Signal Lost
February 14, 2025
The distress beacon pulsed on the screen. A single word, repeating every thirty seconds.
HELP.
Captain Mira Lawson of the Argus-7 exhaled sharply. “How long has this been broadcasting?”
Her navigator, Reyes, scanned the readings. “Looks like… seventy-four years.”
A silence fell over the bridge. No one had been in this sector for decades. Whatever had sent that signal should have been long dead.
Mira straightened. “Bring us in.”
The wreck drifted in the void, a hulking mass of scorched metal. The words SS Titan were barely visible along the hull.
Mira and her team docked and pried open the airlock. Inside, the ship was eerily intact—no bodies, no decay, just silence.
“Command logs should be in the bridge,” Mira said. “Let’s move.”
As they walked, their boots echoed against the metal. The lights flickered, struggling to stay alive after seventy-four years of neglect.
Then a voice crackled through Mira’s comm.
“Who’s there?”
She froze.
“Identify yourself,” she ordered, heart pounding.
Static. Then:
“Please… don’t leave me.”
Reyes exchanged a look with her. “That’s impossible. There’s no life signs aboard.”
Mira swallowed. “Then who the hell just spoke?”
The bridge was pristine—too pristine. The command console was active, as if someone had been sitting there moments ago.
Mira activated the logs. A hologram flickered to life, showing a bearded man in a tattered uniform. His voice was hoarse.
“This is Captain Elias Kade of the SS Titan. If you’re receiving this… it’s already too late.”
Reyes shifted uneasily. “I don’t like this.”
Mira motioned for silence. The log continued.
“We picked up something—a signal, an anomaly. The AI went haywire. Crew started disappearing. One by one. Then I was alone.”
Kade’s face darkened.
“But the ship wouldn’t let me die.”
The log cut out.
Then Mira’s comm crackled again.
“Please… don’t leave me.”
Her breath hitched. The voice wasn’t Kade’s anymore.
It was her own.
The lights flickered—then cut out completely.
Reyes cursed. “Mira, we need to go.”
A sound echoed down the corridor.
Footsteps.
Slow. Measured. Coming closer.
Mira drew her weapon. “Move. Now.”
They sprinted back toward the airlock. The voice followed them, distorted, overlapping with dozens of others.
“Don’t leave me.”
“Help.”
“Please.”
Reyes reached the airlock first, slamming the override. The doors hissed open, revealing the docking tunnel. Mira turned back for one last look—
And someone stood at the end of the hall.
A shadow. Featureless. Watching.
The doors slammed shut.
They launched back to the Argus-7 at full thrust. Mira didn’t relax until the wreck was a distant speck in the void.
Reyes finally exhaled. “What the hell was that?”
Mira stared at the fading Titan. Her voice was hollow.
“A ghost ship.”