Sergeant Counselor Holly reporting:

36 hours I resolve have passed since the sphinxlike light of arrival yesterday morning. Vast quantities of bipedalists have vanished in a most strange manner. Life support is extant only by smidgen engine, lost all are the other systems. all ships, meager and mighty, were either off planet or also lost to the luminous flash. Those away have not returned and all communication is lost.

Morale is low, what has come of the ships and our bipedalist friends and loved-ones? From whence did this fulgid flash originate? I fear, the soupçons of rumor hold truth; indeed our food supplies will soon run slight leaving only the foul forage of nourishing and healthful native plants and the sadly few scrumptious space savories.