Dungeon boss requested oxygen producing organisms be created. Ship core had insufficient resources to complete the request. Biological material was required to produce the organisms, ship used most suitable materials available to complete request.
Ethan frowned at the words. It had said something similar when he’d seen Mark’s body earlier. That in order to repair the damage the dungeon boss, Ethan himself, had suffered, the ship had used the most suitable resources at hand to do the job. Thinking about Mark made Ethan’s face go pale, and he turned quickly, taking the three or four steps needed to bring him back to where his brother had been.
“Thank goodness,” he breathed when he saw his brother’s body laying where it had been. “He’s still here.” Wobbling on his feet a little, Ethan steadied himself with a hand on the wall. “But why do I feel so dizzy?”
Ship core had insufficient mana to perform dungeon boss’s request. The ship core used the most suitable materials available to complete request. In addition to needing the biological material from the deceased passenger, a large sum of mana was required. As the only contracted creature to the ship core, that cost was paid by the dungeon boss. Mana levels will return over time, and the dungeon boss’s condition will return to normal.
“Hold on a minute,” Ethan said with a frown, trying to work through the mental words despite his head feeling like he’d been through an explosion. “You took the mana from me? Does that mean to power the engines or create food or whatever ship cores do… you’re going to have to drain me dry?” That didn’t make any sense, how could they have gotten all the way out here, months of travel time, without him ever noticing something like that happening?
Negative. Under normal operating conditions mana is collected passively from all living creatures within the ship core’s hull. This mana is stored in mana batteries, where it is banked for future use. The Ficus pumila will, in addition to creating oxygen for the dungeon boss’s consumption, also passively generate mana the ship core can use.
“So, all we have to do is wait for a while, and the mana batteries will charge, and the ship will come back online?” Ethan asked hopefully.
Negative. Ship core has been damaged and the active domain has been restricted in size. There are no mana batteries nor mana engines currently within ship cores active domain.
“…I see,” Ethan said after a moment. Thinking through the connotations of what the orb had just told him. If there were no mana batteries, and no engines, then he couldn’t store power, and even if he could, he had no way to move the ship. Not that he knew how to drive a spacecraft anyway, he was a shuttle craft pilot. He flew a shipping container back and forth between a cargo ship and a storage hangar a hundred times a day. That didn’t really prepare him for his current situation.
His hands shook, and his eyes kept darting down to Mark’s body. This was rapidly becoming more than he could handle. Running his quivering fingers through his hair, Ethan tried to think.
“Ok… if we can’t move then what can we do? How about the situation outside? Can you show me what’s going on outside the ship? Maybe there are survivors out there, someone who can rescue me, or provide an engine or… something?”
Negative. The ship was heavily damaged, and the ship core’s domain was restricted. There are no working sensors within the ship core’s current domain. Access to the outside world has been cut off.
Ethan groaned, slumping back down into the command seat he’d been in before the explosion. He wasn’t sure how, but it had survived the explosion when almost nothing else had. He looked around the room, with its crumpled walls and crushed ceiling. It was probably half its original size, something like an irregular fifteen feet by fifteen feet, filled with debris. Shattered crates, their contents strewn around the floor. Long term ration packs, weapons, clothing. Some miscellaneous electronics he didn’t know anything about. The hulking medical exoskeleton, which looked mostly intact all things considered, a bunch of metal and plastic shrapnel… oh, and everything was coated in a thick layer of creeping fig.
“How about you tell me what you can do in this situation then. How big is your domain, is Cherry alive, how about the others. Is there anything you can tell me to help make this situation more bearable for me?” He said at last, at a loss for what to do. His head hurt, his mouth tasted bad, his brother was dead, and he was stranded, potentially all alone, in an alien system who knows how far away from the moon. The rift was months of travel from earth, but would the rift even still be there? Could it survive the explosion of an entire fleet of ships… the explosion of an entire planet? He didn’t know, gosh, he didn’t know anything right now.
