He only has one, he is copying versions into one core, wiping it, and then repeating the process. Since it they were never activated they are just ones and zeroes. he is basically power leveling his programming, and the last one is the most advanced version he is capable of.
The Brink and Back - Tinker of Fiction
- Thread starter MetaBettaOmega
- Start date
He only has one, he is copying versions into one core, wiping it, and then repeating the process. Since it they were never activated they are just ones and zeroes. he is basically power leveling his programming, and the last one is the most advanced version he is capable of.
Nitronorm5688
The Armchair Reader
- Location
- Oakdale, CT
Puzzle maker AI needed.
Even machines need friends. A Trinity of AI for a community to keep them on track would help.
Cyber security, Doctor, Engineer, Games, Camera, Cook, Accountant.
Something like Evolver, A small robot with an arm cannon, looks like a toy to play lazer tag, until he switches out his rubber bullets for steel ball bearings and kitchen knives.
If this was an urban environment I'd offer to have him soup up the lawnmower with a few attachments.
Even machines need friends. A Trinity of AI for a community to keep them on track would help.
Cyber security, Doctor, Engineer, Games, Camera, Cook, Accountant.
Something like Evolver, A small robot with an arm cannon, looks like a toy to play lazer tag, until he switches out his rubber bullets for steel ball bearings and kitchen knives.
If this was an urban environment I'd offer to have him soup up the lawnmower with a few attachments.
Oh! I thought he built three AI cores and was power leveling his hardware and software. Whoops.
You know, now that I'm thinking of Titanfall tech that is incredibly useful but not blatant (like their super-stable AIs), I can't help but think that they must have incredible production tech to pump out titans so quickly and cheaply! I mean, titans are spent practically like candy militarily. Even ignoring the forcefields, warp-tech, and holograms, they've got some crazy stuff!
Oh, and their medical technology is pretty amazing too! Pilot armor seems like it contains an autodoc, not to mention the neural-link helmets and stimms! And of course they have an awesome mobility kit. It's a really great support/utility tech tree!
Oh, and their medical technology is pretty amazing too! Pilot armor seems like it contains an autodoc, not to mention the neural-link helmets and stimms! And of course they have an awesome mobility kit. It's a really great support/utility tech tree!
- Location
- CABA
Absolutely miss opportunity to bame him Prime. But I will his parts in Optimus's voice
Tisaku
Head Chief Thinkomancer
Jackie's eyes
us
as
flatlined
roll
louder
scav's
scavs
cyberware
maybe
shit's
pincers
waste
choomba
was
Elerium
the
katanas
katana
Vik's
Vik's
"
nanosurgeons
armor's
Street
-ring laser gyro. 1960s tech. -
flatlined
device
titan's
Chapter Thirteen
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The following day, I woke up later than ever before, at least while in this reality. It was just past noon when I finally slid out of bed, yawning and stretching carefully, still conscious of my surgery. I was still a bit tired, but a quick cup of coffee fixed that up. I didn't usually drink coffee, but this was exactly the kind of situation I made an exception for. I couldn't exactly spend the entire day moping around, trying to stay awake. I had shit to do, after all. Besides, the coffee was actually real, made from real beans, or at least instant coffee made from real beans, so it was by and far the most normal thing I had tasted here so far.
Once I had a cup of warm coffee in my hands, I stepped into my workshop, only to find One standing in front of my computer.
"Hey, One. You wanna come out to the couch and talk for a bit?"
I asked my new assistant, leaning around him to see what he was reading. The computer was open to an article about AI, specifically the several that openly worked in and around Night City. A picture of Delamain, the AI taxi service, was tucked up into the corner. I couldn't help but wonder if he had already had his forking meltdown already. From the few seconds I had to read the article, it wasn't mentioned.
One nodded, and together, we headed to the couch. Once we were sitting, I took a sip of my coffee. Before I could finish, One spoke up.
"I have chosen a name," They said immediately, catching me off guard. "I believe I will go by the name Samwise. Sam for short."
"That's… Sure, Samwise. That's a great name," I said with a smile. "How did you settle on that?"
"It is the name of the Hobbit who assists Frodo in destroying the one ring," He responded, tilting his head. "I believe, for my role as your lab assistant, it was a fitting name. The humble MRVN bot, who cannot perform the task for you, but will help you along the way as best he can."
