Happy New Year! 🎉
"So do you guys need anything?" I asked Dubbilex.
"The offer is appreciated, but no. Batman has been very forthcoming regarding supplies. He has sent over everything we need."
"That's good to hear. Remember what we spoke about yesterday?"
"Yes, I remember."
"Is it okay if I give you a quick rundown of my proposal?"
"Please."
"Okay. Here's the thing. I have some large scale projects I want to undertake. If I were to do them myself, it would take way too long to finish. That's why I want to hire you and your people. With all of you guys chipping in, they'll be completed a hell of a lot faster."
"You would pay us," Dubbilex stopped.
"Of course. This is a job. People get paid for work they do. Besides, I'm not your former… employer," I said, making air quotes.
"Just because I helped liberate you doesn't mean I get to take advantage of you. Everyone deserves some form of independence, and a way to make money after finding a home is a good place to start."
Dubbilex stared hard at me, his picture perfect calm visage the same as it always was. "I would say that the price of our freedom alone is enough for us to help you, but I get the sense you'd refuse that too."
"Trust that instinct," I said and squared my shoulders.
In a move I did not expect, the Genomorph leader bowed his head and upper body a full 45 degrees. "On behalf of all my brothers and sisters, thank you. We'll forever be in your debt."
"Please, don't," I went forward and helped him up. "You guys being free and living your lives is thanks enough for me."
We'd caught some stares due to Dubbliex's sudden act, and I think he could sense my discomfort and embarrassment about the whole thing even with my mind closed off to him.
He resumed walking after that thankfully and brought me to a tent so large it reminded me of the ones found in carnivals. Except in this case, the material it consisted of was less colorful and actually brought medical tents to mind.
The medical part was proven accurate as I entered it and put eyes to injured and bandaged Genomorphs of varying size, each resting on a separate bed, even the trolls. Blockbuster's rampage had been short, but he'd managed to injure over a dozen of the creatures before I arrived.
It was a miracle none of them had died. They were a hardy bunch.
"Doctor Spence," Dubbilex called out to the bespectacled woman with a clipboard in hand, going around the occupied beds checking drips and other stuff.
"Dubbilex, who is this?" she asked and approached us.
We met up and I palmed the Genomorph's shoulder. "I got it from here."
"Alright. I will take my leave now."
His departure soon left me with a doctor who was confused as to who I was and what I wanted.
"Hello? Have we met?"
"Yeah, actually. I'm the owner of the island."
"Oh," recognition bloomed on her features.
"Right. Glad we got that out of the way. I'm here about a friend and a possible job offer."
That seemed to catch her interest. She fixed her glasses and held her clipboard tighter.
"Cadmus took his arm and I intend to give it back to him—" I started.
"Please, I knew nothing about that. Project Kr was—"
I raised my hand and stopped her.
"I know. This isn't about that," I said and held a small tablet out to her.
"My friend lost his arm and I'm building him a new one. When it's done, we need someone to implant it, and I thought of you. This is also about the job offer. At Cadmus you helped Lex control others. I am giving you the opportunity to help them. What do you say?"
She stared at me long and hard before slowly reaching over and grabbing the tablet.
"Everything you need to know about what we need from you is on it. If you think it's too difficult or you're just not interested, you can reach out and let me know. I'll forget we ever had this conversation."
After saying my piece, I turned around to leave, perfectly fine with her silence. However, it turned out she wasn't.
"Thank you," she said suddenly, making me stop. "For bringing me here. Batman explained what would've happened if you left me back in the facility. So thank you."
Without turning around fully, I looked over my shoulder a bit and nodded before resuming my exit. She believed Batman when he told her but not me. Another piece of evidence about the League's ironclad credibility.
Damn. I needed me some of that.
.
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Happy Harbor
May 24, 11:47
The beach on my island was better, but the one just outside the cave was good too. Clad in simple clothing, I stood beside the fully assembled speeder-bike hovering above the cream colored sand and waited for Mike to finish his hundredth scan on the thing.
