"There's an island ahead," Dan announced for everyone on the bridge.

  Having the Voyager stop after getting a bit closer to have a clearer view, Dan again linked to the camera and focused on the far-off beach.

  He didn't have to look long to notice how messy the beach was. With clear signs of fighting, bloody patches here and there, and the bodies of the Harvesters lying all around, it wasn't too hard to realise what must have happened.

  "The beach is messy and has clear signs of going through a fight," Dan explained to everyone, "However, the exact state is uncertain."

  Dan found it funny how this was the first island they had laid eyes on, and for it to be like this their luck was really quite something.

  The island itself seemed pretty big, with a mountain range and a huge forest covering it. Humans' effect on the island was clear too, with the mountain having deep caves all around, and the forest having a few bald spots here and there. Of course that all was without mentioning the obvious buildings at the bottom of the mountain.

  After Dan updated everyone on what he had seen, Marcus spoke:

  "We can get closer at night, and see what the island has for us."

  "Yes, that's what I thought too." Dan nodded. "Waiting till night falls so we can approach safely and see what we are dealing with here."

  "Why don't we ask Nulara and the young man?" Robert suddenly asked, "Even though we don't know anything about an island around here, they might know about it."

  "That's a good idea." Dan found himself agreeing

  With that decided on, they called the pair, and just as they had expected, the two knew nothing about an island like the one in front of them being in this part of the ocean.

  "Well," Robert said with a light smile, "Seems that waiting for the man to wake up to know where he's from and what all this is about is the only thing we can do really."

  "So should we continue with the plan to get close to them at night?" Marcus asked as he looked at the others, "Night isn't that far off. We can close in on the island to get an overall idea about the situation there before the man wakes up. It shouldn't be that risky if we are careful about it."

  None of the people there spoke at first, they all fell into deep silence. At that moment the bridge had Dan, Marcus, Robert and old Raily. They were the ones Dan called for to study their possible actions.

  "I think we should go for it." Dan decided to break the silence and move the conversation along. "As Marcus said, it couldn't be that risky, and we will stay far, just using the cameras to get a clear look at the situation."

  "In that case," Robert said with a smile as he clapped his hands, "Let's go for it."

  With their decision made, they went with their routine evening activities as they waited for late night to fall. As always, with a coming operation, even though it was quite safe and the chance of something going bad happening was quite low, Dan still found himself stressed.

  He doubted that would change any time soon, in this new world they found themselves in, no matter how low the chance of anything going south was, it would never be zero.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Around midnight, hours after having dinner, Dan finally got the go from Marcus and had the Voyager approach the island so slowly. In the end, they had decided to get around 4 km away from the island. That still wouldn't be enough for the thermal cameras to give a clear view, but getting any closer was too risky

  The Voyager's normal cameras could see big targets like an island or land from up to a distance of 30 km away, sometimes even double or triple that if the target had huge peaks. Dan had stopped the Voyager at a distance of 15 km from the island at first, it was close to sunset and he doubted people would be able to catch a glimpse of them at that time. Those were the normal cameras though, thermal ones had a much lower range.

  Even with how close they were, Dan was worried that he would see nothing clearly due to how low the thermal camera's range was. He knew that they needed to be around one to two km away from the target to get a clear enough feed from them, one clear enough to see what the people on it were doing, not just seeing blobs on the screen.

  So you could imagine his surprise when even while being 4 km away, he found that he was still able to see the people moving around the shore clearly. He could make out what they were doing and carrying and even see what they were wearing somehow. It was only then that he realised how much the Voyager growing had strengthened the cameras on her.

  Throwing all those distractions aside, Dan looked deeply into the shore, trying to find any clues about what was happening on the island. The first thing he noticed was how people were patrolling the shore, from how they were wearing what seemed to be a uniform and carrying different weapons, it wasn't that hard to conclude that they were some kind of guards. He did casually note that the guards weren't as malnourished as the man they had saved from the Harvesters though, their clothes seemed to be cleaner and better too.

  He left those aside and moved his attention to the caves he had seen in the mountain before. He found himself frowning as he saw people going into and out of those caves even that late into the night. The cave was extremely far from the shore so Dan didn't get a clear look at what was happening, but he could still see that people were entering and leaving the caves while others stood guard at them. He managed to notice that the latter ones were most likely wearing uniforms like the guards on shore.

  Dan updated the gang on the bridge about what he was seeing and again, the place fell silent. He had a guess in his heart about what he was seeing, as the others must have too, and it gave him a bad feeling. It was just that though, a guess, so he didn't bring it up.

  "They didn't react at all," he said, "So I doubt they noticed us, we are safe."

  "Yes," Marcus added, "We should be good, and we got what we needed from there. Let's just retreat and wait to see what the man is going to say when he wakes up."

  They had the Voyager retreat and everyone returned to their rooms for the night. They did of course have someone stand guard at the man in case he woke up and he was more dangerous than he seemed; judging someone based on appearance wasn't that wise in this new world after all.

  The day had been quite tiring for Dan. It started with the attack by those bugs, and even though it wasn't that dangerous, controlling the dark aura for as long as he did, the longest so far, did a number on him. That's all without even mentioning how stressed seeing those dead bodies made him. Due to all that, after a quick shower and changing into his sleeping clothes, as soon as his head hit the pillow, he was out.

  Dan didn't know for how long he had been out, but he found himself sitting up in shock as constant knocking was heard from his door. His mind took a few seconds to realise what was happening, and he finally remembered the instructions he had left for the guards the night before. He jumped to his feet as he hurried to answer the door.

  Before sleeping, he made sure that Marcus would tell the guards that he needed to be called whenever the injured man awoke, no matter what time it was.

  As expected, once he opened the door, he was met with the impassive face of Hank. The Wandering Adventurer didn't seem to care about Dan's state of dress and didn't wait for him to ask anything as he said,

  "He's awake. I've left Ricky with him and came to fetch you."

  "Okay, one moment while I change," Dan said before closing the door.

  Not even five minutes later, he found himself walking beside Hank as they made their way to the med-bay.

  "Was he aggressive?" he asked after they had walked in silence for a while.

  "No." Hank shook his head. "He seemed confused more than anything. The fact that I was in full gear and helmet must have added to that too."

  "I can see that." Dan could see how being abducted by some huge bugs then waking up and finding someone in full body cover and helmet would make someone confused. The fact that he was just confused was a miracle in itself.

  Before even making it to the med-bay, Dan saw Marcus and Fleta standing outside talking.

  "How is it? Did he say anything?" he asked.

  "We didn't talk with him much," Fleta said, "As soon as I calmed him down and made sure he was alright, I left him with Ricky and decided to wait for you and Marcus to arrive before deciding to do anything."

  "Thank you for that." He nodded at her, then turned to Marcus. "So, let's go in."