77.12.15 -- Part Two
I think I might be in shock. At least, I hope I am-- because if I’m not in shock, I’m just an idiot.
Here’s reason number one: when I climbed out of my ship to sit on top of it, I didn’t put my suit on. You know, the thing that allows me to breathe, protects me from radiation, keeps me pressurized? Yeah. I noticed I was burning literally seconds after I suspended my last log. I mean, of course I was, this planet has two fucking suns. I’m just lucky the vegetation here produces oxygen instead of, I don’t know, carbon monoxide.
Here’s reason number two: When I saw my skin starting to slough off, I panicked a little, and uh… jumped into the green ooze. Shut up, we’re blaming shock, remember? But here’s the thing-- it fucking worked? My skin cooled off immediately. When I clambered back onto my ship and shook off the goo, my skin was smooth and whole again, and probably better moisturized than it’s ever been before. I mean, I look fantastic.
I’m gonna call this stuff Super Aloe.
Anyway, my suit is back on, and I’ve managed to pull the ship out of the lake. It wasn’t actually that difficult-- the Super Aloe is only a couple feet deep, so I was able to wade to a tree at the edge of the lake and tether my ship to it. After that, it was just a matter of using the ship’s robotic arms to pull her to dry land. The tree bent a little under the strain, and when I went to free it from my tether, I saw the same green goo oozing out of the broken trunk. While I watched, the bark knit itself smooth again, and the goo dried to glass in the sun.
Maybe all that vegetation I destroyed when I landed will be ok, after all. Strange seeing nature forgive, for once. Earth 1 could’ve used a bit of that.
At any rate, even with my suit protecting my skin, I feel dangerously close to combusting in this heat. I’m just working on getting the gunk out of my engines, and then I should be able to get off this sweltering planet. Before I go, I think I’ll dump my rations into my escape pod and use the containers to collect a bunch of Super Aloe. It’s not as shiny as the Hekk tend to prefer, but still-- magical healing goo has to be worth something.
At least, it had better be. I’ve had the sinking realization that I can’t land on another planet until I get my stupid brakes fixed, and if I can’t land on alien planets, then what the hell am I doing? No, I worked too hard for the freedom to be an asshole in space just to lose it all to a hardware malfunction. If the Hekk don’t see the value in Super Aloe, I’ll make them see it.
I’m just glad I won’t need to land on a planet in order to conduct business with the nearest Hekki trader. He prefers a more… remote approach.
Anyway, this is me signing off for now. I’ll check back in after I get what I need.
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