Chapter Text
Where creation originates, there is a long tunnel full of vibrant shining stars, all yellow, red, green, and blue. All full of life, uncharted and undocumented. They’re ready to be explored, to be seen. The only way is forward through this tunnel, every glance around reveals only more stars, and the core of the galaxy blinding any individual’s vision that looks toward it. But in this tunnel, there are no eyes to be blinded, no vessel to feel the sensations, but there is a tingling tickle in the cosmo’s nerves, playing the act that there’s something alive in this tunnel in the great cosmic blanket encompassing every celestial being that will ever live and die. Energy and light dance around in the expansive void between star systems, But there is a vessel that can feel it but there isn’t an actual form, at least not yet to be visualized to something real from the creator.
It’s silent in the tunnel as no sound is unable to exist, all that is seen by various ideas from the creator, they all travel so quickly through that there isn’t anything to remember, it all comes and goes. It poses the question, that it could be all insignificant to think of anything more of them if their destined death will be the only thing that changes something in the universe being everlastingly added onto.
A ubiquitous entity utters words, those only understood from itself and travellers on the path it gives. It speaks to the specified vessel and that individual will first understand these words before anything else as the tunnel closes into its gleaming dead end. Now the time for it to become a Traveller amongst the stars will come into fruition, something more to this universe than an idea in the fabric’s seam. The divine has decided that it’s ready to be torn out, sent to the planets orbiting stars below it to be discovered.
“Endless night unfolds before existence. The seeking of the kindred never ends. Wonder and fear. Silence and delight. Knowledge awaits.”
The universe lights up white with no more stars to see in the tunnel, there is no tunnel anymore. Now there is nothing to see besides the white void, this sight only exists for sixteen minutes.
ITERATION: ASTER
“Begin Initialization?”
The Traveller presses into the white void, he can only see cosmic strands weaving into what would become his inner body, then his real vessel begins to form, an exosuit begins to manifest to protect the fragile shell that is this vessel, all bunker down his soul under the protection of any hazard that inevitably tries to harm him. The words that were in front of him dissipate and his body finishes developing as the Traveller, Aster. A calm, measured voice speaks distorted by its existence being artificial intelligence, it tells Aster that they are not an idea anymore, now they have become physical.
“Commencing Atlas System Suit Initialization… Life Support Systems Activated…”
Aster feels a rush of oxygen begin to coarse through his cosmic veins, the tunnel full of the celestial beings above now expanding over the sky on this world that he stands on like a blanket being unraveled to rest on the floor. His eyes now flicker with life, at least from only his perspective. Aster was created not with facial features, nor a head at all. His eyes were underneath curtains of light composed into an bright ethereal orb that manifested his life into the rest of his body. It replaced the spot where a head would be, detached and free-floating with two metal debris small and gleaming with energy orbiting all around his enigmatic orb head.
“Shield kinetic system online… Aerial propulsion jetpack online… Multi-tool mining and laser attachment operational.”
Hexagonal shapes form over the world for a second, everything was still unclogging from Aster’s newly created mind. The tingling sensation made him flinch as they flowed from the center where a neck would be, down to the steel toe boots and only then could he feel his whole body. He looked down from the sky and looked at his hands, they were real now and not just an idea. Aster felt on his back a kick of energy as something activates, it was all a part of his clothing, it was an exosuit created for him by “Atlas”. He felt behind him a long cape that flowed down from his shoulders to his ankles. It was made of synthetic fabric that was smooth to the touch. This smooth feeling flowed down Aster’s cape in a sort of tentacle pattern, all coming from the top where there was a smooth jellyfish head sewn into the design of this cape at the back of his neck. Next forward with his technology, Aster unholsters a small multi-tool, orange and compact with a simple energy emitter at the front. He inspects it at both sides to get the feel of the pistol-like look and shape to the multi-tool.
“User initialization sequence complete.”
The robotic voice goes silent, Aster begins to feel the world that encapsulated him, now that initialization has been completed, he could feel everything that he once only saw from an orbital view. The planet was freezing, desolate with dead trees and full of snow that lightly sprinkled from the clouds above. He shivered silently and rubbed his elbows in a gesture to show. Breezy winds blew through and rattled his body while he stood still in the thick snow. He could feel the cold temperature through his clothing. Aster took his first step, he stood high at six foot one in height, but it didn’t stop the feeling that he was just a tiny baby taking the first step into the long journey of life. The snow crunched under the steel boots that he was equipped with, what kept him warm through the below zero temperatures was the installed hazard protection, the exosuit was nearly nullifying what would be a frost-devouring chill that would break his fragile body apart. But despite the treachery that the very environment was trying to kill with, it brought slight beauty to the world. It was all a chilly wonderland in Aster’s eyes.
