《Satele X-2: Under The Elusive Azure》


 1. Falling Feelings

    I remember like it was yesterday


    The grand line falling, sound exceeds


    Bang, rumble, calling across the freeway


    With thrumming heart, a crater of mach speeds


    What once green was now a grime sight


    Around blackened burning weeds, a bot bleeds


    The most lovely figure, sizzling starlight


    Heaven''s photons, astra eyes stare


    "Phew! That was quite t¡ªbzz¡ªthe landing, right?"


    Her golden screen gleams, a true cadet''s flare


    In a doze, motors move, rebirth


    "I¡ªKhzzz¡ªwhere am I? Is this place somewhere?"


    "This is an old world long forgotten, Earth,


    from lower realms, under stars'' reign.


    We dance to the Sun, that is our worth."


    "Are you uncanny! Er, my line again:


    Am Satele, Explo-Series.


    Pleased to mee¡ªbzzt¡ªuh? I forgot, what a pain!"


    That was the day I met her. The Satele I''ve known for a week. This long lost planet in the depths of the universe snatched her, and she possessed that which we could not decipher; this fruit falling far from the tree across space was quite unlike anyone I''ve met before, and in fact anyone who had come to Earth now or long ago bore no close resemblance.


    Robots never sang, never danced, never had any manner of sensibilities which transcended electrical impulses, except for Satele X-2, who was a deviation nobody could dismiss.


    "Are you okay?" Satele chirped, looking straight at me. I must have been staring, riveted by her display glowing like sunlight, the hundreds of tiny blue electronic components embedded across her surface glinting in yellow.


    I reckoned I wasn''t, somewhat.


    "Are you criss-crossed lost in thought¡ªOh?" her antenna ears perked up again, "WE WITNESS THE EXPLOSION OF OUR LATEST ROCKET... AGAIN." She shook her head as the errant transmission waned, "aww, that''s sad! How''d it malfunction?"


    Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings."The fuel ran too short, I think," I mumbled, "this is the 6th failure. We just don''t seem to improve."


    She tilted her head, her cathode-eyes were bright, warped with technicolor, the static crackling against the busy radio spectrum. "Why are you sad? The research is still a blast, you learned a bit more about fuel in your last attempt, too, there is always room for a new plan to fire up," her antennas took up the pause and spun, listening for more signals, "don''t you think?"


    I didn''t know how to respond, my brain was still full of flame and smoke.


    Circuitry tinkered, supplies checked, fuel level signs read, combustion engineers grumbling with nobody''s approval as their final efforts come down the execution chain.


    All for what? Another ball of fire? With our resources diminishing, twenty years of supposed progress whittled down to nothing as the wheels of space and time spun ever faster, momentum restless in our rush to attain distant planets.


    "I love these thingies! What do you call them?" her lo-fi voice misted through my haze, sounding clear. She was holding a pop-up hologram device showing the blurry, monochrome model of a flying insect I have never seen in person, for it has been long extinct.


    "They''re called butterflies, Satele," my reply came to me slowly.


    It flitted and faded away as its animation left the device''s range.


    "You have to show me more of Earth, I''d like to see the flying butters, falling waters... yah ok?"


    "Not much of it is worth seeing, these encyclopedias are the gold standard," I closed my eyes, "Earth is a dead planet."


    "You are living, are you not?" she asked, not in jest but in a curious manner.


    "I don''t know anymore," was my florid response after a second of thought, another one of my recurring walls to hide behind.


    Her antennae twizzled, "ghosts are faster than light," she said as her screen face warped and distorted, her circuits abuzz, "I learned this while exploring Gliese 667Cc, the Tw''nak wraiths are hyperspace things. Blue, fast and such. You don''t look like them. You look like an Earthling: fleshy, solid and roundish."


    I might have smiled, Satele fascinated me in a way, her alien knowledge told through messy data, snippets of knowledge with confusing simplicity.


    "Don''t you feel happy to be¡ªoh! Channel 335855 Hz is showing Angry Explosions Of Rocketsnakes again! I love this show! Wait wait wait, here comes the disaster shot! Ohhh!"


    Maybe Satele is the Earthling who sees the greens of the forests and I''m the one lost in space.

 2. Rocket Retrieval

    "The Agency is running short on personnel as you all well know," the communications officer spoke into his microphone between puffs of thick smoke, "we are allocating the aerospace team to the recovery of fragments of Innermoon V6. Out." the speaker popped off without waiting for a reply.


    By aerospace team he meant me, my colleague, and the bumbling bot, not exactly a salvage party.


