Chapter Text
„The propulsion is going down! Oxygen is going down as well! Everything is going down!” exclaimed Chrome as he watched over the ships parameters. They got away from the space pirates, dodged meteorites, only to have the old ship going down through material wear.
“We have to make an emergency landing! Kohaku, which planet is the safest?” asked Senku while trying to minimize the damage.
“Three planets moving with two suns. No detection of intelligent life here. P8452 should have enough oxygen, but it also has life forms,” explained Kohaku, while watching over the data.
“Then we move there. Chrome, start landing approach!” said Senku in a hurry.
“I´m trying!” said Chrome while adjusting the ship.
They got through the atmosphere, the ship giving them more and more warn signals. They flowed through clouds, which indicated water, and saw brown and green scenery before them. Mountains with volcanic activity were seen everywhere.
“There!” said Kohaku and marked the landing radius. “We should be able to land there!”
Senku tried to adjust the last power to this direction, while Chrome started the landing process. “This will be a bumpy landing, folks,” said Chrome while green plants were now starting to scratch at the ship. Their transportation moved up and down, only to scratch along the surface of the planet. Senkus crew got bounced around, but everyone was still in their seat as the ship came to a standstill.
Everyone was breathing hard, sweat pooling under their suits. Chrome shut down the ships function on after one. After he was done, he let himself sink into himself.
“Damn, that was a close call,” he mumbled.
“Should we send SOS?” asked Kohaku. Senku shook his head. “Not yet. I would wait at least a day, since we only got away from the pirates. Let´s first look at the ship and gather the breakdowns.”
***
After they caught their breath, Senku and Chrome looked at the error codes. It seemed like parts of the engine didn´t hold anymore.
“We would need more metal to start again,” said Chrome as he walked to the engine. The atmosphere of the planet and the gravity was similar to earth, only a bit heavier. Since they were in space for a few months at that time it was hard to adjust again.
Senku followed Chrome with their communicator. “Yeah, but Kohaku is searching for information about this planet. Maybe we will simply find some metals around here.”
Kaseki came around from behind the engine. “Guys! What was that landing? Don´t do such things to my poor ship!” He looked like he crawled through the pipes at this point.
Senku grinned. “At least we´re alive. We will scan the environment; maybe we can handle this ourselves before calling SOS.”
“Would be better, since our license is not up to date,” mumbled Kaseki. “What?” exclaimed Chrome. “I thought we did that at Keppler?”
Senku shrugged his shoulders. “They wanted around 3000 credits. I don´t have that many, do you?”
“But we can´t fly to the next planet without it!” complained Chrome. Senku waved him off. “I took care of it, nobody will see that it is fake. After our next stop we will get the right one, if we have the money.”
At the moment they searched for medicine for Kohakus sister – somehow she got resistant pneumonia. Since normal pills, antibiotics and plants didn´t work, they searched for other solutions.
“Guys,” crackled Kohakus voice through the ship. “I have found nearly nothing about this planet. Some people landed here like us because they needed repairs, and the atmosphere is enough for humans. No logged illness or other stuff. Because of the volcanic activity a lot of metals should be found here as well.”
“Nice!” said Senku. “Chrome, you and I will go and search for them. Kaseki, you will look and make a plan what spare parts we need exactly.”
***
An hour later Chrome and Senku were suited up and walked out of the ship. The plants seemed to grow over the ground or high up in the sky. As Senku looked closer, the plants on the ground looked a lot like moss.
His display found enough oxygen for them to breathe, but they were careful first and foremost. He scanned their environment, found signals next to one of the Vulcans.
He pointed in the direction, as Chrome nodded. They got bags on their back, walking through the undergrowth of this planet. Sometimes insect-like animals were slowly crawling over the ground, but fled as they saw them.
“They seem creepy,” said Chrome. “They look so slimy.”
Senku walked on, looking at his scanner. “I would think this planet has a lot of earthquakes. Maybe being slimy helps them.”
He stopped them after an hour of walking. He pointed to the beginning of the Vulcan. “The scanner shows metal here. If we find enough, Kaseki will repair our ship faster than we can think.”
Both got their bags down and Senku got their laser out. It would only last a few minutes with its energy, but he was pretty sure they didn´t need more than that.
He pointed the laser on the stone, letting it penetrate it. The stone glowed at the entrance point and Senku made a circle with it. After he finished, he gave the laser to Chrome.
Senku pulled on the now colder stone, getting the first part up. He pushed it aside, finding sparkling metal under it.
“Nice!” said Chrome. They used their hammers after that, breaking down small parts and gathering them in their bags.
“We need to walk more than once,” said Senku. “Next time we take Kohaku with us.”
“Yeah, she can hold twice as much as us,” said Chrome. They gathered their tools again, as the ground started shaking. “An earthquake! Down!” said Senku and pulled Chrome down with him. The earth was shaking in small intervals. Senku looked to the Vulcan, but it didn´t seem to come from him.
After the ground stopped shaking, both he and Chrome stood up again. “Damn, that was scary,” said Chrome.
“I just hope the ship is alright,” said Senku. “We should go back fast, as…”
The ground cracked under Senku, as his feet seemed to sink in. Senku couldn´t finish his sentence, couldn´t even grasp onto Chrome. The whole ground fell away, letting him fall down – getting his suit scrape on the rock. The last thing he saw before his head fell against the next part of the tunnel was the light in which Chrome was holding a hand to him.
