Heading out

"Ready?" you everyone, voice echoing in your helmet.

"Yeah," Rachel says, trough the comms, in the chair to the far right.

"Yes," Yasmin agrees, afterward, sitting next to her, to your right.

"Uh, yeah," Haruka says nervously, she is on your left.

All are wearing the EVA suits, encase the shuttle is not, exactly, airtight. It has been a few hours since Yasmin gave you the cybernetic arm; during that time you had let Rachel know how great the arm worked, and helped her check the hull for any openings.

"OK, here we go," you tell them, starting up the fusion core of the ship. Angling the ship up you start the burn into the atmosphere; leaving the colony behind. You should have enough fuel to de-orbit safely and get close back to the settlement. However, unless you can find more fuel, this will be the last time you enter space.

"OK, orbital burn-in, 3... 2... 1...," You flip the switch, the primary fusion engine light, lights up.

The rockets begin to roar, throwing you harder higher into the atmosphere; and sending you flying hard down in the seat. Everyone is silent as the sky quickly passes across the window of the shuttle, clouds blurring across.

After the long grueling hours of the burn, you feel yourself become free of the chair, only occasionally being pushed back as the ship's computer circularizes the orbit.

"OK, everyone, we made it," you say, letting yourself relax, noticing how tense you were, unclenching your jaw.

"Alhamdulillah" Yasmin whispers.

"Ahhh, hotto shita." Haruka sighing in relief.

"It worked!" Rachel shouts.

"Wha-" Haruka asks, following Rachel's outburst.

"-OK, we'll move to rendezvous with The Apollo," you say interrupting; shooting a glance at Rachel.

A short burst from the engines burning, retrograde, and you are on your way towards meeting The Apollo. After a while you see something enter come into view from the inky black vastness of space. The first thing you notice is the object is spinning quickly, too quickly for you to dock. Finally, you see that it is only a small section of the front of The Apollo; the part that connects to the rear, having been harshly shorn off.

"What happened?" Haruka asks, shocked.

"Hold up I'm going to pull alongside," You say interrupting again, burning the engines to match its velocity.

"Now I'm going to match it's spin," as the shuttles directional controls push the ship to match the spin of the Apollo.

"Don't look at the planet, it may cause nausea," you finish.

Now you all can get a good look at the fragment of the ship, it is the front third of the vessel; however, the habitation ring has been shorn off with the back section. Noticing that it is surrounded by hundreds of similarly spinning pieces of debris. Next, you can see spots of black residue marks, covering the surface, surrounding deep holes into the hull.

"Wow, do you think anyone survived?" Haruka asks.

"I don't know," you answer.

"I don't know what could have made these markings," Rachel states.

"OK, we're here to salvage anything useful," you say steering into nearly intact docking ring.

The ship shakes as you park the vessel onto the ring; a deep thump, running along the shuttle's hull. The sensor is telling you that docking was successful; however, the other side is not responding.

"Keep your heads clear," you tell them turning in the chair, unbuckling and flying upwards.

Grabbing onto the roof, while others follow along.

"We'll separate into two groups, stay together with whomever you are with, we don't know what we'll find," you tell them, "Each group will get one of the two rifles."

"Got it," Haruka says shaking.

"OK" Yasmin says, getting her pack ready.

You turn towards Rachel waiting.

"Sure," she says shrugging, floating in zero-g.