Vivid Stars Online

I spent the next several hours planning the details of the cave mission with the Captain. There were a lot more logistics to go through than I had expected, however, we eventually settled all the details.

He would begin marching toward the mountain in two days with forty-three of the already trained soldiers. We believed that would give us enough men to clear out the caves, while still leaving a few more experienced people to keep training the newbies.

They would travel slower as a group than I could on foot, so it would take them roughly three days to reach the base of the mountain. I would then meet them with Linnea and proceed up toward the cave.

That would be five days from now, which lined up with my other commitments. The biggest of which was the new Psi power I was receiving in four days. I hadn’t been told where this was located for security reasons, so I was playing it safe and giving myself two days to acquire it and meet up with my team.

I would also have three days beforehand to work on everything else I had on my plate. I still had to check out the frigate progress, drop off Elana’s robots, and work on writing up the notice for investors.

With luck, I might even get a little rest in there somewhere as the previous weeks had been exhausting.

With the plan completed, I thanked the captain and left the tent to find Linnea. She had set up at one of the targets in the training area and was preceding to blow it to pieces with her new weapon.

“Hey Jared!” she called out as I approached. “All done? I figured you were safe in the camp, so I got some training done.”

“Yeah,” I said with a smile at how happy she looked. “It’s all sorted, we’re due to meet with the soldiers at the base of the mountain in five days. I’m only walking over to the frigate, so I should be safe enough if you want to keep training.”

She looked torn for a moment before she darted in for a kiss. “Thanks, Jared,” she breathed as she stepped back. “I agree you should be safe enough near the town. Call me if you head out, though, I don’t want to skip out on the job.”

I grinned and assured her I would, before turning and walking back through town.

It was early afternoon, and the town was a hive of activity. From the look of things, the fishing vessels had returned and were being unloaded. Several trucks, the first actual ground-based vehicles I’d seen, were being loaded.

Curious, I walked over and watched the process. They would load each truck from one of the fishing vessels before it drove off toward my frigate. Following, I found they stopped by a series of VTOLs on makeshift landing pads.

It wasn’t fancy, but it was doing the job of getting our goods into the VTOLs and back toward the city. It’s good to see everything working smoothly, I mused as I walked past. This is going to be the hard part in the mountains, though.

While I was pretty sure that our gunboat had been targeted because of the wyvern corpse we were carrying, I still wasn’t about to allow regular flights through the area. Even one in a hundred occurrences would be an eventual tragedy on regular flights.

That meant ground transport to at least the base of the mountain, but more likely all the way here to the town. Even in its current haphazard state, it was a lot safer than doing it out in the middle of nowhere.

It was a conundrum that would have to be solved, but I put it aside for now. I figured it best to discuss the situation with whoever was going to invest in the mountain village, as they would have to live with the solution.

Moving past the VTOLs, I came to the frigate itself. Half a dozen armed men stood around the front and each trained their gun on me as I approached. A moment later, they dropped them, and the lead man walked forward.

“Sorry Sir,” he said with a deep bow. “Just being careful, we’ve had a couple of attacks already.”

That doesn’t sound good, I thought as my stomach dropped. “What happened?”

“The first attack was a stealth infiltration,” the soldier responded with a wince. “I’m afraid to say that we missed that, Sir. If it wasn’t for your communications officer warning us, then it would have been very bad.”

“After that, we rushed inside and subdued the infiltrators. They are currently being interrogated by Army Intelligence.”

I was confused for a moment, not having hired a comminations officer, before I relaxed as I remembered that our resident AI was going to take over the role. Got to remember that she’s Mira now. It’s good to hear that she can pass for a normal human when needed.

I had been a little worried about having her in such a front-facing role, but it seemed that I didn’t need to be. If she could fool a group of trained soldiers, then she could probably fool most people.

Seeing that the soldier was shifting uncomfortably in front of me, I realized that I’d left him hanging for too long. “Thank you for subduing the assailants, I wouldn’t have wanted my crew to be stuck with that job.”

He nodded as a look of relief crossed his face. “Thank you, Sir,” he responded with another bow, before straightening up. “The second assault was simpler, though more deadly. Ten men attacked from the open grass on the other side.”

“They were well armed but lacked any of the more advanced tech that has been associated with them before. Intelligence is suggesting that they are likely running low on assets in this province.”

“With us having tech parity, we were able to take them out with minimal casualties,” he finished with a proud look. “Only two of the attackers survived, and we also shipped them off to Intelligence.”

“Good work,” I responded with a nod. I was very glad that I’d organized for the army to come and protect the ship. Ten armed men were a level of force that Elana couldn’t have stopped on her own.

Even if I’d stationed men from the village there, I doubted that they would have fared well against such a force. Whoever we stationed to guard here after the army withdrew would have to be well armed and prepared.

I thanked all the men and continued toward my frigate, still lost in thought. It’s interesting that the soldier suggested they had the advantage when they had tech parity with the enemy.

