Axy Stormforge and her Journey to the Edge of Reality

Chapter 3: Anaxon Depot

Anaxon Depot is a massive space station in the farthest inhabited orbital band of the star Stoic. It is a combination of 90 large cylinder habitats forming a complex and vaguely spherical shape. Ultimately, it Is a dodecahedron within a dodecahedron. Five cylinders (each 35-miles long and 2 miles in diameter) form a pentagon, and twelve of these pentagons are fitted adjacent to each other to form the outer layer; the edges between vertices each have two parallel cylinders, or 60 total. The inner layer has only one cylinder per edge, or 30 total. It is perfectly aligned beneath the outer layer such that cylinders are clustered up in groups of three, all connected to nexus nodes that hold everything together. Cylinders are counter-rotated such that their torque cancels out and the station floats with perfect stability.

Each one of these 90 cylinders represents a city of millions of people. Generally, the outer layer is inhabited by residents, travelers, and digital business, whereas the inner are generally reserved for cargo storage, manufacturing, and docking. Ninety cities, full of commerce, industry, and diversity are locked together to form one mega-economy. Around half a billion souls live in, stay in, disembark from, and pursue their financial conquest at Anaxon Depot.

In the center of Anaxon, a complex scaffolding of corridors, tethers, and transport systems web from the vertices and inner layer toward the center, forming endless modular shipyards and space docks throughout the volume of the station.

Today, however, as Axy's cramped shuttle descended toward the busy geometric structure, through her HUD live-feed she could see its shape was different. Jutting through the station's center, so large that both ends pierced beyond the perimeter of the station, was a 100-mile long cargo liner. If a rotating cylinder habitat is big enough to hold cities, the volume of this cargo ship could hold a fraction of a continent! When full, its mass alone can even begin to exert its own gravity.

It was relentlessly symmetrical. Its midsection, which was a good 95% of its length, consisted of spheres, cubes, and hulls that carried cargoes of various types, punctuated by actuating arms and devices used to collect material in space. On either end was a cylindrical equipment hull with a crew habitat module forming a spinning embedded ring within it. Beneath this is a fathoms-deep core of nuclear power plants, electromagnetic field generators, factory-sized 3-D printers, shuttle hangers, and the guts of the nuclear engines. Capping each end off was an array of direct-nuclear-drive thrusters; on the front of the vessel, a brand new dish-shaped nosecone was being fitted to cover the forward-facing thrusters. Its overall shape was extremely long in proportion to its width, allowing it to pierce through the gas clouds in the interstellar void.

The fore and aft modules were painted a proud golden orange color, with dark green lettering:

Operator: Lexum Firm Shipping

Vessel designation: "Cinder"

Registry: F-110-301-03

Alongside the script was massive QR-style symbols and data for computers to visually interpret.

Cinder would be Axy's new home for the next several years, as she trained for her new position as navigator. But before that, she had to meet up with the rest of the crew in Anaxon.

The shuttle docked similarly as it had departed, interfacing with one of the many nexus nodes between cylinders. Transport pods carried her into one of the cylinder cities, where the check-in process was completed, and her implants updated with Anaxon's AI infrastructure. Her HUD now could guide her to the meetup point.

[Travel time via pod: 2 hours]

[Travel time via walking: 8 hours]

[Time until boarding: 14 hours]