It had all come crashing down.

From a wreckage of a once state-of-the-art spacecraft a woman slowly crawled her way out and sat up.

Everyone else, all 25, simply... dead. Gone in an instant. The woman hung her head low and found herself looking at the strange silver colored orb she held in her bloody palm.

Written in flashing red letters just below the glass surface were the words "Main User Identified - Bond Forming Initiated".

Before she had time to properly think how this object might have come to her posession, the orb clicked and, as if melting, moved to cover her entire hand with intricate silver ornaments.

Panicking, she stood up and violently tried to pull the silver off of her skin. Unfortunately, her efforts were in vain as her free hand was quickly seized by the silver-covered hand, apparently moving according to the will of the alien substance.

An unfamiliar voice suddenly echoed in her mind: "The host seems distressed, please calm down until preliminary body scan is complete."

The woman's eyes widened in shock and she asked with a shaky voice: "Who... What are you?"

The barren landscape of the planet she had crashed on and the silence that followed her question both made her feel extremely anxious. When the voice finally spoke again, she winced out of both surprise and fear.

"Host's scan complete. Will now answer host's earlier queries", the voice said with its low frequencies buzzing soothingly in her mind. "This one is an adaptive and immersive artificial intelligence EVOL designed to support the host in both military endeavors and everyday tasks, including internal and external monitoring for possible threats to host's life. The host may now choose a name to call this guardian system."

Dumbstruck, the woman blinked and said nothing for a while. "Really I...", she finally sighed, "be called whatever you want, just remove yourself from my hand and mind. Now."

"I am afraid this is not possible for the moment", the system said in a tone that somehow reminded her of her unbending lecturer Mr. Lex at the space academy, "the synchronization of the system must reach 100% with the host first to ensure safe extraction."

Relaxing her hands and pose, the woman shut her eyes and took a deep breath. "Fine", she finally said in a defeated tone, "how long will the process take you?"

The voice inside her was silent for a while, then hesitantly answered: "Approximately 1 year."

The woman inhaled sharply when hearing this. One year of this... thing, inside her mind? Anyone would go crazy.

"This system has now calculated and chosen a name host can call us with: 'Husband'."

"....Yeah definitely not", she quickly refused and continued, "EVOL, that was your model name, right? I'll call you that then. Evol."

She couldn't help but think she heard a hint of sorrow in its voice when Evol confirmed her suggestion with a low "Understood".

Turning to look at the wreckage she had climbed out of earlier, she took a signal beacon out of her uniform's front pocket.

Thank the stars, it still worked.

After pressing a well-practised code with the black button in the middle, she started her search for items that would keep her alive until the emergency extraction team would arrive.

The voice in her head stayed silent for about an hour, until it asked her: "Host, what shall this one call you from now on?"

"Ula is fine", she replied indifferently, "just make sure you speak as little nonsense as possible, so that once I get you extracted, I don't instantly crush you to pieces."

"I... Understand", Evol confirmed softly, "...Ula."

Hearing her name spoken so tenderly she involuntarily shivered. It wasn't entirely unpleasant.