12 Miles Below

Remember how I mentioned I wasn’t sure if Quath was genuinely a happy-go-lucky merchant or just smiling through a mask.

I got my hands on the map he was making, and now I’m nearly completely sure he’s the latter, because only a complete psychopath would fill the map up with this much detail.

“That is… uh, impressive.” I said, looking through the layered maps.

We’d arrived at a blast door, one embedded inside the cliffside wall. Past that would be the underpassage, and then they’d be spat out into the grand highway. A sort of mite biome that was less of a large sector and more of a thin branching root that wrapped around quite a good chunk of the world. This was why most cities lived within the first two stratas, the third strata didn’t have a highway like this anymore and got more alien as far as I’ve heard

Quath nodded at my earlier paise, “Green segments are those my convoy has personally crossed by and confirmed their authenticity. Pale green are my hunches and guesses on what the layout would likely look. Yellow are those where I am no longer as certain. Those are locations that are known to have some drift associated with them, and the maps I found that partitioned those sectors are beyond ten years out of date.”

“And the gray is just a complete guess?” I asked. The map he’d sent was this multicolored blob of hyper condensed details. To the point even Wrath took a few seconds to go through all the layers and absorb the information. She even mentioned finding the visual framework to be novel and would replicate that style in the future.

It looked like an anatomy picture of a dead body, with the veins in green and yellow, arteries filled with life that gradually tapered outwards into smaller passageways growing dimmer in color until it turned completely gray. Most of the surrounding map was all gray.

“The gray would be map partitions as written down that are beyond the main pathways. Mites often change those outskirt sections the most, and those sections none of my people nor myself have crossed by at all. Larger roads like these are generally safe from changes, so I feel reasonably comfortable mapping even sections I’ve never crossed as yellow.”

In giant red was a dot surrounded by a circle further up. That would be where the mite terminal existed. Not too far off, about a day’s jog.

“The map is excellent,” I said. “However I’d be remiss to not ask for something else one of my minions wants.”

Quath raised an eyebrow at me. “Ask away master Nighthaven.”

I pointed straight at Wrath, then at the crate she’d been watching over nearly the whole trip. “Mind if we bring some more food with us?”

Quath laughed. “I’ve seen your food storage and rations, you’re quite prepared and well stocked for travelers who’ve explored for a while now. I take it this is more for a single one of your ‘minions’?”

I have him a thumbs up. “What gave it away?”

“She has been staring at that crate for far longer than anyone normal.” Quath said, as if he hadn’t been staring and tinkering with his computer slate for far longer than anyone normal himself. “And her questions about the rations were… particular. I didn’t take the knight for a food lover at first, her armor certainly still fits her. Unlike myself. I’m beyond the standard deviation required for fitting inside an armor. Regrettable.”

“That’s why you have a skiff for.” Captain Atlas said.

“My minion has a really fast metabolism.” I said with a shrug. “And she likes to try out new things. We spoil her every now and then, because she can easily kill basically anything out here and possibly the most dangerous knight on our roster. Best to keep her on our side, you know?”

Wrath looked back, silent. Likely holding her breath and hoping the merchant would agree to the proposition, given she hadn’t started bickering back about being called a minion or a murderbot.

Quath waved a hand, “By all means. It’s yours, master Nighthaven. And if it’s about sampling new ration bars, I’ll have the captain here make sure the crate is filled with one of everything we’ve got on hand.” He turned to the captain who gave a quick nod back. “If you say she’s among your most dangerous warriors, while having a Deathless among you, I’ll believe you.”

Father, our Deathless, watched over all the hubbub. Then he spoke for the first time in a long while, “Which city are you bound to?”

Quath paused, as if equally caught off guard by Father’s curiosity. “Well, that does bring up a point. I have been speaking to my captain about our next destination and there’s two possible locations. If Capra’Nor is off the map, the closest city is Gitrian. About three weeks extra is Atrena, Tarkrav and Lo’Rien. Given the amount of power cells you’ve brought back to us, we’ll have more than enough for any extended trip so the options are larger than a mad scramble to reach Gitrian before our supplies run out.”

“Food isn’t an issue?” Asked Wrath, looking suddenly guilty holding onto an entire crate of food she technically didn’t need. I hadn’t noticed but she’d stopped looking at that crate and now had it in her arms.

Quath laughed, “Not as dire as you suspect. I have a hidden ace I use to stretch out food supplies in harder times. You mentioned before that these ration bars are new to you, even though you’re from Capra’Nor?”

