Stellar Survival Quest

by Jalf Whitemage

  Nathan stared eyes wide, with too much white showing at the tree from amid the trash. The tree stood a mere couple feet away and stared back, for long moments.

  The tension rose between the two. Nathan felt cold sweat pouring down his face and neck. Before the tense moment was broken by either party, the air lock swished open to let Boov enter.

  Her normally smiling face split into a toothy grin as she saw the situation in front of her.

  “Oh good! Master has started to get to know our young tree friend!”

  Both pairs of eyes slowly turned toward the grey human who was bouncing in place excited.

  Nathan too terrified to do anything lay there, in a cold sweat. However the tree with the tense moment shattered to eternity turned toward Boov and began to move rapidly on the thin tips of a hundred roots.

  Boov just stood there holding her makeshift pot and the dug she had filled it up with.

  As the tree reached near her the mouth opened again tongue moving out with a sticky sap like saliva gleaming. Boov just smiled broadly and in a quick snatch grabbed the base of the small tree.

  “Ah none of that now, little darling! I know you are just hungry and thirsty! Well let’s get you settled.”

  With her free hand she quickly moved some of the dung aside and shoved the tree roots into the hole. To Nathans utter surprise the moment the tree’s roots went into the makeshift soil the tree began to still and its irritated movements slowed.

  As Boov dug deeper into the glowing dung, to allow the roots to reach deeper into the planter. The roots began to help and were each sinking lower; disappearing into the glowing crap.

  A minute later Boov completed the planting process and stood up. The red leafed tree firmly sank into the small planter. To Nathan’s relief the eyes slowly began to close and the rustling of the roots slowed, then stopped.

  Boov went into the other room, smiling. Nathan slowly extracted himself from his trash pile and began to clean up the mess. Boov returned with a bottle of water and poured it into the planter.

  “I’m not sure I want to keep a mobile carnivorous plant in a pot of glowing alien poop after all.”

  Boov tilted her head smile vanishing, “No? Well if you do not, then that is your choice, master. Although the dung has enough proteins in it to keep the little thing happy for a while. And when this batch becomes exhausted there is a whole bunch more out there.”

  Nathan looked at the tree now seeming to be soundly sleeping, or whatever a man eating fauna did, then to Boov. “Are you sure? I mean it is pretty and this place really could use a pick me up… But, I do not want to become dinner.”

  Boov shrugged, “This one is not sure. But, she does think that it is safe. At least for now.”

  Nathan sighed and then nodded, “Okay let’s move it over to the counter over there, maybe in the corner so the color is easy to see. I was also thinking before I go to sleep that we should rearrange our bay out there. Maybe move the Habitat to the ground and organize the layout a bit.”

  Boov clapped her hands in excitement, “as the master wishes!”

  Two hours later the bay had been rearranged. It proved easy to move the habitat in the void once the magnetic gravity was shut off with the controls.

  They moved the habitat so that it was in the far Southeast corner, farthest away from both the hall and the outer hatch. Nathan decided that to make things easier in his mind North was going to be on the left once he entered the hatch from the landing pads. So walking in made him face east and back out was west.

  The crate of dung they placed in the northwest corner along with what little materials they had scavenged. The Transport was moved into the southwest corner, with its lights arranged in a way as to illuminate the rest of the bay.

  It worked out well, but there was a severe issue with shadows when someone walked around blocking out the lights.

  Finally, they arranged the new Wdadf Lights in the hall. The cord was long enough to reach nearly half the entire hall’s length. The lights were strangely bright, Tso it provided a fair bit of light in that darkened corridor.

  Satisfied Nathan ate his supper, took a shower and went to his bunk. Before he could lay down though Boov interrupted him

  “Master? What would you like this one to do? She need not sleep the whole time and although she can lay with master. She feels like there is better uses of her time.”

  Nathan considered this for a moment. He almost told her to try and gain access to one of the bays they were locked out of. Or, maybe that other door in the corridor… But, he wanted to be there when that happened just in case. Instead he made another decision.

  “You should go to the cargo bay with the crates and sort through it. Anything useful bring back here and place it into ordered piles on the North wall. The garbage you can pile up in that bay. You can also take the trash from the Habitat out there for now too.”

  Boov smiled, “yes, master! Your will be done!”

  Feeling like he had heard that odd phrase before Nathan fell into a dark and dreamless sleep.

  Chapter 05 – Parthigoth Gamma Station

  Elsewhere on the station, a sphere the duplicate of one that landed a few weeks ago touched down. Only, this one was covered in a viscous looking sludge concealing the sphere’s normal exterior. The Pad it landed on was cracked and nearly buckled with the added weight, even in zero G. However, it did not, and 15 minutes after landing the hatch opened to allow 6 figures to emerge. In the darkness of the void not much could be seen about the figures. However the dark did not seem to bother them.

  Without a word or a noticeable indication of body language the six figures broke into three teams of two.

  One team began to go around the transport and remove equipment from the storage bays.

  The second team entered the dark hatchway that lay open before them. The last team began to scurry around the exterior of the station, searching their new environment: dark talons clacking noiselessly against exotic metal alloys of the stations exterior in an eerily synchronized way.

