The galaxy has been at war for over two thousand years. Although the emperor and his kin have been fighting a losing battle for some time now. It is still believed that imperial tactics technology and know-how will prevail. Emperor Shinza's empire stretches to encompass almost one-third of the galaxy. The empire continues to expand, it's expansion fueled by those with nothing else. They take the risk, hoping that when they awaken from stasis a pristine world will await them. Not all within the empire agree or support the Emperor and his policies. Certain factions have begun to make their sentiments known. Some seek to curb imperial power, others believe in focusing on winning the war. While still yet others oppose unending expansion. Regardless of the motive, ships began to disappear. Space is treacherous and at first, the presumption was they were either lost or destroyed. The vastness of the empire itself hindered any search efforts. Too much ground to cover and not enough spare ships. For one reason or another, sabotage was always involved. But our story doesn't start here, no, it begins in a star system with a yellow sun and nine planets. Lt. Saran orbited around the single moon of the only inhabitable planet. His fighter managed the routine grid search for the tenth time in the last half-cycle. The planet below was uninhabited and could support life without complication or alteration. Saran was scanning for available resources to repair the damage done to the main ship. It wasn't supposed to be like this, stranded in some back-water cesspool. Their orders had been to scout the Epsilon-Sigma 9043 region. While in cryo-sleep, the navigation system had malfunctioned and the AI safeguards malfunctioned. By the time that they came out of stasis. They were in an unknown sector, thousands of light-years from the nearest outpost. Way beyond the red line that represented the imperial border. Help would not be coming, not within their lifetime at the very least. The captain had ordered diagnostics on all the ship's navigation systems. She wanted to know why they were so far off course. This sector of space wasn't cataloged. Which meant that they couldn't even be sure of returning to the empire. Captain Tarmac had heard rumors of sabotage and ships disappearing. Yet she was still shocked her that it had happened under her watch. She had handpicked her crew and could have sworn they were all eager and committed to the mission. Without accurate star charts, the only thing they could do was use their own nav data. It was the long way, but they would reach home one day. On their way towards the edge of the system, a shuttle launched from the landing bay. It immediately accelerated it's to flank speed, as it headed for the edge of the system. Tarmac ordered the comms officer to open a channel to the shuttle. "Shuttle, this is Captain Tarmac, return to the Kovali or I will turn you into space dust. You have one minute to comply." "Captain", the ship's AI said. "I am detecting a transmission from the ve....." At which point the lighting on the bridge flicked from normal to the emergency systems. A few seconds later the lights restored and the AI's voice resumed. "Power surge detected, running diagnostics. Working.....Working. Diagnostics show weapons, shields and engines are no longer functional. Explosive decompression detected in engineering. Dispatching damage control crews." "I hope you enjoy nature. Enjoy your stay." The voice said before the comms officer said, "Channel closed Captain." A few minutes later the shuttle left the Kovali's sensor range. Half a solar cycle later and Tarmac still wanted to find those bastards and tear them into small chunks. The damage report wasn't good. Several of the crew including the Chief Engineer died in the blast. Worse still, they had had only enough power to return in-system to the habitable planet. Saran and the rest of the crew held little hope for rescue or repairing the ship. The necessary minerals were deep under the third planets' surface. They didn't have the required mining equipment to reach the material. They had little or no options left to them. They would have to stop and move on with their lives, but they still had hope. Saran turned his fighter around and headed back to the ship, reveling in the feel of how his fighter handled. His fighter was nine feet long with a sleek cockpit at the rear, and an almost triangular needle-like nose. The sub-light engines gave off a faint blue glow as he made his way towards the planet's surface. As Saran landed his fighter in the landing bay, he noticed all the techs as they secured the equipment. For Saran, this was a normal activity, but what made it strange was they all wore the same facial expression. It was the face of panic and fear. As he opened the hatch to his fighter, he heard the blaring klaxon and over the comm system he heard. "Attention all personnel report to launch bay 1 in fifteen minutes. That is all....." Saran knew that this was different from all previous meetings. It was likely that the captain had come to a decision about their fate. When he arrived back in the launch bay, it was standing room only against the far wall. All the faces around him were anxious and nervous at what his captain had to say. They didn't have to wait long. The captain approached the center of the galley and began to speak, with a somber expression on her face. "I'm not going to lie to you," Tarmac started