//------------------------------//
// Ishimura: New Hope 
// Story: Dead Space: Deep Space Terror 
// by Blackdrag-rose 
//------------------------------//

"I see you are feeling much better now," Isaac commented, noticing that Chrysalis was fast to deactivate her helmet as they rode the Tram away from the Hydroponics Deck, one that he was glad to get away from as he followed his companion's lead and deactivated his own helmet.

"Well, it's not hard to feel better when you have hope." Chrysalis replied, though even as she said that she was beginning to realize why the ponies always thought about what when they were under pressure, such as when she first invaded Canterlot or when some other evil was attacking another settlement, "After experiencing all of the horrors that we have faced so far, and killed all of those Necromorphs to reach this point, it's good to actually have a plan of action that will get us saved from this nightmare. I'm not going to lie, the situation we've found ourselves in is more terrifying than any I've been in over my long life, though for some time I was actually wondering if we were fighting a losing battle... though now I'm glad to have some hope that we can get out of here alive."

Isaac wasn't surprised to hear that Chrysalis was slightly terrified of everything they had been through so far, as he felt the same way, but the both of them had been brave as they fought the Necromorphs and completed the various tasks that either Hammond or Kendra had for them. Sure, it was challenging work to repair a ship of this size on his own, since his companion didn't have the knowledge that he had, but the two of them were lucky that none of the systems they had been asked to repair had been completely broken. He wasn't sure what they would have done if the engines had been completely destroyed or if the ADS had been wrecked beyond repair, though he was grateful for what they were able to do with what remained on the Ishimura. At the same time, however, he actually wondered if Chrysalis had ever loved someone enough that she was starting to hear their voices inside her head, like he was with Nicole, though he decided not to say anything about it since she would think he was going insane.

As he opened his mouth to say something else, however, Isaac watched as the Tram started to slow down until it came to a stop in the station area of the Mining Deck, to which he and Chrysalis sighed as they reengaged their helmets, checked their weapons, and disembarked from the Tram.

"Isaac, Chrysalis, this might be our last chance of getting out of here alive." Kendra spoke up, to which a video link appeared in front of the duo, where they stopped in their tracks as they wondered what she was going to say to them this time around, while keeping their eyes open for enemies around the station area, "Fortunately there's an asteroid loaded up in the mining bay, waiting to be smelted. If you guys attach an SOS beacon to it, you can launch it away from the ship to make a clear broadcast. The beacon is located on the Maintenance sub deck, and the asteroid can be launched from the Control Room... which is locked at the moment. It looks like the crew kept an emergency access key on the Processing sub deck... couldn't be easy, could it? I don't know how much more of this I can take."

"Hopefully this will be the last we have to endure," Chrysalis said, as she was getting tired of all of this as well, though that didn't stop her from worrying that something else might go wrong while they were on this deck.

Kendra nodded and the communication was terminated, to which Isaac and Chrysalis quickly searched the station for any supplies that were around them, which was mostly credits, before they headed towards the hallway that would bring them to the hub section of this deck. What they found was that the hallway was short and brought them right to a slightly larger chamber with a good sized door, though before they activated the door Chrysalis spotted a wall box and claimed the Power Node that was stored inside it. Once she had that in hand the duo activated the door and walked into the RIG Room, which had to be a preparation area for the people that worked on this deck, or at least that was Chrysalis' thoughts as she looked around the room. The area was definitely large for a decent sized group, which would have been the engineers and workers that were assigned to this deck, though she also smiled when she noticed a Bench on the right side of the room.

Chrysalis did find quite the number of supplies in this area as well, where she and Isaac kept the ammunition that was for their guns and sold off the pieces that they didn't need, while at the same time Isaac stored some of their excess med packs inside the storage function of the store, which they could access at any of the stores if they ran out of what they currently had.

Once they had gotten themselves situated, and had taken care of their inventories, the duo approached the doors to the cargo lift and called the elevator up to where they were standing, though when it arrived they witnessed the death of yet another person that had survived this long, who raised half of his arm towards them before collapsing. Based on their experience with such things both Isaac and Chrysalis prepared themselves as they walked out onto the elevator and stood their ground, to which Isaac pushed the button for the Maintenance sub deck, as the Mining sub deck option, and the deck itself most likely, was offline at the moment. Even as he pressed the button the two of them heard Kendra inform them that she was going to try and find a bypass so they could access it later on, though as the door closed they readied their weapons for whatever enemies were waiting to jump out at them this time around.

