The Protagonist System

Atlas knew he didn't have to file a flight plan with anyone, since no one actually controlled space access. Everyone just assumed you needed to go to the spaceport and ride a rocket up through the atmosphere to reach space, and normally they would be right.

However, the cargo hauler was primarily a space cargo hauler and his flight path wouldn't intercept anything the spaceport was sending up or having come down to the planet's surface. On the other hand, he didn't want people in the various companies and agencies freaking out if he did it without telling anyone where he was going.

So, Atlas sent a copy of his flight plan to the flight control office at the spaceport and then sent a copy to the Interpol Space Police agency, just to warn them that a new player was making his debut in the space stage. He launched from the warehouse and followed his flight plan, which seemed to surprise a bunch of people.

Several of them sent him inquiries and they were automatically rerouted to an automated response, just as they had been when he first started cleaning up the garbage and everyone wanted to know what was going on. He chuckled as the attempts to contact him increased and he ignored them and kept flying up into the sky.

When the ship tilted up almost vertically, there was almost a constant stream of messages flooding in and Atlas kept laughing. The ship didn't take long to reach the edge of the atmosphere and Atlas wasn't surprised to see one of the Interpol's Space Police reaction-controlled transport units was waiting for him in low Earth orbit.

Instead of stopping there and letting them board, he sent them an invitation to follow him to his chosen worksite in high Earth Orbit and they responded that they didn't have the reaction mass to change orbits. He responded that wasn't a problem and he locked a tractor beam onto them, then he kept laughing as they shouted about being dragged along through space.

They quickly arrived in his chosen space, which was between the Arasaka Orbital Station in low orbit and the Crystal Palace. They had to avoid a lot of debris and other satellites that countries, corporations, and various agencies around the world had put into place.

Atlas disengaged the tractor beam and the Interpol reactive thrust transport shot off at an odd angle, which clearly showed that they had been desperately trying to break away from him. He sighed and reached out with his telekinesis and technopathy and stopped their flight by disengaging the reaction engines and then he turned them around and brought them back over to his ship.

He parked them in a good position to have a great view of him working, then he had one of the cargo hexagons open up. Since he had left a small amount of air inside, everything was very slightly pushed out into space. The Interpol agents were shocked at that and watched as Atlas left his cargo ship wearing an advanced and streamlined space suit that made them very envious.

Atlas gave them a wave and a thumbs up, as if confirming he would share them, and he used his suit's reactive thrusters to move over to the generator and the much larger reactor core. Since the space station parts had been designed to make them easier to handle and assemble after years of testing, he spent the next few hours easily assembling them and securing them.

He concentrated on building just the skeletal structure as a base to build on, then he wired up everything he would need to attach to both the reactor core and the power generator. He also attached several consoles and tested everything, just to make sure it worked and proved to his observers that he wasn't fooling around or was wasting their time.

The next things to add were the artificial gravity generator and the inertial compensator. The station he was building was going to be in a stationary orbit over Night City and no one had ever seen anything so big stay completely still in geosynchronous orbit before, since everything else in space had to orbit to keep their large mass moving and unaffected by Earth's gravity well.

Mind you, the various satellites and stealth weapons in orbit, could be stationary when necessary. It cost a lot of power and fuel to do so, though. Most of them had huge solar panels and they could be easily seen from the new station's vantage point, since they were in a much lower orbit.

Atlas ran out of parts and opened another hexagon container of his ship. All of the contents popped out with a small puff of lost atmosphere and he started attaching the necessary computer components where necessary and consoles at different points, then he started securing a mass of protective panels around the reactor room.

He added various hallways around and a few other rooms that would hold the industrial replicators he would need to make more parts. He was soon finished with building the core of the station and he knew the Interpol agents were recording it all and commenting on how easy it was for a single man to do it.

Of course, he was cheating with his powers, since moving such large massive metal parts usually needed many hands to get them into position. However, he was an old hand at starbase construction and the DS9 design was quite simplistic when compared to the other much more advanced stations that he and his exploration agency had handled in the Delta Quadrant, since there was no Caretaker tech involved this time.

After adding a barracks, a cafeteria, a lounge area, and a large room that would eventually become one of the internal shuttle docking areas, the current circular form was finished and airtight. He initiated the startup protocols remotely and then spent a few minutes setting up a temporary airlock that the Interpol agents could use in the shuttle dock.

