Countdown (Reality Benders Book #1) LitRPG Series

by Michael Atamanov

  Uraz Tukhsh, without standing from the hovering couch, said something else incomprehensible, turned and pointed at his ship. It seemed he was suggesting I follow him to the ship although... I wasn’t sure. No, couldn’t be right. I opened Gnat’s skill table and set all five free Astrolinguistics points there, thus raising it to level eighteen.

  It became somewhat easier. I even understood the captain's next question: he wanted to know if two single-use geological analyzers would be enough, or if it would be better to take three. Clumsily, to the best of my ability, I suggested we get three. Just to be clear, I showed him three splayed fingers.

  “It’s expensive here... damn... boondocks... backward planet... damn... fifty per... totally... damn... just... damn...”

  In that matter, I was in complete agreement with Uraz Tukhsh because I was still in shock after hearing the price myself. Fifty crystals for just one!!! What could I possibly find to compensate such huge expenses?!

  “Gnat... elevator... landing zone... go Shiamiru... buy three... hurry.”

  Uraz Tukhsh considered the conversation over, got up heavily from the table and headed up the spiral ramp.

  So, for now, I understood what to do. The captain had ordered me to take the elevator and go to the starship, while he went off to buy geological analyzers without me. I didn’t argue and headed to the elevator in the middle of the room, although I of course would have liked to go up a floor to take a look at an alien electronics shop.

  But, I when I reached the elevator doors, I was stumped. Was this some kind of joke? The wall didn’t have any panel of buttons with floor numbers like I expected, just a small flat slit, perhaps for a narrow plastic card or some kind of key? I didn’t want to go find the captain to ask. Such a small issue wasn’t worth looking dumb this early. But there was no one else around.

  If I went and asked the captain for help, his first impression of me would be that I was ignorant and bad at taking orders. That was off the table. I considered going down the spiral ramp, leaving the dispatcher tower and just climbing the landing field wall. But I figured that was too risky. After all, what if the Geckho guards took me for a thief and shot me?! But what other options did I have? Stand here and wait like an idiot? Or just go up after the captain? What if...

  I looked around and didn’t see any security cameras, so I took out my knife and tried to pry up the panel. It was held to the wall with simple snaps and fairly easily broke off the wall, so I removed the whole panel with its electronic circuit and wires. So, what do we have here? I carefully studied the device.

  Electronics skill increased to level seventeen!

  The way the security system worked, the proper key would connect the wires and form a circuit. Was that all?! With the knife blade, I completed the circuit and immediately heard the elevator go into motion. It worked!

  Break-in skill increased to level seven!

  Break-in skill increased to level eight!

  You have reached level twenty-one!

  You have received three skill points!

  Quickly putting the panel back in place, I entered the elevator doors as they slid aside. Inside, instead of the usual buttons, there was just a slide lever that moved along a slit in the wall. But this didn’t take much thought. I needed to go down, so I moved the lever to the very lowest position. The doors gradually closed, the elevator went into motion and soon took me to the landing field.

  Hell yeah! It worked! Now time to go to the starship!

  * * *

  I was expecting the crew to be intrigued by me, but their reaction was surprisingly reserved and even insultingly careless. After hearing that Uraz Tukhsh sent me, and that I was flying with them to the asteroids, the Geckho lost interest and got back to business. The technicians were readying the shuttle for take-off, checking the systems and fussing around with the tools next to the right thruster. The high-level Navigator and Supercargo on the ground next to the gangway phlegmatically led their gazes over me, not asking any questions. The guardsman, draped head to toe in weaponry, also simply stepped aside, letting me onto the starship.

  They just took me at my word, and I got the impression that anyone who wanted could enter. What could I say? I didn’t insist on being tested, just came aboard the Shiamiru.

  Inside the shuttle, conditions were very cramped. There wasn’t enough space even for me. I had to walk down the main corridor hunched over. In places, I even had to go sideways. I simply could not imagine how the larger Geckho moved through these halls or let others pass! In fact, the whole crew area was no larger than a typical intercity bus, even though it was meant for sixteen crew members!

