“What the hell is that?
Why is there a giant hole?
Were we attacked?” I’m practically hyperventilating, I’m talking so fast.
[Calmness, Host.
Beta dug an internal ship hanger for the Bessie and has been making caverns and caves.
They’ve set up the surveillance equipment from Beta all around the asteroid, giving it complete situational awareness.
No attacks have been made.
There have been a few ships detected, but none have approached Beta.] phew ok “Thank you Exie, sorry I lost my cool there for a moment.
The thought of losing our base right after starting really hit me hard.
This is important to me.
Also, I don’t want to lose Beta or the ship.” yeah its Beta, I got worried about Beta.
In fact, it was a surprise to me how floored the thought made me.
This really is important.
Just because I’m winging it and only have an outline of a plan, doesn’t mean I’m not invested in it.
I’ve been grinding nutripacks to pay for all this.
And other stuff, but it was all geared to come back here and make a base.
I need a secret place to do my thing.
No one can learn of my powers and abilities nor Exie.
too many secrets, sigh.
It’s a lot of work keeping secrets, costs a lot of internal energy that no one sees.
Exie maneuvers Amadeus to enter the internal hanger bay through the tiny looking hole.
Before it was so big, now I’m wondering if we’ll fit.
“Umm, Exie.
Are we gonna fit?
It looks like we’re not gonna fit.” [Host, there is plenty of room.
There’s over a meter of extra space, well within tolerances.
We’ll just go slow and cram it in.] “A meter?
That’s not much.
Just take it slow.
Damaging our new ship would really suck, and I’d have to explain it to my sister.
Do you want to explain it to her?” [Definitely not.
I’ll do my best but she won’t listen to me, it would have to be you.] “Funny guy now are we?
Heh alright just don’t damage Amadeus.” I am definitely never piloting it in here through that tiny hole.
Nope.
No way.
Despite my worries, Exie expertly threads the needle.
Slowly, barely moving, we glide into the hanger, one meter at a time.
The sound of metal grinding on stone never comes and soon, the display adjusts to the lower light level and I can see a giant cavern that we are flying into.
It’s about 100 meters long and 50 meters wide with an arched ceiling over 30 meters tall in the center, easily big enough to fit both Bessie and Amadeus.
In fact, as Amadeus touches down softly, Bessie is landing right next to us.
Not too shabby.
With Exie piloting both ships, it’s just as smooth a landing over there as here.
I’m just uncertain how fast Amadeus can exit in an emergency.
I make a mental note to see if we can back in next time for a fast reaction in case we have to defend the base.
Beta comes through the LAN comms, [Welcome to Beta Asteroid Base, Host.
I hope you are happy with our improvements.] His deeper tone really makes it feel like he’s a separate entity from Exie.
“Good job holding down the fort, Beta.
I’ll need a run down of all the changes since I’ve been away.
Also, let’s expedite a door to the hanger so we can put some atmosphere in here.” I grumble the last part, not trying to sound ungrateful for all their hard work.
It’s obvious they’ve been busy while we were gone.
[Sure thing, Host.
It was just left off the list since it didn’t impact our speed of excavation.
All of the maintenance bots from the ship have been repurposed and busy digging out the base since you’ve been gone.
We started making ramps to the Beta ship and excavating the first cavern, a 50m by 20m cave, then moved to the hangar here which you are parked in.
Nice ship by the way.
It’s a good thing I used Beta ship as the model for how big a ship to prepare to fit in here.] As they speak, I’m walking out of Amadeus, inspecting the main hanger.
It’s a rough rectangle with tall vaulted ceilings.
The walls look a little rough but well made.
You can see the marks from picks or lasers, honestly I’m not sure how they did it.
I look toward the hole we just flew through to get in here, then back at Amadeus, then back at the hole.
Its amazing Amadeus fit.
I can’t help thinking it looks like an anus.
Shaking my head, I move on.
I then wander to the cave next to Beta Ship, the first one he mentioned.
It’s smaller than the main hangar, but still 1000 square meters, which is pretty big.
And empty.
It’s just an empty shell, but we’ll fill it up in no time.
The ceiling is lower here, only about 6 meters, but we could cram some 2 story buildings in here and double the space.
Nice, 2000 meters of storage and workshops.
Since this is next to the ship, and might be noisy, let’s make this the ‘loud’ zone, the industrial section.
Locating all production here would make logistics and maintenance much easier.
Smiling ever so slightly, I glance up towards Beta Ship and see… Empty space?.
Just a ledge where the front half of Beta used to be.
Wth.
