Chapter 348
I spent the rest of the night working on stuff. Mainly, putting together the hover bikes that I’d promised. The parts had all been done for a while now, so it was just getting everything together. Once I got everything set up, hopefully this part would go buy much quicker in the future.
Unfortunately, the bikes weren’t something I could rush. I ended up only getting a quarter of the way though my first bike before I went to sleep. It didn’t help that I got distracted halfway through and started working on something else.
I’d been thinking about it for a while now, but I couldn’t exactly lift stuff on my own. Not that I was weak necessarily. Some stuff was just too heavy without external support. I didn’t want to have to call someone over every time I wanted to move something.
Originally, I wanted to just make some kind of anti-gravity dolly using gravitic. It’d be easy enough. Just strap a couple gravitic chambers to something with wheels, a control terminal, and a small battery back. I, uh, I didn’t do that.
Instead, I got so distracted I ended up making what I’d call Hover Pucks. The tech behind them wasn’t all that interesting. It was basically just the same thing as the Drop Chutes, but some of the circuits and control boards were swapped out to sustain continuous lift. They’d stick onto something, and then reduce gravity around the object to make it as easy to lift as air. Mass and wight wouldn’t matter if gravity completely cut out.
And! And since I didn’t make it a dolly, I could theoretically lift up anything as long as I had enough pucks to disperse around the object. That was the kicker there, though. I’d need more.
I always needed more of my tech. More Dragonflies, more Fireflies, more—it was just never ending. When I finally got my workshop all moved down, I’d be able to get onto that. I really wanted to set up an industrial grade Foundry to automate making gear with minimal input from me. Maybe a couple smaller ones too that could specifically focus on my disposable gear.
The next morning, I chugged down some energy drink and entered the storage closet that the entrance of my place was hidden behind. I had to put in the code three times before I finally managed to stop fumbling it. The hidden door silently swung open and let me in.
The place was as dark as ever. Usually, I didn’t bother with turning on the lights. I didn’t really need them, so there wasn’t a point. That stayed true today as well. I worked my way back to the back rooms and tossed my bag onto one of the tables.
Most of my stuff was still working on parts, and a half finished hover bike lay just in the mouth of one of the back rooms. I shuffled around and made sure everything was still running smoothly. Once I was assured, I dropped back toward the tunnel leading into the depths.
The walls were as jagged, uneven, and windy as ever. Once I got finished with my artificial cavern, I’d have to send the autominers through this section to get it cleaned up too. I didn’t really need to, but I had the capability to make it look nice, so why not?
Besides… this whole setup kinda made me feel like a supervillain from one of those comics. How could I not give myself a grand entrance that’d make any hero quake in their boots? Speaking of hero’s… honestly, the whole Troubleshooter act basically just set up superheroes by another name. Bloody, brutal superheroes, sure, but I could totally see the new mayor pushing that angle.
Speaking of autominers, that was my next stop. I dropped down to the lip just before the cavern and shuffled on through. They'd been busy since I last checked on them. The area was slightly bigger than a warehouse now. It lacked some of the height, though, and six pillars of rough-hewn stone sat evenly spaced around to support the roof.
The auto miners themselves were off finishing up some final touches around the place. The brilliant glare of their mining lasers was quite frankly blinding after spending most of my time in the darkness.
I watched the little guys crawl around for a moment before turning my attention to the new cavern. It was almost done. There were just a few things I wanted to touch up before I started moving all my stuff down here and cleaning up the speakeasy.
Mainly, the walls were too smooth. I wanted this to feel like a super cool, subterranean hidden base. It kinda hit that vibe, but the walls were unnaturally smooth and the floor was too even. Even with the kinda rough cuts the autominers made, it was still too perfect, in a sense.
I sat down on one of the brick piles made from compressed stone and pulled out my deck. The device had definitely seen better days, but it was still good enough for my purposes.
I opened up the auto mining program. It was basically just a three dimensional modeling program I stole and then reworked to work with the autominers using my admittedly limited knowledge from Quantum Automation. Nothing fancy, and Luna could probably blow it out of the water with a couple hours of work. It was easy to use, though.
I pulled up the schematic for the cavern that the autominers had been working on. From there, I moved through and started to make small adjustments. The central area of the cavern wanted lifted slightly, and then the surroundings past the pillar were to be mined down some more to create a platformed look.
I also went ahead and adjusted the walls. Now, I could manually lay bricks over a couple places to make it look less plain… or I could just have the auto miners make small, microscopic cuts that’d imitate the look of bricks without any of the effort. I, of course, went with the latter.
While I was at it, I updated the schematic with my first side room. I still had that micro nuclear reactor waiting in the interface, and I needed a place to put it. I couldn’t just leave it out in the workshop with my other tools either. While it was technically radiation shielded, I’d feel better if it had its own room with proper protections.
I pushed the updated schematic out to my autominers and sat back on the pile of stone. Now what? I shifted around for a moment and then reached out through the rings. “Hey, Mira… whatcha up to?”
”Certifications for becoming a Troubleshooter.” She didn’t even miss a beat. Her voice came back fast and kind breathless. “I’m a little busy.”
”Don’t let me distract you.” I sighed and shook my head. “Saint?”
”In the middle of an interview.” His voice came out rushed and quiet.
“I’ll leave you to it.” Did everyone except for me have pressing matters to attend to? Ah! Wait, Luna probably wasn’t busy, right? She was never busy… okay, that wasn’t true. But surely she could talk now? “Hey, Luna.”