    "From what I have gathered most of the debris scattered in a 150-kilometer radius around Atarcania, I tried asking for an infrared spectral survey but, well, you know," Egori tapped the pen against the map on the wall, "we don''t have a spare set of drones for this job."


    "We never do," I growled with my face planted on my desk, "I told you this months ago."


    "Hmm, it''s a wide range, but the desert should give us clear visibility of the wreck," Egori jotted down the coordinates, ignoring my boiling bitterness adding to an interminably growing stack of complaints.


    The driest place on our planet, Atarcania, is responsible for sand dunes and solar storms, the list of attractions as absent as its rainfall. Yet the local clans survive and maintain control with the aid of a network of water storage pipelines and tanks, the blue domes perhaps the most noticeable and certainly the most coveted features of the desert. The same clans also hold a dear stake on Earth''s raw material trade, a messy yet instrumen¡ª


    "Oooh, supernova signatures!" Satele floated into the monitoring room, antennae spinning wildly, her screen winking and buzzing, "the glow, it''s changing! So beautiful!"


    "Satele, focus please," I interjected, "did you find anything?"


    "Anything? Oh! You mean, is there any debris? Oh yes! There are so many asteroids orbiting ''bout and beautiful, wow! Wait, soon the nova is going past the ultraviolet range, we need to..." her words spun into a whirlwind of gibberish as she felt the longwave radiation levels rising, her vitals lighting up excitable patterns of what is imperceptible to human senses.


    "For the love of... I mean debris on the ground, Earth!" I tried a stern tone, it was time to cut the hyperactive bot short, "Satele, did you try finding the wreckage as I told you to do?"


    She was hovering as far above our heads as the ceiling would allow, her strange abilities and interests alike showing fascinating yet incongruous vigor.


    "Yes, yes, I am trying. Ah, zero dot zero times seven to one three three six astro units to the east starting from the Western Slopes I might say¡ªmy laser rangefinder is not what it used to be¡ªI felt glints of messy metal there, ''kay?" her screen dimmed suddenly, with one last bright flash, like a sparkly meteor, she collapsed onto a box full of burned out cables.


    That kind of day.


    Our ride for the mission was a weary tiltrotor, not my least favorite craft but it wasn''t ideal for the wide range of pressures we put on it.


    "3-8-1 confirm, we are receiving lift," squawked Egori over the radio as I carefully leveled off.


    I could hear Satele clanking behind me as the craft shook, she was still out of it somehow, I was worried but it wasn''t her first trip out.


    "Do you see anything? Egori radioed beside me, "I am seeing exactly zip."


    What I saw were the light blue skies and sandy dunes of Atarcania, a dry and monotone sight. Dust whirled in the air, clouds of fine grit drifting with the currents. Over millions of years of whittling rock and stony soil, wind sculpted its desert. Shining out against the dust were the water domes, connected by the pipelines webbing across the desert. Despite the precariousness of their mechanisms and maze-like structure, they were anything but scrap metal.


    The map beeped faster as we approached our destination and the craft vibrated with a lurch as I sequenced the landing; sand sprayed in all directions as we floated down the last meters.


    As the dust cleared, I could make out a grey line against the horizon, the stone wall of a settlement only a hill away.


    "Two kilometers east of the Western Slopes like Satele said, yet I see nothing of¡ªwait!" Egori paused, craning his neck across the expanse, "does that look like an impact crater?"


    Without waiting for a second opinion, he hopped out of the ship, sliding and tripping across the soft soil.


    The trip took longer than expected but I wasn''t in a hurry. Still, it was a relief to get out of the cockpit and see that Satele was still in one piece in the back. She looked okay, as good as could be expected, but something about the appraisal left me unnerved. Her technology was not the most advanced, yet it seemed so alien; the construction was difficult to comprehend, a trailblazer of a different breed. I could see the strictures of the universe had altered her, she was far from polished, but in a uniquely human way. I was used to beaten up tech but not quite used to the way her form worked, it was like a piece of electronics homebrewed with care by a cave dweller then left out in a field and forgotten. Somehow that seemed appropriate and gloomy at the same time. What was it that I felt as I checked her frame for damage?Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    "BEEP BEEBEEEP!" her speaker crackled as her screen spun and flickered on. "Stellar energy levels low!" she spun her head, looking around. "Um? What?" a red light beeped on her chest. Her electronic eyes flickered in sync with the volume of her voice, shaping into a mouthless smile as she looked at me. "Staying indoors for so long is not good for my vitals, you know."


