A Lesson In Ancient History: Session 6

After six sessions, I’m beginning to understand some of the strengths and weaknesses of my chosen narrative style. It’s a simple approach—enjoyable to write and well-suited to both serious moments and lighthearted ones. Each session I narrate is an exercise in seeing the adventure through Gabe’s eyes and exploring his personality and perspective.

The downside of this method is that it doesn’t always capture the full range of humor, contributions, and storytelling from the other amazing players and the referee. To address this, I’ve started focusing more on how Gabe interprets his friends’ actions rather than just emphasizing what he thinks about the situations or recounting his own behavior. It’s a work in progress, but I’m confident I’ll find additional ways to better represent the collaborative nature of these adventures as time goes on.

The featured image for this chapter is our resident engineer and unofficial “protocol officer for alien affairs”, Max “Coop” Cooper.

365-1102 … continued… again.

The Droyne that greeted us called himself Duisk. Pleasant fella. I ain’t never really met a Droyne before, but if he’s a fair representation of his folk, I reckon they’re a right nice species. He offered to drop us off at our ship and asked that we meet his leader after we cleared the planet. Seein’ as how they saved our bacon, it only seemed right to agree.

Duisk noticed Kaigh was holdin’ one of them crystals. He cautioned her not to keep ahold of it too long. Said it wasn’t meant for biological creatures—could “make her mind go crazy.” Right about then, it occurred to me I oughta put mine back in the sample container we found it in.

We headed back onto the crawler and had us a heart-to-heart on what to do with Sorrel. For my part, I was inclined to fly her to Caledonia and hand her over to the authorities. Zem was concerned she might not survive the ride off-world if it got bumpy. So the team decided we’d turn her over to the mining company instead—let them patch her up and deal with transport.

The Droyne dropped us off at the main site, and Dan drove the crawler into the base. Whole place was shakin’ like it was about to come apart at the seams. I got Kaigh’s contact info before we split up. Figured it’d come in handy if we wanted to check up on her—or see what became of Sorrel.

Soon as we got into the hangar, we split up. The miners made their way to the evac ships. Zem and Coop went to get the Garnette warmed up. Mitch and me went lookin’ for the facility director. We gave her the short version of events and asked her to take Sorrel off our hands and keep her safe. Fortunately, she agreed. I gotta say—gettin’ Sorrel and all her problems off my back was more refreshin’ than a cold glass o’ water in hell.

Now, it must’ve been real obvious I had a strong dislikin’ for Sorrel, on account of her tryin’ to blow up a planet with us still on it. Someone might get the idea that, since she was Zem’s friend, I’d be doubting his gift for judgin’ character. Mitch seemed to think that, at any rate.

While we were makin’ our way back to the Garnette, Mitch opened up. Said that maybe Zem showed poor judgment with Sorrel, but that he hadn’t shown poor judgment when it came to him. To be honest, the statement caught me a lil’ off guard.

See, Zem introduced Mitch and me not too long ago, and even though it’s been a couple months, Mitch never talked much about his past. Truth be told, I didn’t know too much about him. Before that moment, I wouldn’t’ve thought it mattered much to him whether I trusted him or not. But people’re funny things. Can’t always tell what they’re thinkin’.

Like I said, it caught me off guard so I muttered somethin’ like, “we’ll talk it over later,” and we beat feet outta there.

Zem and Coop had the ship ready to cut an’ run as soon as we got on board. Ol’ Zem got us back through the canyon without so much as a scratch. All the stress from dealin’ with Sorrel and the murders back at the Experimentation Facility must’ve frayed his nerves, ‘cause he scorched the hull somethin’ fierce once we got off planet.

With the crisis behind us, I took a moment to let Mitch know that, even though I hadn’t quite figured him out yet, I was mighty glad we met. Mighty glad he was on the team.

001-1103

We caught a few winks while flyin’ out to the jump site and linkin’ back up with the Droyne ship, like they asked. We coupled our ships and went aboard theirs. Duisk greeted us again and took us to meet their leader, Yusote. Their ship was downright strange to me, but I gotta admit—it was pleasant to look at. Reminded me of the inside of a conch shell from back home, with blues, greens, and silvers.

