Scarlet Steel

Antimatter engines and gravity manipulation are often considered the largest technological breakthroughs in human history. Despite my reluctance to introduce my own biases into this work, I disagree. No development was more important than Earth’s first space elevator. - An Incomplete History of Space Travel

I’m left once again with the hardest question I’ve ever asked. How do people relax? No matter how hard I wrack my brain, I can’t come up with an answer before Exa returns.

“Wait, where’s the gun?” I ask.

“You think you can just carry it around the station?” She sounds genuinely bewildered. “It’s being delivered to the ship, dummy.”

“Right, yeah, I knew that.”

“Uh-huh. So how are we relaxing?”

“I have no idea.” I admit.

“Come on, there’s got to be something you want to see.”

“How is this place powered?” I ask. “The amount of energy to power the gravity must be absurd.”

“You’re on a station that houses millions, with tens of thousands of stores and restaurants, and you want to break in to see the engine powering it?”

“Not break in! Well, maybe if that’s what it takes. They’ve got to be doing something incredible. You’d need kilograms of antimatter!”

“About a kilogram per year, actually, based on some rough math.” She heads down the street, obviously with something in mind.

“Wait, that’s it?” I pull my phone from my pocket and start to plug in numbers. A hundredth of a gram per second, enough fuel to send a car a million miles. Six thousand times more than that first cell I found. I can’t believe I thought that was nearly limitless energy. I really was messing around with absolutely nothing all those years ago. “That’s only a little over 6 grams an hour? That’s still a ton, but pretty manageable."

“Only? That’s 60 times bigger than our main ship’s engine.”

“We consume a tenth an hour when we fly?” Where do we even store that much?

“To get up to speed, yeah. Local Space acts as a multiplier, but we still have to get moving in the first place, not to mention in system travel.”

“It’s probably a good thing I didn’t go look at it then.”

“Pretty sure Andromeda would shoot you before you even got close to potentially damaging her, and us with it.”

“Would she even feel bad about that?” She’s not sentient, so the answer should be obvious.

Exa confirms my suspicions with a simple shake of her head.

“Don’t worry about that though, she’s not a danger, just protective over us. Accidentally blowing up the ship leaves us stranded, and she won’t let that happen.”

“Uh-huh. I hope I’m included in that?”

“Oh, of course. You’re part of the crew, after all.”

“That’s a relief. Where are we going, by the way?”

“You’ll see.”

She leads me through the maze that is the city center, and down a narrow street teeming with people. Blazing signs crisscross between the buildings in an array of languages. Even here, in tight quarters, the crowd is nothing more than muffled mumbling.

“Go ahead, give it a look.” Exa gestures to a pair of double doors, and I step into a cramped shop.

Aisles only wide enough for a single person run along the entire shop. The shelves are full of buckets, not just items. I pull one out, taking a look inside.

“Oh my God.” I push it back into place before pulling out another to check, quickly followed by a third. “It’s all parts!” Gears, microcontrollers, braces, breadboards, wires, motors, everything I could possibly want. Parts I had to struggle to find in the junkyard just sitting in a bucket, waiting for me to take them home.

“You’re going to want a basket.” Exa’s voice makes me jump. I glance back and take it from her. “What are you going to make?”

“Octo-drone.” I answer instantly. “A little guy to crawl into tight spaces and do small repairs. I’ve wanted one for years, but never got the chance.”

“I’ve pulled up some blueprints and a part list on your phone.” She says.

“No, no, I can figure it out myself.” Electromagnetic ball joints for the limbs, each ending in simple claws. Three-finger or four-finger? Four can grab wires better, but three would potentially be able to unscrew bolts? No, it wouldn’t be able to generate enough torque. Two sets of two claws set apart from each other would make the most sense to stabilize wires with. Should I do a different tool on every leg? Two suction cups for hanging, two wire hands, screwdriver, scissors, can I fit in a soldering iron? Maybe? Either way I’m going to try!

I quickly make my way through the isles, grabbing literally anything I think I could possibly need, and a lot I know I won’t. I’ll never regret having extra parts for future projects.

I reach the end of the isles and run into a dark-skinned woman about my age in a slightly dirty uniform and twin buns.

“Finding everything ok?” She asks.

