NOVEL NEXT Book 3 - Chapter 143
"I hope you weren't hoping to actually salvage any of these vehicles," Monroe told Trace with a laugh as they gathered the materials from the last truck.
The bolt from the railgun had made a mess of the vehicle, just like all the rest. They were collecting all the wheels and tires, something they had decided was rather important to have on hand. Every gun, knife, and the few swords they found were also thrown into the back of the trailer. The vehicle control modules were also retrieved. Only one was damaged beyond repair, so they had ten to add to their growing collection.
The last item they grabbed was the armored panels that had been flung free. Not all of them had been welded or bolted down to the frames of the cars and trucks properly. When they went spinning through the air, some of the body panels had been ripped free.
They had no immediate use for them, but armored metal was always useful to have around.
Trace dug out a bag that contained a couple of water bottles and some jerky from the crumpled back seat and shrugged. "I'm fine with the three I already have. I can't even use the personnel carrier yet. I don't want to crowd the warehouse with a ton of vehicles I'll never use." He looked around the field and began stuffing everything he had found into the bag. "I think that's all for this truck. Let's head out. Anyway, if one of them had managed to survive, it would have been a decent present for Ko. She won't be able to keep borrowing Sevorah's car once she officially heads out on her own."
Monroe laughed, a rumble shaking the air as his belly got involved. "How far have you and her gone, anyway? Are the two of you official, or friends with benefits, what?"
"I'm not entirely sure," Trace said as they tossed the last of the items into the trailer and shut the door. "Neither of us have dated before, and it is making things move somewhat slowly. We are just sort of stumbling around discovering boundaries, limits, what we are both comfortable with at the moment." He shrugged. "We're making progress. It's just happening at our own comfortable pace, is all."
The big man stared at him for a few moments. "That's nice. I sometimes forget how innocent and odd the two of you are. I hope it works out for you both."
Trace rolled his eyes as he climbed into the truck through the driver's door and climbed over the seat to his own spot. "What do you mean, kids? You're only a few years only than me and Ko."
The two continued talking and lightly bickering as Monroe drove the truck through the off-road area and back onto the highway a while later.
Trace pointed to an area off to the left. "There's the bunker. Should we still stop and risk digging it up, or try another day?"
Monroe moved his foot, taking it off the pedal and letting the truck gradually coast to a stop. "I admit, I am definitely curious as to what is inside it. At the same time, parking this truck here will be like putting a large sign on where we are. It might be better to come back with your smaller truck and some actual digging supplies."
"That's fine. I'm tired anyway. We can come back tomorrow or something." It was starting to get late, and it had been a busy day for them both.
A heavy boot went back on the accelerator and gradually pressed it to the floor. The semi picked up speed, and a couple of hours later they rolled up to the gate at the city wall. Despite the late hour, the lines to go in and out of the city were absolutely ridiculous. Thankfully, the one for heading inside was a fair bit shorter, though still moving quicker than the side leaving.
Trace cursed softly as he suddenly remembered what Deckard had told him. He hadn't heard anything more from the man after their last communication, and the entire matter had slipped from his mind.
"What do you think is going on?" Monroe muttered as they waited in line.
"Err, maybe they're just working with a skeleton-crew tonight or something?" Trace guessed nervously, not wanting to say the actual reason right then.
"Yeah, maybe. If it's not one thing in this city, it's another. Everything just calmed down with the gangs, and now the border police are acting up."
Fifteen minutes later, it was finally their turn at the sole operating gate for people heading inside. Two armored officers approached the semi and motioned for Monroe to lower the window.
"Returning or new arrival?" The lead officer asked.
"Returning. We left this morning on an official job. We're both edgers. I have the job orders right here if you would like to inspect it?" Monroe told him before handing over a data prism.
Due to the current circumstances, he had decided it was better to hand over the official data prism instead of sending the information through the network, as was normal. With how oddly everyone was acting, he wanted everything to be as aboveboard as possible.
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They scanned the prism, reading the contents of the job. With a nod, they handed it back to him. "Alright, open up the trailer. Let's check to make sure everything was delivered and then you can be on your way."
The two hopped out and hurried to open the door of the trailer. "What's going on? Are you guys short-staffed tonight?" Trace asked, nodding his head towards the extremely long line of vehicles attempting to leave the city.
"Just some trouble that happened while you two were away. Nothing to worry about." One of them answered. "What's with all the tires and other crap you have in here?"
"Raiders," Monroe growled. "They tried to cause trouble with us, and we decided that we might as well get something for our efforts."