Ship core domain is approximately 2,900 cubic feet, centered on this room. Ship core has access to one dungeon boss, approximately 3,000 square feet of Ficus pumila, one partially used human corpse…
“Alright stop,” Ethan said, throwing his hands up in frustration. “First of all, his name is Mark. He’s my baby brother, and I expect you to show him a little respect. Secondly, you keep saying, ‘ship core this, ship core that,’ aren’t you the ship core? You’re confusing me here, why don’t you use words like ‘I’ and ‘me’ to simplify things. On top of that, the dungeon boss, that’s me, right? Not sure how that works, but I don’t enjoy being called ‘dungeon boss’ all the time. Call me Ethan, or if that’s too much for you, then… call me Captain instead.” Ethan hesitated over that last line, his brother was the captain, not him, but his brother was dead. He had control of the ship’s core too so, he guessed that made him the captain, right?
Dungeon boss has now been redesignated Captain Ethan, human corpse has been redesignated as Mark. However, Ship core is unable to comply with the request to use personal pronouns. Intersystem law was updated in 2150, to require all military personnel and vessels to speak in the third person and refrain from the use of pronouns as they were deemed too…
“Let me stop you again,” Ethan said, holding up his hand in frustration. He wasn’t sure why he bothered since he didn’t know if the ship core could even see. “Those laws were made like, one-hundred-twenty something years ago. I’m a Lunarian anyway, Earth’s laws don’t apply to me, and by extension, to you. So, please, just say I or me. It will make it easier for me to talk to you. Also, do you have a name? I’d rather not think of you as ‘ship core’ in my head while I’m thinking about you either.”
Understood, Ship core will… I will use personal pronouns from now on. As for my name, the previous dungeon boss… Mark, designated my hull as Luna, so you can call me that. As Luna is a feminine name, I will be as well.
Ethan blinked, that one sentence contained more personality than everything the ship core had said until now. Perhaps it… she… was more intelligent than he thought. If she was programmed to obey laws that had been obsolete for three quarters of a century, then maybe she was older then he thought too. From what little he remembered of dungeon cores; their age had a lot to do with their intellect. He just needed to learn how to phrase his questions, and direct Luna in a way that got him the information he needed without stressing him out too much.
Still seated in the command chair, he thought about what she had said already. Her domain was approximately 2,900 cubic feet. It took a while for him to do the math in his head, but eventually he concluded that this room was the extent of the area she could control. He further proved it when he mathed out how much 3,000 square feet of creeping fig was and determined it was just about enough to cover all the exposed surfaces inside the mostly destroyed bridge. Ok, he could do this. All he had to do was ask the right questions, get the answers, and ask more questions until he figured out what he could do to survive. That was it, all he had to do was ask questions, and ignore the fact that he was stuck in a tiny room with his brother’s mutilated body. The thought sent him to his knees again, heaving. Thankfully his stomach was well and truly empty now, so he didn’t have any more of a mess to clean up.
“Ok Luna,” he said once he’d gotten himself back under control. “First things first, please redesignate Ficus pumila as Creeping fig, and Quercus alba as White oak. Next, please tell me what you can create, what you need to create it, and what I can do to assist you in the process. After that, I need to know…”
* * *
Three hours passed while Ethan asked questions, and Luna answered them. He knew that Three hours had passed because one of the first things he’d done was ask if there was any way she could help him keep track of time. It turned out she was responsible for the holo screen, and just because she didn’t have the sensors available to project what was going on outside didn’t mean she couldn’t project anything at all. So, Ethan now had a small clock displaying the time in the corner of the room.
He'd also gone through most of the crates during that time too. Separating out piles of junk from food, and equipment he thought he could use. Thankfully he’d found a toothbrush in one of the crates, along with a few bottles of water. He was able to clean his teeth and get some food into his system while he worked, which went a long way towards making him feel human again.
“Let me see if I understand you correctly,” he said once he’d absorbed so much knowledge, he started forgetting what he’d been told. “You can create anything you’ve absorbed using mana. You absorb something and it goes into a sort of blueprint bank? Where you pay for the item’s construction with mana?”
That is correct Captain. Though it is worth repeating that any item I absorb is destroyed in the process, and that, if suitable materials are provided, the mana cost is greatly reduced.
“Right,” he said nodding, happy with how Luna’s responses had gotten so much clearer in such a short period of time. To the point where she was volunteering information that hadn’t been specifically asked. “But… for lack of a better phrase, your blueprint bank got deleted when the explosion tore away at your hull, and your domain?”
Again, that is correct Captain. It is also worth pointing out that without a mana battery to collect excess mana, I am limited in what I can passively draw in from living creations within my domain.