    "Come on, there''s plenty of light outside."


    I hesitated for a moment before picking her up, her mechanical body was alive, cognizant, it was different from the inert hunk of metal I hauled to the ship just a few hours ago. Still, she was too weak to float by herself.


    She wrapped her arms around my neck as I carried her. Sweltering was the air outside; the dunes whispered as thousands of sand grains danced in the air.


    "Over here!" Egori''s voice split the swirls from behind a dune, "over here!"


    As we got closer, Satele''s metal against my bare arms burned hotter, and I wondered if the heat bothering me was already present in Atarcania.


    "Ah, G2V stars are my favorite, nothing quite like a round yellow gemstone warming my panels. I think I can hover by myself now!"


    Indeed she could, her gravitation thruster engaged and she drifted off my arms, gliding a bit uneasily but gently.


    Egori waved as we approached, "look, there are tire tracks around the crater."


    "It doesn''t take drunken speculation to realize the locals scavenged our rocket," we did not concern ourselves with the dealings of the Atarcanians, but our tenuous connections to the desert clans made our dealings rather cold. They would sooner steal from us than seek our gifts, and here we were in this harsh land looking for our snatched goods.


    The winds grew stronger as we neared the settlement, and we watched four armored trucks lumber through the dunes, driving off to the north. High walls circumscribed the outpost but the front gates were open.


    "Act nonchalantly, please," I told Satele.


    "Act do you mean? What do I what like? Do I look like a Chalan?"


    "Just be quiet!" Egori signaled me forward, "let''s just go in, alright?"


    Guardsmen manned the posts outside but left us alone; the alleyways were mostly deserted, the Atarcanians were subtle people despite their ruggedness. A not so hustly market lined with vases, spices and locals immersed in the twilit hagglings greeted us. The customary cubic architecture of the streetscape looming around us.


    "How much for the bot, traders? I am not tech expert but you be headed strange, you look not of Quel H¨¤?" a hooded figure spoke, camouflaged against the busy background of trinkets and shapes.


    "We''re not traders, just travellers looking for some specific things to buy. Can you tell us w¡ª"


    "This market," she stood up frailly, "full of bad choices, less obstacles in your way when you pick one from this row," she gestured with a bony finger to a stack of colorless dolls and geometries, "my eyes departed, yet my hands still delightfully alive, I can sense¡ª" she wiped her nose with her sleeve, "sense your bot value, you want the very good price or give me some due of the memory, hmm?"


    "She is not for sale, I said¡ª"


    "Tell me bot, cha you robot, il nerringaderies depuech a''ha?"


    "I am sorry market madam, my data bank does not contain information about your language!" Satele responded after a short buzzing sound.


    "It staying?" she looked at us uncertainly, "vie vas technology price?"


    "She is not for sale!" I repeated, tired of some hustler looking for trouble.


    The woman sized me up rapidly with her dead eyes, then she looked Satele up and down, cocking her head, studying her, "have your way."


    We eventually made our way to an open square with dozens of stalls huddled together. Satele soared higher, balancing herself with the strength of her reaction wheels, "Clear to scan the area from above, like a glove. Glint, glint, glint! I detect a footprint!" she pointed to a building surrounded by scrap metal in the outskirts of the square, the grey rubbish that littered the building seemed like a good clue towards our fallen rocket''s whereabouts.


    "Rocket? Oh yes, we got rocket parts, just now in fact!" the vendor was very pleased, his smile was radiant, eager, "to repair trucks, of course, of course? I heard something''s been lost?" he walked to the back of the workshop while still talking, "the salvage be incredible, oh, you looking for something in particular?"


    "Just show us the newest parts you got, from scrap to control systems. We need anything."


    "Snell!" he shouted through the open window of his small workshop, "traz il roket aoi vie surru d''ouge! Gentlemen, please follow me."


    The man led us to a field, boxes and metal lay scattered, loose cables dangled all over the place, there was a distinct smell of rust and steel.


    And there it was, the white and blue of our ruinous rocket, or at least a portion of it; the broken parts were roughly pieced together like a scrap sculpture, with wire stands holding up the bits that didn''t want to stay in place. A sturdy black robot stood next to the rocket, silent.


    The structural damage was clear in every part, so was the name, Innermoon V6, a mortuary number that painted the sides. This would help us identify the cause of failure well enough, surely better than the complete loss of V5.


    It was dark and windy, the flying sand made it hard to see properly. We bought as much as we needed and it took us a couple of hours to carry all the junk into our tiltrotor even with the unyielding help of Snell, who stayed silent the entire time; the deadpan of the machine only broken by its single red eye faintly shining the dust around it.