As the elevator descended towards the level that Isaac chosen, the very last one since that was where the beacon was located, the vent above the elevator shattered and several slashers jumped down onto the floor that Isaac and Chrysalis were standing on. It came as a shock for the duo, since they weren't expecting it to happen at all, but they quickly regained themselves and opened fire on the enemies that had come for them, dismembering the slashers before they even had a chance to turn around or brandish their bladed arms in a menacing manner. When they passed by the door to the third level, the Mining sub deck, Chrysalis froze as she thought she saw the form of the hunter lurking behind the door, but she didn't have a change to prove whether or not her mind was playing tricks on her as they continued down to the fourth and final sub deck... before finally coming to a stop and letting the door open, allowing them to enter the Maintenance sub deck so they could find what they were looking for.

As they walked off the elevator, however, Chrysalis remembered that Mercer had two test tubes in his lab and that there was a slim possibility that he might have made a second hunter while they were dealing with the Leviathan, but she pushed that thought away, because two hunters terrified her more than one did.

One thing they both discovered was that there was some organic growth in this area as well, which made sense considering that the Leviathan had stretched itself across the entire ship, though when Chrysalis looked to the left she spotted a organic ball sitting out in the open. Instead of wasting bullets on it she simply levitated the ball with her magic, causing two infectors to charge out of their hiding places, though Chrysalis used the ball to blow the furthest one into the wall while Isaac dismembered the one that came at them. She then put her weapon to the side for the moment as she pulled out one of the bone blades she had taken from a Necromorph before she had acquired her main weapon, to which she decided not to waste any ammunition on the wounded infector and finished it off with one of the blades that she had been carrying on her back the entire time.

With the deed done they searched the area and found an audio log, one that revealed that Dr. Kyne had kidnapped something and was threatening to kill the man, though he wanted the access codes to the cargo bay, where the Marker was supposed to be stored. According to what they heard it appeared that the Marker was definitely the key to everything that had happened aboard the Ishimura and Aegis VII, though either of them were absolutely sure that that meant since they still didn't have the full story on the Marker. When the log finished playing Isaac picked up a gold semiconductor as Chrysalis slipped the audio log into the container where they were keeping all the logs they had acquired so far, before opening the door that was in front of them and moved to the next part of the ship... where they found a lift area, like the one they pulled towards them in the Engineering Deck, before Isaac turned around and headed back to the elevator.

Chrysalis, not understanding why he would want to leave the beacon behind, since that was what they had come for, sighed and followed him back to the elevator, where Isaac pressed the option for the second sub deck, the Processing sub deck, and the elevator got moving once again.

"So why are we going to Processing without the beacon?" Chrysalis asked, as she knew that the key they needed was somewhere on the sub deck they were heading towards, but she wanted to know why Isaac picked the Maintenance level when he wasn't planning on getting one of the items they needed.

"There's something down there that made me think that getting the access key was the smarter move," Isaac replied, though at the same time he couldn't explain the feeling that he encountered when they opened that door, as he was sure that there was something there that was pushing him away until it was ready, "besides, we need both of the access key and the beacon before we can enter the Mining sub deck, so I decided that getting the access key might be the best course of action at the moment."

Chrysalis wondered if there was another reason behind the decision, like a past memory or something, but instead of arguing with Isaac over the matter she decided to drop it, since she knew that her companion was correct in his assumption that the order they acquired the two items in didn't matter. If he wanted to go for the access key first, instead of the beacon, then she would suck it up and follow him, since they worked well as a pair and had each other's back when they were fighting the Necromorph hordes that stood between them and escape. Of course she was unwilling to admit that she might have felt something as well when Isaac opened the door that made him change his mind in such a manner, but somehow she had the feeling that Isaac already knew what she was thinking.

A few moments later the elevator came to a stop at the door to the Processing sub deck and opened, to which the duo walked out and began to take stock of their new surroundings, where Chrysalis picked up another audio log, though this one was from Temple. What they discovered was that Temple was able to find Elizabeth, which made Chrysalis happy for them, but also learned that there weren't any spaceworthy vessels left on the Ishimura, though when Elizabeth spoke up it appeared that they were looking for a beacon as well. That instantly told the duo that they weren't prepared for what was in front of them, the Necromorphs, and likely failed in the end, but at the same time that meant that they couldn't fail, since they had friends that were waiting for their success.

