Dark, silent, and empty... Stars twinkled like countless eyes all around, a cosmic audience that gave their undivided attention. Their point of interest? The Maginot Belt, an asteroid belt surrounding the planet cluster of Alecto, Megaera, and Tisiphone. Existing beyond the pull of and light of a sun the planets are dark and devoid of life and their overlapping gravity fields pull each other in a constant loop and traps extraterrestrial debris like these asteroids in their combined orbit.

Marathon-4 was one such asteroid, or planetoid as the case might be. Marathon-4 was barely one thousand kilometers smaller at the equator than Luna, Earth's moon. It's cratered surface was marked in several places by Terran infrastructure, mine shafts, refineries, landing platforms, residential complexes, hydroponics and a constant traffic of shuttles and surveyors littered the airspace. The sprawling city of Athens was situated on the planetoids northern hemisphere.

"How's that receiver coming Radik?"

"I'm steel vorking vis de ohptic cables, und it dohsn't 'elp ven you keep deestracting me sir." The reuniclus said, his voice heavily accented. Thick gloved hands worked around a trio of cables, each about two inches thick. A large console had been erected about twenty feet from their surveyor, a long antenna stretched towards the stars.

A cloud of dust was kicked up as Jericho planted another seismic stub in the rock they stood on. The device he used resembled a hand-cart you'd see people use to move large boxes, instead of the small platform it had a canister resembling a spare breathing apparatus in the center of it, Jericho leaned back on it to get it to move so he could place the next stub. Seismic stubs were placed equidistant around the console forming a cross with four stubs at each corner and the console at the center.

The stubs were made to send a sonic pulse into the asteroid's crust, the vibrations would be detected and interpreted by the console and sent back to the city. Different minerals gave off different vibrations so the console would translate the different frequencies into whatever matched in the database and would report them as whatever minerals were present.

"Just get it done, if we're not back by O' eight hundred McKnight will have us all scrubbing air vents."

"Sounds like a day at the beach." Allister the luxray quipped, no doubt grinning behind his domed EVA helmet.

Their EVA suits were built specifically for exoatmospheric work. Metal plating protected most of their bodies, being comprised of interlocking disks and plates they flowed smoothly to allow for a full range of movement. A rubberlike fabric layer was worn beneath the plate-armor to keep vital oxygen from escaping. The final line of defense protecting the team members from the harsh, cold vacuum of space was a hydrostatic gel layer that was spread over the skin. The gel was pressurized so that if for any reason the suit was breached it would fill the gap, it also acted as a coagulant so should any injury be obtained by the breach you wouldn't bleed to death. That possibility was unlikely, however, since the plating alone could take a pulse-fired slug at point-blank range and barely get a dent, plus if the gel layer didn't plug the breach effectively you were more likely to be flash-frozen than bleed out.

"Jes, my day voodn't be cohmplete visout a good round of grunt vork." Radik retorted smugly.

"I feel you there guys." Jericho added. The mightyena was the head if the survey team, their whole objective was to find more caches of precious ore to expand the mines. He had had a take at just about every line of work available at Athens. Having been with the settlement since it was little more than a way-station. He'd worked as an engineer, a miner, a member of the Colonial Security Service, he'd worked in the hydroponics departments, and more. He was one of the Pokemon that brought Athens into existence, helping build it from the ground up.

Closing a compartment on the console Radik signaled his completion with a thumbs up. The console and stubs lit up at the same time as it came online. The console glowing white as several holographic displays winked into existence while the stuns flashed green.

"Alright let's get this show on the road Radik." Jericho said, satisfied with the results.

"Ohlready on it bohss." Radik answered touching the console glowing interface. "Synchronizing seismic stubs." In response to his comment the stubs each tuned red and flashed, then turned orange, then flashed green three times before settling on bright blue signifying their readiness. "On three... two... Von!"

On one the stubs each shifted from blue straight to red once again as the ground vibrated, the sensation muffled by the insulated gear the three wore. Jericho and Allister looked at Radik waiting for the news while his focus was based solely on the holo-display. "Shood only take a few moments before the information can render."

Even as he spoke a new panel popped up showing several layers of various colors. Top few layers were green in color but lot were also red and yellow while all of the layers were flecked with blue and black. While the bottom layers were solid blue and red. Seeing the results Jericho and Allister couldn't help but burst out in celebratory laughter. "We hit pay dirt boys!" Allister said whooping loudly through their team-comm.

"Manganese, chromium, cobalt, nickel, might just make our quota for the-" Jericho started to say but was cut off as a splitting pain shot through his skull. Vainly trying to clutch his head he dropped to his knees. His vision flashed red and varicolored spots painted his vision as he tried to focus. He saw one of his teammates in the same state as he was but the suits made them indistinguishable from one another, the other however was kneeling beside them. Just as another burst of pain lanced him again, bolting down his spine, he felt as if his eyes were burning before darkness consumed him.