  When Nathan awoke Boov was asleep in the bunk next to him. She lay with her head on his shoulder and a leg over his. Her soft breathing was deep causing her ample chest to push ever so snuggly against him. A fact that his body was responding to with rapt attention.

  Taking a deep breath Nathan began to extract himself from the grey woman. The blood flow to his groin was not helping, but he managed it after a couple minutes.

  Quietly leaving the room, Nathan stepped into the tiny hall leading to the main hall. To his surprise it took a few seconds for the lights to brighten. He mentally noted to check the motion sensors. It shouldn’t have taken that long to recover from sleep mode’s dimmer settings.

  After a quick shower Nathan grabbed some food and went to the main room to eat. At the halls opening he stopped dead in his tracks. The tree’s three eyes were open and Nathan swore they were watching him. But after a few tense seconds two of the three eyes closed and the third lowered to only show a glowing purple slit. Relieved Nathan exhaled a long slow breath before sitting down to eat.

  By the time he finished eating Boov entered the main room. Nathan nodded and smiled at her.

  “This one completed your assignments master.”

  “Thank you Boov.”

  The grey human smiled a broad toothy grin, “To report she found 1260 square feet of low grade metal sheets. All salvaged from crates. There was also a crate of various industrial strength electrical cables. A single low-grade freight robot that she was able to salvage. Although it needs some repairs and a new Processor core. Lastly there was a heavily damaged J rank part printer. She brought it over, thinking you could look at it and decide. The rest however was trash.”

  Nathan had mixed feelings. He had hoped that from the dozens of crates in that bay, there would be more useful items. However he was excited to see what they could do, with what they had recovered.

  So Boov, now we need to make a plan I think. I have mostly just b
een doing whatever and I feel like I’m not getting anywhere.”

  Boov sat down beside Nathan and watched him intently.

  “There is a variety of angles to go at. It just depends on what my goals are…” he paused to think for a few minutes in silence. Finally he began to speak again, but clearly in that tone of voice that one uses when talking to themselves. “I was sent here to restore the station and claim it for myself and by extension Earth and Humans. They mentioned talking to others and some kind of gathering point or something. That seems like a note worthy goal, but do I want to do it? If not what else can I do?” Silence reigned for several more minutes.

  “I think I could take the transport and explore the solar system. From what I saw in the controls though it is not fast. It primarily uses Cryogenics to keep the occupants alive for the long distance between planets and stars. Bubba may not like me effectively being asleep for some unknown amount of time. There is also that interest upon the balance I owe for my resurrections. That could add up fast.”

  “So, if I want to explore the system I need a better ship. Now I could salvage and repair parts of the station to buy a ship. Or maybe just explore and see if I can find something on this bad boy… heck I guess I really do not even know how big the station is. What if our little piece here is the majority of it? What if beyond those big doors is some small crew compartment and this was just a layover station?”

  “It might be easy to fix up a little station like that. Then I could use it for whatever or even just sell it. But if it is bigger, then what? The first thing I guess is to find out how big the station is. Then maybe go from there. I want a ship of some kind. I’m a Pilot for goodness sake and having a slow pod as my only ship makes me grumpy>”

  Nathan turned to Boov and asked, “What do you think?”

  Boov smiled, “This one thinks your plan is great master. What would you have this one do?”

  Nathan thought about it for a moment longer before deciding. “You said you found steel plating. Maybe you can start working on the stations structure and systems. Start with our bay, replace the most damaged exterior hull plating first. Then check on the mechanical and electrical portions of the bay. Replace what you can with what we have. If it isn’t enough, take what you can from the trash bay. Then if it is still not enough to fix things up in here, then take it from the second bay too. But try to do what you can. I do not think I’ll be gone long. Then I can help.”

  Boov nodded vigorously, “Will do master!”

  They cleaned up, got Nathan into the space suit and exited the habitat. After moving the plugs from charging the Transport to directly charging the habitat Nathan double check the systems of the Transport.

  With 73% full batteries and all systems yellow… which meant good to go… “Stupid none human made crap” Nathan thought. He left the safety of the cargo bay.

  Outside he directed the Transport to carefully move away from the station so he could get a view of it.

  What he saw made his jaw drop in shock. He had half expected some small space station. Or, at least a moderately sized one of some kind. If not a little station with eh few landing pads he knew of and some support areas. Then the image of the circular station with a central pillar came to his mind.

  There wasn’t a lot of light provided by any of the stars, so he was getting an idea from what he could not see. And, he could not see a lot! He moved further away from the station at the best speed the transport could handle, but quickly grew annoyed. As he moved away the limited visual cameras on the transport quickly became nearly useless. So he move closer and resigned himself to a close fly by.

  A few minutes later another obstacle came up with his flight. There was a bunch of loose debris floating around the station. Be it from ancient space battle, or just trash. The station and its immediate space was crammed full of trash.

  Directing the transport to go first one way and then the other. The view screen and dim lights showed that his landing pads were in the middle of a set of five. Each set had three small landing pads and a walk way leading into the station.