    As we bid farewell to the vendor and his robot, Satele was floating above a dune several meters away looking towards the sky. The dust was too thick for me to see anything above but she seemed entranced; her eyes matched the yellow of the sand, shining bright in the darkness, the diffuse light fed her ethereal looks.


    "Hey Satele, we need to get to the rotor," I managed to say through the howling grains.


    "A new star shines, one more," her eyes were focused on the deep cosmos above, "a new arrival to explore."


    Understandably, I could not see a damn thing, but her awe was palpable and my curiosity was aroused, "what are we talking about?"


    "So, so many are there. Look at the heavens, be aware. This is the time to open your eyes, see more, don''t ignore," she tilted her head towards me, her eyes nearly blinding me with their intensity, "novas are a couple of seconds of triumph so rare. Billions of years of energy free, the climax ashore," her voice held a theatrical whine, "can''t you feel the force? Follow their course! Don''t let the chance pass!"


    What I felt was a tired man climbing the cold and dry sand; he chased the astral brightness, yet he could not understand. He could see the glow in the void, for it was right next to him; he wished he could feel what the light was feeling from space¡¯s rim.

 3. Tower Two

    Our mission was surprisingly productive, our data team analyzing the remains of V6 would be able to learn and maybe, just maybe, help us find the cause of its fiasco. The salvage would also provide spare parts to go into repairs of our other craft.


    "Well? What do you want? A pat on the back, a hug?" the Administrator''s voice greeted me back, "we wouldn''t need to salvage any rockets if you and that Igor weren''t so fond of wasting my resources," smoke was swirling around the stinging sentences, "and the damned thrusters are missing. You couldn''t find anything more, just metal scraps. You idiots."


    I left without a word, I thought it was a level-headed act of defiance but the truth is that my anger and bruised ego drove me out of the room, down the empty halls and back to my dormitory which only allowed me little privacy. I thought of a million things to say and do to ruin his life, crafty sabotage, maybe raise warnings about his incredible incompetence to other workers, but I wasn''t sure anyone or anything would listen. Solitary impotence once again overwhelmed me, a flurry of thoughts and emotions jumbled up in my head feeding into frustration and rage. A boiling feast for the devils in my head, feeding me back with nightmares to torture me, nightmares of my body crumbling to pieces, the doctor examining my blood found deadly chemicals in it, an ill-timed static test burned me to death, all the procedures, the endless tests returned a jumble of gibberish, the radiation suit''s air filter shattered into my mouth, Satele...


    "Attention all personnel," the stentorian voice of the broadcast addressed us all, "it is with heavy hearts and saddened eyes that we inform you that our beloved V7 has crashed," mumbling filled the poorly lit room, the grunts of tables being turned, "the failure was so devastating that the remains are unable to yield any important and valuable clues to its cause of demise, it is such a colossal disaster that our very existence has been knocked out and the Agency is over." Rattling of chairs, murmurs of gossip and other voices of displeasure followed, some kept weeping over the rocket, tears splattering. "Good news follow this announcement: We know who has disrupted, sabotaged, and spited us. We will accordingly act." All eyes turned to me, the Administrator was standing there behind the coffin, his sharp angry eyes stared through me like lasers, he reached under his desk and


    "BEEP!" a loud notification woke me up and the annoying voice said, "Mission Commence: Not Slash Applicable."


    A break day, a day out, just enough to stretch and rest. I stared at the ceiling and its mess of exposed wires hoping a trance would form in my mind, but the techniques never worked on me. Egori''s bed was empty; thinking about his blind innocence pushed my furrowed brow deeper into a frown, how I wished I were as carefree and empty-headed as him.


    "Illustrations of raining fire painted on the canvas of a forlorn tree, the melancholic overtones and ill-fated figures in coal define the earliest memories we have, the oldest known painting dating back to..." the faint monologue from "Nolosheena" reverberated through the wall from the briefing room, interrupting my musings.


    I pathologically avoided going to briefings but the faint fluorescent blue inside the dim room nudged me inside; Satele was there alone, transfixed by the screen, her glowing eyes painting the wall yellow.


    "Why are you watching that?" I grumbled, stopping at the door.


    She did not turn her head away from the monitor, "I am learning about the history of this world, after the dawn."


    "...fossilized remains of these small creatures lie below great beds of black tar..."


    "Is that your family down there in the dark?" Satele''s confusing question added to the challenge of deciphering her.