They turned to the left and came to a small section that had some ammunition boxes, though as they collected what was in front of them a trio of slashers dropped down on the path they intended to take, to which Isaac stunned them with a Stasis blast as Chrysalis opened fire, dismembering the trio before they could even fight back. As a fourth slasher came towards them, however, a pregnant Necromorph came up the path behind them, from the path they didn't take, so while Isaac fired at the slasher Chrysalis opened fire and dismembered the other foe without breaking open it's stomach. Once those enemies were taken care of the duo continued to explore the area they were in, carefully searching for more foes while looking for the way forward... which they eventually found, in the form of a ramp that brought them down to a door, one that let them access a hallway that would take them to Material Processing.

They followed the passage right into the waiting blades of a slasher, which Chrysalis loosed a blast of magic at and knocked into the wall behind them, before Isaac dismembered it completely, allowing them a small breather to examine the text log that was on the floor in front of them. The text log indicated that there had been a gravity failure at some point, as one of the asteroids the workers had been collating had broken free of where it was being held, killed two of the crew members, and slammed into a wall, where it separated into multiple chunks that prevented anyone from getting the master key. When they reached the point where the writer indicated that they needed engineering help, which was at the end of the text log, Chrysalis could help but wonder why only a few people had Stasis Modules, when it appeared that everyone on the ship should have had them.

As they put the text log away, however, they found the asteroid that was mentioned, as it was resting in the wall in front of them, though at the same time the hole it had punched through the wall gave them the quickest way into the area they needed to go through... even though that meant cleaning up the mess that the crew had left behind.

Chrysalis stared up at the strange circular contraption that bits of rock were floating through in a straight line, heading from one side of the room to the other, though at the same time she immediately spotted several bits of rock that had come from the asteroid.

"There's a failsafe on the processing room door," Kendra told them, though that was another moment where Chrysalis wondered if Kendra was actually watching them and knew that they picked up something that said the same thing, or if she only knew when they were approaching certain obstacles, "It won't open unless you restore gravity to the room, but you guys can't turn the gravity on unless you clear that room of all the boulders that are floating around. Isaac, maybe you can grab some of them with your Kinesis Module and drop them in the gravity beam... Chrysalis, I guess you can just wrap your magic around some of the boulders and do the same thing."

Once the communication was terminated Isaac jumped over to the other side of the chamber and started moving towards the rocks that were the closest to him, leaving Chrysalis to do the same thing on the side where the hole in the wall was. While the two of them made their way towards one of the boulders, however, they were assaulted by leapers that started crawling out of the vents around them, though both of them were ready for such an attack and opened fire on the Necromorphs that were coming at them. What Chrysalis did, in addition to moving her two boulders into the gravity beam that was in the middle of the room, was levitate the various fragments of the Necromorphs she slew into the same area that the boulders were being put into, along with the corpses that hadn't been changed by an infector yet. She was making sure if an infector invaded this area there would be nothing for it to transform, something that Isaac nodded his agreement with when he asked her what she was doing.

They knew that the anomalies were being destroyed because the computerized voice was telling them that, though it took them a few minutes to clear the area of enemies, and their corpses, and the asteroids themselves before there was nothing left for them to grab... before the voice informed them that they were now allowed to restore gravity to the entire room, to which they jumped to the console in question and landed on the area around it.

As they restored gravity to the entire room, however, a trio of Necromorphs, being a slasher, a pregnant, and one of the exploders, though the slasher was separate from the other two, forcing them to divide their attention between the two groups of enemies. Chrysalis, thinking smart in this situation, targeted the exploder and blasted the ball of goo that it was carrying, causing it and the pregnant to explode together, allowing her a moment to watch the walkways restore themselves as she heard Isaac firing at the slasher. Of course that wasn't the end as more slashers and exploders started to flood the area, though with how they were grouped all the duo did was fire at the good sacks that were being carried and destroyed their enemies with ease. Once they had taken out all of the enemies that decided to come after them, for the moment anyway, the duo took a few seconds for Chrysalis to levitate the dead bodies into the gravity beam and burned them like everything else they had fired into the beam, before heading towards the door they had unlocked by restoring the gravity to this room.

When they entered the room that was their destination they found more dead crew members, which wasn't new for them at this point in time, they found some ammunition laying on the floor and in some crates that they opened, before they found the key resting in the hands of one of the corpses... which they carefully pried from the body before grinning to themselves for a few seconds, as this allowed them to get one step closer to getting off this ship.