"Well... I can't say it doesn't make sense. I just hope that in time, you will develop past just being my assistant. Still a good name, though," I said with a smile. "So, you've had some time to browse the internet, get a feel for the world… Any questions?"
There was a part of me that had been nervous about leaving the newly born AI alone with the internet, especially without me around to answer questions and guide him. However, I had programmed him with some pretty serious intelligence when it came to fact-checking and data analysis. When it came down to it, I trusted his judgment because I made it for him. Over time, his personality would diverge from the core I built, but for now, he wasn't much more than the pre-existing program, one I could predict pretty easily.
"I do have a question. Why do you remain in this city?" Samwise asked, his head tilting to focus on me. "Night City is reportedly the most dangerous city in North America. Are there not safer places to live?"
"There are, but making progress would be a lot slower," I explained with a frown. "You alone contain a dozen parts that I would not be able to buy if we were anywhere but Night City. Here, I bought them online and had them shipped to my door. But I do plan on leaving the city itself as soon as I am more self-sufficient."
"And what criteria must be fulfilled for being self-sufficient?"
"Primarily? I need to be able to produce my own parts. I have a few ideas in my head, and now that I have finished you, I want to try them. If they work, then our next step is moving out of the city."
This was an idea floating in my head since shortly after I woke up in this apartment. Moving out of Night City and going somewhere I could work in peace, without people watching over my shoulder, would make my life a lot easier and safer. Once I could make my own parts, I didn't need to hang around in Night City anymore. Even better, I had the perfect place to go.
Rocky Ridge.
An abandoned town outside of Night City, complete with a garage, bar, a few dozen trailer park homes, and plenty of other stuff. In the game, you're first introduced to the town while working with Panan to get her truck back. There, it was barely a minute past the outskirts of Night City. Here, it was a five-minute drive, far enough away that a lot of the crazy shit from Night City didn't quite make it there.
That wasn't to say it was perfectly safe, either. Wraiths, a nomad family gone bad, were a constant threat in the Badlands. If you survived them, there were plenty of unaffiliated opportunistic assholes who would still see you as easy pickings. Thankfully, I had ways to solve that. I could even make my own power, which was, as far as I could tell, the main reason why the homeless hadn't moved into the abandoned town yet.
Best of all, since the people who had lived there gave up when the town started to fail, I could buy a large chunk of that land for cheap. In fact, it was so cheap that I felt guilty about buying it from them.
But that was all for the future. Whether or not I could move there was dependent on me being able to grab and construct quite a few juicy bits from the Titanfall universe. The IMC, by and far, was an exploratory production company. Their entire schtick was spreading colonies out to the stars, colonies that had to be almost entirely self-sufficient. There were dozens of different tech bits that were steered directly to taking materials, refining them, and turning them into useful things. Everything from raw ore and scrap back into useful metal to converting mountains of trash into polymer and normal plastics
Handily enough, there just happened to be literal mountains of trash and scrap all around Night City. Hell, Rocky Ridge had its own fair share of that hanging around.
I shook my head, focusing myself back on the current topic, smiling at Samwise. It was well and good to have plans for the future, but for now, I needed to focus on the present. I only had eleven days to get as much out of Titanfall as I could, and there was a whole lot that I wanted.
"That is agreeable," Samwise said with a nod. "We are vulnerable here, both from monitoring systems and corporate watchlists."
"I know, and it's getting harder and harder to ignore," I admitted, shaking my head. "Keep your eyes open, even just around the apartment."
"I will, sir," He agreed. "If our future plans are set, what of the short term?"
"I'm going out with Jackie to do a job for Padre, a local Fixer," I explained. "Before that, I want to make a few small blueprints. When I'm done, I want you to build them both up until they are almost complete. Then you're gonna finish one when I get back, and I will finish the other, probably tomorrow morning."
"You are putting our compatibility to the test?" He asked while flashing "ToF" on his chest screen.
My abilities, or at least, everything I knew about them so far, were included in his final build, built into a subsection in an easily deletable data chain. He was also programmed to be extremely circumspect about mentioning it, even when we appeared to be alone.
"That's right. Better to learn now than get surprised later," I pointed it out. "With any luck, even if it turns out like I think it will, I'll still have a use for the blueprints."
