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Once in a lifetime

Prolugue: Mechanic

Admiral Dean walked in to his office, it was a pretty large room, for an office that is, there was some plain white paint on the walls and roof with a nice brown carpet covering the floor and a nice window behind my steel desk.
In the window you could see another building, mostly grey with some large white lines to indicate where the different offices where, most of them also had a window identical to mine, but between the buildings there was a little garden to look at.

Dean pulled out his little chair, it was a standard office chair but it was very comfortable and sturdy.
He then sat down and opened up his green laptop and pressed the power button, typed in the password ‘’Leanehound’’.

Leane was his wife and he loved dogs, he always had one.
The laptop started and automatically opened his folder of messages from work, there was only one.
Assault on the outer Colleral space dock
-General Meadow

Colleral was the name of an aggressive species that had initiated a war with the human, the message read:

We need another mechanic to fix the mechs in time for the assault, I have to supervise the progress so you have to find a mechanic and send him here ASAP.

He doesn’t have to be anything special; we just need someone who can follow orders.
Dean proceeded to look at available crew in the Nebula, the human space explorers.
Several buttons appeared:
Captains:
Medical officers:
Medical crew:
Mechanic officers:
Mechanic crew:

That was the one he needed, before bothering to look at the rest, thirty available crew showed up, four recommended, he read the recommended first.

Mange Orique:

Performance: A very experienced mechanic who has been on sixteen short missions and two long missions, mostly a hard worker but can get very frightened when things are really at stake.

Age: 42

Derok Goldheim

Performance: A very high tempered mechanic who doesn’t go on long missions because others don’t like being around him for long, otherwise a very good mechanic who is rarely afraid, twenty-five short missions.

Age: 37

Linda Forsée

Performance: A self-confident mechanic who also studied science for a period of time, a fast worker but has a hard time following orders but still gets the job done most of the time, very good at improvising.
Nine short mission and one long mission.

Age: 27

Venus Dimm

Perfomance: A stunning mechanic with high expectations, still very young and not in full understanding of everything, he can do a good job inside his knowledge and he follows orders, two short missions.

Age: 24

Dean considered all of them.
Orique could be a good choice but this mission was in a dangerous zone, if the enemies were to attack he could be a lot less usefull.
Goldheim was a no, this was only a short mission so they shouldn’t need someone who could disturb the others, were at a tight schedule already.
Forsée was a good choice but in the end he went with Dimm, this could be a good chance to see his potential and he was good at following orders, which could really be needed in this tight schedule they had.

Chapter one: Cold before the storm

-WAKE UP VENUS! A female voice said.
-Wha? Venus replied as he slowly regained consciousness.
-Venus it’s nine already! The voice said.
-Mira, the academy lessons doesn’t start until evening today, Venus said.

‘’I know, but I saw you had a new assignment.’’
‘’Didn’t I tell you to stop looking at my laptop?’’
‘’It was an accident, I promise.’’
‘’whatever, let me check it.’’

Venus quickly goes out of the bed and stands in his and Miras Bedroom, it was mostly white on the walls and the roof, but the bed was black and so was most of the furniture, Mira thought it was ‘’artistic’’.
He walked into a restroom right beside the bedroom.

It was a standard white restroom with a shower, toilet and a washbasin, nothing special; he put on his clothing in a flash and hurried out into his office, a standard little home office with a desk, laptop and a lamp.

He hurried over to the desk and pulled out the small black office chair and sat down.

His laptop was already on, considering Mira knew what was on it, it wasn’t a big surprise.
The work folder opened as always and he saw the new message:

Outer Nebula station requires assistance
-Admiral Dean

You are needed in the Outer Nebula station, information is classified.
A small transport ship will pick you up at the academy, twelve hundred o clock.
Don’t be late.

This was amazing, missions were more fun than just studying at the academy, he was very excited for the mission.

-I will leave around eleven, Mira, Venus said.
-What are you supposed to do, nothing dangerous, right? Mira asked.

-It’s classified, but you know Nebula has security as their high- Venus replied when Mira interrupted and said: -est priority and bla bla bla, you said that a few hundred times.

‘’Just saying that I’m returning in one piece, maybe two if you get lucky.’’
‘’Then you would have to be a little richer.’’
‘’Well, people studying don’t usually get much money for it, remember how much they gave you when you went to school?’’

‘’No?’’
‘’You see? They usually don’t get paid very much.’’

Mira appeared in the doorway and said: ‘’Hope you have a good trip, I’ll miss you’’
Venus stood up and said: ’’I’ll miss you too Mira, I don’t think it’s a very long assignment though, they save them for people who actually finished the academy’’
‘’You’re close Venus, you know that, anyways, I have work to bye!’’
‘’Bye!’’

Mira left the doorway and Venus heard the door open and close a little later, he should probably get ready to leave too.
Two hours later Venus was on the transport ship.
-Can you tell me my assignment pilot? Venus yelled.

-Negative, I haven’t heard what it is, the pilot replied.

A few hours later the ship arrived and Venus stepped of and the ship took off again instantly, must be a tight schedule.

Venus was greeted by the chief mechanic.

-Welcome, you must be Dimm, was it? The mechanic said.

-Yes I’m Dimm, chief mechanic, Venus replied quickly.

-Call me Arale, I need you to follow me.

Venus followed Arale through the space station, it was mostly grey walls but there was lots of crewmembers aboard so it didn’t feel alone, eventually there was also a door in the wall, it was still a large corridor at least 3 meters tall, which was probably an indication of the station being large.

After some time they saw a large door in the side with a sign saying ‘’Mech bay’’ above it, Arale went over and pulled the door open and as Arale and Venus walked through Venus saw the amazing room.

It was at least 20 meters tall, lots of people walked around and appeared to be building mechs, the huge metallic vehicles were all along the walls, there were also second floors on the sides of the room with another layer of mechs.

-I need you to go upstairs on the left and help  Kim and Nina fixing the 3’rd mech from the right, they will brief you in what to do, Arale said.

-Right after that a woman ran over to Arale and said: ‘’Sir were running out of time, they’re almost here!’’