The Pantheon Moves

by Michael Chatfield

  He smiled to himself as he watched those ships as they continued on their journey. The first one would arrive in as little as a week, the longest taking a month and a half to reach them.

  It wouldn’t take them too long to set up the outpost. Most of the time, Sato wished for his people to work with those from Emerilia to try to understand more about the technology they were using to grow their own abilities. He also hoped that they would be able to create better relations with them and help them in their efforts. The council had essentially tied his hands but he hoped that through the outpost, his people would be able to help out the humans from Emerilia.

  Edwards stepped into the conference room, where Sato was staring at the screen with the plans for the different ships.

  “You’re looking pretty morose today,” Edwards said, eloquent as ever as he slumped into a seat. He looked like crap.

  While Sato and Adams had been sorting out the security over in the Nal system as well as flight paths and administrative details, Edwards had been the man who should have been sent to aid in creating this outpost. However, with politics, he’d had to remain behind.

  This was no simple undertaking as he had to design the outpost, figure out how to build it and what would be needed, all within the space of a few short days.

  Sato shook his head as the screen changed to show Admiral Adams inside the third asteroid shipyard, in her personal quarters.

  “Fellas.” Adams saluted them both with a bulb of coffee, a plastic squeeze bottle that one could use with and without gravity and atmosphere, her hair out of her regulation ponytail and her clothes in a state of disarray as she’d gotten off work.

  “What I called you here for is to discuss the real purpose of the outpost. It is meant to be a place for people to be stationed, but its biggest goal is to assist the people of Emerilia in being ready for the coming conflict they will have with the Jukal. This means helping with building various weapons of war and the like. I want to sound out Dave and the others a bit more but I think we all agree that they’re trustworthy.” Sato looked to them both.

  Even in their tired states, they agreed completely with Sato’s words.

  “The council is getting all scared at where this might go. We’re doing things that most of them didn’t think would be possible. Dave and the others have a plan to deal with the Jukal. I want to see that we help them as much as possible. The best way to do this is through the outpost. We can funnel them resources, information, help train up their people to fight in space,” Sato said.

  “So, help them establish a proper space navy without the council finding out?” Adams asked.

  “Yes.” Sato nodded.

  “Give them access to technology that is normally restricted and offer the services of our people to assist in building their different ships and systems?” Edwards asked.

  “Yes,” Sato repeated once again.

  “Well, they might as well learn from the best. We were born and raised in space, after all.” Adams’s serious demeanor evaporated with a smile.

  “I don’t know how much we can help them, but if we can give them laborers and also help supply them with resources, that’d be the best,” Edwards said.

  Sato nodded. He trusted the both of them completely, but this—it wasn’t going against the council or their orders but it was seriously pushing them. If the council were to ever find out, they would probably strip Sato of his position and also stop the outpost from being established in the first place.

  “I just hope that whatever plan they come up with to destroy the Jukal Empire is a damn good one,” Adams said.

  ***

  Dave, Oson’Mal, and Kol were all sitting around, eating dinner. Koi and Desmond were both in their cribs. They’d been fed first and put down for a nap. The men finished off their food and started to sip on the fire whisky that Kol had supplied.

  “How long do you think it will be before we need to start using the machines from the Initiative?” Kol asked after some time. He was unwilling to ask the question but he was driven to do it.

  “I’m not sure. We’re currently clearing out the last locations where the portals were taken over. However, it’s clear that Earth, Light, and Dark are all gearing up for a fight.” Dave sighed and shook his head before taking a sip from his drink.

  “With the flying citadels, it’s clear that there’s little chance of the portals staying around for long. Also, with the Jakan being hired on as mercenaries, it’s become a lot easier to deal with the various difficult groups, both the ones coming through the portal and the ones that arrived here through the event.” Oson’Mal had been keeping abreast of the war. Both his son-in-law and daughter—not to mention his wife—were heavily involved in it; there was no way that he wouldn’t keep an eye on it all.

  “When we have to reveal them, we’re going to need to pull out everything,” Kol said.

  “I know,” Dave breathed, reluctant to think on this. “In the meantime, I want to step up a factory capable of making the orbs that I use, give the people of the Terra Alliance a simpler version, one that’s automatic, can give them extra shields, also can allow them to have gravity and retain air so that when they do get on a ship after this all, they don’t die immediately or trip over themselves.”

  “When are you thinking of telling the other leaders of the alliance?” Kol asked. Both he and Mal looked at Dave with expectant eyes.

  “Soon. They need to get their people ready for the coming fight. Not the one that will be waged on Emerilia, but the one that will be waged across the Jukal Empire.”

  Mal and Kol took heavy breaths and sipped on their drinks. Dave’s tired eyes looked across the room to where Desmond and Koi were sleeping peacefully, not knowing what was going on in the world around them.

  He had his purpose for doing this and he would do anything to see it through. He took a long draw from the whisky, savoring the burn as it went down.