We talked a bit longer and answered Sam's questions so I could get a feel for his conversational abilities. I was at least partially still testing him, seeing if any bugs sprung up. His core was, after all, a custom project rather than a line-for-line copy of something from the Titanfall universe. After I finished my coffee, I got some food from the machine in my room, actually paying for it since I had already removed the hack Spot and I installed. I sat down at my computer and got to work, eating my late breakfast and early lunch as I did.
I already had the two projects for Samwise to work on in mind, so I could immediately start putting the plans together for him. The first was a simple double fist-sized drone surveillance drone. As far as I could tell, this world seemed determined to strap thrusters on every little drone, doubling their size, making them big, hot targets, and making them much more expensive to upkeep. The Titanfall universe, on the other hand, developed an entirely new thrust system for a lot of their drones, one that I was pretty sure was a more refined version of the Gremlin thrust system. They also maintained propeller-based drones, advancing them in small bursts but mostly leaving them as they were. They were cheaper, easier to maintain, easier to keep powered, and frequently easier to use. They could also be relativity quiet, at least when made correctly.
Like the one I was designing.
The second project was an early version of the minion detector, a semi-standard piece of equipment for Titan pilots. In the game, there was an advanced version of this device you could equip on your character that would clearly mark hostile targets on your minimap. Its only real limitation was that it couldn't track pilots because they were frequently moving way too fast for it to follow. This version was very much not portable, significantly less efficient, and its difficulty tracking faster targets was even more pronounced, so much so that the device had to be stationary to work, but it did have one solid advancement.
It was much easier to build.
As I started to mentally dive into the Titanfall tech tree, I quickly realized I would have a serious problem replicating complex, nonstandard parts. XCOM had been easy since the scientists and engineers working for the program were pulling from a relatively low-tech world. Titanfall, on the other hand, had two hundred years of advancement and specialization. I could mix and match some of the general, simple stuff, like hydraulics and servos, but when I started making the crazy, high-end tech with no real equivalency in the Cyberpunk universe, I was going hit a wall very quickly. This only made self-sufficiency even more important since that was the key to making those unique parts.
Luckily, the older model of the minion detector required a lot fewer small, finicky parts, so I could settle for an off-the-shelf infrared scanner, a sonar module from an underwater drone, and a seismic gauge used to monitor road traffic. These three devices worked together to create a real-time tracking system for all slow-moving entities in and around a singular building. By excluding people with proper credentials, you had an impressive addition to any security system. I didn't have the sonar module or the seismic gauge on hand, so this device would be the one I finish on my own, probably tomorrow when they were delivered.
At the end of the day, both of these devices would be sold to Padre, this time at a much more reasonable price. I had already cemented myself as someone he should protect, and it was in his best interest to keep my name off the records now that I could prove I wasn't just a one-hit-wonder.
Or, really, a three-hit wonder.
I spent the last bits of the afternoon whipping up the minion detector's programming since it was a pretty complicated system. Collating three streams of live data, interpreting it as a visual representation, and laying it over a 2D representation of a building was relatively complex. The drone's programming was much more simple, so I had that finished in ten minutes.
When I was finished with the design process, I handed the projects over to Samwise. At this point, I had a pretty solid grasp of both builds, with a good understanding of the general design and how some of the bits worked. I was still missing a good chunk of information, as well as that final blast of knowledge that accompanied the finishing of a build.
In all honesty, I had relatively low expectations for this to work. My ability, Tinker of Fiction, while it provided me with real, hard technology that actually functioned on its own, still had a lot of Tinker-like aspects, limitations, and quirks, a lot more than I first realized. Having someone else complete my projects so I could focus on other things, drastically reducing the time it took me to build and advance, seems like a pretty obvious loophole. It's why I chose two bits of tech I wasn't overly interested in having locked into my brain.
Still, even if my fears proved true, having someone like Samwise to help me build stuff I already got the benefits of, construct my own creations while I was focused on a tech tree, or just generally help me work, especially once we moved into better facilities, would be absolutely priceless.
I watched Samwise work for a few minutes before idly checking the time.
"Alright, Sam. I'm gonna have to leave you to work on your own for a while," I said. "I'm already running a bit late to meet with Jackie."
"Very well, sir," He said. "Please endeavor to be as safe as possible."
"Don't worry, buddy. I got a whole suit of armor stashed in Jackie's garage," I assured him. "Plus, Jackie will be with me, we've got it covered."
"Understood. See you soon."
