Station Theta: Observation Log
Log Entry #581
Location: Station Theta, Astraio Moon of Virelia-9
Mission: C̸r̵y̷p̸t̷e̷d̶
No human presence within the frame, as usual. The reflection axis remains perfect. All celestial bodies, both recorded and calculated, are visible in flawless symmetry. The surface behaves like water but shows no measurable depth. The team now refers to it as “the screen.”
We still don’t know what causes it. The reflection ignores all known optical and atmospheric rules. It simply exists — precise, unchanging. Temporal artifacts occasionally appear in the footage during playback. Last week, a junior analyst reported seeing a figure at the corner of the frame. We reviewed the data. The frame was empty. But the timestamp… had shifted.
The atmosphere here has changed. Not fear; just a quiet sense of being observed. The phenomenon isn’t escalating for now, but we’re starting to suspect it’s not just reflecting space. It might be recording us. Not what we do, necessarily, but how we perceive it.
The longer we watch, the more it seems to respond. Not visibly, but structurally. As if part of our attention has been drawn into its symmetry, and it’s beginning to remember us.
Platform Eidos: Commander’s Journal
Entry #57
Location: Platform Eidos, Virelia-9 Troposphere
Mission: Reconnaissance – Station Theta (Astraio Moon)
From the upper decks of Eidos, I can see the towers of Helion and Varsa piercing the stratosphere, their silhouettes rising above the cloudline like silent sentinels. Below us, Virelia-9 churns with mist and volatile currents — a planet where we developed a few infrastructures, but haven’t yet tamed. The research platforms were built high above the storms, chasing clarity where the planet offers none.
But it isn’t Virelia that concerns me now. It’s Theta Station — orbiting Astraio, the closest of Virelia’s three moons.
Three days ago, Theta stopped transmitting.
No emergency beacon. No nav data. Just silence. The station houses fifteen researchers and a full AI operations core. The last recorded log was routine: data consolidation, energy readings from the planet’s « screen », a few minor anomalies in reactor cooling. Then... nothing.
High command wants answers. I’m taking the Aegis with a small crew: Talren (systems) and Kez (engineering). I hope my training as a xeno-biologist stays irrelevant. That kind of knowledge only becomes useful when things go deeply wrong. We’re outfitted for diagnostics and recovery, not conflict. Officially, it’s a technical check-in.
Unofficially? We’re walking into the complete unknown.
Theta’s crew is highly disciplined. If something caused them to go silent, it wasn’t mechanical failure. Not without triggering failsafes. Not without someone — or something — suppressing them.
If all goes well, we’ll be back within two rotations. I have a weird feeling about this mission. Something tells me Theta hasn’t just gone quiet.
End log.
Lake Nareth: Commander’s Journal
Entry #58
Location: Surface of Astraio, near Lake Nareth
Mission Status: In Progress – Theta Station remains unaccounted for
We made descent last cycle.
Theta Station… isn’t here.
Orbital scans showed nothing. No thermal readings, no active signals. The coordinates should have been precise, yet we circled for hours. Searching, recalibrating, doubting our own systems. Nothing. It was like Theta had never existed.
Then I saw the lake.
Nareth, I’m calling it now. It wasn’t on any of our primary scans . Just a shimmering basin tucked between jagged ridgelines, still and vast. It caught the last light of Astraio’s day — streaks of orange and violet mirrored in perfect silence. Above us, the dusk sky burned with stars and the brightness of Orionis’ galaxy. Virelia loomed massive, serene, almost watchful.
Something about this place... pulled me in.
I don’t remember issuing the landing order. But we’re grounded now, near the lake’s eastern ridge. Kez said the pressure gauges dipped for a moment during descent. Nothing critical, but enough to make her frown.
Theta may not be here, but I believe we’re close. Or at least closer to something.
Tirak Mountains: Commander’s Journal
Entry #59
Location: Eastern Range, coordinates unknown
Mission Status: Theta Station remains missing – anomaly discovered
We found something. But not Theta Station.
Past the ridgeline, the terrain warped. More jagged, unnaturally so, as if shaped by forces we simply don’t understand. After nearly two cycles on foot, we reached what we believe to be a gate. A fracture in the mountain wall, lined with markings that match nothing in our database. Not construction. Not erosion. It’s like the rock itself was rewritten. A giant eye, watching us.
It’s not a doorway in the usual sense. Just light. A violet pulse that almost hums in the silence. It’s… alive, I think.
Kez ran scans. No data comes back clean, only static and distorted telemetry. But one thing is consistent: energy is flowing through it.
We believe crossing it might give us some answers about what happened to Theta’s team.
We stood in front of that gate, and for a moment, we remembered being here before. That’s impossible, I know. But the feeling remains... like a dream we never had. Familiar and wrong at once. We’ve lost the trail in every conventional way.
So we’re going through. Because this… this is what called us here.
End log.
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