A small chip from his exosuit pops out from his chest. With panic, Aster scrambled around to catch it from not falling into the snowy ground. He placed it in the center of his palm and it opened up to be a catalogue of discoveries and guide, it told what this frosty planet was, and what he needed to do to fix his exosuit. Despite everything seeming operational, his scanner device was out of commission from initialization and required ferrite dust in order to be operational once again.
“Kejaku, Hiemal Planet, Minerals specially found: Dioxide, Frost Crystal, Copper. Occasional Snowfall. Sentinels: Low Security.”
Aster played with the holographic screen that was exposed to him from the small circular chip that planted itself into the palm of his right hand. He looked at the star system that he was in by pinching outward on the screen that revealed him Kejaku. There were three other planets orbiting the star that were somewhere beyond the blue sky above. He had manifested into this world during the early afternoon of this planet, with clouds thick and lightly sprinkling down the tiny complex snowflakes that dance in circles in the air before joining with the ones on the ground below. Eventually Aster would find his cargo storage, where he could see what technology was installed into him, he already had three which were quite vital to allowing him to live. The life support system and hazard protection which were both built into the exosuit for their obvious name as to why they exist, as well the jetpack that could be found underneath the drapes of his cape. There was nothing more in the cargo storage, he would find his multi-tool technology as well, which was sorted into slots like a collectors box. His multi-tool was named the “Waveform Focuser N56-P” and all it had was a mining beam, but the slot next to it was glistening to him, wanting him to press on the screen. Aster wasted no moment to curiously press on it to see what it wanted, it showed to him that there was a technology upgrade ready to be added, at least when it has ferrite dust because it was the scanner.
Aster closed the holographic screen and the small circular chip retreated into his exosuit right where he placed it, the palm of his hand. His exosuit was sleek and highly advanced, though rugged. His main colors were a dark red, with secondary’s of dark orange and greys. But there was one thing he needed to focus on and that was being stressed onto him, the hazard protection only protected him for so long until it needed a recharge of sodium, sodium nitrate, or an ion battery. So it was time for Aster to spread his wings and explore the world that he awoke on.
The aerial propulsion jetpack was especially to Aster’s desire, it allowed him to traverse faster than a run or a walk, though it was very limited to a few seconds before Aster would drop back down to the ground so there was that risk behind it. He found a few small rocks which with his multi-tool it told him from a small holographic screen off to the left side of it, that it contained ferrite dust. The only way to harvest the resource effectively was through the equipped mining beam. With a firm grasp around the handle, Aster pressed down the trigger and a green laser shot out from the energy emitter at the front, essentially this multi-tool was a gun with multiple uses that could be wired into it, all Aster needed was the required resources to install it. The rock began to shake with intense vibrations, and it began to fragment apart with bits of ferrite dust being collected into Aster’s cargo. Not long after the rock was entirely gone, reduced to 23 units of ferrite dust. He opened back up the chip in the palm of his hand to see the progress that he had amassed from the singular rock; the scanner required 75 units of ferrite dust in order to be installed successfully into the multi-tool. So Aster aimed toward the next rock, similar in shape and size to the previous rock and began the same process with fracturing apart the rock in chunks, to pebbles, and to ferrite dust ready for use. That rock became 20 units, the next one became 25 and lastly the final rock amassed to be enough with 21 more ferrite dust which would be eighty nine total.
Aster opened up the screen to show him the technology installed into the multi-tool, and tapped on one the slots and selected the scanner, the multi-tool then exposed its circuitry and Aster then inserted the seventy five ferrite dust to suffice the cost.
“Technology Installed.” The exosuit in a calm manner, expressed that it was successful to add the scanner into the multi-tool.
