Chapter 13 - Base Development and Exploration

The next day he connected the laptop to the wall by an HDMI and USB cables that just extended from it, Rose had also offered to create a better computer using her materials to replace the brittle ones like plastic and carbon structures for the chips, screens, and batteries, but Erik didn't think it was necessary for now, maybe if he recovered another laptop from the spaceship he could empty it and allow her to scan it however she liked, anyways, he played a movie on it and it appeared on the bathroom wall to keep Inky entertained, it was documentaries prepared for the colonists about making pottery and tools, he figured she would like that, and he was right, she barely even moved, even eyes fixed to the screen, she barely noticed when he brought her some snacks and she just started to eat them on instinct, maybe he would introduce her to videogames next he thought chuckling to himself.

Then comes the digging, he picked the pickaxe from the armoury and first went to the pool area and started digging a side room, this is where his increased strength and powered suit helped a lot, he could mine big chunks of granite, and he also had plans for this granite, he would use the dust as the foundation for his dirt and then grow grass on it, then just wait to add more fertilizer and rock dust, layers would build up over time and he would be able to get good dirt.

he would dig 4 pits in that room, 1 for the grass,1 for growing worms with scraps, and 1 to just let food waste and algae rot to see what happens and then feed it to the worms too since there appeared to be no bacteria inside the place, so he predicted the meat would just degrade and turn bitter, just becoming rancid from oxidation, that also meant it would be easier to dry-age meat though, as, for the last pit, he was just going to compost plants.

It took him all day to dig the room and the pits, he also cheated and used the plasma guns sometimes and vibroknife to cut the details and sharp borders, then he though of one plant he could use to easily create biomass, he added some duckweed to the unused part of the pool and also added rocks and lots of gravel and granite dust to the bottom making the water a bit murky but rich in minerals, and with light already present, water lentils would probably take over that pool in just one week, these were even modified to grow faster, composting these for dirt or jus eating them were great choices, then he filled the 4 pits all with a bit of rock dust, while also installing lights on the ceiling, with nanobots already starting to cover the walls, he would wait until he had a bit of biomass from the water lentils first, that would make things easier, he might even be able to compost them and grow mushrooms in them, he would need to go back to the spaceship though or send Inky there since he only had rooting mushrooms to help plants grow in his seeds pack like boletus edulis, luckily they were stored in special containers and should remain alright for a couple of years, and with the octopeople protecting the place, it should be alright.

( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boletus_edulis )

In this monotonous kind of work, he couldn't help but reminisce about his life on earth, he was already 60 and looking for his first job, quite a young age to start working as most didn't even consider working until they were 100 years old and depended on the UBI (Universal Basic Income), but he had met a girl just 16 years older than him, a short age gap considering the hundreds of years people lived, and they had fallen in love, so he had also gotten a profitable contract for a colonizing company for a total of 30 years, 20 years of travel and 10 years of setting up the colony and she would cryosleep during this time and also arrive there after those 30 years to meet with him and live there together, they would then be even closer in age as people don't age in cryosleep, it would be their own planet until more colonists arrived, an adventure, but now that was meant to never happen as after just 16 years of travel he had been put out of cryosleep, as for fixing an entire spaceship and launching it to space by himself from the bottom of the ocean... it sounded impossible no matter how much he thought about it, it was just ridiculous.

( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_basic_income )

"sigh..."

[is something bothering you?]

"it's just... I kinda miss people I left behind on earth, we were supposed to meet on that planet in 14 more years, now it probably won't happen"

[one never knows, destiny can be mysterious sometimes]

"Thanks, Rose, for trying to cheer me up, anyways I better get to work on the lower floor, tell me if any wall is already just 10 meters thick and I will stop digging in those areas, this base needs to be tough in case anything attacks".

[will do ヽ(^o^)/]

He went to the living room and started digging from there as he could just accumulate the rocks on a corner for now, and entire weeks passed like this, with Inky going out to hunt by herself and coming out with hunted prey, or seaweeds if she didn't hunt anything, she sometimes also just brought shiny things she liked and put them on the Bathroom which apparently she already thought as her room, and Erik could only ask Rose to transform 2 of the 6 guest rooms into a big bathroom, one of the benefits of an interior made of nanobots and intelligent alloys.

He also cut slates of granite and polished them for the interior of the bathroom, they had a nice black color with grey tones and lines, even carved a big granite bathtub enough for 2 that he transported to the bathroom with Rose's help using nanobot created cranes, now he could bathe like a king, Inky also watched him work curiously sometimes, her tentacles had already regenerated but she still most of the time used the wheelchair as she had gotten used to it.

The lower floors new rooms included a Turkish sauna room carved in the granite and polished, with an onsen included next to it, then a meditation room, 6 storage rooms, and 1 big room to plant things once he had dirt, for now, it was a solarium he planned to use for drying foods and materials, it also had a small channel by the side that he would fill with dirt and plant reeds on one side and a pond at the end the size of a small truck, that way he could pour wastewater on one side and get clean water by the time it reached the pond at the other end and use that water for watering his plants as it would be biologically active and full of nutrients.

Rose thought it wasn't much hygienic but growing a farm and small forest under the ocean is a tough process, the bottom of the pond was connected to the lower part of the 10 meters deep empty pool with 1 meter of loose rocks, and 6 meters of gravel and rock dust to imitate soil conditions on earth, so that way the tree roots could dig deep and get minerals and water, the ceiling was also 12 meters high so there were stairs at the entrance to descend, in essence, it was a massive room and there wasn't much oxygen on it for now.

He also ate quite a lot of algae from the algae reactors and from eating animals from these planets and their bones he could feel his own body strengthening too, he also made a big vibrosword weeks ago to cut through the stone and it made the work much easier, all the stone blocks were moved by grapple cranes and transported upstairs and into the underwater garage, where he would then transport them outside and build an entrance for the garage, and also surrounded the door of the first floor in granite from the outside, to eliminate or reduce that weak spot on the base.

On the other hand, Inky seemed to want him to go out hunting with her but he was always busy, they did bathe together on his larger bath and tried the sauna and onsen that she both loved, she was starting to get a bit touchy though, and liked to hug him, he remembered that it's not a human woman but an unknown alien species and remained cautious though.

The duckweed had indeed also taken over the pool by now and he started pouring some into the dirt-producing pits already, everything was going smoothly.

Then he started going hunting again, much to the delight of Inky, also the transported had been repaired, it had 2 mechanical front arms and a trunk to transport things, he decided to go to the opposite side of the plateau than were his spaceship 'landed' since that area was a sand dune plains.

They arrived at the other side after 1 hour of driving, Inky amazed with the vehicle also and wanting to try to piloting it, Erik didn't let her thought as his life would be in danger, maybe another day.

They arrived at a gigantic algae forest that the light didn't penetrate through, this was just the outskirts and the light already didn't penetrate…, he wondered what could be inside, farther away in the distance he could see the algae grow to an even bigger size.

He parked the vehicle outside the forest so it wouldn't get tangled and was preparing to go out to explore this forest a bit swimming, but Inky grabbed his hand and stopped him, she was shaking and looked afraid, he wouldn't trust his instinct as a land creature over a natives, so he used the arms to grab a piece of algae and that's when it happened, from behind of one of the algae appeared a green sea snaked that bit the arms of the transport, leaving holes now leaking venom, that spooked him too, just one of them could have quickly ended him, he grabbed one with the transports arm, quickly killing it with a twist and some algae and left quickly to analyze them back at the base.