by David Aries
“Technology is working again?” Demi said.
“See for yourself,” Faris replied, drawing her spear. A single button press enveloped the head in an electrical storm.
I’d completely forgotten that thing was supposed to light up…
In my defense, this was kind of the first opportunity we’d had to engulf it in electricity.
Demi’s widened eyes seemed to enjoy the show. “It’s true. Then perhaps that means…” She tapped her bracer.
It responded with a static groan, before turning into a voice. “Hello?!”
“This is Demi,” she replied. “Faris and the others are safe. They’ve secured the facility and restored power to our tech. Stand by and wait for further instructions. Out.” Once the call was over, her face curled into a grin. “Remarkable. I feared we’d never be able to communicate like this again.”
“Hey, you’ve barely just arrived. Think about how we feel,” Trez quipped.
Demi’s curled lips twitched before she went back to her wrist. “I’ll see if I can send out a distress signal.”
I shook my head. “Sorry, we already tried that.”
Unsurprisingly, calling for help was the first thing we attempted after getting everything we needed online. However, it hadn’t worked.
“It appears something is jamming any external communications,” DD said. “As we are still able to contact the satellite stations, I must presume they to be the culprits.”
Casella clapped. “But that’s not a problem, yes? Now that we’ve got the power working, we can fly out of here ourselves.”
“Once we’ve got a working ship,” Faris said.
Vay laughed. “Which should be no problem at all for our little zulk, am I right?”
Trez grinned. “Well, I’ve not actually seen this shuttle myself, but as I’m a total genius who made a drill outta nothing, consider it done.”
“And I shall happily offer any assistance I can,” DD said with another of her trademark cursties.
Demi chewed her bottom lip as her fingers danced over the hilt of her sheathed dagger.
“Seriously,” I said to her. “You don’t need to worry about DD. We wouldn’t have been able to do this without her.”
“You flatter me, Master Brandon,” DD replied with a small chuckle. “All I did was act as your guide. The rest was up to you.”
“Don’t sell yourself short: you pulled us out the firing line, armed us up, got the lift working, and helped us take control of the terminal without screwing anything up. If this was a footy game, the man of the match would be going to you.”
“He’s right,” Faris said, eyes focused on Demi. “She was a big help.”
Even Akko, the most vocal opponent to our partnership with DD, was silent. Admittedly, that didn’t mean she was singing DD’s praises… but it was better than screaming bloody murder.
Demi moved her hand away from her knife. “I see…”
DD curtsied. “It will be an honor to work alongside you, Lady Demi. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to ask. I shall do everything in my power to assist you.”
“We were thinking you might want to turn this place into a base of operations,” I said to Demi.
It wasn’t as if we could abandon The Core after we’d gone to the effort of taking it over. Our opponent’s full strength was unknown, but I couldn’t see them sitting back and letting us keep it if we left it deserted.
And who better to keep this tactical location safe than a former admiral?
“A sound suggestion,” Demi said, folding her arms. Her deep black eyes stared at DD. “If you want to help, give me all the information you can about this base. I want a map of the area, as well as a full inventory report.”
DD giggled. “Right away, Lady Demi. If you would please follow me.” Together, the trio—Joobee included—headed back the way we came.
Vay laughed. “It seems you picked the right woman for the job.”
“That we did,” I replied with a smirk. “We couldn’t ask for a better pair of hands.”
Faris didn’t say anything, but her smile was positively beaming.
“So we’re not staying here, yes?” Casella said.
“Not unless you want to,” I replied, rubbing her head. This place was pretty cool, but it wasn’t exactly ‘homey’.
Especially not compared to our lovely tent back in Ulium.
“We’ll let Demi handle things here,” I said. “Don’t forget, there’s a certain something we still need to take care of.”
We’d gotten power back online, but that wouldn’t mean much if we couldn’t utilize it.
It was time to turn the ship beneath the sands into a star-conquering machine.
