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This fictional work is an “actual play” from the solo journaling game called “The Wretched” by Chris Bissette. Content warnings: strong language, horror, hopelessness, alien attack, stranded in space, fecal matter, dead bodies, pet death. Played on July 23, 2025. The premise of the game is that the player is the sole survivor of an alien attack that killed their entire crew, and the alien is now on the outside of the hull, surviving in the vacuum of space, and hunting the survivor….
Note: This solo journaling game is intended to be recorded as an audio recording. While the transcript is provided below, you’re encouraged instead to listen to the recording for the full immersive effect. Music by DELOSound on pixabay.
Day 1
Salvage ship The Wretched Flight Engineer Sadie Dancer reporting. The other members of the crew are dead and the engines remain non-operational, though ship integrity is good and life support systems are still active. I successfully jettisoned the intruder from the airlock, but it remains alive and continues to try to access the ship. With a little luck, I can repair the distress beacon and somebody will pick me up. This is Flight Engineer Dancer, the last survivor of The Wretched, signing off.
Day 2
Flight Engineer Dancer of The Wretched. I checked medbay today, to double-check the supply inventory. There’s plenty of medical supplies for any non-emergency I might encounter out here. And anything critical… well, my odds aren’t great to begin with.
There are deep gouges in the corridor to medbay. At first, my worst nightmare occurred to me– that the creature had gotten in, that these were new scratches from its enormous mandibles. Then, I saw the trail of blood and remembered Nurse Hodgkins. He’d barricaded himself into medbay when the alarms went off, but I guess his lockdown didn’t hold. Poor bastard.
Day 3
What a hell of a day. This is Engineer Dancer of The Wretched. A sewage leak started my day, thanks to a shitty maintenance schedule, no pun intended. And I can say that because I’m the one who made the maintenance roster. After rigging a fix with poly-tape, and no small amount of prayer and cursing, I was about to return to the bridge. But then, I heard the creature back in the airlock. It’s making an even more determined effort today, but I had a clever idea to give it something else to think about. The sewage reclamation system has two modes– full recycling and partial disposal. There’s no way I’ll need all the solid material, not with food reserves for the 20-man crew sustaining only me. So I vented the solid waste in a beautiful brown line– right at the creature’s face. Take that, space monster!
I don’t attribute motive to the creature’s actions– it’s no more than an animal, as far as I can tell. But it certainly felt personal when it cracked the main forward lamps. There’s nothing to see out there, but it was cold comfort, knowing that if something was out there, I’d see it before the collision sensors did.
Day 4
Engineer Dancer’s log. The lights were bothering me too much, and there’s a technical port that gives access to replace them from inside the ship. So, I did! I did that, and it was exhausting. And also… disturbing. I’ve grown too comfortable in the bridge module, where I spend most of my time. I was hit with a sudden sense of claustrophobia and agoraphobia at the same time. Like, the crawlspace is so very small and tight, and the wall membrane is so thin. Such a small, fragile thing between me and the void….
Day 5
Engineer Dancer’s log. The bridge door lock failed today and I caught myself muttering “be careful what you wish for” over and over again while fixing it. Yesterday I wanted nothing more than to be back in the bridge, safe and secure. Today, it became imperative that I get out of the bridge. Fortunately, I’m an engineer and while it wouldn’t pass any kind of inspection, I got the damned thing open.
I keep thinking about Science Specialist Strayhorn. Barb. My Barbie girl. Shit. I know it’s stupid and we can’t change the past, but it would be nice if the last words I’d said to her hadn’t been “I bet it tastes worse than your chowder.” Like, super. My last words to the woman I– I could have loved? — were an insult to her cooking. Way to go, Dancer. You fuckup.
Day 6
I’ve had Vikram’s rifle since he died. He loved this thing, called it “Buddha’s Little Secret.” I’ve charged it every sleep cycle, just to make sure it’s ready, but with no way to test fire it, I have no idea if it will fire correctly, and even less if it will be effective against the creature. That thing is nearly indestructible, so it’s even more of a crap shoot than what I did 3 days ago. Now that I think about it, I haven’t seen the creature in 3 days. Dare I hope?
Day 7
I’m so goddamned tired. I thought it was just exhaustion, but the tingling in my hands and feet told a different story– oxygen deprivation. I’ll be honest, my solution isn’t great. I hauled an O2 tank from medbay. While I was trying to decide on a more durable fix, I heard…. something in the air vents. I don’t know. Maybe it got in. Maybe not. It’s pretty hopeless, either way.