  The four tiny living quarters branched off from the main hallway, each with four bunks. The residential area had two, other smaller offshoots as well — one into the locked cargo hold, and a second leading to the captain’s bridge. I stopped in indecision, not knowing where to sit.

  “Gnat can go here... enough... things,” one of the crew members noticed my confusion and (here I didn’t understand) was either inviting me to stay in his bunk room or angrily demanding I make way.

  Vasha Tushihh. Geckho. Clan Tushihh-Layneh. Level-62 Heavy Robot Operator

  Seemingly, he was inviting me to join him, as the red-furred giant, huge even by Geckho standards, wearing an armored space suit and an unbuttoned helmet stepped aside, making room for me. I immediately took him up on that and sat down on the very edge of the plastic bench. What was this? I felt like I was seeing double. An identical Geckho was sitting opposite me and polishing his helmet with green paste and a rag.

  Basha Tushihh. Geckho. Clan Tushihh-Layneh. Level-63 Heavy Robot Operator

  Twin brothers? That seemed to be the case. My other roommate was a short Geckho with huge yellow eyes and thick black fur, striped with an unusual white forking pattern in white. Nature could hardly have created such a bizarre, geometrically-perfect coloration. I was probably more likely seeing an artificial dye job.

  Uline Tar. Geckho. Clan Tar-Layne. Level-56 Trader

  Our bunk room could not have been larger than a standard train compartment. It was quite cramped. I took a look around at the place I’d be spending the next day. Dim lighting. The walls and even ceiling were festooned with boxes and bags, which were seemingly attached by magnets or something sticky. My roommates personal items were crammed under the two benches. There were two more sleeping shelves folded above us. If they were down, none of us would be able to walk.

  I greeted my roommates one after the next in Geckho and added: “Happy to meet you!” To which the trader grumbled through his teeth, not hiding his annoyance:

  “Last trip... damn... loser... didn’t find a decent Prospector... I’ll leave Uraz Tukhsh for another... damn... is gonna get it!!!”

  Seemingly, it wasn’t only the trader upset by my low level. But I soon realized that I was not the only reason for Uline Tar’s dismay, nor even the most important. The Trader was calling the captain a loser, and I assumed such angry words must have had some basis. I caught less than half of what my talkative roommate said, but I got the general picture. Our captain Uraz Tukhsh was from an ancient aristocratic house and, according to Geckho tradition, before receiving territory or subjects, he had to prove himself either in military service, or some other field.

  Uraz Tukhsh decided to try his hand as a trader, seeking adventure and fortune. It was apparently quite a common choice. He got some starting capital from his family, enough to buy a cargo shuttle and hire a crew, then headed off into the cosmos, seeking his lucky star. He couldn’t hack it on the more crowded routes. The traders there were too crafty. So, the young aristocrat headed to the edge of the known universe, hoping to find success out on the frontier. That had led him to a recently discovered system, the projection of our Solar System in the game that bends reality.

  Trading with the native tribes (one of which was my Human-3 Faction) had not been quite as profitable as he hoped. We simply didn’t have the currency to purchase high-tech go
ods from far away. The local goods, meanwhile, were mostly cheap raw materials that needed further processing and were of interest only in massive quantity. But that niche was already occupied, and the Shiamiru was too small for that anyway.

  Now, Uraz Tukhsh had been trying his best to process asteroids for twenty days and had even bought an automated mineral processor. But he hadn’t found anything of value in this system yet, and the cheap metals he had collected just barely recouped his ship upkeep expenses. What could I say? This confirmed Ivan Lozovsky's story and explained why the captain had a sudden need for a Prospector.

  Astrolinguistics skill increased to level nineteen!

  * * *

  “We’re taking off! Everyone get ready! Navigator, set a course for previous coordinates. Hopefully we’ll find something better this time and put our mobile ore processor to good use!” the captain’s voice thundered down the corridor. I understood every word!

