About two weeks passed as Dave and Cam worked to bring the mining facility into a more human friendly state. His brain kept flipping back and forth between moments of terror ridden anxiety and "COOL! I have a secret hideout!". The food stores that he appropriated from the Profit were noy in danger of running out, but they were getting low. He would have to take the hauler to the nearby outpost and resupply. His nerves were hanging on by a thread at the prospect of an outpost full of aliens, but Cam assured him that as long as he kept his head down and only spoke to the people he needed to things would work out well.
The thought occurred to him that communication would be an issue until Cam reminded him of his implanted translator. He had spent the last few months speaking so easily with the AI that he completely forgot about it. So the plan was made. He would pilot the hauler to the outpost and dock, make his way inside and go shopping. Cam assured him his ident card would pass muster and that through various glitches in the financial records of several business entities, Dave should have enough funds to get what he needed. "Did you just commit embezzlment, Cam?" he asked warily. The sound of a tongue clicking came back, clearly an affectation, before Cam replied with "Dave, just as your planet has no security over broadcast data, many businesses out here have very poor bookkeeping. Missing credits happen all the time. Trust me." Dave scowled for a moment, "Well I very little choice but to trust you, so I will."
So he boarded the hauler and settled himself in for the trip top the outpost. Cam calculated that the trip was about sixteen hours so he would get the chance to rest and be refreshed upon arrival. Also, since her awakening, Cam seemed to really enjoy piloting the hauler. While Dave had learned just enough to be dangerous, he wasn't going to deny Cam the piloting duties. The first several hours of the flight was more of the same as the journey ito the system. Watching shows and listening to audiobooks. He was mildly dissapointed that he couldn't look out the skylight and see asteroids everywhere. Cam had explained that human science fiction always misrepresented asteroid belts. While there are billions of asteroids, space is so vast that they are quite well spread out and fairly easy to navigate. Realizing that his disappointment over never getting to zoom through an asteroid belt like Han Solo in the Millenium Falcon wasn't all that important in the grand scheme, he decided it was time to sleep.
About seven and a half hours later he was awake again and preparing himself for his first foray into a society he didn't belong to and knew absolutely nothing about. He fought as hard as he could not to think, "What could go wrong?". Then he realized the act of fighting to keep the thought away meant that he was thinking that very thing anyway. Ignoring the sudden onrush of heartburn he continued to prepare. "So how will this work?" Dave asked Cam as they made their approach to the outpost. "I have made a list of supplies and sustenance for you, all of the food should be biocompatible with humans. Just walk into a vendor and read the list. They will tell you what they have and what they don't. Then they will setup delivery to the dock and off to the next vendor you go." Cam Replied. Dave nodded, "Sounds like a plan I guess."
The outpost was inside of a very large asteroid. If he had to guess it was maybe half the size of Earth's moon. Outwardly there were about two dozen large pressure doors with landing pads jutting out in front of each. Speaking to oupost personell was straight forward enough, Dave informed the being on the other end of the comm that he was only to be there about a day to resupply before leaving and they instructed him to land on pad 17. After touching down the pad retracted through the large pressure door into an airlock. As the inner door opened Dave stared as the main area of the outpost was revealed. A large cityscape covered the interior of the asteroid. There were no bright shining skyscrapers. Instead it appearewd very cobbled together. Some parts looked like what he could only describe as old Detroit from the Robocop movies while other areas resembled Brazils favelas.
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As the airlock door of The Murph opened his other sense were bombarded. Sounds of hustle and bustle louder than Chicago during rush hour filled his ears. Smells assaulted his nose. Some seeming familiar, such as cooking meat and feces, others scents were far too unfamiliar. Before stepping off the ship Cam emparted one last, "Good luck, stick to the plan, and don't do anything silly.". This shook Dave out of his reverie as he looked down at his phone. Cam had transferred the shopping list to it as well as directions to several dozen nearby vendors. Taking a deep breath he put one foot in front of the other and ventured forth into the unknown.
For the most part the shopping excursion was relatively painless. The translator worked like a champ and aside from a few moments when Dave had to school his expression upon meeting a new alien species things went fine. Okay, EVERY person he encoutered required facial control, particularly one species that had blue gray skin and tentacles everywhere. Although it wasn't so much the look as the smell. Every vendor who had items of need would deliver to the berth they were docked at as Cam had said so after about five hours of business Dave decided to take his time going back to the ship.
He very much noticed many similarities to human society. Some people clearly had far better circumstances than others. Small conversation knots were everywhere with people just being people. Some looked shady while others eminated a sense of desperation. Still others seemed just content. As he wandered about he began to hear the rythmic thumping of music. It sounded an awfully lot like human industrial electro music with a fast beat and harsh sounding instruments creating the melody. His ears led him to what looked for all the world like a bar with flashing lights and smoke and it was indeed the source of the music.
"One drink wouldn't hurt I think, after the last several months I've had." he told himself and headed inside. As he entered he was confronted with Mos Eisley cantina vibes. Dark booths running along each side with tables spread out here and there. A large curved bar centered on the back wall dominated the overall space. There was an overwhelming amount of noise as he made his way to an open spot in the bar. The music wasn't bad as he found himself bobbing his head to the beat. Abruptly, a heavily accented voice came through his translator, "Hey! No standing at the bar unless you is ordering a drink.".
Dave turned to the bar to see an absolute mountain of an.... alien. The being was humanoid and had to be a good seven and a half feet tall and covered with rippling muscles. If this person wasn't polishing a glass he would have assumed it was security. After a couple of quick false starts at speech he quickly blurted out, "Give me a shot of your strongest stuff my friend." The bartenders eyes widened and a small smirk crossed his face. Dave also failed to notice that the other bar patrons who were close enough to hear his order suddenly went silent. "Are you sure you want the strongest stuff?" the bartender asked. Dave, undaunted, replied with a quick and confident, "Very sure! Thank you."
With a sudden burst of volume the barkeep called out "One shot of Trolam here at the bar!" followed by a loud and hearty laugh. This time, Dave did not fail to notice that all the voices in the bar went silent. A few moments later the bartender returned with a glass about the size of a typical double shot on earth filled with a nearly black liquid. He looked at it for a moment, then looked around and was puzzled to find all eyes on him. Scanning the faces in the crowd gave him no indication as to their interest in this particular shot since he had no basis of reference for alien facial expressions. So he turned back to the bar and did what any human would do. Dismissed the silence as an unknown solcial ritual and grabbed the glass. Lifting the glass into the air he said in his loudest and most confident voice, "Iwlij Jachjaj!!" then slammed the shot down his throat. Shortly thereafter, Dave's esophagus melted.