with. "We will never be able to leave this system again within our lifetimes." At this remark, the crew began to murmur all over the ship until she spoke again. "So what we hope is for our decedents to be able to repair the ship, someday. Until that time we will leave the ship and hide it underground near the base of the nearby mountain. "The ship's AI will shut down and go into sleep mode, until such time until one of our decedents finds it. " Everyone in the crew looked at her like she'd grown a third arm, including Saran. They knew it was coming, yet it still seemed unthinkable. "All personnel will lock down everything on the ship and we will take the bare necessities to survive. That means no advance technology, I want to leave this ship intact for our descendants. We will be leaving in two planetary cycles. That is all." At this point, the captain left the galley and proceeded to her quarters. Once there the ship's AI contacted her, "Captain, some of the crew are quite upset by your announcement. Some are even attempting to steal supplies. Will I send them off into the wilderness somewhere, with nothing?" Captain Tarmac replied, "No but make sure what they take makes it back to their proper place on the ship." "As you wish Captain" replied the AI. "Now, do you understand what you have to do AI?" "Yes, Captain I understand." replied the AI. "Good I hope the next time you wake up, you'll have a better captain than me." Two planetary cycles later the crew were off of the ship, some happier than others. The ship had finally finished burying itself near the base of the mountain. All went silent inside the huge ship, as the reactors spooled down and the AI went into standby mode. It wondered whether what the captain had said was true or even possible. But that would have to wait until the AI woke, and who could tell when that would be. Ten thousand years later, that question would soon be answered. The date was April 20, 2020, and Mike Anderson was arriving home from school. Mike goes to the local university, in Toowoomba, Australia. Mike had turned 18 and he was still a little hungover from the night before. Mike isn't a heavy drinker, being last that night was his first time drinking with his friends. He was hammered after two drinks, so when his friends brought him home they took a magic marker and drew on his face. obscene language and weird hand gestures. Mike had a huge crush on his best friend and next-door neighbor Emily Ross. Though Mike wasn't movie-star handsome, yet he was decent enough to deserve a second glance. He was 6'2 with light brown hair and green eyes with a pale complexion. He wasn't athletic either but had plenty of muscles with squared-off shoulders. Emily was a curvy blonde with shoulder-length hair and deep blue eyes. She had legs you could get lost in for hours at a time and a medium size bust. Mike had kept his feelings about Emily to himself and was afraid of what her reaction would be if he told her how he felt. Emily already knew about Mike's crush and had her own feelings for neighbor Mike. After getting home Mike had watched Emily come over and asked if they could hang out. Mike said sure, but he wanted to take his afternoon jog into Mount Holly and asked if Emily wanted to come along. "Can I take a rain check on that run, I have to be back before my dad gets home," said Emily. "Yeah, it's ok, I understand, next time though," replied Mike. Emily then strolled back home swaying her hips as she went. Mike thought, Does she know and do that on purpose? Then Mike went into his two-story house to change into his jogging gear and after five minutes was on his way. Half a block from his house Mike decided to change his routine, so he turned down an old dirt road. No one came here anymore, so it had become overgrown over the years. Mike had always passed this road on his jogs and now he knew why. There were potholes all over the place, trash littered the ground, and weeds grew like wild fire. Mike's pace was slow going. He'd heard rumor's from kids, back in high school, how they came out here to party and drink to their heart's content. Though, the kids did say there was something strange about this remote area. Nothing definite, but he couldn't shake the feeling that he was being watched by unseen eyes. Mike now knew what they were talking about. He too felt like he was being watched. He didn't feel like there was any hostile intention towards him. Though he did feel like he was being observed or evaluated. After a while, Mike shrugged off these feelings as simple paranoia. The call of the small deer trail that led deeper into the woods proved too alluring. Mike felt compelled to follow the trail to its end. He had been on the trail for no more than five minutes, when he came across the biggest hole he'd ever seen. The hole was five feet wide, ten feet long and he couldn't see the bottom from his vantage point. Mike hadn't heard any stories about this hole, but it did look newish. Mike assumed that the hole could be the result of the last floods. It was possible that the flood water unearthed an entrance to a cave system below. Mike thought it was a good idea to turn around now and go home. But as he was turning to go, the ground underneath him started sliding into the hole. The last thing that Mike remembered was rushing darkness and fading light. He felt like he was flying, but knew he was falling. Then everything went black, as Mike lost consciousness.