C48 Now you see me
Now you see me.
“ Anthony ? “ Hope uttered softly, aware that Ina was sleeping still and careful not to wake her.
“ Yeah ? “ Anthony responded, idly stroking over Ina’s side, finding it kind of cute how she had a habit of sleeping in his arms, even if it made it harder to sneak away, but that was probably part of why she did it.
“ I am done with the program translation. “ Hope reported.
“ Found anything useful ? “ Anthony asked, while then recalling the sight from within the ship.
The Drone carrier was empty, not a single corpse inside, so the Terran’s made sure to recover their dead. Which showed that they intentionally deposited the wrecks in that system. Logan as he recalled it’s name to be.
But the ship had not been without reminders of the battle that rendered it’s abandonment in that place, as there was blood and traces of fire within the ship. The damage was gone, since he repaired it, but the traces, they still reminded that war wasn’t just a game.
At least though, he now knew that there was an ongoing energy drain when he kept the ship in his influence, though it was so minimal, it was barely noticeable. But that was likely to change the more he kept influencing passively.
“ It is as you assumed, it’s a support vessel, used in battle situations to swap out armor platings and repair exterior damages to some degree. But it has only a small hold, so I assume it must have been used together with transport vessels that held a stock of required materials. “ Hope reported.
“ Figured, if they have role specific ships, then repairs for those front-liners may significantly prolong their battle endurance. Do you think we can use it in a builder role ? “ Anthony inquired, watching Ina’s face as she looked so peaceful when sleeping, it was kind of alluring in it’s own way.
“ Yes, the ship has smaller drones in it’s hangar, for more delicate assembly tasks. But it requires prepared materials and modules for them to work with, as even the small drones will not be able to assemble modules by themselves. “ Hope noted.
“ But I am guessing that, if we ever use your shipyard, it could increase ship building speed, or use it to assemble ships outside your originally intended scope ? “ Anthony asked.
“ Yes, that should be possible. “ Hope agreed.
“ And the other ship ? “ Anthony asked then.
It had been four days now since he claimed the drone carrier, and two days ago he went ahead to claim the second Terran frigate that was close by. A long build with a slimmer front, and a wider rear, which kind of reminded of a long, slim screwdriver handle in a way. By looks alone one could tell that it was build around a massive main cannon, a large scale rail-gun as he assumed.
“ System’s have been taken over, but it has little fuel left. I have started to siphon fuels from surrounding wrecks to refuel both ships. “ Hope reported.
“ Good, evade siphoning from wrecks that look largely intact, I will likely try to claim more. “ He instructed, and then asked, “ How is it on ammunition ? Is there any left on them ? “
“ To some degree, easily accessible armories have been cleared, but the artillery vessel has still about 20 rounds remaining for it’s primary armament. But it’s close range turrets are dry. And the Drone carrier has only limited close range ammo left, barely enough to last a few seconds if fired. “ Hope summarized.
“ Then see if you can’t find more in the surrounding wrecks, and perhaps, if you can find out the bullets composition and build if able. And I assume, neither ship has actual AI, right ? “ Anthony spoke.
“ Understood, and no, VI that requires constant command input. It can automate building tasks in case of the drone carrier, and in case of the Artillery ship, it aids in targeting. They can both perform basic ship maneuvers, but have little to no standalone capacity for long range ship movement or sustained combat action.
I can perform these duties for now, but longterm, we may need to upgrade the VI system, or crew these vessels. “ Hope responds.
“ Hm, I think a Vi system upgrade would be best. Crewing is not feasible unless done by Androids, and that would only create a complex command structure.
Although, I guess we can upgrade the Vi, and then give it command over Androids that take over the crews task. That would be a more likely approach. “ Anthony considered.
“ Yes, but we have to get these ships to the Hope to do so. Unless we find a way to set up a base in that system, one that can produce what we need. “ Hope noted.
“ Have you noticed any movement at all in System ? “ Anthony asked.
“ No movement at all, but I found that there are a lot more wrecks then initially assumed. It’s not just around the area of the 02, it seems more like they have created an artificial asteroid belt with a stable orbit around the star. By my estimate there should be thousands of ships. “ Hope offered.
“ Hm, a treasure trove to be plundered. “ He noted, considering for a moment.
“ How likely do you think we can set up an outpost there ? Hidden and out of sight. “Anthony wondered.
“ There are a few smaller planetary body’s that could be suitable to hide ships behind, and a few larger Asteroids that might be suitable to hide ships within, but we would need personal to dig, and install an actual outpost. “ Hope suggested.
“ Hm.” Anthony mused, looking at Ina again who still slept.
“ I’ll try and see if we can claim that Seltran vessel, it may have something we can use. And even if not, we might find something else useful in there. “ Anthony decided then, closing his eyes to return to the Psychic plane.
And there he would go straight back to that lone Haunt unit, still parked on the artillery frigate, soon to have it lunge towards the Seltran ship in hopes to claim it for himself.
And while slowly floating towards it, Anthony took the moment of wait to check on his command limit, which had now risen to 326.7, indicating an increase of 0.7 during the last four days.
Very little as he believed, but he had not gone out of his way to increase his activity with the Siren, as that would then start to become work, rather then fun, and he felt like it should remain something to look forward to.
“ Must be a better way though. “ He uttered to himself while adjusting the drones flightpath, to then latch onto the Seltran ship with the maglock.
Moments later, he had the ship under his control, but when checking it, he had to find out that there were materials used in it’s construction he had never heard about, or rather, that his system was showing as, Question-marks. Either because he did know nothing of these ships, or because it was actually an unknown material the Seltran used.
“ Well, that was a waste of time and effort, I guess. “ He grunted displeased, checking his energy, which now stood at 31%, enough for another frigate without repairs. It would be nice though to try a bigger ship, or if a frigate, then something that could help him hide the current assortment of ships away.