With a press of a red button to the side, above the trigger was now used for the scanner and when it pressed, a ton of information was given to Aster’s eyes. He could see all the nearby sodium plants labeled yellow, oxygen plants labeled red, di-hydrogen labeled blue. It was very interesting for Aster’s eyes to be able to see the distances and what was identified. Aster went toward the direction that led to a sodium plant that was 120 meters away from his location, and when he was closing in on the location, the plant disappeared from sight. That only meant that he had to scan the environment again. He required the sodium plant as the hazard protection was getting closer to running out and it was obvious that when protection from the freezing environment is out, death will follow soon after. With this desperation, Aster tried to express his worries with an attempt to use language.
“I have just been created, death won’t have me just yet.” Aster spoke weakly, his vocals had not yet been developed entirely so it was premature sounding, weak and distorted like a signal trying to be reached from a long distance.
Aster reached the sodium plant and picked from the ground, 20 units of sodium was added to his cargo which was briefly then taken out and used to recharge a portion of the hazard protection, just enough to be past half way.
“Technology recharged.” The exosuit spoke to him. Aster sighed a robotic sounding relief, but he would require more than just one sodium plant in order to stay alive and stray from running out of hazard protection charge.
“Environmental protection, falling.” The exosuit says as the hazard protection reaches 50 percent shortly after Aster had given it a sodium-filled recharge.
“I had a feeling, suit. You know what, your name is Alyss.” Aster responded to its message.
He sighed before scanning the surroundings once again in search for other sodium plants that were picked up from the first scan, Aster quickly propulsed himself toward each plant, collecting a total of four before using the sodium to reach one hundred percent power again on his hazard protection. But because the hazard is constant, being the atmosphere of the planet. Aster could tell that sodium was going to be a good buddy that will never latch away from where it stuck in his cargo hold. Aster looked through his technology, he hadn’t seen it before but a second glance revealed another thing that could be made and installed into his multi-tool. That second installment required just one thing, and that was a singular set of carbon nanotubes, which required fifty grams of carbon in order to be created. So Aster searched for something alive rather than a stone, because a stone is not alive and only generates ferrite dust. It was still something that he occasionally harvested as he jogged toward a frozen forest that was about 200 meters away. Aster made the run into a much shorter travel with the jetpack, it truly was the best movement option that could have been given to him. There was a trick behind how he could turn the few seconds of vertical flight into a short but long horizontal leap that saved time. Because at first the jetpack felt somewhat useless in order to cover a long distance on flat land, but if Aster gave a strong right hook hit with his multi-tool in hand and activated the jetpack at the same time, that would allow him to push forward rather than up with the transfer of momentum. This simple trick saves some time and the constant state of running by allowing Aster to propel toward where he wanted to be in quicker fashion, in this case toward a forest of dead trees coated with snow on top of the branches.
“So if I assume so, the mining beam will work just as effectively as the rock.” Aster hypothesized the simple action of harvesting some carbon. He was proven right when he held the trigger to shoot the laser and melt down the tree into carbon that was tangible to his grasp. He didn’t feel proud for predicting that, as it felt obvious from the name of the technology he uses. Aster harvested a few trees but something then arose from over the small snowy hill.
The exosuit immediately put a warning over Aster’s face telling him about sentinel drones being alerted. Instantly he was advised to stop harvesting and stared at a small orange plated drone with a large blue eye turned red propel itself from one jet thruster toward Aster’s face, the red mechanical eye started to scan Aster’s vessel, two rectangles distorted from dilation upward and downward, meeting at his torso before going back up and down his body for a few seconds. Aster could feel a phantom sense of tingling as the blue rectangles scaled down and up his body. Then the sentinel drone went normal with a blue eye and looked around to the left and right of Aster before choosing to go to the right of him. It flew about like a hummingbird, Aster watched it as it went farther away from him and scanned a few rocks and small plants downwards the small hill.
“That was a strange experience. What is a sentinel drone?” Aster asked his exosuit, but it didn't answer. So instead he went back to harvesting the last chunk of the tree before that interruption.
With that attempt, the sentinel drone returned back to Aster, it didn’t show any emotion but that red gleaming eye shining into his but that red expressed only anger. Aster was able to get the existence of these drones. They were made to enforce the planet’s laws, and they didn’t allow the destruction of the natural environment. But they still let go of Aster as soon as he ended his harvesting. At the end of the process, he was able to install an analysis visor into his multi-tool, which with it now enabled, he was able to scan what he was seeing.
