Elan never remembered the air tasting like metal.
The ground trembled beneath him as he and Max sprinted through ash-choked streets, calling out for their parents. Buildings were shaking, people screamed, and black snow fell from a bruised sky. They pushed open doors, checked the grocery store, the neighborhood shelter, but there was no sign of their families.
Time was running out. Ash was already coating their hair and clothes, making every breath sting.
Max checked his watch, panic in his eyes. "Elan, if we don't go now, we won't get another chance."
Elan clenched his jaw, looking back down the street where his house stood hidden behind a curtain of ash and smoke. He shouted one last time for his parents, but the only answer was the distant rumble of the earth tearing itself apart.
"Damn it…" Elan wiped his eyes, smearing ash across his face. "Let's go."
They ran, pulling Ren along with them, heading toward the government aerospace facility where Max's father once worked. The roads were chaos, cars abandoned, sirens wailing, people stumbling through the ash like ghosts.
At the gates of the hangar, alarms blared. The sky overhead was pitch black now, glowing faintly from distant lightning in the ash clouds. They slipped inside, the ground quaking beneath them as another eruption shook the earth.
Inside, the last spacecraft stood, engines warm, emergency lights flickering around it. Max ran to the storage crates, breaking them open and pulling out two cans of Fluxine, the newly discovered fuel that could keep them alive longer than any earthly fuel could.
Elan looked back at the hangar doors, waiting for his parents to appear, praying they would come running through the ash, but no one came.
"Max!" he shouted.
Max was already climbing into the pilot's seat, Ren securing the fuel. "Elan, we have to go. Now!"
With a final, shaking breath, Elan climbed aboard as the doors sealed shut behind them. Outside, the world roared as another volcano erupted, and the sky turned to darkness.
The engines rumbled as Max flicked switches, fingers trembling, Fluxine cans secured behind the cockpit. Ren strapped himself in, eyes wide as he stared at the black sky through the ship's viewport. Ash swept across the glass in thick waves, making it look like they were sinking into a dark ocean.
"Elan, close the rear hatch!" Max shouted.
Elan slammed it shut, the clunk of the lock echoing in the small cabin. He took one last look outside as a wave of ash washed over the landing pad, burying the ground in black snow. The hangar lights flickered, sirens screaming in the distance, the world trembling as another eruption cracked the horizon with red light.
Max's hands gripped the controls, knuckles pale. "Hold on."
The engines roared, vibrating through the metal frame as they lifted off the ground. For a moment, the ship wobbled, ash whipping around them, slamming against the hull like a storm. The hangar doors opened fully, revealing the collapsing world outside.
Flashes of red lava flowed through cracked streets far below. Lightning danced in the clouds as the earth shook again, a massive boom echoing through the sky. Elan's breath caught as he saw the city they grew up in, now half-swallowed by black clouds and glowing rivers of fire.
"Faster, Max!" Ren yelled, clutching the straps of his harness.
Max pushed the throttle, the ship breaking through the thick layer of ash, rattling violently. For a moment, darkness swallowed them, and it felt like the ship would fall back down.
Then they broke through.
Above the ash cloud, the sky was clear, the stars cold and distant. The thin blue curve of Earth glowed beneath them, but Elan could already see it darkening under the swirling clouds of ash, hiding the lights of the cities below.
Elan pressed a hand to the glass, eyes stinging, heart heavy. They had made it, but they were leaving everything behind.
Max exhaled, letting his head fall back. "We're clear."
Ren wiped his eyes, staring out at the stars. "Now what?"
Elan swallowed, looking down at the dying world, the ash clouds rolling across continents, the fires burning where cities used to be.
"Now we survive," he whispered, as the ship turned away from Earth, engines humming, carrying them into the dark.
The stars looked so calm, so distant, as the last whispers of Earth's blue curve faded behind them. Silence pressed against the hull, a heavy reminder of everything they had left behind.
Elan unbuckled, floating for a moment before grabbing a rail, the hum of the engines vibrating through his fingers. He glanced back at Ren, who was hugging his knees, eyes red, staring at nothing.
Max was at the console, flicking switches, checking the ship's status. His face was pale, jaw tight, but his hands were steady.
"We're stable for now," Max said, his voice rough. "Life support's working, Fluxine levels at seventy percent. We have enough to last a few jumps if we're careful."
Elan nodded, swallowing the lump in his throat. "What about food and water?"
"Emergency rations for a few weeks," Max replied. He didn't look up. "After that, we'll need to find something."
