The Atlantis
Aly pressed a button on a control panel in the wall, and a weapons cabinet popped out of the wall.
Aly stuck Grayson’s and her own weapon in, along with the grenades. Aly pointed out the Anti-Energy armor in the same section, then pressed the button for the beds. The beds slowly folded down, and made a hissing sound as the E-Foam inflated. Grayson, inside the Cabin, flipped two switches, and dim red lights switched on, and the door folded up, and they heard as the boarding ramp slid into the ship. The red lights were not unlike the emergency ones in the Exo 3, Grayson thought as he settled into bed. The Cleaning ray turned on, and emitted a glow as it passed up and down the bed. It felt cold, but sanitized and cleaned the bed and their clothes. then Grayson fell asleep.
Aly sighed happily. Soon she would leave the ship! She would finally get to see the world!
Aly wondered briefly what had happened to her dad. And Grayson’s parents, who were they and were they ok? With so many thoughts flooding through her brain, it was hard for her to go to sleep. But she managed, and she was soon fast asleep.
Grayson woke up to the smell of food. Grayson was sure he had never woken up to food before, and for a few seconds he thought he was still in his small room, alone. then the events of the last sixteen or so hours came crashing back.
Aly had cooked some packaged eggs and fried meat. Aly had folded a C-pad down from the wall near the engine. The C-pad was fueled by the heat of the Plasmo-Nuclear engine that made the flammable gas that fueled the ship. It also made the electricity for the Glow Lights on the ceiling of the ship. Grayson yawned and streched, the fold out bed creaking. There were low powered Tractor-Beam emitters under the beds, to keep the occupant safely on the bed in case of a rough landing or something similar.
Grayson heard the low hum fade as the Tractor-Beams shut off. He hopped out of bed, and walked over to where Aly was eating her food, the C-pad recharging inside the supply closet
“Good morning Grayson!” Aly said cheerfully through bites of food, “Your food is on the shelf over there.”
Grayson saw a foldable plate set on one of the shelves, the eggs still steaming.
Grayson grabbed the plate and sat across from her, on the pop up chairs. He poured himself a cup of water and sat down at the table.
“I can’t believe it!” Aly said, taking a sip of some kind of beverage called Morning Drink® “We’re finaly leaving this dumb ship!”
“I know, but...” Grayson pushed his eggs around his plate “What do you think happened to the other Passengers?”
Aly’s smile disappeared. “You know the big escape cruisers? They left early this morning. They flew out of sight. Then when I started making breakfast, The huge Colonisation Pods left. They just left. Hopefully both of our parents are ok.”
Grayson sighed. ”My parents probably aren’t” He looked at Aly “You know Atlantis? The biggest ship in existence? The one that went missing. My parents were on the last transfer ship that ever made it. I was going to meet them on the next transfer ship, but it went off the grid and was declared missing before I had the chance.”
“Oh! Uh- I didn’t know...” Aly said. “They may still be alive, right?”
The story of Atlantis was well known. The biggest of all interplanetary ships by far, even a level delta on the Atlantis was a big deal. The Atlantis went missing five years earlier. All chatter between Atlantis and the other ships ceased, and it’s last reported position was a 23,450,000,000,000,000,000 trillion miles ahead of the Exo 3, due to the Warp range of ships of that scale, relatively close. But then, abruptly, the ship dissapeared from the radar, and all trans-ship ships stopped too.
“Well,” Grayson stood up a bit abruptly, his food half finished “let’s get out of here.”
“Um, Ok” Aly awkwardly put away the plates, and folded the table and chairs. “Sure.”
Grayson never liked talking about his parents. He missed them too much.
He stepped into the cockpit and turned on the engine. The buttons in the command place Glowed, and the Holographic Nav-Ball hovered above the displayer. Grayson flipped a switch, and a map appeared on another Holographic display. Words streamed along the cockpit. The cockpit acted as a heads up display. The Cabin was small, with space for two people. The control panel wrapped around both swiveling chairs, and there were a couple buttons and switches in the ceiling.
Grayson pulled a lever to Manual mode, and pushed the Throttle up to low power. He turned on the takeoff thrusters, and the ship slowly rose into the air. The Skyhawk slowly slipped out of the rip in the ship. There was a gleam as the sun reflected on the windshield. The wings folded down till they were level to the ground, and Aly watched as more of the four winged creatures slipped past the ship.
