⭐️ Monsters Among the Stars ⭐️

A Call from MIRA HQ

"Hello Cyan," I say sweetly, approaching him. He was stooped down on the ground, using his hands to pile up the white substance. He patted the mound and scooped up some more. "Do you want to build weather-men with me?" He asked. 

I sat next to him and gave him a confused look. "Weather-men?" I questioned. "Oh, sorry, I forgot that I usually hang out with Purple when I do this. I scoop up some of this 'weather' and put it in piles to resemble little men. I even put rocks on its face to make them some eyes!

"So that's where all these weather mounds came from!" I exclaim. "Red was going to make the group research where they were coming from." 

"Oh really?" Cyan asks, a little bit nervous now. He tapped his index fingers together and hung his head. "I'm so sorry, I should of told everyone I was making these little weather-men. I didn't mean to make anyone scared..."

I pat Cyan's shoulder to reassure him. "Don't worry about, man. I'll explain it to Red next time I see him. He knew they were harmless, he just got a little excited because he thought there was intelligent life-forms on Polus."

Cyan sighs. "I feel bad that I made him excited."

"Forget about it, okay? Anyways, show me how you make these... weather-men."

His face seemed to lighten back up at the thought of me wanting to spend time with him. "Are you sure? Okay! Okay, first I scoop up lots and lots of weather and pack into a big mound for the body!"

He talks as he works, and began patting down the mound he was working on as I watched. When he was satisfied with how the body looked, he began making another ball of weather, but this time in his hands. 

"Next, I make another little mound but this time smaller for the head. Once it's nice and round, I stack it on top of the first ball!" He does just that and places the head on top of the body, patting around the sides to make sure it wouldn't fall off. 

"All done!" Cyan said happily, standing up next to his work. "Would you like to put on the finishing touches?"

"Me?" I asked, getting up from where I was sitting. "I didn't even help to put the little guy together."

"That's fine, and besides, the eyes are the best part!" Cyan stoops down again and picks up two pebbles from the ground and hands them to me. I take them and carefully press them into the weather-mound where a set of eyes would be on a person. Once they were properly secured, I stepped back next to Cyan to get a good look at the weather-man. 

"He's perfect, Brown," Cyan beams at me. "Thank you for helping."

"That was fun, the next time you and Purple go to make some more, make sure to tell me, okay?" I say and Cyan bounces on the balls of his feet. He was incredibly excitable. "O-Okay! With the three of us, we can cover all of Polus in weather-men!"

We were both about to leave and head inside to get warm when an alarm rang out over the PA system located in every building. Cyan and I locked eyes, these alarms never had rung out once since we first landed and began settling down. 

"Those are the emergency meeting sirens!" Cyan gasped, starting to tremble in fear. 

"Something has to be wrong! Come on, we need to get to the Office!"

And with that, I grabbed Cyan by the hand and dragged him across the field, away from Electrical and Communications building and into our main part of the Base. This building houses the most important rooms on all of Polus, including a way to get to the Specimen Room and the Admin room and the Office. It also hold our barracks. 

We scramble down the hallway of the building and enter the Office. Inside the room was a large table set out in the middle with a emergency button set on top of it, the button that was pressed to set off the alarms. There was other machines set up in the room, but no one was allowed to touch them except Red and Black, who were in charge of keeping us safe while in Polus. Red told me once that those machine can tell all of our vitals, no matter where on Polus we were.
Red and Black had already taken their places at the head of the table and Red had just returned the plastic cover down over the emergency button. Blue, Green, Lime, Orange, and Purple was there too, murmuring to themselves as they wonder why this meeting has been called in such a dramatic way.

"What happened?" I ask as both Cyan and I enter. "What's with the alarms?"

Red sits down in his chair but Black remains on his feet. "Don't fret too much, Brown, we are only having a meeting. We have received word from MIRAHQ and it is very urgent for me to relay to you all, and this was the fastest way to gather everybody here." He explains as he gestured for the two of us to sit. 

"We are still waiting on Yellow," Black says in his harsh tone. 

"I'm sure he'll be along soon," Red reassures his partner, but he doesn't seem convinced.

"I was just with him," I say. "He was in Electrical finishing up tasks when I met up with Cyan." Cyan nods in agreement.  

And with that, we heard frantic footsteps echoing down the hallway. Yellow, sweating and breathing hard, made his way into the meeting, fashionably late. 

"I'm so sorry I took so long, I was finishing up my tasks!" He panted. 

"You were still soldering wires?" I ask.

Before Yellow can answer, Black slams a hand down on the table. "Yellow, there shall be no excuses for why you are so late to such an important meeting. You are wasting all of our time with your tardiness, you should be ashamed."

Yellow hung his head and sheepishly sat down in his chair. Red sucked on his teeth before patting Black's shoulder. "Now, Black, there is no need to be so harsh. He had apologized and learned his lesson. That should be enough."

Black sits down and grumbles as Red went on. "As for our meeting, I have very important and exciting news to share with you all. MIRAHQ has contacted Polus for the first time since we have colonized it four months ago, and it wasn't for a routine check-in. They have a mission for us."
The other crewmates all started talking among themselves in excitement. Even I couldn't control my happiness to be back on a mission and I grinned like an idiot.

"Okay okay," Red chuckled, shushing us so he can continue speaking. "I know it is very exciting, but we need to act professional. This mission is extremely important for us and those aboard MIRA to learn more about life on foreign planets. Another  planet far away from Polus found an intelligent and complex life-form travelling in space. They have successfully captured it and want to research more about it, but that said planet has many people living on it so they don't want a life-form like that around citizens. So they are sending it here. And it wouldn't come alone, they are sending one of their top Astrobiologists along with the specimen to aid in research." 

Even Black seemed impress as Red clasped his hands in front of his chest as we all cheered. This was MIRA's main goal, and our goal as well. To find intelligent life somewhere in space. And it was finally coming true. I couldn't believe what I was hearing! And we're even getting a new crewmate!

"Now!" Red continues. "MIRA has the life-form aboard and contained within the space ship. To get it here to Polus, we are meeting them halfway to pick it up and bring it back here. We are going to be travelling for a full week on The Skeld and Polus's base will be empty."   

"I hate The Skeld. It's so cramped," Blue complains.

"Do you know who they are sending with the specimen, Red?" Cyan questioned.  

"What will happen to our base while we're gone?" Lime asks, concerned.

"Are we really sure that this life-form is safe to bring to Polus?" Orange demanded. 

"These are very good questions," Red says. "But I'm not in the position to answer them all right now. I will get back to you. But for now, I want you all to go back to the barracks and pack a bag for our trip tomorrow. Get a good night's sleep and I'll see you on board of The Skeld in the morning, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed."