Day: 2

Year of event: 22+ 10^(10.1395)

Notes: this chapter contains mild violence.

The inside of the docking bay, although more welcoming than its airlock, had two other ships stationed in it. Thankfully neither of these ships were close enough to Dorothy’s dedicated path for her to even risk bumping into them. The docking bay floor was also squirming with people, most of whom came and went from the larger of the significantly larger ship, which no doubt carried some sort of cargo.

Dorothy landed without incident.

"Thank God that's over with." The same male voice came through the speaker.

"Ha, wait to see how they do on the way out." Another voice answered on the other end of the line.

"Oh no! I don't even want to think about that idiot being stuck in the airlock again -"

Dorothy turned off the transmission.

She pulled back the piloting aid, and turned off the 3D map. One of her friends knew how to land ships with only pure visual data, i.e. with a good direct line of sight, but Dot had never bothered learning that particular skill. She felt more comfortable sticking to repairing engines and telling people to flush their coolant pipes at least once a year.

"Right."

Dot pushed herself off the piloting chair and headed towards the back of the ship. She opened a control panel, and with a few quick clicks, released the secondary fuel tank. It slid through the moving mechanisms that separated it from the liveable part of the ship and came to halt when its upper half was exposed to the artificial atmosphere. The tank was cylindrical in shape, with a diameter of 40 centimetres and a depth of twice that number. It weighed almost 30 kilograms, and had special indents at each end where a carrying cap and handle could clip in.

The tank was made of hundreds of tiny, scale-like, modular pieces, which expanded when in a vacuum to occupy a volume 8.5 times larger than its current one. This was done for several reasons; the two main ones being ease of transport, replacement and/or modularity, and the fact that exotic matter(I.e. the fuel used during sun jumps) occupied less volume when exposed to gravity. This also meant that those 30 kgs were entirely made up by the tank's own weight, since exotic matter did not have any mass.

Dorothy checked her outfit one last time, closed the trap door that led to the guts of her ship, easily picked up the tank, and headed towards the airlock.

As soon as Cassie's outer door opened, Dorothy was hit in the face with the stench of organic fuel, human sweat, and something else she couldn't quite place but definitely didn't like. She squinted her nose and waited for the airlock door to close, before entering a command on an outdoors control panel to purify the air inside.

Anyone watching would have assumed this woman was locking up her ship after realizing just how improper the people around here were.

In reality, Cassie was equipped with several lifeform scanners as well as a genetic lock. The latter had been put in place not in fear of theft, but rather to prevent any animals and insects from getting in. A lot of the smaller AI models had a tendency to find these critters cute, and most large ships did not come with a built-in filter to keep them out. The genetic lock was in place to prevent an animal from hopping around on the console and accidentally activating weaponry or the jump engines.

By the time Dot was done, she had already gotten used to the smell. And she just started to notice the usually high humidity.

According to Cassie, this was a Human-centric outpost. Which meant that the air was breathable, gravity was a standard 10, and humidity should not have been 80 something percent per cubic meter.

Dot leaned back against the door, taking a second to observe the docking bay. She wanted to make sure she wouldn't have any weird reactions when she'd meet aliens for the first time; she had been aware of their existence as a whole, and she recently learned what Gromlids, Vimlen, Sigwa, and Faklar looked like. She had also memorized some basics do's and don’ts around them. And of course, she had known about Lzrausums, the only alien race her people communicated with, beforehand. But knowing about something, and seeing it in person were two very different things.

Most of the guards, easily distinguished by their dark red military-type vests, were tall, bird-like, creatures. Their six eyes seemed to work independently from one another, as they scanned the docking bay for any potential threats.

One of these guards was currently in quite a vocal argument with the owner, or pilot, of the small ship parked next to Cassie. The other person was more human-like than the guard, but their face and hands (and presumably the rest of their body) were covered in irregular bone structures.