…
Silence. I checked her location with the Packheart Ring and found her still at Nael’s clinic… whatever, she was probably asleep. She’d been working herself to the bone to hunt down clues about her brother.
Well, it wasn’t like I had nothing I could be doing. I was just a little bored. I hopped off the pile of bricks and moved back up to work on my second hover bike. I needed to get two more of them up and ready sometime soon.
Just as I was slogging through it, my phone started to wring and a familiar name popped up into my HUD.
— - —
“So? How goes it?” Hope inclined her head and lifted a coffee cup in greeting. Her mask lay off to the side of the table and glinted in the shop’s light like a sharp warning.
”It goes.” I slid into the seat across from her and dropped my bag to the ground. I was back in Crusade attire for the first time in a long while. Even if it was a perfect fit, it still felt stuffy.
We were back at the Jousting Java, the place just outside the Crusade. It buzzed with low voices, the hiss of a high-end espresso machine, and the light clanking of metal. Crusaders in full armor lingered around the area. I’d met Hope for coffee here once. She looked tired then too.
Her cup clinked lightly against the table. “Did I pull you away from anything important?”
“Nah, just the usual.” I was about to finish up my bike when she called me in. And I had on my to do list was to drop off contracts and stuff, but that hardly mattered. “Nothing more important than coffee. What’s up?”
”I’m calling the squad in.” Hope exhaled through her nose and set her cup down. Her tone flattened, and her tired eyes sharpened. The shift in mood made me tense up. “Nothing too serious.”
“Doesn’t look like it.” I shifted in my seat and glanced toward the exit. There were dozens of Crusaders between me and it.
”It’s a job from Commander Ligh.” She shrugged. “Joshua and Dev are also on this one. We have unlimited use of Crusade assets.”
“You call that not serious?” I stared at her. “Sounds like I just lost my week.”
“Don’t be so dramatic.” She huffed lightly and some of the tension eased up.
”That’s—“ So much for having free time. I might as well accept that I’d be stuck moving with Crusaders for the next couple days. “What happened?”
Hope looked around the place and then pulled out a palm-sized scrambler. Seriously, did everyone have one of those? “This is need to know, but recently a shipment was stolen from the Crusade.”
”Of?” Who was dumb enough to steal from the Crusade? Wait—I stole from them… technically, I still was. I meant to say, who was brave and courageous enough…
“Armor.”
”I thought it was custom?” Each piece was only made upon a promotion, chek? They shouldn’t have shipments of armor laying around to steal in the first place.
Hope leaned back, crossed her arms, and let a beat of silence pass that made me feel incredibly uncomfortable. Then she dipped her head. “It is. This was armor of the fallen. Protocol is to send it back to Oryoat to be salvaged. The alloy the armor-smiths use isn’t cheap.”
“Oh…” Must be really expensive if even a mega-corp like the Crusade had protocols to reduce the price. Huh… could I replicate the alloy with Transmute? I could make my own stuff and sell it on the side… not that I would. At least, not without adjusting it so it couldn’t discernibly be from the Crusade.
“Yeah… Ligh’s pissed about the desecration. We’ve got a week to find it, and then he’s opening up a manhunt with every Crusader in the city. No one’s getting in our out of the city.” She shrugged. “You can probably imagine what kind of chaos that will bring.”
There’d be nowhere safe. Even my speakeasy might get rooted out and ransacked at that rate. Crusaders out for blood were terrifying. “So we have a week to find it?”
“Any means necessary, Zuku." Her voice was a carbon copy of Ligh’s emotionless one, but her eyes burned like she wanted to be angry and just didn’t have the energy. “Even calling in outsiders like Nightshade.”
Nightshade… yeah, I’d completely ghosted the Crusade after that conversation. I just—I didn’t know how to approach it. If they just assumed only I could contact ‘her’ though, and turned me into the intermediary then wouldn’t that work out just fine?
”What about the trackers?” As far as I knew, all Crusade armor had in-built trackers. The magic and tech kind. It was why I usually left my armor in my apartment if I wasn’t using it. The slightly higher protection wasn’t worth being tracked by the Crusade.
”Disabled. Whoever snatched it knew what they were doing.” She ran a tired hand down her face and then picked up her mask. She didn’t immediately put it on, and instead just stared at her reflection. “I suspect an insider.”
“That makes sense… Traitors seem like they’re pretty common.” I’d been a part of the Crusade for a relatively short time, and that was pretty apparent.
”Yeah, but…” She lifted her head and stared me dead in the eye. “We, of course, know everyone who claims to be someone they’re not. We put them to work, but they’re never in a position to hurt Blue Crusade Inc’s interests.”
”Hah hah…” I rubbed at the crook of my elbow and tried to put on my honest smile. She didn’t know. That was just paranoia speaking… right? “S-so someone slipped through?”
”Doubt it. I’ll send you what we know shortly.” She stood and slid on her silver mask, leaving her half full cup of coffee behind. “Regardless, the hunt begins now.”
”Chek…” I sat back in the seat and watched her go. My brain whirled uselessly in my head the entire time.
— - —
AN: It’s finally out! Outrun - Neon Divide has officially launched on Amazon. It’s got KU, paperback, and an Audible done by Clara Rose with Royal Guard Publishing. Never thought the day would come, but I’m officially a published author now. Still hasn’t quite sunk in yet. I wouldn’t be here without all of you lovely people, so thank you!
Here’s the link: https://www.amazon.com/Outrun-Neon-Divide-Lost-Rain-ebook/dp/B0F2XPPZQF/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0