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The Vellani Ambassador did not return to Castlebourne until the evening of
July 6, 2488. Before the new crew could use it outside of training purposes,
Ramses had to get into the slingdrive, and find out why the navigation
system was still off. There was something he was missing, and he now
believed he understood what it was. “It’s us.”
“Us?” Leona questioned.
“We’re a variable that’s not being accounted for. We may never be able to
account for it. I think that our temporal energy is mixing with the
quintessence, and interfering with its normal operation. Think about it, you
jumped forward a year and a day to get to the Goldilocks Corridor, then
another year and a day when you came back. It’s based on our pattern.
It’s...including that in its calculations, for some reason.”
“You don’t think you can fix it?”
“I don’t know that we need to,” Ramses replied. “Is this our ship anymore?”
“That’s a good point,” Leona said. She looked around at the ol’ girl. She
had served them well, but they had been training a replacement team for
years now, even though Team Matic only came up with the idea days ago.
The year that the slingdrive was off-limits was not wasted. After three plus
years of hard work, Mateo’s daughters were nearing the completion of their
studies, and Prince Darko had already decided that they were fully ready for
the field. During this past year, even though they weren’t allowed to jump
into FTL, Mirage took the time to train the cadets in ship operations. They
were delegated responsibilities, and no longer needed the aid of Ramses or
Leona. It was time to make good on their mandate, and rescue as many people
as they could from the tyranny of the Exin Empire.
“Okay,” Leona said with a sigh. “I’ll tell Mirage that she can upload
herself.” Mirage was waiting to do this while Ramses worked, but his job
here appeared to be over. Team Matic was once again aimless. They would have
to find something new to do.
“Whoa, we still need you here,” Hrockas insisted an hour later at their
daily briefing.
“One day at a time?” Ramses questioned.
“You get a lot done in that one day,” Hrockas reminded him.
It was true, Ramses had become exceedingly great at maximizing his presence
in the timestream by setting up multiple projects for automation that would
continue on while he was gone. Then, when he came back a year later, he
would inspect them before moving on to the projects for the next interim
year. The sky was positively littered with orbital defense platforms. One of
the moons over Castlebourne was being converted into a sort of Death
Star-like thing while the other moon continued to serve as a shipyard for a
growing fleet. Some of the battleships and battledrones would stay here to
defend the homeworld while others would be transdimensionally shrunk, and
sent off to the Goldilocks Corridor to aid in the conflict against the Exin
Empire. Ramses had done more for this world than anyone besides Hrockas
himself, and the former had a hard time acknowledging that. He was too
humble.
Azad and Costa were here too, having been fully read into the situation, in
regards to time travel and whatnot. They had their own jobs here now. Azad
was on defense, and Costa on offense. Hopefully, this star system would
never be attacked, and the two of them would have nothing to do, but it was
best to be prepared. “I still need to learn from you,” Azad told him. “This
technology is way beyond anything we used a century ago, even ignoring the
superpowers you all have.”
“Same goes for me,” Costa agreed.
“I always write manuals,” Ramses explained. “Or rather, I have them
written by my AI. I don’t type them up myself, like an animal. The point is,
you’ll be fine, wherever I end up.”
Hrockas offered Prince Darko a job, overseeing all internal security of the
planet, but he had yet to accept it. He wasn’t sure whether there would be
any more teaching opportunities, and if there were, he couldn’t do both. He
was invited to the meeting anyway. “Let him rest if he wants to. People like
us see time differently. Keep in mind, it’s only been a day for him since
last year. He probably never gets breaks. Not even, like, an hour. Do you
sleep anymore?” he asked Ramses.
“Occasionally,” Ramses answered.
“We have a number of relaxation domes for you to choose from,” Hrockas
pitched. “Some of them are opaque with permanent nighttime holography, and
we’re equipped with hibernation sedatives for the ultra-sleepbound.”
“I can control my own neurotransmitters and hormones,” Rames explained. “I
could fall asleep right here, right now, in seconds.”
“Really?” Azad asked, intrigued. “Do it,” he goaded.
Ramses smiled, considering it. Then he leaned back a few centimeters, shut
his eyes, and drifted away.
“Computer, is he asleep?” Hrockas asked.
“Affirmative.”
“That’s wild,” Azad said excitedly.
Leona looked over at her engineer. “To clarify his point, I believe that he
is done. He has some...personal projects that he’s been putting off, and you
should be able to operate without him at this point. He’s not designing any
new ships or satellites. He’s just having them built. There are multiple
people in this room qualified to carry on his legacy. That’s what this
meeting is really about, actually.” She looked over at Team Kadiar. “Have
you settled on a...hierarchy, for lack of a better term?”
Mirage stood up. “I’m the ship. I will become the Vellani Ambassador.
While aboard, I serve as captain. Dubravka is my lieutenant, and while on an
away mission, she will lead the team. Kivi is the primary negotiator while
Romana handles team security. Lastly, Tertius controls everyone’s memories.”
“I’m also security,” Tertius adds. “I’m not a mindreader, per se, but I
might be able to detect an infiltrator or mole in the population that we’re
visiting. So I will alert the team to that, if it comes up.”
Mirage nodded in agreement. They had been discussing this for months.
“Sounds good to me,” Leona said. “I believe that I’m ready for handoff.”
Jesimula Utkin opened the door from the hallway, and strode right in. “What
about me? Could I join you?”
“On the VA?” Mirage asked. “Doing what?”
“It sounds like you need a coordinator on the ground,” Jesi answered. “I’m
quite capable of managing large batches of information. I used to hunt for
cures all throughout time and space. Did you think I was just guessing?”
