The Cold, Dark Space Called Infinity, Part Ii
Oblivion437
Join Date: 2003-02-06 Member: 13178Members
Join Date: 2003-02-06 Member: 13178Members
<a href='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?act=ST&f=6&t=37389' target='_blank'>Part I</a>
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
Chapter 5: Life aboard USES <i>Hope</i>+
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Hope was cramped, as expected, but cramped, and with even a few other people, this would be the longest half year of my life. The basic order of the day was to attempt to fix the cryo tubes. After two weeks of work after work after work, we concluded at best we could stay under for 2 months, due to lack of proper hibernation materials. There were advantages to staying awake, namely I could talk to people, and I would stay in physically acceptable shape.
The floors of the cockpit were covered in a sectional berber carpet, with machinery and access panels scattered throughout. The plastic fibers used didn't build static, and the grip ridden walls and ceiling made any direction comfortable. Plus, the shuttles were LONG, about 800 meters long, made of three shafts, engines, supply, cryo&Cockpit were the third section. Each one could be sealed to withstand the rigors of space, and if you left them open, you had a nice jogging path to run up and down, aside from the weak gravity, but a pair of the right shoes fixed that.
Overall, I was just plain glad to get off that damn cargo ship. Good company or not, the ship had some serious problems, and I don't like large indoor spaces. The design seemed almost intentionally flawed, which I would get to the bottom of at the receivership bay.
Life onboard was very uneventful, which was an eventful relief in itself. Aside from some occasional mechanical failures, we enjoyed our nice little ship, and the nice calm with it. We landed, but rather than be caught with our pants down again, we charged out of the shuttle in atmospheric wear with loaded weapons. Only to find one of the most bizarre port scenes I'd ever seen in my life.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Chapter 6: Something out of Do Lung+
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Old movies often have powerful parables to rather trying situations. My thoughts aside the current situation were on <u>Apocalypse Now</u>. The scene at Do Lung, with the whole base in chaos as the Vietcong attacked and Willard's unwitting entry into the chaos. Like Willard, I knew the situation could only get worse from here. The shuttles were there. But they were rusted all over.
There were men firing into a port hole into the base, firing Grenade Launchers, expending whole magazines into a 2'X2' tube. Other soldiers were running in random directions away from the base. All this in seconds. The following explosion blew out a blast plate behind our shuttle, and it then flew into one of our engines, blowing it completely apart. The rain was pounding down on us, with the wind kicking the flora up in an indescribable motion of fury. We ran to them, before we could get a word out,
"What the hell are you doing here?"
"Meeting other remnants of abandoned ship."
"Man, you picked the worst port to land on! We just been overrun!"
"By who?"
"The Goddamned Chinese!"
"Where's everyone else?"
"Scattered into the forest."
This was what survivalists call SHTF scenarios. Everything had been lost, they ran the base, and the tube they just blew out was the flood control. It could take too long to repair it before irreperable damage occured to the security nodes. They started running into the great, dark forest, and we ran after them.
++++++++++++++
Chapter 7: Scatter+
++++++++++++++
We ran into the forest, following over a dozen men who were following over a hundred men and women running for their lives. There were massive explosions behind us, and the laughter of the saboteurs ahead. We ran for a good half hour, then slowed to a jog for about another hour, finally stopping when we were on the other side of a ridge.
The forest was massive. It encompassed over three quarters of the largest continent on a planet 6 times the size of Earth. This continent was incidentally over half the planet's landmass, and covered roughly three fifths of the whole surface. The forest provided good protection, and we were in space suits, but I was still unsure of the situation. After all, we'd landed without taking a shot, now here we were, in some godforsaken forest making plans to attack.
"Look, we only have about a hundred grenades left. We can blow out all their ports, they'll never fix them, then the rains coming in a week fall, the base will be destroyed. They can't wait their for long," the lead saboteur stated.
"Neither can we," said a personnel officer of low rank, the kind who sorts janitors out.
"Yes we can. We're here in one of the best forest fer hunting. Plenty of food, water and clean air. They have to hold that base, don't they?" Said the old hunter, who must have been talking around.
"Indeed they do. I give them a week at best. We can stay out here for as long as we want," said the chief of staff. His summation was right.
Ever since the Sanjii debacle, the Chinese had been very aggressive about nabbing un-claimed bases. The TSA, once marking a bases territory to a particular nation, would impartially defend that claim, even getting friendly UN nations to sanction or fight the violators back on Earth.
With the way interstellar economies work, it takes at least a year to build a self-sufficient colony anywhere, even on ideal worlds. This place was there, but China had a large number of colonies that weren't, and they needed material support until they got there. If the Chinese ever stepped on anyone's toes, none of those colonies would survive, and millions of deaths would be on their hands. Chances are they'd also lose so much in their investments that the other nations would slice China like a pie.
The chance the TSA even knew this was happening, however, was quite slim. No Kharaa activity in this system, no nanological hotzones nearby to worry about, so out of the way as to be conspicously out of the way. This station had no strategic value, or mineral wealth, must be set for research.
It could work, oh of course it could work. Oxygen could turn into gold, but would it? The chances the plan would work were quite good though. Chinese assault vessels are usually unsupported, as a capital ship preying on un-tagged colonies looks bad. Real bad.
The nearest vessel was usually a month away, given that they'd only been in the base for a few hours (killing the occupants who failed to escape, half in this case) they probably didn't know the proprietary equipment procedures, they didn't signal for help either. If we were lucky, the transmission systems were destroyed in the flood that followed our escape. We decided to retaliate as quickly as possible, and we began marching over the massive, tree covered ridge, preparing our assault.
