Stellar Survival Quest

by Jalf Whitemage

  “Um, not right now Boov. We have things to do.”

  Nathan looked back toward the air lock and then down to his boys flapping in the breeze.

  “Well, I guess I can’t do a lot right now.”

  Boov smiled, “I’m better and can help master!”

  Growls and hisses drew both their attentions to the four awake Wipynie.

  “We are able to survive longer than a soft skin in the void. We demand you give us a task and we will work hard to finish it. However, we are soldiers not low caste workers or scientist. So we are only willing to demean ourselves for our new commander.”

  Boov looked at Nathan questioningly.

  Nathan nodded. He had no idea what their issue with castes and work was but he would take the help. “Thank you…”

  The Wipynie who was speaking growled low and jumped toward him teeth gnashing, “DO NOT EVER GIVE platitudes AND SOFT COMPLAMENTS! WE ARE NOT LOWER CASTES TO NEED SUCH USELESS WORDS!”

  Taken aback Nathan responded on instinct and swung his foot up in a defensive kick, that the Raptor woman easily knocked aside. She however seemed impressed with his instinctual response and did not press the attack. Nathan settled back to a more Neutral stance. “Does any of your people have mechanical or engineering skills?”

  All four Wipynie shook their lizard like heads in a motion that for Humans meant agreement, however Nathan got the impression it was a negative for them.

  With a sigh he said, “Oh well. I have some things that need rearranged and the second shipment of supplies should be arriving today. You can at least await it and rearrange things. That will allow Boov to finish repairs on the station. The robot…”

  Nathan trailed off remembering the robot. Taking a few steps he moved over picked up the tablet intending to check on its status.

  But when he did he noticed a new system message.

  *** System Message ***

  Skill Level Increase: Level 5Achieved: One Skill Promotion rewarded.

  Skill Increase: Psionics: Interpreter:(J)

  Skill Increase: Authority: Nascent:(J)

  Milestone Achieved!

  Marine! Become a leader of a Marine Unit.

  Reward: 20% to next Human Level.

  1 Random Skill Infuser with applicable Soldier class skill.

  *** System Message ***

  “What the hell is this?”

  Tapping through the screen he moved to his Bio to check out the two new skills.

  After reading the first he turned to Boov.

  “Can you understand them? Pointing at the soldiers.

  Boov shook her head, “No master is amazing though and can!”

  Nathan rubbed his chin, “So that is what the psionic ability does. It lets me understand the intention of a creature who is directly speaking to me. It only works if they are talking at me, thus sending their intentions in the words. But in a way, I now have a universal translator built into my head!”

  Boov jumped up and down clapping as the four soldiers watched impassively.

  Nathan pulled up the other skill and had mixed feelings after reading it over. Authority was a branch of skills covering the ability to assert a measure of control over others. His particular skill was based on a primal method of domination. In many cases this meant physical violence, but as in his case sexual dominance was covered too.

  Coughing, “Nathan straightened, ugh... yeah okay… So… Uh… The other Humans will be respawning tomorrow. That means we need to get the station ready for them today. You four can move the crates and supplies into the other corner of the bay. Then hopefully my other supplies will arrive. Boov I need you to head to the control room and check the systems there.”

  There was a brief pause as the women moved toward the air hatch. Nathan’s eyes fell on the still prone Commander. “Umm… Is she going to be okay?”

  He had not spoken to anyone in general and as such his Psionic ability did not trigger allowing translation.

  Not getting a response he turned to the Marine he had spoken to earlier. “Is she going to be okay?”

  The Norrik Marine glanced at Nathan then back to their commander, “Yes, she sleeps now. Although she should have returned to her lower form…”

  Nathan looked at the four soldiers who all appeared more like Raptors than people; then to the commander who looked more like a Lizard-woman hybrid.

  “So, just guessing here, but you’re in the lower form and she is in the higher form?

  The Marine pulled back her thick lips showing a row of sharp white teeth. A gesture Nathan’s new skill told him meant agreement.

  “Right, well I’ll watch over her since I’m stuck in here anyway. You should all head out and get started.”

  All five women assented and moved out the air lock.

  Nathan now mostly alone took one last look at the sleeping commander and the tree who had been oddly quiet. Then returned his attention to the tablet and his Admin page. He was not surprised to see the Wipynie Marine squad listed there.

  It did amuse him that they were listed as a squad and not individuals. So apparently, the system would not make it easy for him to issue them commands except as a unit. Shrugging he selected the mechanical robot and gave it new repair orders.

  With that done, Nathan opened up the MESO store browser. The prompt to choose his new skill infuser flashed on the side of the screen. Swiping it to the side he first went to the clothing section. There he was relieved to see that some enterprising people from Earth were selling jeans and T-shirts already.

  Nathan began to do some clothes shopping. He hated doing it back on Earth, but here and now he was finding it oddly amusing to go through the store and pick out a few changes of clothing for both him and Boov. Albeit most of Boov’s clothing he chose was either low cut to show off her amazing cleavage, or barely covered anything anyway. Even with his reduced funds Nathan was not really worried about spending on clothes. The prices were mostly in the 100th of a QOBOP range, so he could literally buy more clothes than they would ever use.