Dot tried to listen in on their conversation, but she quickly realized that she couldn't understand a word from it. She automatically reached to check the small bump of metal hidden behind her ear. Her sub-dermal translator was still in place, and her best guess as to why she couldn’t understand that conversation was because the language used was not in the translator’s database. This was an issue worth sorting out in the unlikely and undesirable situation where Cassie and Dot would need to land in Onshore territory again. The woman turned back towards the control panel, and entered instructions to collect and process all local audio data.

Then, she picked up the field tank and headed towards a large passage which served as the main entrance to the docking bay. It was easily identifiable as such that to the "Welcome to Cosmos 6" sign above it. Cassie hadn't lied about that at least; English was the primary language in this sector.

Despite knowing this beforehand, Dorothy was still surprised at just how similar this station was to Offshore infrastructures; the hallways were crowded with people, and whatever it was they were constantly transporting to and from the docking bay in those large canisters of theirs; most walls were grey and lacked personality. Their noticeable wear and tear made the few painted facades look even worse in comparison. But worst of all, Dorothy had almost fallen over on several occasions on account of sudden shifts in gravity. This wasn’t the kind of station that spun around a central axis to generate gravity, but rather one that hand complex electro-magnetic circuits running under its floorboards.

The strange thing was that Dorothy felt almost at home, in this endless maze of fused houses and shops, and poorly lit alleyways that had likely once been maintenance tunnels. What made it feel so familiar was that look people had in their eyes; like there was nowhere else in the universe they could be because there was nowhere else they should or could be. With that thought, Dot's anxiety slowly faded away.

She strolled through the streets, gradually getting used to the humidity, and more importantly aliens. She was looking for a place that reputable people wouldn't visit, a bar, a figuring ring, or a brothel; a place where money was regularly slid under the table. She knew that she'd get ripped off as a first-time client, but she couldn't risk proper, clean-handed people, to go asking where she'd found the fuel.

At some point Dot realized that she was lost.

Of course, she still remembered the way she came in, so she could backtrack and go back to Cassie, but that would go against the whole purpose of coming this far. To make matters worse, not only was Dot strolling through the streets of what seemed like a residential area (judging by the lack of people and the names written on most doors), but she had noticed that someone was following her.

With every step she took, she could hear a clicking sound some distance behind her. The sound stopped whenever she did, and accelerated to match her pace on occasion. This meant that backtracking was no longer an option.

Once this possibility had become a certainty, Dorothy no longer had the luxury to worry about how well she blended in with the locals. She needed to act, and act fast.

It was clear that whoever had been following her was after the fuel tank; after all, the woman had nothing else of value on her. Thankfully the tank came with a built-in safety mechanism. If its carrying cap was to be detached at any point, the tank would anchor itself onto the nearest non-organic surface. This had been put in place to prevent these cylindrical tanks from rolling around when they were stored outside of their designated containers.

“Hey pal, I know you’re there.” Dorothy called out as she unclipped the handle from the fuel tank. That way, not only was her cargo not going anywhere, but she also had a makeshift weapon. “So how about we stop playing around and you come out?” She said as she quickly spun around to face the direction the noises had been coming from.

To her greatest surprise, a human man emerged from behind a corner. His sleeves were rolled up, and he was cracking his fists, clearly ready for a fight. His grey eyes met Dot’s black ones, and for a moment he seemed to hesitate. Dot took the opportunity to have a better look at him, as it seemed he was doing the same. They had a fairly similar build, but he was half a head taller, and most of his exposed skin was covered in strange protrusions, like bones poking through the skin.

“Umm, so,… Do you have a boyfriend?” He unexpectedly asked.

His tone was more arrogant than flirty. This robbery had taken a weird turn, so naturally, Dot replied:

“What?”

“What I mean is … umm…” The man nervously glanced back.

When his line of sight returned to his opponent, he was surprised to find that she had moved quite a bit closer. He raised his arms up in a guard, just in time to stop her from hitting him in the chest with a chunk of metal.

“Fine, it’s not like I care if you're conscious or not.” He said, and threw a quick series of punches towards Dot’s head.

Dot dodged by quickly moving backwards. His punches weren’t wide enough for her to try redirecting them.

The man kicked the air right by Dot’s head. He then took a step back and slightly lowered his guard, as if inviting the woman to give up after having demonstrated his skills.

