FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

It took all of ten minutes to fix the leak on the fuel pump. The Nuva wrap was a strong material and held well, and after fixing it and dropping the wrap in the repair bay, I stepped into the armory to pull on my E.A suit.

Th Environmental Assistace Suit, or E.A suit for short, was developed by Ameron Technologies, and did what it sounded like by assisting the wearer with their environment. Comprised of three parts, the body suit, the helmet and the arm gauntlet, it was a lightweight and versatile suit, and variations of the gear had been developed for mining and military use, as well as deep space exploration.

The E.A suit that I used was designed for use during long periods of space exploration or travel, and was made with a metal chest and back, a self-sealing and releasing helmet, and a multi-purpose tool gauntlet. The body suit was made of two pieces that connected via shoulder and side straps, and was built with engineer and repair capabilities in mind. The chest piece was built with clips to hold repair tools, and the back piece was fitted with a hook system that could keep the wearer attached to a stable surface; a small box on the left shoulder was used as a collection box for data. The gauntlet, used in tandem with the shoulder box, would scan an area of fifty meters to find things like unstable ground, cracks or faulty structuring in building or cliff. It could also collect data and information about the area and send it to the box for later use.

The helmet was also used to scan the area, but with a more narrow range in mind. A small flashlight was built on the helmets left side, near the visor, and the visor itself would split down the middle to cover or uncover the wearers face. The helmet connected at the neckline of the suit to regulate the wearers body temperature, and at night could switch to a thermal or night vision setting.

In the armory I shrugged of my utility vest and the pants, and pulled on a thick padded grey flight suit. Donning the arm gauntlet and the body suit next I picked up the helmet, pulling it over my neck, then locked it into the neckline of the suit. I heard a _tiss _sound as the helmet clicked with the suit, then I tapped a small button on the gauntlet that slid the faceplate over my face. From the armory I took a small scanner that could detect faults or damage done to large generator systems, like the engines of a ship, and went down the hall, then the stairs and into the cargo bay. Nir was working on fixing the engines, but scanning the engines for faults and damage could help the onboard AI in my ship get the repairs done faster. After all I wasn't going home on just one engine.

Hooking the scanner to the front of my suits chest, I walked to the cargo bay then tapped in a sequence to disengage the gravity. I heard a _woom _sound as the gravity in my ship came offline, and I put a hand on the wall of the cargo bay as I waited to drop the door. The gravity lifted me off of the ground, and I tapped a button on the panel by the cargo bay door. The panel made a chime sound, then flicked green a second later.

I pressed the button for the cargo bay door now, and as it dropped down I watched the dark reach of space come into my field of view. In the bottom left corner I could see the planet Corris, a wide ice planet covered with snow and harsh temperatures. I had come to the planet to recover the rune that, until early that day, had been aboard my ship, locked away in a locker that I had the sole key to. But now the rune, a mysterious circular grey stone with a curious marking on it, was missing. As the cargo bay door lowered into place, and I moved myself away from my ship, I thought to myself, but if Carver wants me back to base instead of looking for this rune, it's not that important.

Outside of my ship I took the hook and clipped it into a handle that was on my ship. Making sure the hook was secure I let go of my ship for a second, then took a hold of the side of one engine with a hand. The engines were set to minimal power and my gloves would help deflect the low heat, and as I pulled the scanner from my front chest piece, I tapped it on and got started.

* * *

As I scanned the engines I again thanked myself for taking the four years out of my life that I had to do engineer work. I had worked with Umina Industrial, one of the larger mining companies on the outer colonies in the Quar System, for four years aboard a military class Warship. The H.G.M (Hamond Galactic Military) Warship _Super Nova _was designed for outer colony and deep space exploration and combat, but when problems with the engines and primary weapons systems arose, a group of around two-hudnred and fifty men and woman, myself included, signed up or volunteered to travel to the Warship and assist with the repairs. The majority of the _Super Nova's _engineer and repairmen and woman were away from the Warship, helping the soldiers that were fighting on different planets, so the group that I was with stepped in to take their place.

