Blackness. Emptiness. Each emotion seems strange to Pr. Walker as he shifts his glance on another patch of what surrounds him. He feels his being has been misplaced somewhere like his mind. He checks the survival cone's monitor.

'Two hours, fifty-eight minutes, thirty-eight seconds. Why do I feel like I have been in stasis longer? Disorientated..that's the answer.'

Stars. Void.

'Where are the murderous aliens? What happened to the fleet?' Walker processes questions but has no answers.

From the survival cone lights project, shining out into inky void, their beams become absorbed by the black. The rest of the survival cones from the Longfox have been dispersed over such a wide area that radio or visual contact is impossible.

Walker looks down at his hand. No scars or wounds. He flexes what was once injured into a fist, conscious of his breath becoming more rapid. 'I must control myself. Take charge,' he attempts to think positively. Flicking a switch on his data bank. No response. To the left, behind his head, an auxiliary override sits. He unclips the release catches, the whole data bank illuminates.

The survival device is three meters long, two meters in width and depth, shaped like an ice-cream cone. There's just enough room inside for one occupant to shift his, her or its body to avoid cramp. Most of the space is taken up with worse-case-scenario gear. Survival cone computers are not bright, in fact, very basic. It responds only to the most simple commands:- stop, go, where to go, send message to nearest; planet, asteroid, ship, station. Its primary objective is to save the life of its passenger before the limited oxygen supply runs dry. If it fails to locate a rescuer or place of refuge, thirty seconds before the air tanks empty, before the very end of sixty-eight hours, the survival cone will self destruct.

Data starts to appear on Walker's right hand side:-
LOCATION~ NOT KNOWN
NEAREST PORT~ NOT KNOWN
S.C PREVIOUS DATA~ NOT KNOWN
AIR SUPPLY~ 65HRS, 40 MS, 57 SEC
NUTRITION RATIONS~ 100%
FUEL STATUS~ 89%
ENERGY STATUS~ 97%
FLARE BEACON~ OPERATIONAL
SONIC BEACON~ OPERATIONAL
CENTRAL THRUSTERS~ OPERATIONAL
REVERSE THRUSTERS~ OPERATIONAL
SIDE THRUSTERS~ OPERATIONAL
S.C COMPUTER~ 100%

'Maybe the data had been scrambled somewhat by the hurried departure from the Longfox? Why has the location, date, history or nearest port not been relayed?'

A tiny blip on Walker's radar has appeared and the anticipation of rescue sends his gathered calm into chaos. His heart quickens. He punches in a request for information on the approaching vessel.

OBJECT~ NOT KNOWN
VELOCITY~ NOT KNOWN
DISTANCE~ NOT KNOWN
POSITION~ NOT KNOWN
MASS~ NOT KNOWN

Walker erases the data with frustrated dread. 'How can a computer, even this basic, not be able to give facts when it has picked up the bloody thing on its own radar? It doesn't make sense!' He stabs IDENTIFY into the keypad.

OBJECT~ NOT KNOWN

He pushes the keypad away from him anger raging. To Walker's horror the sign of another vessel, a potential rescuer, disappears. 'Am I tripping?'

He requests previous data on what was on the radar just seconds ago. The survival cone computer draws a blank.

"FUCKING HELL!!" Walker shouts out loud.

He checks the radar once more. The small screen is suddenly pock-marked with tiny blips. The blips increase in number and flash in a blitz all over the screen. The radar screen burns white as the blips merge, fusing to pure white, forcing the private to turn away.

The screen is empty once more. 'What the fuck is going on here?' The young soldier punches in more enquires to the computer, wishing to find reasons why a vessel or vessels or objects or whatever they may be, are playing with the scanning equipment.

Every coordinate starts to fill the data bank. A small red light starts to flash on the side of the screen, warning him of an impending overload.

He attempts to shut the system down. It doesn't respond. Moving onto more data, confusing information- senseless gobbledygook.

The red light ceases flashing. The computer overloads. He punches at the keys but there is no response. Control goes out-of-the-window as Walker rips the keypad from its placement. Immediately he regrets the foolish action. The radar glitches out.

Then the main monitor returns back-up systems going on line. It scrolls:

NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN WELCOME NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN ALAN WALKER NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN DO NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN BE NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN NOT KNOWN ALARMED NOT KNOWN...

All ceases. The S.C goes into total darkness. Walker's hurried breath seems amplified as his quickening heart rate marks the situation that may or may not be an absolute loss. His whole body shakes uncontrollably knowing that with such a technical breakdown, the next power to go will be the life support. To his dread, SELF DESTRUCT can only be activated by the computer that has thrown-in-the-towel meaning that he'll not have a quick death.

He sees something, which makes him balk. He faints before he can throw up, fainting for the first time in his life.

A huge alien vessel has abruptly appeared before the miniscule survival cone. A white cylindrical form, a tube, from a great distance looking perfectly smooth. Closer, a mile or so, the ship has a network of billions upon billions of lights. Sharp little points embedded into the outer shell of this vessel and watched over time the light matrix changes and grows to other directions, different patterns, alternating colours, like a living object.

The alien craft makes no commotion as it pulls Walker into the hollowness that runs through its tube-like middle. Even whiteness emanates from the core to which the tiny S.C is drawn. He awakes to whiteness on the inside of what may be his final resting place.

He screams.

The craft is five miles long, two and a half miles in diameter. Inside this core knowing that there is nothing now he can do. The massive space flashes like God's camera burning. The survival cone with Walker disappears. The vessel becomes transparent, a ghost of an image left in space momentarily- gone, as though never having existed at all.