Chapter 33: Exploring Ashen Port Part 2

 

As expected, finding a fish market in a space station on the outskirts of the galaxy, far far away from any planet, proved to be quite an impossible task. Abyssal and Meica walked far and wide and visited shops left and right. From small grocery stores to a large hypermarket that sells almost everything. 

They travelled a large chunk of Ashen Port in their quest. They used various modes of transportation such as walking and the usage of the train network that goes around the whole spaceport. It was as Abyssal suspected, the whole place was just a large circle. She expected that it would take a few hours to half a day to go around the whole place. 

Along the way, they encountered all sorts of buildings. A list of what they could see were metro complexes, showrooms(for ships and cars), storehouses, rows of houses, small electronic shops, large component dealers and many more. The place probably had what a space traveller would need to kickstart his or her journey. Just exactly what Abyssal wanted.

Unfortunately, the only fish related product that they could find was just canned fish. A product that although dampened Meica's excitement, was still bought in bulk as the Nekomi crave eating fish.

This small trip for grocery shopping, however, gave Abyssal an opportunity to gauge how much they could buy with the credits on-hand. By going through all those shops and seeing the prices of goods in general have allowed her to come to a conclusion.

The 20000 credits that Meica had were nowhere near enough to buy what they needed.

The price for goods and components were definitely out of their budget. The uranium rods to fix Abyssal's reactor amounted to 30k credits per rod. That was just the rods, a whole complete set of components like a new warp drive or a better camera system could cost them hundreds of thousands of credits. That's not to mention buying a whole new ship, that would be in the millions.

The money they had on hand was, without a doubt, equivalent to the allowance of a young teenager. It was barely enough to buy Meica the supplies she needed to stay on board. Abyssal was now in the situation where she needed to find credits before she could go any further.

Having tired of exploring around, Meica and Abyssal decided to take a small break. They packed and carried all the canned fish and visited a nice small outdoor restaurant near the lobby of the station.  Abyssal was laid down on the table at the opposite side of Meica. She was thinking about their situation and how best to tackle it as Meica indulged herself with actual cooked food, the first in months for her.

Abyssal had thought about trading goods to slowly earn cash but ultimately gave up on the plan for now. Just a simple cubic meter of cargo was already in the hundreds of thousands in price. She then thought of maybe selling the Maxwell class ship that she obtained and opted to fix her Fierca class ship instead. She was sure a large freighter like her current ship could get her quite a sum. Though, she would rather that be her nuclear option if possible. She rather liked the new ship. Plus, who knows what kind of ship she will be able to afford, it might be worse than the Maxwell.

She did think about selling the Fierca instead. According to the smugglers, the Fierca class is antique and should fetch quite a price. Though she was a little hesitant about selling the original ship.

"Haaaah…." Abyssal let out a long sigh before looking into the skies.

The skies looked no different than the skies she was used to on earth. It was slightly yellow now, signalling that evening would soon come. Abyssal couldn’t help but praise how amazing these artificial skies were. Maybe she could install one of these in her ship one day? To fully mimic a day night cycle. So far she just turned off most of the lights when the clock strikes nighttime.

“Abyssal okay, Nyaa?” Meica asked as she chewed her food, a single piece of fish whose tail could be seen outside of Meica’s lips.

“Yeah, I was just shocked at how… expensive everything is.”

Meica’s feline ears and tail swooped downwards the moment she heard this. “I’m sorry, Meica don't have much money.”

“No! No! It’s not your fault! Cheer up! If it wasn’t for you, we wouldn’t be able to dock in Ashen port in the first place! I just need to find a way to get more money. It’s my problem, not yours.”

"Un,” Meica nodded before going back to chewing her food.

“Maybe, I should consult Kuon about this first before making any hasty decisions…” Abyssal muttered to herself.

“Nee, nee, Abyssal," Meica called out.

“Hmm? Yeah? Anything?”

Meica turned her head around to observe her immediate vicinity. Once she confirmed that no one was looking at them, she brought herself closer to Abyssal and whispered in her 'ears': “Abyssal is nanomachine, right?”

“Yeah…” Abyssal replied through the small earpiece on Meica’s ears.

“Can assimilate and stuff, right?”

“Yeah, I guess so?"

