3 The interstellar lifestyle

Sparks flew as some droids, in a hand formation, used a welding tool to seal the damaged exterior panels of the hull together, while my fingers pulled each internal electronic circuit board of the merchant class ship for inspection.

The entire cargo bay was a-buzzed with activities from the sounds of the busy droids and it resembled a small repair shipyard.

Wires, metal and any usable circuits that the droids scavenged laid around. Small busy swarms of droids separated from the giant swarm to perform their designated duties of maintenance and repairs.

I found primitive manual ships fun to fly and fix. These types of ships exercised my limb and eye coordination, as well as tested my reactive speed, compared to the automated neural linked piloting system of the war cruiser.

The small merchant class ships are cheaper to repair and change.

When I first bought this junk of a merchant class ship, it lacked starlight and hyperdrive engines. The ship now has both types of engines.

Starlight engines allowed ships to move faster a thousand times faster through space than the regular main plasma engines. However, the ultimate speed engine must-have is the hyperdrive engine.

Different spacefaring species used different technology to achieve faster-than-light (FTL) travel. All had their advantages and disadvantages.

My species specialised in hyperdrives that created a temporary artificial wormhole at the point of origin to form a super speed highway towards the destination point.

We called the speeding process through the wormholes 'jumping'. One key disadvantage of using the hyperdrives is the intense spatial radiation generated by the wormhole.

The pilot in a damaged ship, without thick shields or specific hull structures, will never survive jumping through space via a wormhole.

I recalled the sight of the interior in one heavily radiated ship in one of our space forages, a long time ago - nothing like stepping over the piles of solidified melted bones, with hair and charred skin fused to the ground.

Fortunately, my radiation suit blocked out any smell.

Certain FTL engines didn't require a wormhole to travel faster than light, but that made them vulnerable to a stellar phenomenon, like an imploding star or attacks. Or the usual, slamming into moving space traffic.

High speed collisions from those FTL engines are like entertaining fireworks, as long as you are not the victim. Hence, the need for a rapid response reaction time to avoid colliding with oncoming FTL speed-heads - a known hazard of travelling interstellar space between planetary systems.

The wormholes provided a safe dimension with timing, provided the enemy ship didn't follow in.

I ran a diagnostic scan of the wiring under the command module through a handheld device.

The tangled mess of wires in the already crowded spaces behind each panel made it impossible to spot any shoddy wiring, even with my enhanced sight using the optical implants.

Fire from faulty wiring in the ship is the biggest killer in our galactic quadrant. A few sparks in the right places, like the engine compartments, are all it takes for a mass explosion in a small pressurised cabin.

"Arabaki…," I called out while detangling my arm from the loops of wires. "There are problems with the wiring on the right panel of the command module."

The droids came in handy. A small group of droids disengaged from the bigger swarm, inspecting the main engine and flew past me into the panel.

I got up and looked around. The interior of the merchant class ship created an illusion of moving metal in quick crawling motions, as though insects overran the entire ship.

"This junk ship needs to be replaced soon," Arabaki's voice echoed from some of the busy droids. "It will last… maybe ten more trips before it rips itself apart. Or five if you plan on using the hyperdrives."

*CLANG*

I ran out to the loud sound outside, and saw a few mechanised droids flattened under a rusty panel which fell from the protective casing of the left thruster.

My hand lifted the panel from the squashed droids and placed it aside while my other hand pulled out a low magnetic handler device, a size of a small key.

The other undamaged droids moved away at the sight of the key, like a crowd moving away from an ambulance service.

The atomites within the mechanised droids attempted to self repair their injured companions.

My amazement never ceases when watching a droid, a small artificial combination of programming and tiny metal parts, acted in a mix of self preservation and altruism, just like any other biological being.

"I'm going to my room to fix a part of you," I called out to Arabaki and flicked the switch on the low magnetic handler device.

"I think all the droids are me." Arabaki's disembodied voice responded all over the bay. "Don't need to shout."

Why the heck did I do that? I gritted my teeth at the realisation that I'm treating the droids as a physical biological person.