“I need a universal circuit board, a few actually. But for this project I need to plug in a powerful transceiver, receiver, camera array, an onboard processor would probably be useful? Something around an SP-128, along with some memory.”

“Sounds like a drone, right? I’d recommend upgrading just cameras to a full sensor array. Less than a square inch of space difference and only 13 grams heavier. All that for way more information.”

“Sure! Let’s do it!”

I follow her down isles, swapping ideas as we go. She doesn’t even have to check baskets before pulling them out and holding them up for me.

“So what other projects do you have in mind?” She asks.

“Well, I’m a pilot, so most of what I do relates to keeping my mech in good shape.” I answer.

“Upgrades?” Her eyes shine.

“Ugh, I wish.” I groan. “Apparently there’s a standard I can’t go above. I built her in a scrapyard, and we’ve already swapped out every non-perfect part. The only thing I can do is make repairs easier.”

“Hence the drone?”

“Yeah! I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve had to take off parts to fix a minor mistake deep in the engine. I swear, when I was first learning, between scavenging parts and undoing my own mistakes, less than 5% of my time was spent actually putting her together.”

She laughs at that.

“You picked a hell of a first project.”

“Yeah, still not sure how I actually got her to run.” I laugh as well. “It wasn’t just me though. Exa,” I nod towards her, slowly searching through a row of ancient looking movies, “my dad, and the rest of my extended family would come by when they could. Plus, turns out Mom used to be a mechie.”

“Exa, she’s your… friend?”

“Closer to a sister.” I say. “She was my dad’s second before he…” I let out a breath. “And now she’s my partner!”

“Uh-huh. I’m Tera, by the way.” She grab another tub and holds it out, letting me grab a few more parts.

“I’m Scarlet, it’s nice to meet you!”

“You too.” She continues down the isles before slowing down a little. “Hey, uh, if you don’t have anything going on, and want some help putting your drone together, I get off work in half an hour.”

“I think that’d be fun!” It’d be nice to get another perspective. I can basically predict what Exa will say before she gives advice. “My tools are on the ship though.”

“We’ve got a workshop in the back for employees.” She jerks her thumb over her shoulder.

“Oh! That works! I’ll just hang out here until you’re done?”

“Cool! I’ll come find you.” She gives an awkward thumbs up before turning and heading deeper into the shop.

I make my way over to Exa, who’s still not paying attention. Or at least she’s pretending not to.

“Hey, I’m going to get some help from another engineer here soon. Sorry if I ruined your plans.”

“No, no, you’re fine.” She reassures me. “Trust me, I can find plenty to do around here. You have fun, give me a call when you’re finished.”

“I will.”

Exa leaves, and I finish up my shopping while I wait. I only stop adding items when my basket is threatening to overflow, and stare longingly at what I can’t fit.

A while later, a tap on my shoulder makes me jump. I spin around to find Tera. She’s changed out of her work uniform, and into a cute sleeveless shirt.

“Sorry! I didn’t mean to scare you!”

“It’s alright!” I quickly reassure her. “Exa scared me earlier too. I guess I’m just a little on edge.”

“I’m guessing being a pilot is rough?” She heads towards the front of the shop, and steps behind the checkout desk.

“More than I expected.” I place the basket on the table. “Alright, imagine I’m an idiot who’s never done this before. What would I do?”

“Theoretically, not much. Everything in there’s already tracked and accounted for. I’d tell you your total is 2,891 arcs, and if that’s fine, you’d put your hand on that screen.”

“Ok.” I may have gone a little overboard, but that’s fine. I follow her suggestion, and the machine beeps a moment later.

“That would have scanned your biometrics, and completed the sale!”

“If I didn’t know what I was doing, that would have been really helpful.”

“Mm-hmm!” She heads towards a door built into the back of the shop, and I follow close behind. “First time on the station?”

“First time on any station. I didn’t even have a bank account until a few weeks ago.”

“Oh, so when you said a junkyard mech, you really meant a junkyard mech.”

“Yeah. My aunt dropped off a chiral mesh, and I had a single IOU from the recycling plant. Every other piece was scavenged, up to and including my first antimatter cell. I found a junked car with a hundred thousandth of a gram in it.”

“Wow. An Old Earth Design I’m guessing?”

