New Game

Chapter 1 of Book 1: Exploring the Stars...

Absolute silence surrounds me as I wake from my little cat nap. While this may sound unsettling at first, I can assure you that this.. is perfectly normal. In fact it I would find it far more unsettling to wake up to the opposite, as the deep dark vacuum of space doesn't actually carry any real sound. Hell, if I'm hearing ANY noises onboard, it would be the siren. Which is even more pleasant since it means either there's a lackage of oxygen, or that the ship is about to collide with something... and make a huge mess.

So given the circumstances (and all of the possible outcomes of the situation), silence is good.

That being said, there isn't anything particularly unusual about today. It's been about 2-3 months since I had waken up on this planet. I don't mean this with any degree of sarcasm either, I mean actual... LITERAL, waking up here. With no memory what so ever. Not even the person I was here with initially knew anything about me, but I've been all by myself for most of my journey thus far... well, aside from SAIL.

“Who is SAIL?” you might ask. Well, I didn't know until I asked to be honest. Apparently SAIL is an acronym for Ship-based Artificial Intelligence Lattice. As you can imagine... SAIL just rolls off the tongue much easier. To keep it simple, SAIL is an AI that monitors the ship. He's a little broken right now though, apparently the ship has a couple of broken parts. Among them, something called an FTL Drive. People love acronyms a lot, because as it turns out FTL means Faster than Light. That means travel beyond this solar system won't be possible until this has been fixed.

THAT, my friend.. is a real.. f****n'... travesty.....

What's the point of having a futuristic space ship that can explore the universe faster than light if that's the one part of the damned thing that won't work!? That's like owning a submarine with like, a dozen leaks in it... pointless.

So.. yeah. That's about it, really. Why did I decide to fill you in on some back story and world building instead of getting out of bed and continuing on with my day? Well that's because it's a story, stupid. This whole passage would be pointless if you had no idea what I was talking about, but you can blame the author if you want.

On a brighter note with the ship, if there's one thing that does work... it's the teleporter. I have a device on me that allows direct contact with SAIL, therefore making it possible to “beam me up” when I need it. SAIL corrects me every time that I call him Scotty, it's a shame he doesn't understand cheap references.

I'm standing on said teleporter by the way. It's about time that we start today's adventure, shall we?

With a simple press of a button on my futuristic wristwatch, I've activated the teleporter. A split second later, it beams me down. This process isn't instant, by the way. It takes a few seconds to travel between points.

A moment later, and here we are. We currently reside on a nice, lush planet. SAIL classifies it as a tier 1 "Garden" planet. Basically this planet is lucky, and incredibly safe by comparison to many other things in the universe. Lots of trees and other flora, with a mix of some wildlife as well. None of them are particularly dangerous, but can be bad if they catch you off guard. The grasslands on this planet seem to go on forever.. and there's nothing here. Either that or this planet is reaaaaally good at hiding things.

I took a big whiff of the air after I beamed down. It's a bit of a... practice of mine I suppose. It pumps me up for the day ahead! My ears perked up and I prepared myself for a running start.

Oh, I totally forgot to mention something. That opening paragraph I told you about a cat nap? I was being literal. I'm part kitty... and I REALLY love to pounce. Go back and read it. I'll leave a few asterisks right here so you can remember where you left off. ***

After a little mental preparation, as well as lowering myself to the ground level (butt wiggle included, to signify that a pounce is imminent), I bolted forward. Prancing through the grass and weeds without a god damn care in the world.

“Estimated coordinates are about -94X by 397Z, headed southeast. You are currently on route with bookmark: Butts. Shall I track this location for you?”

SAIL always throws off my groove like that. Also, that bookmark he mentioned? I can name it whatever I want. It's hilarious to hear him read it back to me.

“Nah you're good, SAIL. Disengage tracking and compass systems for the time being.”,

“Disengaging these systems can result in a negative-”,

“I know. Just do it, I'll contact you if I need them reactivated.”,

“Process completed. Engaging standby protocol”,

“THANK you, SAIL.”

Now, I know what you might be thinking...

“What a mean person.”, “I can't believe they're disrespecting their AI companion in such a way.”, “I can imagine how you would treat an actual person!”, Just to throw a few possibilities up in the air.

Look... between me and you, I think SAIL has too much of a pole up his a*s for my tastes. I know that it's just how he's been programmed and such, but I'm too... spontaneous to want an AI to constantly remind me things. I want to just wing it, and see what happens. SAIL does everything by protocol, and that just doesn't fly with me.

About a mile into my little prance, I started to stumble upon a little home of mine I made quite a while ago. It's nothing more than a bit of processed wood and stone, but it keeps me safe and it keeps me warm. And that's all I can ask for.

The cool thing isn't about the house itself, but rather.. HOW I acquired the materials to create it. This, my friend, is due to the wondrous power of this... doodad.. thing. Look, I forgot what it was called but it's a tool that I received from someone. Remember that buddy I mentioned in paragraph 3? Yeah, that one! *** (More asterisks in case you want to check it! :3)

Turns out this little powerhouse can break down pretty much anything you aim it at. Interestingly, it doesn't work on animals or fauna of any kind. But it will disintegrate the s**t out of any plants unfortunate enough to get in the way.

Seemingly by some form of black magic (or deus ex machina) this little guy is able to break it down into measurable units that I can place somewhere else afterwards. And saves them as data to the device. So in conclusion I can literally break down a tree to its base components in about 6-8 seconds, retrieve a few samplings, and turn that material into BASICALLY whatever the hell I need it for. I need a crafting bench for it to be turned into most other things however. Yeah, don't ask how that works either. I'm not completely sure how it works myself. SAIL basically walked me through it with this fancy little tool.

To put a visual in your head, imagine the letter “U”. Now imagine a horizontal line passing through the center of that U. This line is the handle, and the rest of it for the most part is yellow. Yeah, that's about as good an explanation as you can get out of me.

I lit up the torches on each end of the house for some light. Turns out installing a roof on your house without any windows makes things pretty damn dark. While I have a great setup here on this planet, things have gotten boring. I don't have any particular goals right now. I have a shelter, I have food, I have weapons, resources, and all the tools I would need to accomplish these things when those resources start to diminish. So then, what more is there?

Part of me wants to go exploring, however... I've scouted the immediate area of the house for quite a ways. There is little of interest here.

There is however... one thing I never thought about until now. Something that my stubbornness never allowed in the past.

“Hey SAIL, I have an idea that you can help me with.”

Like I rang a frickin' bell, SAIL had immediately answered. He “dinged” my watch in the process.

“What is it your request?”

I took a moment to process how exactly I wanted to word my query. Then it hit me.

“Are you able to scan the planet's surface by chance?”

“My list of features do include some scanning functions. What is it exactly you were looking for?”

“I'm not entirely sure how to word it, but just... SOMETHING, I guess. Look for any inconsistencies on the planet, weird energy readings, anything. I couldn't have been the first thing to step foot on this planet.”

“Processing...”

After a period of silence spanning roughly 5-10 seconds, SAIL responded to my request.

“I can run all of my scanning functions on the planet as a whole, if that would suffice. However, this would take time. Roughly 20-30 minutes in total.”

Not quite the response I was expecting, however we ARE talking about an entire flippin' planet after all. If I have a highly intelligent AI that can scan ALL of it in as little as 20 minutes, I'll take it. Not like I have anywhere to be...

“That's perfect, SAIL. Thank you”

“Confirmed, you are certainly welcome.”

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