“If you can both go to your interface rooms, and from there please look at the objects on my desk. Shaun, pick something on the left. Ember, the right if you please. Pick one thing and think about them lifting up. It’s that simple.”
We both did as we were told, and within seconds a stylus was hovering in the air. Not my object. I tried again to focus more intently and finally the orange ball I'd chosen lifted into the air.
“Great work, guys. Amazing in fact.” Ogun clapped his enormous shovel-hands together. “Now, I want you to visualize your body lifting into the air.”
Again, we did as we were told, and I could tell I was lifting up off the floor.
Ogun cheered again, “Fantastic! You have cut my lessons short with your aptitude. Quite the boon, as I have many things to prepare for landing. We must be ready for anything. I will take you to the ship's training room where you can pick the weapons that you chose to wield going forward. Obviously, you can change your minds at any point, but for now, whatever you pick you will have with you when we land. So, practice, practice, practice. You should try to combine your weapon skills with your mental skills to be a true warrior, capable of holding your own against a Fystr.”
He led us to a large room that looked like a gymnasium. We walked across it to a smaller room where the walls were lined with weapons. There were a row of guns too.
“These are all laser rifles. Projectile weapons are ineffective against the Fystr. You can manipulate bullets with your mind, but you can’t manipulate lasers. I can see you eying the swords and axes here. They have energy-infused blades and will deflect laser fire too. You may also wear a shield on your wrist. Here.” He picked up a bracelet, pressed something and a shimmering almost body height shield sprung up. He quickly deactivated it. “Normal shields don’t stop lasers, so we use these shields. The problem with them is that they could easily cut off a limb, or a head with one wrong movement. No good at all in a melee. We do not use them unless you’re making a shield wall. You are both untrained with guns and they offer only offensive abilities. You’ve had a year fighting with melee weapons, so I suggest you pick one of those.”
“This daft ass hasn’t. He used shovels and baguettes!” Ember said, pointing her thumb at me over her shoulder.
Ogun ignored her jibe and continued, “Still, most people would pick guns because you come from a world where guns rule. My people focus almost entirely on melee for close quarters fighting. There are good reasons for that, as you will eventually find out.”
“Those shelves over there hold various weights and objects to practice combat telekinesis. So, enjoy, develop, and don’t forget to armor up.” He pointed to the back of the weapon racks where I saw an area with body armor.
After that, he left us to our own devices.
We both mooned over the weapons for a long while. Ember chose a wicked looking sword. For me, there was only one choice, seen as they didn’t have a scythe. Part of me made the decision because I’d never fought with my axes much in Anatolia. So, two hand axes for me. The worst thing about them was that I had to press a button to turn their function on. I couldn’t just charge them with a thought. I mean, yeah, I might be able to eventually with telekinesis, but that sounded like more work than just using my thumbs.
I pressed the and they sprung into life. A glowing, blue aura, shimmering around the heads and the hafts to the handle. I uncharged them and followed Ember to get some armor.
The gear on the racks went up in sizes and I was just about to grab one I thought would fit, when Ember stopped me. Leading me down the line, she stopped at a rack. “This one’s yours.”
“I have my own?” I asked excitedly.
“Yup. Has a little inscription right there with your name on.”
I leaned in to have a look, and sure enough, there was Shaun Sutherland engraved onto the side of the breast plate. It was easy enough to put on, but Ember helped me all the same. It consisted of an over the head chest piece and shoulder pads. Arms and legs were left unencumbered. As soon as it was settled on my frame it began self-tightening onto the uniform, like they were supposed to be one. When it had tightened enough to fit my frame like a dream, turquoise lights came on like it was some kind of power armor. All in all, I felt cool as fuck.
Once kitted out, we had a light spar, with the weapons turned off of course. We tried to get the feel of fighting with our almost, brand new bodies. From our time in Ogun’s little experiment we had increased in strength and stamina and reverted back to a physical age of around twenty-eight years old. For me personally, I also wasn’t a ginormous fat-ass anymore.
