Zytainium

Zytainium

By Robert Willgren

Copyright 2011 Robert Willgren

Smashwords Edition

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Table of Contents

Chapter 1 – The Beginning

Chapter 2 – A New Dawn

Chapter 3 – The Launch

Chapter 4 – The Falling

Chapter 5 – Spaceport Command

Chapter 6 – New Mission

Chapter 7 – The Investigation

Chapter 8 – The Next Move

Chapter 9 – The Tevian Connection

Chapter 10 – Jarod’s Meeting

Chapter 11 – Grundale Again

Chapter 12 – The Rescue

Chapter 13 – The Complacent

Chapter 14 – Finding Gasvores

Chapter 15 – Systems in Turmoil

Chapter 16 – The Offensive

Chapter 17 – The Counter Offensive

Chapter 18 – The Turning of The Tide

Chapter 19 – The Peace

Chapter 20 – Epilogue

Chapter 1 - The Beginning

Our hero did not start out as a hero.

But then, what really is a hero.

Perhaps, it can be simply summed up as one who has the courage to do what others will not, despite the obstacles.

For Tarin, life began in a simple and intricate village where mining, agriculture, and the raising of livestock were the primary activities. Tarin’s village was known as Farbirch. The village elder said it meant, ‘living a trouble-free life.’ Those who chose to live the village life were involved in one of these three activities or some subset of them. The village was originally setup to be self-sufficient, trading with other villages directly or through the major spaceport centres. The mineral zytainium that was mined around Farbirch was invaluable in energy production. This energy when converted from its mineral form powered tools, equipment, appliances, communications, lighting, and transportation. When zytainium is activated through a special production process, a cyan glow is given off which is why the mineral is known as Cyan Energy although everyone simply called it zytainium.

This energy had a combination of magnetic and gravitational properties making it extremely useful and efficient. When used for normal applications, zytainium was the perfect energy source since it produced no harmful by-products. It was also used for colony defence purposes. Its unique composition made it an essential component in weapons technology with a destructive power unmatched anywhere in the galaxy. The elders would relate stories of old, in which much destruction resulted from the production of weaponry based on the mineral zytainium. Untold loss of life occurred within our own system from the war with another system. Our once proud and prosperous twin star system of 17 planets was reduced to 14. The outer three colonies were completely lost in the war defending our space.

The resulting gravitational disruption on the remaining colonies almost caused the collapse of the entire system. If not for the brilliant efforts of our own system planetary engineering scientists that found a way to stabilize the remaining orbits, all would have been lost. An aggressive neighbouring system sought to take by force the control of the mineral deposits located throughout our system of colonies. The Gasvores of the Hadar Delta system, as they are known, are a warring, conquering species. They suffered great loss in the invasion when we converted the zytainium to maximum warring potential as a final option. Our Colony Defence Forces were unable to stop the invasion without a huge miracle. We got that miracle, at huge cost.

An unfortunate miss-calculation by Colony Defence Force weapons design scientists not only annihilated, stopping the invaders, it also obliterating part of our system in the process. Zytainium’s true destructive potential was understood. We also happen to have the most pure form of the mineral, which cannot be artificially manufactured or even purified. Its purity naturally formed here as a result of the incredible forces of our twin suns. Our system was located almost in the centre of the galaxy making the conditions perfect for the formation of zytainium. It was a unique combination of the different features of our systems environment that produced the zytainium in its current form. The suns gravitational pull would have shredded all the planets or not let them form in the first place without the creation and introduction of zytainium.

That in turn made our system of colonies very attractive by any species wanting an ultimate power source. Other systems within the galaxy had the mineral in less pure form, containing a fraction of the power generated compared with ours. Despite that, the less pure state of the zytainium still provided powered their infrastructures.

The resulting war with the Gasvores only proved that this energy source had to have healthy respect. A quorum of many systems agreed that hostile intentions from any system within our galaxy would not be tolerated. All systems signed a Treaty not to pursue zytainium outside their system boundaries. We agreed to only use our almost pure zytainium for peaceful purposes and abandon any further weapon development research. That Treaty has been in place for millennia now.

Our 14 remaining colonies decided to pursue a more simplistic lifestyle while still maintaining a Colony Defence Force to protect our system borders. It was felt that taking advantage of the benefits of zytainium for the betterment of our society instead of returning to totally old ways. We were peaceful, not brainless. We knew we still had to maintain a security presence to maintain our safety from a future possible aggressor. That philosophy was lost over time, as outside threats became a distant memory.

