LF Friends, Will Travel

Innovation is Impartial - Chapter 3

There was an impressive sense of scale to the structure. As the small government-provided FTL-vehicle travelled through space, the station's immense... mass filled the viewport, spreading out as far as the eye could see. It was a diverse, moon sized, artificially created mass, floating out in the middle of nowhere, a single blip in the infinite vastness of space.

Lena could see the station was awash with activity, vessels moving too and fro, military fleets hovering in its orbit in defense of the research station. The occasional explosion erupted against the surface, visible even from this distance, the evidence of some kind of weapons test causing new craters to appear in the lifeless gray rocks that made up an eighth of this station's mass.

The rest was a strange mismash of biozones, a kaleidoscope of colours: the greens of a verdant forest, the blues of a vast endless ocean, the reds of a hot dead desert. It was as if someone had taken slices out of other planets and fit them together like lego bricks, to create the perfect testing environment for anything special R&D projects the Terran Alliance might want to create.

Lena couldn't help but feel impressed by such a feat. Most stations of this size, such as the neutral Federation created structures that the galaxy used for diplomacy, would normally build upon an existing uninhabited planet. That way you didn't have to worry about what to build your station's core out of, or how to keep its orbit regular enough to not eventually collide with nearby systems. To build something like this, a new moon sized station in the middle of nowhere, outside of the view of prying eyes, was an impressive feat of engineering.

Of course the Scythen's own technological feats far exceeded that of the Terrans, to the extent that building such a structure in normal reality was an outdated concept. This didn't change Lena's admiration for the project: it was still impressive, much like seeing a complex clockwork machine go about its business; even if it was obsolete, it was still interesting and a work of craftsmanship.

They stared out at the structure that would soon become the Scythen's new home, the station getting larger and larger as they approached, passing by enough orbital defenses to take on even the most mighty of Estorian fleets. Lena had heard the station be referred to by a number of names during the process: "The Death Star", "Site-19", "Blackbox". The official documentation however gave the location a simple name: "Research Location 9". Lena had been told that research locations one through eight did not exist, that it was a common Terran naming convention to pretend they had more resources than they did.

"I miss you as well sweetie, I'm counting down the days until I see you again."

Johnathan spoke enthusiastically, eyes twinkling as he continued to speak with his wife. Lena wasn't getting much from the one side of the conversion they could hear, all while the Terran prattled on about random topics and people the Scythen had never met or heard about. The Doctor had done this for the last half an hour, filling the otherwise silent two person vessel with incessant noise.

"I will! I'll single handedly discover how to give some slavers a good kicking, then be home for tea. Anyways, I've got to leave you now, we're about to land, I'll call you tomorrow."

This was indeed the case, as the station had grown from a very large moon in the distance, to encompassing the entire idea of the 'ground' as their vessel moved quickly towards the section of the planet filled with buildings of various sizes, the AI driving the vehicle silently dealing with the business of securing a landing spot.

"No, I love you more.... Nu huh, love you more... Nope, I love you even more!... I really gotta go now, so as a final statement.... Loveyoumore."

Lena watched with amusement as Dr. Fletcher spoke with the same enthusiasm of a love struck teenager, quickly whispering out the last three words before ending the call, a smile stuck to his face as he did so. While Johnathan, like most Terrans, did look to be in his earth twenties, his current marriage had been going strong for over a hundred years. The Scythen had long since gotten used to Fletcher's constant calls of doting and adoration with his family back home: Whether speaking to his two sons, or his loving wife.