  Next he moved on to more useful items. He began to look for Space suits or environmental suits. He briefly considered just reordering the ones he had purchased for himself and Boov before. But, he had went with a lower quality suit in his very limited price range at the time. Even now with his net energy production close to the same, his accounts larger sum gave him the feeling of having more. Plus, he reasoned a better suit would keep him from losing 1000 QOBOP in respawn fees.

  After searching he found two suits for them both at a reasonable 25 QOBOP each. One suit was an upgrade to their prior suits. Now they would have small jets to allow easier movement in Zero-G and magnetic boots. The second suits were light armored units that were combat rated for protection. Both suits had internal air tanks and even had limited on board computers that could be linked to a stronger computer core.

  Finally he moved on to his newest units. The Wipynie Marines needed suits and if they were soldiers they needed some real weapons. He thought about the actual need for weapons for a bit.

  “Do I really need them? I mean it isn’t like I’m planning on going to war… But maybe the other Human’s will cause some issues? Having armed soldiers on my side could ensure no one tries to take things that are not theirs… Heck I know this isn’t a game, but will they?”

  Having talked it through with himself he bought two load outs for the squad. The first was a light armored space suit and a Void rated infra-red laser rifle set. The second was a Medium grade armor set with kinetic weapons designed to not puncture hull armor. Each set was specifically made for the Wipynie Norrik Marines by a company who made gear for their warriors. The cost gave him pause though. The two load outs came to nearly 300 QOBOP per lizard… That was nearly half of what he had remaining…

  “Shit… I hope I am wasting this money, because if I ever need this the shit has hit the fan.

  Nathan confirmed those purchases and was about to close out the store when eh blinking icon for the ski
ll infuser reminded him of one more thing he should do.

  Nathan’s fingers flew over the skill infusers almost on their own accord as images of him bald in a floating chair using mutant powers to crush the wills of his foes and lifting massive objects with a thought raced in his mind.

  A second later Nathan slammed the tablet down and began to shout, “Oh come on! What do you mean I can’t buy Psionic abilities with the free skills! You never said anything about their being a price limit for the skills before! Did someone Nerf me! HACKS!’

  Nathan stomped around cursing and shouting about the unfairness of the universe for several minutes, drawing the irritated glare of the tree. But the temper tantrum ran its course and Nathan picked up the tablet again to search for something a bit more mundane…

  “Maybe, if I can’t have a small ship I’ll just make this big old bucket of rust my bitch!”

  With images of him flying the station around the galaxy swarming through his head, Nathan navigated to the Skill Pilot: Capital Ship and confirmed the selection. The second he did he groaned, “Right, that was stupid! I should have gotten something more useful! Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!” Each time he smacked himself in the head with his palm...

  As Nathan finished with his shopping spree the Air lock opened allowing entry for the Wipynie. They entered the habitat breathing heavily and shivering. Nathan check the time to find only half an hour had passed since they left.

  “Is that as long as you can stay out there?” Nathan asked.

  The four raptor like soldiers turned to look at him briefly, until he repeated the question directly asking one of them.

  She showed her teeth in confirmation and growled, “Yes, although we are stronger than a no scale like you. There is limits to even our bodies’ tolerances for void exposure. If we were in the open void and subject to the radiation outside it would be even less. Give us a few Microns and we will return to our tasks.”

  Nathan nodded then opened up the Galaticpedia to find out what a Micron was. It appeared to be the Galactic standard unit closely equal to a minute. It had just been an odd consequence that the GS day equaled 32 Earth hours. The GS had their own measurements of hours, minutes and seconds. Oddly enough, they seemed to be a system based on eights. Shaking his head Nathan figured since the days to hours worked out he would just leave it in his more familiar measurements.

  15 minutes later the Wipynie went back out leaving Nathan alone and bored.

  The next couple hours passed quickly, although to Nathan who was bored the entire time it was not quick enough. Finally though he got the alert he was waiting for. His second delivery had arrived. With mounting impatience he had to wait for the Wipynie to return to the Habitat before he could tell them to open up the hatch and allow the bots to drop everything off.

  Finally though Nathan watched through the nearly clear plastic of the air lock door as the large crates were unloaded. In total there was six crates, each one twice the size of a standard shipping crate from Earth.

  Two of the crates Nathan was easily able to identify. The first was a dull metal gray crate that had a series of black markings on the outside. But what gave it away as the way the crate looked to be seamed at odd points.

  Nathan looked at his tablet’s display as one of the Wipynie flashed the scanning device over the bar codes.

  *** System Message ***

  Rok’ZrZr’ Recycler

  Model: 

  Class: J

  Size: Small C

  Battery Storage: 100 QOBOP

  This J class recycler made by the industrious Gu’Ru’Nurzz people is capable of breaking the bonds of matter and converting it into energy, at the standard 10% efficiency of the J class. This model is set to convert the energy to the galactic standard unit QOBOP and has an onboard storage for 100 units.

