Unexpected Encounter 17
10 Apr 2016Rebecca Hail
"It's strange." Burwellian looked over the now built out fuel processor. "It should work. But it isn't. And I can't seem to find the fault." He scratched his head."Is it that important?" Rebecca floated with a bored face through the cargo hold of the DBE.
"Not really. But I'm an engineer and I'm interested in such things. I mean, that thing is brand new. Not even a year old, like the whole ship, and yet it already seems like material fatigue. By the way, how is he?"
"The stasis drugs f*cked him up big time. I'm honestly surprised that he managed it to deploy his beacon."
"Seems like he wasn't in stasis before, huh?"
"Probably, dunno. I'm here to bring the spare parts, not to listen to his resume. Is his tank full or does he need some more limpets?"
"How many do you have?"
"Sixteen."
"Hmmm, give him another eight. Then he's more than fine to jump. Can you get some stims from his medicine cabinet?"
"So we're giving him drugs against drugs? Fighting fire with fire? I like that idea.", she grinned and sounded a bit sarcastic as she said it.
"Haha, basically. Well, I'm so far finished with exchanging the processors. I only run a few diagnostic and calibration programms over it, before we'll switch it on, then we're basically done here.", he answered while he picked a tablet and several floating tools out of the air.
60 minutes and 4 stimpacks later, the thrusters of the Diamondback ignited and the still a bit brittle voice of the pilot could be heard over the coms.
"Thanks for saving me out here. How much do I owe you?"
"You don't owe us anything.", Rebecca answered, "But whatever you did to your scoop. Don't do it again.", she laughed a bit as she said it.
"Let's just speak the Fuel's Prayer for the parting.", Burwellian said over the coms.
Ria looked at Rebecca.
"What the hell is the Fuel's Prayer?"
Rebecca grinned, muted her mic, then she answered, "Just listen."
"Our Fuel Scoop in heaven,
hallowed be your name.
Your fuel come,
your transfer be done,
in abyss, as it is in the bubble.
Give us this day our daily fuel,
and forgive us our carelessness,
as we also have forgiven the careless.
And lead us not into instancing,
but deliver us from our death by suffocation.
For the fuel, the power, and the oxygen are yours,
now and for ever. Fuel'em.
Commander, fly safe and have a good trip home. Becks ... see you on Wollheim."
Burwellian giggled and Ria looked a bit baffled.
"You have a prayer for that?"
"Trust me, you would pray too, if we run out of fuel. All glory to our lord and saviour, the fuel scoop.", she laughed a bit during the last part.
"I hope I won't experience running out of fuel. Sounds somehow unpleasant."
Rebecca got serious again, then she took the blue, cubic crystal from the front pocket of her flight suit and threw it over to Ria.
"There is a cubic slot under the tastature of your chair. Insert it there."
"What's that?" Ria asked, then she put the crystal into the slot.
The map of a system opened on the right holoscreens on the right of their pilot seats.
"Woaaah, an earthlike and a waterworld forming a binary. That looks awesome.", Ria said in awe, then she noticed the marks on the earthlike, "What's that?"
Rebecca smiled a bit.
"That's where we are going next."