Where’d the ship go?
“Um, Beta, where’s the rest of the ship?” I ask, unsure why it was dismantled in the first place.
I figured we could dig it out if we ever needed to use it, but not anymore.
Nope.
there’s a pile of armor panels on the ground to the side.
Ok at least they’re organized.
That’s a good sign.
I walk up the ramp and see that the only part of the ship remaining is the engine room.
Damn.
the whole ship’s been taken apart.
Beta doesn’t make me wait long, but it feels like an eternity.
“Host, when you left you said to make this place into a base.
After building the first two caverns, we integrated the ship cabins into the third cavern as living space, since you can’t live here until we put up the gate and pump air into here.
The third cavern is about the same as the first but with the ship as living quarters inside of it.” woah, so it’s in the third cavern?
I walk quickly, since I’m curious now more than upset, and lo and behold it’s like a ship city.
The cabins are all placed on one side of the cavern with easily enough space for another 2 ships worth of cabins.
As I passed the entrance it was easy to see the foundation for an airlock here to allow this whole cavern to be pressurized.
Ok i’m warming up to it.
The bridge, then the captain’s quarters are located side by side.
Then the other three residences and the cargo hold last of all.
However, the 3 crew cabins are sitting on top of the cargo hold, making it a 2 story structure.
It looks even better than when I was imagining it in Cavern 1.
The way it was done so that all the walls of the buildings match and the external metal stairs to access the cabins, it looks truly professional.
It’s a little town, right here inside an asteroid.
I must admit I’m a bit impressed.
They are all intact and seem able to hold pressure still, but it’ll still be a while before this is the living quarters.
There is power here at least.
They’ve run power cables into here to power equipment from the main engine.
We can bring one of the auxiliary power units over here if we need to but running power lines works too.
It’s kind of nice to keep that farther from the living space anyway, they’re not quiet so let them live over there.
On the right side of the room is the 3D printer off Beta Ship as well as all the hoppers holding the material it uses.
The machine is busy printing what looks like panels of metal for who knows what.
I need to wrap my head around everything going on so it’s not running me.
I run things.
Not the other way around.
Nodding to myself I acknowledge their hard work “this looks good Beta.
A good start.
I was a little unprepared for how much you’ve done, but you’ve done good.
Mission accomplished.
Lets get this room pressurized asap, and then the ship hanger gate door.
Once this area is all livable we’ll expand some more, deeper into the asteroid.
Send a progress report to Amadeus, our new ship by the way, and I’ll read it and figure out our moves going forward.
What are you making here in the printer?” I can’t help but ask.
Not knowing is bothering me.
“It’s the panels for the pressure door of the airlock nearby.
Once they are done printing the maintenance bots weld them together and then attach them to the door frame.
The foundations are curing, we’ve been using regolith mixed with metal powders and heating them with microwaves till they heat up and melt together.
It’s very strong.
Much stronger than concrete and just slightly less strong than steel.
It’s stronger than iron for sure.
Once I learned it was strong enough, we didn’t continue testing to find its failure point but it’s definitely stronger than cured concrete.” As I listen, I notice some maintenance bots doing just that.
They dumped some powder and shaped it to their required dimensions, then another one came over with a small antenna and dish, holding it next to the powder.
It slowly softened and molded into a putty looking consistency.
They removed the antenna dish gun and the putty solidified into a glass looking metal crystal material.
It looks like both metal and glass at the same time.
Wow, just like I did when I made the lenses to cover Beta’s engines when I left.
Smart AI.
This really is the skeleton of an Asteroid Base.
Ok time to get the trike out, since all the important stuff is out of the way.
Trike time!
Since there’s no problems, let’s have some fun.
“Beta, I also need a ramp built to get outside.
I don’t think I can drive the trike out the hanger door.” Sheepishly I request the ramp.
“No need, Host, we’ve already made one.
On the far side of the residential area is a ramp and airlock.
That airlock was completed first and the second one is just hours from finishing.
After that 12 hours or so to fill with air.
So by tomorrow this area will be ready for habitation.” “I can hear the pride in your voice, Beta.
Good work.
Ok keep it up.
I’m gonna check the perimeter.” I say with a smile on my face.
I used to know a guy who’d say that when he wanted some alone time from his wife.
He’d go out and smoke in his man cave or wander the yard.
Private time is very important.
We need to switch off sometimes.
And that’s what I’m about to do.
Switch off.
Private time.
Check the perimeter.
No nutripacks.
It also gives me an excuse to try out my new ride!
I’m not playing, this is important work, heh.
Very important work.