The Last Assignment

​“Hey Trixie! What did I say about using the Peanut Butter Admiral Munch for the omnidrive?” It had been a long day aboard the Thresher and Ronald had really been looking forward to a nice hefty bowl of Admiral Munch with space whale milk.The pleasure of lapping up the sugary spheres had been dancing around in his mind since the pair had left the Yugbo System. He glanced out of the corner of his eye from the control deck to see Trixie’s perfectly round head peak from her position near the navigational charts. Her features, although projected from a screen, did a good job of imitating a look of disdain.

​“That it was strictly prohibited.”, she said with a slightly exasperated tone. Her newest upgrade had given her a wider range of emotions to choose from and it seemed her favorite was mild sarcasm. Even her digitized eyes gave an overdramatic roll at Ronald’s question. “But you see sir, we’ve started to run low on organic material to use and I figured that we didn’t really need it. Plus, you shouldn’t complain. All that processed sugar hasn’t slimmed your waistline.” It took Ronald only a quick look down to confirm this fact. Ever since he’d joined the Harvester Program, Ronald had taken full advantage of the wide range of SmileCo products that were offered to him on the weeklong assignments he received. It was also true that the Thresher was running low on fuel. It had been four hours since the compost that fueled the ship’s omnidrive had run out, so Trixie was actually following protocol by dumping unused food products into the drive’s processor. Like always, Trixie was right. Ronald simply turned back to the ship’s controls in response.

​Refocusing on the vast expanse of space ahead of him, Ronald directed the Thresher to the artificially rendered path before him. Trixie had set the last waypoint of the week’s assignment for a planet near the Sigma nebula. Supposedly, it held some platinum deposits near its surface, along with some vegetation that Ronald could use to refuel the omnidrive. But all Ronald could think about was reporting back to the mother ship and taking a long, warm shower in his bunk, followed closely after with a roasted Brukka shank from the program’s café.Despite the brutal work hours, being a Harvester had its perks. It’d be another couple of days before Ronald would have to take on another assignment and get crammed back into theThresher’s tight quarters with Trixie’s unbearable personality. But Ronald knew that if he kept taking assignments on a regular basis, he’d qualify for the Harvester Program’s all expenses paid for three-month vacation to Velmonde. The planet was a literal paradise, perfect for some much-needed R&R. Pretty soon, it’d be all fruit trays and little umbrellas for Ronald if he just pushed through. In fact, he could practically see it now.

​It was during this daydream that the Thresher’s orange alarms began to flash, signaling a possible obstacle in the ship’s path. Snapping to attention, Ronald saw a giant purple mass coming straight for the front of the ship. Even with the impending impact Ronald managed to hear Trixie sigh heavily and say, “Well isn’t this grand.” In the split-second between the mass’s collision and unconsciousness Ronald made a reminder to himself to tamper with her personality module. It was beginning to be a real bother.

​“Ronald. Ronald can you hear me? If you don’t respond within 27 seconds, I am allowed by protocol to eject you fromthe ship and I promise you I would happily comply.” The distant sound of Trixie’s automated tone roused Ronald from his dreamlike state, although he seriously considered allowing her to follow through on her thinly veiled threat. It was only when thoughts of cool ocean breezes and the comforting heat of a triple sun suntan entered his mind that he decided he should suspend his eventual death until after his vacation. Ronald’s head pulsed as he leaned up to view his surroundings, barely noticing Trixie’s dejected, “Oh” in response to his waking. Despite his blurred vision, Ronald could see cracks all across the ship’s main window and several busted fluid pipes. The omnidrive was in a similar state of disrepair but seemed to still be functioning. 

​“It appears sir that we encountered a space whale on route to our designated waypoint. Even though you are a qualified pilot of the Harvester Program, you failed to notice a creature that is approximately 4 meters wide and 50 meters long. I’m sure that will stand out nicely on our assignment report.” Trixie’s remarks were accompanied by an awkward arms-folded stance that proved that the bot engineers were still working on lifelike movement. 

​“Yeah, yeah. I realize all that. But where are we now?” Ronald could see through the cracked window that instead of the comforting blackness of space that usually surrounded the spacecraft, there was a dusty patch of white.

​“Ah yes, I was getting to that”. Trixie motioned for Ronald to follow her to the exit. “Regardless of your blunder, the collision with the whale directed us into the orbit of a nearby planetary system. We then crashed into the nearest object in our path, which happened to be a moon. Instead of immediately being blown to into indiscernible chunks, the Thresher’s shields managed to hold up and brought us to a halt. While you lingered in your state of unconsciousness, I took the time to inspect the moon’s resources using the RGS. Luckily for you, the moonseems to contain a concentrated deposit of californium, which should more than make up for our lost platinum”. As Ronald stood trying to take in all the information, he caught sight of Trixie’s quizzical look. “So are we just going to sit her appreciating the breathtaking views or…” Taking the hint, Ronald put on his external travel gear and loaded up his tool kit for extraction.