After a well-earned night’s rest, that was.
***
Rocket’s paws pounded over the desert.
“Are we almost there?” Trez said, wafting herself as she sat on my lap.
I chuckled. “Feeling hot?”
“Of course I fucking am! See?! I didn’t even try turning that into some saucy one-liner.” She grumbled as she mopped a bead of sweat from her flushed face. “Fucking desert…”
“I never dreamed I would ever get the chance to see one,” DD said as she rode between me and Faris. “Thank you for allowing me to come.”
“It’s no problem,” I replied. “Call it a reward for helping Demi. Besides, who knows when your expertise will come in handy?”
“Again, you flatter me, Master Brandon.”
“I’ve heard I’m good at that… and you don’t need to keep calling me ‘master’. Brandon is fine.”
She giggled. “I will be sure to keep that in mind.”
After a quick and increasingly familiar journey, Rocket padded to a stop in the shadow of the deflated gigiamus corpse.
“This is it,” I said before leading the girls beneath the desert’s surface to the humid scrapheap. “Follow me. The ship’s this way.” I went to move, but I paused before stepping foot on the junk pile. My gaze drifted to Trez. “Actually, maybe I should give you a lift.”
Her face scrunched into a scowl. “Muscles…”
“It’s just, it’s pretty dark. What if you fall? Some of this stuff is pretty pointy. Imagine if—”
A spotlight struck me in the face.
I winced and threw an arm in front of my suffering eyes.
What the…?
DD’s eyes shone like a car’s headlights, illuminating the area with two glowing beams. “Would this assist you, Master Brandon?”
“It’ll assist me, alright,” Trez said as she waded into the scrapheap. “Let’s go find ourselves a shuttle!”
Knowing a losing battle when I saw one, I jumped in and guided the girls to the treasure.
Trez squeaked the instant she saw the ship reflecting DD’s torches. “Holy shit, Muscles!” she said as she rushed over. “It’s a ship. There’s seriously a ship here!”
I chuckled. “Did you think we were lying?”
“Well, no… but that’s beside the point!” She darted all around the hull while giggling her head off. “It’s seriously a fucking shuttle, and it’s in pretty good nick, to boot.”
“I was thinking the same thing, Lady Trez,” DD said as she remained on an elevated ground, lighting up as much of the area as she could. “While this vessel does not appear to be space-worthy at this time, it is nothing somebody of your considerable expertise should have much difficulty with.”
“Oh, you flatterer, you,” Trez replied coolly, even though her giddy expression seemed chuffed to bits.
“We still need to make sure it works,” Faris correctly pointed out.
“Good point,” I said before prying the door open. “Want the honors, Trez?”
“Do I ever!” She jumped inside and rushed straight to the cockpit. After parking herself in the pilot’s seat, she started flicking every switch in sight.
Bit by bit, the ship lit up.
“It’s working,” I said with a la
ugh.
“This doesn’t guarantee anything,” Faris replied as she followed me inside. “What about the engine?”
“Engine’s working,” Trez said as her fingers danced over the controls, “but I can’t connect to the primary thruster. Weapons, shields, auto-pilot, and most of the life support functions are offline too. Summat must be wrong with the connection.”
I gulped. “That’s… bad, right?”
“It means we can’t escape,” Faris replied.
My heart dropped like a chunk of lead.
“Damn piece of shit; you were supposed to be in good nick!” Trez complained, smacking the console.
I grabbed the back of her seat. “Isn’t there something you can do?”
She slouched back. “If you mean ‘can I fix this’ then… probably—no, definitely! I could get this bastard up and running no problem if it weren’t, you know, stuck in a dump like this.” All that could be seen through the window was scrap and sand.
Add darkness and Trez’s low tolerance for heat to the mix, and you had one terrible place to work. It made Trez’s favorite glade look like some sophisticated garage.
“If only I could—” Trez’s face lit up. She jerked forward and started fiddling with the controls. “Oh… ohh! Why didn’t I think of this earlier?”