“Why not assimilate the entire port? Can take all the components you want,” Meica asked with a small innocent smile.

‘Right… There is this option as well, huh. Wait, can I even do such a thing? Take control of an entire space station?’

“Let’s just say… I don’t want to draw unnecessary attention to myself. At least for now,” Abyssal replied.

“Hmm…” Meica furrowed her brows and began to think deeply. A few seconds later she perked up.“Then! Big battlecruiser! Can assimilate! Take over from owner. Solve our warp fuel problem,” Meica whispered loudly.

Abyssal stayed silent for a moment after hearing Meica’s idea. That idea pretty much gave the same kind of problems as assimilating the whole station.

“That’s…. Just say I can even do that, and that’s not even a guarantee, what are we going to do to the crew of the ship,” Abyssal asked Meica.

“Nyaa? Eject them like you did the two smugglers?”

‘This girl is more dangerous than I thought,’ Abyssal thought to herself.

“Proposal rejected. Too random. We will seek other ways to make money,” Abyssal said.

“Roger, nyaa,” Meica gave a clumsy salute before continuing to eat her meal in peace.

They two stayed silent as Meica enjoyed her meal like a happy cat. In the meanwhile, all sorts of thoughts came to Abyssal’s mind. She wondered about how she was going to proceed forward in the future. It was just as Meica said, she is capable of assimilating entire ships and perhaps even an entire space station. She is technically a dangerous weapon, after all.

Yet, something inside her tells that she shouldn’t be doing that. That she shouldn’t not be too careless and expose her identity as a Living Core so easily. Considering what happened to Kuon during her time in New England, Abyssal wouldn’t be surprised if the military would get involved to capture her the moment she was found out. After that, who knows what would happen to her. She might get dissected or something. There might be a chance that her core could be wiped clean and a new memory or personality would be installed in her.

‘I am not in a game, this is real life. I need to be careful about my options.’ Abyssal thought to herself.

But then again, money won't come by so easy for her. Just docking at port was an expense that she could barely afford, don’t talk about trading or transporting cargo. Her knowledge about the matter was knowledge from the games that she played. In those games, there would usually be a terminal, a cafe, a space bar, a guild or even a lounge where players could find, complete a task and get paid. 

Abyssal just wasn’t certain if such a thing existed here in the real world, thousands of years into the future. 

“Hey, Meica,” Abyssal called out.

“Nyaa?” Meica replied while trying to get a piece of meat that was in her teeth out. She was mostly done with eating by now.

“Is there a place where we can accept requests of sorts to get paid or something? Maybe a place to gather information about the sector. Like an oddjobs centre?” Abyssal asked. Might as well, no harm in asking.

“Like doing jobs for people? Do this and that and get paid?” Meica asked.

“Yeah, yeah. Something like that.”

“Freelance work?”

“Yep, yep. That’s the word. Freelancing.”

“Hmm. Can go to space lounge to find jobs.”

“Ohhhh. So they do have a place where I can accept jobs for money.”

“Un. Terminal or people usually at space lounge near landing bays. Terminals also connected to galaxy web, can get information and jobs in the sector..”

“Ohhh. so it’s near the landing bay, huh. Let’s visit the place before going back to the ship.”

“Okay~~”

….
…
..
.

“Oh wow, how did I miss this place the first time around?” Abyssal asked herself as she saw the weird looking bar in the lobby of the space station. 

It was a large premise located at the end of the lobby room. At one corner of the place, one could see pool tables and sets of dart throwing games. At the entrance of the place were few bouncers standing at the entrance of the place. They wore black suits and black glasses. Also, all over the place were the terminals that Meica spoke to Abyssal about. They look like phone booths, except instead of a phone, they house a monitor.

The bar itself looked like a lively place where people from all walks of life would hang out during their stay at Ashen Port. Seemed like a place where people go to gather information and find jobs. From the counter, Abyssal could see a few brawny men having a drinking game. At the pool table, strong looking men and women playing games against each other. Then, you have people just sitting at the table having a civil discussion with one another. 