  “That must be the other four doors I’ve seen inside.” Nathan mused to himself.

  When a loud ping echoed through the transport Nathan jumped, nearly hitting his head on the low roof. Quickly checking the ships status, Nathan was relieved to see no real damage had occurred from whatever had hit the ship.

  Biting his lip Nathan decided to keep looking. To the north of his bay he could see star light closer than to the south, so he directed the transport’s autopilot in that direction.

  As the stations hull disappeared forcing him to direct the ship down a sudden drop, another ping followed by hissing echoed through the transport. Flipping to the status Nathan ground his teeth. The transports hull had been breached again and he was venting atmosphere. At that moment Nathan was extremely happy he had forgotten to remove his air mask and was still safe in his suit.

  Outside the station came back in to full view when Nathan switched the display back over. He was looking at a set of much larger landing pads. These appeared to be a set of two that shared a larger walk way in to an equally larger bay door.

  The transport had passed over two more sets of the larger double pads before a third crash vibrated the transport. This time the ship shuddered sending Nathan sprawling to the floor. He hit the ground and bounced as the ship spun wildly for nearly a minute. Finally the transports autopilot recovered and Nathan regained his footing. Moving to the screen he growled as he checked the status screen.

  “You have to be kidding me!”

  The transport had lost one of its four thrusters from that last impact. The display could not identify the exact cause of the issue. They simply showed that the thrusters were malfunctioning.

  “Yeah, alright time to head back and then I’ll see what the habitats computer can come up with from this recording.”

  A short time later Nathan was entering the bay slowly. The transports limited autopilot was having trouble with the reentry. A grating screech vibrated as the top gun lost some paint on the entry hatch. With a relieved sigh Nathan set the ship down on silent struts. Upon exiting the transport Nathan reconnected the solar arrays and went back to the Habitat.

  Boov was nowhere in sight so Nathan assumed she was off in another bay getting materials.

  In the habitat Nathan loaded the video into the computer and used the systems onboard to help him understand what he saw.

  After nearly an hour of using the limited system that was never designed for this. Two programs he had created on the fly, and some serious overclocking Nathan had some answers and many more questions.

  The station was massive. That much was clear. It appeared that the area he was located on was a kind of pie shaped wedge. The set of bays he called home was one of what he figured to be 10 near the broader exterior portion of the wedge. Still, he had not reached the full breath of the exterior wedge and was just guessing. But judging from the view when he pulled away there was more. If his math and the computer was right then this wedge measured some 10 miles on the broad exterior angle. The two inner edges, from outer edge to the point where it met more of the station measured some 7 miles. Finally the wedge was at least 3 thick… If that was not astounding enough there was more to the station. A lot more! His computer was too limited in computing power to even hazard a guess, but it was for sure not a simple way point. More like an entire freaking city in space!

  Nathan sat down heavily on the couch, “Well shit! There goes any chance of fixing this place up quick and selling it. Now what do I do?”

  He wanted to claim the station, but it was massive, and he had no idea how to do that. He wanted a ship so he could go fly around space and get into space battles or what not. Then there was also that part about helping out Humanity. A Station this large would be akin to a freaking colony, if he could get it fixed. A colony outside the Sol System… A colony he could own like some little country or nation of his own... A Smile grew across N
athan’s face. He had never considered being a leader of people before, but now that the idea had come he found he liked it. He pictured a thriving station full of humans who called it home. Humans who were far removed from the crooked politics and other grudges of Earth. Humans who followed the rules, guidelines and moral compass of the stations owner and leader… him.

  With images of grandeur running through his head Nathan moved over to the terminal again.

  “I need to get this station working and I need a few things to do that…”

  He opened up the shop, limited the prices to under 3 QOBOP and began to browse.

  Hours later Boov entered the habitat. Her gray flesh was goose-pimpled and she was covered in grease. But, Nathan didn’t even notice. Beyond a quick glance as the air lock cycled open he paid her no mind.

  Boov being mindful of the mess she was making went to take a shower immediately. After she finished she returned to see Nathan still looking at the terminal.

  She moved over to see what he had. It was a checkout full of items.

  Nathan had a limited idea of some of the things they would need thanks to his limited knowledge in Engineering. He spent a few hours, searching the many, many layers of the store for as much of the items he counted as necessary as possible. A lot of the items were just too expensive, so he went with the idea of getting the smaller things first.

  As he looked over the list one last time he smiled, then hit confirm. As he did the Habitat’s lights went out and the bay was plunged into darkness…

  “Oops… I may have spent too much…”

  The next half an hour was spent by both Boov and Nathan moving the charging cables from the transport to the habitat, and ensuring that all items were turned off if they were not immediately being used. Once the Solar arrays was connected back to the Habitat Nathan was relieved to hear the life support systems come back online. Even if the lights or the computer, did not yet. At least he had heat and air.

  “So um Boov, I guess I’ll go to sleep… there is only one set of tools for now and we cannot charge them once they are dead. Nor the lights. If I go to sleep you can take both and keep working.”