It didn't take four years to fix the ship (In truth it only took the better part of sixteen months) but after that I signed up with Umina Industries and helped them with projects that took me as far as they did wide. I flew from one end of the galaxy to the other, visiting all different kinds of planets and star systems. I meet all different kinds of people and aliens, some friendly and some not so friendly, and over the next three years I learned the basics, and hards. Basic things like how to fix a fuel pump leak, and then hard things, like repairing an eight year outdated star map that was the only way to get back to a rendezvous point; after the primary mapping system had been shot and destroyed by unhappy deep space aliens.

After the four years of engineering aboard various ships and vessels, I found myself in between work until I meet Carver Atol, a General for the Hamond Galactic Military. Carver took note of my engineering skills after I helped another engineer fix a broken wall-mouthed plasma cutter that was being used in a hospital, and Carver took down my name. A month later he got a hold of me while I was still living in the west side of the Irinek city on Nurin-Vegya Six, and invited me to enlist with the H.G.M.

"But what does a military general need with a common engineer?" I had asked him.

Carver had laughed and said, "To be honest, just about dam near everything."

After that I spent the next three years in the service of the Hamond Military Engineering Corporation. The projects that Carver had me working on consisted of military weapons and vehicles for the most part, but every now and then something more interesting would come up.

Last year, Carver had come across a transmission that was coming from the H.G.M _Andromeda, _but the signal had been ignored because the _Andromeda _had been listed as decommissioned for the past eight years. Carver had sent me to the wreck site of the ship, it was hanging in orbit above Tietrus IV, to find where the signal was coming from. The trip had taken a full day, it was from one end of the Turimon System to the other, and arriving above Tietrus IV I had to navigate through a field of debris that were left over from a previous skirmish; a fight between two waring countries, Banzar and Pulgress. Reaching the ship and getting inside was a matter of handing off the controls to Nir and letting the android pilot my ship while I unlocked a doorway that opened into a barracks hallway. Inside the ship I found the source of the transmission was a recording being played on a loop by the long dead crew member of the abandoned ship.

Another personal mission Carver sent me on was to recover a set of military grade schematics that detailed a new kind of lightweight armor for his division of the military. The schematics had been stolen by a group of rouge militants that had been secretly answering to an ex-military General; after finding the base on Naro, a rainy city-covered planet near the middle of the Quaris System, I made my through the Generals men until I reached the schematics. I had been hesitate to accept the job at first, because a military-trained engineer didn't seem like he would stack up well against military trained militants. In the end though I dropped the schematics on Carver's desk, and the plans for the ship ended up being the base for my ship, which I would end up naming the Red Horizon.

The most recent mission Carver had found for me was something that had few details to go on, and even fewer names or locations to tie to it. I was heading for Corris, in the Rogin System. From the Torina System where Nurin-Veyga Six was called home to many aliens and humans alike, The Rogin System was a full days travel by warp travel. I had taken the job after Carver told me it would be simple though, and took the few details he could give me.

A strange "rune" as he called it was giving off an unusual energy above planet Corris, from somewhere aboard a decommissioned Hamond Flagship. _Another abandoned military vessel _had gone through my mind at the time. But as the _Red Horizon _jumped into warp, I leaned back in the pilots seat and relaxed.

Again, I had been a bit skeptical at first, but Carver told me that I it would be a simple retrieve-and-return mission. After spending three years in Carver's division of engineers, he picked me for the mysterious job for a number of reasons. Two of them being that I was reliable, and a fast worker.

A ping sound pulled me out of my thoughts, and I looked at the scanner in my hand as the pad hovered over the left primary engine. I heard another ping, relayed through the headset in my helmet, and saw a circle light up on the pad. I gave the pad a tap now and above the circle of light I saw the words "Diagnoses Sent" appear above the circle.

"There's one down," I said to myself, "And only about a thousand more to go."