"Isaac, Chrysalis, that's definitely the key you need," Kendra spoke up, though her voice sounded happier, meaning that she was happy to see them making progress like this, since it would allow them to send out an SOS signal to whoever might be listening, "It'll get you into the Control Room so you can launch the asteroid, but don't forget to find a beacon and attach it to the asteroid first. I've been reading another report on the colonists dementia, and it appears that it started after they brought the Marker up from the planet. God knows how long it's been down there."

The duo sort of knew that the dementia started with the Marker, though now they knew when it started, but since that wasn't really relevant to their current situation they opened the door in front of them and walked into the hallway that appeared to wrap around towards the entrance of this area. Before they got too far Chrysalis opened a wall box and recovered another Power Node, though with it in hand she followed after Isaac as they rounded the corner and headed towards the door that would take them back to the entrance. As they approached the door, however, the lights went out for a few seconds and they could have sworn that they heard some sort of Necromorph roar echo throughout the decks of the ship... before the vent above their heads burst and caused them to back up, only to find that there weren't any enemies that wanted them dead.

As the two of them calmed down they opened the door and turned to the right, where they opened a second door and followed the path back to the elevator, though they had to dismember a leaper that dropped down in their path before reaching their target... where Isaac tapped the option for the Maintenance sub deck, returning them to the first level they picked a few minutes ago.

When they arrived at the Maintenance sub deck the duo discovered that none of the enemies they had killed had been replaced by new ones, to which they carefully approached the door that they had opened earlier and walked out into the area that they had ignored earlier. From there Isaac latched onto the trolley that was hanging in front of them and pulled it over to where they were standing, though one it was in place, and the bars were raised, he let Chrysalis walk onto it first before stepping up to the control terminal. As they started moving towards the other end of the trolley line, however, they found several pods resting on both sides of the trolley, to which Isaac pointed his Plasma Cutter at the right side while Chrysalis did the same with the left side, though she held her Pulse Rifle out. The two of them then fired at the tentacles that the pods pulled out in an attempt to hurt them, while at the same time being disgusted by the organic growth that rested on the area around them.

As they reached the end, and the trolley came to a stop, Chrysalis noticed that the bars didn't raise immediately and that there was something tickling the edge of her mind, before she heard the sound of someone walking around them and turned around... where she spotted a lady, wearing the attire that the other crew members had been wearing, walking out of what appeared to be her hiding spot.

"Isaac!" the lady said, though the instant she spoke Chrysalis realized who she was staring at, as this had to be Nicole, the person that Isaac had been so worried about while she and the others were using the Kellion to reach the Ishimura, "Is that really you?"

"Nicole!" Isaac said, though his tone was much happier than it had been since they landed in the Flight Deck, because now he knew that his beloved girlfriend had survived the outbreak and had, somehow, managed to hide from all of the Necromorphs that were running throughout the Ishimura, "Yes, it's really me!"

"It feels like it's been so long," Nicole commented, where she also sounded happy to see Isaac again, before noticing that Chrysalis was even there, though that didn't seem to bother her in the slightest as she turned back towards Isaac, "but we can help you. Come with me."

Chrysalis had no idea how Nicole managed to survive down here, for so long on her own, but she became worried when she heard 'we' escape her lips, because as far as she could see Nicole was the only person around, something that Isaac must not have noticed. As Nicole walked back behind her hiding spot, however, the trolley bars opened and allowed the duo to walk over to the door that was in front of them, though when they walked through it they found that the room was separated into two halves. The side they were on was much larger, easily taking up half of the total size of the entire room, while the part that Nicole was walking on was half the size of what they had to work with, though she didn't seem to mind it at all.

"The beacon is in the storage room next to you," Nicole said, pointing at the door in question as she walked towards a console, one that she seemed more interested in at the moment as she turned to face it, "I think I can disable the lock from here. Hold on."

As Nicole started hacking the terminal both Isaac and Chrysalis remained on their guard, because this wasn't going to go unnoticed by their enemies, though they smiled as they watched a slasher drop down on the side that Nicole was standing on and turned towards her. Isaac was the first to react, as he immediately loosed a shot that blasted the slasher's legs right off, before following that up with a second shot that tore off it's arms, killing it in a matter of seconds and stopping it from hurting Nicole. As the number of enemies started to increase Isaac moved to attacking the slashers that were closer to his beloved while Chrysalis targeted the enemies that were either near the door Nicole had walked through or the slashers that had climbed up to the area she and Isaac were standing on. While all of this was going on, however, Chrysalis noticed a shimmer on the other side of the room, where Nicole was standing, and a Necromorph that both of them had missed was sliced apart by a lance that embedded in the chest of a second slasher.