  Chapter 9: Craft

  “Well, this doesn’t look complicated at all.” Dave looked around the special room. There were seats all in a circle, looking at the center of the room. In the armrest of each of these chairs, there was a Mirror of Communication and a thick bundle of runic lines that ran from the chairs to larger runic lines that met underneath a magical circle in the middle of the room. Above the circle, there was a set of manipulative arms of all different sizes.

  The others in the room, people from all manner of races across Emerilia, smiled at Dave’s words, taking up a seat and reclining in it. Many of them closed their eyes as they were submerged into the Mirror of Communication conference room.

  Dave looked to Malsour as the two of them moved to their seats. “So, how were the players yesterday?” Dave asked as they moved to two seats next to each other.

  “They were a little stunned—kind of a big thing to know that we want to train them to be warship pilots. A number of them were excited. Others really want to just fight on the ground. I think we should give them that opportunity but train them up with everything we have and try to temper them through the battles on Emerilia. We need veterans, not just people with good training,” Malsour said, as always the voice of cold reason.

  “I heard that some people who weren’t interested before caught wind of the spaceships and started to join up the fighting force,” Dave said.

  “Well, it takes different kinds of people to fight on a spacefaring warship and in a fantasy setting. Some can do both—some find it really odd.”

  “Well, this whole thing is out of whack.” Dave shook his head.

  “How is this supposed to work?” Malsour said, indicating what was around them.

  “I’m not sure.” Dave shrugged. “Ela-Dorn had been all mysterious after talking about the smaller version of the portal and the battleship. Saying that she had an idea that she had to check with some people.”

  Malsour shrugged and sat in his seat, connecting to the Mirror of Communication in his armrest.

  They all appeared within
what looked like an auditorium. Standing up at the front there was Ela-Dorn and a small but cute-looking elven boy who played with his hands nervously as he glanced up at the nearly two hundred people in the room and then quickly averted his gaze.

  Dave chuckled slightly. His face filled with warmth. The boy’s reactions made him remember the boys and girls of the Dracul day care. I wonder what Koi will be like at his age?

  Dave’s smile gained a hint of melancholy as Ela-Dorn cleared her throat, returning him to reality.

  “As you all know, the battleships that we have been working on have multiple issues going on with the ship’s systems.” Ela-Dorn’s words brought frowns and unhappy looks to the faces of the people in the room. They hated not having something that worked perfectly and they knew the monumental task ahead of them with making the battleship functional would not be an easy one. “Now, in a discussion with Dave, we were talking about a possible way of fixing the issues within the battleship, without making one totally from scratch, or going through the ones we have, finding the issues and fixing them all. We make a scaled-down version of it!”

  “The conversion of different items from the scaled-down version to the real version would all be skewed,” one person said. A few others nodded.

  “They might, so I’ve been looking into it and I found out about Olue-Jacques’s project.” Ela-Dorn waved to the boy near her, who anxiously scratched his head and gave them a weak smile.

  His clear awkwardness made those in the room relax their expressions. Ela-Dorn turned to the boy with a gentle smile on her face. “Olue-Jacques, could you please tell us about your project?”

  “Ermm, okay, well, it was really an idea. Where I used to live, we all work together at what strengths we have and then combine them together to make our homes and different places. Someone might be good at making a tree reinforce its roots, another might be good at creating an overhead canopy, another the interior and all that. We use it when doing spells, too, which makes them stronger!” Olue-Jacques said, getting excited. By his appearance, it looked as if he was part of the wood-elf race that lived in trees that they had used their magic to alter and grow. “When people work together, then it’s a lot easier to make harder things. Like how we need all kinds of people in order to get the automated miners to where they are! So, umm, I wanted to make something where people could work together to make something. My dad said it wasn’t safe for me to use a lab or work space, but then, in the college in the Mirror of Communication, you can make all kinds of things and they can’t hurt you,” Olue-Jacques said with a pleased expression.

  “In here, we can create and work without worries of causing any damage. We will be working at full scale. Everything can be recorded so we can check through our steps. Also, all of our actions, once confirmed, will be replicated by Jeeves—who is connected to this conference room—taking our input to create a fully functional model. Allowing us to create everything in here easily, instead of having us all crammed around one model we’re working on,” Ela-Dorn said, clearing up Olue-Jacques’s words.

  There were quite a few people with wide eyes and impressed expressions on their faces.

  At seeing the expression on their faces, Olue-Jacques smiled happily, most of his nervousness falling away.

  “Thank you, Olue-Jacques,” Ela-Dorn said.

  “No problem, Miss Ela-Dorn.” Olue-Jacques smiled. “Can I log off now?”

  “Yes, you can. Go and play,” Ela-Dorn said, her voice almost musical as she stopped herself from laughing at the boy’s childish manners.

  “See you later, Dad!” Olue-Jacques waved to his dad, who was with the others in the room, before he logged off.

