Entry 18: Research Centre Visit
27 Feb 2020Worldbuilder92
Current System: MaiaIt’s been a tense and crazy couple of days for me... I’m okay, but I definitely think my scavenger hunt has gone for too long.
It started innocently enough; after a simple breakfast and Eden reminding me to take my medicine, I decided to start on my trek to hunt down the ruins of the Palin Research Centre. I’d hoped to find some rare materials to upgrade the Mobula with, as well as data for where nearby Thargoid Barnacles could be; the only problem was, I couldn’t find any trace of the site on the planetary maps. On my first flyby of the 3rd moon of the 3rd planet around Maia A, there was nothing I could find beyond a signal buoy broadcasting an emergency evacuation message. It wasn’t new, for sure - was launched when the Centre was abandoned.
When I returned to Darnielle's Progress, dismayed at the lackluster start of my hunt, I asked around for information on what had happened and why the Centre was no longer showing on maps. Most of the folks there didn’t have much clue; all they knew was Thargoids had shown up and driven everyone away. A couple crackpot theorists were speculating about some hidden top-secret experiment there, but I think its safe to say that isn’t likely. For a little while, it seemed like I’d need to do a dedicated search on the surface; but then I got a tip that I could probably use the Mobula’s Direct Surface Scanner to find the base’s signal. I’d only ever treated the DSS as a mapping tool to find mineral sites for surface mining, it hadn’t occurred to me to try using it to detect abandoned sites.
So with my belly and heart filled with determination and fresh ideas, Eden and I returned to the moon and placed the Mobula into a polar orbit, a trick I picked up from reading on early spaceflight history. Within an hour, I had the whole planet mapped, and amazingly we’d triangulated a signal source! The Research Centre was situated on a plateau near the rim of a great crater, which lined up with the pictures I’d been shown on Obsidian Orbital. Excitedly, we put the ship into a dive, preparing for atmospheric flight.
Eden set the Mobula into a gliding flight pattern, letting inertia guide us towards my destination. When we reached about 50km from the Centre, I broke off the autopilot flight path, and starter turning us into a curving path that would swing us towards the cliff behind the base. I did this as a precaution; if there were Thargoids swarming the place, as everyone had warned, I wanted to have a good view of where they would be.
That was the plan... however, I was caught off guard when we received a comms link from the research centre.
Bidding us to request for permission before docking.
Naturally, I was shocked. After all, if this place was abandoned, what reason is there to keep the power on...? I tried to activate the autopilot docking routine, but it wouldn’t work, forcing me to manually maneuver the Mobula to the designated landing zone. After that, the automated docking system brought us into the hangar, thus keeping us safe from any hostile ships outside.
I first deployed the rover and went exploring the perimeter of the compound, looking for materials or scrap. I found plenty of scrap piles from destroyed starships littering the area, but nothing particularly salvageable. There weren’t any accessible terminals either, so I couldn’t scan anything. However, I did pick up a reading of... something, I wasn’t sure what it was. I could tell it was a good 2km underground, buried beneath a massive stone outcropping. So I docked the SRV, and explored inside the building on foot.
The interior was a mess: papers and trash strewn everywhere, half-working lights flickering here and there, puddles of water collecting from a burst main here and there... it’s amazing the power was still on. I was expecting to find someone running the place when I learned the docking computer was still on, but after a cursory scouting session, I was convinced nobody was living here voluntarily. The docking computer was probably still on by chance, I figured, seeing as how rushed the evacuation seemed to have been.
I ventured deeper underground, hoping to find a terminal or some server somewhere I could access for data. As I explored, I... I began to hear something. A voice, whispering something. I couldn't make out any distinct words, it was just nondescript. I was sure it wasn’t real, because it didn’t echo, and for a moment I was worried for my sanity - I didn’t want to have to go back to the asylum due to a relapse of some kind. I took a deep breath, forcing myself to calm down, and then continued on in my search, ignoring the whispers as figments of my imagination.
As I approached the end of a hallway, I found a great metal door, sealed tightly; a small glass peephole was the only way to see inside. What was curious to me, though, was unlike the other doors, there seemed to be a bright source of light emanating from within. I got close to the peephole, and took a look to see what was behind the door...