Chrysalis' eyes widened as she recognized the flaming lance, something that shouldn't be in a location like this, before she spotted the owner drop down on the walkway near Nicole and trotted up to the impaled slasher, to which the familiar form gripped the lance and pulled it out, before finishing off the slasher. Chrysalis took in the familiar light gray colored coat that the mare had, along with the fire red colored mane and tail that was similar in style to Spitfire's mane and tail, though she only knew the Captain of the Wonderbolts because she impersonated Princess Cadance for some time. The mare in question was wearing light armor, fit for a pegasus such as herself, that would allow her to move around easily without wearing herself out quickly... though it was the mare's familiar amber colored eyes that caused Chrysalis to freeze for a moment as she stared into them.

Even though the mare's Cutie Mark was obscured by the armor she was wearing, and couldn't be seen, Chrysalis knew what it looked like, since she had seen it many times in the past... and knew who this had to be, despite the facts that she knew at the moment.

"W... Wildfire?" Chrysalis weakly asked, though at the same time she lowered her weapon until it was resting by her leg, as her mind was struggling to understand what was happening, "Wildfire Comet? I... Is that really you?"

"Chryssi?!" the mare said, though that was before she flapped her wings and headed over towards the side of the room that Chrysalis and Isaac were standing on, before she stopped in front of the duo and studied them for a few seconds as she tried to see past the helmets, which prompted Chrysalis to disengage her helmet for a moment, "Chryssi, it is you! I knew I recognized your voice the moment you started talking, though it took me a second to realize you had changed forms again... and I'm not against the form your wearing now."

Chrysalis couldn't believe what she was hearing, because the only pony that knew that personal nickname, which she only gave to the mare that truly held her heart, was somehow standing in front of her, causing her to stand there in shock for a few seconds.

"Chryssi? You look like you've seen a ghost," Wildfire commented, though that was followed by her smiling as she leveled herself with Chrysalis and twisted her head as she placed a light kiss on her cheek, before pulling back with a grin on her face, "Not that I mind reminding you about the fun we had in the past."

"Now is not the time Wildfire," Nicole said, causing the pegasus to glance back at her before sighing and departed from Chrysalis' company, to which she turned back towards Isaac, "Okay, the door's unlocked Isaac. Wildfire and I are going to find another route so we can meet up with you... but remember that I love you, Isaac, just as she loves Chrysalis. This will all be over soon."

Before Isaac could say anything Nicole walked towards the door she had walked through earlier and walked out of the room they were in, to which Wildfire waved a hoof at Chrysalis before following after her, leaving Isaac and Chrysalis to their own devices... which was mostly Isaac opening the door behind them and finding the beacon they had come here for, as well as the schematic for the level four RIG suit.

"Isaac! Hey, I lost both your signal and Chrysalis' signal for a moment there," Kendra spoke up, surprising Isaac by that fact, though at the same time he stored the beacon and the schematic before shaking Chrysalis out of the shock that she was in, where she reengaged her helmet once more, "I was worried there for a moment... but now my fears have been eased, especially since you have the beacon now. Just head to the Mining sub deck and attach it to the asteroid. I've been running trajectory calculations and if we launch soon, there's a good chance the asteroid can reach a safe distance to begin transmitting. Unfortunately there's still no sign of Hammond... in his state, I can't imagine he's still alive..."

Isaac was sad to hear that Kendra thought that Hammond was dead, but considering how much poison he had taken into his body before he and Chrysalis arrived at their destination he guessed that their commander might have died before they took out the Leviathan. Chrysalis, on the other hand, was still shocked by what she had seen and said nothing as she followed Isaac out of the area they were in, as she was trying to understand what had happened and who she had seen. She knew that it was impossible for her to have seen Wildfire again, especially since she was already dead, and knew that the Marker must have already wormed it's way into her head, showing her the first signs that it showed the crew of the Ishimura and the colonists of Aegis VII... and yet she couldn't stop her heart from racing as she touched the part of her helmet that rested above where Wildfire had kissed her, as it had felt completely real.

Chrysalis wasn't sure what was going on at the moment, but she hoped that, at some point in the future, she and Isaac figured out everything about this strange mystery... hopefully without going completely insane before they and their friends escaped from the Ishimura.