  A howl and a whistle blasted out. The walls vibrated. I looked at my neighbors in alarm, but Basha Tushihh was still polishing his helmet lens, while Uline Tar just kept complaining. The vibration was getting stronger, even surging. My back was pressed against the wall, but it was bearable.

  A bag fell off the wall onto the floor. The Trader remarked in dismay that it was an insignificant occurrence:

  “Our captain’s just trying to save on the gravity compensators...”

  “Well, we broke one gravity compensators during landing,” Basha Tushihh finally looked up from his helmet and joined the conversation. “I told the captain, enough ore containers in the hold already, we’re already nearly one and a half times over capacity. But no, he didn’t listen...”

  “And most importantly, the risk wasn’t even worth taking,” Uline Tar found more fodder for her dismay. “All we found was practically worthless. It couldn’t even pay for the repair...”

  As I listened to Uline whine, I was walking on air. I had begun to understand them! Cool! What was more, the engine overloads began to gradually weaken, then came to an end. Things were looking up!

  But my rose-tinted glasses flew off when I took out my scanner and switched it on. YIKES! On the dark screen, there was a complete mess of abstract colorful flourishes. What the heck??? I didn’t understand a single symbol. My level-19 Astrolinguistics skill and understanding of spoken Geckho were no help with written texts... How could I do my job if I couldn’t understand a single bit of the scanner’s output?!

  Just to test, I dumped another point into Astrolinguistics, raising the skill to level twenty. It didn’t help. I might as well have been reading Chinese. Actually, this was worse. I at least had a tentative grasp of how Chinese writing worked. Here I didn’t even understand where to start. How did these variously colored geometric patterns work? I had to ask my roommates for help.

  Uline Tar, not hiding her negative opinion of me, the captain and our expedition as a whole, predictably refused. But Basha and Vasha agreed. It was more likely out of boredom than a desire to help, but still the twins started teaching me their writing.

  * * *

  Our practice was already entering its fifth hour. I had to admit, my brains were already fried from the abundance of new information, but I was still trying diligently to memorize more and more sequences of curves, broken lines, spirals and loops. The Geckho symbols didn’t correspond to sounds or even separate words. In their language, every sentence or phrase was depicted with a single line, wiggling, looping and spiraling depending on the meaning, but always closed at the end, indicating the end of a semantic unit.

  At a certain point, seeing my obvious strain and even limited success, the Trader also started trying to teach me. And eventually, I reached the point of being able to write “Uline Tar, space trader.” Part of it looked nearly identical to another phrase they’d taught me, “pretty lady,” and clearly that was no mere coincidence.

  Astrolinguistics skill increased to level twenty-five!

  You have reached level twenty-two!

  You have received three skill points! (total points accumulated: five)

  I told my teachers I thought the two different phrases looked similar. And at the same time, I asked whether I had understood correctly that Uline Tar was a Geckho lady.

  “Ha! He finally got it! Took you a while,” Uline frowned.

  She stood up and walked into the corridor. It seemed she was offended. I suspected that Uline considered herself irresistibly attractive, so she was offended that I couldn’t tell the difference between her and the two huge twin brothers.

  “You know, it’s actually pretty obvious,” Basha told me, lowering his voice to a whisper. “The ratio between arms and torso are different, the height is somewhat less, the ears point back, the figure is different and women have unique fur patterns. Didn’t you notice?”

  I didn’t try to excuse my ignorance, apologize or justify myself. I just wasn’t up to it. Uline was already back, carrying three folded metal tripods and a silver envelope.

  “The captain told me to give you these geological analyzers and this spacesuit,” the furry lady remarked.

  Above all, I was interested in the suit. The whole silver jumpsuit was made of rubberized fabric with metallic coating. It also had clip-in gloves and a ball-shaped transparent helmet that folded back. The back of the suit had a fairly heavy thick metal container, clearly an air tank.