Anyway, back to the present in Farbirch. Components for the various zytainium-powered devices were typically the most sought after trade items. Although good ale was always a treat for the villagers. The Maconians were infamous brew masters and concentrated mostly on ale production. Food goods and zytainium were great trading commodities for them as well as components they obtained from other trades. Villages tended to specialize in certain areas of production. Food, minerals, components, ale, light or heavy transports, equipment, clothing, and specialized building materials to name a few, were created in specific communities. This specializing in certain areas encouraged the highest quality of goods. It also promoted a healthy functional interdependency on each colony. The various spaceports throughout our colonies had trading centres to balance out the village trading system. Very specialized items were traded amongst the colonies of our system through the spaceports to ensure no one world went without.

My home world is called Helios and is the fourth world in the system called the Twin Mist Rune. The name came from a combination of our twin suns and when viewed from the outer colonies, had a mist like appearance.

I work in the zytainium detection, mining, and extraction process. The whole mining process is fully automated. In the distant past, the mining of zytainium was a more hands on process. I operate a Mining Transport Craft or MTC that is capable of locating the mineral and extracting it. The process of mineral extraction has developed into a safe clean operation. Deep deposits require the use of a tunnelling device capable of drilling through the ground to get to the mineral. A gravitational magnetic field is produced that moves aside soil and rock to get to the deposit and backfills the path created so that little is disturbed. Solid rock formations are scanned for any fissures that could cause any surface disruption and those areas avoided although zytainium rarely occurred in solid rock. The mining process has become a form of art. As a result, coupled with the purity of zytainium on our colonies, only a small quantity of it is required for our energy production.

The process of finding and extracting the mineral is still very important. Our village’s mission was to mine much more than we needed in order to exchange it with others where the mining process was more difficult or not in sufficient quantities to extract. The mineral extraction policy was such that no area would be completely mined out. Just excess was mined and removed. Our area had an over abundance of the mineral. The resulting zytainium production was equally shared on our colony and with our neighbouring colonies where needed. This interdependency within our colony and in our system of colonies provided an effective cohesion for our society. No one had to go without the necessities of life and the sharing provided the necessary interdependency. Life was good.

So where did things go wrong? At what point did peace across our galaxy become unravelled? The elders had been saying that the Gasvores would one day become aggressive again and seek revenge for their loss so many centuries ago. An ancient prophecy had suggested just that.

The Gasvores were a reptilian species and they had not been heard from in a long time. The naive thinking at the time was that their being quiet was a good thing. There were no indications of any problems. No border incursions. No aggressiveness. Nothing at all and perhaps that should have been the warning flag. After millennia of peace, we tend to forget and become complacent.

Chapter 2 – A New Dawn

The buzzer went off with its familiar, ‘its time to wake up’ buzz. I yelled the command silent which turned it off. You would think with all this technology that we would have an easier way of waking up. Of the several wakeup settings available, I liked the plain old buzzer the best.

Another day, another mineral vein to find. I had retrieved the last of the allowable zytainium mineral from sector 112 yesterday. We tended to equally mine the mineral over a large area only taking small quantities. The mineral itself is a component of our world’s stability providing protection from the powerful gravitational forces from our twin suns. In addition, this special mineral had regenerative properties. If we only removed a small portion of the mineral from particular deposit, given enough time, the deposit would regenerate the removed portion. I was officially called an Extractor, which involved operating the ship’s console located within the MTC, a self-contained craft that had everything needed for extracting the mineral. Once a deposit was located, the mineral extracting process would begin. The zytainium provided us with the energy required to power our transport vessels enabling us to fly anywhere we wanted. This made ground transport obsolete. Why build a transport that required the building of roads when you could fly, hover, or move stuff easily. The designers had seen fit to construct our mining transports space worthy for high altitude scanning. It was possible to travel to other colonies with the transports although it would be slow. We had better equipped and faster ships for that. I would typically fly high enough to obtain a proper scan of the sector I was working in and then go to that location to determine feasibility of the mineral recovery. We were mandated to extract the mineral with little or no disturbance to the environment or any wildlife. That could only be done on a site-by-site basis, closely inspecting the potential area. Our village operated anywhere from 50 to 100 mining craft at any one time depending on seasons and mineral demand. Far more people were involved in the mineral to Cyan Energy production then other activities because of the shear sophistication of the process. My partner Chase and I operated the MTC, each performing different functions and being interchangeable. Today was my turn to fly the MTC to sector 113 to look for zytainium.