The robot turned back to his work, preparing the off-the-shelf parts for the small drone while I started getting ready to leave. Once I had everything, including a few magazines of bullets for my rifle, I headed out, making my way down to the garage and hopping into my truck.
It was a quick drive to Jackie's garage, my friend waiting outside the large door for me. He waved and opened the garage door for me, and I backed the truck halfway into it.
"You ready?" I asked, stepping into the garage.
"Just about," Jackie said, grabbing his helmet off a counter.
He was already dressed in his armor, wearing his black and red jacket over it. He looked intimidating as fuck, which would only get better with his helmet on. As he watched, I made my way over to a stack of cargo crates, where I knew he kept my armor. While I put it on, Jackie filled me in on the details about our job.
"So 6th Street has been pushing on Valentino turf for a while," Jackie explained, sitting down on his weight bench. "It happens all the time. Usually, they just push them back, take out a little extra, then retreat. Problem is, this time, they pushed too far, and when they got pushed back, they took something with them."
"What did they take?" I asked, pausing as I pulled on the second part of my chest armor, feeling it connect around my back and tighten into place.
"Padre didn't say, I didn't ask," Jackie said with a look, though after a moment, he shrugged. "My guess is a drug shipment or maybe some hardware. Either way, when the Valentinos pushed them out, it went with them."
"So we what, we clear a 6th Street hideout, then get whatever they stole back?"
"No, they've already written off whatever it was, which is why I'm guessing drugs. They would have already split it up to sell and use," Jackie explained. "But a message needs to be sent, something deeper than just a bit of a pushback, so we are going in, clearing out the building that Padre tracked the good too."
"What's the building for?"
"Just a gathering area, nothing major," He responded. "We are looking at twelve, maybe fifteen, no more than twenty members."
"Seriously?" I asked, looking up from finishing the last piece of my armor. "That's a bit more than seven or eight scavs."
"We can handle it," He assured me, "Just gotta hit hard before they can react, cut the group down by a handful. After that, we move slow and steady."
"Sounds like a plan," I said, pulling on my helmet, letting it seal itself in place, feeling the synthetic muscles squeeze and move as they activated. "I'm ready, let's go."
Jacke nodded, and together, we climbed into the truck. Thankfully, unlike the van we took to the scav hit, the truck had more adjustable seating, letting me slide the passenger seat back and down, meaning I just fit inside while in my armor.
It was tight, but it was better than laying in the back with the guns.
The drive was blessedly short, crossing across a bridge from the Vista Del Rey subdistrict into Arroyo, otherwise known as 6th Street Gang territory. Thankfully, we didn't move very far into their territory, only passing a few blocks before Jackie pulled up on a driveway, startling a few people walking on the sidewalk.
"You ready for this?" He asked as he shut the truck down.
"Yeah, why wouldn't I be?" I asked, a bit confused.
"Well… 6th Street are assholes, but they aren't quite scav assholes," He explained with a shrug. "I was worried you wouldn't be up for it."
"Oh… well, I mean... I'm not going full murder hobo, but… Live by the sword, die by the sword, right?" I said, quoting the paraphrased gospel line. "If you're gonna be a violent ganger, you don't get to complain when that violence gets turned back around on you."
"Damn, fitting in pretty quick, Genio," Jackie said with a laugh, stepping out of the truck just as I did as well.
The sudden appearance of a rather large, fully armored man, looking everything like combat borg, got even more attention than Jackie riding up on the curb did. Suddenly people knew shit was about to go down and decided that this street was a very bad place to be.
Both of us walked around to the back of the truck, grabbing our weapons from the truck bed. I racked a round into my rifle, before reaching in and letting my sword latch onto the magnetic holster on my back. I then reached inside and pulled out Jackie's axe, handing it to him.
"Damn… I like it."
He took a moment to study the axe before clipping its holster to his belt, practicing pulling it before nodding and sliding it back on the opposite hip as his pistol. He then reached forward and grabbed his helmet, slowly pulling it over his head. He looked at me, the menacing, almost ogre-like face looking back at me, giving me a simple nod.
Together, we walked down the street, weapons ready, before finally, Jackie turned onto a pavilion, one lined with a few dozen vending machines, all lined up along the walls. There was one of those mini shops in the center, though it was empty of anything to buy. Instead, two gang members, covered in metal, both chains and cyberware, were sitting inside. Rather than say anything, Jackie simply reached into his jacket, pulled out a frag grenade, and underhanded it into the mini shop as we walked by. Both of the gangers were shocked by our appearance, and when the grenade thunked off the wall behind them and landed at their feet, it was way too late for them to do anything about it.