We went really slowly, almost like we were making a dance up. These weapons were lethal even with the energy layer off. We needed to figure them, and ourselves out. We had built experience in-game, but the bodies we had now definitely did not have the same abilities, nor could we respawn.
We went at it for a little while, slowly speeding up as we gained confidence and showing a surprising amount of skill. I felt like I understood my weapons of choice well. Then, Ember called a halt.
“We really need to practice telekinesis and levitation,” she said.
“Absolutely,” I agreed, and we set off to put our weapons back.
“Here, carry some of these Shaun,” Ember said, handing over a some of the telekinesis aids. We carried a few handfuls each of the various metal balls to the middle of the floor, then sitting opposite each other we both went to our interface rooms.
Within seconds, Ember had a ball floating and I quickly matched her. She sent her ball moving slowly around the training room. Again, I copied her. My ball following her ball around the room. She began to speed her ball up, faster and faster. I tried to copy, but for some reason my ball wouldn’t go as fast. She slowed her ball speed so I could catch up and once again, our two balls spun around the room in unison. Ember managed to bring another ball up into the air and set it spinning in the opposite direction. I tried hard to replicate the feat but couldn’t even get another ball to rise.
I dropped the ball I had up in the air back down into the pile and waited for her to finish.
Five minutes and three swirling balls later, Ember gave up. “Whew! Three’s tough. Why did you stop?”
“I can’t go as fast as you. I couldn’t even get another ball up in the air.”
“So, you were sulking?”
“No. I wasn’t sulking. It’s just, I prefer playing to my strengths. You did that right off the bat. In five minutes were far better than me at telekinesis. Why train hard for two weeks to be the same level you’ve reached intuitively? You’ve clearly got a natural aptitude for it. In a few days you’ll be months ahead of me.”
“What a defeatist attitude, Shaun.”
“I disagree. And as long as I’ve got you to cover my telekinesis blind spot, I’ll be fine.”
“You’ll always have me, but that’s still a totally lame cop out.”
“Listen, my kickboxing coach once told me something when I was doing a few different sports and turning up to training lethargic and crap. He said, ‘Shaun, to be everywhere, is to be nowhere.’ Now, I don’t know if he’s used the quote right, or if I even understood it right, but he was pretty much telling me to concentrate on one sport at a time, play to my strengths if I wanted to a chance being successful somewhere. He had the right idea.”
“What’s your strength then?”
“I haven’t got a clue. Oh yeah, twenty-nine!” I laughed, and she laughed with me.
“I’ll let you cop out for now, but if I don’t see some serious OP skills showing up soon, I’m gonna make you train harder with telekinesis. I’m not getting killed because you’re a big sulky bitch when you can’t do something. Especially with ninety-nine percent Potential.”
“Can I just ask; did Ogun seem weird about that to you?”
“Not really. No. Saying that, he changed the subject pretty quickly.”
“He seemed, concerned.”
“You’ve a Wisdo
m score of two. I really wouldn’t worry about it. Now, come on. Let’s see if you can at least levitate like a man.”
“Okay,” I sighed, and we stood up together.
“Wait a sec,” Ember said, holding up a finger, then started quickly shooting the balls we had carried over onto the shelves. “Right,” she smirked, “let’s fly.”
We didn’t fly. I precariously hovered about six inches from the ground, while Ember managed a more confident couple of feet, but with no other movement.
“I can’t see how fighting like this would ever be better,” I grumbled.
“It’ll be the same with telekinesis. How on earth are we expected to fight in our interface rooms and normal state at the same time! We really need to talk to Ogun about this again.”
“What’s the point? He pretty much said, until we raise our Mental Clarity it’ll be like this.”
“Yeah, you’re right. I suppose all we can do is practice like crazy for now.”
