Nova- Chapter 2

Story by Grawlixed on SoFurry

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#2 of Nova

The second in a series. Hopefully the wider image of the world is starting to form. Let me know what you think!



From:Sales@envirotec.relay.de

To:Aiden@nova-research-group.sci

Hello, Aiden!

Regarding our phone conversation earlier today, this is an email to confirm the purchase and dispatch of the following items:

15 x Envirotec™ Temperature Sensor

1 x Satellite Relay Unit (SRU)

1 x Signal Amplifier

5 x Envirociv™ Motion Sensor

1 x Custom Product Code: 9982, (Atmospheric modification dispersal unit)

1 x Envirociv™ Wireless Camera with Microphone

These items have been scheduled to be dispatched on the second-to-last shuttle of this batch; if I remember rightly, you're on the last one, right?

Good luck in the wastes, and be sure to watch yourself, I hear that degeneracy runs rampant out there.

Thanks for being a valued customer, and hope to talk to you again soon!

Ryan


"God, fifteen of these bloody things?! Now he tells me." Alex grumbled as he realized he was only halfway through the installation of these infernal modules. They were to be installed in the ground around the compound; how did the wolf explain it, again? Some large box he was installing on the roof of the lab would speak to these devices and a satellite in orbit (Although, how on earth he expected to be able to do that in *this* weather without a signal amp was beyond him) to try and calculate if atmospheric modification was possible. Apparently, the guys in the know had discovered a second deposit of Etherite in this region; about the same size as the one the First City was built around. Etherite was essentially the oil of this planet; a single "Shard", about 10 by 30 centimeters squared, which was the standard unit for this material, was enough to power a house for a year, and as the technology evolved it could only go up.

Needless to say, for Earth, slowly running out of oil and uranium, was very interested in developments on Nova. Only problem was, it was a long, long way away and it was quite expensive to send craft there. In fact, shortages in fuel had caused the regular supply shipments to the First and Second Cities to stop; thankfully, by now the planet was self-sufficient.

"Hey, I heard that!" Wolf responded; in an... uneasy manner. He had been acting a bit weird; like he wanted to speak to Alex but stopped himself at the last moment. Alex left it for now, but.. He didn't want to essentially live with someone holding something back. For the time being he pushed it back into his mind and onto the job. The interface glasses he was wearing gave him the location of the sensors he was supposed to install. The sensors were oval-shaped with a button on the top and the bottom; you could tell one side from the other as the top had various indents in, supposedly to receive signals. Pressing the one on the bottom extended the "anchors" which would go into the ground, and the one on the top extended the antennae which was concealed in the top half of the device.

They were pretty heavy but he was able to carry all of them at once. Installing them was simple; they had their own batteries that lasted for months at a time. Just press the button on the bottom, stick it in the ground, press the buttom on the top and move on to the next one.

Alex had done all but one of them when the weather was picking up, and picking up fast - he was regretting not bringing some kind of protective face mask as the cold was getting past his warm clothes and fur. He didn't have the time to stop now; Aiden would have to connect to each of these which would take a decent amount of time; until morning, and the pair had been given orders. He didn't want to disobey orders. He knelt down to the ground and put the last monitor in place before standing up. The wind around him was howling something fierce. He reset his destination to home - he couldn't see more than a meter in front of him so he'd have to rely on its guidance.

At this point, the weather was downright dangerous. This wasn't normal, not at all - usually the system predicted every change with clockwork efficiency. Something was wrong here. Alex trudged through the snow as fast as he could, but the heavy snow and wind were impeding him. His fingers, face, feet.. They were all cold, to the point of being numb.

"Oh God, what did you do?!" Alex yelped through the mic as a piercing wave of cold overtook his body. "It's never been this bad!" Dog continued; making his way towards the lab; - thankfully, he was able to reach it before anything particularly bad happened. Desperately rubbing the key-pass against the sensor, the door eventually let him in and he stumbled inside; the door closing behind him. The first thing he noticed was the warmth; it almost felt like he was on fire, but he was too weak to do anything about it. The light, too - it made his eyes water. He gasped to air as he took his coat - the first of several layers - off and discarding it on the floor beside him as he slumped against the wall to the left of the entrance.

He was soaked, chilled to the core and exhausted. He very nearly could have died of frostbite, too. It had never been this bad - not ever. How peculiar that this would happen right after "monitoring equipment" was installed! He let out a deep breath. He was fine - he was fine, he didn't have frostbite. This was just some kind of freak occurrence. Bad luck, that was all.

"Alex, Alex, I just got your message, are you alright?" A concerned Aiden rang through his ears. Sounded convincing, but at the same time lying came incredibly easy for some.

"I'm- I'm fine, a bit cold though." Alex laughed, deciding not to worry the wolf. No, it.. It wasn't even possible for the equipment to be up and running at this stage, Alex reasoned. Aiden had nothing to do with it.

"I got all of 'em set up anyway, just don't go asking me to go out and do that again, 'cause the snow kicked up something fierce. If I'd been out there much longer I would have got frostbite, or.." Alex shuddered a little, "Or worse. Anyway, I'm fine. How's it looking on your end?" Alex spoke, hopeful.

He looked around; the various boxes that had been occupying this hallway were gone - presumably, equipment to be installed. In front of him was the entrance to the lab. The door was mostly glass, which let him see through - that entryway was clear, as well

"Yeah, it's all looking good here. I have a few more things I need to do, but that's the satellite uplink for tomorrow. I'll need you to do that, they said you were good with comms stuff." The wolf spoke; indeed, 'comms stuff' happened to be something he was quite good at.