The grenade went off when we were a dozen feet away, blowing smoke and hundreds of fragments up and out of the structure, annihilating both of the "guards." We kept walking, both of us protected by the building, though I did feel a few small, residual fragments ping off my back. As we approached the front entrance to what was once a store, three gangers came pouring out of the front entrance, shouting and yelling. They ran face-first into us, having no idea what was going on, completely unprepared to meet us. Jackie snapped his axe out of his holster and slammed it into one of their skulls as the ganger tried to skid to a stop while I raised my rifle and pulled the trigger twice, spraying down the remaining two.
My time in the Badlands had given me a much better understanding of how my rifle worked, and it showed. The first bursts I fired went a bit wide, only the last two bullets hitting my target. Even so, each impact was devastating, with the heavy steel rounds blowing chunks out of the first man's shoulder and chest. My second burst was much more on target, with a quartet of rounds annihilating the third man, both of them dropping to the ground and sliding to a stop.
"I'll lead," I said, my voice filtered through my mask.
"Si, right behind you."
I stepped closer, kicking the door in. The flimsy, cheap frame crumpled and slammed open hard enough to knock the door off its hinges, clearing the door permanently. However, rather than stepping through, I stepped to the side, just as whoever was on the other side mag dumped through the open door. Eventually, after a moment, I heard a click, and Jackie immediately stepped into the doorframe. He fired a pretty tight grouping of bullets into the frantically reloading ganger. When Jackie stepped back, I stepped through, my rifle up and ready as I cleared the front entrance.
I confirm in the back of my head that shortening my redesign of the mag rifle had been the right choice as I turned and scanned the entrance, the rifle up on my shoulder, ready to fire. Two steps into the room, a ganger with a significant portion of his left side replaced with cyberware burst from behind cover. He was armed with a telescopic club, sparks of EMP static crackling around the end. The second he laid eyes on us, he jerked back in surprise, clearly not anticipating either of us. He dropped a second later, his baton going silent as it rolled away from his corpse.
Two more gangers came charging out of a back room, a door marked with a fading sign that read "Employees Only." We were facing the other direction, and both of them got several shots off. Bullets pinged off my armor and flattened against Jackie's, but neither of them had anything capable of penetrating our armor.
When both of them had been dispatched, we both made our way to the door they had come from. We both had time to reload before I put on a repeat performance, kicking the door off of its frame and stepping into the small storage room beyond. It was empty, but not for long, as a man dressed in modified military fatigues and chrome built into his head stepped around a door further in, holding something in each of his hands. Even as he tossed both of his grenades, I turned, my body running on instincts I didn't even know it had. I slammed into Jackie, the enhanced strength of my armor just enough to drive us both through the door frame. I was in the process of shoving him away from the opening when the grenade went off.
The explosion was deceptively small, but with nothing between me and it, I was battered by a barrage of shrapnel. Still, the explosive had gone off inside the room, so instead of being battered and broken, I was merely tossed a bit, falling down on my ass, my ears ringing.
Thankfully, I had succeeded in pushing Jackie out of the danger zone, so when three gangers came sprinting around the corner, coming to confirm or finish us off, he finished off all three of them, dumping most of his pistol mag into them.
Slowly, I stood up, quickly helped by Jackie after he confirmed the storage room was empty.
"Ey, you good choom?" He asked, his voice barely detectable under a constant whine.
"Yeah, I'm good. None of the shrapnel made it through," I confirmed. "Probably just some bruising. Ears are ringing."
"That's good, the ringing will pass," He assured me as he slapped my shoulder.
With a nod, Jackie grabbed my rifle and handed it to me, covering me while I stretched, shook off the explosion, and checked my weapon. I gave him a nod when I was ready.
We pushed back through into the storage room, which was now a heavily perforated mess. After quickly clearing the mess, we cleared the next room as well, which was set up as a break room of sorts, with a staircase going down in the far corner.