I got up out of bed and looked around my room. Boy, I do hope someone cleans this place up. Being single had its tendencies for order to quickly become disorder. I’ll tidy up after my shift, I promised myself. My place was of moderate size for a dwelling of one. It had an extra room for guests if needed plus bathroom, kitchen, and living area spaces. Another village specialized in the building materials that consisted of a metallic type material called quartzate that was light and highly durable. The walls were no thicker than the width of ones baby finger. Despite its thinness, it could withstand a plasma blast without making a scratch. This material was common in the construction of most items used on Helios because of its unique properties. Composed of metallic materials with exceptional attributes, it could be manufactured in any colour including transparent, in addition to its magnetic properties. It being malleable allowed it to be formed into any shape. This meant the formation of our village dwellings in circular design was relatively easy. Larger structures although not perfectly circular, were nonetheless curved.

I made my way to the bathroom to sonic shower and get ready for the day. I said out loud lights, and the room was illuminated. I could see my medium length dark blonde hair with slight curls through my sleepy blue eyes in the mirror.

A restless night left my eyes tired. The weird dreams were back again. I could only recall bits and pieces of them, although there were voice overlays from the ancient elders saying, "be wary." Wary of what, I thought to myself.

I had traces of these types of dreams in the past. Recently though, they were occurring more often and with more detail. I wondered what it all meant.

Was I working too hard, not getting enough sleep?

Was I just having a moment of reflection that the conscious was trying to make sense of through the dreams?

Was some deep mystery of existence trying to reveal itself?

I could speak with the village elder and get some clarity. I’ll think about that, as I did not want to bother him with trivial stuff.

Oh well, I said to myself, I would worry about this later. I was fully awake now and wondered if Chase would actually show up on time this morning. He was similar in height and more slender with dark hair and brown eyes. He had the uncanny ability of arriving late at our departure point located next to the mineral processing installation. And of course, he would always come up with a new adventure as to why he couldn’t possibly make it on time.

I quickly got dressed in my brownish grey durable coveralls with black waterproof boots, grabbed a quick bite, and packed a few provisions for the day. I headed towards the exit and said the command lights out. I preferred to audibly turn them off although if I did forget, the lights would turn themselves off after a certain amount of time unless, of course, you programmed them not to shut off.

Open, I commanded and my front door slid open. We had the convenience of using either touch pad or voice activation. As a culture, we had developed a simple existence combined with the latest in high-tech. Even our homes had the look of a simple village with advanced construction and features. I departed through my front door and said, close.

As I began to walk, I was drawn to the fresh scent of the morning air. I made my way along a soft, firm path with village housing on either side me. We have the technology to fly anywhere we wanted but choose to walk within the village proper. Being fit was not even thought of in terms of exercise, it was just part of everyday life. We could have installed moving walkways like they have at the spaceport centres or a compact transport system, but there was nothing wrong with walking. Over time as the village grew into a larger centre, some of these things might be installed. Our village was laid out in a circular fashion with a community-gathering place in the centre surrounded by dwellings on the north, south, and east sides. On the west side were our processing facilities for zytainium, agriculture, and food production. All villages on Helios would have these three basic divisions of operations while specializing in at least one area of production. A village’s population would have people interested in one of the three main areas or a specialized trade, which provided the cohesion for the entire colony.

I lived in the southern part of the village and would walk through the central area, greeting people as I travelled along. This morning I noticed Elder Jarod quietly sitting alone in the square. He was looking at his tablet, probably getting the latest council updates. There normally would be someone around either listening or speaking with him. People loved to speak with him. He had that invisible glow of wisdom emanating from him. I veered over towards him since he was not busy.

Greetings, Elder Jarod I politely spoke.

Greetings, young Tarin he responded back without even looking up. He always seemed to know what was going on and who was around him at all times.

It’s a fine day, I said. And it was truly that with the sunlight of our twin suns gleaming in. I would have said it’s a fine day to Jarod even if it was raining.

It is indeed, he responded. What is your assignment for this fine day? he softly asked.

Well, Chase and I are going to scan in sector 113 for zytainium, I said. I’m sure Jarod had an idea where we were going.

Ah, I think that will be a great area to look in, he said with confidence.

"In fact, I think you could be working the sector for some time as long as the ground holds.

