Project Overworld

There was not enough oxygen left within the c.o.c.kpit to eject them into the emptiness of space, fortunately. However, Keith did grab the door firmly with his free hand to prevent any incident from happening.

Afterwards, he bent both of his legs and jumped in direction of the door. They got there after only a few seconds of being oxygen deprivated, since Keith had actually parked them as close as possible to the space station

Remembering the later's explanation, Leyla grabbed onto one of the protuding parts at the edges of the door and let hi hand free. Keith then proceeded to turn the wheel that was sealing the door and managed it in another couple of seconds

Once it was finally open Leyla infiltrated the building before Keith, who locked the door back behind him. He then operated a lever to activate the depressurising mechanism, hoping that the solar panels of the station have been enough to supply itself up until now. Fortunately, oxygen invaded in a matter of seconds and they both got to breath yet again.

This whole chain of action took them a little bit over twenty seconds, not nearly enough for their characters to be at danger of oxygen deprivation, but still stressful enough. There was not really any way to simulate the loss of consciousness of a player in a game other than blocking access to their own character.

The way Project Overworld handled this matter was really predictable, albeit sudden. After exactly thirty seconds of oxygen deprivation, one's screen darkened a lot thus leading to troubles witnessing what was happening around them. After a complete minute, they would finally lose all access to their avatar, which would in turn die after another minute has passed.

That was why, Keith and Leyla were not quite close to dying by the end of these twenty seconds, but it was a pretty scary experience nonetheless. After gaining his composure back, Keith finally opened the door leading to the rest of the base, introducing Leyla to his latest project he had yet to share to anyone else.

- "Quite impressive, isn't it?" He inquired of Leyla.

However, the later replied with a disappointed pout : "Meh... Everything is so narrow... It feels like I'd get claustrophobic just by living here."

Keith feigned being offended and pursued : "Heh! My base doesn't fit Madame's standards... And here I was, thinking that its size wouldn't really matter as long as the view was great! Hum... Let me rephrase that quickly, it sounded kind of strange." He suddenly realized before the both of them laughed it up. "But seriously, the view is actually really good from up there." Keith said while leading the way to one of the very few windows which were scattered around the base.

He did not install a lot of these since they were so much of an hassle to maintain.

- "Woah!" Leyla exclaimed. "It is indeed really beautiful to see the Earth from up close." Leyla has already had the occasion to see the Earth from afar after they stopped on the Moon with their 'Apollo 8' mission. However, it was her first time taking her time to look at it from a stable orbit.

- "Don't worry." Keith expressed. "You'll get to see it in full once we get to work from the outside."

Actually, Keith just realized it but it would be really necessary for him to do a complete inspection of his base from the exterior to repair any micrometeorite impact that had happened during the large amount of time he has not been there.

Fortunately, he had preventively placed large metal sheets over the most vulnerable places of the EOSS before going back on Earth. Also, he had implemented a program in his station's main computer that would be sealing off any room from oxygen supply if there was a breach detected in there while he was away.

Actually detecting a breach would be pretty much impossible for now, since it required that his base was fully covered with captors to detect any impact in its hull. Instead, the program would only detect a contant yet quick loss of oxygen in any of the modules. This would ensure that the both of them would not be sealed off just by breathing around the base.

Anyways, since he would be making a guided tour for Leyla to know where she would be finding anything that she needed during the stay, Keith would also take this opportunity to check how many rooms have been sealed off so far.

'Hopefully, no oxygen or fuel reservoir have been damaged yet.' He thought while leading the way.

The tour went a lot faster than it did for his other bases. In fact, although the total number of rooms may be matching that of his land base, especially with the new modules he launched up there, each one was only fifty-five square feet in size. In just a few minutes, Keith was done with his guided tour and counted a total of three rooms which have been sealed off.

It worried him a little since one of them was related to his fuel supplies, but there was not much left in his tanks anyways when he left the station a few months ago.

Once they got to the bedroom, however, Keith could not help but realize there would be a predicament for the both of them.

- "Erm... We might have a problem." He expressed while looking at the bed.

- "What do you mean?" She could not help but worry.

- "Well... You see... there's only one bed and two of us." He explained with an embarassed voice.

- "I knew you were going to make one of those silly jokes."

Keith's tone got a bit more genuine: "No but more seriously, that might actually be a problem for our stay. If one of us happen to die while not having set his spawnpoint there, they would have respawn back at our land base. Worse, if the both of us set our spawnpoint in turn depending on what we need to do, if we happen to die it's right back at Midgard that we would have to respawn."

- "Oh yeah, no beggie. Just set your spawnpoint there, I don't really care if I respawn on Earth."

- "Sure thing, but you'll have to be extra careful when navigating around the base."

- "Anyways, don't you have some resources to make an extra one?"

- "I do, but it's on the outside." He pointed at a nearby wall that was separating them from the void of space.

- "Then I just have to wait there until you get to the necessary module."

Keith nodded in confirmation and started activating himself. Actually, he had other things to do beforehand, and Leyla would have to wait several hours for him to build her bed.

In any case, he first needed to put on his space suit if he wanted to do anything in there. After putting it on and checking if it was tightly shut, he went back to the depressurising chamber and activated the reverse mechanism in order to empty the room from gas and oxygen before going into space. Equipped with a belt full of tools, Keith made a complete tour of his base from the exterior. He needed to spot any impact in the hull of his station that could potentially be dangerous for them.

This process alone took him a couple of hours, so much so that he had to come back inside of the base to disconnect for the day. Fortunately for them, they left the Earth really early into the morning and managed to get all the way to the intended orbit in under a day. This meant that they would also have the whole following day, a Sunday, to work onto the station.

When Keith came back into their base, he found out that she had already disconnected from the game.

'She doesn't have much to do here all alone. I should connect back early in the morning tomorrow to make a bed so she can start doing things around here.' He meditated before disconnecting in turn.

However, his complexion darkened after finding out it was already two in the morning. "Short-night sleep it is." He breathed out while setting up an alarm for eight a.m.

Although his awekening a lot harder than he expected, he managed to get his module containing a portion of his resources there in under two hours. Thanks to this, Leyla did not have to wait long until he came back with everything needed to make a bed.

- "Okay, this will be your first time moving around in space with one of these. My advice would be that you try move as slow as possible to begin with." He explained to her while they were equipping their space suits. After putting his on, he actually had to go and help Leyla with hers since she did not know how to do it.

- "What about this?" She inquired while holding a long strip in her hand.

- "That's the security. There are several anchors placed around the base, you should always tie this rope to one of these anchors so you won't accidentally derive in space. Okay, seems like we're all set." He concluded while equipping his helmet.

- "Let's go!" He talked to Leyla using his talkie-walkie.