Along the way, I asked Coop what I thought was a reasonable question. Seein’ as how I ain’t never met no Droyne before, I didn’t know if we oughta bow, shake hands, or just wave hello when we met their leader. Coop was real set on not bowin’. I don’t reckon how he could be so sure, seein’ as he ain’t never met no Droyne neither—but he told me not to think too hard on it and to “trust the engineer when it comes to etiquette.”

They took us into a big ol’ room with a whole mess of Droyne and one sittin’ on what I reckon passed for a throne. That one was Yusote, of course. Duisk introduced us and really talked us up to his boss, callin’ me a “Marine extraordinaire.” Maybe he was just bein’ polite—or maybe he had a real high opinion of our achievements. Embellishment aside, he seemed well-informed on what we’d been up to—highlightin’ dang near everything we’d done since teamin’ up. Not sure how he knew all that, but he’d clearly done his homework.

All told, the introductions took nearly an hour. Seemed to me a simple “pleasure to make your acquaintance” would’ve sufficed—but I figured it must be the Droyne way. Given they saved our lives, it seemed polite to play along. ‘Specially since they invited us to stay for a meal and get to know each other better.

There were plenty of nice Droyne there. A young fella named Otshayyuk. A lady Droyne with a real fancy walkin’ stick named Ssartes. It was a bit tough keepin’ up with it all, but I did my best to be polite.

They laid out a real nice spread. Said some kind of prayer over it before we dug in. Duisk asked us casual questions about our time before we teamed up—back in the Marines, Scouts, and what-not.

They asked us plenty about our past and any strange or interestin’ things we’d seen on our travels. I shared a few stories from my time in the Corps. When Duisk was talkin’ to Mitch, he mentioned seein’ a beautiful comet outside the station he grew up in. I hadn’t pegged Mitch as the kind to stop and take in the scenery—but I guess there’s more to the fella than he lets on.

Coop shared a story from when we was stationed together on the Kreiger. We were doin’ a hull walk for repairs. He was doin’ the fixin’—I was just haulin’ gear. But he said that was the moment he realized just how big space really was. Standin’ out there on the hull, nothin’ but a vac suit between him and the dark.

I remembered the time, of course. I remember thinkin’ how cool it was that all the kit was weightless out there. Easiest detail I’d had all year.

Zem told a story about him and Sorrel—how they accidentally started a bar fight that lasted three whole days and somehow turned into a revolution. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for the fella. To have been through all that with someone, and then to see her lose her mind and cause so much destruction… had to’ve been tough on him.

At the end of the meal, Duisk wished us well and escorted us back to the Garnette. We plotted a course for Windsor. Only one jump away, and seemed a decent enough place to get repairs done.

‘Bout eight hours into our trip, we all came down with some hellacious sickness. Coop and I had terrible pain and numbness. I could barely work the sensor controls—couldn’t even feel my fingers. Lasted a few hours for me, longer for the other fellas.

I pulled the medkit and checked us all out. Nothin’ I did helped the symptoms—only time. But once it passed, we all felt a world better. Better than before we got sick, even. It was the darndest thing.

002-1103

You ever been too tired to rest? That was me last night. Barely slept a wink. Guess I was just waitin’ for my head and body to settle down. I’d been through it plenty before. Give it a day or two, and I’d crash hard—twelve hours or so—and wake up right as rain.

‘Round the mess table, we got to lookin’ at that ring we’d taken off Sorrel. It was unusual for sure, but I couldn’t make heads nor tails of it. Mitch ended up figurin’ it out. Called it a “spatial displacer” something-or-other. What it did was shrink an object down small enough to fit inside the ring. And you could call it back out just by thinkin’ on it. That’s how Sorrel hid the laser pistol from us.

The fellas figured I was the one to keep it. I obliged and loaded a laser carbine into it. These days, I’m quite happy to not have to shoot nobody. But better to have a laser and not need it than need one and not have it, I suppose.

009-1103

We arrived at Windsor and docked down planet-side. First order of business was gettin’ the parts we needed for repairs. Mitch coughed up a ship share to cover the cost, and we spent the day turnin’ wrenches. Coop was a little off his game, but by the end of the day, the Garnette was lookin’ right nice.

It felt good. We’d pulled through some tough times. Done some good. Scuffed up our new ship, sure—but we fixed her with our own hands. Felt real good.