17th APRIL 7080, ILARIK ASTEROID BELT, VARCOLE SYSTEM

Although not the most incredible of galactic phenomena, the Ilarik Asteroid Belt was simply beautiful to witness. A cascade of rock shining brightly in the sun of the system in which it drifted and backlit by a deep blue nebula, Ilarik was easily the most attractive feature of an otherwise unremarkable system.

It was this sight that greeted a small number of observers as their ship blasted into the system, and its awe was not lost on them. A quiet chorus of wows and gasps of amazement drifted around the bridge of the small craft.

Sean Hayes, captain of the vessel in question, whistled appreciatively. "That's something you don't see every day," the Greyhound breathed. "Sally, take us in, will ya?"

The German Shepherd at the controls steered the ship as its sublight drive re-engaged. "Can do, Cap. Looks like an easy approach."

"That's what we like," Hayes grinned. "Plus, our guests are expecting the best service." He shot a glance back at the three members of the Outworld Scientific Authority, who were sat tightly lashed into their seats and staring straight ahead. Their faces were bathed in the blue glow of the nebula. "You lot holding up okay?"

One of them, a female Jackal with lovely golden fur and shortish chestnut hair, gave him a grin and a thumbs-up. "You got it."

"Opportunity of a lifetime for you guys, right?" Hayes called back.

Doreen Mundie smiled. It was indeed. To see Ilarik was one thing, but to walk on one of its asteroids... well, that was something else.

And that 'something else' was what they were here to do. On the orders of the Outworld Scientific Authority's Geology Division, the team that Doreen belonged to had been assigned to the Ilarik Asteroid Belt on orders to investigate its largest asteroid. A survey probe had swept the system some weeks earlier and picked up some fairly anomalous energy readings from the space rock, and so the OSA had wanted a close-up report. As a geologist, Doreen was enraptured by the opportunity to explore such a wild environment and discover what lay within.

"When do we get our peanuts?" chortled Rodolfo Valance, sitting in front of Doreen. The leader of the OSA detachment, the grizzled Mutt was a veteran of several asteroid drilling operations – as he never failed to inform anyone he spent more than ten seconds with. Doreen looked up to him regardless; the man knew what he was doing wherever he was.

"We're staring at the most beautiful thing in the sector and you're asking about peanuts?" Captain Hayes laughed. "You OSA lot really do enjoy the little things."

"Like solving civilization's problems?" retorted Hachi Sedge. The wiry, short-haired Arctic Fox was the team's own explosives expert, and everyone was supremely nice to her as a result. No one wanted to annoy the trained user of a Dragon's Breath mining laser.

"If you can call it that," Hayes replied, his snark obviously not restricted by the fear of disintegration.

Doreen stared out at the enormous asteroid that was filling the ship's viewport. This one shone brighter than its smaller companions, and clusters of sparkling... something peppered its rough surface. The whole thing looked valuable.

"I think we've all scored big on this one," Rodolfo said. "Hayes, if we get anything out of this, SubTechnology Mining gets something as well."

"We're counting on it," Hayes laughed.

"Beautiful, isn't it?" Doreen said. "I just can't wait to get down there and see it all from the surface."

"Doreen Mundie, galactic tourist," Rodolfo laughed.

"We're all tourists, Rodolfo," Doreen shot back. "Although I do regret not packing my sun hat." She kept on staring at the asteroid. "Maybe we should get Oliver up here and let him see this..."

"That Panda's got a job to do," Rodolfo cut her off. "No time for sightseeing on his schedule."

Doreen knew Rodolfo was right. As the team's engineer, Oliver Conroy was belowdecks preparing the equipment for the mission, along with two of Hayes' own crewmembers. She felt sorry for him right now, being stuck down there getting covered in oil and risking serious injury instead of witnessing the beauty in front of her. He loved his job, though, so she doubted it would be much of an issue.

"Fifteen minutes to landing," Sally the pilot reported from her seat. "You OSA lot better get ready for action."

Hayes stood. "Sounds like you OSA lot better get ready for action."

"Think you're right," Rodolfo said. He unslung his crash webbing and stood, stretching with a series of audible clicks. "Doreen, Hachi, you two gear up. Go see Oliver and get your stuff. We're on."

Doreen grinned. She was on all right.

The Mucky Pup, a modified Urata UT800 exploration vessel in the service of the SubTechnology Mining Corporation, shot like a rocket-propelled dart towards its destination. It was a small, somewhat blocky craft, with wedge-shaped cockpit section, massive curving shield projectors vertically mounted to either side of its midsection, and an outboard FTL drive that resembled a stack of logs attached to its cylindrical engines. In short, it was not the most aerodynamic thing to roll out of a shipyard, but it was still tough, agile and more than capable of doing its job.

The Mucky Pup soared toward the enormous, effulgent asteroid that it was to set down on and settled into an approach vector, its guidance systems giving its pilot the bearings for a landing zone; this was to be a shallow crater that the OSA probe had designated due to its agreeable gravity reading.

Onboard the swooping vessel, Doreen was preparing herself for the mission – mentally as well as physically.

She stood locked in a pose of meditation, feeling the world around her and making herself separate; letting calmness fill her; lifting her mind free of mortal concerns and worries. She took a deep breath, preparing to exhale and let go all of her negative energy...

"Doreen, ya dopey dog," intoned a voice that she identified as Rodolfo's, "will you put your other leg down and get over here?"

Doreen growled and thumped her other foot back on the deck. "Can't I have a minute for some meditation? I don't know how you lot even get about with all that tightness in you." She sighed and turned to face Rodolfo, who was regarding her with the expression of an alien abductee. "What's the look for?"