It’s a remote mountainous area with some great soul searching scenery, he related. He also had that wisdom of knowing when one needed time to think things through.

Yes, I responded waiting to hear if he had other insights that he might want to share.

These quiet times in which we live, are sometimes too quiet, he said. I nodded in agreement.

And how is your pal Chase doing these days, he asked.

Well, Chase is Chase, I said. He can’t seem to make it out his front door most days without having an adventure, I said amusingly.

Yes he does have his moments, doesn’t he? he said. Smiling, I nodded again.

You have a great day Elder Jarod, I finished, as it was time to go.

And you as well young Tarin, he spoke. I gave a quick smile and nod, and just when I was about to walk away, he said, And be wary.

I stopped for a split second, wondering if there was more to come, he returned to viewing his tablet.

I continued on down the path toward the processing facilities to begin my shift. The first thing that came to mind was how did he know. Did he know of my dreams and that statement that occurred in them? I’m sure I had a puzzled look on my face. I continued on, occasionally greeting or waving to people that were going about their business. I was still caught up in what he had just said and would make it a point to speak to him again, hopefully when he was alone.

I approached the entrance where I would get the morning briefing and pickup the MTC. I paused for a moment and thought to myself, I have been operating this craft for some time now. I should give it a name of something other than MTC, or would that appear too frivolous? And if I did that, I’m sure Chase would come up with some name so ridiculous that it would lose the true purpose for giving it a name in the first place. For the moment, I’d leave that one alone. I stopped at the entrance for the standard quick access scan procedure. The security was in place to ensure no one got injured during MTC launches and operations. There was little concern with anyone stealing anything, as that was not part of our culture. Anyone could ask and would be granted a tour of the facility.

The entrance portal opened and I went through a corridor into the briefing section. Other extractor’s were reporting in for the morning briefings. I took my customary seat, which was next to Chase’s. His seat, of course, was empty. There was still time for him to arrive. There were pockets of people speaking to each other as they moved about the room. Everyone was waiting for the announcements for the day to begin. Typically, these necessary briefings were short. The briefing leader, Silas, entered the room and the milling about dissipated as people began to take their seats. Crews from twenty-five MTC’s were in today’s launch briefing. The briefing room could hold up to 200 people in a lecture type setting. Today’s group was over 50 people. Silas greeted those that he passed by as he moved toward the front of the briefing room. Placing his tablet on the podium, he began the brief. Chase scooted in at the last possible moment and quickly took his seat beside me, panting. He was clearly out of breath, as if he ran all the way. I smiled and gave him a single nod. He was busting with anticipation to tell me what delayed him this morning. The briefing was about to begin, so whatever it was would have to wait until later.

Okay, lets get down to this mornings briefs, Silas spoke up. The room became quiet and all eyes focused toward the front. He quickly looked around the room before continuing.

Anyone working in sectors 110 to 115 please see the reassignment postings for the changes. There has been unusual seismic activity in this area making mineral extraction unpredictable, Silas said. Reassignments were not an unusual occurrence. I wondered where we would be sent next although it was no big deal.

It has been reported to me by Spaceport Command to expect an increase in meteorite activity in our areas, Silas continued. "There is no reason for concern here. Spaceport Command would like us to carefully monitor for incoming meteorites or if you happen to locate meteorites that may have made it to the surface.

"If you happen to locate a surface impact in one of your sectors, please report it to launch command with the coordinates.

Spaceport Command may send a Recovery Team to investigate. Silas paused for a moment. You could hear murmuring within the briefing room.

Are their any questions regarding this directive? Silas asked.

I’m sure there were questions, as Spaceport Command did not typically get involved with meteorites or the sending out of Recovery Teams to investigate them. This was something different. I wondered what was going on. Someone raised a hand and stood to ask a question.

Should we be concerned about being hit by one of these meteorites or any harmful effects from them? Silas straighten to respond to the question.

There are no concerns of being hit at this time. I have no reports of anything harmful from the meteorites. Any other questions?

Chase raised his hand and stood. Oh brother, I thought, what’s he going to ask?

Yes Chase, said Silas.

Why is Spaceport Command so interested in these things?

Silas sighed, continuing, They simply want to study why they are falling at this time and possibly identify their origin.

What exactly is falling then? Chase asked. It seems to me that something is going on here.

Silas calmly replied, Chase, you always think something is going on. I don’t have any other details. He looked back down on his tablet as if looking for something. He looked back up again and asked, Any other questions?