    "...black is our nature''s beginning, of life, the crimson rain its..."


    "No, I mean, not exactly. You can say we are related somehow."


    "...did not win the game of life, an entire species'' destiny interrupted by the unforeseen..."


    "What is it like, losing so many relatives?"


    I knew Satele was asking about the morbid sights on the display, but her question gnawed in my gut. I could not answer.


    "...fields untended, yet teeming with..."


    The Administrator tapped his microphone, "In the spirit of the Agency''s birthday, congregate in the courtyard for the festivities."


    "Open The Curtains, Reveal Gardens Anew"


    We often mocked this slogan, yet we raised the surrealism over the skies.


    The Agency used to regulate its public image, they fabricated glamorous stories and vivid reinterpretations of our work so the world could view our deeds as heroic. Words formed curtains thrown to the waves, blocking out sad realities. But who would buy the lofty claims that we tried to maintain when we had nothing but failed measures to justify our existence?


    Our work became a mirror image of this: each day new torture, chasms of endless failures, and new deadly accidents replacing the old laments.


    Perambulating aimlessly in a concrete circumscription for the umpteenth time did not excite, yet this was the tradition every year. My apprehensive boots dragging across the courtyard next to Satele, who looked far more interested in the ritual than anyone alive.


    Required to witness this were the few skeletal figures which showed up every year, the deadwood of the Agency forces: Ministry, Resources, Research, Operations, Justice, Engineering, the six departments collected together in a theatrical rendition of a prison, or at least that was my interpretation.


    The head of Resources, O''ua¨¨ge, a cretin and opportunist, gave a short introductory speech, "This year''s efforts were limited to budgetary structure improvements and efficiency," his dry wheezing hissed through the microphones, "special emphasis is warranted on individual initiatives, sustained fiscal contributors will have priority in authority assignments, infirmary-level care and..." the droning seemed to be his only talent.


    The day was the same drivel over and over; the fireworks were canceled due to monetary reasons, not like anyone was in the mood to watch explosions anyway.


    In my languor, I lost track of Satele and I slipped off the courtyard to look for her. Outside the main buildings, numerous edifices bore the marks and slogans of the Agency, the structures were obsolete and clunky, it was like walking through some derelict village in which occultists used to perform desperate ceremonies. Further still was the wilderness if you could call it that, rusting hulks covered the corrosive hills, curved by a river in an ominous shade of grey.


    Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more."Satele! Where are you?" I called out several times but her characteristic sounds were not to be heard. My worry grew worse, I ran until my lungs burned as I circled the massive area of neglected buildings, "Satele!"


    My last bet was Tower 2, an old surveillance building that resembled a lighthouse atop a steep hill, I had admired the desolate sight from up there one day and it remained in my memory ever since, I didn''t know why. Time and sulfurous ash enveloped the historical building in an unhealthy yellow; with Satele''s face etched in my mind I advanced up to the top, clambering along the unstable metal stairs, my grip tightened around the sharp corners of the handrails, my breathing became frantic as I coiled the last steps, reaching¡­ I saw her.


    And Egori.


    "Oh, hello! Egori was showing me how to use this," she was holding a spyglass to her screen face, "you can see way over there, wow! Over there!" the main Agency building was shimmering in the distance, the sun''s reflection glinting on the metal panels, "the bunker''s just magnificent, isn''t it?" Observing the indifferent scenery was a novel idea for Satele, she was happy with this world as it is, everything had its own place for her.


    Egori on the other hand seemed mighty uncomfortable with my interruption. "Shouldn''t you be attending the party?" he did little to modulate his disdain for my presence.


    "Shouldn''t you?" I asked in return, I wanted to ask what he was doing taking Satele on a wholly unplanned jaunt but I wasn''t sure how to articulate it.


    Egori took several seconds to answer. Satele was happy in her hackneyed paradise, admiring the concrete and hills as the sun traced its warbling rays above. He spun his sun hat with his finger, "do you think the Agency cares? They don''t notice and we are gone. Well, this seems alright."


    "I noted your absence from the party, may I¡ª"


    "It''s not every day we get a break, is that not a good enough reason? Satele is having fun," he placed the hat on his head and leaned over the railing, "and I''m having fun too. Is that a problem?"


    My heart was heaving and the painful feeling in my throat had grown tenfold. "It''s not, I..." I realized I had nothing to say to that, my jealously was trapping my tongue.