I fell asleep trying to figure it out. I just woke up, and I know I need to fix that system, but I’m just. so. tired.
This is, um, Engineer Sadie, uh Dancer. Log. of The Wretched.
Day 8
Fuck! I woke up to the sound of metal shearing and about a million alarms going off. The main habitat module is gone. The creature got through, probably through the emergency airlock, and was coming for me. I detached the module, but the creature clung to the door lock. The hab’s camera caught it on the feed before the connection severed. It’s big, but I can see it’s also hurt. Good.
Day 9
Welp. I gave myself an upgrade and field promotion, since my bunk is floating in space about 200,000 miles away. Captain Dancer reporting. I have accessed the late Captain Jones’ cabin and liberated his access card. Did I need it? No. I’m a good engineer. There isn’t a system on The Wretched that I can’t get into. But it’s simply easier if I have full captain control. And now, I have it!
Also, his scotch, which he kept in his cabin. It’ll come in handy once I’m not in constant peril….
Day 10
I needed to fix a few things outside the ship– the generators’ solar panels, and the antenna. The solar panels were needed because the primary power system went down. I can’t survive without it– life support will go out and the door locks won’t have active locks, making them absurdly easy to breach.
But how, you might ask, did I do this highly risky EVA without attracting the creature’s attention? Well, I learned from my earlier shit incident, or “shitcident” if you will. I used the sewage system again, this time spraying a directed stream towards my EVA path. Did it make the EVA absolutely disgusting? Yes. Yes, it did. Did I survive? Again, the answer is yes and really, isn’t that all I need to do until I can either get rid of this unwelcome guest, or a rescue comes?
Day 11
I can’t tell if it’s a glitch in the sensors or my own brain playing tricks on me, but I’ve seen the same huge structure, like a docking station, on the comms for several days now. It’s usually after the creature screeches into the hull– a sound that is the most unnerving thing I’ve ever heard. There is no sound in space, so this is the equivalent of the bass vibrations at a rock concert, but high-pitched and vertebra-rattling in its effect.
I decided today is a good day to bury the crew– the ones I can collect, anyway. Vikram, Barb, Jones, the three Chrises, and of course Patch, the best damn dog in the galaxy. Patch had some of the creature’s… saliva on his fur. And it had hardened in the almost 2 weeks since this nightmare started. It was hard, but tacky to the touch, and Patch deserved better. I wanted to clean him up first, but I can’t spare the wate,r and I can’t risk contaminating the reclamation system.
I said goodbye, in my way, to each of them. With the Chrises, I don’t know them that well, so it was a bit like writing in the yearbook of someone you only had one class with.
I sent Barb out last, even though protocol would have sent the Captain. Whatever, I don’t care. I needed time to think of what to say, how to say it. But in the end, I couldn’t find any words, so I just let her go, into the void, silently.
And then I went back to the cockpit and start at the stars.
Day 12
I picked up comms chatter today– a stray signal, maybe? Or an echo. I can’t believe I’m close enough to any inhabited systems for it to have been real. It sounded at first like a panicked distress call, like our own before the beacon went down. But then, I realized it was just an entertainment broadcast, and the panicked screams were cheers from a sporting event.
Vikram was a big football fan. I remember that now. When he– when he died, he said something about guarding the kicker. I really wish he were here now. I could use a friend.
Day 13
Fuck, what a day.
I tried to fix the engines. Took them apart, put them back together. I’m absolutely sure they should work. But they don’t. Probably software.
I was in the mess when I heard the creature moving outside on the hull. It didn’t scream at me this time. It knows it only has to outwait me.
But while I was in the mess hall, I saw something move in the food storage locker! At first, I panicked– this is it. But no, it’s just Lt. Jepsom’s virtual pet thing. Then I realized those things have a pairing protocol that isn’t in the same regulated systems as the rest of the comms! I enabled that protocol on the distress beacon and it worked! I fucking worked!
So, if someone’s kid’s tamaguchi suddenly starts relaying this horror story, I am so sorry. Believe me. But hopefully, it’s not too late and you– or your kid– can raise a rescue for me and I can finally go home.
And if not. Well. Thanks for listening. It gives me some comfort knowing my words have a chance of living on, even if I don’t make it.
Peace– Acting Captain Engineer Sadie Dancer of The Wretched— out.
Day 14
NO LOG FOUND
Day 15
NO LOG FOUND
Day 16
NO LOG FOUND
Day 17
NO LOG FOUND
Day 18
NO LOG FOUND