I agreed with her and we just threw ourselves into training as hard as we could. By dinner time Ember could levitate above head height, moving forward and backwards tentatively. She had also managed to manipulate a metal ball, whilst in the air. She still couldn’t do any of it in smooth, natural movements but she was clearly improving. I spent a while trying a few things, but had I’d given up quickly without any sort of progression. Instead I grabbed the two axes from the armory and went to town on the practice dummies, flowing through a series of moves and attacking with gusto. When dinner came around, we were exhausted.
“Well, I could eat a horse,” Ember said, rubbing her belly.
“Wonder if the FSUs do horse jerky? I bet you’d love that,” I laughed.
She shook her head. “So weird. I never want to see jerky ever again. I don’t know why I liked it so much in the game. What are you gonna eat?”
“To be honest, I really need a shower. I haven’t had one since waking yesterday, and everyone here’s so clean.”
“Shit! I never showed you the shower,” she said, emphasizing the word shower for some reason. “There’s one over there. Come on. I’ll show you.”
“Uh. Towels? Privacy?” I said.
“Just watch, dickhead.”
She went between the screen and the wall, that I’d noticed had little nozzles all around it. She raised her hands above her head and was hit from all sides by what looked like white powder. She turned around, dropping her arms. The powder stopped being produced and she walked out smiling, sweat free and smelling slightly of soap. She walked up to a mirror, gave her hair a little comb through with her fingers and like that, she looked pristine.
I shrugged and went in, doing what she had done, raising my arms. The powder nozzles activated. Within seconds I was lying on the ground, retching, coughing, and heaving. Eyes, stinging like hell and streaming with tears.
“Shit. Sorry, Shaun. I should’ve said to close your eyes and hold your breath in the powder shower. I forgot you’re a complete and utter, fucking moron.”
I hadn’t yet recovered enough to retort. By the time I had, my anger had been partly replaced with embarrassment. It wasn’t a good look for me.
“Never mind, eh? At least you're clean. So, shall we go eat now?” she said, smiling sweetly.
“I don’t even know what to say to you, Ember, I said, while trying to get the taste, of whatever the fuck that powder was, out my mouth.
“I’m happy with you saying absolutely nothing. Come on. Let’s go eat,” she said, linking my arm. Despite our height differential making it a little awkward, and the intense stinging in my red streaming eyes, the gesture dissolved any remaining anger I still held toward her.
During dinner, Ogun’s second in command, Astrid came over to us.
“Hey Ember. How are you holding up?” she asked. I was struck with how soft her voice was. She was a powerful looking woman, around six-foot with a very athletic build. Her hair long, brown and tied back into a ponytail, revealed a plain but friendly face. Unlike Cassia’s pretty, resting bitch face. Both of them paled in comparison to Ember, but that’s just my preference.
I suddenly realized I’d phased out with my thoughts and had missed whatever had been said next. Luckily, I hadn't been staring.
“...Shaun here, seems to be my lucky mascot,” Ember was saying. “I’ve developed a lot in the two days he’s been awake.”
“Yes, Ogun told me you’re both doing really well.” She turned to me. “Hi, Shaun,” she said, extending her hand out. “We haven’t really met yet. Hopefully, we’ll have time to become friends. Ember here has told me a lot about you.”
“Nothing good, probably,” I groaned, as I shook her hand.
“Nope, nothing good at all. But it was said with genuine affection,” Astrid laughed.
“Well, suppose that’s something, and it’s a pleasure to meet you properly Astrid. With luck, I’ll have the chance to prove I’m not that much of an idiot.”
“I think you’ll do just fine, Shaun. Anyway, this is not just a social call, though I wish it was. We will be landing in a couple of hours. Everyone is needed to load up the ship as quickly as possible, so we can continue to make our escape.
“Ogun is taking one team of twenty, as will I. We will each be in charge of different needs. You two are on my team and we need you to collect oxygen and FSU stock. I will split our group up again into tens. You already know Cassia, so I’m putting you in her group to get the FSU stock.”
