Chapter 123: Vexton 2
Location: Magicon Empire; Song Duchy; Vexton System; BCS (VS) Stargazer
We decide to take things slow again and don’t teleport to our last destination here in the Vexton System. Instead, after arriving back on the Stargazer, we ask Clara to plot a route toward Vexton 2. Then we activate the autopilot and retire in the living room. Clara can notify us if anything happens.
The others obviously have a lot of questions, and Lucy, Lydia, and I do our best to answer them. The evening continues with a nice meal courtesy of Lucy, and some board games. After that, we go to sleep in our respective cabins. Well, most of us go to their cabins, as Lucy and Nick have come a lot closer over the past months.
After breakfast the next morning, I enter the bridge and find everyone already there. “Morning sleepyhead,” Alina greets me with a big smile.
I return her smile and greet everyone else as well. “So, are we there yet?”
Instead of answering, Alina points at the window, and I notice the Stargazer turning slowly. Little by little, a planet starts entering our field of view.
I laugh. “Never mind then. Let’s get started then. I want the full program of scans and if possible be down on the surface by noon.”
“You’ve got it!” Nick replies and starts working at his console. I have my chair floating over and join him. When Lucy and Tim join us as well, he sighs. “I’ll put it on the main screen. You’re crowding me.”
Tim chuckles. “Sorry, mate, we don’t have that much to do until you’ve got some results for us.”
“It’s okay… But I’ll be faster if you give me some space.”
We collectively float our chairs a meter back, which causes everyone to laugh again. Even Nick joins in this time, then he shakes his head and gets back to work.
He’s always been scholarly but watching him work with Clara and the Stargazer’s sensor suite feels like he never did anything else. It’s like he’s born for this job. That reminds me that I still have to talk with him about his hyperspace theories. I just don’t know how to address the topic without telling him about my own hyperspace adventure. And I can’t talk about that… At least not yet.
We watch in fascination for a little more than an hour. Screens change all the time and show different readings. He then taps them and mumbles something to Clara, then he looks at another screen or projection and does the same.
Finally, he leans back in his chair and takes a deep breath. He turns around and startles when he sees us still sitting behind him. “Huh, you’re still there?”
“Anyway, I’m finished with my preliminary analysis. I’m taking you want to hear my verdict?”
I nod at him. “Yeah, that would be great. And good work, Nick!”
He gets up from his chair and walks toward the big window at the front. A quick gesture with his hand has it change into a holographic screen. It now shows the planet below us much closer with a lot of notes from Nick all around it.
He clears his throat. “Alright, if you’d come over, please. There are a few things we have to talk about, as they might influence how we proceed from here on out.”
That catches my attention, and I raise an eyebrow while walking over. Tim is right behind me, while Lucy takes a little bit longer. Alina and Lydia just turn their chairs around as they are already close to Nick’s projection.
As soon as we are comfortable, Nick dives into it and points at the holographic planet. “As you can see, this is Vexton 2, the only planet that isn’t a gas giant here in the system and therefore possibly habitable. Most of the time, something like that means that there still is extensive terraforming to do until humans can live on such a planet.”
Alina interrupts him. “If you’re saying it like this, I’m guessing this is not the case here?”
“Exactly! The scans we did upon entering the star system already indicated something in that direction, and the scans Clara and I just did, confirmed it. Vexton 2 is right in the Goldilocks zone of Vexton Prime. This means the planet is just the right distance from the sun for water to remain liquid. And not only that. The atmosphere is also stable, and the air is breathable. In fact, we basically could go down there without any protection at all. Hell, we wouldn’t notice a difference from Terra’s air.”
This time it’s me who interrupts him. “Okay, so far everything sounds nice… That makes me wonder why nobody lives here. But you also said you had some readings that could influence if we go down there?”
He shakes his head slowly. “Yeah, I’ve asked this myself as well. It doesn’t make sense… At least at first. And that’s where our further readings come in. I actually didn’t mean IF we go down there, rather HOW we go down there, as it could possibly be more dangerous than we expected.”
A slight frown finds its way on my face. He’s skirting around the point, and he seems to enjoy it! But what could be dangerous down there? He said the planet is in perfect condition and no one lives there…
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.
Nick continues. “This is where things get a bit stranger. After confirming that the planet is actually habitable, we proceeded to scan for life signs. Why? Well, maybe some pirates made the planet their base without anyone knowing or some hermits settled there. Who the hell knows? Neither Clara nor I expected any results, as everyone always told us the systems, we explore for the exploration course are empty. Well, we did get positive results… And this is where things get strange. First, the scans came back fuzzy, as if there was some kind of interference emanating from the planet. I guess if we had worse sensors, we wouldn’t have gotten anything at all. And second, what we could identify from the fuzzy readings made it even stranger. See for yourself.”
The projection changes and now shows a table filled with numbers. There are two columns next to each other. The headlines say human and Vexton 2 respectively. The strange thing is that the numbers don’t match! As if the life signs Nick and Clara found aren’t human!
“Aliens?” Lucy blurts out with wide eyes. Nobody laughs, as we’re all thinking the same.
Clara takes over the speakers to respond. “No, as unfortunate as this might be, there are no aliens. At least as far as we know. What we have here on Vexton 2 are animals, or better reptiles. I can’t say more, as this is where everything gets fuzzy as Nick said so nicely.