Rodolfo laughed. "You, spacing out. I could swear you were drooling, too."

"I was not!" Doreen shot back, her voice shrill with indignation. She spun to wipe her muzzle dry before completing a full three-sixty to face her superior again. "Maybe you should try it sometime."

"Sure, I'll get right on it. Let me complete my lotus blossom exercises and finish my noodles." The grin on Rodolfo's face had Doreen fairly shielding her eyes. "C'mon, cut the mystic crap and come get your stuff."

Grizzling, Doreen followed him out of the quiet corner she had picked for herself and into the corridor leading to the ship's equipment bay. Racks and shelves packed with equipment even Doreen couldn't identify, stains left by industrial solvents... the place reminded her of a torture chamber. In the centre of it all, two individuals were laboriously working on serried bits of machinery, sparks showering into their faces and being deflected by transparent head shields. One of them, a Red Panda, noticed Doreen and shut off his implement of despair. "What kept you, Mundie?" he asked through his shield.

"She was – get this – meditating, Oliver," Rodolfo told him bluntly.

"Seriously?" Oliver snorted. "And here I was thinking we had a genius onboard."

Doreen fulminated quietly. "I'm smarter than you, Conroy," she uttered upon marshalling her temper. "You just finish work on that rock-analyser." She surveyed Oliver's progress on the device; it was almost complete. The analyser was a basic unit modified on her own request; while Doreen was hardly an engineer, she had some ideas for how it could be better.

Oliver snorted and turned back to his work. "There," he said, after a few spurts of blinding light, "it's all ready to go. Let it cool for a sec, though." He switched his head shield off and glanced at Doreen, offering a quick smile.

Doreen nodded. "Thanks."

Rodolfo was looking about the room. "Where'd the medic go? We can't do this without her."

"Yeah. Who'll put boo-boos on our ouchies if we sprain a claw?" Doreen thought to add.

The SubTechnology engineer standing next to Oliver, a Tabby Cat, glanced at Rodolfo. "You're talking about Fleur? She's in the med-lab."

"She doing anything important, Davis?" Rodolfo asked. "Only we need her down here."

"If she ain't prepped," Aaron Davis said, "you don't go anywhere. You just gotta wait."

"Where's Hachi, by the way?" Doreen said aside to Rodolfo.

"Hachi? She went to get something to eat in the mess." Rodolfo paused for a moment. "What do you say to a bit of tiffin before we head out?"

Doreen grinned. She was pretty peckish. "What do I say? Yay."

"There's our medic," Rodolfo proclaimed as he and Doreen entered the ship's limited mess to find the Mucky Pup's medic and Hachi seated at the table. "Thought you were supposed to be in the med-lab."

The Newfoundland looked up and smiled, ears twittering. "Team Leader Valance. Pleased to meet you. Well, meet you further. We didn't get much time to chat before leaving port."

"Just bringing the lady down for a spot of brunch before we head out." Rodolfo flicked his eyes hopefully towards the lockers nearby; at least, his eye-flick sort of looked hopeful to Doreen. She wasn't expecting much. "What's in the pantry?"

Hachi grinned. "Always thinking about your stomach, boss man."

Fleur Marlow – name helpfully advertised by her jacket's nametag – stood and ambled over to the lockers and proceeded to rummage. "We have self-heating SynthaMeat beef bars."

"Yuck," said Doreen.

"And some processed meat cakes."

"Yuck," said Doreen.

"And toffee gel-paste."

"Yuck," said everyone present in unison.

"Gimme one of those beef bars and I'll dip it in gel-paste," Hachi said, whiskers twitching. "The combination of disgusting and disgusting might round out to something less disgusting."

Doreen pulled a face at the locker as if expecting its contents to lunge at her. "I'll take a beef bar," she mumbled, choosing the least objectionable item. If there was one thing she hated about going into space, it was the food. She'd grown up on Racale, an affluent world known for its roadside cafes and eateries, and to go from the rich cuisine of her homeworld to preserved muck was simply horrible.

She caught the bar as Fleur chucked it, and opened it. There was a short hum and blast of hot air as the bar auto-cooked, and Doreen jammed it into her mouth, intending to finish it as fast as possible. She barely tasted it – that was her intention – and what she could taste of it tasted foul. It resembled beef in the same way an occasional table resembled a lollipop.

She snorted and glanced about at the others, who were gasping their way through their own meals.

"I'm glad we have a medic present," Hachi was saying, obviously trying not to choke on a mouthful.

"I can't help you now," Fleur Marlow was responding, trying not to let the gel-paste she was attempting to ingest render her unconscious.

"You lot really are a buncha lightweights," Rodolfo exclaimed, chewing his way through a beef bar with enthusiasm if not enjoyment. "This stuff ain't that bad."

"Ain't that bad? I'm gonna have to wash that down with sand." Doreen threw the wrapper somewhere in the direction of the recycler and swilled her mouth out with saliva. "And don't even tell me what's to drink around here."

Fleur's embattled mouth opened; Doreen forestalled it. "Don't tell me. Really."

Despite all her admittedly snobbish complaints about ship food, Doreen did have a soft spot for the humble fizz-shake. She strode from the mess sipping on a cherry shake, grateful for its artificial almond-like flavour. Sure, it still paled to anything naturally produced, but it was marginally more tolerable than SynthaMeat.

"Right," Rodolfo said, "Doreen, go get your scanner from Oliver. Hachi, you can go see if he's done with your mining laser. Miss Marlow, stay with me and we'll suit up." He ran his finger across all of them. "Everyone at the lock in ten minutes, okay?"

"Aye, sir," Doreen saidwith a toothy grin.