I took the lead, slowly descending down the stairs and entering a run-down, patched-up basement. As I stepped out of the stairwell, I got my a clear view of the surprisingly open room. There was a lot of stuff stored there, crates and boxes all stacked up along the walls, with a table in the center of the decently sized room, with what looked like the remnants of a poker game going on. There were also three gangers waiting for us, in cover behind some of the crates. I stepped forward, looking to take cover as well before they could open fire, only for one big mother fucker to come out from behind a stack of boxes and slam into me. Just from a glance, I could see he was seriously chromed out, with all four limbs replaced by exposed cyberware. The impact drove me back and knocked my rifle from my hand, the shock of his charge and yell stunning me just long enough for him to disarm me.
Jackie, who was just behind me, stepped out of the stairwell, trying to line up a shot on the chromed-up ganger, only for a barrage of bullets to force him back into the stairs.
The brute continued to try and grapple me, his robotic limbs, and whatever other enhancements he had, actually giving him a significant edge. My warden armor only improved my strength and speed to around, maybe even slightly past peak human. It did not contend very well with someone kitted out to the nines in steal and servos, especially someone with actual experience fighting hand-to-hand.
Knowing this, I didn't fight him for dominance, only to stay standing, focusing instead on reaching down to holster, grabbing my knife and pulling it from its sheath. I slammed it down into his back, just below his neck, punching through what I was pretty sure was some sort of subdermal armor. I stabbed him several more times before finally hitting his spine, or the cyberware equivalent, the man going limp instantly, falling to the ground. I left my knife in him, focusing on the other three gangers still standing, their attention now split between Jackie and myself.
Rather than scramble on the ground for my rifle, I grabbed my pistol, pulling it out and holding it one-handed, firing as I moved, trying to flank around the three remaining goons. One of the three noticed what I was doing and tried to pull his shots to follow me, but his Copperhead clicked, his magazine empty. As he screamed out a curse, desperately fumbling with a new mag, I put him down before focusing on the next ganger.
Together, Jackie and I made quick work of the remaining two 6th Street gangers. When the gunfire finally stopped, we both took a moment to breathe. I retrieved my fusion knife, wiping the synthetic blood off of it and sliding it back into my holster before reloading my pistol and sliding it away as well.
"Let's clear the upstairs again," Jackie said. "Then you stand guard while I fill some duffel bags up."
"Sounds like a plan," I said with a nod. "So… how did you like your ax?"
"Worked well, thought for sure it would get stuck in that guy's skull," Jackie answered. "Not bad."
"What can I say? I do good work," I responded, following after Jackie while he shook his head.
"Don't get cocky Genio," He said, though I could hear his smile. "Just keep watch, I'll fill a few bags, and we'll get out of here quick."
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The following day, I woke up later than ever before, at least while in this reality. It was just past noon when I finally slid out of bed, yawning and stretching carefully, still conscious of my surgery. I was still a bit tired, but a quick cup of coffee fixed that up. I didn't usually drink coffee, but this was exactly the kind of situation I made an exception for. I couldn't exactly spend the entire day moping around, trying to stay awake. I had shit to do, after all. Besides, the coffee was actually real, made from real beans, or at least instant coffee made from real beans, so it was by and far the most normal thing I had tasted here so far.
Once I had a cup of warm coffee in my hands, I stepped into my workshop, only to find One standing in front of my computer.
"Hey, One. You wanna come out to the couch and talk for a bit?"
I asked my new assistant, leaning around him to see what he was reading. The computer was open to an article about AI, specifically the several that openly worked in and around Night City. A picture of Delamain, the AI taxi service, was tucked up into the corner. I couldn't help but wonder if he had already had his forking meltdown already. From the few seconds I had to read the article, it wasn't mentioned.
One nodded, and together, we headed to the couch. Once we were sitting, I took a sip of my coffee. Before I could finish, One spoke up.
"I have chosen a name," They said immediately, catching me off guard. "I believe I will go by the name Samwise. Sam for short."
"That's… Sure, Samwise. That's a great name," I said with a smile. "How did you settle on that?"
"It is the name of the Hobbit who assists Frodo in destroying the one ring," He responded, tilting his head. "I believe, for my role as your lab assistant, it was a fitting name. The humble MRVN bot, who cannot perform the task for you, but will help you along the way as best he can."
"Well... I can't say it doesn't make sense. I just hope that in time, you will develop past just being my assistant. Still a good name, though," I said with a smile. "So, you've had some time to browse the internet, get a feel for the world… Any questions?"
