All the robots immediately turned on the moment the starship was about to start the landing on XERBAB-7.
"Darian, you should immediately sit down, soon the landing will begin." Darian got up extremely fast and immediately went in front of the window to have a better view of the planet. The moment the starship was about to get ready for the landing, Pax immediately told Darian to sit down again.
"Right, sorry," he answered, sitting down in his chair. Darian looked behind him and saw all the other robots, who weren't sleeping anymore, ready to go outside the moment the ship would land.
Pax was the only one who remained on his feet, he was the one who had to adjust things in case the landing went poorly. Right now, the starship was about to enter the atmosphere, strong wind pressed against the metal of the starship, Darian, hearing that, understood only one thing: the landing was about to begin.
Darian looked outside the window, under the starship, the planet could be seen in all its beauty. There were multiple trees with their purple leaves already moving because of the strong wind generated by the starship.
"It won't be a turbulent landing, everything seems to go well." Strong winds could be found near the atmosphere of XERBAB-7. The moment the starship was slowly going down, the wind stopped pressing so hard against the metal of the rocket.
Darian could not contain his excitement anymore. If he hadn't had his seatbelt on, he would have jumped around like a child and could have gotten hurt. Pax noticed the excitement in Darian's eyes and smirked with his facial sensor. "The rocket will land exactly in… 3…" After Darian heard that, a more excited look appeared on his face; he could barely contain himself anymore.
"2… AND!" shouted Pax while slowly turning off the propellers on the ship. While still flying during the landing, the starship was shaking really hard, but now that the propellers were being turned off slowly, the shaking stopped and soon enough it felt like the rocket just stopped; it landed safely.
"1… Everyone, we have safely landed on XERBAB-7," said Pax as he removed his hands from the controllers of the ship. The moment he did that, the seatbelts were already removed from Darian and the other robots, and they could move safely again.
All the robots immediately headed towards the exit of the starship. Pax, before opening the doors, called out, "Let me know when Aegis is ready so that I can open the doors!" Aegis walked to the front and prepared the assault rifle in his arm. All the other robots took a step back. "We're ready," called out Aegis. Pax nodded his head and the doors in front of them immediately opened. Luckily, in front of them there wasn't anyone, but Aegis could never be too sure; he stayed alert while the other robots walked slowly behind him.
Darian wanted to go outside too, but Pax called for him, "Master Darian, an email has arrived from Global Space Exploration Command, you should come and check it out." On the display of the starship, an email appeared.
Darian, annoyed, walked slowly to him. "Mhmm, what have they written here?" Pax immediately began to read it aloud.
'Sir Thorne, we are so happy to have you there on XERBAB-7. If this message has arrived, this means the landing all went well and without any problems. We are happy to inform you that all the robots you have there have a specific work, and they will help you in various tasks on this planet. We're sure that you have already met them and already got to know them, but if that didn't happen, we attached a file that explains how the robots work. If they haven't turned on for any reason, you should definitely check the file to understand how they work.
We wanted to bring some robots with you, first, because we didn't want you to feel alone during this time; second, they are all going to do their work while you work on the plants. They will always be present to help you, so if you need some help from them, you can call them directly from the ship. Focusing more on you, we need you to focus on discovering how plants there work and if they might be poisonous to humans. You should check all the fruits there and see if humanity will be able to plant them on Earth. The moment you return, we need you to bring multiple seeds of the plants so that we can grow them on Earth and see how they work.
At the end of the mission, you don't need to bring the robots back with you. They will remain on the rocket waiting for other humans to arrive. In 10 years on XERBAB-7, they should have done enough and they will be able to adjust to each other perfectly, so we don't need you to bring them back. During this mission, we ask you…' Darian, hearing Pax reading all of that, was slowly losing concentration and the excitement he had before.
"Listen Pax, read it by yourself and tell me the most important parts once I return, alright?" With that, Darian launched himself outside and ran out, because he couldn't hear Pax's explanation anymore.
"Well, I guess I'll read it all…" said Pax. His role was to wait for Darian inside the ship or to go with him outside. Right now, Darian asked him to wait inside the starship, so he remained there reading the whole email, waiting for the moment his master would come back.
The moment Darian stepped outside, he saw Ceres already working together with Mason. While Ceres was chopping down some trees in front of the starship, Mason was working the wood so that he would be able to create a small base for Darian right in front of the rocket.
"Hello Sir Thorne, we are currently working on the creation of your base, so that for tonight you will have a place to sleep safely. We promise that in around 2 hours we will be able to create a small house for you, have you got any preferences?" asked Ceres while working the wood.
"Oh… to be honest, I haven't got any preferences, anything goes," he answered. Darian was caught by surprise by the sudden question. Ceres nodded his head and immediately returned to work, while Darian wandered around, amazed by everything around him.
The trees around the starship were extremely big, on Earth, it was rare to find trees this large and tall. Darian remained amazed only by looking up. He was currently in the woods and on top of him, a leaf was slowly falling down.
Darian grabbed the leaf just to see that the touch of it was totally different from the ones he used to touch on Earth, they were softer and more elastic. Darian immediately felt like the leaf was the same as a bungee cord; he could lengthen it as much as he wanted and it wouldn't break. "Eheh, it feels so good," said Darian, still checking how much he could lengthen the leaf, until he stretched it too much and it split in half.
'Still, they aren't very resistant…' Darian made the leaf fall on the ground and a beautiful flower immediately caught his attention. This flower had a crystalline color and it was smelling like sulfur. "Eh? From our studies, there wasn't anything like this on XERBAB-7…" Darian leaned down and checked the flower. Humanity hadn't discovered everything on XERBAB-7 yet, just some things, so Darian was surprised to see a flower this beautiful.