Dorothy moved in for an uppercut. It made contact with the man’s hand. His hand wrapped around hers, and she would have been on the floor if not for her split-second decision to drop the tank lid and grab hold of his shoulder for balance and knee-kick him in the balls.

He let go of her, leaving Dot with a few seconds to come up with a plan. She quickly glanced left and right, trying to find something in her surrounding she could use. But the station hallways were deserted and barren.

Dot spun around and made a run for it. She would come back for the fuel tank later, it’s not as if it’ll go anywhere without her fingerprints to reattach the lid.

“Hey, wait you СЏКА!” The man yelled before running after her.

Dot ducked into a narrow passage.

The man followed her, but stopped the second he realized that the narrow corridor was empty. He wasn’t known to be the brightest mind aboard this station, but even he wasn’t dumb enough to lose someone who stood out as much as that woman did.

“Hey!” He called out in hopes of getting an answer.

He took another step forward, squinting his eyes, hoping to see any trace of his target.

That was the moment Dot chose to drop onto him. She knew this was a risky move, but she was also short on options. She landed with her knees over his shoulders, and punched him in the face. He stumbled backwards slightly, but the woman wasn’t sure if it was because of the punch, or the fact that his face was practically buried between her legs. She hit him again, and again. He took hold of a nearby wall and tried to shover her off. She tightened the grip around his head with both her free hand and her knees.

She hit him once more.

He tried to yell something.

She hit him one more time. When she pulled her fist away, it was covered in blood; presumably her own if the pain in her hand was anything to go by.

He tried to shove her off once more.

This time, Dot barely held on. Her limbs felt like cotton; having used up most of her strength to climb up the corridor walls, Dorothy was holding up through willpower alone. But she couldn’t do so much longer. Her un-wounded hand slid from its anchor point behind the man’s head. Dorothy felt something hard and cold under her fingertips. In a rush of desperation, Dorothy grabbed onto it as she let her own weight pull her to the floor.

A scream echoed through the empty hallways and Dorothy was fairly certain it wasn’t her own. Her vision had gone blurry for a second, as she had hit the ground, but when she regained her composure, she saw that her opponent was laying limp on the floor. A small puddle of blood was forming under his neck, and his chest was moving up and down ever so slightly.

Dorothy unclenched her left fist, and found a small, bloodstained metal box inside. A few thin slimy wires emerged from it, and wrapped around Dot’s hand. The woman threw the device against the nearest wall. As it flew away, the wires slid along her skin, like dozens of tiny maggots digging into flesh. The sensation sent shivers down the woman’s spine. She’d have Cassie look at it later on.

She clenched and unclenched her other fist a few times. The pain was dull, but still present. Dot kneeled by the body, and used his shirt to wipe off the blood of her knuckles. Thanks to her genetic condition, she wasn’t worried about an infection. The wound didn’t look pretty, with skin missing in several places, but Dorothy had seen worse; but not from punching some thug though. She blamed the bones that poked through all over his face.

She shook her head and got up. She needed to get those documents and get out of here as soon as possible. Being attached by uncivilized brutes was the last thing she’d signed up for when she wrote down her name at the bottom of the “Project Gaia 17-kappa-08” document.

Notes: The genic lock system has began to be widely implemented after a research team on Object 45008315, now know as New Milan, found a deer inside their weapons unit. It took them several days to get the deer out, because the animal had somehow managed to equip itself with a portable laser cannon (that team was working with military grade biotech). Unfortunate the footage from that incident is no longer available without special clearance, due to my colleagues over at the ETCH deeming it as “unprofessional” and “bullying” of the scientists involved. I, personally, have see the footage, and can testify to how hilarious it is to watch four full-grown adults trying to lure a scared animal out of a missiles-storage room (the deer did visit most rooms aboard that station during its stay) with a bunch of leaves impaled on a stick.

Do keep in mind that a genetic lock can be overwritten by the ships’ AI, which is why most small models are put to sleep when docked.

Current year: 22+e^(23.347)

Redactor signature: E.E. Shwartz