++++++++++++
Chapter 8 Later+
++++++++++++
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
Chapter 5: Life aboard USES <i>Hope</i>+
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Hope was cramped, as expected, but cramped, and with even a few other people, this would be the longest half year of my life. The basic order of the day was to attempt to fix the cryo tubes. After two weeks of work after work after work, we concluded at best we could stay under for 2 months, due to lack of proper hibernation materials. There were advantages to staying awake, namely I could talk to people, and I would stay in physically acceptable shape.
The floors of the cockpit were covered in a sectional berber carpet, with machinery and access panels scattered throughout. The plastic fibers used didn't build static, and the grip ridden walls and ceiling made any direction comfortable. Plus, the shuttles were LONG, about 800 meters long, made of three shafts, engines, supply, cryo&Cockpit were the third section. Each one could be sealed to withstand the rigors of space, and if you left them open, you had a nice jogging path to run up and down, aside from the weak gravity, but a pair of the right shoes fixed that.
Overall, I was just plain glad to get off that damn cargo ship. Good company or not, the ship had some serious problems, and I don't like large indoor spaces. The design seemed almost intentionally flawed, which I would get to the bottom of at the receivership bay.
Life onboard was very uneventful, which was an eventful relief in itself. Aside from some occasional mechanical failures, we enjoyed our nice little ship, and the nice calm with it. We landed, but rather than be caught with our pants down again, we charged out of the shuttle in atmospheric wear with loaded weapons. Only to find one of the most bizarre port scenes I'd ever seen in my life.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Chapter 6: Something out of Do Lung+
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Old movies often have powerful parables to rather trying situations. My thoughts aside the current situation were on <u>Apocalypse Now</u>. The scene at Do Lung, with the whole base in chaos as the Vietcong attacked and Willard's unwitting entry into the chaos. Like Willard, I knew the situation could only get worse from here. The shuttles were there. But they were rusted all over.
There were men firing into a port hole into the base, firing Grenade Launchers, expending whole magazines into a 2'X2' tube. Other soldiers were running in random directions away from the base. All this in seconds. The following explosion blew out a blast plate behind our shuttle, and it then flew into one of our engines, blowing it completely apart. The rain was pounding down on us, with the wind kicking the flora up in an indescribable motion of fury. We ran to them, before we could get a word out,
"What the hell are you doing here?"
"Meeting other remnants of abandoned ship."
"Man, you picked the worst port to land on! We just been overrun!"
"By who?"
"The Goddamned Chinese!"
"Where's everyone else?"
"Scattered into the forest."
This was what survivalists call SHTF scenarios. Everything had been lost, they ran the base, and the tube they just blew out was the flood control. It could take too long to repair it before irreperable damage occured to the security nodes. They started running into the great, dark forest, and we ran after them.
++++++++++++++
Chapter 7: Scatter+
++++++++++++++
We ran into the forest, following over a dozen men who were following over a hundred men and women running for their lives. There were massive explosions behind us, and the laughter of the saboteurs ahead. We ran for a good half hour, then slowed to a jog for about another hour, finally stopping when we were on the other side of a ridge.
The forest was massive. It encompassed over three quarters of the largest continent on a planet 6 times the size of Earth. This continent was incidentally over half the planet's landmass, and covered roughly three fifths of the whole surface. The forest provided good protection, and we were in space suits, but I was still unsure of the situation. After all, we'd landed without taking a shot, now here we were, in some godforsaken forest making plans to attack.
"Look, we only have about a hundred grenades left. We can blow out all their ports, they'll never fix them, then the rains coming in a week fall, the base will be destroyed. They can't wait their for long," the lead saboteur stated.
"Neither can we," said a personnel officer of low rank, the kind who sorts janitors out.
"Yes we can. We're here in one of the best forest fer hunting. Plenty of food, water and clean air. They have to hold that base, don't they?" Said the old hunter, who must have been talking around.
"Indeed they do. I give them a week at best. We can stay out here for as long as we want," said the chief of staff. His summation was right.
Ever since the Sanjii debacle, the Chinese had been very aggressive about nabbing un-claimed bases. The TSA, once marking a bases territory to a particular nation, would impartially defend that claim, even getting friendly UN nations to sanction or fight the violators back on Earth.
With the way interstellar economies work, it takes at least a year to build a self-sufficient colony anywhere, even on ideal worlds. This place was there, but China had a large number of colonies that weren't, and they needed material support until they got there. If the Chinese ever stepped on anyone's toes, none of those colonies would survive, and millions of deaths would be on their hands. Chances are they'd also lose so much in their investments that the other nations would slice China like a pie.
The chance the TSA even knew this was happening, however, was quite slim. No Kharaa activity in this system, no nanological hotzones nearby to worry about, so out of the way as to be conspicously out of the way. This station had no strategic value, or mineral wealth, must be set for research.
It could work, oh of course it could work. Oxygen could turn into gold, but would it? The chances the plan would work were quite good though. Chinese assault vessels are usually unsupported, as a capital ship preying on un-tagged colonies looks bad. Real bad.
The nearest vessel was usually a month away, given that they'd only been in the base for a few hours (killing the occupants who failed to escape, half in this case) they probably didn't know the proprietary equipment procedures, they didn't signal for help either. If we were lucky, the transmission systems were destroyed in the flood that followed our escape. We decided to retaliate as quickly as possible, and we began marching over the massive, tree covered ridge, preparing our assault.
++++++++++++
Chapter 8 Later+
++++++++++++
Comments
keep the work flowing yo!