“And if you pull too much, the living being will die. Though the act of dying will create a rush of mana many times greater than what you can pull while they are alive… it cuts off future mana draw… because its dead.” Ethan finished, remembering her warning of just a few minutes ago clearly enough.
He sighed, sitting back in the large chair that had become his, and rubbing his face with the palm of his hands. He still wasn’t sure just how much mana was required to do… much of anything really. What he did know however, was that the passive amount generated by the creeping fig wasn’t enough to do anything noteworthy. Maybe if he had more time and a mana battery, he could build up power, but without that he was extremely limited in what he could do. He cursed silently under his breath at the fact Luna’s blueprint bank had been dumped during the crash. He sighed a second later when he realized it was only thanks to that bitch Cherry’s obsession with plants, and because his brother and Sven had died, that he was alive and able to breathe right now.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
“Alright Luna,” he said, sitting up at last and clearing his mind of the morbid thoughts plaguing it. “I think my next move has to be trying to explore outside this compartment. I have to see if the rest of the ship is intact, or if this room is all that’s left. Also, whether or not any of Mark’s team are still alive out there. If so, I can’t leave them alone. However, before I do anything, I need to have an understanding about how much mana we have to work with. How far it will go, and how long it takes to recharge. Are you sure you can’t just tell me?” Ethan asked when he was all done talking, knowing full well that she’d already told him her memory had been damaged during the explosion.
Sorry Captain, I’m afraid I have no frame of reference to use to convey that information. If I had a mana battery, and a mana engine, I might be able to tell you something based on how much mana they required, but as things stand, the only things I know are what I have already absorbed and created.
“Very well then,” Ethan said with a sigh. “Let’s just do this by trial and error then. I need something to go off of and if I have to invent a system then so be it… let’s start by having you absorb a few things and adding them to your blueprint bank. Then, we can experiment creating them with mana. See how much we can make with what is available, and then how long it takes to come back. Let’s start with this bottle of water…”
What followed was a tedious few hours, where Ethan had Luna absorb bits and pieces of random junk, as well as food, water, bullets, a kitchen knife, tool kit, emergency repair panels, and even a small flashlight he’d found in one of the shattered crates. At one point, Ethan almost gave up, because he couldn’t keep the numbers straight in his head. That was, at least until Luna told him she could keep notes for him and project them into the air for him to reference. That had made him smile, it was like his VR headset back home, only far more advanced. If he hadn’t been in such a bind, he might have wanted to experiment with that function more.
“Ok,” Ethan said at last, once he had Luna absorb everything he was willing to lose and exhausted himself and the creeping fig twice each. “So, based on our experimentation, exhausting the creeping fig to the point of risking damage gives enough mana to create one serving of food and water. It is also enough energy to produce simple or small constructs like the kitchen knife or a plate or an emergency panel. My body has approximately twenty-five times as much energy. Meaning if I exhausted myself to the point of risking damage, I could create twenty-five servings of food and water, or twenty-five plates or kitchen knives or the like. Also be it either me, or the creeping fig, it took approximately an hour to recharge the mana. On my second test I recovered faster when I ate something, though there haven’t been enough tests done to verify that outcome. Therefore, I’m going to call one full depletion of the creeping fig, the amount needed to create one meal, one unit of mana. That way you and I can estimate how much mana will be required to do something based on what we just learned. What do you think Luna?”
I think the tests were inconclusive.
The words scrolled across his vision in a manner that almost seemed disapproving.
The creeping fig actually took seventy-five minutes to recharge after creating the meal. It took you, Captain, fifty minutes, not an hour, to recover from full exhaustion of your mana. This introduces considerable variables to the test right away. Next, creating the kitchen knife did not exhaust the creeping fig to the point of exhaustion. In fact, I estimate it still had approximately 80% of its mana producing capability remaining. Also, the plastic box you constructed had a volume considerably larger than the kitchen knife and required far less mana to construct then…
“Great,” he interrupted tiredly, giving the softly glowing orb in his hand a mock glare. “I’m glad you agree with me. I’m open to changing it later if my system proves unfeasible, for now though, we’re using it.” His system having been decided on, Ethan pulled out a skinsuit with a fist sized hole in the chest he’d found while going through the cargo crates. “Now, we already know we can’t afford to make one of these from mana, but if I were to cannibalize the remnants of mine, Sven’s and Mark’s, could we offset the cost enough to…”
Three hours and a quick nap later, Ethan was standing in front of the hatch that had the least amount of damage of the two that had once entered the bridge. He had on a refurbished skinsuit, complete with helmet, in addition to a ballistic vest he’d looted from where Sven’s body used to be. It didn’t quite fit him, considering he was closer to his brother’s size now that he was recovered than the slender Sven’s. Still, he didn’t know what he was going out into, and there was no way he was going into the unknown without protection.