“You’ll need to go through proper training,” Dubra said to her. “Even
Tertius went through basic.”
Jesi laughed. “I can handle myself in a fight.”
Darko stood up, and tried to look imposing. “Can you? Hit me.”
Most people in the room couldn’t quite tell what happened, but before too
long, Darko was on the floor, and Jesi was on top of him, holding him in
place. She leaned down, and kissed him on the forehead. “Tap out.”
He tapped twice against his leg. “Who taught you that?” he asked after she
graciously let him get back to his feet.
Jesi smirked, and looked over at Leona. “I was trained by the Crucia Heavy
of The Highest Order. She taught me everything she knew.”
Leona stood up quickly. “No shit?”
“No shit,” Jesi answered.
“Ever since we met?”
“And then some,” Jesi said.
Leona stared into Jesi’s eyes, perhaps looking for any hint of deception, or
maybe even using some kind of psychic connection. “Mirage,” she began, “I am
bound by my oath to recommend Jesimula Utkin for this assignment most
ardently.
That seemed to be good enough for Mirage. “Very well.”
The meeting continued on for a little while. Hrockas offered Darko the head
of security job again, but Mateo had the bright idea to suggest Kallias
Bran, who had less experience with hand-to-hand combat, but more experience
with police work. He would be better suited to the position, which shouldn’t
involve any physical confrontation. That freed Prince Darko to found a
training program. Who his students would be, and what their goals would be,
were questions that they weren’t going to worry about asking quite yet.
Only after the meeting was over, and everyone else had left, did Mateo wake
his friend up. “Did that help?”
Ramses quivered into his stretches, and looked around at the mostly empty
room. “Yes, actually. That was a brilliant suggestion. Who was that again?”
“It was Azad who told you to sleep.”
“Remind me to thank him.” He yawned and stood up. “What did I miss?”
“Nothing you care about,” Mateo replied. “Leona said you have personal
projects that you’ve delayed in service to others. I’m bored. What can you
tell me about them?”
“Two major projects, which are related, but not inherently interdependent.
Only one of them is ready. The other may never be. At any rate, they will be
limited to the team. I mean it, I don’t even want Romana to have them. I
believe that only the six of us are built to withstand the technological
upgrades that I’m working on. I have a working prototype of the first one
that I’ve been hoping to test, if you’re willing to be my guinea pig once
more.”
“I’m in,” Mateo said sincerely.
Ramses offered his hand, then teleported them both to his lab. He looked
around to make sure that no one was watching before approaching a wall. He
started to make weird gestures in front of it, sometimes reaching out to
caress or tap the surface, and stepping back a couple times to give it a
strange look. Finally, the sound of a pocket door sliding open came from the
perpendicular wall, but nothing changed visually. Still, Ramses pivoted, and
walked straight through what was apparently only a hologram.
Mateo followed. They were in a new section of the lab. There wasn’t much
here that was different from the main section, but some of the items looked
more advanced, while others looked less complete. “We couldn’t have just
teleported right inside?”
Ramses shut the door behind them. “Permanent teleporter suppressant. We
couldn’t escape here either. It’s completely self-sufficient. All it shares
with the main lab is that hidden door, and the regolith between the walls.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about it before? Does anyone else know?”
“Because you didn’t need to know before, and they still don’t.”
“I see.”
Ramses started to walk to the far end. “Take off your IMS; every layer of
every module, and lie face down in your birthday suit.”
Mateo removed his suit, and walked over there buck naked. The table was
mostly solid, but there were conspicuous and symmetrically placed openings
throughout.
“Please read this,” Ramses asked.
A hologram appeared underneath the table’s face hole. It detailed what was
going to be done to him in clear, unambiguous language. Even an idiot like
him could understand it, and after finishing the brochure, he was now more
interested than ever. “Can I see the needles?”
Ramses took a beat. “Probably shouldn’t.”
“Okay.”
“Do you consent?”
“I do.”
“And are you ready?”
“Absolutely.”
“You read the part where it says it’s gonna hurt?”
“Get on with it.”
“Brace yourself. Literally. Hold onto those handles.”
Mateo gripped the metal bars. The robot started swinging its various arms
into position, which he could hear, but not see. One of them started
lasering into his neck, and worked its way down his spine. Other incisions
were made on his wrists, shoulders, ankles, the back of his knees, and even
his mons pubis. The cuts hurt, but the implantation of the devices hurt even
more. It was over surprisingly quickly, though the spinal implant took the
longest. Another round of lasers sealed him back up, and it was all
apparently over.
“How do you feel?”
“Ready to throw my IMS away,” Mateo said.
“Don’t get ahead of yourself. Only the procedure has been tested. You need
to learn how to activate the nanites.”
“I think I have it figured out.” Mateo could still feel the implants
underneath his skin. They were too deep to protrude and be noticed by
others, but he was acutely aware of them. The one against his brain gave him
neural access to the whole network. He could sense them tucked away dormant
in their little gel matrices. These were not his first nanites. In one go,
he released them. They spread all over his body until he was fully
encapsulated in only a few seconds. It was like something out of a scifi
movie. Then again, that described their whole lives these days. He was now
basically wearing an Integrated Multipurpose suit, except that it was
extremely thin, with only one layer needed, reportedly vastly stronger than
his last suit, and on him at all times. One thing seemed to be missing,
though. “I still need a PRU to breathe, drink, and eat.”
Ramses held up an injector. “Collapse the facial segment so I can inject you
with the life support pocket dimension array. It goes in your mouth.”
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