“A Hopper.” I confirm. “She’s a little more temperamental than you’d think though. She’s eaten nearly a dozen flywheels. One of them wasn’t even my fault, it was a brand new part!”

“Wow.” She pushes through the door, revealing a fully furnished workshop.

It’s small, a little cramped, but has absolutely everything I could ever want for smaller projects. You definitely can’t build a mech in here, even if you could fit one, but building a drone? I’d rather be here than all my tools back home.

“This is nice!” I heft my basket onto the workbench. “Thank you, by the way. I had to leave most of my tools behind when I left home, I’m not sure I could have done this without you.”

“I’m glad I could help.” She says. “So, what’s your plan?”

“Eight legs with a different tool on every foot.” I dig through my basket, pulling out part after part.

“You can re-use a micro drone as a chassis to build off of. As for the legs, you could- Never mind! You already got some.” She pulls electromagnetic ball joints out of the pile and sets them to the side, laying out a few small pipes for legs to go with them.

“I’m pretty sure I got at least one of everything.” I laugh, but I’m not sure if that’s actually a joke or not.

“Good thing someone else has to restock.”

“Is that difficult?”

“No, it’s not hard, just time consuming.” Tera works quickly, basically reading my mind. Before I can even ask her for specific parts, they’re already waiting on the table.

“Good. If you’re comfortable working on the electronics, I’m way more familiar with physical engineering.”

“Sounds like we’d make a good team.” She gets to work with the circuit boards, and pulls over a laptop to run tests with.

“You probably would have saved a few hundred poor sensors. I can’t tell you how many I hooked up backwards.”

“Yeah, I’ve made that mistake a few times. Had a polarity reversed when I plugged a board into my head. Nearly knocked me unconscious. I’ve been careful since then.”

“You have brain implants?” I pause momentarily.

“Just a simple interface to stop my hands from being a bottleneck while programming. You don’t?”

“No.” I shake my head and get back to work.

“Huh. Would have thought all pilots are chipped.”

“Maybe one day, if I feel like I’m being held back. I’ve been on a grand total of one mission, so we’ll see.”

“So what does it actually take to be a pilot?” Her eyes shine again when she asks. “Feel like I don’t see many at your age.”

“Honestly? I have no idea. I’m just following in my dad’s footsteps. I’ve known Juno, the woman who runs his old group, from my earliest memories. She took me in.”

“Yeah, I figured it would take something like that.”

“I think Dad got into it through military service though. I imagine that’s more common.” I shrug. “But equally, no idea how you get into a mech there instead of just being a foot soldier.”

“Me either. How old are you, anyway? I’m guessing 18?”

“Almost. I’m a few weeks away.”

“I thought so. I’m eighteen as of last week.” She says.

“Oh, well, happy late birthday!”

“If you’re staying around, maybe we could do something for yours?” She asks. “I’d love to see your Hopper.”

“No, sorry. We’re on a 24 hour break, and then we’re heading towards Mnemosyne space.”

“Oh.” She deflates a little. “Guessing you won’t be back anytime soon?”

“I have literally no idea. Juno pretty much just decides where we go.”

“Ah. Well, do you have a Q line? You seem cool, maybe we could keep in touch? Keep each other updated on projects?”

“Oh I’d love to! I’ve never actually used it before, but I do have one.” I pull out my phone and boot up the app. It’s full of junk mail that I’ve literally never checked, but that’s probably fine. I pull up my address and slide my phone over.

“Got it.” It only takes her a glance. “I sent a test mail. Network’s congested, might take a few weeks to get through.”

“That’s alright. I’ll write back when I get it.”

“Cool.” She nods. “So, uh, what’s up with the white streak in your hair?” She reaches up and touches her own. “Is that dyed?”

“Oh, no, It’s actually a birth mark.” I pull back my hair and lean down to show her. “I used to be self-conscious about it when I was a kid, if you can believe it.”

“It’s cute.”

“I know, right?”

The two of us work and chat for hours, letting time get away from us. Hunger threatens to put an end to our work, right up until I pull snacks out of my backpack. Slowly my little drone comes together, and we’re left with a little hexagon with thin arms. I haven’t finished the hands, but that’s fine. The bulk of the work is done.

“Ready to give it a shot?” Tera asks.

“Fire her up!”