"The atmosphere is 75% nitrogen, 24% oxygen and 1% are other gases" exclaimed Bura. The miners had geared up in anti-UV suits. Despite the fact the planet was primordial, there was no sign of life. The surface consisted of rugged terrain and reddish-brown dust in the atmosphere. The rocks were of a similar colour to the dust which suggested that the wind erroded the rocks. The crew's geologist Parker walked out first and prodded his probe into several mountainous areas until he found a rich deposit. Satisfied, the geologist planted the explosives and ran back to the ship. The idea was to gently move the ores backwards while creating a sizable hole for each miner.

After the explosion the miners geared up. They wore anti-UV suits, picked up a titanium probe and a precision laser specifically designed for tearing through rocks. The laser caused the atoms to move apart which increased the weakness of any rock. I was among those miners. I had good results on my MAT but I wanted a simple job. I was an engineer like Derek but I wasn't high on the pay scale. Then I noticed this mining job and they offered me more money than engineering. I was a technical advisor, pedantically speaking, which meant I was in charge of mining technology but I still was a miner. In my spare time, I developed systems and/or improved systems. I had a modified rock destroyer which powered through rocks much quicker by increasing the energy efficiency of the laser.

I put on my helmet and walked with my colleagues to the hole in the mountain. Parker had left a flare to mark the location which we found instantly. Parker told us that he had calculated about 50 tonnes of titanium ore in the vein. Anyway, how rude of me to not introduce myself. My name is Xe. Eventually, we arrived at the mine and began work. I noticed a fault in someone's probe and it read "100%" which is impossible; we never encounter pure titanium. After cutting through that rock we noticed a slab of pure titanium and a mysterious liquid. I sampled this liquid and stored it in a test tube.

One of the miners took off his anti-UV suit due to the intense heat inside the mine. After a few minutes he started to show signs of hyperthermia (dizzyness, lack of sweat, etc.) so we rushed him to the medical bay on board the ship.

We had robots for medical diagnosis as medicine had become to advanced for human capacity. The robot was capable of performing any surgical operation after a quick anatomy scan. The robot said he didn't have hyperthermia but actually was faint. He lied down in the bed while the robot took a blood sample to determine the cause of this faintness.

I took the liquid to the chemical analysis laboratory and the results were scary. The liquid was amino acids which hinted at life. Was the miner infected by amoeba from Ceres? I rushed to the medical bay and I asked the robot for the blood test results. He replied with "Some cells are dividing at a rapid rate hinting at cancerous infection."

Then I noticed a weird dot in one of the cells. When I enhanced it, it was revealed to be a virus. I observed the activity of the virus. It had burst through the membrane and partially embedded itself in the nucleus. Then it reproduced rapidly and several copies burst out of the cell. The host cell then became cancerous and reproduced rapidly after it repaired itself. The virus had fully integrated itself with the cell. I then observed twitching by the infected miner but thought nothing of it.

The robot said "The virus has infected neurological connections." This was unusual. How did the robot know about the virus? It had no sense of curiosity so how would it investigate the black dot? When I looked back at the miner he wasn't twitching or breathing. His pulse had completely gone. We placed him in a clear container to prevent infection spread. After that incident we returned to our sleeping quarters trying to forget the day.

To be continued...