The two metal debris showed their purpose rather than only orbiting around his light orb head, it became a controller of both his energy and the visor, they aligned together into a long half-circle visor that stayed put in front of where his eyes seemed to be under the light orb and it gave him a new muted blue vision of the world. He aimed his eyes towards the skeletal trees he had just harvested to create this new technology and scanned them.
“Snow Arboris, Units Received: 2,659”
Aster noticed that this time the units were capitalized, which meant it was currency and not the amount of something he harvested, because it didn’t show up in his cargo but rather by his name next 2 other currencies, nanites and quicksilver. He asked internally about how to gain these other currencies but he figured they’d make themselves known later than now. Aster had reached a different screen when he inspected the snow arboris that he had scanned, it gave him a small description of the lifecycle and how it had adapted to the cold environment, it was actually alive despite the fact that it looked like skeletal plant remains in reality, and it fed on carbon dioxide in the air, like any other plant does to photosynthesize. He proceeded to scan other environmental objects scattered about, such as the rocks and smaller plants or saplings and it told them that they gave ferrite dust or carbon, but some had secondary materials that could be given to him. These included di-hydrogen, oxygen, or even chromatic metal. Then there were also the much larger rocks that were usually in the middle of large snowy fields of stone that gave pure ferrite, which couldn't be harvested with Aster’s regular mining beam; they were the ones that gave the chromatic metal which saddened his mood. He harvested some other rocks after gaining their Units from their scanning and amassing some ferrite dust and some di-hydrogen, sometimes Aster would also be lucky enough to even get a geode which when cracked open it gave him various things, what he got from the two geodes that he collected before the pesky sentinel drone returned back to him was 35 units of pure ferrite, and 72 units of ferrite dust. Aster had a total of 258 ferrite dust at the end of his stone breaking.
The sentinel drone came back over while Aster turned to collect some sodium plants to refill his hazard protection, the drone gave him a quick scan before returning back to staring at rocks. He looked back at its percentage to see that it was nearly at 10% and it began to heighten his worries, he couldn’t sweat but there was a clammy feeling in his hands that acted as a play on toward that feeling. Aster ripped the plant from the roots and when the sodium was harvested from the plant, he dropped the emptied out plant back on the ground and used the scarce amount of 12 units of sodium to charge it back up to about 30% which still undoubtedly feels uncomfortable low to stay around so, with another scan from his multi-tool, he ran toward the sodium plants that were in a 100 meter radius around him and harvested them up too and used them to gain a full recharge on the hazard protection which should suffice for a few hours like previously. After running about the planet's surface, it had been dropping in temperature slightly as the sun began to set below the distant horizon, the gleaming golden light that was shone through the clearing up sky and the from behind mountains gave way to a view that felt luxurious to see. Aster felt what he wanted to do, capture in the moment. Attached to his exosuit, he noticed a camera that he could use, he pressed on the button on the holographic screen that was being expelled from his palm, which upon the button press, the chip he inserted into his hand popped out and he was able to hold it.
Aster had noticed that it was shooting out a small flame, it was fine for it to be let go as it would then propel itself in place. He took the chip and it displayed a view of what it sees through the eyes of a camera, and when he pointed the chip toward the sun and sees what he wished to be captured, he tapped on the button to capture this moment of time in a digitized photograph, the sunset still remained there but now a specific moment of has been captured to be forever documented. Aster was able to see the beauty behind this photo, the clouds had cleared up making room for a dimming blue sky consumed by a palette of warm colors all originating from the sun, but in the dimmed blue sky that was still there was becoming the night sky with stars able to be seen faded and partly cloaked by the still present sunlight. There was still land captured in the frame which it was all snowy and covered with the skeletal snow arboris being seen from the unlimited visibility, colliding night and day sky, with the night achieving slow victory as it consumes slowly in the moving present outside the picture, it gave itself a name Aster felt in his cosmic woven heart.
“I will call this photo, Two Worlds Collision. I think this twilight sky deserves that name.” Aster hummed proudly in this photograph.