After I returned from Providence, I dived right into the work I was supposed to be doing when Roy arrived.
I helped Mike finish the large industrial fabricator, taking about two hours to assemble all the printed parts. What followed once the components were in place were repeated scans, checks, and adjustments following said scans to ensure everything was spick and span.
When we were certain that things were a hundred percent, we connected the feedstock storage to it and synthesized our first item: a drone.
This wasn't one of the DWARFs as I'd taken to calling them, but rather a drone in the sense of what you'd find in shops back in my world if you walked into one that sold them.
It was made of hard plastic and cheap components, nothing at all advanced. That wasn't the real test we were going for however. We wanted to see if the dense computations we'd done could really guide the synthesizer into making items whole.
The test was a success… sort of. We only encountered an issue with how an item being synthesized was suspended and then delivered after it was complete. For now we were using a mix of the tractor beam tech, a flat, x-ionized surface, and a few robot arms.
Something about the tractor beam tech interfered with the chromodynamic energy beams responsible for the actual matter transmutation, causing the fabricator to draw in more power than our original projections predicted.
It was all good though. The tractor beam was a forcefield being applied to solve a problem it wasn't invented for. The fact that it could defend somewhat against transmutative effects was a plus that would have to be explored.
God. We had so many things to test.
Thankfully, we had a lot of time and I was learning to pace myself. So taking this speeder out for a spin would do fine for now.
"Scan complete," Mike said and retracted his extended arm, the blue inquisitive lights retracting into the small square device that had popped out of the top of his hand. It slotted back into place without a sound and he looked down at his tablet for a bit before looking at me.
"All systems are intact and at 100 percent fidelity."
"Could've told you that myself," I said and wore a pair of shades, a HUD coming alive in my vision.
Tech-Adapting and M and E hadn't been idle since the vehicle became whole. They had a lot to say about our work, and while I appreciated the input, why weren't they this active during the assembly? Maybe because they saw the speeder as a whole thing on its own now?
I shook my head and focused. This wasn't a test to know more about my powers. It was for this tiny beast of a vehicle.
The computer in the lenses and temples responded to my sharpened thoughts and produced a query when I focused on the hovering speeder, asking if they should connect to it.
A simple relay of intent and the lights on the vehicle lit up, the low whine of its engine competing and losing with waves crashing against the beach nearby. A ring of blue lit up in the thruster at its posterior, and a short cylinder of electric blue plasma followed.
I dismissed M and E's thoughts on how the thruster's size and position in relation to this vehicle reduced its efficiency by 12 percent and shortened the distance to it, throwing a leg over the seat.
Comfortably seated on the high-quality synthetic leather, I leaned forward and grabbed the steering handles, a flight path charted by Mike appearing in my sight.
"Engaging stealth," I said, and the shades enacted my will.
An imperceptible field was projected out of the speeder's core and covered it in a sphere that removed it from sight and host of other visible spectrums.
"Tractor unit and compensator units coming online."
These ones I activated manually, tapping the right buttons on the touch screen where a normal bike's dashboard would be. A wrapping feeling overcame me, but it was nothing restrictive, more like a paper thin cloth with the consistency and opacity of air anchoring me properly to the seat and bike as a whole.
With those safeguards activated and the successful tests to determine their viability out of the way, I squeezed the handles and urged the speeder to move. I went from zero to about a dozen miles per hour in a second, the scenery around me changing from beach to open sea.
Quickly calming myself and taking active control of things, I eased into the speed and reoriented myself back onto the thick blue line indicating the path designated by Mike.
My perception didn't remain stable as I twisted and turned, the experience reminiscent of driving vehicles in games while playing in third person from within the vehicle. It was always hell driving that way.
Not with the speeder though. Using both the steering handles and the shades to pilot the speeder was a bit overkill in my opinion, but they gave me the kind of control only a god whose domain was vehicles could have.