There was a part of me that had been nervous about leaving the newly born AI alone with the internet, especially without me around to answer questions and guide him. However, I had programmed him with some pretty serious intelligence when it came to fact-checking and data analysis. When it came down to it, I trusted his judgment because I made it for him. Over time, his personality would diverge from the core I built, but for now, he wasn't much more than the pre-existing program, one I could predict pretty easily.
"I do have a question. Why do you remain in this city?" Samwise asked, his head tilting to focus on me. "Night City is reportedly the most dangerous city in North America. Are there not safer places to live?"
"There are, but making progress would be a lot slower," I explained with a frown. "You alone contain a dozen parts that I would not be able to buy if we were anywhere but Night City. Here, I bought them online and had them shipped to my door. But I do plan on leaving the city itself as soon as I am more self-sufficient."
"And what criteria must be fulfilled for being self-sufficient?"
"Primarily? I need to be able to produce my own parts. I have a few ideas in my head, and now that I have finished you, I want to try them. If they work, then our next step is moving out of the city."
This was an idea floating in my head since shortly after I woke up in this apartment. Moving out of Night City and going somewhere I could work in peace, without people watching over my shoulder, would make my life a lot easier and safer. Once I could make my own parts, I didn't need to hang around in Night City anymore. Even better, I had the perfect place to go.
Rocky Ridge.
An abandoned town outside of Night City, complete with a garage, bar, a few dozen trailer park homes, and plenty of other stuff. In the game, you're first introduced to the town while working with Panan to get her truck back. There, it was barely a minute past the outskirts of Night City. Here, it was a five-minute drive, far enough away that a lot of the crazy shit from Night City didn't quite make it there.
That wasn't to say it was perfectly safe, either. Wraiths, a nomad family gone bad, were a constant threat in the Badlands. If you survived them, there were plenty of unaffiliated opportunistic assholes who would still see you as easy pickings. Thankfully, I had ways to solve that. I could even make my own power, which was, as far as I could tell, the main reason why the homeless hadn't moved into the abandoned town yet.
Best of all, since the people who had lived there gave up when the town started to fail, I could buy a large chunk of that land for cheap. In fact, it was so cheap that I felt guilty about buying it from them.
But that was all for the future. Whether or not I could move there was dependent on me being able to grab and construct quite a few juicy bits from the Titanfall universe. The IMC, by and far, was an exploratory production company. Their entire schtick was spreading colonies out to the stars, colonies that had to be almost entirely self-sufficient. There were dozens of different tech bits that were steered directly to taking materials, refining them, and turning them into useful things. Everything from raw ore and scrap back into useful metal to converting mountains of trash into polymer and normal plastics
Handily enough, there just happened to be literal mountains of trash and scrap all around Night City. Hell, Rocky Ridge had its own fair share of that hanging around.
I shook my head, focusing myself back on the current topic, smiling at Samwise. It was well and good to have plans for the future, but for now, I needed to focus on the present. I only had eleven days to get as much out of Titanfall as I could, and there was a whole lot that I wanted.
"That is agreeable," Samwise said with a nod. "We are vulnerable here, both from monitoring systems and corporate watchlists."
"I know, and it's getting harder and harder to ignore," I admitted, shaking my head. "Keep your eyes open, even just around the apartment."
"I will, sir," He agreed. "If our future plans are set, what of the short term?"
"I'm going out with Jackie to do a job for Padre, a local Fixer," I explained. "Before that, I want to make a few small blueprints. When I'm done, I want you to build them both up until they are almost complete. Then you're gonna finish one when I get back, and I will finish the other, probably tomorrow morning."
"You are putting our compatibility to the test?" He asked while flashing "ToF" on his chest screen.
My abilities, or at least, everything I knew about them so far, were included in his final build, built into a subsection in an easily deletable data chain. He was also programmed to be extremely circumspect about mentioning it, even when we appeared to be alone.
"That's right. Better to learn now than get surprised later," I pointed it out. "With any luck, even if it turns out like I think it will, I'll still have a use for the blueprints."
We talked a bit longer and answered Sam's questions so I could get a feel for his conversational abilities. I was at least partially still testing him, seeing if any bugs sprung up. His core was, after all, a custom project rather than a line-for-line copy of something from the Titanfall universe. After I finished my coffee, I got some food from the machine in my room, actually paying for it since I had already removed the hack Spot and I installed. I sat down at my computer and got to work, eating my late breakfast and early lunch as I did.
