HOME | DD
StefanPWinc β Consumer of all
Published: 2013-02-19 00:11:58 +0000 UTC; Views: 881; Favourites: 20; Downloads: 2
Redirect to original
Description
Just a "little" stray black hole from a supernova a few billion years ago that happened to make it's way towards the Orion sub arm of the milky way galaxy to a little yellow star known as sol
to the moderately intelligent lifeforms there it was an... inconvenience.
Related content
Comments: 74
Morta: (grinning) just give it a moment⦠(the silvery, semi-fluid smartmatter continues to spread, oozing through the fibres of Alex's clothes, coating them and making them look like smartmatter replicas of themselves, eventually covering Alex from the soles of her feet to her head, leaving only her face uncovered, as that is instead covered by the mask. Morta makes a series of finger-gestures in the air by Alex's head, and just on the edge of her field of view, Alex can see the virtual controls Morta is operating. She feels the smartmatter remoulding slightly at her ears and under her chin. Morta snaps her fingers, and a coating of similar smartmatter erupts from her own wristlets and covers her completely in an instant, turning transparent (but deeply tinted) around her face. She lays several electromagnets in place around the crack)
Morta: (directly into Alex's ears, without moving her lips at all) OK, we're good to go. Start at the far end, do about a millimetre or two at a time, use a narrow beam first to go deep into the crack, then go broader as you work upwards to the surface. Let the feedback guide you and you'll get the feel of it pretty quickly. You should have a virtual magnifier in your field of vision - just twitch your eyebrows down to zoom in, up for out. Can you hear me OK there?
π: 0 β©: 1
Alex nodded, but had no idea whether or not it was safe to talk in this suit, and she took an experimental breath and tried to speak
π: 0 β©: 1
Morta: You can speak, or subvocalise - it's fine, I'll hear you either way
π: 0 β©: 1
"I dunno what subvocalise means, so I guess I'll speak" she said, and then twitched her eyebrow experimentally, and zoomed in her vision "Here goes nothing" she said, held the laser with both hands and pulled the trigger, and squinted her eyes at the bright light, despite most of it being filtered out by the gel
π: 0 β©: 1
The work was tiring, requiring intense concentration, but they made steady progress. They communicated more through their tools, and through to occasional nod or glance, than through words. Morta directed Alex to close the crack one millimetre at a time, slowly and painstakingly. After an hour and a half, they reached the half-way point. They were sweaty, their throats were parched, and their eyes hurt.
Morta (subvocalising): wanna take a break?
π: 0 β©: 1
Alex sighed, but nodded anyway, she had tried this sub vocalizing thing, and didn't really like it "Let's head back to my farm" Alex suggested "We can cool off and get lemonade and something to eat... and I should probably get a change of clothes with all this mud and sweat. And you can meet my parents and brothers, I'm sure they'll let yah stay over, though you might not want to mention you crashlanded a spaceship >_>
Nick got up from his electrical work and sat down exhaused on a tree stump, and leaned on his hand
(Have you (talkymeat) heard of Star Citizen or Elite Dangerous?)
π: 0 β©: 1
Morta: Hmmm - lemonade sounds pretty tempting β¦ but we doΒ have food with us, and it prolly would be good if we could get this thing off the ground and into your barns tonight. I'm pretty sure the crashsite could be spotted from orbit.Β
She picks up a water-bottle, gulps some, pours some over her face, then offers it to Alex.
Morta: Would be cool to meet yer family, though. We'll need to come up with some sort of story about where I came from. D'ya think they'd buy it if I said I was a feral child being raised by wolves? (to Nick) Hey Nick, how's that gravity engine coming?
(I haven't - had a quick google though, and they look interesting
π: 0 β©: 1
Alex: *sighs and nods* You're right of course... *takes the water bottle, and gulps down a good half of it without pausing, and then adds afterwards "You reckon we'd get in trouble for helping you hide your spaceship if someone caught us? Like, arrested by the cops or something? I mean, we're just helping you, and as far as I'm concerned it's your ship and if anyone wants to take it from yah that's stealin', and stealing from a time traveler no less!
Nick: "The anti-gravity spheres and their surroundings are realigned, resurfaced and in position, the computer on this thing says. I've worked on the negative mass and energy generator, It's in rough shape, but it's workable, though not enough for "warping" space time much
Alex: Good job nick... I'm proud you didn't complain about all the dirt
Nick: *small smile* After playing with you i've gotten used to it
Alex: *giggles, glances back at morta* Naw... I don't think they'd buy that... We can just say you're one of my friends from school, you may look kinda wild... but they've seen wilder...Β
A better question is how are we gonna keep them out of the barn? 
π: 0 β©: 1
Morta: I dunno much about the law here. I don'tΒ thinkΒ so. I mean, it's not like they can prove I nicked it.
*grabs the water bottle, rinses her mouth, spits water on the ground stained brownish red by residual blood from where her tooth got knocked out. Leans into the cockpit, rummages around, comes out with a small first aid kit. Goes over to the open gravity engine and examines Nick's work*
This looks good.