Wrath nodded. “I have sampled most hu- ahem, most staple dishes from the Undersider city. These ration bars are novel, and not used among the military there.”

“That’s because some of our goods are unique to this little convoy.” Quath said, then opened a bag to his side. “Normally, I hide this deep from everyone else, so do keep this to yourselves if you would.”

In his hands, out came a metal bucket. He set it by his feet and went back into his pack. The next thing that came out was a cube. One that looked near exactly like the mite cube I’d used to power a god-like fractal. It even had the same sleek design that the mite seeker on my belt had.

He hummed a soft tune and tapped the surface of the cube. It hummed back, glowed bright yellow and leaped out of his hands to hover a few inches above. A moment later, it began to break apart into pieces, each piece falling off the cube like peeled skin, then slowing down a half inch off before floating back up, orbiting around the rest of the cube clockwise.

Once enough pieces had broken off, I got to see the central part of the cube, a small glowing orb.

Definitely not human made tech. Golden age era stuff still had a practical feel to it all. They could certainly make floating objects, but this many orbiting an orb had that superfluous feel that didn’t belong to humanity’s design.

“A mite treasure.” Father said, confirming what I was already suspecting.

“The master Deathless is correct.” Quath said. “It’s a shared treasure between me and captain Atlas, recovered from a mite chest during one of our expeditions. It’s both a mild bauble, and also our most useful item we have.”

“Technically, by law, it is wholly yours Sir Quath.” The captain said. “That was part of the contract.”

“Written years ago when I was young and delusional enough to think we’d actually stumble on treasure on well treaded paths. I’d even forgotten about it by the time we found that chest. All besides the main point however, power cell please.” His hand reached out, open palmed. The captain turned and rustled through some of the storage until he snapped off a cell from its secured holding. Then handed it off to the merchant.

Quath unhooked the manual draw stopper, and tipped it above the glowing central orb. A drop of green luminescent power hit the orb, coating around it before sinking through the metal from all directions. He continued with six more drops, counting each.

As soon as the seventh drop hit the orb, all the surrounding metal pieces instantly contracted back together, the cube snapping shut. It hummed, and out the back came bars, falling straight into the metal bucket he’d prepared ahead of time.

“Unlimited food,” Quath said. “Is what I would say if I wanted to be more dramatic.” The bars continued to rain down from the cube then instantly stopped. His hands reached out to snatch the floating metal mite treasure just as it fully powered off and fell down. “In reality, it will only give exactly twenty five bars, not one more nor one less, per twenty four hours. Given we were over capacity and the loss of a skiff on the path, food had to be left behind for now, hence why I haven’t had to use it. From what I’ve been able to tell, about five bars is enough food to last someone normal one day, so five people can be fed indefinitely so long as there’s a few drops of power cell fluid to spare. Personally, I need at least ten to feel full, they are rather scrawny things.”

He grabbed one and waved the yellow brick. It had red spots on it, like dried berries. With clear practice, he took out some of the reusable foil and wrapped the bar up.

“In lean times, we could theoretically wrap frostbloom around the bars. That should greatly extend how far these rations go.” Atlas said. “Surviving on as little as a single bar per day possibly, with enough frostbloom and water to rehydrate the plant. Fortunately, we haven’t yet needed to be that savage.”

Frostbloom wrapped ration bars was a staple survival food to surface dweller expeditions, and infamous among us for a good reason. Since the plant could be dried out into super compact space, just finding a field of frostboom would last a single person a short lifetime if it’s processed right. Part of the reason airspeeders and convoys would make stops whenever a field was spotted even if we didn’t need the plant. A few years down the line, someone else might.

“Savage?” Wrath asked, now holding her food crate with more confidence. “What makes frostbloom savage?”

Quath actually looked uncomfortable for a second, as if realizing for the first time he was surrounded by clan knights. And my earlier comment on the one weirdo here being among our most dangerous knight. “My mistake sir knight, I didn’t mean to insult your culture.” He quickly said, backpedaling.

“No insult.” I waved him away, quickly helping the poor man out. “Frostbloom ruins the taste of anything it touches, that’s a fact no matter what culture you’re from. We just happen to rely on it more than Undersiders do, since long expeditions out there run into space issues. Of which, regrettably, frostbloom does not take up much. That plant is the one plant I’ll give a pass for calling savage. You insult my crickets though, and then I’ll draw my sword.”

Captain Atlas started to laugh at that, “You know, when this is all done, I’d be interested in trying out those bugs you topsiders eat. I hear you have entire sauces and side dishes to accompany them. It makes sense of course, those kids stories of surface dwellers eating bugs right off the walls can’t be true.”