Ren's voice was small, cracking. "Where do we even go?"
Elan looked out at the stars, the endless dark stretching in every direction. No answers, no signs, just the cold glow of distant worlds.
"Anywhere we can," Elan said quietly. "We're not going back."
The ship rattled softly as it adjusted course, the engines shifting pitch. The console displayed a map of nearby systems, blinking dots of potential planets they could reach before their fuel ran out.
Max let out a slow breath. "We'll start scanning. We need somewhere to land, somewhere to refuel, somewhere to survive."
Elan placed a hand on Ren's shoulder, squeezing gently. "We'll figure it out."
Outside the viewport, a lone piece of ash drifted past, a tiny reminder of the world they left behind, dissolving into the void as the ship carried them into the dark.
Elan watched the blinking system map, the dots of possible destinations hovering like ghosts on the screen. His eyes lingered on one glowing dot, and he leaned forward.
"We should probably consider going to Titan," Elan said quietly. "The moon of Jupiter. It's the second best habitable option after Earth."
Ren looked up, hope flickering in his tired eyes. "Titan... there's a colony there, right?"
Max hesitated, pulling up data on the console. "It was an active colony. Plenty of people evacuated there when things on Earth got bad."
"So we can go there?" Ren asked, gripping the side of his seat.
Max's eyes scanned the console, his jaw tightening. "We can try."
They adjusted the ship's course, the engines shifting as they set their sights on Titan, hope a thin thread they held onto. But as they approached Jupiter's orbit, Max's face paled.
"No... no, no, no," Max muttered.
"What is it?" Elan asked, leaning over his shoulder.
On the screen, Titan was surrounded by a field of debris—twisted metal, shattered ships, drifting panels, and flickering lights.
Ren's breath caught. "Is that... all ships?"
Max's voice was hollow. "Titan's orbit is blocked. Something happened. A collapse, maybe a civil war, or... something worse."
The sensors beeped a warning. The debris field was too dense to pass through without tearing the ship apart. Elan's hands curled into fists as he stared at the ghostly graveyard drifting around Titan.
"So we can't go there," Elan said, forcing the words out.
Max shook his head, adjusting their course, the engines whining softly. "No. If we try, we die."
The silence in the cockpit was heavy as they watched Titan shrink on the screen, the last hope of a nearby safe haven fading into the black.
Ren wiped his eyes, whispering, "Now what?"
Elan closed his eyes for a moment, letting the grief pass before he spoke. "Now... we keep going. We have a month and a week of fuel if we're careful."
Max exhaled slowly, setting a course out of the solar system. "Then we go as far as we can. And we find somewhere else."
As the engines roared softly, pushing them away from the cold glow of Jupiter, the three of them sat in silence, the weight of the empty stars pressing against them as they left the last familiar world behind.
The hum of the engines became their constant companion as the stars stretched around them, cold and distant, unblinking. Earth was a memory now, a small, fading light behind them, and Titan's failed promise left an ache none of them spoke of.
Ren pressed his forehead against the viewport, watching the endless black. "It feels like we're not moving at all."
"We are," Max replied, his voice tired. "Thousands of kilometers every second. But out here, it doesn't feel like it."
Elan floated near the console, watching the blinking fuel indicator, counting every percentage that dropped. A month and a week of fuel, if nothing went wrong. If they didn't need to push the engines harder to avoid debris or find supplies.
"We're drifting," Elan whispered, the words tasting heavy in the recycled air.
Max glanced back. "We're searching. It's not the same."
They moved through the dark, passing shattered satellites, drifting metal, the remains of humanity's reach. Every so often, they would pass a piece of a ship, frozen in silence, a reminder of what they had lost.
Ren spoke again, his voice soft. "Do you think there's anyone else out here?"
Elan didn't answer for a moment, watching a piece of metal slowly spin past the viewport before disappearing into the black.
"There has to be," Elan finally said. "Someone, somewhere, trying to survive like we are."
Max nodded, setting the scanners to sweep for any signs of life or signals, though they all knew the chances were low. Still, they had to try.
As the engines purred, pushing them further from everything they knew, the ship became their world. The stars became their sky, cold and uncaring. And they drifted, three souls in a metal shell, searching for hope in a universe that felt endless.
Elan closed his eyes, letting the soft vibrations of the engines steady his thoughts.
"We'll find something," he whispered, more to himself than to the others.
And in the dark, the ship kept moving, drifting into the unknown, carrying with it the last pieces of their world, and the fragile hope that somewhere out there, they would find a place to begin again.