*digs around in the first aid kit, pulls out a little white box, from which she removes a small white seed-shaped object; her eyes water a little as she pushes the 'seed' into the socket of her missing tooth; the seed beeps twice, and she smiles*
*to Alex* I dunno if we can say I'm from your school - I mean, I kinda stand out, and it's not a big town. Also, if I wuz local, I wouldn't need to couchsurf at your place. Maybe we could say I'm on an exchange? As for keepin' 'em out the barn β¦ I guess that could work. It certainly will be a surprise if they see us roaring off out the atmosphere!
π: 0 β©: 1
Alex: Yah... how about we say you're... uh... an exchange kid from the city who wanted to try living on a farm, and so chose to stay with me! 
(I know initially I said I wanted to push this up to the 2040's or so... but I want to put it back in the early 2010's, just for consistency with other stuff 
π: 0 β©: 1
Morta: Heh. I stick out in my own time too, if I'm honest
*setting up the camp stove digging out some food*
Let's have some dinner, then we can finish the repairs before it gets dark. What d'ya fancy?
(I'm happy to make it about contemporary-ish. To Morta, anything before the evacuation of earth is a blur of lessons that failed to hold her attention, really.
π: 0 β©: 1
Alex: You mean the blue hair's in your DNA? *sits down on a log near the camp stove, and added* "I'll eat anything"
π: 0 β©: 1
Morta: Nah. I got a colony of nanobots livin' in my hair. Each dyebot's pretty simple, but they got stigmergic signalin', so they can show some pretty clever collective behaviour - like ants, or termites. You programme 'em using RNA. Well, there's scripting languages you can use, but then you need a compiler that'll translate it to RNA-code. I'd rather get my 'ands in the A's, C's, G's an' U's. Anyway, ya just mix the RNA in with shampoo, plus a little ATP for 'em to eat - an POW! Any colour, any pattern ya like, as long as you can figure out their emergent behaviour.
*dumps a tin of beans & veggie sausages & a tin of mac & cheese together into the pot, & starts warming it up, while rummaging around for other ingredients to throw in.*
π: 0 β©: 1
"Morta... it's 2013... we don't all got RNA printers" Alex said, trying to wipe the dirt from her hands onto her overalls
"I asked my dad for one, but he said they where too expensive and I'd never use it" Nick added
Alex took the wooden spoon and started stirring them together, licking her lips at the smell coming from the food, while Nick grimaced at the concoction
"After we fix your ship... do you have to go right away? I mean, you're a couple hundred years in your past... wouldn't it be fun to see what things are like?... you're really cool and it'd be fun to have you around"
π: 0 β©: 1
Morta: *tossing in some nacho chips & sliced pickles* Oh well, I guess the blue hair stays
*looking conflicted, and a little sad* - well β¦ I got a long way to go, an' β¦ getting home could take years. I wanna still be a kid when I see my Dad again. But β¦ a few weeks couldn't hurt. *brightening* It's nice to be somewhere where I'm welcome
π: 0 β©: 1
"It'll be a long journey... I wish I could come and help yah... but... I can't leave my family... you deserve some rest and fun before trying to go back to the galaxy's core" Alex said, patting her on the back, and then reaching out to sniff the "soup" they had made "That smells amazing" She added, Nick rolled his eyes and pretended to gag at that remark
π: 0 β©: 1
Morta: *wistfully* Alex - I couldn't take you, even if you didn't have family. The galactic core is crazy dangerous! It's - there are no worlds with native civilisations there, cuz there are too many giant stars, too much radiation, to many supernovae and stuff - life can *exist* there, but not stably for long Β - but it's also where all the exotic particles needed for all the galaxy's interstellar ships come from. So, loads of money to be made, loads of people out to make it, but no sort'a stable government or anything like that. Plus, no-one sane goes in there without having a backup of 'emselves on the outside, so folk'll assume killin' you is just puttin' you to a bit of expense and inconvenience, an' losin' ya a few weeks memories. But brainweaves don't work on kids, cuz'a the neuroplasticity, so I just gotta take my chances. I don't know if I'm gonna make it, but - I can't give up.
Also, there in't the infrastructure to keep this thing fuelled all the way to the core right now, so after I give you guys a bit of a tour an' get you back to earth, the first thing I gotta do is get back to my time - which is easy, but it's a one-way trip.
*sniffs the concoction in the pot, immediately brightens up* Cor - that doesΒ smell good! *takes a taste* hmmm - I know just what this needs *adds some powdered parmesan* ...and... keep an eye on this for a sec, will ya? *runs into the woods, returns seconds later with a few pungent wild garlic leaves, chops begins to finely chop them up for the pot*
It will be nice ta unwind fer a bit - last few months've been nuts!
π: 0 β©: 0
This looks really really good
π: 0 β©: 0
Wow, that's actually pretty cool looking 8D
π: 0 β©: 0
I like this, the awesome power of a blackhole in such a wonderful painting.
π: 0 β©: 1
Thanks ^^ It was my first attempt at a space painting
π: 0 β©: 0
Nice ! how did u do that ???
π: 0 β©: 1
I used acrylic paint
π: 0 β©: 0
<= Prev |