Engineer’s Log Day 26

Spent more time today weeding and then spent some time adjusting the turrets around the base. They like shooting at the local bird population, particularly at 5am. While I appreciate the diligence, I also like to sleep in so I just took a bit of time to up the size requirements for things to be blasted. I feel fairly confident in my ability to square up with things like possum raccoon if it comes down to it.

Engineer’s Log Day 27

Spent a bit of time reorganizing the files today. Grabbed everything with the HARP tag and slapped it into one file. I’d originally planned to try and build the sucker even going so far as to print a few of the parts but ended up running into issues. Problem is that I don’t know which parts are supposed to go where. I can make guesses based on the electronic internals but I’d prefer not to ride in a vehicle that's powered by my hunches. I feel like the mere existence of the HARP blueprints means there has to be an instruction manual somewhere in the base but unfortunately for me I haven’t found it yet. It’s also big as fuck so even if I do find a manual, it’ll be a while before I even make anything.

Engineer’s Log Day 28

Played printer roulette again and just got some tableware. Today’s been kind of boring.

Engineer’s Log Day 29

More xythalaxn visitors. They took a few potshots at the side of the base again so I just ignored them. Cleared up the garden and sapling orchard but it’s beginning to become clear to me keeping it cleared out of weeds is going to be something I need to spend a bit of time on each day. I’d probably complain more if I had some more interesting things to do.

Engineer’s Log Day 30

Today, I patrolled for weeds, played a bit of Printer Roulette, and then alternated between reading some of the books I brought with me and reading up on botany. Concerning these audio logs, I’m kinda don’t have a huge amount to share so I’ll probably skip out on making them until something interesting happens. No sense in making a 5 second logs.

Engineer’s Log Day 33.1

Boredom will take you to strange places and today boredom took me right into Command’s office. I don’t know really why I decided to snoop around the place but I did find a few interesting things.

First interesting thing I found was a set of unmarked books sitting on the shelf. All the previous times I’d been in here I thought they were fake books for decoration or something boring like a dictionary but no these are actually proper books. Well, proper might be a bit of a strong word for these things since a quick scan revealed several misspellings, wonky grammar structures, and chapters that varied wildly in length. Nothing was off enough to make it immediately obvious what was going on but after flipping through a few more of the books things became clear when I started seeing some familiar names from pop culture. That’s right ladies and gentlemen, Command’s office is filled to brim with fanfiction. What a day to be alive.

While that was certainly interesting, it wasn’t actually the most helpful thing I managed to snag from the office. Hidden away in one of the filing cabinets to the side, I found the dossier on xythalaxn relationships and biology. The information I’d received so far was mostly through a disclaimer put out to discourage us from causing trouble.

Took a bit to sit down and read through it and I have to say it's kinda interesting how convergent evolution does things like this. Xythalaxns are from a similarly sized but slightly lighter gravity homeworld than us which I suppose makes sense given that we want to both colonize the same planet. Their bodies function extremely similarly to ours with expected differences in our internals and a few obvious exterior differences.

They have a bit more range than humans in terms of heights but as a rule of thumb I can probably expect any that I meet in person to be clocking in a few inches short of 7 feet with their sexual dimorphism favoring larger females and smaller males. While they are typically covered in black fur, apparently there are a few folks that will come covered in brown and grey though these tend to be a bit more rare. I almost wonder if it's kinda like humans that have red hair where it's not something you’ll commonly see but like it isn't crazy if you do see one out and about. They also each have a small red stripe a little below their ribs on each side which is unique to each individual kinda like a fingerprint.

A lot of the information was a repeat of what I already knew or had guessed. They’re omnivores like humans are but are slight closer to the carnivore side of the spectrum than we do. They’ve got good sniffers but apparently their ears are more for show than ours are which is kinda interesting. They’re also ambush predators to our persistent predators and the way their legs are set up reflect that. Theirs are much more springy, allowing for faster twitch movements which manifests in the day to day in a weird bouncy gait.

Psychologically, they’re something like a 99% match with humans which is really rare. From what I understand, most races don’t even hit the 70% mark so that fact that they’re so similar is really wild. For the most part, their differences from humans don’t super matter with the exception of two particular pieces. They have a stronger pack mentality than humans and a slight warrior culture. Basically take human family mentality and crank up the intensity a bit and you’ve got xythalaxns. This all manifests in mobs consistently at my gates which is…

Sigh

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

It’s honestly fine. I feel a bit isolated so it could be better but like my situation is tenable. I wasn’t selected for the mission for my handsome looks alone after all. I can handle a little duress.

Engineer’s Log Day 33.2

I’ve made the ill advised but informed decision to crack open Command’s fanfic collection. It’s bad, really bad, so bad it loops around to being entertaining with how bad it is. I wonder what got Command into this sort of stuff in the first place?

Engineer’s Log Day 37

I received another visit by the unruly mob today and have decided to start up a little engineering project as a result. Seeing them has me kind of wondering what their place looks like up close. I’d seen it very early on while both of us were still getting things set up and then from a distance when I returned from my forest sabbatical but never up close.

I don’t think it’s really safe for me to be going in person so that means if I really wanna see the town, I’ll have to use a drone. Now, I’ve given some thought to the situation and have landed on two particular designs that I like.