The two laughed and slapped him on the shoulder. "Good for you both. Well, everything looks in order to me. You can head on through. You both have a good night."
Just like that, they were let into the city.
"Huh, maybe not all little oinkers are bad after all," Trace muttered as Monroe drove through the wall.
"Don't let it fool you. The guards at the wall and the rest of the police force aren't really the same. Officially, they're supposed to be, but more or less the police on the wall are now guards and no longer actual police officers."
At the warehouse, Monroe took his items and weapons and put them in Black Betty before leaving with a tired wave. Trace locked everything down, took off the damaged stealth suit, and slipped into bed.
***
The stealth suit was spread out on one of the tables down in the basement.
Trace had already used a ceramic knife and a special chemical solution to clean around the various tears and holes. He would need to add more material to the underlayer of the suit first, then he could remake the top layer. After he did both of those things for every spot that had been damaged, he would need to start working on new armor pieces.
That was just for this suit. It had nothing to do with the enhanced suit he had yet to finish designing and would eventually build.
He needed to get more of the special electro-paint and make the armor plates first before he could finish the suit. Until then, that particular project needed to be set to the side for the moment. Rolling away from his current table, he moved over to one that was placed closer to his desk. Laying on it was the android body.
Glancing back at the cameras Deckard used to look around the area, he sighed and stood up. "Come on Deckard! You awake?" He snapped his fingers near a camera in irritation. Trace had already sent the braincase-trapped man several messages since waking up that morning, all of which had gone unanswered.
They were close to getting the android fixed, for the most part at least. All the external damage had been repaired, largely due to the reprogramming Deckard had initially done and continued to do to their first 3D printer. The print area wasn't the largest, however, it could make some small plates for the body.
Trace had then filed them smooth in the appropriate places and using the laser welder fitted them to the body. It was a little patch-worky, but it had worked and after sanding down the seams, it even looked halfway decent.
Now all that remained was replacing the damaged hardware and components on the inside. He managed to repair a few items, but for the most part, they needed to be sourced from another body or the supplier themselves. Which meant credits, lots of credits at that.
Supposedly they now had credits from the little heist Deckard had pulled the day before, but the stupid brain wasn't responding to anything he did.
Finally, he checked the man's nutrient mix level, something that he had refilled just the day before, and found it nearly empty. Over time, he and the others had come to the rather obvious conclusion -in hindsight- that the reason Deckard's nutrient mix was always empty was because his nanites were using it as well.
Once they came to that conclusion, Ko had slightly modified the mix again to include more trace minerals and the metals they needed. Since then, his rate of consumption had decreased by at least half, though it was still more than normal. However, there were times when it was just plain odd, such as that day.
What could Deckard have done that would require his nanites to burn through all the nutrient mix as fuel?
Clicking his tongue at the man's recklessness, Trace refilled him through the feeder port. Then he decided to keep an eye on the level as it began to physically decrease in front of him. He refilled it a second time, and then again when it stopped around the halfway point. It was better to be safe than sorry.
While he waited for some reaction from the man, he began moving some of the items from the trailer down to the basement. Namely, all the control modules he now had to play with, a couple of the guns, and a few of the electric motors and other components they had decided to grab. Random items for the most part, but they might have items inside he could use. If not, well, the 3D printer would separate the metals into all their useful bits.
After moving everything down, he sat back down in front of his desk computer and continued working on the design for the pistol variant of the railgun. It was harder than it first appeared due to a few factors. The length of the barrel on the rifle version actually did a lot to help make it as effective as it was.
Without the length of the barrel, everything needed to be made stronger, more compact, and efficient. If Trace was a proper researcher, doing something like this might not be difficult. As it was, he was just a guy working in his basement. Sure, he was studying to become better, but it was a long path, even with the shortcuts he was taking.
Not to mention a lot of the more specialized items were only being made by one or two corporations. If you wanted synth-muscles, there were two corporations who actively made them. One was the original, while the second was a corporation that had reverse-engineered them and created a somewhat lesser version.
That was generally the way it worked.
A corporation would develop a true innovation, and then another corporation would reverse engineer a lesser model. However, the information on how to create it would never be released in any form.
He only had to look at Koarden Enterprises as a possibly bad example to prove his point. Meredith and her husband had been true geniuses. They had pushed the technology of the world forward more than anyone else. The corporations were still working on how to recreate the nanites they had developed, and that was just the one he knew about.
How many others were there that he didn't?
For all he knew, Vinna-Kwoi might already have a pistol variant of the railgun. In the meantime, he would be stuck developing one on his own the slow way.