    "The Agency complicates things to absurd levels in their bureaucratic game of telephone," Egori persisted while my scarlet cheeks betrayed me, "this sort of thing has been going on for decades, in my off time I deserve to be carefree. Satele likes it here, why stir it? You have to do what you like, that''s part of living. You have been acting like them lately."


    A harsh dose of seeing him alone with her had uprooted my composure, and now he thought it would be a good time to disparage me?


    "I have been working so hard, Egori," I couldn''t contain myself as my reason collapsed into hopelessness and restrained hostility, "I just spend day after day under th- this... this black stain, I have duties that the Agency has failed to fulfill, I am not having fun, I am never done with my work, I have nightmares, I- I¡ª"


    "I know you better than you think," he cut in, "that''s not it. I''m also working, and it has been hard for me all this time. You''re not the only one making sacrifices. I suffer as well, and you believe you have it worse? No. Each day is¡ª"


    "''The least I deserve is Satele!'' That''s what you''re saying, isn''t it Egori?" I erupted, my burning emotions consuming my words, "I''m the one who found and fixed her! I''m the one who¡ª"


    "Bird!" Satele hooted with glee, still happily watching the landscape through the glass.


    "She is not yours to command, you don''t own her!" Egori shot back, "She seeks her own way, let her be, do you keep an eye on her forever?"


    Thankfully I lost my breath for a moment, emotion without calculations, that was not a good way to express myself.


    There was an uncomfortable silence, and Satele hooted again, "Birdy! Where are you? Birdy, are you out there?"


    I spotted a solitary little splash of black in the distance, flying soundlessly from one dead tree to the next.


    "There it is! Isn''t it beautiful? I''ve never seen this," Satele said, her eyes locked on the landscape, "the atmospheric pressure is so great on this planet, I wish my thruster worked better to fly like that too. Never change, birdy." She finally lowered the spyglass and spun. "Dedicating your life to flying, chasing the stars above, someone can dream! But you have to make your dreams come true, you have to fly too."


    Egori took a deep breath. "My dream is not flying anywhere, I just want to spend some time with..." he twisted his mouth in a smile and glanced at me with the expression I was already very familiar with, the fake one that hid his thoughts I could only guess at, "nevermind."


    Satele turned back to watch the panorama, "Bird, will I see you again? Will we meet someday? I would love to fly with you, see the world, but my flying is not what it used to be."


    "Satele, what do you see in this desolate place so far from your home planet?"


    "It has been a long time out in the dark, time can change everything. I have wonderful recordings, but my friends are far away now. All stars are people with their own light and beauty. You just have to spy through the scope and see."


    Egori sat on the chair and chuckled. What was so funny?


    "Who were your friends? I want to know more about them." I asked quietly.


    "When cosmic objects meet each other, they go fast, very fast. So much energy goes to a single bright point. I met friends during their brightest moment," Satele giggled and spun her wrist motor in full rotations, "if you ask the birds about their friends, they will sing a special song."


    Egori crossed his arms and laughed again, the hat obscuring his face as he lowered his head. For so long I looked at both silently, from a distance.


    The view out into the field changed as the sun settled. "Birdy? Can you find the lost bird?" she closed her bright digital eyes, enveloping the tower in darkness, "I can''t see or hear him anymore, can you?"


    "Birds go to sleep at night, I''m sure he''s fine."


    "He must find his flock, big flocks sleep together," her screen stayed dark, "while they are all together, not even the brightest flashes can blind them."


    Her meandering talks didn''t make much sense to me at the time, like most people I asked for information and expected an answer; I didn''t speak without being asked or without having clear resolve. Her mysterious expressions thrown to the wind felt like nonsense yet sounded effortless to her.


    "Satele, can you tell me what you think and feel, how do your thoughts look to you?"


    "Floating on the shore of the sea which fell from the air. Blue, bright and musical like a dream, all colours changing together as I drink the stream, I have to pace myself though, or else it spills everywhere."


    "Unfortunate place to land, this dreary planet doesn''t seem like your natural habitat."


    "Distance between stars, vastness of universe, how I longed for waves of atmosphere. I have no light left to fuel me, my thoughts fade away until, by chance, another star wakes me up and I can see again," spheres ignited within Satele''s screen, "you''re fortunate to always have a star with you."


    A bird called in the distance.

 4. Miss Morgue

    I preferred to think of Egori as "living" only before he fell into the aerospace rabbit hole. Not so long ago all he wanted to do was enjoy himself. He tried to maintain his lifestyle, but it was still tossed into this structure that told him what to do. Later, he found himself slipping off, craving excitement in other ways, but never knew where to turn. A sybarite out of time, I could tease him like that. He was still open-minded about his job, just wanted to lighten the load on this planet, but like any seasoned worker and prisoner, being wrong about his place under the managerial job line was painful. I tried to speak out of honesty, yes, but I was also seeing through the wall with Egori. We had little in common, he was a misfit for being in the Agency.