First and most probably the more logical of the two, I create a helicopter and disguise it as a bird to keep it from being identified and shot down immediately. This’ll give me a pretty decent overhead view of the situation and I should be able to use it a few times. It’s not particularly durable but that should be fine.

The second idea is a four wheeler drone. I can give it a bit of metal armor so it can survive more abuse and it gives me a bit of a closer look at everything but that's about where the advantages end. It’ll be way more obvious to anyone looking, easier to stop in its tracks, and I’ll have a way more narrow view of everything. That said, this idea edges out the other for one simple reason. I can convert those empty bombshells into RC cars and the idea of doing that is entirely too funny to pass up on.

Engineer’s Log Day 38

I’ve gotten started with my RC project and I’m having a grand old time. Technically speaking, I have a working RC car made but at the moment it seems to only want to go forward and backwards which isn’t quite ideal for maneuverability. The bombshells chasis mean this is a little bigger than your usual RC car but fortunately for me, it’s still fairly light. The part I was the most concerned about was the camera but I managed to add it without any issues. It kinda pokes out a narrow slit in the top half that restricts the vision a little bit but not enough to really matter. I’ve also been workshopping a few extra features, one that I think is kinda funny and one that should be generally handy. I’ve cut a strip of the top out and attached a motor arm to that so that in the event it gets knocked over, it can right itself and zoom off on its merry way. The funny feature is the little Raspberry Pi I installed that lets me remotely play audio. I’ve got some dastardly plans for that.

Engineer’s Log Day 39

Today was a very productive day!

The turning issue has been resolved and the drone successfully deployed for its maiden voyage. I wasn’t super confident about its ability to make it through undergrowth of the forest unassisted so I suited up in one of the security team’s combat outfits and left to deploy the RC drone myself. No issues to speak of on my walk there or back.

The xythalaxn’s village is kind of interesting. In many regards, its quite similar to what we had in mind for our place with the outside consisting mostly of farmland and a few utility buildings. It’s mostly dirt paths on the outside but as you get closer to the center they start to turn more and more into regular pavement. They then have a concrete wall surrounding the town with a few varying entrances. I will say their place is much bigger than ours in terms of shere land taken up. I didn’t spot any automated defenses but that doesn’t exactly mean they don’t have any, just that I can’t see them. The entrance I was near did have a few guards that had looked fairly bored right up until I zoomed up to their hut, started playing Barber of Seville for them, and then took off into their inner city. They clearly weren’t fans of the bomb shaped RC car based on the yelling but they didn’t get to do anything actionable before I’d made it in.

The inside of their village was interesting. Their buildings seemed to be all of the same design, an almost boxy adobe kinda style with slanted roofs, and each were painted a variety of different bright colors. Most of them were blues and yellows but I did catch a few red buildings hiding a little deeper in. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to make heads or tails of the various buildings given the guards were in hot pursuit but each seemed to fulfill some sort of purpose. I don’t know why I added that, every building fulfills some purpose. That’s how buildings work.

I did notice something kind of interesting as I tore through the streets. In contrast to the human settlement, the xythalaxns brought their kids along. Their population was also far greater than the human’s back when they were all here, maybe two times the size? It’s pretty clear they were here to set up a colony to our outpost.

Now, I covered a pretty good amount of the village with the drone so when the horde of military folks began boxing me in, I wasn’t overly sad about my RC car’s inevitable demise. That’s not to say I just rolled over and accepted it though. That’d be no fun. For the most part, I’d been sticking to the public walkways since they were a little wider and easier to maneuver but that wasn’t my only option. There were also an abundance of alley ways clearly designed for small amounts of pedestrian traffic. Tore down one of those and slipped into a different part of the village. I think it might have been a residential area since there were a lot of little xythalaxns around. Did a few donuts real fast for the fans and was planning to leave but then things got interesting.

Listen, I’m not saying I’m a people pleaser but when a group of xythalaxn kids started pointing at a ramp, I felt a moral obligation to take it. They were also 100% right because the speed I hit the ramp let me get onto the roof tops and that was when the real fun began.

Since they were slanted, I was able to start hopping from rooftop to rooftop and actually lasted a surprisingly long time. All good things must come to an end eventually I misjudged a distance and crashed into the streets below. One of the guards caught up but unfortunately for him, I had one more trick. I had a sound effect that would make my RC car start beeping like the bomb it kinda looked like.

I feel a little bad since it spooked her something fierce as the game of chase reversed. They actually tripped basically immediately and I responded by rolling the little RC car riiiiiight up to ‘em. Poor lass looked like she was about to have a heart attack when the beeping ended and I shot a little confetti out the top at her.

I didn’t manage to get any farther than that since they immediately grabbed the cart, ran it out of town, and blasted it to smithereens from a safe distance and you know what. After the scare I probably gave her, turnabout is fair play.

Overall, I’d consider that run an absolute success. I managed to achieve my objective of mapping out the town and even managed to get a better idea about the sort of people I’m dealing with. I also managed to cause some chaos which is always a win as far as I’m concerned.

Those poor fuckers don’t realize it yet but that whole thing was entirely too much fun for me to not do a repeat run.