Aiden did not keep staring.
Shock was dangerous. Awe was worse. Either one could cost him focus, and focus was the only thing keeping him alive.
And staying alive was his goal for now.
He did not know where he was. That fact pressed against his thoughts harder than the pain in his ribs. Aiden had studied most of the discovered and charted planets humanity knew about.
Not as a casual hobby, but as part of his upbringing, his education, and his work. He had memorized star maps, read planetary surveys, and cross-referenced atmospheric data until it blurred together.
There had never been a confirmed habitable world like this within reachable distance.
Two moons alone made that clear.
Not just two moons, but two with distinct coloration. One tinted red, the other faintly blue. Even among fringe discoveries and theoretical models, there had been no instance of a stable, Earth-like planet with twin moons like that, not this close, not this visible. And lush vegetation made it worse.
Trees. Grass. Open sky. Those kinds of environments were rare, even with full planetary expeditions.
A research-class vessel like his was never meant to search for worlds like this.
To reach a planet with these conditions, he would have needed a mothership-class exploration fleet. Long-range warp arrays.
Dedicated survey teams. Years of preparation. There were no such planets anywhere near Earth that could be reached through standard warp routes.
Yet here he was.
He forced himself to step back from the viewport, boots scraping softly against the warped deck. The alien sky remained at the edge of his vision, pulling at his attention like a gravity well of its own, but he refused to let it drag him further. Whatever was out there would still be there later. If he let himself spiral now, it would cost him time, oxygen, and judgment.
And he could not even be sure he would ever leave this planet again.
The ship was wrecked. Systems were failing. Power reserves were dangerously low. Even if he survived here, escape was far from guaranteed.
He planted his feet and took a slow breath, letting the suit regulate it for him.
One problem at a time.
Gravity came first.
He shifted his weight deliberately, lifting one foot and setting it back down again. There was no delay. No drifting sensation. No resistance beyond what he expected. Gravity held him firmly, steady and consistent. It felt almost identical to Earth's pull, familiar enough that his muscles did not need to adjust.
He could not be certain how close it truly was without proper testing, but at least for now, it did not feel heavier or lighter. His movements were not sluggish, nor did he feel overburdened.
That alone ruled out a long list of worst-case scenarios.
Next was the air.
He tapped the side of his helmet, bringing up the suit's environmental readout. The external sensors were basic, meant for short-term exposure and emergency assessment rather than full planetary analysis. With tools this limited, there was only so much he could extract from the data.
Even so, he knew that if his parents were here, it would not have slowed them down. With the same constraints, they would already be forming atmospheric models, predicting weather behavior, and breaking down chemical compositions from partial readings alone.
Aiden was good at what he did. One of the best among the newer generation, by most measures. But planetary science was a different tier entirely, and no amount of talent could replace decades of experience.
He swallowed.
"Mom... Dad..." he muttered under his breath, then forced the thought aside.
Focus.
The readings were still better than nothing. Oxygen levels outside are registered within a breathable range. Not identical to standard atmospheric composition, but close enough that his lungs would likely function.
Likely did not mean safely.
There were trace compounds mixed into the air that the suit flagged as unknown. Not immediately lethal, but unfamiliar enough to be dangerous. Breathing it unfiltered could cause irritation, chemical burns, allergic reactions, or long-term damage that he had no way of predicting.
He exhaled slowly.
The helmet stays on for now.
His suit hissed softly as it continued circulating filtered air, the sound steady and reassuring. As long as the suit held pressure, he had a controlled environment. A barrier between himself and whatever waited outside.
That thought led him to the next concern.
The suit itself.
He flexed his arms and rolled his shoulders, feeling the resistance of damaged plating shift against his movements. The impact had not breached the suit fully, but it had come dangerously close. Fine white lines spread across the chest and upper torso, stress fractures in the composite armor where the force of the crash had nearly split it open.
Microfractures.
They were small, almost invisible unless the light caught them at the right angle, but they were among the most dangerous kinds of damage. Hairline cracks ran through the outer layers of the suit's armor, weakening its structure. Under pressure changes, movement, or further impact, those cracks could spread silently.
There would be no dramatic rupture.
No warning explosion.
The suit would simply begin to leak, slowly bleeding pressure and oxygen until breathing became harder, vision blurred, and consciousness slipped away before he realized what was happening.
That was how people died in space.
Quietly.
Aiden knelt with a grunt, pain flaring through his ribs as he reached into a storage compartment built into the side of the suit. His fingers closed around a short cylindrical canister marked with yellow bands.
Emergency sealant compound.
He twisted the cap off and activated it. The compound inside warmed instantly as it reacted to air exposure. It was thick and viscous, engineered to flow into microscopic gaps and harden when it detected pressure differences.
He pressed the nozzle against the cracked plating and squeezed.
The compound flowed out in a slow, controlled line, filling the fractures like liquid metal. It seeped into the cracks, spreading deeper than the surface before hardening into a flexible seal. As it set, the suit's diagnostics updated, pressure stability climbing steadily back into the green.