When I peeked through the window, I saw... well, I don’t know what I saw. It looked almost like one of those Thargoid pod-things that Gnosis researchers found back before they came, except it had some wires and this... glowing blue... ‘thing’ connected to it. The pod glowed with a dim pale-green light, and it seemed to pulse every once in a while.
And that’s when I saw it... the body.
It looked almost human, yet it was very heavily disfigured. The skin looked charred and blackened, as if it had been burnt somehow. It seemed like it was wearing an equally-burned flight suit, although there were no insignia or badges i could make out save for a glint of red and green on the left shoulder. It seemed to be reaching for the contraption in the middle of the room.
For a few minutes, I found myself unable to move, unable to tear myself away from the porthole; whether it was from shock, horror, or curiosity, I‘m still not sure. To my shock, it... the corpse moved, lifting itself up with its charred limbs, and turning to look at me.
The face... just remembering the face, it’s hard to fight back the shivering. Its skin was charred as well, yet its empty, sunken eyes were darker still, almost a mirror of the inky blackness of space. Its head was tilted, showcasing a twisted smile with broken and mish-mashed teeth. As it gazed on me, I could hear the voice in my head clearly for the first time.
‘We want you. Come here.’
I didn’t need to think twice; I bolted for the lift. I didn’t know what that thing was, or what it wanted with me, but I sure as hell wasn’t about to find out. But as I ran further and further, the voice I tried so hard to ignore started getting louder, and louder.
‘Come here. Come here.’
The next parts I can only vaguely remember, probably since my focus was on shutting out that voice which was practically screaming at me, begging for me to come back. Cmdr Siara Solatra told me what happened from her perspective when she brought me back to Darnielle’s Progress, which helped me bridge some of the gaps in my memory.
From what she described, my shipboard AI Eden had sent an automated distress message after I hadn’t come back in time, and Siara answered the call. She had arrived her Diamondback Explorer, the Single Action Army, and apparently found 3 Thargoid scouts hovering near the station. They scattered when she arrived, and after landing at the docks, she set out looking for me on foot. When she found me, I had made it to one of the long access corridors; I was sprinting frantically, and almost knocked her over when she caught me. When she grabbed my arms, I tried to wrest myself free, screaming that I had to “get away from them”, and fast. It took her a couple minutes to calm me down enough to where I wouldn’t struggle against her. After that, she brought me back to the Mobula and helped set Eden on a course to leave, with herself flying escort.
After we landed, I went through some of the techniques I learned for dealing with breakdowns; I ran through my breathing exercises, put on some relaxing ambience, took a warm bath, etc... I managed to get myself calmed and relaxed, despite the memory of that place still being fresh in my mind. Siara checked up on me before she left back for the bubble, and we talked a bit about what had happened. I didn’t mention my past history in the asylum, for fear she would get me recommitted, but I told her everything else - the door, the alien thing, the corpse, the voice I kept hearing...
To her credit, Siara didn’t seem to think I was making anything up. She figured it was the Thargoids messing with my head, somehow; I have no idea if that's even possible, but it would explain a few things if that was the case. She didn’t think I had anything to worry about for now, but she advised me to be careful either way. After swapping numbers and thanking her for rescuing me, we parted ways.
I... I can’t say for sure what happened. I’ve always fancied myself a rational-minded individual, even when I was in the asylum; I don’t assume without evidence, I plan from what I observe directly, and especially nowadays I make sure I’m not over-stressed or mentally overtaxed. With that being said, I can only say this: I don’t think I imagined it. Whatever it was that I saw, be it a hallucination, Thargoids, or some kind of space ghost, it definitely was real. To me, at least.
One thing’s for sure, I definitely don’t plan on exploring any more abandoned laboratories anytime soon. I fortunately managed to find someone selling a Meta-Alloy at Darnielle’s Progress, so after shelling out the 200k to buy it for Farseer and a last-minute packing, I’m leaving the Pleiades. And I don’t think I’ll be coming back for a while.