The whole ship lurched.
I held onto her seat as the shuttle tried to throw me off balance. “What was that?”
Trez snickered. “Just a regular bounty of genius from everyone’s favorite zulk. I mean, sure, the primary thruster isn’t working, but what about the sub-thrusters? They ain’t gonna be getting anyone outta orbit, but if we’re just talking about getting ourselves out of a sandy situation, they should more than do the trick.”
“Are you telling me what I think you are?”
“Damn straight!” Trez said as she grabbed the wheel. “Everyone on board? Good, coz we’re blowing this desert!”
With an erratic wobble, the ship dragged itself out of the scrapheap. It staggered vertically into the ceiling and didn’t stop rising until it had reached the other side in one sand-stuffed piece.
All of a sudden, the cockpit window was showing open desert and cloudless blue sky spanning as far as the eye could see.
“Wahoo!” Trez cheered, throwing an arm into the air. “What did I tell ya?! I knew it would work.”
“Well I’ll be,” I said, laughter slipping into my voice.
I can’t believe this; we’re seriously flying.
Sure, I could probably jump higher than we were hovering, but this had still been unthinkable a week prior.
Rocket barked outside.
“It’s just us, girl!” I yelled through one of the wounds in the shuttle’s hull.
I think I’d yap too if something like this appeared from straight out of nowhere.
“We could give her a ride for once if the door was bigger,” Trez said.
“A ride?” Faris questioned.
“Well, duh. Now that we’ve got this baby airborne, it’s time to take it back to camp!”
“Are you insane?”
Trez shrugged. “What’s the problem?”
“Sub-thrusters are meant for small precision movements, not flying long distances.”
“Pff! It’ll be fine.”
“Are you quite sure, Lady Trez?” DD asked as she studied the main console. “It appears the right rear thruster is currently inoperable.”
“Wait, what?” I said.
Trez wafted my concerns away. “Don’t worry about it. Three thrusters is plenty—trust me.”
She didn’t give us much choice; Trez took straight off.
The whole ship rocked with such gusto it was a miracle we didn’t barrel roll.
I caught a tumbling DD with one arm while my other held onto a disfigured piece of décor. “Plenty?!”
“Just a small teething problem. Nothing to worry about,” Trez insisted. “Trust me, I know how to fly a ship. Within a few minutes, you’ll think you’re riding some luxury taxi.”
And she was right… as long as you picture ‘luxury taxis’ as swerving deathtraps.
At no point did our ride become close to feeling safe or comfortable. Its every movement was a reeling shambles. I spent the whole disjointed trip on my feet, ready to grab Trez and get out of there at a moment’s notice.
However, despite the fact we spent more time jerking to the sides than heading forward, Trez did indeed manage to navigate us back to Ulium in one piece.
She snickered as we hovered over the camp and its gathering residents. “What did I tell ya? Piece of piss.”
“Let’s never do this again,” Faris said.
“Hey, we’re not done yet. First, we’ve gotta land.”
I jolted. “Here?!” One wrong move and we’d crash into Ulium like a comet.
“Of course not! Like I’m gonna leave something this vulnerable out in the open,” Trez replied. “Nah, gonna land it right… over here.”
She tottered our ride over the clearing that had previously been home to the drill.
“Wait, what?!” I said.
“Don’t worry about it! Landing is what these thrusters are made for. You’ll see; this’ll be nice and smooth. Trust me.”
“I can’t help feeling you’ve said that before…”
“Nice and smooth,” Trez repeated to herself. “Nice and smooth…”
The ship jerked, slamming against a tree.
“I meant to do that!” Trez squeaked. “Just as planned.”
Our shuttle lurched the other way, thudding against another obstacle. Then it went back, and forth, and back, and forth, bouncing around the clearing like a pinball before landing with clunk.
For a moment, Trez was silent apart from her hectic breathing. She removed her trembling hands from the wheel and brushed her ruffled hair out of her face. “See? Easy.”
