Xeno Core

Zzzztt! Darkness swallows the corridors between the barracks and mess hall. Another burned out circuit or frayed wire.

Systems that worked admirably under the light touch of a seven-member crew strain and fail under the high demand of more than triple the number. It is only by sheer chance and the grace of the stars that nothing more vital has been lost.

"Bella, can you send someone to check out the deck three power supply," I ask from a speaker in the hangar, where she's working on Jumper. "We've lost lighting in several corridors."

She grunts as she tightens a bolt deep in the guts of the armored transport. "Operative Nett was wanting to cross train, you might see if he's free." A loud clang followed by cursing delays the rest of her reply. "This junker's in worse shape than you are, and I can't step away until the blasted repulsor is secured or it'll rip out the bracings," she adds, either as explanation or apology.

Leaving the harried mechanic to her work, I flip quickly through various camera feeds before locating the young officer. He's in the officers' lounge, playing some strange game with Vren.

Nett shakes his cupped together hands vigorously before casting the contents onto the table the two are sitting at. Three spindly triangular pyramids about half a bit long each spill onto the laminated wood surface. The small triangular bases are colored black and each of the three tapered faces of each piece are vivid red, blue, or green. The arrangement has no significant meaning to me, but Jett seems quite pleased. The dice land roughly in line. Blue/red up, red/green up, green/blue down.

"That's red facing and both points. And green facing for a double, non-point," he announces triumphantly to his scowling companion.

"Tcha. Very well, I admit your win," grunts the Tserri leader. He reaches down to his belt and draws a hooked dagger whose blade measures at least eight bits long and places it between them. "One more throw, and I'll add the sheath?"

Nett nods with a cocky grin on his face. Vren grabs the dice and proceeds to shake them using his lower set of claws. He casts and again the colors mean nothing to me, but I wait for the game to play out. A short delay before the light is repaired will be good to toughen up the resolve of the crew.

The smile on Vren's dark furred face is predatory, fangs dominating his mouth. "All out, no match green. A fair throw." Ah, the dice landed in a loose circle, with each spindle pointed outward. Both coloration and positioning affect the value of a toss. Each displays a green face, but no same-colored faces are towards each other.

"True, true. But I've the cripple's luck today," the newly promoted Operative declares as he scoops up the dice for his turn. A brief shake and he lets the dice roll across the table. When they come to a stop he jumps to his feet with a cheer. "All in and trifecta!"

Indeed, the dice landed and point inward. One pair have red sides facing each other, with green and blue also matching up between the other exposed sides. Vren hands over the sheathed dagger with a shake of his head.

"Operative Zar, your assistance is requested outside the crew barracks. Lighting has gone out and Bella Tropp recommended you for the assignment," I announce into the lounge.

Vren scoops up his dice and presses the black end of each die with an extended foreclaw. The dice revert to a dull white color one by one. He then places all three into a small compartment built into his purple and silver vacuum armor.

"At least you know the dice are fair, they're yours," Nett says before heading off to see what needs fixing. His limp is barely noticeable. Tonn, the ship medic, has opined before that with proper exercise it'll disappear entirely, at least until he changes out his cybernetic prosthetic for a more advanced model.

A towel from a dispenser nearby serves to wipe the table down. After tossing it into the disposal chute Vren picks up a large green and orange striped fruit from a bowl of produce kept on the bar. Taking a bite of the albulb he walks back to his quarters down the curving officers' hall.

---

In the war room Ship-Father Tollek and two of his officers, Gelly and a newly transferred Second Operative Las Nokk, are seated around the centrally placed table. Displayed above it is a hologram of local space, with orbits marked and our own location highlighted.

Formerly of the Centra Defense Force, Operative Nokk's speckled face is set in grim lines as he listens to his commanding officer.

"Yosip's idea of a stationary base is still solid. Mos Denn, unfortunately, used much of the raw material available to construct said base, however," he sighs and presses a couple of buttons inset before him on the table. The displayed graphic zooms in on the location of the remains of the Learned Stalker and her sister ship.

"The Grand Matron is busy rebuilding Centra. There aren't any spare supplies to send up," complains Las, weary acceptance dripping from his voice.

Gelly nods along absently, paying more attention to his personal comms.

"We can't be forced to stay in system," Jim declares. "There has to be another source of material available to use." He turns his gaze to Operative Drop. "Have you found anything, Gel?"

"Could be, Jim. Depends on how ye feel about catching a nice big rock or two." He never looks up from the device in his hand. "May be we've a couple 'o candidates."

He touches his comms to the table and enters a command. The view provided changes again to long range focus, with two new ellipticals added to the display.

"We'll be needin' em both fer this, if'n ye want it done right. This big honker, Kalibern, named after the hero's sword, would serve as the main body. That smaller one's needed for the water ice and other volatiles. Locals call it-"

"Bestera Minor, after the sisters that helped the hero forge Kalibern," interrupts Las. "Major is much farther out, but the two orbits line up pretty closely, such that they are visible together during winter nights."

"Which hero is this? I do so enjoy a good adventure story," I interject, causing Las to start in surprise.

Jim chuckles before answering, "The nameless hero. A legend among our race dating back to before space flight. I'm glad to find out that you don't spend all your time reading children's tales, Mos. Go on, Gel."

"Aye. Kalibern'll be first. Lots 'o iron 'n nickel, other metals. Dig in a wee bit then plant what's left o' the Tserri hulls on top. Drag Bestera over fer drinkin' water and air. Only thing we lack is everythin' else to build a station."

"And with those armored suits of yours," adds Las with excitement, "the work can be done without needing a small fleet of tugs and shuttles."

"What should I be doing, then? Should I drag the wreckage to intercept Kalibern or nudge the asteroid towards the scrap?"

"Kalibern will need to have its orientation and rotation adjusted anyway, so might as well drag everything to this spot," Jim states decisively before sketching in an approximate orbit for the proposed base and highlighting the spot closest to us on it. "Oh, and have one of the science team draw up plans for a mobile refinery and micro factory. The smaller the better."

Active magnetic field manipulation drags the debris behind us as we slowly make our way to the proposed location. Half a day of flight will see us to the destination, though not without complications.

The entire ship is kept much less humid than I would have preferred in my organic body, but the sectioned off quarters used by the Tserri are dryer still. Or would be, if the installation of atmospheric systems had not been so rushed.

Armor abandoned as unbearable, their thick fur clings to their stripped-down forms as they replace filters and reprogram ventilation monitoring software.

"Engineer Teah, could I interrupt? New orders from the Ship-Father," I play over the speakers mounted in the common area the engineer had been working in. "He needs you to design a portable forge and factory. It needs to be able to handle multiple blueprints and size is a major limiter. Something that could fit in the shuttle would be great, but smaller if possible."

She shakes the sweat from the longer tawny fur around her head. Putting down the small device she had been using to seal up joints in the wall plating she turns towards the center of the room to address me.

"And able to sing and dance and cook too, I bet," she laughs and reaches for her design tablet. "How much of that is intractable?"

"Well, the new gizmo is going to be used to fabricate much of the electrical infrastructure of the asteroid base they're wanting to build. Circuits, wires, display screens; that kind of thing. It needs to be able to move around, and I think Tollek wishes to take it with us after Kalibern Base is finished."

Already tapping away at her screen, Teah just waves a spare arm in acknowledgement.