid as before, making it quite easy to remove. By the time he was out, his sight was somewhat back to normal, especially after the few tears he had shed thinking about Fred. He had already lost all his family and friends; he really didn’t want to lose the only one he had left.

Pulling himself up, he noticed the pod was laying down flat, at a roughly 15-degree angle from the ground, hatch facing upwards. Looking around the still locked door’s frame he quickly found a lever labelled ‘PULL TO OPEN HATCH’ and so he did. And as expected the door promptly shot out from its frame, and I really mean shot out. It easily flew ten or so meters before landing and coming to a halt. Which was good because it meant that had it been obstructed by debris it would have had a much easier time blasting it out of the way than with Siton simply pushing against it.

Finally stepping out of the capsule that ended up saving his life, Siton took a good look around and was left in awe. He stood inside a large roughly circular cave that was easily 20 meters in diameter. The rock that made up the walls were dark and sturdy looking. The ceiling easily reached 10m in height, arching upwards from the walls into a dome. At the center of it was a huge hole, likely due to the escape pod crashing through. But it wasn’t the only hole, many other smaller ones littered the ceiling, letting rays of light shine through into the cave while allowing a peek at the canopy above. Out of some even came mini waterfalls that fell in a small pond that quickly turned into a stream, providing water to most of the plants within. Said plants were spread out through the entirety of the cave, ranging from colorful mushrooms with peculiar and mesmerizing shapes to tall flowers that almost reached the ceiling with green stalks larger than some tree trunks and giant purple petals. A peaceful and luscious looking carpet of grass followed the tranquil stream of water that coursed from the pond to the other side of the cave and then into darkness. Siton assumed there was a tunnel there, he also spotted one on the other side of the cave.

The whole scene had an air of calm and serenity that was truly breath-taking. The air was filled with the gentle scent of flowers, calling for one to come and relax amongst them. More than that, the whole place seemed to be filled with a vibrant invisible energy that slowly seeped into his veins, filling him with strength. Bursting with newly found confidence and serenity Siton took a step forward into this new world…

And immediately regretted it. Near instantly, extremely sharp pains made their presence known on the sole of his right foot.

“Aaaahhhh! Fuck! What the hell?!” He screamed as he pulled his right knee back up to his chest, stepping back into the pod in the process.

“What the hell was that?” He yelled out in indignation, clutching his foot as he sat down.

Noticing a wet sensation on his hands Siton looked down to find them entirely soaked in blood. ‘Shit’ was the only thing he thought before promptly removing his slippers to look at the damage. At this moment, Siton could swear he had never seen that much blood in one place for real before. True, he was born and raised as a true Kiwi, but he had never been too keen on the whole hunting or even just fighting business. Sure, he had gotten into some fist fights before, but none of them had ever ended up that bloody. And, oh boy, bloody it was.

His entire foot was covered in the red liquid. With every beat from his heart, Siton could see blood gushing out from the multitude of small wounds spread across the sole of his foot. The wounds we all very thin lines that highly resembled paper cuts but clearly dug deeper than their counterparts. Left at a complete loss as of what to do Siton could only stare in disbelief as his blood slowly decided that it was time to move out. That proved to be a potentially dangerous mistake because even after a full minute and a half, the blood showed no signs of stopping.

Although he was still at loss concerning what had hurt him as there was only grass there, Siton was not clueless regarding the severity of the situation he was in. If he didn’t take action now, he would probably end up as a desiccated corpse by the end of the day. Luckily, he was in an escape pod, and any good escape pod should have a first aid kit. Especially one made by the World Alliance in a last-ditch effort to save humanity. So, he got looking, and indeed, true to his prediction, he found a first aid kit just under the padding.

He quickly rummaged through it and ended up grabbing the two items he believed most helpful at this moment. The first one was a small spray-on anti-septic bottle that would disinfect the wounds to prevent them from getting infected in the future. He took off the lid of the bottle and promptly sprayed his foot.

“JESUS THAT STINGS LIKE A BITCH!” he proclaimed while gritting his teeth with all the strength he could muster.

The next item was a recently developed spray that would create blood stopping foam wherever applied. That wasn’t all it could do, it also enhanced blood clotting for cases similar to his, thus providing great protection against blood loss.

This one was significantly less painful than the previous one. If anything, it was quite soothing. Instantly after being applied, the thin layer of liquid that was sprayed over his foot started swelling up like crazy. Quickly turning pink due to the absorbed blood, the foam only took seconds to stop the bleeding.

Rummaging through the first aid kit (FAK) once more, Siton pulled out a roll of bandages. These bandages had interwoven silver fiber in it to further reduce the chances of infection. They were also very flexible, sturdy and reusable if cleaned. He quickly wrapped them around his foot while following the instructions of a handy manual that he had found tucked into the FAK.

Having taken care of his foot, Siton took a quick peek at where he had placed his foot down once more. But even upon closer inspection, he could see nothing but grass there. It seems that whatever cut him was gone. Weird.

Once that was done, he took some time to just lay down against the padding of the pod and relax. This had been one hell of a day and he really didn’t have any time off ever since the lights went out on the ship. Although it may not have been that long since it happened, it still felt like it all occurred ages ago. Before you ask, no, getting knocked unconscious due to pulling Gs didn’t count as taking a break.

Thus, as the lights shining down through the hole in the ceiling of the caves started to dim down, Siton finally laid back and relaxed. Only to find himself slowly drift asleep despite the possibility of danger lurking around. He was a bit out of it due to the blood loss, exhaustion, and shock from his situation. He just couldn’t care. Thus the soft snores of the man marked the end of his first day in this strange new world.