Levitating, Hashard reached out with his accumulating and analyzing scions into the deep space of the just entered solar system.

The shining of a bright, near white sun warmed his old and wide branches. Chloroplast became whorled and he relished the sweet and soft stimulus.

In his consciousness appeared a nearby planet. Huge, with planetary surface covered with water. And two moons. It may approve of advantage to have two moons near a planet. And the reflecting echo of his scions attracted his awareness towards a curiosity about one of those moons. There might be a subterranean artefact to find.

According to the prevailing view of the Unfallen he send a team of young saplings to fathom...

With professional awareness and the assurance of their defensive capabilities Nailik and his companions landed smoothly upon the moon. Dark, grey rocks that seemed combined with cinder drew the scenery. “There is a nebulous pond nearby. I sense an agile surface”, Jaaron informed him. Nailik moved towards a small cliff around the strange area. In his 380 years this first encounter of a foreign moon was a new high-pitch in his life. Quickly he sensed an acid sting above the ground level and it got more displeasing as they approached the pond.

As soon as the team saw the yellow thick dust, their scanning devices assured their curious eyes. The pond was of several hundred meters deep and full of moving, agile smoke.

“We move on, scale the moons parameters and gather information. Maybe we find some caverns.” Nailik declared and moved onward, with a respectful distance to the pond. So far he was a very healthy and inwardly pure Unfallen. To get his branches etched by liquid or even infected by microbes – his foliated outer limbs shivered at that thought.

Within the day the data had been collected. Yet, in the deep of the moon, around its smoky core, laired a thick mass of an ashes-steam-mixture. If collected properly it should serve as an excellent humus soil.

 “Let us create an ongoing wimble that drills into the deep. Then we loot the potential soil through quarantining sucking pipes.” – he sensed out to his team.

Jaaron objected: “If the drill is just a bit too heavy the cinder may break into pieces. We cannot calculate the complete consequences, the moon may even be lost altogether.”

The consciousness of the team deliberated about whether to declare the mission failed.

But to Nailik it was precious win, if the soil could be looted. With his ship-connected tablet he coordinated the cyborg kit, witch paled, pressed and formed a fitting construction.

Although emotions clearly urged him to stop the mission, Nailik forced the construction into work. The huge wimble turned, grinding sound from the buried tunnel echoed upon the surface. The ground began shaking and yellow dust poured up at many spots around them.

Nailik kept consuming and looting the soil until huge fractures broke up and released more dust...

Dear Readers and fellow profilers,

Similar to other partakers to this contest, this is my first contribution and even my first post on games2gether!

After finishing my story I read quite a lot of the other contributions and there are many great stories, so I am curious about the coming voting week.

Always in mind to keep short I first had a story of 627 words. O_o

Delete the end and keep it more open? Shortening descriptions / scenery? Cutting down dialogues? Quite difficult to me to get it to less than 500 words, I did a mix of all of that, but now it should be fine. :)

If you enjoyed reading the story and could imagine it within this great game, please feel free to give it a vote.

Several remarks : 

 - I like the way you describe the environment : your use of adjectives like "agile" to describe smoke makes me think of the unique perception the Unfallen must have of their environment.

 - Same remark as for TheTakenKing : because plants are all bisexual, why using "he" instead of "it" : it gives more personality to you characters, but ... I don't know, it is an interesting problematic, and I avoided the problem in my submission my using only "I", "you", "we" and "they" (which is easy, since all my submission is about inner dialogues).

 - The "main character" of your submission, the sapling Nailik, has an interesting personality, quite different of what we could expect of an Unfallen (I imagine it is the energy of youth... All is easier when you are only 380 years old).

I wish you good luck :)

 - Same remark as for TheTakenKing : because plants are all bisexual, why using "he" instead of "it" : it gives more personality to you characters, but ... I don't know, it is an interesting problematic, and I avoided the problem in my submission my using only "I", "you", "we" and "they" (which is easy, since all my submission is about inner dialogues).

Actually, many plant species have separation to male and female specimen (dioecious). If we are talking about androgyne Unfallen, I suppose we may use "he"/"she" to emphasize character's personality.

thank you both for your comments and hints!

With this story I tried to include several, different things.

Like the combined/connected consciousness of the Unfallen, when "Hashard", who is the exploration ship itself, has "his" own perceptions and yet there is

a prevailing opinion built and therefore they start to explore the curiosity...

a sapling with nearly 400 years being a sapling :D.. the contact with dust for opening

several ways and options for a faction quest... and so on.. ;)

I thought about the "he/it" according to Hinins hint.... good point, I assume that

avoiding it is a clever idea, yet within this story it may have a more intuitive effect on the reader if it is written like this. ;D

Good luck with your contributions. Both are great! As I mentioned (you will surely agree) there is a lot of high potential in this contest.