He stored it into his new page of “wonders” in his exosuit’s catalogue, it had tons of pages worth of things to keep ahold of the beauty that Aster planned to capture here onward from this point of time. Afterward, Aster would wander yonder into finding some creatures that have come out of the surrounding iced over caves. It was elusive to see life on this planet, but it didn’t seem to have shocked him all that much. Aster aligned the metal orbiting around him into the visor once more and it detected the small fauna that walked between the rocks; they must have looked large in the small creature's eyes, because it dwarfed the sight of it according to Aster once he had approached it to scan. The small fat creature hollered out, it was able to feel it being scanned and it only had the brain capacity to sense that it needed to run from Aster, it was futile of it to do so but yet it ran from him. The scanner told Aster that it was an antelope but it had some cave marrow growing on the back of it, which was a small bulbous flower with a dark purple stem and yellow petals and bulb in the middle that glowed with bioluminescence. It was a nocturnal creature and it usually sleeps in the caves during the day, occasionally eating on plant bulbs that grow inside the caves.
Aster’s exosuit gave him some insight, it told him about taming creatures but he didn’t want to tame this one but it still told him about offering creature pellets to make it happy. That was something he did not want to bother with, the cold was beginning to catch up with Aster. Behind his back there had been a heavy set of cumulonimbus clouds rolling down snow in the far distance over the towering mountains. The clouds scaled up to the sky far above those mountains, making them look tiny in comparison to their impending wrath that will hail onto the land, and Aster was entirely in the path of its inevitability in the next few hours. However there were so many things that could distract him from the need for shelter, there were many creatures now about. They must have all been nocturnal and now they come out as the moon alerts them awake from their slumber. Now it felt that this planet had achieved a community of sorts, adding onto the peaceful setting that stayed in the air. Even for the approaching night storms that will blow down more snow from the sky and aggressively tamper with the environment for hours on end, to pass on and dissipate back to the tranquil reality that all these creatures must live everyday and forward.
“There are birds in the sky that took off from these dead trees, I knew they weren’t completely a dead plant to rot on the planet, they do serve a purpose. Everything here does, and there’s this feeling that is rising in me that I appear to be an anomaly in the environment, therefore I don’t know how much more I want to be the storm encapsulated as an individual, tampering with this land. I can begin to see why there is sentinel intervention on this planet, because it feels like it’s a luxury to see. But maybe all the planets that are in the night sky here are as well too, something to be seen by someone, but is it me that should see them?” Aster spoke to a creature that was a green crab with a large shell to act that it was a bigger size than it really was, the actual crab was pretty small compared to the big rock that it hides in. He hadn’t paid much attention to where he spoke and it turned out to be that grassy green crab with two stalk eyes that were a black orb at the end that blinked blankly at Aster, clearly having understood nothing that he said.
“Alyss, I’ll take up on your insight about how to tame a creature. I like this guy.” Aster spoke to his exosuit.
He opened up his catalogue to his cargo, where in one of the open slots with the ferrite dust and the other minerals he had collected, and with 50 units of carbon he created 5 creature pellets that were about the size of the combination of pinky, ring, middle, and pointer finger adducted together. Aster kneeled down and planted his knee into the snow a close distance to the crab and tossed one pellet down in front of it. The brown powdery pellet dug into the snow and the little creature weakly walked toward Aster’s offering.
“Oh little one, you’re starving. I hadn’t known that. You deserve another one, poor arthropod.” Aster gently placed another one next to the crab, its eyes looked at the other one, and didn’t think much of it as it was still feeding on the other pellet.
Aster got up to sit down on the frigid snow, it felt like it was freshly blanketed onto the world, and now off to the horizon was another army of clouds that was getting ever closer. The small crab had fully emerged from its stone shell, and 6 legs slithered from the sides of the rock and lifted up the creature, Aster had stood up to stare at the clouds marching forward and noticed that the crab was slightly taller because of its legs not being so shy anymore, it seemed quite fond of Aster now that it walked closer to him and made small chirps that sounded like a raspy squeak. His exosuit informed him through his visor on a small pop up that displayed over the crab with a green circle filled in with black and white cross in the middle, and that meant he was able to adopt the small crab now because it’s trust had been earned by being fed.
“I can adopt this little guy? Oh I certainly will. Your name is now.. Crab… Are you a female or male?” Aster asked, and he did a check in his catalogue about the arthropod he’s now adopting.
“Gender: Asymmetrical” The information reads for the crab in Aster’s catalogue.
“Then I’ll stick with my first name in mind, Crabuletta.” Aster touched Crabuletta’s forehead and scratched it softly.