Chase sat back down, it seemed he would not be getting anything new. I wondered what Chase thought he would get them to say anyway.

Please remember to check that your MTC’s inventories are complete and up-to-date. Upload your usages logs and submit any maintenance requests. Silas looked about the briefing room seeing if there were any other questions.

That’s all I have for today. Briefing over, he said. Chase and I got up to make our way to the reassignment sheets to find out where we were going today. Before Chase had a chance to begin any new dialog on the meteorites, I asked, So, what happened to you this morning?

I could tell by the look on his face that I caught him completely off guard and interrupted his thought process.

Oh that he said. Well, you wouldn’t believe it, I lost my work boots. Couldn’t come to work in my sandals could I? I shook my head, thinking to myself, well that’s a new one. I’ll bite, what happened to your boots?

Chase, with a smirk on his face said, You see, I was straightening up around my place, getting rid of some old stuff and things like that. I had planned on taking the stuff down to the recycling centre after dinner. So, I slipped on my sandals and dropped the stuff off last night. This morning, I got up to prepare for the day, and couldn’t find my work boots. I was running out of time and I thought, what would be the chance that my boots slipped into the bag I dropped off last night? So, I ran like mad down to the recycling centre to see if they were there. And wouldn’t you know it, there they were. I scooped them up, put them on, and ran here.

He paused for a moment to catch his breath. Only that would happen to Chase.

I see, I said. That’s a new one. Now that I have heard your latest lateness story, can we now check the reassignment posts to see where we are going today? Would that be alright with you? I asked facetiously.

Oh yes, yes that would be okay, He said back, not even catching my jab.

We made our way over to the reassignment posting area. We were the only ones working within sectors 110 to 115. I checked the postings and it indicated that we are going to sector 165. With that information, we headed off to the MTC launch area. The launch area consisted of much larger corridors both in width and height. The whitish-blue interior of the launch area looked a lot like that of a spaceport. On the right hand side of the corridor were the launch bay entrances with monitors displaying current information on weather conditions, latest sector data, and the latest bulletins. On the left hand side was a compact seating area directly across from the launch bays for personnel to gather together to discuss any last minute items. A few times, I had to wait for Chase here in front of our launch bay when he was really late. He always did show up, with a tall story. I had become amused with his being late adventure stories. It could only happen to him.

We arrived at Launch Bay 55. We had been assigned to this bay when we were first paired together and continued to use it. I began saying to Chase as we took seats across from our launch bay, I guess you will be using the MTC’s food packs today? I noticed he did not have his backpack with him or forgot it somewhere during his boot finding mission. The MTC’s food packs were fine; I liked to bring some fresh favourites from home to have during the day.

Ah yes, I guess so he responded just realizing he did not bring anything with him and probably wondering where his backpack was.

So, sir Chase, could you please check the monitor to ensure that we are fully stocked with food packs as well as the rest of the MTC’s provisions? The checking was part of the pre-launch process anyway. And I wanted to check out the new sector that we were going to on my tablet. Sector 165 was even more mountainous than 113. A thought occurred to me at that moment regarding something Elder Jarod had said earlier about where we were going. He said, a remote mountainous area with some great soul searching scenery. I thought he was referring to sector 113 that was not that mountainous or that remote. He said soul searching, what did he mean by that? There were more puzzles today than answers.

Chase returned from the monitor. The MTC is fully stocked for our mission today, he announced, trying to ensure me that he was ready for duty and not distracted by events that had happened thus far.

Internal systems activated and our ID’s have been inputted. Again, this was standard pre-launch procedure so that launch command knew who would be piloting the MTC.

Chase was a good extractor and knew his stuff. At times, he could be easily distracted. I recall once while he was landing the MTC to start a mineral analysis, that he misjudged a landing area. We landed on a sloop steep enough for the stabilizers not to compensate, which caused us to sit slanted. When he realized his mistake, calmly he said, opps, my bad.

Chapter 3 – The Launch

All was ready for our departure. We both proceeded to the launch bay entrance and we walked in, stopped for a second for scan process to authorize access to the MTC. The launch bay entrance quickly slid to the right and we stepped through. There she was sitting proudly, ready for flight. The MTC was 15 feet wide, 45 feet long, and 12 feet in height. She held a lot of equipment from portable drillers to a tunnelling driller that was fully automatic. The front of the craft faced us and you could almost see into it through the tinted angular curved control centre. She looked sleek. Chase had