When it was done, he turned to wave at them and sent them a short message of invitation. Atlas laughed when all three occupants immediately disembarked from their small transport vehicle and tumbled into space.

They were wearing bulky space suits and used their own reaction thrusters to stabilize themselves and carefully oriented to both him and the station core. Once they were, they floated over to him on minimal thrust. He grabbed a handhold by the airlock to secure himself and held out an inviting hand to them.

They were close enough that he saw the relief on their faces and he smiled at them. He also nudged them a little with his telekinesis to ensure he could catch them if they started to drift. He caught the commanding officer's hand first, since he was closer, and guided the man to the handhold on the other side of the entryway.

The second officer came close and Atlas caught their hand and guided him to the handhold above the airlock. Atlas turned back and caught the hand of a fairly pretty Russian woman and she beamed a smile at him, since she knew there were no more handholds and he would have to keep hold of her hand.

Atlas laughed at her reaction and initiated the airlock procedure. The first door opened and he gently pulled her forward. She didn't let go at first, then smirked at him and let his hand go. She looked surprised when she floated inside the airlock and saw how big it was.

Her commanding officer followed her inside and he was just as surprised. If there hadn't been a normal airlock door and had a hangar one instead, they could have easily flown their transport vehicle inside and landed... if it had landing gear and wouldn't collapse under its own weight if subjected to gravity.

The third member of their team came in, was just as surprised as his fellow agents, and Atlas entered as well. He shut the door and turned to mime in the air about air pressure and then pointed down and clapped. It took a moment before they understood what he meant and each of them gave him a thumbs up.

Atlas nodded and reached for the panel by the door and hit several buttons. It was quiet for several seconds, then sounds started to grow and echo inside the empty room. The three Interpol agents were again surprised at how quickly it was happening and then a loud beep sounded. They were then shocked to hear a snooty British male voice speak.

“Warning: Gravity initiating at point one gradient per second.”

Atlas clicked his helmet latch and took it off. He made a bit of a show of it as he took in a huge breath of air and let it out. “There's nothing like a breath of fresh air after so long breathing canned.”

The three Interpol agents exchanged slightly worried looks as the gravity started up and they slowly started drifting downwards.

“Vine, I vill do it virst, you cowards.” The woman volunteered and her slight Russian accent made her sound sophisticated.

She opened her helmet's outer visor first, disengaged her internal air, and unlocked the inside visor and popped it open. She only took a small sniff at first to test it, then she smiled widely and did the same exaggerated deep breath move Atlas had.

Atlas chuckled at her copying him and let the slowly building gravity pull him to the floor naturally like the other three. He didn't want to give away that he had been flying on his own out in space and hadn't been using the reaction thrusters at all.

“We'll be at a full one gravity in a minute.” Atlas said and checked the panel by the airlock. “This outer door won't unlock until the room's evacuated and the air removed, so you don't have to worry about it.”

The two men relaxed and the woman took a tentative step. She seemed to acclimate quickly and walked over to him in a slight hop and waddle, which was the same way experienced astronauts walked on the moon.

“How did you seal such a big construct so qvickly?” She asked Atlas when she reached him.

“It's inherent in the part design and construction. The armored panels interlock and also have wiring and connection things already installed.” Atlas explained. “As soon as the gravity settles, we can enter the space station core and I can show you on one of the consoles.”

She beamed a smile at him for giving her access to so much information. “That sounds vunderful.”

“Lieutenant.” The commander said in a normal tone.

She let out a soft sigh. “However, I must decline. We are here on a mission...”

“I know.” Atlas interrupted her. “I was the one that sent my plans to your agency in Europe and I assumed they would have someone near my flight path to interrogate me about what I'm doing up here.”

She looked around at the large empty room and back to him.

Atlas chuckled again. “This will be a small docking area for shuttles after I set up a few other things. I only added the personal airlock here so I could bring you inside. It's easily removable later, unlike if I had installed it in the cafeteria or the lounge.”

The three agents stared at him with blank faces at that last comment.

Atlas opened his mouth to say they would see it soon, then the computer beeped again.

“Standard one gravity has been established.” The snooty British male voice stated. “Have a nice day.”

“Thank you, computer.” Atlas said and walked over to the other airlock door. It opened without him having to do anything and he stopped walking in the lounge and pointed at a door. “The small barracks are in there if you want to change. Appropriate clothes are waiting for you if you do.”

