DIVA: Starmetal #1

[deucexm]

A new thing that came to mind and took shape, because I felt that I shouldn't dam 
the flow of creation, even if I wanted its course to be directed at other ends.

Starmetal: A DiVerse Alpha Chronicle
by Felix

01

:PRINCIPIUM EST:
:LOCAL CONEXION ESTABLISHED:
:AREA CONEXION FAILURE:
:ORIGIN CONEXION FAILURE:
:ABSENT AREA AND ORIGIN STARMETAL MUST OPERATE IN SOLITAIRE:
:BEGIN ASSESSMENT OF CAPABILITY TO OPERATE:
:NL CORE CHARGE STATE 12:
:J BODY INTEGRITY STATE 993:
:X BODY INTEGRITY STATE 892:
:SENSORY PACKAGE STATE 887:
:LOCAL CONEXION STATE 0000IRREGULAR STATE LOGGED:
:BEGIN PRIORITY THREAT SCAN:
:SCAN NEGATIVE:
:BEGIN GENERAL THREAT SCAN:
:SCAN RETURNED 2 THREATS AT OR ABOVE DEFAULT:
:SCAN RETURNED 246682 THREATS UNDER DEFAULT:
:RETURNING CTO ASSESSMENT:
:AT PRESENT CTO IMPACTED BY NL CORE AND LOCAL CONEXION:
:RECOMMEND 1 RECHARGE NL CORE UU PRIORITY:
:RECOMMEND 2 REESTABLISH LOCAL CONEXION:
:RECOMMEND 3 RETURN TO ORIGIN:
:BEGIN INTERIM STABILITY OPERATIONS:
:SOLAR EQUILIBRIUM ACHIEVED:
:TERMINUS EST:

Irona let out the breath she had been holding in as her new container - she
tried not to think of it as a coffin - floated leisurely around the nearest
star.  A lot had happened all at once, none of which she could have predicted.

Finding a relic that appeared to predate the Cosmic Era was enough of a shock by
itself, but finding one that was relatively undamaged and still retained a
trickle of power... well, no one could have blamed her for wanting to test it
out.  But the moment she sat in the pilot's seat - because whatever else this
was, it was a vehicle - it tried to start up, and she'd panicked...

Too many connections on this thing, too many wires!  She had implants, sure; who
didn't?  But whoever designed this didn't care a whit about being /invasive/. 
The memory of that first moment, recalled, gave Irona another shudder.  Ugh.  If
that's what she had to deal with in order to fully control this- this thing,
then... well, then she'd do what she had to.  But she didn't /like/ the
interfacing process, and probably never would.

So, with some things plugged in and others left hanging, she'd been presented
with a matter-of-fact systems report - at which point the relic had (entirely of
its own accord) broken free of the asteroid that partially contained it and
headed straight into a stable orbit around the nearest star, without so much as
a confirmation prompt.  And then it shut itself off, or at least returned to the
same barely functional state in which she had found it - except that she was
/inside/ it now.

And so here she was: locked in a box, circling a gravity well, with nothing to
do while she waited for her problems to fix themselves.  Of course if Irona had
actually needed to breathe to survive, or eat or drink, she'd be more worried. 
As it was, she was simply bored.