* * *

Scanning the primary and sublight engines took longer than the repairing the fuel pump by far. It took a hour and a half to scan the primary engines, then an extra forty minutes to run over the sublight engines. I would have had it done sooner if I had been within the atmosphere of a planet, but being in space, and attached to my ship by only a single cable, It took a bit longer.

Holding the scanner in one hand I put the other hand to the side of my helmet then tapped a button and said aloud,

"Nir, did you get all the scans I sent?"

"Yes," I heard the robots voice in my ear, a bit static but otherwise fine, "I'm recalculating the time of the repairs now."

"Alright, I'm coming back in," I said.

Taking my hand from my helmet I moved from the back of the ship back to the landing ramp that was still down, and pulled myself back into the cargo hold with a hand on the wall.

Inside I shut the cargo door, then when the click sounded to confirm the ship was sealed I disengaged the zero gravity. I took a step back as the gravity made my body take weight, and as the faceplate of my helmet came away I hear Nir say,

"The repairs to the engines will now take just under an hour to complete."

"Good," I pulled off my helmet and walked through the cargo hold and up the stairs, then added, "I'm going to catch up on sleep. Keep the long-range scanners online and if anything comes up, set the ships primary weapons to manual fire and let me know."

"Yes master," I heard a series of beeps from within the ship's internal AI workings, and I stepped into the armory to pull off my gear. Setting the helmet and my gauntlet on the table in the room I pulled off my body suit, and set it on the nearby stand. I ran a brief hand through my short hair, I kept it close cut per the military training I had gotten four years prior, then left the armory in my padded flight suit. From the armory I went to my quarters, where a bed was on the left side of the room and a dresser and wardrobe were to the right side. I loosened the neckline of my flight suit and pulled off my gloves, then sat on the well worn bed. Laying down on the bed I closed my eyes, listening to the quiet beeps and sounds of my ship as Nir's AI worked on the engines.

* * *

I didn't dream as I slept, but that didn't surprise me. Spending the last four years of my life in the almost constant company of the fourth largest military in the galaxy, I had gotten enough sleep, but I had gotten more than enough time awake. I wasn't someone who dreamt a lot. I hadn't ever been that way.

So coming out of a dreamless sleep was more than refreshing, considering the previous days events. As I sat up and rubbed my face, I glanced at the clock on my wall. It was synchronized with the Rogin System's zone of time, and it looked like it was was 9:26 in the morning. The inside thermometer of my ship read the temperature at sixty-four degrees, and I stood up from my bed and tightened the neckline of the my flight suit. I let out a breath that just fogged the air, then figured the temperature was a bit lower than sixty-four.

As I walked from my quarters, through the doorway and into the pilots cabin, Nir's voice greeted me with,

"The needed repairs to the engines have been complete and full efficiency master. We'll be ready to get moving as soon as your prepared."

"Let's go then," I said. I dropped into the captains chair and began to flip a set of switches to bring the engines up to full power. I heard the ship whine and shake just briefly, then it settled as the engines began to hum. "Set a course for Nurin-Veyga Six, in the Torina System," I added.

"I'm setting a course now," Nir said in reply.

I pulled knob to the left and felt the ship hum louder, than I tapped the main mapping screen and examined the scopes. There was nothing around me, no debris or hostile signals, and no strange rune signals. I frowned at the screen, but taking the controls in my hand I waited for Nir to input the coordinates to Nurin-Veyga.

It didn't take but a a few seconds before the AI said my course was set, and as I pulled the ship to the left and fired the thrusters, the _Red Horizon _hummed louder as it picked up speed. A quick tap on the mapping system pulled up the course that was set for the Torina and said the trip would take just under six hours to complete. I ran back numbers in my head and figured that I had more or less than ten hours to get back to Nurin-Veyga before the deadline that Caver had set for me. _He didn't actually mean that _part of my mind said. But the other half of my mind said he wouldn't go through with it because I was to valuable an asset for him.

I tapped a pad that made the sublight engines hum as the warp generator fired up, and I waited for a second before tapping a second pad. A louder hum sounded, then the _Red Horizon _gave a small jerk before the stars turned to streaks and my ship jumped for its course to the Torina System.