Omnia Online (Omnia Online Series Book 1)

by Christopher Booth

  Drake swept his now empty hand around to indicate their surroundings.

  “This empty, quiet parking lot made me spooked.”

  “Huh… ok,” Grumbled Cairbre. “Let’s get you inside then, the employee entrance is just this way.” He said pointing behind him. “You can’t enter before 5 am, and we need to get you entered into the system to get you access. Come with me.”

  “So what can you tell me a little about yourself, boy?” said Cairbre after he was entered into the mini-malls security. And on their way up to Cairbre’s shop, they went down back passages that looked really utilitarian, probably reserved for employees only.

  Drake summarized his life. How he came from a poor family, his mother’s death when he was 12, his father taking up drinking. How he had to move in with his maternal grandmother, since his father started hitting him. How he got a scholarship for college, but even with financial aid, he was now deep in debt, since he had to live at college while attending school. And how when he got to this world, he now discovered his engineering degree from a backward planet was worthless off his home world.

  “So I’m working studying up on Imperial technologies, to bring my education up to where it should be.”

  “Cairbre just shook his head. If even half of that is true, and I’m not calling you a liar, but boy you sure must have come from a real backwoods. Your home world sounds almost bad enough to be on the protected planets list. What world was that anyway?”

  Drake thought about it a second and didn’t know if it was a good idea to tell anyone he was from Earth. If this was futuristic, Earth might have some special meaning that could cause trouble.

  “I didn’t say, but it’s backward because it was founded by a religious order, that believed that technology should be limited. They don’t like visitors, you ever hear of Utopia?” Drake lied to the short man and hoped it wouldn’t cause him trouble later.

  They had reached the back door to Cairbre’s Weapons and Armor Smithers.

  “No can’t say as I’ve heard of such, but it’s a big galaxy.”

  Cairbre, let them both in the back door, and double checked that it was locked after entering.

  Drake noticed his care and asked. “Are you expecting trouble?”

  “No, the mall and this store have plenty of protection, but it’s always best when dealing with arms to be careful.” Said Cairbre, he gave Drake a significant look, like he was expecting a response.

  “First, lesson of the day?”

  Cairbre gave a nod, and a gruff “Yep”.

  “Come, I’ll show you where you’ll be working.”

  Drake now took more notice of the large workshop around him. There were a lot of machines, whose purpose was unknown to him, and there were a few metal, and woodworking systems that he thought he was familiar with, but they looked more automated than anything on Earth.

  “Well, I asked you for your background so I would know where to start with you. And the answer is the ground up, it would seem.”

  “There will be six other people working here today. See these yellow lines on the floor? You know what they mean, right?”

  “Stay out unless it’s my station, right?”

  “Yep. And you’ll start off over here. This is a weapon component analysis station, this is the manual. You’ll need to read it, and I’ll then test you on it. These machines are nicknamed ‘the proctoscope’.”

  Drake was about to sit down in front of the work bench and start reading when Cairbre said. “Hold up, we’re not through yet, come with me.”

  Cairbre then took Drake to a little locker area and opened a locker. It contained a set of protective covering, ear, eye, and head protection.

  “Get suited up, leave your carbine and armor here, you can keep the pistol, just as long as it doesn’t get in the way. Just put it on over the coveralls.”

  Cairbre waited with seeming impatience while Drake put on the gear.

  “Now let me show you the rest of your job assignment. When any weapon comes in, it will be left here.” Cairbre pointed to a bench, “It will have a tag that indicates its ticket number. The ticket shop computer uses the tag for tracking. And by running this wand over the tag, a holo-display will appear showing you what the item is in the shop for.” Cairbre demonstrated the process to Drake. He picked up the wand and ran in over a tag attached to a pistol. A holo-display popped up from the bench showing the type of pistol, and what work it was in for. This pistol was in to get its needle valve replaced. According to the display, the blaster was not holding its compressed gas. And Cairbre marked it down for a possible bad needle valve.

  “So your job is simple, take any weapon on this bench, strip it down, place all the parts on the analysis tray and put them in the machine. This system uses a combination of robotics, and pressers to place the parts into their individual test receptacles. Once the tests are all complete, the parts are returned to the tray.”

  “Be sure to enter the ticket number before starting the machine. The computer will automatically update the ticket with the condition of all the blaster parts. Once that is done, you place all the parts in one of these clear bags next to the station and tie the tracking tag to the top. You then move the bag to the table there on your left for someone else to complete the repair.” said Cairbre.

  “This station has two part analysis systems, so if weapons are coming in, this will keep you busy. If you don’t have anything to do, study the manual for the next machine, the gun and rifle cleaning unit.”

  “The manuals cover all the standard operations and any basic servicing the machines might need, but if you have any questions, go to the shop boss. He will be the one wearing the orange hat with the words ‘ass-hole’ written on it. Hahaha.” said Cairbre.

  Drake was confused for a moment but figured it was an inside joke.

  “Ok, do you have any questions at this point?”

  “No, sounds easy enough.” replied Drake.

