Ethan barely felt the rumble beneath his feet as the shuttle's boosters ignited. The blast off from Earth Station Vega was as routine as it was terrifying—every launch came with the hidden threat of mechanical failure or unexpected sabotage. He glanced at the others: Rina strapped into her harness, knuckles white around the armrests; Aly hovering free, her modified space suit calibrated to perfect pressure; and Eve, deep in the comms module, monitoring every system heartbeat.
The main viewport framed Earth's blue curvature receding into black, a silent reminder of all they'd left behind. Ghosts of past failures haunted Ethan's mind: the collapse of EDEN's first iteration, the Entity's near-escape, and the whispered promise of the Obelisk's power. Now, every second of this ascent was fraught with the potential for one final, catastrophic misstep.