“Oh, goodie,” Ember said, full of sarcasm.
Astrid gave her a questioning look. “Is there something wrong, Ember?” Astrid asked, as I kicked Ember under the table.
“No, nothing at all. I can’t wait to work with Cassia.” I heard the sarcasm still, but Astrid seemed mollified.
“Well, when you’re ready, if you make your way to the training room and get what weapons and armor you need, then wait there, or in your rooms for the call.”
“Sure thing, Astrid,” I said.
Ember just nodded in response.
“She seems nice,” I said, once Astrid had departed.
“Yeah. She’s actually okay. I can’t believe we’re under fucking Cassia again though.”
“Must be trying to smooth out the animosity.”
“Best way of doing that is to keep her away from us, I’d say.”
“Hard, on a ship of forty people,” I replied.
“Not that fucking hard. There’s people on this ship I’ve never spoken to yet. Now come on. Let’s get ready.”
We quickly arrived in the armory and dressed for action. Ember found a small satchel for the metal balls and donned her sword from earlier. I found a belt for the two axes and strapped it around my waist. Then, gave a quick check of the charge and found one stuttered and didn’t start. “Shit. Axe is broken,” I whispered.
“Well, pick another one,” she huffed.
“I don't want to. I've practiced with these, and there's no others like them.”
“For fucksake, Shaun. We're picking up some crates! It doesn't matter if one axe doesn't have an energy coating. You heard Ogun. There's no one down there.”
I was about to respond when a red-haired, bearded man came up to me. He didn't say anything, but put his hand out. I was momentarily confused, before tentatively handing the broken axe over to him. He smiled and took it.
Pulling a small screwdriver looking implement from his pocket, he had the handle opened up in a second, then began fidgeting around with the odd looking transparent cables inside. A minute later, he handed it back over. I was seriously impressed with his confidence that it would work, without checking it over himself.
I thumbed the button and it sprung to life as it should. “Hey man. Thanks,” I said, just in time to stop him walking away. “What’s your name?”
“Gus,” he said, and tried to turn again, but I thrust out my hand. He shook it, just as another dark haired man appeared at his side.
He gave Gus a nudge and smiled at us. “Don’t worr
y about him. He's always quiet around new people. I’m Mick. We’re all in the same group, so thought it best to make your acquaintance before we head down.”
Mick was thin, almost gaunt, with jet-black hair and a well-groomed beard. He had an instantly likeable demeanor about him.
“Nice to meet you both. I'm Shaun. This is Ember.”
“Hey, Mick. I think we’ve spoken briefly before,” Ember said.
“Yeah, think we have. Still, good to get a proper intro. We're gonna be together a lot through this shit storm. I can’t believe how well you’re both taking it considering you knew nothing of Fystr a week or two ago,” Mick said.
Gus had slowly drifted off into the background and was now messing with a handheld terminal of some kind.
“We didn't really have much choice,” Ember replied, as she shrugged.
“Well, hopefully we can catch up at some point soon. We still have preparations to make,” Mick said on leaving.
“Nice guys,” I noted, putting my axes into the belt around my waist.
“Take some projectiles too, Shaun,” Ember said.
“Nah. I’ll more likely get myself killed trying to use them than cause any damage to anyone else,” I laughed.
For once, she had nothing to add, so we went over to a corner of the training room and sat quietly.
There were a few other small groups in the large room, but they also kept to themselves. I mused that team building and morale could do with some work.
C5
A Brave New Supply Station
“Attention!”
“All crew, please report to the cargo bay!”
“Landing in ten minutes!”
“We have been hailed by automated responses and can land in Bay One. This indicates there are no other visitors. We still have a negative reading on life signs, which is also very positive, but we must keep in mind a lot of this station is deep underground. Be ready for anything.”
Condition Evolution 2: A LitRPG / Gamelit Adventure Page 5