“We don’t know their size or what kind of reptiles are down there. We don’t even know for sure if there are any at all. It could also be that our sensors show us faulty data. But we should prepare for the worst and assume that those reptiles are hostile and prepare accordingly.
“Therefore, I’d recommend that you all go together to bring our full magical weight to bear. You all have either A&D magic or shield Magitech, so if worst comes to worst, you are protected, and Tim or Sara can teleport you back to the Stargazer. I also recommend that you descend with the yacht to save your magic for emergencies. I’ll hold her in the air after you depart or bring her back up to space depending on what awaits us down there.”
Reptiles, huh? I wonder if it’s a planet full of geckos. That would be so cool. Those small little things are so adorable. But I hope it’s not snakes! They are a bit creepy.
When Clara finishes her report, I stand up and walk toward the hologram of Vexton 2, then I nod at Nick, who looks relieved and sits down. I make a full turn and look at the others. Time to be the captain now!
“Thank you, Nick and Clara, for the analysis. You gave me a lot to think about. I agree with your assessment. We should treat this as a hostile environment and do not take things lightly. Which means we go down fully shielded and our A&D Mages will be ready to blast everything that moves into oblivion.” I nod at Lucy and Alina.
“The same goes for our Space Mages. Tim and I will be prepared to teleport us off the planet if necessary.”
Lastly, I look at Nick and Lydia. “That means the two of you will be doing the actual exploring down there while we others protect you. We need everything, ground samples and analyses, air quality, plants, and probably some samples of the local fauna. We should also discover why there seems to be some sensor interference. But that’s basically only the bare minimum. I guess as soon as we’re down there, we’ll find a lot more things to inspect. Now, questions?”
Tim winks at me. “When do we start?”
I grin back at him and shake my head. “One thing after the other. We still have to prepare.”
Lucy is the next to speak. “You said we’re going down shielded… While I can easily do that, this will take a lot out of me, especially if I have to keep the shields active for a long time. I’m not sure how effective my attacks will be then, especially as I’m still learning the more advanced ones.”
I hold up my left wrist where I wear the successor of my old shield watch. “I know. Both Alina and you should only shield yourselves for most of the time. I do have this to keep me safe and Lydia can have my old shield watch. This leaves Nick and Tim. Thanks to Olivia from our Improvised Combat course, we have a few shield rings. While they don’t offer complete protection, they dull incoming blows by a lot. This should be more than enough I’d say. We’ll also be wearing our spacewalker suits.”
Tim holds up his wrist. “I actually have a protection device as well.”
Of course, he has one… “Alright, then it’s just Nick. Sorry about that…”
“It’s okay, I’ll stay close to Lucy then,” he replies.
I flash him a grin. “Good, anything else, or can we start loading up the yacht?”
“Yeah, one more thing,” Alina chimes in. “Where are we staying at night? I’d prefer camping on the planet, as the nightlife could be completely different than what we can see during daylight.”
“I agree, if it’s safe enough, we’ll definitely be camping… Otherwise, I’ll probably teleport us back to the Stargazer.”
“Okay, then let’s get loaded up!” Alina answers and rushes out of the bridge with a spring in her step.
We follow her, laughing. I haven’t seen Alina that happy in a long time. Sure, my parents’ interference worked out pretty well and she’s now something like a retainer to my family. I don’t know all the details, but they made it look like Christopher caught notice of her determination and told Adrian. He in turn petitioned my parents to take her under his wing as they both follow the same path magically speaking. All this was enough to make it believable for Alina’s parents and they backed off looking for suitable partners for her.
On the other hand, her relationship with her parents is still strained, and I can see how much it bothers her. So it makes me very happy to see her so elated right now.
We follow her toward the hangar where she already started loading up supplies. We join her and so the yacht gets loaded up pretty quickly. Luckily, we have a big crate with a grav generator, otherwise we’d have to carry everything by ourselves down on the planet. That would have been literal hell, as our stuff weighs a lot. Especially those devices we got from Sam, that will help us with various analyses. I’m also very fond of our Magitech tents we got from Tim. They build themselves as soon as we press a button and come fully furnished with almost all amenities.
I finish with a mid-sized magical battery, just in case. It’s going to stay inside the crate, but who knows when we might need some extra magical power. Then the yacht is ready to go and we close the airlock behind us.
I sit down in the cockpit and take over the controls. Sure, I could have let Clara do the flying but sometimes I just want to do it myself. I don’t want to get rusty after all. I enter the coordinates of our landing site – which Clara picked out earlier – into the navigation software and follow the projected route.
The trip down is smooth and barely takes more than half an hour. There’s only a slight shudder that goes through the yacht when we breach the atmosphere. When we’re almost at the landing site, I reluctantly give over the controls to Clara and join the others in the main room. It’s time to suit up.
Our six spacewalker suits stand neatly on the rack, and one after the other we each grab one and put them on. Right when we’re finished, Clara’s voice sounds through the suit's speakers. “We’ve successfully landed on Vexton 2. You may exit the yacht as soon as you are ready. As of now, there are no life signs around the yacht in a one-kilometer radius.”
We do another round of checks for our suits and when everything looks fine, I have Lucy take point. She steps toward the airlock and gives a thumbs-up for Clara toward one of the cameras. With a slight hiss, the airlock opens.
Time to explore a planet!