My narrowed gaze disagreed.
Trez clicked her tongue. “Alright, maybe that wasn’t quite as smooth as I would’ve liked… but, hey! We made it!”
I breathed out. That we did. Bumpy ride or not, we had a ship packed in Trez’s outdoors workshop of choice, ready for repairs.
We were yet another inch closer to escaping this planet.
Chapter 12
The box of junk in my arms rustled, adding to the wonderful symphony of noise pouring out of the glade.
Usually, you didn’t hear a peep from the forest when Trez was working unless something went wrong. However, she’d never had a project this big before.
Nor had she ever had so much assistance.
Our orange ticket to freedom sat squished among the trees, monopolizing most of the space in the clearing. The rest was taken up with scraps, tools, or helpers doing their bit for the cause.
Po—Sylvetty’s multi-armed smithing protégé—focused on welding a sheet of metal over one of the many holes in the shuttle’s hull. It was quite the role reversal, with her acting as the master while Sylvetty watched with childlike wonder in eyes.
“Brandon!” Sylvetty said upon noticing me. “Have ya seen this? Bleeding strewth, look at it go!”
Trez thumped the roof of the ship, where she and DD were sitting while they fiddled with the shuttle’s innards. “Hey, keep it down. In fact, what are you even doing here? I told everyone to stay away.”
“Yer expecting me not to be interested in a wingless bird?” She rubbed its sleek metal exterior. “So this is the kinda thing that snatched me up…”
“I’ll snatch you up in a minute if you don’t cut the din.”
“Feck off! Since when are ya the boss of me?”
I cleared my throat. “Come on, let’s play nice. Look.” I gave the box a rattle. “I’ve brought gifts.”
“Ooh!” a suddenly perky Trez said as she hopped down and got to digging. “Not a bad haul, this. Not a bad haul one bit…”
I smiled. “Always happy to help.” If anything, I was a little irritated I couldn’t do more than act as a gofer, bu
t as long as it helped lift some burden from Trez’s shoulders, it was fine with me.
At least she’s not alone this time.
On top of Po knowing her way around a welding rod—a prize claimed from The Core—DD had jumped straight into the role of Trez’s assistant. She may not have had any experience when it came to repairing ships, but her engineering skills still put her in a different league to myself and everyone else around Ulium.
With a dainty hop, DD joined us on the floor and started inspecting what I’d brought.
It was hard to believe she was an android… for me, at least. There was plenty of speculation about her being one from the residents of Ulium.
At DD’s request, we’d told everyone she was a simple automaton who was less advanced than she appeared. She didn’t want people being frightened of her and thought shielding her true identity would be for the best.
It hadn’t stopped them from talking.
I was going the opposite way. After all, DD didn’t seem like a robot. She looked, sounded, and acted like a beautiful young woman.
Seriously, she was gorgeous. Whoever had made her body knew what they were doing, although you had to wonder if it was necessary for her to have such a curvaceous, busty figure.
At least her long slender legs seemed justifiable.
DD stopped rooting through the parts and offered me a smile. “Is anything the matter, Master Brandon? You appear to have been observing me for some time.”
Heat flushed into my cheeks. “S-sorry. I didn’t mean to stare.”
She giggled. “That is quite alright, Master Brandon. It is only natural that you are curious.”
“It’s hard not to be,” I confessed, fingers tapping at my box of junk. “I mean… you’re a genuine android, right?”
“In a sense.”
My mouth fell open. “Huh?”
“If I understand your language correctly, the definition of an ‘android’ is a robot with a human appearance. However, as I am modeled after a humanoid rather than a human, I am technically unbefitting of the term.”
“W-what?” I sputtered, still gawping like an idiot.
DD giggled. “There is no reason to fear, Master Brandon. While I do not technically fit the definition of an ‘android’, it seems the translator has deemed it an apt description of my being.”