“There is some smoke to it. Agrifarmers do farm them off vertical walls,” I said. “I think they also double dip by growing plants. Some insects are excellent at keeping pests and other fungus off our crops from what I’ve heard. Then we collect both vegetables and proteins all at once.”

I sent him a few choice images I’d taken with Journey of some particularly good food. Ever since House Winterscar had gotten rich, we’d been able to afford the good stuff.

He got another laugh out of those, and then slowly stopped laughing as some of the more tasty looking meals got shown. Particularly the pillbug sections. When they got big enough the meat would look like their crabs and shellfish. Just as juicy too. Cracking open the underside shell, then ripping up the soft white meat from the inside while steam came off it looked excellent with the video resolution Journey had.

Made me hungry just to see it.

“I still fail to understand why frostbloom is so disliked. I rather appreciate the number of ways to cook and prepare the plant.” Wrath said, interrupting our food dreams.

I opened a private channel to answer back. “Wrath, you literally declared steel rebar to be tasty.”

“Yes and? Humans eat rocks and metals in many dishes already, it is a perfectly normal part of your diet. Yrob and I have done comprehensive tests on this. Frostbloom is a perfectly tasty addition to any meal.”

Under certain definitions, it did add ‘taste’ to any meal. But debating what was good or not good with Wrath was a losing battle.

Quath put the mite treasure back into his personal bag. “This is why the additional crate you requested has no great consequences to me, and I’m more than happy to share. I’ll skip a few meals.” He patted his belly, “Rather think I could use a few less meals. And further along the path we can replenish our stock.”

“Not enough to feed the entire company and merchants here.” Father said.

Quath shook his head. “That’s what makes this more of a bauble. It is excellent for a single person or a small group. More than five and its use becomes limited. At our scale, it’s our final backup. But one last resort is better than none.”

He didn’t mention it, but I could tell already that he’d considered giving us that little treasure of his as a reward for saving the lives of the convoy. I can understand why he hadn’t. If I were in his shoes, I really could not afford to give that up. It let him plan out expeditions and trade routes with far more distance and wiggle room. Just too useful to have some kind of food security in the worst case.

“Got any advice for finding mite treasure of our own?” I asked.

He gave a raised eyebrow at that. “You do know you’ve got one treasure on your belt, yes?”

I had a lot of stuff on my belt, most of which was hidden by cloak and clothing. I traced his look back and found what he talked about. Peaking just a little past the clothing was the mite seeker. “That came about by special reasons, we didn’t find it in a mite treasure chest.”

“Ah, I was wondering.” Quath said with a shrug. “Well, mite treasures always come in a chest off the beaten paths. Usually. Some say the mites put down their little treasure chests to get people to explore the world they created. Sometimes it’s useful tools like this one. Other times, it’s absolutely useless. A colleague found a kinetic statue once. We still don’t know if it has any actual uses or not, but it certainly looks mesmerizing on his desk.”

“Treasures are rare.” Father said. “The most common are single-use items of some kind.”

“Like?” I asked, turning to Father.

Quath went quiet, noticing I was clearly talking to the ‘Deathless’ over private comms.

“Serums and pastes that heal near anything are what we’ve almost always found within the chests.” Father said. “Lower stratas offer more items and tools. The chests themselves are valuable. Sold to Undersider merchants like Quath and the resources used to buy and trade.”

“Why not keep the chests?” I asked. “Mite-made unbreakable chests sound pretty neat to have.”

“Size. Weight. Efficiency.” Father said. “They are useless in all three. Too decorative, slow to open, unable to be locked, and take more space than needed. If we cross paths with one, you will understand why they’re rarely kept. Hold for a moment, boy. The trader and captain are speaking to each other in private on their side as well. They’ll be asking for us soon.”

He was right. Quath basically coughed into his hand a moment later, and waved at Father. “For our final destination, we do have something of a dilemma. I was hoping we could speak in private master Deathless?”

“He comes with me.” Father said without a pause.

Quath gave a look my direction. “I see no issue with this, captain?”

The captain gave me a look, then nodded.

The rest of the winterscar knights snapped at attention the moment I dropped down from the skiff, as if asking an unworded ‘Do you wish us to escort you?’

To which I waved them off. Father was right next to me, I don’t think anything Quath or the undersider captain could do alone would be any threat to him, or me.

We both followed the pair off the campsite and into one of the empty buildings to hear what it was Quath needed to speak in private for.