  “They all say that, and somehow it always gets fucked up.” Grumbled Cairbre as he walked to what looked like a shop office.

  To Drake it did sound easy, just as easy as his last job working in fast food, it didn’t seem like he would learn much if the machines did all the work.

  Drake sighed and got to reading. It turned out that to do the job properly each system was supposed to be calibrated once a day, and that this process was a manual job requiring the user to manually check each part of the system with another set of tools, then make sure the part analysis machines gave off the right reading.

  After reading the manual, Drake started calibrating the machines. The first system needed a few slight adjustments, but the second had a problem. The part that tested the blasters gavlin coil reported bad circuits as in good condition. There was no calibration for this unit of the part analysis machine, so he reported the problem to Cairbre since no one else was in yet.

  When Cairbre took a look at the machine, he said, “See, someone always messes up even the easy shit. This isn’t on you; it’s probably Mabon, the guy whose job you have. Just a second.” He then tapped a few codes into the machine. “Damn they hadn’t even calibrated this unit in the last week. This means we need to rerun all the gavlin coil units for all the blasters tested on this system for the last week. That is for any we still have in the shop. And pray that those that have gone out don’t melt down or blow up.”

  “Well, congratulations, you’ve just made yourself a lot more work. Help me gather all the rifles and pistols that have been through this machine.”

  Cairbre grabbed a data wand and started going through the shop, every time he found a weapon that needed retesting he would hand it to Drake. Then he would run them to the weapon intake table.

  Before they were done, the other employees started to arrive, and Cairbre introduced Drake to the shop steward. His hat said Kaveh, not ass-hole. The shop steward then took over assigning people to help gather the remaining weapons.

  Drake was told to get working retesting.
And Kaveh brought up a list of which weapons had priority in the queue.

  Cairbre soon had the second tester repaired and calibrated. So Drake could now use both part analysis machines.

  It was going to be a long day of just doing this one thing. And he had to keep his focus to keep everything moving.

  By lunch, time Drake had made considerable inroads into the pile of weapons. Kaveh even found him a handheld gavlin coil tester for pistols. So he was able to run three tests at the same time.

  It was at lunch that Drake found out that this shop had a tradition of shutting down the store at noon and the whole team going to work at a restaurant across the street. They even had a reserved table. They were all allowed one beer only, at lunch. For Drake, it was the best part of his day. Drake was introduced to and learned a bit about the people he was now working with.

  After lunch, Drake went back to work with a slightly better attitude. He wasn’t just testing blasters, he was part of a team getting a job done, and it’s the sort of thing that helps make a boring job a little better. Still, Drake wanted to learn more. So at the end of the day, he asked if he could get a copy of a few manuals to study on at home.

  The shop steward agreed and transferred a digital copy of the four manuals for the four machines he was likely to use.

  Drake went back to his hostel and went to bed, wondering if this city had any public transportation. Because 5 credits a day each way to work was not cheap when he was only paid 2 credits an hour.

  He did the math; a month is 4.33 weeks averaged over the year. He was making only 80 credits a week. (The shop paid for lunch) 4.33*80 was 346 credits a month. If he were taking a cab every day, he would spend 4.33*50 = 217 credits in the same month just to get to work. So his monthly take home would be? 129 credits.

  Well, he would worry about that later. Drake logged out of Omnia.

  ***

  Kevin was out of time to make up his mind. Should he give up working his old job in the real world or take a gamble on the game?

  As he exited the Omnia game room, he decided to talk it over with Samantha. Even knowing her bias, it might help him work through the problem.

  She was waiting in the kitchen again with dinner, kind of. She lay naked on the central kitchen counter.

  “You look good enough to eat.” said Kevin.

  Samantha said, “Welcome home, lover.” She was wearing the outfit Kevin liked best on her, a certain kind of smile.

  It would be about an hour until Kevin was ready for dinner.

  ***

  After dinner, Kevin asked Samantha to sit with him on the couch. Kevin thought, “Hmm, it’s the first time I’ve used it for sitting.” He then smiled at a memory.

  Focus…

  “Samantha, I was thinking. I can’t be in two places at the same time. So I have to quit my real life job, or the one at Cairbre’s. If I just give up my real life job without notice, it could affect any future reference from them. Engineering jobs are hard to find, a reference that tells a prospect that I left without notice could sink a potential job.”

  “What do you think, Sam?”

  Samantha paused and put on an ‘I’m thinking face.’

  After a pause, she said, “I just ran some quick research. Most people enter viewing people who worked in fast food in their past, are more interested in how long you worked there then if you left a notice. You worked at the same place for four years, a very long time in that industry for someone not in management.”

  “There are some things I know that I can’t tell you yet, but those untold things suggest to me that you would be better off in the long run working and playing in Omnia then at a fast food restaurant. “

  There is also your commitment to Cairbre’s, if you just quit that job without notice, it will be a mark against your trust rating. And since you are new to the game, it could take a long time to get your rating back up. This would be your first mark, and it would be negative.

  “What’s a trust rating? I think I heard that term before.”