  This module features a special mobile feature allowing for it to pack and unpack itself into a standard shipping unit like configuration. A 360-degree rotating arm allows the recycler an unparalleled ability to recycle materials of a much larger size than itself.

  *** System Message ***

  Nathan did a little happy dance. He was going to have this Recycler moved to the trash room at first opportunity. From his research on the recyclers, they were given a class by what percentage of the matter to energy conversion was retained. This one had a very low class and so most of the material would be lost. But still the ability to turn garbage into power was amaze-balls!

  The second crate he could identify was one that looked to be covered in a silver foil. Nathan had watched the way the delivery robots had moved it in. then as one of the marines lifted the foil Nathan got a glance and smiled.

  The crate was little more than a large palate for 9 other smaller crates. These however Nathan knew by sight.

  He had ordered nine more of the maintenance robots. One of which was even an I class. He knew that as soon as he had this area of the station set up he would need more help fixing and repairing it. This was his solution.

  Along with the nine robots he had purchased three bays for them. Each bay was able to perform automatic repairs as well as do quick charges of the robots batteries.

  Nathan had debated on the need for the repair bays. But after realizing, that right now he did not have the ability to charge all of the robots at one time, it became more important. Ad into the ability to have the robots maintained automatically and the Repair Bays became an easy sell.

  Finally, Nathan turned to the last three crates. The first had already been scanned so Nathan pulled up the information on his scanner.

  “Not that one.” He muttered not reading past the name of the first scan. He had ordered four more solar arrays and although important, it was less exciting than what the last two containers held.

  *** System Message ***

  Gentech J Class Fusion Power Plant

  Model: 

  Class: J

  Size: Small C

  Output: 100 QOBOP

  This J class Fusion Power plant is gentech.

  *** System Message ***

  Nathan smiled. The powerplant was the size of a 55-gallon drum and had pretty much the same general dimensions. It was able to convert a special Hydrogen fuel into a Helium based fuel, then further combine that until it reached Oxygen. At which point it would shove the “waste” into a pressure tank for later removal. Nathan had been surprised to find it as affordable as it was until he discovered the wonders of gentech.

  Gentech was technology unowned by anyone. This was mostly due to the technology being so common in the Galactic community that it was on par with something anyone could build in their garage with ease.

  Nathan had wondered about why everything he had ordered seemed to be labeled with some corporation name or some other kind of labeling and he had discovered why.

  With the ability to convert matter into energy and energy into matter, copyrights had become a big concern for the economically minded races. A solution was quickly found. In printers a simple program made it, where the only way that printer could create an object was if three requirements was met.

  First of course was the basics. The printer had to have an accurate blueprint and the materials to build it with. The second was the GC’s solution. A system of licenses was created. An industrial plant all the way to a food-printing unit all had to have a license from the owner to be able to make any given item. That license would say under what conditions, how many, and how often an item could be produced.

  For something like the MESO Industrial Stations, they were given permission and schematics every time an order was confirmed. Some others were given the ability to create an item on an unlimited scale.

  The last thing a manufacturing or printer needed was a connection to the Galactic system. If for any reason, it was cut off from being able to verify the proper authority to create items it would cease functioning.

  Nathan assumed there were of course those who ran manufacturing
plants they themselves made and thus did not have to follow the rules, but for his purposes, they seemed to work and be fair.

  Anywhoo Gentech was an open license for anyone. A schematic classified as gentech did not require the permission of anyone else to produce.

  He had actually looked into buying the equipment so he could build his own reactors after finding out they were fair game. To his dismay he discovered that the reactors required special Industrial manufacturing printers and some hard to come by ingredient. After doing the cost comparison, he discovered that he could buy 25 of the reactors for the same price as it would take him to buy the equipment and materials to build one. That even was after buying a lower grade industrial unit that had to have the materials on hand and could not just create the power plants from energy.

  Moving on he looked at the scan of the last crate.

  *** System Message ***

  ExoBio Carbon Based Life Support System

  Model: C:NO:ACC:23463732

  Class: J

  Size: Small C

  Supports: 10,000 cubic GU’s, or 100 standard life forms

  ExoBio is proud to produce this newest generation in community life support systems. This module is designed for the small meteor base, or habitat dome in mind. Perfect for a budding community. This unit will both produce and maintain an atmosphere based on the desired parameters, it will also maintain basic climate control in the way of heating and cooling. Some additional air circulation units may be needed for some locations.

  *** System Message ***

  Smiling Nathan did a small fist pump. This was the one he was really looking forward too. With the life support module, he could finally leave the habitat without a space suit. More importantly, it would allow the other humans to survive when they respawned tomorrow.

  Nathan watched as the Marines closed the hatch and came back to the habitat. He exit the air lock before they began the decompression sequence. Therefore, he missed Boov showing up and joining them. When all five entered Boov smiled, “master! This one has good news. She found a dead Human at the module controls. After taking her to the trash room, she checked the status of the computers in the controls. This one replaced two with the spares master had the wonderful foresight to purchase. Finally she was able to start up the computer hardware and review all systems.”