However, completely juxtaposed to the environment of the place was a lone woman wearing eastern style clothing that looked to be a Kimono. She had long black hair tied into a traditional japanese kimono pattern, complete with a pinkish flowery clip. Her dress was pinkish-yellow in colour and had a few black strands here and there. Her dress also revealed some of the more mature parts of her body, her long smooth legs and a sizable breasts size which can be seen from an open cleavage. 

She was sitting down in a seiza on the floor with a small wooden table in front of her. A set of japanese tea cups on the table which she took occasional sips from. On the floor next to her were two swords. One smaller and one bigger. Abyssal knew them as Katanas. It seemed that she was waiting for something or someone.

‘Is that… a japanese person?’ Abyssal asked herself.

The moment that Abyssal thought that, the woman in the kimono turned her eyes to look at Meica. Or rather, she was staring directly into Abyssal’s personal drone, Kaon. The two locked sight onto each other and Abyssal could feel a sudden chill in her imaginary spine. A few good seconds passed before the japanese looking woman broke eye contact. She then continued to drink in peace, ignoring Abyssal and Meica.

‘Okay… that was weird. This woman looks like trouble. Better not get involved,’ Abyssal thought to herself before turning her attention to Meica.

“Alright. Come on, Meica. Let’s enter the place!”

“Okay~~” Meica replied happily as she tried to walk into the place. She was immediately stopped by the bouncers who were standing at the entrance.

“Hold on missy.” one of the bouncers said.

“Nyaa?” Meica stepped backwards as the two bouncers came towards her.

“Sorry, missy. No nekomis allowed in here unless given permission by the owner”

“Nyaa? Why?” Meica asked back. “Meica needs to get to a terminal.”

“Dunno, owner doesn’t want to have to deal with you people in the lounge, I guess? If you want to use a terminal you can find one elsewhere. Unless you can prove to me that you have permission to be in here, you best be going away.”

“Nothing big man can do to let me in?” Meica asked as she tried to sidestep her way in. The two bouncers moved to prevent her from doing so.

 

“Sorry, rules are rules. Jobs a job. So buzz off, alright?” The man responded in a rude tone. He then shoved Meica away. 

“Hiss!” Meica let out a snarl at the man before letting out a "Hmpph!” before walking away from the area.

 

* * * * *

 

“Nyaa! Meica angry! Two big men so mean, don’t let Meica enter place!” Meica complained as she slowly walked up the ramp to the S.A.S. Abyssal. They decided that they had enough of exploring for the day and got back to the ship.

“Yeah… I didn’t think there was such a rule. Such a weird rule and out of nowhere too. Ahhh... it would have been great if we could check out that terminal,” Abyssal said as the two entered the ship.

The moment she entered the ship, Abyssal immediately got off Meica's hands and started to float about like she normally does. 

“Meica sorry, nyaa," Meica said in a depressed tone, her tail and ears swoop downwards, as if she had no energy.

“Don’t worry about it, we’ll find another terminal. Pretty sure they are some that's not in the bar. Maybe in another port/that doesn't have these stupid rule."

“Un… Meica feels tired. Going to sleep early first,” Meica said as she started walking towards her room lethargically.

“Good night. Have a great sleep!” Abyssal said as she waved at Meica from behind. 

....
....

Abyssal stared at her back for a while until Meica disappeared from the drone’s sight. She gave herself a nod before speaking out. “Kuon, can you hear me?”

“I read you loud and clear, Master. Welcome back," Kuon’s voice answered through the small communication device in Kaon.

“The exploration… didn’t really go well. Meet me at the bridge, we need to discuss our next move. Also, how’s the installation of the new cameras?”

“Installations of the cameras are successful, Master. They may not be as high quality as the other cameras, but with this, there are no longer any more blindspots in the ship.”

Abyssal focussed on herself and she could indeed find new vision at places where she never used to have. Cameras that she asked Kuon to create from the scraps of unused drones in the Maxwell. She checked through the camera’s one by one until she saw a certain Nekomi, walking towards her room— in her hands was a bag full of canned fish.

“Got it. Looks like the system is working well. Good work, Kuon,” Abyssal said as she made her way towards her bridge.

The entire purpose of the trip wasn't just to explore Ashen port, but also to make sure that Meica would not be in the ship as the two ship girls enforced the security of the S.A.S. Abyssal. So far, she had not done anything wrong, but it always pays to be safe.