It was not a perfect fix, and it would not last forever, but it stabilized the suit long enough to keep him alive.
He worked carefully, sealing every visible fracture and every weak point the suit flagged. Sweat trickled down his neck despite the cooling system, and his arms trembled from strain, but he did not rush. Missing even a single crack could undo everything.
When he finished, he leaned back against the bulkhead and closed his eyes for a moment.
The suit would hold.
At least for now.
With immediate survival stabilized, he turned his attention outward.
If he was going to remain here, even temporarily, he needed to understand where "here" was.
Aiden moved to the airlock, each step measured as his battered body protested. He keyed in the manual release and waited as the chamber depressurized with a long, drawn-out hiss. The inner door slid shut behind him, sealing the ship away.
The outer hatch opened.
Air rushed in, cool and heavy against the suit, carrying unfamiliar scents even through the filters. The ground lay just beyond the ramp, dark soil packed firm beneath flattened grass where the ship had torn through it.
He stepped out.
The sensation hit him immediately.
The ground did not crunch like metal or echo like a deck plate. It absorbed his weight with a muted resistance, real and solid. Wind brushed against the suit, not violent, not hostile, simply present. Somewhere in the distance, something chirred softly, followed by another sound that might have been insects or something imitating them.
This was no simulation.
No hallucination.
Worlds did not feel like this unless they were real.
Aiden turned slowly, scanning the surroundings. The crash site was a mess of scorched earth and torn vegetation, the ship half-buried at an angle, its hull scarred and blackened. He crouched and gathered debris, broken plating, twisted supports, anything that could be reused.
Using spare components and a damaged sensor array, he assembled a crude beacon and planted it near the ship. It would not reach far, but if anyone was listening nearby, it might mark his presence.
Assuming anyone was listening at all.
Movement caught his eye.
He shifted instantly into assessment mode.
One quick glance was enough to judge distance and intent. Whatever had moved was not close. It was not charging. There was no immediate threat. Something shifted at the edge of the trees, just enough to disturb the grass.
He froze, muscles tightening.
The movement did not advance. It lingered, then withdrew, as if whatever had noticed him was uncertain how to respond.
He did not pursue.
He did not have the option to chase unknown life in an unfamiliar world, injured and under-equipped. Even if he did, without understanding what was hostile and what was not, aggression would only shorten his lifespan. Observation was safer. Patience was survival.
Back inside the ship, he reinforced the damaged hull with debris, stacking earth and plating to insulate and stabilize the structure. It was crude, but it reduced exposure and made the ship less visible.
Knowing there were things out there, he moved to the internal lockdown controls and manually engaged the secondary and tertiary latches. Heavy locking bars slid into place with a deep metallic thud. The hull plating was reinforced with layered composite steel, a material engineered to withstand extreme stress, radiation exposure, and the spatial distortions of warp travel.
He exhaled slowly.
"There shouldn't be anything alive that can tear through that...right?" he muttered.
He hoped he was right.
Base One.
Not home.
Just shelter.
If he wanted to live, this ship was his only lifeline. Every system, every tool, every scrap of knowledge he had left was tied to it. Lose the ship, and he would be stranded here with nothing but time and a slow death.
He limped back to the console and tried once more to bring J.E.M. online, rerouting power by hand and tightening the connections. He fed the AI what little energy he could spare.
The screen flickered.
[...environment... unknown.]
[Power critical.]
[Protocols restricted.]
Then it went dark.
Aiden slumped into the chair at the console, exhaustion crashing over him all at once. The failure felt heavier than it should have, as if losing J.E.M. drained something deeper than power.
"Damn it," he muttered.
Without the AI, everything would be slower. Dumber. Riskier.
That should not have been possible.
No matter how far a ship was warped or how badly a jump went, there were always signal relays scattered across known space. Trade ports, deep-space beacons, navigation buoys, or emergency listening posts existed in every major corridor and along even the most dangerous routes.
He dismissed the idea of equipment failure just as quickly. He had checked the system more than once, rerouted power, verified the arrays, and run diagnostics until there was nothing left to question. The signal was working.
The thought crossed his mind that he might simply be too far away for the signal to reach anything at all, but he discarded it almost immediately. His ship could not survive a displacement that extreme. The stress alone would have torn it apart long before it carried him that far.
Silence on every channel was inconceivable.
Hunger dragged him back to himself. He ate quickly, the nutrient paste heavy and unpleasant, but effective. Strength returned in small increments, enough to think again.
He sat against the wall, staring at the darkened panels.
He needed a plan.
Not a grand one. Just survival.
He needed to know what he had left. What tools remained? How long he could last?
Inventory came next.
Aiden closed his eyes and drew in a steady breath.
"I will live," he said quietly. "I will survive. No matter what."
The words he uttered were not out of desperation.
They were a decision.