Chapter Two: The Harvest

On a cold and dusty world, left over from the early days of the universe formation, a planet apart from others, seemingly alone in the galaxy, slowly working its way around a distant sun it used for a small amount of light and an even smaller amount of life-giving warmth. ?The ground was cold and dark on this planet, even during times when the sun was high in the sky. The weak sun did not generate enough light to see clearly, let alone enough heat to fully warm the ground sufficiently to walkaround, the creatures on this world evolved heavy fur coats or other methods to keep warm. The only colours visible in the soft blue glow from the distant sun were greys and blacks of ?the shadows, the dim light made it feel like constant twilight and the temperature never got very much above freezing. The only plants that grew were short and scrubby, tightly gripping the rocks, with deep roots trying to collect any moisture from as deep below the surface soil as possible. There was very little rain, even during the short summer months when the temperature was slightly warmer, dust storms and wind was frequent making the living hard and unpleasant for any creatures. Only small animals and insects existed on the surface that ate the plants and each other, larger animals hunted the smaller ones following the same pattern of eat or be eaten that can be found on almost any world in the universe.

Only small animals moved around on the surface during the day, in the minimal warmth, but beneath the soil there was movement, hinting at larger creatures borrowing their way underground, where there was protection from the cold. Small creatures battled the elements and each other for the right to survive, and to secure the privilege to breed, to extend their lineage. This constant struggle has continued for a countless number of years, with each of the diverse species on the planet, where the weak die or are eaten by the strong. Only small evolutionary advancements were made through natural processes, allowing these creatures to continue adapting and surviving on this unforgiving world over the millennia. Life was hard and brutal at every level and intelligence was limited to the very basic necessities for survival, fight or flight, kill or be killed, eat or be eaten.

Two male creatures no bigger than a large earth feline, but with armadillo-like body armour, sharp teeth and spikes from their heads and tails, came together in an epic battle for life and death to secure the right to mate with a nearby fertile female. While the female dug a burrow, the males battle to ensure their genetic seed would be carried on to the next generation. The males circle each other in an epic dance, screeching and snarling, trying to intimidate, looking for the opening to strike a mortal blow, guttural growls and ear-piercing screams echoed around the combatants as they continue their graceful battle. They lunge and dodge each other as they attacked and counter attacked, jumping, tumbling, trying the gain the upper hand. The battle raged on for hours, as the combatants kicked up dust clouds that partially obscured the opponents as they fought, totally oblivious to the increasing shadow that started to cover the land around them. The shadow slowly grew ever larger and consumed what little passed for daylight on the world, while the small creatures continued their epic dual. They fought on, uncaring of the new noise that was carried on the wind, a low rumble that was settling into the air and permeate everything. Until, finally a vast, intense beam of red light cut through the combatants and the entire valley where they battled, ending the fight and vaporizing everything in an instant, cutting deep into the planet’s crust.

Four massive starships take up their positions at the four corners of an insignificant harsh planet. Each ship has three sections, a small bridge at the front, where a faint glow can be seen through the small windows where unconcerned shadowy figures can be seen moving, going about their business, the second section was an autonomous mining rig complete with all manner of heavy equipment for cutting and grinding planetary materials, and finally a large cargo section capable of holding immense amounts of rocky material. The mining lasers from each ship activated simultaneously, cutting deep gouges into the planet’s surface carving out large chunks of rock, while tractor beams pull the materials into the refinery section for the automated mining equipment to process. Each chunk of the planet, as it was cut away, ran through a complicated conveyor system across an immense network of belts and rollers to further brake them down into smaller pieces, to release the faint energy, which is sucked into a collector for storage deep within each of the ship’s cargo sections. As the planet was slowly broken apart and consumed by the mining equipment, the magical energy was collected, concentrated and stored. As each ship completed their assigned collection process, all that was left of the planet was a new asteroid field of floating debris, where the automated mining machines ejected the unwanted material from the planet after each part was processed and squeezed, wrung out like a wet sponge.

“Commander Krag, the planet has been processed, but we have only collected less than 50 mega-joules of the energy.”

“That is disappointing Captain Boor. Prepare the fleet for departure, I will be in my courters. Inform me immediately upon our arrival at the next destination.” Krag instructed, as he stormed off the bridge to his quarters.

“Understood, commander.” Boor answered to Krag’s back as he left the bridge.

Once all four mining ships completed offloading their cargo, they returned to the mothership to dock. Each of the mining ships maneuvered to their docking locations, around the center axis of the mothership, and began the integration procedure and engage their locking clamps, ready for faster than light travel to the next planet on the list.

“What is it the commander is looking for on these planets?”, the navigation officer asked as soon as the bridge door closed behind Commander Krag.

“That is none of your business, Baran.” Boor answered shortly.

“All I’m saying, is that we’ve been mining these planets for the past year and we never keep any of the resources or precious metals or…” Baran continued.

“Baran, enough!” Boor interrupted curtly, “You are here to navigate, not to ask questions of the commander. Any further outbursts from you and you will be relieved of your duties. Understood? Unless you would prefer to be left here on this… planet?”. As Boor snapped back to Baran, maybe more harshly than he really needed to, but Baran is not the first navigator they have had on their journey through the stars, visiting planetary system after planetary system. He had been with Krag, ever since they first met over two hundred years ago.

“Understood, captain” Baran answered formally, “Course set, captain.”

Baran’s acknowledgement snapped Boor back to reality, “Engage.” he commanded dryly.

The FTL drives deep in the mothership started to spin up, a low rumble started to build as the dust and debris from the now dead planet was drawn inside the engine manifolds, in the same way the blue whale draws in massive amounts of water to feed on krill, to use as fuel in the powerful engines. In a few seconds the massive ship was gone in a blink of light, underway to the next star system on the list.