“Appropriate, hmm?” The woman asked and gave him an appraising look.

“Professional uniforms and basic underwear that's highly functional and not sexy at all.” Atlas clarified, just in case.

She let out a bark of laughter and walked over to the door. “I vill check this for myself.”

When the door closed behind her, Atlas turned to her commanding officer. “I assume she doesn't realize that shaking her hips doesn't work to gain attention in a bulky spacesuit?”

“It's never come up before.” The commander answered and glanced around at the surprisingly furnished lounge that would fit in any luxury suite or high-end business office. “How did you do all of this so quickly?”

“It was all in storage.” Atlas answered truthfully. He just didn't say where that storage was. “When you're all changed, or decide not to, I'll be in the cafeteria next door after changing my own clothes.”

The commander nodded and watched the enigmatic man leave them alone in a surprisingly comfortable room that gave them the illusion that they were back on Earth and not inside a vulnerable tin can that floated above the Earth and could be depressurized at any moment.

“Sir, the communications signal is still up.” The corporal said and the commander nodded. “What are your orders?”

“We...” The older man stopped talking when the barracks door opened.

His very sexy blonde-haired lieutenant stepped out of the barracks and wore a uniform suit that was so new that it looked like it had been freshly pressed after coming off the assembly line. If he owned something like that, he would never want to get the thing dirty. It was highly stylized and polished, even the shoes, and he lamented that it looked better than his dress uniform.

She also looked entirely too pleased to be wearing it. “It is so comvortable it is sinvul.”

The two men watched as she stroked her sides to highlight how well the thing was cut and showed off that she was a nicely figured woman underneath it. Then to their shock, she reached inside the suit coat under her arm and pulled out a small firearm. The shock was only increased when they realized it was the same firearm issued to each of them.

“It is functional.” She said and showed them the moving parts she could without actually firing the thing, including showing them the full magazine. She reloaded it and tucked it away again.

“He's not worried about us inspecting him and his station at all.” The corporal commented.

“No, he is not.” The commander said and gave his lieutenant another full gaze and then sighed. “We should change as well.”

The woman smiled knowingly at them and waved towards the barracks. “There is even a locker to store the space suits vithout damaging them.”

“Of course there is.” The commander said and entered the barracks.

The corporal followed him and glanced back at his coworker to get another look at her. She grinned at him trying to sneak another peek and he held in his grimace, because she would tease him a lot about it later. It wasn't his fault that she was so attractive and he couldn't stop his eyes from wandering over her.

She usually dressed down and didn't let her attractiveness influence her job, so seeing her look both normal and sexy at the same time, was confusing as hell, and he struggled between his professionalism and his need to cover her gorgeous ass with his seed. The pants she wore needed to be outlawed or restricted to private areas.

Of course, that last thought made him think of her private areas and he didn't bother trying to hide his erection as he carefully removed his bulky spacesuit. It did bang on things a few times as he changed and that just kept him hard instead of annoying him.

When he pulled on the crisp new clothes waiting for him, he barely held in his reaction as the immensely soft cloth of the underwear cradled him in places he didn't know he needed to be cradled. It kept him hard as he finished dressing and he couldn't look his commander in the eye. If he had, he would have seen that he had an erection as well that hadn't gone away.

The pair of them stepped out of the barracks and the lieutenant let out a low whistle. She didn't comment and started to walk with them as they went to the cafeteria. They entered the similarly sized area and saw many vending machines that had products they had never seen before, so they spent a bit of time perusing what was being offered and it was extremely cheap.

What they didn't know was that they weren't vending machines at all. It was just a facade over food replicators and the buttons they pushed commanded the replicator to make that item. They gathered their food and walked over to the middle table in the middle of the room and sat down. Before they could taste the food, another door opened and Atlas walked in.

The lieutenant let out a curse under her breath when she saw the tall handsome man wearing a corpo suit that looked more expensive than her mid-range car.

Atlas ignored the scrutiny from the three of them, gathered his own meal, and walked over to their chosen table. “Do you mind if I sit here?”

“Vuck, you have manners, too?” The blonde woman asked. “Vere have you been all my life?”

Atlas laughed and sat down beside her, then started talking about what the station was going to look like when it was finished, which would be fairly soon, since he worked very fast and most of the place could be done in independent sections and wouldn't disturb the rest of the station.