The artificial gravity died with a sickening lurch.
"Magnetic boots offline. Preparing for braking" the ship's computer announced.
Inside the command deck of the Victory, the twenty-five elite soldiers of the First Battalion floated up from their seats, their heavy combat armor are suddenly weightless. It was a sensation Captain Jason was used to, but for the rookies, it was a vomit inducing reminder that they were no longer on Earth.
"Visual on the target," the pilot called out.
Jason grabbed a handhold and pulled himself toward the forward viewport. Below them, the grey, dusty surface of the Moon rushed by. It was a dead wasteland of rock and silence, a place humanity had gazed at with reverence since the primitive era, believing it to be the home of deities.
But in the center of the massive Bailly Crater(south west moon), a miracle rose from the dust.
Moon Base One.
It wasn't just a collection of buildings; it was a city enclosed in glasses. A massive dome, two kilometers wide and a thousand meters high, glittered like a diamond against the black void of space. Surrounding it were fields of solar panels and heavy mining machinery that looked like toys from this height.
From the passenger cabin, Jason could hear the faint sounds of crying. The scientists and engineers were looking at that dome and seeing salvation. They saw civilization. They saw a future.
But Jason saw a tomb.
"Captain."
Vice Captain Austin drifted up beside him, his face grim. He wasn't looking at the view; he was checking the charge on his rifle.
"Something doesn't add up," Austin said, keeping his voice low so the pilot wouldn't hear. "Intelligence says the prisoners revolted three days ago. They took the administration building and the life support grid".
"That's correct," Jason replied, his eyes fixed on the approaching dome.
"Then why is the air still on?" Austin gestured to the dome. "If I was the base commander and I was being overrun by revolters, I would have vented the air. Killed them all to save the facility. Why did they let themselves get killed instead of flipping the switch?".
Jason turned to look at his second-in-command. It was the right question.
"Because the facility is worth more than the people, Austin. Infinitely more".
Jason pushed off the wall and grabbed the inter-communication handset to address the squad. "Listen up! Organize your gear and strap in. We hit the atmosphere or whatever passes in five minutes".
As the soldiers scrambled to secure their floating weapons, Jason floated in the center of the deck, holding onto a strap. He knew it was time to declassify the truth.
"You're all wondering what we're walking into," Jason began. "You know Moon Base One cost sixty trillion dollars. You know it took thirty years to build. But the government told you it was for mining fuel and looking at stars.
That was a lie !"
The soldiers stopped moving. They looked at their captain.
"In 1969, the Americans didn't just find rocks and sand on the moon. Deep in the Bailly Crater, buried under miles of dust, they found a structure. A perfect sphere, fifteen kilometers wide",.
"Aliens?" Marcus, the heavy weapons specialist, asked, his grip tightening on his straps.
"An Alien Spaceship," Jason confirmed. "Only a small part was exposed above the surface; the vast majority was buried in the soil. With our technological level, there was no way we could move it back to Earth".
Jason lowered his voice, delivering the information that had been a top-secret classified item for decades. "The interior of the spaceship has a honeycomb structure, seemingly with an extremely large space. But strangely, it was empty. Except for one thing. Metal Box. they found a metal box containing a substance we call the Perfect Element".
"What does it do?" Austin asked.
"It evolves us," Jason said. "It isn't composed of matter recognized by humans, it's not made of atoms. It appears liquid, like mercury, and its biggest characteristic is that it can be absorbed by living organisms",.
Jason recalled the files he had read , the secret reports from the 1990s meeting that had terrified world leaders.
"They ran experiments," Jason explained to the stunned squad. "For example, the Epiphyllum oxypetalum, a plant that only blooms for two hours. After treatment with the Perfect Element, its blooming time miraculously extended tenfold".
A ripple of shock went through the squad.
"Another example is rice," Jason continued. "The most common annual herb, with a life cycle of only one year. After treatment, it was still alive after twenty years".
"Ten times?" Marcus muttered. "So... humans could also live for thousand of years?".
"That was the theory. It repairs genetic defects, enhances cell vitality, and delays aging. It is the legendary elixir of immortality".
Jason's voice dripped "Think about it. Without the temptation of a tenfold or even eternal lifespan, would the political leaders and tycoons of various countries pour in huge sums of money? What helium-3 energy? What scientific curiosity? All of them are byproducts. The most important thing is lifespan".
"But the Americans couldn't crack it alone for twenty years," Jason said. "Once the Perfect Element acted on humans, it caused brain death in a short period. There were no successful cases.
So, the older leaders who couldn't wait any longer organised a summit with twenty powerful countries which joined forces and formed the Federation.
They gathered world strength to accelerate research. They built the Space Electromagnetic Cannon in the Andes just to launch materials cheap enough to build this place",.
"And the workforce?" Austin asked, though he seemed to already suspect the answer.
"Construction was difficult. Radiation, toxic dust, low gravity... it destroys the body," Jason said grimly. "So, they adopted the 'military plus death row inmates' plan. Criminals, death row inmates, were gathered from all over the world. If construction was successful, the government promised sentence reductions. If they died... it didn't matter. This is a base built with their lives".
"But now," Austin finished the thought, "Earth is gone. The government that signed those pardons is in dust".
"Exactly," Jason said. "The deal is off. The prisoners realized there is no one left to grant them freedom. They have nothing left to lose".
"Great," Marcus grunted, strapping himself into a crash seat. "So we're fighting an army of desperate murderers for a drug that makes you live forever. What good will immortality do us if we starve to death next week?".
"Focus, Marcus," Jason snapped. "The Victory carries five hundred tons of supplies. If the prisoners get this ship, they get food and immortality. We cannot let that happen".
The ship shuddered violently as the braking rockets fired.
"Touchdown in T-60 seconds" the computer Ai warned.
Jason floated into his command chair and locked the magnetic straps. The view on the screen shifted to the landing camera. Below them, the landing pad of Moon Base One grew larger, a massive industrial platform connected to the main dome by a reinforced tunnel.
"Captain," the pilot's voice wavered. "I'm not getting a clearance signal from the tower. The automated docking system is offline".
"Go with manual," Jason ordered. "Put us down on Pad A."
"There are no lights, Sir. It's pitch black down there."
"Use the thermal cameras".
The Victory descended into the shadow of the crater. The bright lunar surface disappeared, replaced by the dark, industrial skeleton of the base's exterior.
Thud
The landing gear slammed into the concrete. The ship groaned, settled, and then went still.
Silence returned to the bridge. Jason unbuckled and walked to the main console. He brought up the external camera feed.
"Where are the criminals?" Austin asked, stepping up beside him. "If they wanted our supplies, they should be waiting for us".
The screen showed nothing but empty walkways and dormant machinery. There were no rovers. No fuel trucks. No people.
"Zoom in on the airlock door," Jason commanded.
The camera lens whirred, zooming in on the base's external airlock, fifty meters away.
It wasn't clean white anymore.
Someone had painted a symbol across the blast doors in jagged, red strokes. It looked like a spiraling eye, or perhaps a black hole. Words were scrawled beneath it.
The Cult of the Void.
Beneath the symbol, a single spacesuit drifted aimlessly, tied to the railing. The faceplate was smashed. The frozen face inside was twisted in a silent scream.
"They aren't welcoming us," Jason said, his voice cold. "They're waiting for us to open the door so they can butcher us".
"Austin, tell the squad to get ready for combat."