Reddit Stories 2019

Smash Em Up #3

The repetitive beats of the engine droned on as we ventured from Orthello's orbit to AX10, a planet so ruthlessly vile I never bothered to christen it. I briefly considered rebelling against my orders and Evan's ludicrous notion that I'd ever set foot on that planet again, but I technically did not have to take the job. So really, I was the one to blame.

Or Billy. He convinced me after-all.

With a sudden lurch, we dropped from slipspace. The journey had been less laborious than I anticipated, which, for once, was undesirable. Of course, many things about the job were less than pleasant, not the least of which was my robotic companion's mental capacity. He'd been sluggish on the processing power of late, taking longer to string together chunks of grade school poetry, and even mixing words together in a way that had nearly disastrous consequences for me.

The unanonymous warning still played on repeat in my mind, building the anxiety I once mastered in suppressing. With Billy on power saver mode, I'd be stuck on the mission from Candle Corp alone. Worse, that was probably safer.

Below sat the acidic jungle catastrophe. The first place I nearly died. I wondered if the remnants of the half-satellite were still on the planet or if they melted already. The other half still drifted in an uncontrolled orbit around the green-or-maybe-orange-ish sphere.

"No point in delayin', right? Not like I'm gettin' anythin' done sittin' here anyway," I spoke to the empty room. Billy made no response in his slumbering state, but I appreciated his imagined words nonetheless.

"Thanks, bud," I replied. "I'll work on addin' the G's back in."

Out of excuses to delay, I boarded my shuttle and set a course for the orbiting satellite. The half that was still offworld functioned on reserve power, an ingenious non-grid development by my somewhat reputable employers, but the docks were all but useless now. Idling the shuttle, I egressed into the void of space, securing a mag-tether to the satellite's hull. Then pulling my sidearm, I meandered to one of the working airlocks. I didn't know if the crossbow would work in space, and I certainly didn't want to fire it while in the decrepit space station, but I felt safer with it ready.

Confirming the oxygen system was still working, I deactivated my rebreather, inhaling a refreshing breath of fresh - well, fresher - air. The satellite was eerily quiet, save for the occasional hum of electricity and static buzz of... something.

I gently flicked the safety off on my crossbow. As long as I didn't hold down the trigger too long, just some light taps, I'd likely prevent a self-defenestration into space. Unless the glass was already weakened. Cool.

Pushing through the rather plain quarters, I made my way to the communications room, which frequently doubled as the databay. The irritating motion-sensing lights flickered on with every step. Unfortunately, that section of the space station appeared to be on the part that had fallen to AX10, so I turned to the next best thing: the entertainment center. Most of Candle Corps early satellites had some sort of short-range communicator in the entertainment center, with the idea that full time employees could stay in contact with their friends and families on nearby passenger ships.

That obviously didn't work out.

"Ah, Jane Harfield, how rude of you to keep me waiting," greeted a pompous ass over the coruscating blue of a hologram as I entered the room.

"The world doesn't revolve around you, you know?" My voice replied.

"Quite the opposite," David agreed.

"What am I doin' here?"

"Her way of talking was flowery enough to turn a car park into a botanical garden," David sarcastically noted, even dictating the phrase into his datapad. "But her face had the kind of ruggedness one would expect from an outland nomad."

"Get to the poi-"

I shut off the recording. Experiencing the event once in person was enough; I didn't need to watch David trick me into contract work a second time. Frustrating that I enjoyed it, usually, and was arguably good at it. Usually.

I walked around the hologram hub, looking for anything that might be helpful. Evan had asked me to recover some specific data logs from when the satellite was fully functional, and, as much as I hoped it wasn't, I feared the information they were after was trapped in the half that lay deep in the planet's jungle.

All I found was a note, worryingly handwritten and recent. At least, more recent than when the shuttle split and fell out of orbit.

'Sorry. -DY'