The Next Step

Chapter 8 of Book 1: Exploring the Stars...

I hadn't realized for a good long while that I literally just sat there zoning out completely. The S.S. Krystal set sail 4 hours ago, sorry kid but you're s**t out of luck. She is long gone!

“Are you okay...? Hey!?”, she said to me. Desperately attempting to get my attention.

“Hm? Oh I'm good.”, I said as I snapped out of it. “Just zoned out a bit there, but I will without a doubt, 100%, absolutely, positively accept your proposal!”

I gave her a goofy smile, complete with a nice thumbs up to show my approval. Apparently I did something good too, because that was the first time I've seen that fish smile since I ran into her 20 minutes ago.

“You are truly a very different person than I'm used to being around.”, she chuckled. “But this is a welcome change. Thank you.”

“You are very welcome! As of this moment, we are now partners.”, I replied.

She crossed her arms and assumed a slightly more serious face.

“So what's our next move then?”, Ayano asked.

“Well, come to think of it I'm not completely sure how to repair the ship's FTL Drive.”, I responded.

I placed my hand on my chin and sat there in thought for a few moments. Then I totally remembered that SAIL is still a thing I can ask for help right now.

“SAIL, are you there still?”

SAIL almost immediately chimed in: “I'm right here, captain. Do you need my assistance?”

I couldn't help but notice that as the AI manifested on my wrist, Ayano had a look of familiarity in her eye.

SAIL pops up as a hologram on my watch sometimes, by the way.

“As a matter of fact SAIL, yes I do. What would I need to do repairs on the ships's FTL Drive?”

A couple of beeps and boops later, SAIL gave me a calculated response.

“I am unsure at this moment. However, I have your ship's model right here. I would suggest finding an engineer who knows what to do next.”

Well that was informative. But I guess we explore the outpost until we can find help.

As I tried to walk into the front door to initiate my exploration, I was stopped suddenly. By Ayano no less, placing her hand on my shoulder again. She looked me dead in the eye.

“Where did you get that ship AI?”, she asked me.

The severity on her face was very weird indeed. I'm not sure what to make of it yet, but it bothers me slightly.

“SAIL? He's just my ship AI. Why are you serious out of the sudden?”

She paused for a moment and calmed down a bit.

“This might be a stretch but.. do you happen to own some sort of multi-tool? Something that can break down whatever you aim it at to it's base components?”

A light clicked in my brain. Something that doesn't happen enough for me, to be honest.

“You mean this?”, I said as I showed her the doohickey she mentioned.

The look in her eyes flared up. She suddenly got very serious and... disapproving. Crossing her arms she stood in front of me.

“Where did you get that? You will explain this right now, before we do ANYTHING more.”

Something has her really pissy... and I am VERY confused about it all. It was like she was accusing me of stealing it, which made me really agitated. I don't like it when people think I'm a mean person.

“Hey, what's the deal?! It's not like I took any of these things without asking.”, I told her. Clearly offended.

She took a deep breath, followed by a sigh. After I slight pause she continued.

“Okay.”

There was long pause. As she said this, she uncrossed her arms. Reaching her hand out while opening her fingers, she suddenly made her own multi-tool appear.

“This is called the 'Matter Manipulator'. As I'm sure you've already noticed, it isn't just any old tool. This tool is exclusive to the Protectors... do you get what I'm saying?”

“So... is that a problem?”, I said. Still partially confused about her blowout.

“Krystal, it means that you shouldn't have access to it unless you had access to a protector somehow. That directly involves me now.”

It's not that I didn't believe her... but it wasn't a topic I really wanted to discuss with a random person I had only just met. Especially not right now at this exact moment. She could read it in my expression, too.

“Look, it... it was a gift. I know you probably don't believe me here, but my friend gifted me my ship, and this matter... thingy you said.”

I really tried my damndest to pull even THAT piss poor explanation out of me. It made me sad at the thought of that memory.

“Look... just trust me, okay? We just met, and you may have NO reason to trust me, but can you just do me that kindness please? It's... not the time or place yet.”

Her expression loosened up even further. After a little thought, she gave me a compromise.

“Consider this an exercise towards a long lasting partnership then. What goes around, comes around.”, she said turning her back to me.

“However..”, she said suddenly continuing. She twisted her head to the right.

“I expect to hear that story sometime in our future. I will not force you to speak of something that makes you uncomfortable. But understand that It's my duty to know what happened to my comrades. Do not rush.”

She then proceeded forward, into the outpost.

I sat there in thought for a moment. Until I heard her voice waking me up again.

“Come.”

When I focused once more, I realized that Ayano was facing me about 20 feet in the distance. She waved her arm backwards towards herself, signaling me to follow. I smiled once more, and trailed after her.

Ayano led me through multiple rooms. Of them was a larger room with a stall in the middle labeled “TerraMart”. I was told they didn't sell anything that would interest us right now. We didn't do an awful lot of exploring really.

The thing I notice about my companion here is that she is very focused on one task at a time. Me? I run off. A lot. And get distracted. A lot. We complete each other, really.