***
As Senku woke up, his whole body hurt. He felt the suit still pumping air bags around his neck and back – but he still felt like a whole parade had walked over him. He saw dizzy darkness, as some stones seemed to fill the tunnel with light. He blinked again, testing his hands. They moved. He tried moving his legs – and that hurt. He pushed himself up, slowly. He could move his left leg, but his right was at a funny angle below his knee. He assumed that the suit was already giving him pain killers. Otherwise he would be able to think clearly.
He used the light on the suit to observe more of his environment. He could find an opening with light in the tunnel, so he seemed to have fallen down way deeper then he thought. He tried to use his communicator, but he got no connection.
Great, just great.
He had no way of communicating where he was – he didn´t even know how deep he was underground – and he couldn´t really crawl with his leg.
Normally this would be a death sentence. But he knew that Chrome and Kohaku would look after him. Better he was staying here, since the tunnel couldn´t have that many openings, right?
He tried calculating how much time they would need to find him – since they walked an hour, they could start with their search in 2 hours at most. Make it 3, for Chrome taking the metal with him and gathering everything for the rescue.
He could hold still for this time. What Senku was more concerned about was who made these tunnels. He saw and felt no water here, but the walls were blank, only sometimes a glowing stones was nestled in. As Senku looked closer, it even looked like the lights were in the same spacing to each other.
Which could mean that whatever formed this tunnels had some form of intelligence.
As Senku wondered about that, still full of pain killers, he saw a small slimy black figure crawling left from him. He put his light to it, trying to get it to move away. The insect-like creature didn´t like the light, but moved in his direction still.
Senku didn´t had the laser with him. His suit was not for fighting. He looked around, found some lose stones from his fall, took them and threw them to the insect. It seemed to work as it slowed down. He threw a rock again, as it seemed to open its mouth way wider that possible. It took the stone in his mouth, seemingly nibbling at it. He saw bite marks on the stone, as the insect let the stone go.
Shit.
If that thing could bite through stone, his suit wouldn´t stand a chance. He tried again to get it away with the light, but now it seemed to scan the air. It then tried to flee, which made Senku take a deep breath. But as the insect was crawling away, a big slimy transparent mass filled the tunnel and took the insect in. Senku saw the insect treading in it like water, before the slime seemed to dissolve it.
Double shit.
Senku tried again to move his leg in some way, but the pain made him black out. He couldn´t move it. In his despair he threw stones again, but they dissolved fast in the slime.
It filled the entire tunnel, as Senku bite his lip.
He let his light go on and off, but it only made the slime move faster.
He then used his microphone. “Stop it! Stop!” he said. He was sure it wouldn’t change the direction of the slime, but he would try everything he had.
As his voice sounded, the slime stopped. Senku took a deep breath. “Could you stop please?” he asked again. He didn´t know if the words or the sounds made a difference, so he tried to hold his tone.
The slime before him seemed to stop for a moment, before it started getting smaller. He saw how it concentrated, forming a lump in his size. Senku blinked surprised as the slime got less transparent and formed itself with two legs and two arms. Only the head was way too big for a human…
No! It was trying to get the same form as Senku! Through his suit he looked like that. The human-like slime formed some sort of stable membrane, copying the texture and color of his suit as well.
“Good,” Senku said. The slime tried imitating a mouth like structure, trying to say “Gooodddd…” but it sounded awful. Senku grinned.
It came nearer, not touching him, but looking without eyes. Senku pointed at his hurt leg. “Hurt. Pain,” said Senku. The slime touched his hurt leg, which made Senku hiss. The slime didn´t touch him again. It wobbled, losing its form.
“No, no, that was fine... what?” surprised the slime Senku as it moved itself under him. It took a hold of his hurt leg – holding it steady and not moving it – and using itself as transportation. It hold Senku steady and followed the tunnel and the lights.
Since Senku didn´t had any chance to change the way, he simply tried to calculate how long from his entrance point they moved. The slime seemed to know which way to go – left, right, and left again- till they were in a bigger cave. He saw some opening where light shined thought, and the ground was stable and clear. A small river seemed to flow along the cave as well.
But he saw bones in a small dent. He didn´t know which animals on this plant had bones, but it seemed surreal to see them like that.
The slime let him – carefully – on the ground near the water. It then moved through a bigger opening and left him alone. He tried using his communicator, but he still had no signal. The metal around him seemed to stop it. If he moved out of the cave Kohaku would maybe be able to get his location.
The slime came back after a few minutes, having some sort structure in it now. He moved to the bones, getting them inside it. But instead of dissolving them, he somehow used them as a base.
Since he seemed to form muscles and organs around it.
It wasn´t fast by any means – but since it was still faster than anything a human could produce. It was fascinating to watch. The base of a skeleton was formed – human! – and the muscles and organs around it. The slime got less mass as the body got more. It seemed to form a male person, as far as Senku could see.
It took half an hour till skin was formed around the head and hair grew. The slime now got a round face and white teeth. After a minute more Senku was sitting before a nude man, but apparently the slime knew something about clothes. It formed a purple coat around himself, apparently out of leather.
It then walked very slowly up to Senku, sat down.
It then smiled, unsure, like it forgot how to do that.
“Hello,” it said.