EPTDay 1
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/H1xwEV3.jpg)
Cold... So... cold...
Cold... So... cold...
It all started on New Earth, July 2358. I had just graduated space academy and was looking forward to my first exploratory missions. I had the choice between exploring a section of Khaydarin Nebula, the largest Nebula ever detected that the Space station has been mapping for decades, or witness and map the birth of a new star in the Dingus sector. Obviously, this was not even a match. New stars are born constantly, but the Khaydarin Nebula.. Now that was a thing. Many anomalies never mapped before were discovered there and I was anxious to become part of the team. I packed my things and embarked.
August 2358. We'd been on board for a few weeks and I was beginning to grow accustomed to my team. There were a few oddballs here and there, but nothing that worried me at the time. The team mostly consisted of veterans in the field and as someone fresh out of the academy I was far too excited to become part of the greater whole and impress the team. I didn't really want to do it for them though. In fact, once I embarked I found I was only really interested in my own job. I didn't really care for anyone else.
With one exception: Adam. A bit of a surprising choice given he was dwarf sized and thus easily overlooked, but he made up for it in his amount of incessant yapping. The amount of times I heard him mention his deceased mother made me weary. A momma's boy as my roommate, just what I've always wanted. Adam was the astrophysicist of the trip. It was his job to predict any anomalies that could potentially be present during our surveys. I didn't trust him too much to do his job, but since no accidents had happened in over 20 years I figured there wasn't really any need for concern. The last ship that went missing in this sector, the Voyager, probably just had poor maintenance. With technology that can scan for hundreds of thousands of kilometres around us, what could possibly go wrong?
September 2 2358. After a long and painful journey, we had finally arrived at our designated sector. It was an incredible sight to behold. Every colour imaginable was present in the clouds of dust, hydrogen, helium and all sorts of undefined gases throughout the nebula, and it was up to me, the technician of the group, to begin the procedure to scan the surface. I started the probe launch sequence and put on my face encapsulating visor to follow its path. Halfway through the trajectory I heard noises. There shouldn't be any noises in space, so I stopped the probe, took off my helmet and saw Adam screaming something indecipherable at me. I figured he was just talking about his mother again, felt a sudden upwelling of anger that I had been holding back the entire journey and knocked him out, then continued my survey.
*THUD*
He had tried to warn me. A spacial anomaly. Our sensors hadn't picked it up until the last moment, and it was now carrying our vessel deeper into the Nebula. The stress of the anomaly would prove to be too much for the ship, and it exploded after what felt like an eternity. The blast killed me and the others on the vessel.
I died. Everyone on the ship died.
Death. An impalpable sensation to describe to anyone. A sudden lack of being and matter, yet a consciousness seems to remain. Was it by design or an accident? The mystery started since the beginning of mankind but was never solved. Here I was, age 28 and exploring the greatest mystery of them all. The mystery of Death. I had hoped to explore more of life, but one does not pick their own fate. As I tried to become more aware of my own, I felt a pull. I didn't know what to think of it. Everything was so foreign to me; senses felt entirely different as they had before. I had no limbs to control, no heartbeat pumping blood through my veins, and no warmth. Everything felt so cold, and it became colder and colder. Was this to be my fate? A state of perpetual agony? I would have preferred there to be nothing at all.
Though I didn't have eyes anymore, I did seem to have some sort of sense of sight. I saw what I believed to be energy. Lots of light everywhere around me, and it was moving. I looked over to what it was moving to and noticed that I was being pulled in the same direction. My senses became colder and colder as I noticed the energies disappearing in what seemed to be a great void. Was this a portal into the beyond, or a black hole that would terminate the last of my existence? Though my experience in the afterlife had been less than kind, I wasn't in the mood to end my second being this quickly. With all my willpower I attempted to resist the pull when I noticed the pull did not come from the void, but from three distinct energy sources near it, seemingly feeding it. I wondered...
It is now Day 1! You have until Wednesday, Jan 21 10:59pm GMT (GMT+00:00) to cast your vote. Votes are to be placed in the Voting is done in the Vote Thread.