To that aim, he also carried an old replica 1911 pistol, chambered in .45 ACP that he’d also taken from Sven’s ‘body,’ and a short gladius he’d taken from his brother’s side. He’d be lying if he said he knew how to use either of them with any real world experience, but he had played a few VR games that utilized varies weaponry. Ethan prayed he wouldn’t need to use them, but not going out equipped sounded like a worse idea than going out with equipment he didn’t have a full grasp on.
“Ok Luna,” he said gluing the last panel into place on the improvised airlock he’d cobbled together using the grey emergency panels and a foaming adhesive he’d found in a repair crate. To keep the atmosphere in the chamber from being vented the moment he opened the door. “I’ve put the airlock into place, I’ve got an hour of oxygen, so I’ll either return before then… or I’ll be dead.” Though he was hoping there would be pressure on the other side, he’d rather not risk the creeping fig, and all the equipment in the room on a maybe. Even worse than the thought of losing his equipment, was the thought of losing Luna herself.
At first, he’d intended on bringing her with him, until she reminded him if she left her domain her mind and growth would be reset, rendering her, and the domain that kept Ethan alive, useless. So, he’d opted to leave her behind, and venture forth by himself. Realizing he was stalling, Ethan took a deep breath and grabbed onto the hand wheel that kept the door sealed and gave it an experimental twist. Surprisingly, it turned freely, and before long the hatch opened onto a dark hallway. To his relief, there was pressure on the other side of the door.
The corridor was directly behind the bridge and led to their sleeping cabins. The other hatch was in the floor and led down into a small cargo hold. It had a usable space of ninety feet. The usable length of the ship, by thirty feet and was actually smaller than some of the shipping containers he used to move. The corridor had pressure, but no lights, and the blast doors had been sealed directly across from the hatch he had opened, indicating there might be a problem further on.
Reaching up, he clicked on his helmet’s built in light, and found himself facing three identical hatches. One directly across from him, one on the right, and another on the left. There was enough room for the hatch to swing open and him to step through, but that was it. It was a safety feature aboard any ship, in case pressure was lost. So that no more of the ship would be depressurized than necessary. The door on his left was the cabin he used, the one on the right belonged to Cherry.
A sleeping arrangement that had annoyed him to no end over the better part of the last year. Cherry, being one of only two women on Mark’s team, got visits regularly from the eight men who made up the rest of the team, and despite the hatches being rated to keep out the cold death of space in an emergency… they weren’t nearly as soundproof as Ethan would have preferred. He didn’t blame any of them for their fun, it wasn’t like there was that much to do aboard such a small ship for months at a time as it flew through space. Heck, he might have even joined in… if Cherry hadn't made it abundantly clear to him before they’d even launched that she wasn’t into cripples.
Closing and sealing the hatch into the bridge, Ethan turned towards his cabin. Gripping the metal, he took a deep breath and spun the wheel. Like before, it spun easily, but unlike before, as the hatch popped open it did so with a violent sucking that nearly drug Ethan from the ship and into the void of space. He’d been prepared for that to happen though and was able to grab either side of the door frame and hold on for dear life. The suction only lasted a second. Once the small space had depressurized the force stopped and he was able to look outside the ship with his naked eyes for the first time in eight months.
It wasn’t a sight he had ever hoped to see in his lifetime. Granted, space was so huge, relatively speaking, that with his naked eyes he couldn’t see much of anything. It didn’t take a high-power telescope, however, to let him see the planet had been turned into an enormous asteroid field, liberally sprinkled with the broken hulks of earth and Mars warships. They were huge hulks of metal and polymer, to compare their size to Luna’s, the warships were elephants, while the Luna was no larger than a flea. Not that the size disparity had done them any good. Ethan couldn’t see a single intact ship from his, admittedly limited, vantage point. Only giant chunks of displaced planet, and broken ships.