  His father chuckled. A few people who knew him and were near him teased him and also praised his son’s abilities. Even though he’d been slightly embarrassed, there was a large smile on his face as he heard them talking about his son.

  “Okay, so the idea is that we’ll review the different blueprints for the various systems in here, then we’ll move to make them. We’ll go section by section, building from the inside out and fixing any issues we find along the way.” Ela-Dorn clapped her hands together. Information packets were sent out to them, detailing which issues they would be working on.

  Different people moved into groups centered around their issue and started to converse with one another. Dave and Malsour both opened up their interfaces and looked over the various blueprints that they were familiar with and had designed. Dave was looking at the teleportation system within the battleships, which would allow them to teleport within a system as well as between systems.

  Dave lost himself in the theories and ideas that had come together to make up these different systems. Different groups disappeared off into various areas, leaving smaller groups and single people who were all reviewing their own systems in peace, focusing their mind on the project ahead.

  This is good for moving within a few hundred light-years, but the power usage is too much. Instead of covering over the ship and moving it along space, wrapping it in a wormhole, it would be better to project it and allow the ship to travel through. However, this is only at a distance between star systems; the straight teleportation within star systems would work fine and give us an advantage.

  With these thoughts, Dave moved to alter the different coding that he had created. It was a small change but its impact would be great. They had first made these plans for the battleship months ago; now they had all gained a greater insight and the number of people who could help them develop the battleship and its capabilities had only grown. With these increased resources, their improvements were vast.

  Once Dave finished with his alterations, he disappeared from the room where they had gathered. In front of him there was a slip; there was nothing around him but white space.

  Floating around this space there were already different people who were talking to one another. Ela-Dorn was there with them, discussing how to use the tools of the facility. Off to the side, there was an array of resources that could be pulled down into the slip and be used, or one might take them off to the side to create something.

  “Well, our facilities are pretty impressive.” Malsour moved forward.

  Dave joined him as they floated toward the slip in the middle of the area. “I’m just hoping it will be good enough to sort out the issues we’ve found with the battleship.”

  “We will,” Malsour said.

  They knew that the fate of Emerilia, whether they survived or not, lay on their shoulders and with these projects. They would do all in their power to make sure that they succeeded.

  Dark mages and engineers talked to one another. After a few minutes, the Dark mages started to move their hands, their bodies being covered in the Dark Mana.

  Threads of metal floated from the walls where they were stored. Dwarves moved in with those who knew metallurgy; as the metals twisted and moved, they called out instructions to the Dark mages. The metal that they were working with was combined with a number of different items, changing the composition of the metal. A few used furnaces to add in different elements, taking the pure metals and turning them into composites.

  As these were finished, they were once again put under the control of the Dark mages. Several of them created lines through the middle of the slip, forming a rough cylinder.

  As they did, other metals moved in from the sides, creating lines that bisected this cylinder while others curled around, attaching to the bisecting lines and the metal struts and supports that made up the cylinder.

  As these metals connected to one another to create the all-important superstructure of the battleship and what was to be its backbone, the ends of the cylinder started to come together. The cylinder’s ends closed off with metal from these end pieces, banding the ends and creating nose cones.

  The bisecting metal that created levels inside the battleship extruded out smaller pieces of metal that attached to the metal supports on the same level as it, connecting the rough supp
orts for each level together. In some places, they grew up and downward, connecting these different levels.

  The metal moved organically, as if it were a living creature. Every movement was smooth and sure.

  In here, the power needed to mold metal was minimal, allowing each of the Dark mages to control it down to a finite detail, checking the densities of the metals and making sure that they were all uniform.

  Other mages, engineers, and techs moved soul gem constructs from the wall and to different sections of the ship. They touched down on the metal supports that had been finished, creating a rough superstructure for the entire battleship.

  The soul gems touched down on the supports and then seemed to explode outward. The soul gem constructs raced through the levels that they were placed on. Between the supports, they created the floor and raced up the walls to create rooms and spread out across the entirety of the battleship. As each of the soul gem constructs touched down, the growth of the soul gem would only increase in speed.

  People who were working on specific systems moved into the battleship that was growing around them.

  The last piece of metal for the superstructure had finished growing. The soul gem construct moved to eat it up, the battleship’s interior becoming more and more substantial.

  The speed started to decrease as power techs moved in with Mana wells. Consulting the plans, they placed them in key locations, maximizing their output coverage and protection from battle damage.

  As they made contact with the ground, runic lines spread outward. The soul gems’ speed increased once again as they became thicker and more substantial. Inside, there were only lighting strips to allow the different techs to see.

  The Dark mages moved their attention to the metals on the walls once again, moving it and manipulating it with the metallurgy. People made sheets and sheets of reinforced armor that would be the plates for the battleship’s hull.

  Dave sunk his consciousness into the battleship. As he closed his eyes, he was able to see everything that was going on within the ship.