The device emitted an extremely low frequency (ELF) electric and magnetic fields (EMF) enough to attract, but not to damage the delicate droids lying on the floor. Soon the key held a chain of damaged droids.

My room has the special repair tank filled with a liquid mix of metals and minerals, a mini hospital for the atomites to begin their self replication cycle, and recycle badly damaged atomites.

Each atomite is my lifeline and wasting them is a big no-no. A new batch of droids will be waiting to be reprogrammed and dispatched to Arabaki's control to replace the damaged ones.

***

Arabaki took over the repairs - not much left to do except welding more metal plates to the hull.

While the anti-collision program in war cruiser autopilot worked for simple avoidance of two or three ships, a more complex case of several ships piling up in a mass collision required an individual to navigate through the tricky mess.

I sat in the pilot's chair, monitoring the autopilot through neutral interstellar space highway, controlled and patrolled by four different planetary consortiums.

The Great Galaxy Council is the smallest of the four consortiums. The other three are the Iktomin Conglomerate, the Nuwan Imperium, and the Tamtun Federation.

Of the four, Iktomin ships are the most dangerous. The Iktomins are a fun loving species and friendly with never a rude word or threat uttered out of their mouths.

Sounds great until you realised their fun is kidnapping other species for their sick gladiatorial entertainment.

They have an infamous reputation for being the species trafficking tricksters of the Galaxy.

However, the Iktomins made profits out of an entertainment demand. They sold subscriptions of 'reality drama' to the citizen species of the other three consortiums, unaware of the Iktomin's more nefarious methods of obtaining their 'star' actors.

The Nuwans are more of a relative to my species and an old ally of ours. The Tamtuns kept to themselves and bubbling is often heard through their wretched attempts at communicating through transmissions.

None of the four consortiums are to be trifled with. Their sheer military power and space fleets are the reasons for neutrality to exist on interstellar space highways in this quadrant.

I watched ships of various sizes zipping past along the shimmering interstellar space from the front viewer, with my eye on the dots moving along on the radar display.

*ZOOOOM* the sound effect alerted me to a passing ship racing past mine.

Sound never travels in the vacuum of space, but I added a sound simulator to emulate the passing sound of a ship as an additional alert.

Meanwhile, the autopilot calculated the speed and direction of the oncoming traffic, and switched to the left to avoid an FTL speed head of a pilot in a large cargo ship.

*ZWEEEEEEL*

Yup, the sound effect for the ship on FTL worked when a flash of the voluminous ship zipped past my ship going in the opposite direction.

My long range scanners detected the hyperspace jump of a ship far behind mine - a star shape appeared on the radar. Still far off from my location and ships usually stop to cool off the hyperdrives when they completed the jump to the designated point.

Space traffic is busy along these routes. Interplanetary trade, diplomatic visits, and the common space tourist cruise ships moved through the interstellar speedway.

<ETA to Destination (Tengshe planetary system): 0.002 parsecs> appeared on the front viewer.

Tengshe planetary system is a border system wedged between the territories of the Nuwan Imperium and the Great Swirl Council.

The Nuwans are far easier to deal with since I started working as a mercenary for them.

I needed a discreet parking space from the Nuwans for the old war cruiser without questions asked, and the Great Swirl Council won't deny entry to any smaller merchant class ships originating from the Nuwan side.

The obsolete war cruiser will attract unnecessary attention from the Great Swirl Council.

"Tengshe Planetary Border control to Kamuy war cruiser, come in," a gruff Nuwan voice spoke over the transmitter.

"Kamuy war cruiser to Tengshe Planetary Border control, here. Over," I replied.

"Tengshe Planetary Border control to Kamuy war cruiser, stand by for secured transmission of parking coordinates and vectors. Do not veer off course."

I squinted at the list of coordinates on the front viewer, and set the autopilot to follow the instructed vectors.

"Kamuy war cruiser to Tengshe Planetary Border control, Received."

"Tengshe Planetary Border control to Kamuy war cruiser. Fleet has approved your hyperspace coordinates for your merchant class ship. Jump restrictions in the Eden system apply. We've adjusted your destination point to comply. When you are ready to depart in the merchant class ship, cite security code Ipto Lapsa."

Next chapter