NMS: THE NEXT ADVENTURER
Chapter 26: Gather Ye Marrow Bulb While Ye May
Within a couple of days, the Korvax had arrived at the base and was busy working at the science terminal. The room glowed with a soft, pink light and complex data only a machine intelligence could fully understand filled a computer monitor.
Upon hearing Noma enter, the Korvax looked up from whatever it was doing. “A fine base, Traveller! As of course fits your honourable status! Oh, Korvax shall be so happy here”. Again, that strange combination of emotive words spoken in a monologue that was devoid of feeling. Did the mind that spoke such words really feel anything?
The Korvax continued. “Traveller, harvest marrow bulb and Korvax will do more, will create plans for microprocessors and advanced refiners!”. Noma agreed that such equipment would prove useful, and asked the Korvax were marrow bulb might be found….
The planet loomed ahead. Noma could see the atmosphere glowing in the sunlight, like a halo adorning half the world. Great white clouds drifted lazily along. As for the surface, from this vantage point in space everything seemed brown, as though the entire planet were made entirely of baked earth.
As the Radiant Pillar descended through the layers of clouds, the ubiquity of brown never diminished, but more and more features could be picked out. There were hills and valleys, plains filled with billowing clouds of dust. And, standing in defiance of cruel winds that blew small debris like a ceaseless sandblasted, plants with their tops bent over like nomads protecting their heads from a sandstorm.
The dust that was kicked up by Radiant’s landing thrusters was carried away by the moaning winds. Noma stepped out onto the landscape, vis shoulder-mounted scanner indicating the direction in which to travel. A cave entrance could be seen a couple of kilometres away. Noma remembered that the Korvax had said marrow bulbs grew underground. Ve set off for the cave.
As ve struggled on against the ever-present wind, clearing vis visor of dust every few seconds, Noma became aware of a presence. A four-legged creature was making its way across the land, leaving behind it the tracks of a three-toed animal, tracks that were soon eroded by the dusty gales. It had no eyes or anything that could be called a face. Instead, its long neck ended in a ring of fleshy tentacles circling an orifice that was tightly shut. Noma figured that eyes never evolved because the likelihood of damage from all the grit blowing around was too great. Still, the creature must have had some senses to guide its behaviour, for as Noma watched it gracefully lowered its neck, dug into the soft earth with its tentacled, and came up with a tuber which it promptly ate.
Noma left the silent herbivore to its meal and carried on. The cave grew steadily larger as ve got closer, and when ve finally stepped into the cavernous interior, Noma could not help but feel relieved to be out of the dust storm.
Noma turned on vis torch and swept it around. Stalactites and stalagmites were momentarily caught in its beam before being swallowed up by the darkness once more. And then...yes! That was what ve had come here for. Marrow bulb. Noma examined this subterranean plant. Its leaves formed a starlike pattern, green but tinged with red at the edges. At the centre of the plant there sprouted hard, crystal-like growths that glowed with bioluminescence.
As Noma harvested the crop, ve supposed that these crystal-like growths were what the Korvax needed to make microprocessors. There certainly seemed to be nothing else about this plant that suggested it served a purpose in building electronic equipment. Noma made his way out of the cave and back to the ship, trusting that the Korvax knew what it was doing….
Thanks to Hello Games for the images.