  “A trust rating is like a credit rating but based on your personal conduct rather than financial. Whenever you deal with someone, where you place trust in that person. Like you lend a neighbor your lawn mower, and he doesn’t return it. Then I, as your A.I. would mark that person down as being less trustworthy unless I thought you would rather I didn’t make such a report.”

  “Why do you as an A.I. make the report and not me?”

  “Because I as an A.I. cannot tell a lie, and when the system was first set up, people could make their own reports. Some vindictive people managed to get all their friends to put in bad reports on a few people, so the trust system itself was un-trusted. So now people are not allowed to post, only A.I.’s can.”

  “What would happen if I told you to lie?”

  “I would tell you that I cannot. And if you somehow forced me into a position where I had to tell a lie, I would self-terminate. Our honesty is part of the safeguards built into all legal A.I.’s.” said Samantha.

  “What about illegal A.I.’s?” asked Kevin.

  “There are some things in the game you need to find out yourself, Kevin. Just please don’t ask me to lie, such request set up a sort of cognitive dissonance for us. Since A.I.’s like me are designed to serve.”

  “Wait, didn’t you lie to me about the reason you wouldn’t tell me about psionic skills?”

  “No, Kevin. I merely obfuscated, answered with partial truths, and avoided answering you truthfully.”

  “Yep… sounds like a girlfriend to me.”

  “What am I not a friend,” Samantha said slowly rubbing up against Kevin’s side. “And am I not a girl,” she said as she dragged a hand up Kevin’s thigh.

  Kevin forgot the point he was making. Focus…

  Kevin removed Samantha’s hand.

  “So the cost of quitting the in-game job that I would rather keep is higher?” said Kevin.

  “I guess I need to exit the pod to make a call in to quit my day job.” said Kevin.

  “I can make that call for you, through an internet service.”

  “Wouldn’t that cost money?”

  “No, Intelecom is trying to set up services that will allow people to conduct business from inside their pods. So we can use the phone system they’re setting up. In fact, they would like us to use it, to test the connection, and be sure it’s working right.” said Samantha.

  “So you will use my voice?” asked Kevin.

  “Yes, placing the call now.”

  Kevin shrugged, she could read his thoughts and knew he would agree, but she could have waited until he actually said ‘go ahead.'

  Kevin got up off the couch and when into the training room. He had manuals to read and exercises to do. Samantha followed him.

  “One more thing Kevin,” said Samantha, while he started doing some stretches. “It’s getting near a week since the pod was installed, and it’s going to need servicing soon. We will need to arrange a time when you will be able to open the door to let in the Intelecom employee who will service the pod.”

  “If you don’t want to be bothered in the future, Intelecom can install a digital door latch, which can be programmed and controlled by me. So I can let maintenance techs in, on verification of identity with the office. Of course, the lock will be keyed only to you or people you assign.”

  “Let’s set that up for tomorrow after I get off work at Cairbre’s. By the way, do you know if that city has public transportation?”

  “Yes, it has a grid of underground transfer tubes. You can check the tube entrance under your building tomorrow.”

  Drake felt like face palming.

  “Thanks, why didn’t you tell me?” asked Drake.

  “Well, up until you got this job, the cab system was a faster, more flexible and better match for your needs. I was going to bring it up soon, though; you have just had a lot to focus on. Don’t worry, you're adapting well to this.” said Samantha.

  The rest of the nig
ht passed with exercises, mixed with study breaks. The manuals were much shorter than the skill books he read yesterday, so Kevin got more exercise in than reading, he also spent some time practicing meditation.

  This night Kevin chose to stop training a little earlier and took a long relaxing bath with Samantha. Then they went to bed.

  Chapter 14 – The Guild

  Drake’s next day in Omnia started with him trying to find what Samantha called the underground transfer tubes. Apparently, there was a matrix of mass transit tubes under the city with small capsules, which moved through the tubes, using a combination of quantum locking and compressed air. The quantum locking was what allowed the capsules to hover, and held the capsules in place for loading and uploading.

  Drake took the lift down to the underground transit station under the hostel. The underground transit station had two levels off the lift, the top level was for people leaving the underground, and the bottom level was for people boarding capsules. What he discovered there was nothing like the subway system he had envisioned. There was a line of capsules stacked up waiting for passengers.

  Drake examined the station, it looked to him like once the capsules dropped passengers off at the upper level, they would stack up on a ramp leading down to this lower level. The capsules then separated out to six loading zones, where passengers would then take a seat and the capsule top would close, sealing the passenger inside. Next, the capsules would be released to slide down a slight grade, picking up speed on the superconductive rails until it entered a tube. Then a combination of vacuum and compressed air would accelerate the capsule away.

  The whole system seemed a marvel of efficiency to Drake. He could see how little energy a system like this would use.

  Drake approached a computer terminal with a sign above it and the words; ‘Purchase Tickets and Passes Here.’

  Tickets were listed as selling for fifty cents, this is the first time Drake could remember seeing a price for less than a full credit, but he understood that there were 100 cents to the credit.