    How would I describe myself? More interested in starting my own business, not blindly following whoever squished me. Involved with work, but out of uniform. Determined with my own values, not for someone''s image, not what impressed me but what was important to me: getting the hell out of this suffocating world, and the Agency was the only opportunity for that.


    Satele was a different breed of misfit, someone who believed giving up is impossible, she believed in second, third, fourth chances. Her syntax was not simple, she served a convoluted purpose I didn''t fully understand. She was in a way more human than anyone, or was that just my emotions projecting onto her? It''s bizarre to write about a robot as if it lived and had thoughts and emotions.


    Egori and I shared an infuriating trait: we both were humans bound to our primal programming, mistaking metal for flesh in our desperation.


    His mere presence made my mind race and become beclouded. I deliberately avoided him at work, I had to. The most critical time of my life was just too important to let someone like Egori inflame my personal sphere. Systematically I sealed off any access to my decision-making processes, I had to get the work done.


    Graham opened up the wide door and poked his head in, "the Research team needs a hand," then continued on his way.


    A hand in Agency terms meant extra unwanted responsibilities for anyone na?ve enough to heed the call, but I had to find any excuse to get away from Egori, so I grabbed my tool belt and ran.


    Going into the hangar, I found a hunched figure in front of V6''s wreckage, knees on floor. Zemlya was dedicated for sure, at least that''s the impression I got from my short glimpses of her work. I cleared my throat to let her know I came to help.


    "Pass me the torch," she said, holding out her gloved left hand without a flair, "the hydraulic lines have separated for some reason."


    She turned her head as I handed her the flashlight, glancing at my hand with distracted eyes. They were the color of coffee, focused and unwavering despite the hint of tiredness. Her hair was black, tied back in an unkempt ponytail. I tried not to stare as she leaned forward to poke the insides of the rocket''s casing.


    "Yep, burnt out, and the hydraulics are shot," Zemlya''s voice was quiet without a hint of reproach or anger. She seemed to possess neither of those, just observational calm. I got the impression that, no offense to her, her emotions were cold.


    I wasn''t sure what to say, so I mentioned the basic facts of the accident. "Just before Max-Q, the rocket''s rotation reached beyond normal parameters as engine seven''s thrust lowered to 94%," she knew that, of course, "maybe caused by carbon-monoxide deposits in the fuel needle?"


    She nodded, "that would explain the pressure spike on engine separation, but that''s theoretical," she stood up and started removing her thick gloves, "to make this work, we would have to plate the needles with gold," she scoffed sarcastically, "unless we found a way to use electricity to spin the fuel nozzle screws continuously."


    That stung me, I wonder if she knew I was the one responsible for the fuel injection system integration. "I''m not sure that''s possible, even if we find a way to continuously energize the nozzles, the friction at high velocities would collect plasma and send it right into the combustion chamber."


    "If we had the engine to analyze," she leaned over the table, looking over V6''s schematics, "we could at least verify the mechanics of the thing. That''d be a start."


    I walked back to V6 with a lump in my stomach, equally irritated and disturbed, convinced that her assessment report would lead to my doom since I was already on thin ice with the administration, "Zemlya, are you going to..." I wasn''t sure how to put what I wanted to say in a tactful manner, what was I thinking? Did I want her to lie in the report and make the next rocket blow up too?


    "Analyze the failures, yes," she took off her jacket, "what''s wrong?"


    "I guess I''m nervous about seeing how this goes," I bit my lip, "I want this thing inspected and analyzed, and I want to see the next design in perfect working order more than anyone else, but..."


    "I''m sure I can find more issues, let''s make the next one work flawlessly." She dropped her jacket to the floor, "If it doesn''t work out," she continued with emphasis, "I''ll be back for the next autopsy."


    The hangar, or rocket morgue as it was nicknamed, held the remains of each of our failures. Every rocket was a rookie that faced a premature death. "What possessed me to pick such a low altitude? Why did I fail to separate? And how come, when one of my engines failed within acceptable levels, my other engines didn''t have enough thrust to compensate?"


    You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.These tragedies weighted heavy within my heart. I never knew that building a rocket would be so stressful. Each launch was a monumental challenge to overcome and each of them led to a monumental failure. Every time an indispensable component flashed red in the telemetry displays my heart pounded in unpleasant anticipation, a weight of guilt crushing my stressed heart. The screaming displays were gauges of my performance and my mind was filled with static, reflecting the video feeds.


