24 replies to this topic

[RocketTheRacer]

Maybe try posting on FFN

[Pranciblad]

Alright, I'll put the chapters back up soon. Remember, you too can write back any time.

[Cyrem]

I'll put the chapters back up soon

That would be good. I'll have a read of this later tonight.

[Fushigisaur]

I did get around to reading this last night.

I liked it. Well written, and as far as I saw the only mechanical errors were a couple letters not capitalized and 'control' spelled 'conterol' once.

I like how you've incorporated the Power Miners into the mythos as a sort of rival organization, and the idea of them being ex-Rock Raiders is interesting. Radium, anyone?

Overall, thumbs up.

[Pranciblad]

Trevor's Log, Entry 01: Karst You!

 

For those not in the know, my name is  Trevor Tine ,I've been a Rock Raider for quite a while now. I'd joined well before our first expedition to Planet U, but that was where I really began to shine. I was actually offered to work on one of the special expedition teams, but I declined. I always feel the best just doing normal field work with the cadets. I get enough of a sense of accomplishment out of what I do everyday. You know, a lot of higher-ups have very little faith in those new recruits, but they learn quick- you have to in this kind of environment. And even though they might not have the most exciting water cooler talk, it's the big mining teams like us that haul in the bulk of the crystals we get here on 'ol P.U. Yes, it's us, the average Joes and Janes that wake up every day to don the orange jumpsuit and bring you clean, crystalline power. We have our victories, we have our failures, and we hope that by the end of the day, our head isn't subjected to several tons of rubble without warning. Life goes on. Hang on, I'm rambling. Alright, barring that soliloquy, here's all of the oddities and endities that went on in my day.

I was leading the team down to a flooded cavern. It didn't seem like any danger there, but the geologists we brought with us were only trainees, who may not be able to discern the subtle differences between stable and unstable rock in these caverns. Of course, I was savvy to these myself, but I couldn't be everywhere at once. It seemed to go well, until I heard the unmistakable sound of the delicate rock below us fracturing. I was leading some raiders carrying crystals toward the base, and they were too weighed down to do any fancy footwork without ditching them. I got over to a stable section and reached out a hand. The first cadet tired tucking the crystal under his other arm as carefully as possible and reached out. His hands were pretty shaky, but I got him up. The floor began to crumble, but the next cadet tried to get closer. The right side started to drop, and he kept his balance, but started to lose grip on his crystal. It was at the point where he could either drop the crystal or just try to set it down as gently as possible. He lowered it slowly, and it seemed like he was safe, at least until the whole floor came down apropos of nothing. We tried to hug the wall, but then the falling ceiling insured we were on a fast track to the bottom of the riverbed.

When I awoke, I was washed up with the cadets in a small side pool off the main cavern. Even the smallest rivers on Planet U can carry you away if you're not careful. Luckily, we'd been separated from the rubble, and it had likely settled upstream. Unfortunately for us, that included our crystals. I checked the radar and found that we were far off from the main cavern, but my geoscanner had been active the whole way, so I had a good picture of the river's course and just how far we'd gone off our course to the base.

It was a long slog down the channel, at least my company was trained for this sort of thing. It was until we neared the point below the cavern collapse that started it. It turns out there was a good reason that all that water started flowing. Excessive lava flows had caused a nearby ice cavern to thaw, causing the large amount of water to come rushing into the more fragile rock layers below. When the rock layers became saturated, they became too heavy and began to crumble... Right on top of us. Of course, this brought down some other surprises for us. Apparently, some ice monsters had been caught in the same cascade that brought us here, and they had begun roving around the upper part of the cave. It wouldn't be such an issue, but once again, due to assuming this would be a safe cavern, we weren't prepared. I had a pusher beam, and the cadets accompanying me were defenseless. We needed a good plan for sneaking by those ice monsters.