After a little while we went back outside. Directly through the back of the complex. It was a MASSIVE shipyard, littered with broken parts and gizmos as far as the eye can see.

The coolest thing I've seen so far are the people! Every passerby was almost an entirely different looking person. Half man, half monkeys. Plant people. Humans. Sentient robots. Even penguins. Friggan' PENGUINS!!!It was Phenomenal. I was also surprised that I knew how to properly use the word “Phenomenal”.

I held my excitement in, and blurted out all of my thoughts loudly in my head instead of in words. I decided to spare Ayano from my annoyance for at least a few minutes.

We suddenly arrived at a gruff looking human man. He was leaning up against the hull of a broken down ship of some sort, with a penguin leaning over the wreck next to him. Clearly the penguin was attempting to repair the pile of parts he was leaning on.

“Hey, Marth. I've got a question for you.”, she said.

After lifting his head slightly and shifting his body a bit, he responded.

“If you're going to pester me about a ship again then tough s**t.”

His voice was just as rugged as his face. He was everything you expected out of the kind of guy you want to know about repairing a car, or a ship in this case. He even had the typical southern accent to compliment, although it wasn't highly prominent. Like he tried to play the part but gave up halfway through.

“I'll have you know that Krystal over here is the solution to that problem. But we need a little bit of information from you first.”

This appeared to pique his curiosity.

“I'm listening.”

“Her FTL drive is busted. We need to fix it, but we have no idea what we need to do it. Her name is Krystal, by the way.”

Once I heard my name, I clicked on like a light switch.

“Hellooooo!!!”, I said to him. Cheerful as ever.

“This ain't a meet an' greet, sweetheart. You have the ship model on hand?”

“Yes I do! It should be right here.”, I replied. Unfazed by his abrasive comment earlier.

He looked over at Ayano, lifting his arm and pointing his thumb my way.

“She's ball of joy now, ain't she? Where the hell did you find it?”

“Let's call it a stroke of good luck.”, Ayano responded.

“Gravity kind of took care of the rest.”, I added.

After looking at the hologram I presented, Marth nodded.

“It's a pretty standard ship. Not even a Sparrow class either, eh? No matter, I can fix it.”

“You can!? What do we need?”, I blurted out excitedly.

“Hun, let me make this perfectly clear. I don't work for free. Now, I'm gonna help ya... but there's going to be a few simple conditions for it.”

“Name your terms, buck-o!”, I told him. Ayano seemed particularly speechless at the way I went about things.

“First, you're gonna need some erchius crystals. Heh, that's not gonna be an easy task 'fer ya. But that's not my problem. I can share some coordinates for ya, but yer gonna need to make some preparations.”

“That won't be a problem, whatever it is me and Ayano can handle it.”

She finally chimed in once I directly involved her with my reckless and carefree style.

“Do not just assume that I'm going to go along with everything you do and get myself killed, simply because I need a favor.”, she said.

To me that means “HELL YEAH!”.

“Heheh..”, he laughed. It was a very airy, and old sounding laugh. “I take it back, I like 'er. She's a real keeper for sure, we're gonna like each other just fine.”

He continued on: “Next, I'd like to offer you an.. extended service as well. Yer model can easily be expanded. More space, more crew, and more features. Its not gonna be cheap, though. You'll be happy you did it.”

He said that last sentence while stretching. His old body crackled a few times as well.

“I doubt she even has an actual ship license”, Ayano chimed.

“You act like it matters, woman. Now-a-days you just pull a few strings, know a few people, and yippie ki-yay, you have a shiny new space ride to f**k around with.”

“The man sounds preeeeeetty convincing Ayano...”, I said in response. He's very blunt and coarse, but the man has a point when he speaks.

“Furball here may not be all together up in the attic, but she's knows her gut. I can feel it. So here are them coordinates I mentioned, let me make some preparations on my end for when you wrap up fetchin' them crystals, then we'll talk. So hop to it!”

After that, SAIL had popped up a new window on my HUD.

SAIL then said: “Coordinates saved, you can now beam to this location.”

This was an excellent start compared to what I had expected from today. It started out like any other, but wound up being spectacular. I found something fun and interesting, I found a companion, and I found a guy that can repair my ship. It's basically dinner AND a show at this point.

Suddenly we we're interrupted by Marth shouting back at us.

“Them coordinates are in a place with no breathable atmosphere, by the way. So don't go jumpin' the gun an' dying alright?!”, He said in his own way of somewhat giving a damn.

I waved at him happily.

“Okaaayyyy!!!”

I looked at my watch, but Ayano stopped me.

“Do yourself a favor first, save the “1 Stop Teleshop” coordinates before you beam to your ship. That... WAS what you were doing, right?”

It hadn't even crossed my mind if Ayano could even beam onboard my ship after I did. I almost left her behind!

We made our way to the teleshop, and stored those coordinates as well. I looked over at my fish companion, and nodded.

“Ready?”, I asked.

“Lead the way.”, she said with a gentle smile.

I sent her my ship coordinates, followed by the line “Beam me up, Scotty!!!”

The sheer look of confusion on Ayano's face was F*****G. Priceless.

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