The exosuit’s insight about tamed creatures said that he may dismiss and recall any creature that he owns at any time, the requirement only being that if it’s permitted in the space that it will be recalled in, so any space that is too small or unauthorized will Crabuletta be disallowed to be recalled into. But for now, Aster will have her following just behind him, which they are in need of shelter from the incoming storm that has fully passed by the mountains.
“WEATHER WARNING: INCOMING STORM” The exosuit spoke monotone for its robotic voice, it didn’t seem like it was that worried about the hailing storm. However Aster was, as visibility became shorter of a distance as the fog rolled in. He couldn’t waste any time and ran with Crabuletta following behind, stumbling over their small hermit home as it began to be affected by the wind picking up past a gentle winter breeze and into a whistling frozen scream. He leaped forward with the momentum transfer with his multi-tool and reached a cave that glowed through the fog with bulbous plants that were similar to the antelopes cave marrow that was growing on its back. He wasted no time getting Crabuletta into safety behind stalagmites and watched as the wind outside blew snowflakes from the clouds down to the ground with strong force. Aster couldn’t go out in the storm, as his hazard protection would drain very fast out in below negative 150 clsius temperatures rather than the consistent negative 10 celsius temperatures. Along with this storm rolling through, the night had risen over the sun at this point and everything was darker outside as well. But inside the cave that Aster and Crabuletta have retreated into was full of glowing bulbous cave marrow that sprouted everywhere in a large room with stalactites and stalagmites interlinking with each other to create pillars in the middle surrounded by yellow lights of the cave marrow flowers, all the stalagmites that grew from the ground and the stalactites that descended to eventually meet all contained cobalt, which Aster felt was going to be useful. So a small mining session under the natural roof of the cave was safe and away from sentinels that would get agitated by the destruction of large cave pillars. It totaled with a grand amount of 182 units of cobalt and a newly recharged multi-tool that consumed some carbon.
Aster looked around with his analysis visor which had the ability to check for underground specialties now that he wasn’t outside, it focused less on all the flora and fauna above and honed into majorly deposits, artifacts, hazards, and any sentinels that were above ground. Sentinels had something inhibiting an interest in what is happening inside caves, because there was one peering at Aster through the misty fog of snow, staying completely still despite the heavy gusts blowing whirlwinds through the wintery fields. All that it did was stare at Aster with a beaming red eye and a light that's blinding to stare at for the high-beams shined his eyes full of a white glare. This made Aster take a picture of the sentinel drone by accident smacking his arms together trying to cover up his visor.
The picture came out into the catalogue and Aster sat down on the freezing rocky ground of the cave and Crabuletta got up and close to sit next to Aster, which it now had looked like he sat on a throne of stones, resting his arm on top of Crabuletta’s snow-covered rock home. He crossed his legs and opened up the catalogue in front of him and looked at the picture of the sentinel drone which had some blur and around a forty five degree tilt as it laid low to the floor where it was taken as the chip fell out of Aster’s hand.
“Now it piques my interest, how even beauty is found from my mistake of stumbling around. I will name this photograph, A Watchful Intervention.” I gave the name to the picture as I looked into it.
Beyond the misty fog of the snow, blowing through with hails of heavenly wrath striking trees in the distance as the raging cloud passes through until they fade back into the sky’s environment of particles. There is a orange tri-plated drone with articulated arms and antennae for its communication to whatever hive it flocked away to wander and protect the living and nonliving things that are found in the planet Kejaku, but are for without a doubt are also found doing their same duty with the other planets that are visible in the sky. It stares at the newly manifested Traveller in this iteration. It hovered with its singular propulsion jet in the back that withstood the high winds, it was uninterested in going into the cave to confront the Traveller ruining the perfected environment of all the underground creatures that lived dominantly on the planet. Yet cared enough to be as intimidating as a bear, a beaming red light staring into the camera’s sight amplified to be brightened by the thick fog, making a glare effect appear as it stared.
The next hour during the dark and stormy night, Aster explored down the tunnel system and came across one of the points of interest that the analysis visor had picked up for him, a collective group of subterranean relics, small trapezoidal artifacts with a small cylindrical hole in the middle of it shining blue around the perimeter on each end. He picked up one of them, and sent a small shiver through his exosuit through his veins woven underneath. It was a part of his cargo now and can be taken out or stored at will now, and so will the other three that were on the ground.