If anything, this certainly explained why most vehicles in Cyberpunk had interface plugs for users to jack into. I felt like I could navigate a minefield at full speed with this level of precision.
That thought urged me to amp things up further, and I instantly felt the bugs and windy effects around me as the digital speedometer climbed higher and higher with each passing second.
110. 130. 150. 170.
A quick thought activated the electrostatic windscreen and protective forcefield and all these effects were canceled.
Religiously following Mike's increasingly extending trail, I screamed at the top of my lungs when he made me do a double roll into an upside down twist and flip that brought my head inches away from the water.
Any other seemingly impossible variation he added to the path, I cleared with ease. I must've stayed on the water for about half an hour before I returned to the beach, a small storm of swirling sand trailing the speeder as I brought it to a stop.
Heart pumping and blood racing, I alighted and took off the shades, leaning up and holding both arms up by side in a victory pose you'd see a soccer player celebrate with.
"Wooooo!" I yelled at the top of my lungs, letting out all my excitement. My voice echoed on the beach for quite a bit before satisfaction hit me. When I reopened my eyes and heavily exhaled, I found that Mike wasn't alone.
"Kaldur, hey," I approached both of them with a large smile. "What's up my man?"
He met my greeting with his own, our hands slapping against each other before ending in a fist bump.
"I am well. And I can see that you are too," he said and directed his gaze to the speeder.
With a smile, I followed his eyes and said, "Yeah. I'm great. Really great. That thing runs like a dream. Want a go?"
"If it will not inconvenience you."
I waved away his concerns. "Not at all. You've been training with me since I joined the team. This is nothing compared to that."
"I heard you defeated Blockbuster all on your own. The whole team did."
"Shit," I slapped my forehead. I knew I forgot something. Damn it.
"I forgot to fill you guys in. Things were quite hectic yesterday but that's no excuse. I'm the leader and I should do better. Next time the gang's all here I'll make things up to you."
"Kid and Robin will be coming later today."
"That's great. I can break the news to them then."
"What news?" he frowned.
"You'll see when we go inside. Don't worry. It's not a bad thing. The opposite really," I said and held the shades toward him, urging him towards the speeder. While he walked barefoot towards the thing, I made a simple gesture to Mike and he activated all the safety features.
A scene similar to what took place at the start of my own ride ensued, but as someone who'd trained in the military for most of his life, had a good head on his shoulders, and more than decent reflexes, Kaldur reassumed control of the vehicle immediately, not losing it even once after that.
His flight path and time was shorter than mine, but every bit as exhilarating, judging from the way he took a few seconds to calm down and return to his stoic self after alighting.
With a tablet full of juicy data and a speeder that lived up to its expectations, the trio of us returned to the cave's confines and went straight for my lab. On the way there, I answered Kaldur's many questions about the vehicle, mainly about its top speed and other features.
Once we were in the workshop, his question switched to the walk-in fabricator and I answered by showing him the holo model of the Zephyr and giving him a basic rundown of the plan to make it a reality.
"A team transport," Kaldur said as I parsed the fresh data Mike and I obtained with our respective methods, he with his scanner and me with my powers, my mind working overtime on how to apply them to the transport in question.
"Yes. We can't take Zeta-Tubes everywhere. Especially if covert is the way we do things. Besides, why not."
"Why not?" he sounded confused.
"Yeah. I want to fly and I can build a plane. Why shouldn't I do it?"
"I cannot argue with that."
"It's really good you're here. I wanted to break the news to the team two days ago, after the mission. But you remember how things got. It slipped my mind and here we are. We really need a team group chat."
"I agree."
"Glad that you do. Now please, would you go and help Mike over there? We're going to start the assembly today and we need every available hand if we're going to get this ship up and running before our next mission."
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1-10 advanced chapters on: https://patreon.com/MasterReigen