They were as sleek as a seal, and the wings were made of impossibly thin material. A curious creature landed on the windshield, and the creature’s wings folded up so tight against the creature that they couldn’t tell the brightly colored wings from the slim agile body. A blue one licked the cockpit happily, then the group flew off.
“Hmm...” Aly said inspecting the retreating birds closely. “I’m going to call them… Sun Gliders! Gliders for short. How about it?”
“I guess that will work.” Grayson said. “Wait! Look at that!” Grayson pointed to a trio of 6 legged animals, slim and graceful, with purple eyes, and downy cream colored fur. They each had a long tail, and short spikes running from their head to their tails.
Grayson brought the ship to a hover, and they watched in fascination as the long legged animals used their long purple tounges to pick the circular bulbs off the tops of the yellow stalks. The creatures looked up sharply, and galloped away amazingly fast, their tails swishing in the air behind them.
“Wow” Aly and Grayson said at the same time.
Grayson switched the ship to automatic mode, and they watched the yellow stalks sway in the breeze.
They rose higher and higher, until they were higher than the Exo 3, and the slim legged creatures were mere dots. They flew over the Exo 3 and headed towards the tall blue mountains.
“Wait.” Grayson said “Uh, the other ships went the other way”
“So what?” Aly said “I’m sure the’re fine! And plus, we might discover something that they haven’t seen yet”
“I guess… ” Grayson said reluctantly.
“Wait, what’s that?” Grayson asked, pointing at a line of huge trees. They were a dark blue in color, with light blue leaves that only grew at the tips of the trees,, and huge thick trunks that were almost as high as the Exo 3 in the distance. Aly left the co-pilot position and climbed into the clear gunner pod. She opened the window, and the middle of the old domed window hissed as it unsealed with the double barreled heavy blaster cannon.
Two quarter spheres of Plas-Glass slid under Aly, to keep the gunner in a safe position. A little radio crackled to life on the gun controls “ Aly? Where too?”
Aly shrugged, watching the last of the Plas-glass strip slide into the top of the ship.
Aly had never felt so alive. Aly watched as the trees got closer.
She could smell the rich earth even from half as high as the huge trees. She saw small little floating things Aly was sure were some type of animal. Aly also saw more of the spiky creatures. And of course the sun gliders. They were everywhere! Flying around the trees, roosting on the huge branches… There was even a whole swarm following the ship. The air was full of squacking and squealing.
“Uh, hello? Aly?”
“Oh, Sorry.” Aly scanned the horizon. “Let’s head towards that mountain, the really long flat one. You see it? That kinda slants downwards?”
“Got it! I can see it. Close the window, i’m going to pick up speed. Plus i’m going to use manual mode too.”
“You betya Captain Grayson!” Aly shut the window and leaned back in the gunner chair.
Aly watched the trees blur by, and the mountain get closer and closer.
The closer it came, the less like a mountain it looked. It was impossibly long and smooth, but still
about three times as tall as the trees. Under the mountain there was a long lake, and the mountain was partly submerged. .There were huge domes of some kind of natural glass.
There even seemed to be windows of the same material coating the sides. There was a relatively small opening in the back, with a large T shaped thing coming out of it. In the opening, there were many building like shapes. There was a thick coat of the same clear materail that covered the domes covering the city. The T poked out from the glass part .The sunlight filtering through made it look less like a mountain. Grayson flew along the sides towards the T, And Aly strained to look through the windows and see the inside of the mountain. It felt like hours as Grayson tipped the ship to the sky and shot up towards the top of the vast thing. The T was big close up, probably ten times as high as the ship. Grayson landed the Skyhawk on the greenish gray top of the T.
The landing legs folded down and the Skyhawk landed with a small thud. The top of the T was a dull color. It looked like metal but wasn’t reflective. Aly hopped out of the gunner pod and followed Grayson down the ladder.
“Aly?” Grayson said shakily “I don’t think this is a mountain”
“Probably not!” Aly said patting Grayson on the back “It’s more like a hill, I don’t know why you’re so busted up about it!”
“Aly, I think this is a ship.” Grayson shook his head incredulously. He leaned over the edge of the T and pointed at a line of rusted letters stenciled on the side of the T.
ATLANTIS
