Starbound: A Space Odyssey

After recovering from the effects of the hangover, John and Lenny left the Royal Hotel and went to find Penguin Pete on the Shipyard Shop.

On his way toward there, he felt a lot of eyes focusing on him. Even though there was no malicious intent, it creeped out John, he started to walk faster.

Lenny who was by side saw that. He glanced at the people that were looking at John and realized that most of them were from the audience of the Iron Fist Arena.

Lenny smirked and threw a side glance at John's direction. "How does it feel being famous now... Black Lightning."

"Lenny..." John angrily stared Lenny. "Don't start it now..."

"Alright, alright..." Lenny stopped messing around.

They arrived at the Shipyard Shop after a few moments. There were Penguins working everywhere in the Shipyard, they were dismantling ship wreckages, and building new ships with the pieces.

John was able to see a middle-aged man with orange hair berating the Penguins from the distance.

John approached the man and the Penguin Pete also felt that there was someone behind hun, so he turned around.

"John... Yer is here." Pete greeted John but ignored Lenny.

"Pete, how are you?" John greeted Penguin Pete.

"I'm fine, thanks."

"Is the ship done?"

"Yeah, it is done. Come, let me you show you how it looks now."

Pete brought John and Lenny to enter inside the shop. The shop was completely made of a rusty metal, it looked very old from the outside, but the inside was sparkling new. There was catalogs of ships, other types of vehicles and pieces for repair on the walls. There was some advertisements about what appeared to be... Mechs.

Mechs aren't a rare sight in the space, a lot of people have them. They are a piece of machinery that is extremely needed since most of the spaceships doesn't have weapon system. Usually, criminals use the Mechs to destroy, or board into ships and space stations.

The prohibition of building Warships and placing weapons on spaceships was made by the Terrene Protectorate. If any ship was sighed using a weapon, they would be hunt down by the Terrene Protectorate and destroyed to serve as an example for the others.

As for the Mechs, the Terrene Protectorate tried to prohibit them as well, but the Letheia Corporation refused to do it. Most of the mining operation in asteroid field and other planets are made by miners using Mechs to venture in this dangerous places.

It was also because if this prohibition that most people started to lose interest in making big ships. Why would they build something big that couldn't have weapons? They would only be an easy target for pirates since bigger ships cannot use the FTL Warp Drive. So this was also one of the reasons why almost 90% of the spaceships on the universe belong to one of the 5 classes, Sparrow, Kestrel, Falcon, Eagle, and Condor.

Pete stopped by a door that was inside the shop, he pressed some blank keys that were by the side of the door, and soon enough it opened.

After the door opened John and Lenny was able to see that there was a stair that leads to the underground.

"Come," Pete called both of them as he slowly stepped in the stairs.

John and Lenny followed behind him.

Once they entered they were met with a huge warehouse and what appeared to be a workshop.

"Hey, Pete! You came at the right time, I need some help with something!" A Penguin wearing giant glasses appeared from the workshop. His entire body was covered in oil and some burnt marks.

"Not now, I have customers!" Pete said to the Penguin.

"Oh... Sorry for interrupting." The Penguin said apologetically.

"Nevermind..." Pete said dismissively. "John this Penguin right here is the best mechanic of the Ark Outpost, his name is Akaggy-"

"Dr. Akaggy." The Penguin corrected.

"Dr. Akaggy..." Pete rolled his eyes. "He focuses his works in building and repairing Mechs."

"Oh..." John curiously looked at the small Penguin.

"Hi!" The Penguin used his wing to lift the oversized glasses back to the place. "Welcome toDr. Akaggy's Mech Workshop!" He said enthusiastically. "Don't worry! I can assure you that this is a 100% legitimate business."

"They're not here for your Mechs, Akaggy..." Pete facepalmed.

"It's Dr. Akaggy!!!!!!! How many times I have to say!" The Penguin started to shout right at Pete's face.

"Get out of here." Pete sent the Penguin away with a kick using his artificial metal leg.

"FUCK YOUUuuuu..." The Penguin shouted as he crashed right into his Workshop.

"*Ahem* Sorry about that..." Pete said embarrassedly.

"You sell Mechs?" John glanced around the warehouse and saw that there was indeed some giant humanoid robots in the walls.

"Well... Not me, but that Akaggy fella!" Pete started to bring walk again. "I don't have experience messin' around with Mechs, they are way too complex for me. All these Mechs that see in this warehouse were projected and built by him. He's a... Genius..."

"If he's a genius why wouldn't he open a shop for himself in the surface?" Lenny was bored so he casually asked.

"He had a shop there... Once... But he lost it..." Pete sadly sighed. "It's all because of that... Fucker called Dreadwing and his crew." Pete shook his head and smiled. "Let's not talk about this for now. Come I'm going to show how yer ship looks from the exterior."

Pete brought them to a giant and empty room that only a single machine in the middle of the room.

Pete turned the lights on and then turned the machine on.

After a few rumbling noises, the machine shot out a huge light from the cylinder that was on top of it.

The blue light formed a giant hologram that showed the exterior of John's ship.

"Here is your new ship..." Pete pointed at the ship.

John walked closer at stared at the giant hologram.

It was almost like a completely new ship. The whole frame had been changed, now it looks like a militaristic Sparrow spaceship from... The USCM.

"As yer can see I changed the frame to a more... Useful one" Penguin Pete started to explain the changes, "While the Terrene Protectorate's spaceship frame is also good, it isn't the best for when you engage in a space battle or yer have fled... Since the Protectors almost never have to flee, their ships were never designed as such. But the main motive I changed the frame was because your previous one remembered too much a Terrene Protectorate ship, it had the style and even the logo by the sides. Now that the Terrene Protectorate is destroyed, any person with grudges would hunt down yer if they found that yer have anything that remembers them the Terrene Protectorate, so I took the liberty to make these changes." Pete explained about the changes, but also warned John using an undertone, about the risks of being found out that he had any relation with the Terrene Protectorate.