"If only it wouldn't smell like sulfur…" The smell wasn't the same as sulfur, but it was really similar. "I wonder how many other flowers like this I can find…" Darian kept walking in these woods, it felt like this type of flower was extremely common, but what was catching Darian's attention was the extremely tall grass that could be found around.
This type of grass was so high that it reached Darian's chest, and its color was purple. Darian remained amazed while walking through it.
Darian suddenly spotted what looked to be an insect of the planet. It was really similar to a grasshopper, but it had 6 legs and a small horn over its head. Darian remained locked with his eyes on the creature before the creature turned around and met Darian's eyes. The creature, which had never seen a being like that, immediately jumped away, scared.
"Tch, I wanted to see him more…" whispered Darian, annoyed that the creature suddenly jumped away scared. He then started to take the plants around him.
'I think I'll analyze them in the next few days… I want to keep exploring,' thought Darian. He kept wandering inside this big forest, taking plants.
Darian walked around taking many types of different plants for about 3 hours. Darian wasn't scared to lose his way to return to the starship, before the landing, he received a small phone from Pax, who was directly connected to the starship. Whenever Darian wanted to return there but he was too far, he could simply follow the instructions on the phone, which would bring him back safely to the starship.
Now that 3 hours had passed, Darian had put enough plants into his bag and he felt like it was time to go back to the starship. The sun was about to set and Darian couldn't tell exactly what time it was. 'I need to see if Pax can tell me how the clock works here…' he thought as he grabbed the phone in his hand to see the location of the rocket.
But suddenly, Darian heard a sort of cry coming from some bushes. Darian, curious, tried to follow it;,it didn't seem dangerous, it felt like something was hurt.
"What's there?" whispered Darian, confused. As he passed through the bushes, he saw a small bird lying on the ground. It was bleeding and it felt like it was hurt.
Darian immediately rushed towards it to see its condition, and also because he had never seen such a beautiful bird. It had four beautiful green and grey wings. It was as big as Darian's hand, but this bird only had one eye and was currently gravely injured.
"Damn… I don't think I have anything to help you…" While Darian searched through his bag to see if he had anything that could be used to help the small bird, he heard a small roar coming from his direction.
It was similar to a tiger, but it was longer and skinner. It had two beautiful black eyes and its body was all purple, so it could easily camouflage with the grass all around the place. "Shit, I don't have anything to defend myself!" Darian immediately started to panic as the tiger rushed towards him at extreme speed, realizing that he didn't have anything to protect himself with.
Suddenly, the tiger jumped towards him. Darian saw that the tiger had multiple claws that were about to hit him, and he couldn't do anything about it. He only covered his face and called for help, shouting, "AAAAA!!!!!!" He didn't stop shouting, he kept going for so long, and it felt weird for him. 'Can I keep shouting even if I'm dead?' he thought while still shouting. The moment he opened his eyes, he saw Aegis in front of him with his katana full of blood. On the ground was the lifeless body of the creature, which was split in half.
"Sir Thorne, are you alright?" Aegis opened his hand toward Darian. It was lucky that he arrived just in time, or else it would have been bad for Darian.
"Aegis… you're here!" said Darian happily, realizing that he was still alive. "I followed you, Master, even if I remained far from you, I remained close and watched you during all this time," said Aegis. Darian grabbed his hand and got up. Darian realized that it was too late for the bird he had seen; it had already died because of too much blood loss.
"Thank you… I don't think I would have done it without you," Darian thanked Aegis. Then he leaned down and grabbed the lifeless body of the bird, while Aegis took the body of the tiger. "I'm going to bring this body toward the rocket to see if you can eat it, you should come with me." Darian nodded and walked with him with the bird in his hand.
"Don't worry, Master, their bodies will not be wasted. Thanks to the help of Ceres, we will be able to understand how they are made so we can understand more about their bodies," said Aegis, breaking the silence. He realized that Darian was feeling sorry because of the death of the small bird, and even for the tiger.
With that, they headed toward the rocket safely. They saw Ceres and Mason, who had just completed a small house for Darian. It wasn't really big and it was only made of wood; the house inside was empty, but at least it had a bed in which Darian could sleep.
"Oh, hello Master Darian!" Pax immediately went to greet Darian while Aegis left the two lifeless bodies to Ceres, who would analyze them soon to see if they could be eaten by a human.
"Hello, Pax!" said Darian, happy to see him again. "How did things go, Master? Do you want to tell me now while we eat something?" asked Pax. Darian looked around and realized that Ceres had already gathered some fruits that could be eaten by humans and was waiting for him.
"Mhmm yeah, let's go, Pax." Darian sat down on the ground together with Pax and began eating the fruit the other robot gathered for him. This one was really similar to corn, but tasted totally differently, like a sort of orange.
"Mhmm, it's so sweet!" said Darian after the first bite he took. The beautiful taste of the fruit exploded in his mouth; all the juice went inside his mouth and Darian felt that he was eating one of the sweetest things that could ever be found on Earth.
While the night passed by, Darian told Pax about all the plants he found and that in the following days, he would begin to analyze them. As the night passed, Darian started to feel tired and he couldn't speak anymore.
"Master, wait, before you go to sleep I need to tell you something important that was written in that email." Darian, with his eyes half closed, nodded his head before he leaned on the bed with his eyes about to close.
"Okay, so…" Pax began to tell Darian about the other things that were written in the email, but soon enough, Darian closed his eyes and drifted into sleep. Pax, not realizing that, didn't stop and told Darian the last part that was written in the email. "By the way, the calculations were wrong, Master. In fact, once you return, 500 years will have passed on Earth, not 50." Darian emitted a weird moan while he was sleeping and Pax, realizing his master had fallen asleep, returned to the rocket and with all the other robots, shut himself down.