The Lost Artifact Of Spode

30

Mel kind of regrets not working when he was first told to. He only took apart the engine and already he was stumped on where to go next. To make it worse, his lack of progress isn't going to be seen as anything but uncompliance anymore, so he really had to get this figured out, on his own, and fast.

Although he pulled the engine out himself, he was in disbelief it belonged to a spaceship. It's such old, clunky technology more comparable to a car than any kind of spacecraft. Not even the nice, clean cars either. Old, petrol cars.

Mel couldn't help himself but marching straight into Lyra's office at the sight of it. "Ms. Lyra!" He announces, scaring her out of her seat.

"Dr. Yazzie, do you mind?!" She demands, putting her hand to her chest. With a sigh, she sits back down at her desk. "What is it now?"

"That ship you have me working on, is that actually what you guys use?"

"Yes?" She answers, completely baffled.

"It's not an old model or anything? It's the same thing you guys use now, this year?!"

"It's 5 years old, but that's the newest you'll be getting."

"It's that new?!"

"Dr. Yazzie, what are you going on about?"

"How do you guys fly that thing?! That's not an engine for a rocket, much less any spacecraft-"

As Mel continued his ramble, Lyra only caught one thing of interest out of his speil. She suddenly cuts him off, "Have you only *just* taken a look at the ship?"

He suddenly falls silent.

She rests her head against the palm of her hand and mumbles something to herself. "Please, get back to work," she orders.

He quickly asks for clarity, "so this isn't a joke?"

"No! To work!"

He had doubts, but he didn't press any further. He closed the door behind him on the way out. As he makes his way back to his workstation, he mumbles to himself. "I had old car engines that look better than this junk. How have they colonized further than us with ships like these?"

When he finally made it back, he took a look at the other parts of the  ship. Surely, he just had to be missing something. Parts of this machine that interacted with the engine just right enough to make it better than it looks. Right?

Wrong. The rest of the ship is just as bad as the engine. Is truely a mystery how the thing even flies.

By the end of his day, he decided he needed to just rebuild the whole thing. To replace it with parts and machinery that actually made sense to him, for there's no way he can optimize this peice of junk he can't even wrap his head around. He ended up spending the night trying to plan out the new ships insides, even going as far as using and adding to the notes he has saved on his eyephi just to make his mental blueprints perfect.

He accidentally stayed up all night with this, too fixated on his project to notice the night passing by. The only reason he even noticed is when the clock by his bed went off, signaling it was time for him to return to work.

"Ugh, already?!" He exclaims, hitting the clock to turn it off. Then, he paused for a moment as realisation set in. "Did I at least eat?" He murmurs to himself, dragging his body out of bed.

Likely not, he's yet to find a safe food since showing up on this planet.

Despite the realisation of the outside world again, Mel could barely pull himself out of his hyperfixation to do his morning routine. All he had to do was change and look presentable, but he still walked out the door 30 minutes late thanks to being that much absorbed in his work.