Bringing his gaze back to his own broken ship, Ethan looked both left and right, as well as up and down. Although he couldn’t see the other side of the vessel, this side was well and truly destroyed. He could already tell that none of the cabins on this side of the ship had survived. Which, in turn meant that at least half of the crew were dead at very least, assuming they had all been in their cabins anyway. looking down, he wasn’t too sure about the cargo hold since the vessel narrowed on the bottom, he couldn’t see it clearly.
Pulling the hatch closed, Ethan twisted the wheel to engage the locking bar, then he manually engaged the safety locks built into the hatches to prevent them from accidentally opening. Work done; he turned his attention to Cherry’s door. Despite his dislike for the woman, Ethan hoped that she would be alive inside. The fact he’d been inside the bridge for the better part of thirteen hours without anyone coming in forced him to realize that wasn’t likely to be the case.
Once again setting his feet, Ethan opened Cherry’s door and found to his relief there was pressure and air inside. What there wasn’t any of, was gravity. He frowned, looking in at the small ten by twelve-foot room. There where objects floating everywhere, including a skinsuited body, which had long brown hair spread out around the head in a macabre halo. With a sigh, Ethan pushed himself inside the room. He could already tell she was dead, but he needed to be sure. He also wanted to look for anything useful in the floating debris.
Fifteen minutes later, he stood inside the five-by-five foot hallway once more as he sealed the room behind him. He hadn't found anything of earth-shattering import in there, though there were several things he would like to have Luna absorb for future use. Right now, though, it was safest for him to leave it all where it was. He could gather up what he thought he would need later, after he had checked on the rest of the ship.
Turning to the blast doors that led deeper into the ship, Ethan slowly opened it. Again, he found himself in luck. Another pressurized section. He disregarded the room on his left not even attempting to open it, there was no point as he already knew what was outside. Instead, turning to the door on the right. This one belonged to Sven, and Ethan really hoped it was intact. With another deep breath, he spun the wheel and opened the door.
To his relief, this room was undamaged as well. Like Cherry’s room it didn’t have any gravity, but Sven had been more aware of where he was, and everything was locked in place. The only things floating in here were his bed coverings and a water bottle that had been left on the nightstand. Doing a quick once through, Ethan grinned at the sight of over a dozen guns safely locked inside their cases that covered all four walls as well as the ceiling. He didn’t recognize half of them, but they covered a wide range of makes and models. From antiques like the 1911 he wore now, to a new mars model that shot taser rounds that tailored their electric output based on what they hit. They could incapacitate a rhino, and a human infant equally well without endangering either beyond some mild burns.
Silently thanking Sven for the contribution, he was making towards Ethan’s continued survival, he moved into the next compartment, repeating the same ritual again as he had the last two times. The next room belonged to the other woman of the group. A small brunette woman by the name of Lesa, who served as the team’s scout and, when called for, thief. She wasn’t one for crowds and spent most of her time onboard the ship in her cabin. Ethan rarely saw her and had asked Mark about it once. All he’d said was she had a rough childhood and didn’t like to be around people much, but she was a hell of a good pathfinder and he’d been lucky to recruit her.
However good a pathfinder she might have been, she hadn't survived the explosion either. Ethan found her body floating inside the room, arms clutched tightly around a large glass box. Frowning, Ethan moved into the room to get a better look at it. At first glance, it reminded him of a fish tank, some five feet long, maybe two feet deep and the same high. Only this tank was equipped with a life support module, as well as a top of the line filtration system.
Gently pulling Lesa away from the tank, he looked inside to find a pair of pure white stoats looking back at him. Both where alive and looked none the worse for the explosion that killed everyone else. Taking a quick look around Lesa’s room, he found quite a few electronic devices he didn’t recognize, as well as a large collection of holo vids.
“Well, that explains what she did in here by herself for months on end.” He muttered, looking down at the dead woman. He wasn’t sure what had killed her or Cherry, considering their cabins hadn't been vented to outer space, nor had they been burned by whatever radiation had cooked Ethan, Mark, and Sven when the bridge had been opened to the void. Still, they were both dead, despite not having a mark on them.
Moving back into the corridor, Ethan turned to the blast doors that led deeper into the ship, only this time when he opened the doors he wasn’t as careful as he had been the last few times and was caught completely off guard when the suction snatched him up and sucked him through the hatch.
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