​Still recovering from the impact, Ronald took slow measured steps out of the airlock and surveyed the ground around him. For miles, there was nothing but a rocky, white expanse, and yet his handheld RGS said that a large cluster of californium lay only a mile away. Ronald thought the device might be acting up and so he reset it once to make completely sure, only to see the same results come up again. Hearing Trixie’s mechanical motors inching up behind him, he said, “You know, even if we do manage to extract any californium from the site, how are we going to get back? Our navigational charts say that we are way too far out from the mother ship to make it back using only leftover food products.” Trixie only glared at him in response and pointed at the RGS. Ronald’s eyesight trailed from the metal index finger to the subtle purple dots surrounding the Californium which revealed that organic matter surrounded the element’s deposit. The dots were quite thin and seemed to shift every so often, but there was more than enough for the trip back to the mother ship. They could even make a quick stop at the Interstellar SmileCo SuperMart in the Gamax system for a refill on Admiral Munch. With the image of a comforting bowl of cereal in his mind, Ronald began the short trek to the californium, with Trixie only a few steps behind. 

​It took less than a half hour to reach the deposit, even with Trixie’s meandering pace. But, upon reaching the point designated by the RGS, Ronald understood why he thought the organic matter sources had been moving. Because they had been. From a vantage point near a cluster of white moon rocks, Ronald could see a grouping of tiny huts spread out in a circular pattern which surrounded a tall pedestal. Atop the pedestal was a chunk of silvery metal about the size of Ronald’s own personal holoscreen: the californium. The supposed “organic matter” the RGS had picked up lay just a few feet away from the californium in a series of tight concentric circles. Ronald let out a hefty sigh. “Snograts.” 

​About twenty squat, violet humanoids with eyes the size of dinner plates and stubby limbs chanted a melodious tune around the pedestal holding the rare element. Surprisingly, Ronald found the medley of voices quite soothing and for a moment considered heading back to the ship. Of course, he realized that the Snograts were most likely worshipping the californium. And of course, he realized that Snograts were generally regarded as a peaceful tribe of diminutive aliens. But at the same time, he knew that the only way he would get high marks on this assignment and be able to get that trip to Velmonde was by hauling that californium back to the Thresher. If that wasn’t enough, he’d also have to use something to fuel the omnidrive. A stormy battle of morals began raging in Ronald’s head and he crouched down to debate his options. It didn’t take him long toreach a decision because, as Ronald distractedly weighed the feeling of extreme guilt versus a chance to swim with the Velmonde Mega-turtles, Trixie casually remarked, “Well. Timeis money.” and switched to weapons mode.

​In a space of about three minutes, Ronald was loading up the californium in a portable hauler, making sure to step around what was left of the Snograts. What Trixie lacked in humanness she made up for in efficient and brutal violence. Although he’d seen Trixie in a combat state before, it never failed to both awe and horrify him when she mowed down creatures like they were dandelions. The display of multi-colored lasers and flamethrowers reminded him of the concerts he had gone to growing up on Hydraxis. When you boiled everything down, Trixie was essentially a particularly sassy minigun with legs. While this often proved to be useful when Ronald was out on assignments, he still had to look away as she unsympathetically tossed a couple of Snograts onto a separate hauler. Though, she must’ve caught his terrified look because she looked at him questioningly and said, “What? We need organic matter for the omnidrive. How else are we going to get back to the mother ship?” Ronald only shook his head in reply and began walking away with his hauler. Despite the distance between the two, Ronald could still hear Trixie mutter, “First he complains about the cereal and now this! Make up your mind, oxygen-breather.”

​A short time later, Ronald and Trixie sat down in their respective seats in the Thresher; one somewhat sick to their stomach, and the other fantasizing of a warm, oil soak on the mother ship. Ronald had made sure to avoid looking when Trixie had loaded up the Snograts into the omnidrive but could still hear bones crack and flesh squelch as the processorconverted the poor beings into pure fuel. “On second thought, I don’t really feel like eating for the next couple of…months.” Ronald thought as he powered up the ship for the trek home. He turned in surprise when he heard a shrill noise emit from the navigational charts, signaling an error. It was only when the noise continued in varying tones that he realized that the noise was coming from Trixie. She was attempting to whistle a tune. Although the song mostly came out as a series of discordant sounds, Ronald could tell from her expression that she was quite pleased, maybe even…happy. For the second time that day Ronald was both astonished and terrified, unable to consider the implications of the bot’s pleased mood. “Yes.”, he thought. “I must do something about that personality module.” With that, Ronald boosted the Thresher into takeoff.

The End

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