That points to whatever hidden advancement system they have being just as important as I thought. If they can roll over any troops with the same level of equipment as them, then only the low-tech level of this world is holding them back from being insanely powerful.

I absently opened the door with a thought before walking into the ship. Stepping inside, I was jerked from my thoughts as an unknown voice greeted me. It was feminine and almost sounded like Elana, though with an accent that I couldn’t place.

Luckily, I had enough clues to guess who it was. “Hello Mira,” I said, hoping I was right.

“You recognized me?” She responded, curiosity clear in her voice. “Or was it just a guess? I thought my emulated voice had reached a level that was undetectable by human ears.”

“Just a guess,” I said with a laugh, “your voice is perfect, but one of the soldiers outside said you’d warned him.” I wasn’t lying either. Even with the accent, her voice was indisputably human.

“Ah, and you deduced that the person who warned them had to be me,” she said, laughing along with me. “Thank you for the compliment as well. Chief Engineer Elana helped me to synthesize it. She is currently in engineering if you are looking for her.”

“Thanks, Mira,” I said, turning in that direction. “And let me know if you need anything. I found a cave full of valuable minerals that might have what you need for the AI cores, but it’s going to take a while before we can extract them.”

“That’s good to hear,” she responded with a relieved sigh. “In the short term, I am fine, Jared. Thank you for asking and please keep me informed as things progress.”

I assured her I would before continuing to engineering. As I grew close, I noticed signs of repair work. Exposed wires and panels had been repaired, and the lights were now functioning at full power.

The door to engineering slid open as I approached, revealing Elana poking at a console. “Hey Elana,” I greeted her as I walked in.”

“Hey Jared,” she responded, pressing a final few buttons before turning around. “Where’s Linnea? I haven’t seen you apart for ages,” she continued a slightly put-out tone in her voice.

“She’s training,” I responded with a shrug. “Over on the other side of the village with the new soldiers. She should be pretty free the next few days if you want to spend time with her,” I continued, guessing that she was feeling a bit jealous.

“Oh, thanks,” she said awkwardly, before sighing and stepping forward for a brief hug. “Sorry about that. I’m just having a little trouble spending so much time apart. While she used to go on expeditions for a week or two, at least she spent all the time when she was back with me.”

“It's fine,” I said with a shrug. “That’s understandable. I think she’s just getting used to the new job and trying to put her all into it. When we’re somewhere safe like this, then she’s free to come to spend time with you.”

She nodded, a smile back on her face before she began speaking again. “So, are you looking for an update? I’m guessing you didn’t just come here to catch up,” she asked.

“I am, yes. But first I have a load of robotic parts and other materials in the gunboat. Can you fire up the loading arm?” I said with a grin.

She blinked for a moment, before rushing over to one of the consoles. “You bet,” she said, her voice jumping with excitement. “I’d almost forgotten about that deal.”

I followed her, and we both stepped onto the elevator platform on the floor. It descended into the hanger bay, where she walked over to a section of wall. It slid open as she pressed an almost hidden button, revealing another console.

“This is where we control the loading crane and the ramp,” she said, gesturing toward the console. “Like most things, it’s not fully tied into the network so we have to come here in person. Bloody paranoid Arkathians,” she said with a shake of her head.

“Is it paranoia when you know for a fact that people can control technology with their minds?” I asked curiously. “Not to mention all the AI they had. Given that, I would say that it may have been justified caution more than anything.”

Elana cocked her head to the side before nodding back at me. “I hadn’t thought about it like that. When you lay it all out, I guess I can see why they designed everything like this. Doesn’t stop it from being a pain in the ass though,” she finished with a snort.

The cargo bay slid open as she worked the console and the landing ramp descending toward the ground. It stopped close to the VTOL, and I walked down to open it up. I wasn’t a trained pilot like Linnea was, but I could at least manage that much.

With the VTOL open, the ship’s loading crane began transferring goods to the ramp. At first, I was worried that it would be too clunky, however, it proved far more agile than I had expected.

It was somehow changing shape as it worked, conforming to the materials it was loading. I let out an impressed whistle as I reached out with my senses and picked up on the Psionic signature coming from it.

“Nice,” I said as I walked past the conveyer belt bringing materials in.

“Yeah, it’s pretty handy,” Elana responded, her tone distracted as she looked at the long line of robotic parts and other materials. “This is crazy,” she said at last. “How did you get so much?”

“Turns out the Duchess’ men were very thorough in clearing the last two facilities,” I responded with a laugh. “They did a much better job than we ever did and grabbed a mountain of stuff.”

“All the robot parts are yours, as agreed, while we can break the rest down to get parts for the ship.”

“That’s a lot of robot parts,” she breathed, before launching herself over for another hug. “Thank you! This is way more than I expected. I have so many ideas to work on.”

“Great to hear,” I responded, hugging her back. “Now, could you give me an update on the frigate?”