    "Anyway, I need some help lugging these things," she smiled, her face was framed by the spotlights above, revealing delicate facial features, with just a thin layer of grime.


    We sweated together on the hangar''s concrete floor, dragging the metal specimens. Neither of us were exactly athletes so this was no small task, especially without the leverage of a lift.


    "So, is it true?" she stopped to find a breath of fresh air, "that robot that hangs around the Engineering wing is yours? Does it talk to you?"


    "Satele? Yeah... I mean, I don''t know really. She just does her thing." I didn''t want to make a big deal out of her, she flew under the radar and it was better for her and everyone to think she was nothing more than a toy.


    "I think she feels when she is damaged, I saw her losing control and hitting a wall once, and I''m sure she yelped as if in pain," Zemlya stopped, admiring the rocket part she was just dragging, "if I could check her internals we could learn a thing or two."


    I couldn''t even think of talking about Satele''s innards; to me, the weird robot was more flesh than me, "don''t worry about Satele, Zemlya."


    "She has a horrible flight controller, right? Super unstable, who designed such rubbish?" her statements bit into my cheeks a little.


    "Someone that hasn''t been around for a few years, I''d say." I didn''t know who built her, couldn''t possibly know. I wasn''t that involved with the machine, but when she was working properly she was simple, fun, vibrant and¡­ nice. I felt like mentioning fond memories with a supposedly unfeeling mess of metal and wires would come off as pathetic so I quickly changed the subject, "so, do you like working in Research?"


    "There are so many things to learn here that sometimes you think it''ll never end," she paced around in thought, "but you keep working nonethe¡ªAh!" Zemlya tripped on a particularly heavy-looking cable and nearly fell over, "um, sorry. It''s okay, I guess, I only wish we had more personnel and machinery to push all this trash around."


    My respect for the girl grew quickly, she seemed to find her job fulfilling, she floated effortlessly between physics and mechatronics. She radiated composed enthusiasm with her glinting dark eyes, Zemlya was a shining reminder of the potential the project carried. Despite our distance, alongside her I designed rockets, schematics with the hope of some future glory based on her findings.


    We met eyes as we tugged the parts to their respective corners; I was painfully aware of the heavy air in the hangar, "we can have some coffee in the dining hall, maybe?" I blurted, heady with the thought of her next to me more often.


    "Oh, I¡­ uh, that''s great, okay. Thank you." Our hands briefly touched while we balanced the rocket''s nose cone, "but I''d better get back to work."


    A vibration rattled my ribs with every breath and sweat poured from my pores; the sedentary drought had left me so thirsty and itchy. The raw heat seared my fingertips where they grasped the doorhandle, squeezing it tight. "Coffee, please." I told the deaf button with the faded letters spelling out my desire, eagerly anticipating the promised beverage. The break room both sterile and destitute and not particularly welcoming, yet the coldness was a relief. Liquid pouring out. The lines of ceiling lights flickering against the black surface; the room''s mix of blue and white''s vain attempts to soothe the burning in my veins. The table with two empty cups directly below the brightest light attracted me so.


    Satele, she was gracious, kind, interesting, insighful, programmed and put together in everything but cold steel. Her creator must have loved her; she seemed eager to please. Her charm was a vessel better suited for a household than the void of space. Yet, she was still a robot. A vaguely familiar and idealized version of Satele danced in my mind, how much of her was just my desperation speaking?


    A tiny flame arose from my heart in the dullness of the break room and into existence, it danced; its little presence awakened, fluttering until it bloomed, jolting from me with such force that my ears rang. My body felt hot and flushed; I began to feel light-headed. The coffee''s odor assaulted my senses, I could barely cope with breathing without it grating at the surface of my nostrils. I sat before my legs failed me.


    I thought I had gotten over it, the whole human thing, who I was even.


    Robots are difficult, unfeeling, they''re expensive, they break, and when they break they don''t fix themselves. Humans are contraptions that think for themselves and fix themselves, have desires and goals. The cup is placed on the table. When robots calls for help, the best they get is an odd look from those around them. Humans offer help, sometimes unasked for and sometimes unwanted; it''s up to the recipient to decide how useful it will be. When humans gaze upon the winds of the world, they sit and think about how it makes them feel, the steam warms their faces. Robots don''t feel, they are cold. They are not programmed to absorb.


    And I''m tired of it.