<div class="floatleft">(http://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/2/22/KimbNormal.jpg)</div><table class="bbc_table"><tbody><tr><td><strong>Character name:</strong></td><td>Dr. Kimb Fern</td></tr><tr><td><strong>Location:</strong> </td><td>Empty Cube</td></tr><tr><td><strong>With:</strong> </td><td> No one</td></tr><tr><td><strong>Doing:</strong> </td><td> Listening</td></tr></tbody></table><br/>Kimb stood in the empty cube, marveling at how spacious it seemed. While certainly not big, it was downright luxurious in comparison to her previous quarters. When Kimb had arrived on the Cooler she had been stuck in one of the older mine shafts; which meant old hierarchies, less ore, and very little hope for change. For the past three years she had been forced to share quarters with three other inmates, one of whom had been a rather irritable Yooforian.<br/><br/>When the government stooges, the Marines, had come looking for volunteers many had stepped forward. Only Kimb remained once they had finished explaining the danger involved.<br/><br/>Having already been on planet, Kimb had had a chance to relocate before the new inmates arrived. The silence. The stillness. They permeated the air like a magnetic field. Through the clear wall of the cube, the barren stretches of the Ice sprawled off endlessly in every direction. It reminded her of the oceans on Feynman Prime: untamed, savage, endless. It was beautiful in the bleak, efficient way certain retroviruses were beautiful. It was like looking at one of the Thousand Faces of Death the friars were always spouting on about. Under different circumstance Kimb might have smiled.<br/><br/>Of course it wouldn't remain like this. Soon the shuttle would arrive. The freshmeant would come and pollute this blessed silence. They would murder this pristine stillness with the sounds of mining and smells of living. They would come, and with them the doom of this beauty.<br/><br/>As if on cue, the landing pad alarms sounded in the distance. Though not incredibly loud at this distance, it shattered the stillness like a hammer would fine china. One of the small voices in the back of her head, Yellow Voice, said that she had better go see. Make an appearance. Better to face these things head on, Moustache Voice agreed. Kimb heaved a heavy sigh. Moustahce Voice was almost always right about such things. She stepped out into the cold and began to walk towards the landing pad.