  Light spacesuit (suitable for thin air, vacuum or noncorrosive gasses)

  Radiation defense +12, Armor 1.

  Air tank refill time: 12 minutes.

  Single tank duration: 2.5 hours.

  Statistic requirements: Constitution 6, Strength 6.

  The statistic requirements were very forgiving, appropriate for practically any person. And the fabric easily stretched, so the light space suit was practically unisize. I opened my equipment window and equipped the suit. A moment later, I was totally inside and ready to work in the vacuum of space.

  Everything was fine and dandy, but I was embarrassed by two clear protrusions from the front of my suit. What was that? Was this made to be worn over a woman’s breasts!? This was a woman’s space suit!!!

  When I told my companions in confusion, both brothers and the girl started rumbling very loudly through their teeth, which was the sound of uncontrollable Geckho laughter. Soon, other furballs also appeared in the hallway, attracted to the sound of amusement. And soon, everyone in the crew had heard the embarrassing story.

  Fame increased to 13.

  What was I to them, a clown to lighten their collective mood? I changed the space suit into my usual clothing. Alright, in one way or another, everything with the space suit was clear — it was perfectly fine, even though I looked somewhat awkward. The time had now come to sort out the geological analyzers.

  I took one of the heavy tripods and turned it in my hands. Lozovsky had said something about screwing the metallic rod into soil, but I didn’t see any threading on any of the feet. It was simply three smooth yard-long metal rods, now folded together, all attached to a rectangular plastic box. Maybe this was a different model? And by the way, where was the on button? And how did they synchronize with my scanner? I grabbed one and unfolded a leg in search of a hidden switch.

  Something clicked...

  The lights turned off not only in our bunk, but down the whole corridor, in the neighboring bunks, and seemingly in the entire starship. The Shiamiru sharply jerked and started spinning on its axis, which threw me into a wall. The only source of light remaining in the starship was my scanner screen. I was happy to be able to read the text, though:

  “Signal detected. Data collection underway”

  Scanning skill increased to level twenty-five!

  I heard screams of fear from all directions. None of the Geckho understood what was happening or why. Through all the clamor, the captain’s voice thundered out:

  “Gnnnnnat!!!”

  Fame increased to 14.

  Chapter Twenty-Five. Space Anomaly

  I WAS
SAVED from grueling punishment only by because the reserve power flipped on in short order, and the automatic systems evened out the Shiamiru's flight. All the same, I was not spared a long and obscene dressing down from the captain. Thankfully, Uraz Tukhsh did not accuse me of intentional sabotage, but I heard a lot of assertions on the low intellectual level of the human race as a whole, and Gnat in particular. But the captain was more outraged by the fact that we had wasted one of three analyzers than the power overload. He even threatened to shake my faction down to recoup his expenses after we returned.

  Haunted by visions of the faces of my faction leaders if that came to pass, I tried to offer Uraz Tukhsh compensation in the form of my Dark Faction laser pistol. But the captain, without even glancing at it, advised me to “use that primitive weapon to shoot yourself through your worthless brain.” Fortunately, the storm gradually settled, and I wasn’t even thrown overboard without a spacesuit. Uraz Tukhsh had been screaming about just such a punishment, though. I was even morally prepared to respawn back at my capital base in shame.

  Over all the screams and commotion, none of the crew even noticed that I had saved the scan in my device’s memory. However, my thoughtless action had netted me a highly-detailed three-dimensional blueprint of an alien starship!

  When the captain calmed down, and my roommates drifted off, I turned on my scanner and carefully acquainted myself with the saved file. It showed all the key sections of the Shiamiru-class ship along with its control systems and power sources, rooms, corridors and technical components. Practically every rivet could be seen in my highly detailed 3D-model! I had even detected a safe in the wall of the captain’s chambers, which looked to contain just over three pounds of platinum and approximately the same quantity of iridium. Naturally, I didn’t tell Uraz Tukhsh and the other crew members about my discovery because I was afraid the Geckho would demand I delete the valuable data.