In the Gravity dome, Leah was staring at a spherical-shaped thing that Azzy took out from his storage card.
"Is this really the spaceship your secret backer gave it to you? It's not a prank you are pulling on me, right?" Leah asked with a look of uncertainty on her face. Well, her worries were not unfounded.
The object literally resembled a baseball created for giants, if there is such a race.
Azzy responded by speaking out loud with his gaze on the object, "Aria, open the door."
*sssh*
The door opened to reveal a barrier sort of entrance.
Azzy then walked towards it, "follow me."
As Leah followed him into the spaceship, she found out that the interior was a lot bigger than she expected.
It was divided into several sections, one attributed to controls, a dorm with about ten rooms, a large gravity chamber, a dining area, a bar filled with various alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks, an entertainment zone, a storage room, etc...
She felt as if she entered a pocket dimension.
Then, they were greeted by a moving holographic 3D image of a girl, "Hello, Captain. Greetings, Ms. Pendragon. I'm Aria, a super artificial intelligence program designed by Dr. Mac. At the moment, my designation is the pilot of this spaceship."
"Ah, hello," Leah nodded in return with a bit of surprise on her face. Azzy casually waved his hand, "Hey, Aria. Everything good on your side?"
"The Ship's condition is good. We leave whenever you are ready, Captain. But, before that, I advise both of you to equip the spacesuit in case of an unexpected malfunction or an ambush from an unknown during the travels between each space jump," replied the holographic 3d image. After a brief pause, she added, "Since this is going to be a test run, we will be doing several space jumps for safety.
The first space jump will be the smallest in order to escape from the radar of the World Space Agency."
Leah couldn't help but marvel at the advanced scientific technology before her eyes and commented, "I thought those battle robots were the greatest invention of mankind."
"Ms. Pendragon, the Battle Robot was also an invention by Dr. Mac," replied the holographic Aria right away.
"Oh!" Leah exclaimed; she wasn't aware of it, for she always thought it was the work of the Northern Qudour government's R&D.
Or perhaps, this Dr. Mac works for the government? "Hmm... it could be possible," thought Leah.
Soon, Azzy and Leah wore spacesuits and sat down in the lounge while Aria operated the ship as the door closed.
Her voice was heard all over the ship.
"Destination selected: Planet Xula, Star system: Proxima Centauri/Gliesse 551
Distance: 519.56 light-years
Needed space jumps required: 18
But, Leah interrupted his words by saying, "We'll take a break, Aria."
"Hmm?" Azzy looked at his partner. Leah replied, "It's been more than two days since we started. I need some fresh air. Exploring the world for a few hours will not do much damage to your mission."
Seeing that Azzy had no reaction, Leah further added, "You can also see that the cooldown timer is increasing with each space jump. Perhaps, it is due to continuous space jumps. Giving it more time of cooldown right now might decrease it in the future."
"Is it true, Aria?" Azzy asked the super A.I.
"Yes," The 3d holographic image appeared before them and gave a firm nod. "However, the total journey time will also be increased the longer you take a break." She didn't forget to warn them.
As Azzy was weighing pros and cons, Leah reminded him of a simple logic that turned in her favor, "the longer the space jump is, the higher the risk of getting discovered by unknown forces. Wasting our time here might benefit us in the upcoming days. We only had like 7 so far. There are still 11 to go."
"Hmm... I guess you are right," Azzy gave his nod for the break, "Aria, scan its atmosphere, planet, and everything, and report."
Half a minute later;
"Scanning is completed."
Planet: unnamed, not recorded in our existing data
Age: 6.4 billion years
Size: 1.8 times that of Gaia (in comparison)
Mass: 12 times that of Gaia (in comparison)
Gravity: 3.7 g
World laws: Restriction on Soul orb, Natural energy manipulation is permitted.
Land: 79.1%, Water: 20.9%
Atmosphere: 40.4% oxygen, 58.2% nitrogen, 1.4%-others
Water composition: Heavy water (D2O-67%), ethanol (32.1%), others (0.9%)
Number of species on planet: 1 million-6 million (approx).
Civilizations: Yes
Known intelligent species: Yer, Aeni
Scientific technology: N/A
Superpowers are discovered.
As Leah and Azzy were reading the details displayed on a holographic screen created by Aria, the latter spoke, "Need to activate deep planetary scanning function for further details."