Far From Home

Chapter Fourteen

(Hi how's everyone liking the story so far? I've probably done more work on this than I have any other story I've written and I feel like I'm actually going to put this story into two parts. Leave a comment below if it's a good idea or not??)

I can't remember if I'd seen anything more beautiful, more sublime than the rocket. Was Tanner's car this impressive? No it had seemed so at the time but now it was like a rock next to a diamond. It was pure shiny silver and seemed to have no edges or any lines running through it. I could see windows surrounding it but I wasn't able to see the interior of the ship. "Culan are we going to go inside the trip for the tour." I asked, I didn't know how since my jaw was on the floor. Culan smirked at me, some kindness in her eyes "I'm afraid not Adira, you'll get to at a later date. Anyway you'll be on that ship for a really long time in the future you'll get sick of it." Culan said; I looked back out at the ship making everything else seem insignificant. It hit me that I was looking at my future home, all for me; it was too big for just me.

"This next part of the tour is going to be very exciting for you guys this is where all the fun technology is in the testing labs" Culan said excitedly as we all followed behind her. We had gone back down to the working floor and were walking across it to a door parallel to the elevator we had first ridden. Culan swiped a card in front of the monitor on the side of the door and it slid open, inside there was a jubilant atmosphere. There were weird machines whirring and beeps everywhere. I looked around to see many scientists playing with technology. "The scientists you see here are all fundamental to the mission too as they're creating everything you'll be using, feel free to move around and ask questions to the scientists." Culan said standing in the centre of the room, the group all spread off into separate corners of the room which was actually around the size of a ballroom. I walked over to a small collection of scientists all surrounding something on a bench, "hello" I said "I'm Adira, what are you working on?" The scientists all turned around to face me with stunned faces; they looked like deer stuck in headlights. One of the scientists adjusted their glasses and moved their mouth up and down silently. "What was that?" I asked gently coaxing them on, "a-are you Adira?" The scientist who adjusted his glasses asked.

"Yeah I'm Adira, what did you say you were working on?" I asked again, I craned my neck to see what they were hiding behind them. I should've been able to see it, there were only three scientists blocking it. "Well, you'll be very excited to know that this piece of sweet technology will be very useful to you." One scientist piped up, he had thick rimmed glasses and a bowl cut, and his nasally voice seemed to fit him to a T. "Well...what is it then?" I asked again, getting slightly irritated that I had to ask again. They parted to show me a tiny oval shaped robot that was standing on little rectangular legs; he came up to my diaphragm. "What is this then?" I asked the scientists, they were about to answer when a little voice piped up "you mean who is this? I can hear and see you know." The scientists looked at me with pride, I realised it was the robot who had spoken. "You might want to get off to a good start with me, we're going to be roommates really soon, just as soon as I get my bugs sorted out because SOME PEOPLE WEREN'T COMPOTENT ENOUGH." The robot yelled, the scientists jumped slightly and then looked down at their feet sheepishly. "Come on Adira let me show you the other guy, boy you'll be disappointed when you meet him. They should have let you meet him first and then showed me so then there would've been more excited." The robot started walking off and the scientists nodded to follow him.

"Are you keeping up?" The robot asked impatiently, I stared at the back of it incredulously, was this robot for real? I was going to have to check back with those scientists later as to whether I could program him into someone nicer. He stopped in front of a huge, black rectangular box. It stood at least two feet taller than me and I had to crane my head up to see a small screen in the middle of it. "What's this?" I asked the robot, the robot turned to face the large box. "Turn on you absolute lump and introduce yourself to the girl." The robot said, blue lines started running up the black box and the tiny screen turned white and somehow it started hovering. "Hello Adira I am the Black Box, you can call me BB for short if you please." BB said slowly; I smiled noticing a small camera focusing on my face "hello BB it's nice to meet you." I said, the small white robot whirred in what seemed anger "I never got an 'it's nice to meet you'!" the white robot said, I shrugged apologetically I couldn't believe this little moody robot "well I never got a name, what do I call you, Marvin the moody robot?" The robot started whirring again, "whoa don't blow a fuse" I said laughing, "Call me P.I.W.I, it's short for personal interface with interaction. You're very irritating Adira, I wish we could change the coding in you." Piwi said blatantly.

I was still arguing with Piwi with BB silently listening to us when Professor Goswami walked up to us. "Hello Adira I'm glad to see you're getting acquainted with your future crewmates. You'll be seeing a lot more of them in the future." I looked at Professor Goswami with an unhappy look on my face and gestured back to the two robots "Professor Goswami do I have to?"

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