“ Hope, can you make anything of this vessel ? “ Anthony asked, while opening the layout plan for the ship, which was showing only one deck, and a lot of equipment placed around it for weapons, power-lines, cooling. Nothing he could do anything with yet, and the rooms where an entire unknown as well.
“ No, I can not see any visible power-source. The drive system appears purely energy based, and there seems to be some kind of, small scale mechanical unit stored within the ship. “ Hope reported.
“ Then let’s see if anything happens. “ Anthony uttered, trying to directly control the ship despite the lack of power, just to see if he could influence anything at all.
Or least gain a sense of the reason why there was a deck, when there was no personal to use it. With the bulkheads down and untouched, it did not seem like anyone made it inside to recover them. But what he found when taking control, surprised him more then a little.
“ Consciousness detected, reconnecting systems. “ A synthetic voice announced, and the whole ship begun to boot up, drawing power from someplace, while Anthony felt how that Ship begun to feel like it was his own body, more so then when he was using the Androids so far.
“ The heck ? “ He wondered.
“ User not recognized, Warning, Authority override. Welcome, Anthony. “ The Synthetic voice proclaimed.
“ Um, hello there ? Who are you ? “ Anthony asked, but there was no response.
Instead, the bulkheads rose, and a swarm of tiny particles were released, swarming out with intent to nearby Seltran wrecks where they begun breaking down material, which would then be delivered to the ship Anthony was currently on, repairing damaged systems and hull.
“ Hello ?! Respond to me ! “ Anthony demanded, but still nothing, so that he would then withdraw from the ship to see if he would get a response then.
But instead, the ship powered down, and the dust-cloud, or, Nanites as Anthony now guessed, all stopped. And even when trying to control it remotely, nothing happened.
“ I guess, this ship only works if there is a, consciousness connected to it ? Do we have any details about this in the files we received ? “ Anthony wondered.
“ Negative, but I wager a guess that the Seltran AI is complex enough to be comparable to actual consciousness, so that it makes no difference if its the AI, or yourself ? “ Hope assumed.
“ Hm, still, it is working automatically, it started repairing itself by recycling the other Seltran ships around here. ” Anthony observed, and then reached back in to personally control the vessel again.
“ Consciousness detected, reconnecting systems. Welcome Anthony. “ He heard once more as the ship booted up again, resuming the repair process.
“ Ok, this is, interesting. “ Anthony noted, watching with fascination how the ship slowly begun to regain its full shape.
“ Can you observe any identifiable system now ? “ Anthony asked Hope, while himself looking through the ships system-blueprints again, but it was all question-marks still.
“ No, I can sense a power-source now, but I can not determine type or fuel reserves. “ Hope responded.
“ Hmm, if we could get this thing out of here. “ Anthony uttered, already wondering what all he could grab from this ship.
“ Jump-drive currently inoperable, please wait for the system reconstitution to finish. “ The Synthetic voice announced, which made Anthony nearly hold his breath.
“ Jump-drive ?! “ He spoke in open delight.
“ Hope, point a camera at this ship, and show me what is happening to it from the outside. “ Anthony instructed then, eagerly awaiting for the ships self repair to finish.
And Hope would silently provide the view he desired, showing the crescent shaped ship that had lost large part of it’s right wing, slowly regaining it’s shape.
It took around an hour before the repairs finally finished, time Anthony had to spend controlling the vessel, or rather, sitting idle while it needed him to be present to function.
Though during the process, he realized that the ship had a sort of, external clamp system, or more like, robotic arms, and it made him wonder, if this ship could jump, could it take other ships along with it ?
“ Do we have anything at all about this vessel ? “ Anthony asked.
“ No, it seems it may be a classified ship-type. The file contained nothing about it. “ Hope responded.
“ Well, more reason to try this then. “ He noted, pondering if he should try to lock down one of the two other ships, and try to use this jump-drive.
The question was, which of the two ? Utility, or firepower. Well, Utility might be best placed with the Hope for now, and if this thing actually worked, and had enough range, well, he could come back to snatch more at any time. Heck, he could drag whole wrecks away and just claim them later.
“ Hope, move the drone carrier below the Seltran frigate, “ Anthony instructed.
“ Are you sure this is a wise Idea ? “ Hope asked.
“ No, but if this ship works as I hope it does, it solves all of our problems. The Hope would need years to reach a new system. But Jump-drive ? If it is anything like it sounds, it cuts any journey short to a moment’s crossing. “ Anthony declared with obvious enthusiasm.
“ But you are working off assumptions. “ Hope warned.
“ Perhaps, just get the carrier below the ship, and maybe we can do a little test first. “ Anthony insisted.
“ Very well. “ Hope relented, starting to move the Drone carrier below the Seltran ship.
“ Good, now just-, “ Anthony uttered, trying to have those robotic arms reach for the frigate.
The arms reached down, even though the Seltran ship was a little wobbly under Anthony’s control, as he had yet to get a proper feel for the maneuvering system this ship used. But then it seemed he was just about to grab the frigate below, only for a massive projectile to barely miss his ship.
“ Fuck, what was that !?! “ Anthony hissed, turning the Seltran ship more on reflex then anything else, only to see a larger vessel that was just now launching missiles at him.
“ Fuck ! Return fire, use the artillery ship. “ He commanded Hope, while thinking that he had to get out of here.
“ Jump drive charging, select destination. “ The voice in his head sounded, and the first thing that came to mind was Cradle, which was then seemingly selected as Anthony witnessed a star-map appear, mark a star system, and disappear again.
“ The heck. “ He grunts, just about to try and pull out of the Seltran frigate as the missiles closed in, only for him to loose consciousness.