"Yep, but I don't think we're going to be talking to any satellite without a signal amp, and even then it'll take a long time to properly modulate the signal. Didn't they give you Quantum Cards?" Alex responded.

"Quantum Cards? What, you mean the quantum-entangled network stuff? No way, they cost more than what I make in a decade, And, yeah, I got a signal amplifier. One of those Envirotec ones, apparently they're supposed to be the best." Wolf spoke through the headset. Envirotek?!

They were some of the best; expensive, too. You could only get their kit imported from Earth, and those shuttles had stopped for now. Aiden was on the last one, presumably. Something about a shortage of fuel and "other things being prioritized". When it came to nuclear propellant, "other priorities" didn't sound too good.

"Hm.. Might be able to get this working after all, but.. tomorrow." Alex stated - no way he could go out and face the elements again. Thankfully, Aiden seemed to agree, having got as much set up as they could. Summoning his strength, Alex got out of his slump and went to his bedroom. The warmth made him relax, and his sore body was at this point begging for rest. He could only close the door behind him before he took off some more of his clothes before collapsing on his bed; going straight to sleep. Dogs were like that; they could sleep almost immediately if they wanted to.

Meanwhile, Aiden, a few floors above Alex, was mumbling to himself. The gentle glow of the screen illuminated his fur as he rested his head in his hands, shaking his head a little.

"No, I don't.. I don't want to be.. I have to.. I have to be careful. Just like before. I can do this." He glanced over to his right; a bag with a few packages inside. Satisfied that everything was connected up OK, he got ahold of the bag and travelled down to his own room, noting the strong scent of dog on his way through the lobby. It was familiar but had its distinct tone from it. 'But we're nothing alike', thought Aiden. 'Just colleagues. Just colleagues.' He bit his lip a little, before lightly sighing and closing the door behind him.

After the pair went to sleep, the machinery upstairs flickered and transmitted. This entire station was originally intended to just be a weather research station - but later on its purpose had been warped a little to include "weather alteration". If they could control the weather, Etherite extraction would go a lot easier. That'd be good for the colony, but as it was right now most of it - what little there was mined so far - was sent back to Earth on the shuttles, but.. It.. wasn't a good place, especially for Anthros. They were a definite minority on Earth; typically assigned the worst jobs. The only reason Alex was able to be in such a "important" job as a tech for a research station was because he was an Anthro; a Husky, able to withstand the cold. Not even with all the protective gear in the world could a human withstand the elements that much. Humans were still here, of course - but few in number. Even if you were a human, life on Earth wasn't all that good. For some, they had to spend their lives scraping an existence, one eye looking forward, but another always glancing behind your shoulder..


City Hall,

Second City,

Nova

These reinforced iron walls were once the pick of the hardy colonists, and not those who saw fit to rule them. However, the resources weren't to spare here. Sure, the buildings could look nice, in their own way, but.. It was made out of the same material. Keeps everyone..in touch, with what they're supposed to be doing. It's cold, though. A draft of cold wind ran through the place; just now hitting a small office room with a few desks. Two people were left inside; presumably trapped in by the storm.

"I hear that the guys at the weather lab got everything sorted out; we're getting the first transmissions accross just now." A gruff voice spoke; some kind of big cat, probably. Maybe a lion.

"Oh, really?" A female voice spoke, surprised, but in the office-workerish kind of way. An off-handed, empty, polite response that didn't mean anything. Her eyes gazed back to a screen.

On one of the desks, a phone began to ring. Ten, twenty seconds - then nothing. It didn't get picked up.

"Yeah. I said to get it done by morning, but I guess they took it a bit too literally. They didn't get the satellite connection up in time so we're going to have to wait until tomorrow to get any real data through, but maybe soon we'll be able to sort these storms phasing in and out." The big cat shivered. "At least make them less brutal, hopefully."

"Mm. You know, we got another transmission through from Earth today," she spoke, obviously distracted with something else. Someone she liked on Novabook, or a text message from a friend. Nothing to do with work - after all, it was past 5, and neither were getting paid overtime.

"Really?" The big cat's eyes rose from his own screen to look at her. "What'd it say?"

"Oh, just something about the Iberians. You know what was going on there, right?" She spoke, a little more 'into it' now. "A region there tried to declare independence, but they.." She took a moment; "They attacked it from orbit. Vaporized the entire place. Fifty square kilometers, gone. Just like that.

The big cat - a lion - huffed. "Ridiculous."

"Don't let them catch you saying that, Chris." A stern, but well-meaning warning.

The storm outside lessened a little; didn't howl quite so much. Sting not quite as severe.

The lion got up from his seat, notified of this brief respite. Saying goodbye to his colleague - "Sure. See you tomorrow."

As he left, she looked at him from behind. An expression of worry rested on her human features. He was good at what he did, for sure. Almost a logistics wizard, he was able to get things from the First City exactly where they were needed and sometimes in the nick of time. He was given almost carte blanche - with reason, of course - to get this city up and running, and that worried her. He let a few too many things slide, and it would come back to bite him soon, she worried.

Not that she disagreed with what he did. Secretly, she admired him for it; tried to support him in the background, when she spoke to her superiors more than a hundred light years away. Someone had to.