The subterranean relics were called vortex cubes, formed by a fusion of a mixture of metals and rock, they did not get warmer from any touch, so they stayed cold like carrying an ice cube in the palm of your hand. All four of the vortex cubes combined to a total 23,200 Units, that felt like quite a lot of Units to have from just one group of subterranean relics, the next group that was in the rocky tunnel was three more vortex cubes which was another 17,400 units, there was one last that was nearby but as Aster descended downwards the cave, easing his landing with the use of his jetpack, he had noticed that he could not get to the last group of relics.
“How peculiar, I cannot reach these ones. Not without mining.” Aster drew out his multi-tool, and despite being called a mining beam, it was unable to break the dirt mixed with rocks. He had to retreat back up to the entrance of the cave, only getting two of three subterranean relic groups as he wasn’t going to get the last one, not without terrain manipulation which he did not have the installation to do such a thing with his tool. But at least he came out from that cave exploring with 40,600 Units total from just the vortex cubes.
“In a way, this big number feels only like pocket change, I need a starship to get off and into space. I've seen them flying and landing down in the distance, but I would not be able to negotiate with them with these little Units, I’m sure of it.” Aster sat down next to Crabuletta who was still resting underneath the rock, making a good arm rest as Aster sat on a stone throne, he contemplated what to do next.
His plan was to either search for a starship for him to rebuild, as he hypothesized that there will be one that has crashed, and the other idea was to negotiate a deal with Units to get a starship. The ultimate goal was to depart from this planet, and to see the stars that were above him. There was something telling him inside his spherical head of light.
“The existence of the universe is what you should see, your desire to explore, Traveller. They will all end in one point of time, as you will live to see it die perfectly beautifully illustrated by its parent.”
“UPDATE: STORM CLEARING.” The exosuit informed Aster.
The wait had turned the night into the morning as the everlasting snowfall blew through the world around him. Aster turned to look at the brightening sky and the disappearance of storm clouds and their whirlwinds fogging up the outside. Before exiting, he looked back and knocked on Crabuletta’s rock home.
“Wake up, little one. It’s time to explore the outside again.” Aster knelt down to where Crabuletta peeked out shyly, and he took another creature pellet and placed it just outside of her reach, so it motivated her to wake up and feed. As the little crab ate the pellet, Aster scratched her forehead again and she got up on her legs again from the praise.
“Exosuit, can you do a long-distance scan?” It didn’t respond to Aster’s question, so it prompted him to ask something else.
“Search for starships, Alyss.” Aster asked with a polite, gentle tone with his fixed up voice. It was no longer distorted and he spoke regularly with a confident tone. He could now describe his voice as somewhat considerably deep, with a spark of softness behind it.
A scan went out from his multi-tool, and the chip from his hand rocketed skyhigh, and then descended at terminal velocity back to his hand, attaching back to Aster in a very quick succession. It had just performed a birds-eye scan of the distance of the surroundings. It was loose with what was considered the surroundings as the scan picked up things that were an entire week's worth of a walk away, but there was one starship that was catalogued as the closest to Aster.
“That’s… only 1,203 meters away. I can walk that distance. I will go get that starship.” Aster emerged from the cave, to see the beautiful sunrise after a night of storms force stopping his wandering.
He dug his foot into the newly planted snow from those storms, and followed the picked up distress beacon that was all but fully apparent from that scan. The sunrise was beautiful to walk in, it recreated his journey through the display of a shadow figure, with a scene of dead trees in front of it creating depth to the whistling morning. The winds walked with Aster, imitating the feelings of two other friends on each side walking beside him. But all there wasn’t much else that was alive around Aster but Crabuletta walking just behind him with all the effort she could muster from her regained energy.
“Onward we shall go, in this frigid world. So many trees but can’t help the feeling that the lack of life from each of them gave way to the sight of a desolate environment.” Aster stared into the distance of mountains, before descending downhill into the sight of thousands of rocks, small ferns, and the sparse spread of trees outside the forests.
The sun shined so brightly, the other planets Aster desired to see their landscapes were visible in the sky. The collection of several beautiful sights reinforced the thought that the universe was a luxury to be able to view. Aster’s desires only grew to discover it all, as the last thing that will ever exist, but that was only a conspiracy he didn’t believe.