I already had the two projects for Samwise to work on in mind, so I could immediately start putting the plans together for him. The first was a simple double fist-sized drone surveillance drone. As far as I could tell, this world seemed determined to strap thrusters on every little drone, doubling their size, making them big, hot targets, and making them much more expensive to upkeep. The Titanfall universe, on the other hand, developed an entirely new thrust system for a lot of their drones, one that I was pretty sure was a more refined version of the Gremlin thrust system. They also maintained propeller-based drones, advancing them in small bursts but mostly leaving them as they were. They were cheaper, easier to maintain, easier to keep powered, and frequently easier to use. They could also be relativity quiet, at least when made correctly.
Like the one I was designing.
The second project was an early version of the minion detector, a semi-standard piece of equipment for Titan pilots. In the game, there was an advanced version of this device you could equip on your character that would clearly mark hostile targets on your minimap. Its only real limitation was that it couldn't track pilots because they were frequently moving way too fast for it to follow. This version was very much not portable, significantly less efficient, and its difficulty tracking faster targets was even more pronounced, so much so that the device had to be stationary to work, but it did have one solid advancement.
It was much easier to build.
As I started to mentally dive into the Titanfall tech tree, I quickly realized I would have a serious problem replicating complex, nonstandard parts. XCOM had been easy since the scientists and engineers working for the program were pulling from a relatively low-tech world. Titanfall, on the other hand, had two hundred years of advancement and specialization. I could mix and match some of the general, simple stuff, like hydraulics and servos, but when I started making the crazy, high-end tech with no real equivalency in the Cyberpunk universe, I was going hit a wall very quickly. This only made self-sufficiency even more important since that was the key to making those unique parts.
Luckily, the older model of the minion detector required a lot fewer small, finicky parts, so I could settle for an off-the-shelf infrared scanner, a sonar module from an underwater drone, and a seismic gauge used to monitor road traffic. These three devices worked together to create a real-time tracking system for all slow-moving entities in and around a singular building. By excluding people with proper credentials, you had an impressive addition to any security system. I didn't have the sonar module or the seismic gauge on hand, so this device would be the one I finish on my own, probably tomorrow when they were delivered.
At the end of the day, both of these devices would be sold to Padre, this time at a much more reasonable price. I had already cemented myself as someone he should protect, and it was in his best interest to keep my name off the records now that I could prove I wasn't just a one-hit-wonder.
Or, really, a three-hit wonder.
I spent the last bits of the afternoon whipping up the minion detector's programming since it was a pretty complicated system. Collating three streams of live data, interpreting it as a visual representation, and laying it over a 2D representation of a building was relatively complex. The drone's programming was much more simple, so I had that finished in ten minutes.
When I was finished with the design process, I handed the projects over to Samwise. At this point, I had a pretty solid grasp of both builds, with a good understanding of the general design and how some of the bits worked. I was still missing a good chunk of information, as well as that final blast of knowledge that accompanied the finishing of a build.
In all honesty, I had relatively low expectations for this to work. My ability, Tinker of Fiction, while it provided me with real, hard technology that actually functioned on its own, still had a lot of Tinker-like aspects, limitations, and quirks, a lot more than I first realized. Having someone else complete my projects so I could focus on other things, drastically reducing the time it took me to build and advance, seems like a pretty obvious loophole. It's why I chose two bits of tech I wasn't overly interested in having locked into my brain.
Still, even if my fears proved true, having someone like Samwise to help me build stuff I already got the benefits of, construct my own creations while I was focused on a tech tree, or just generally help me work, especially once we moved into better facilities, would be absolutely priceless.
I watched Samwise work for a few minutes before idly checking the time.
"Alright, Sam. I'm gonna have to leave you to work on your own for a while," I said. "I'm already running a bit late to meet with Jackie."
"Very well, sir," He said. "Please endeavor to be as safe as possible."
"Don't worry, buddy. I got a whole suit of armor stashed in Jackie's garage," I assured him. "Plus, Jackie will be with me, we've got it covered."
"Understood. See you soon."
The robot turned back to his work, preparing the off-the-shelf parts for the small drone while I started getting ready to leave. Once I had everything, including a few magazines of bullets for my rifle, I headed out, making my way down to the garage and hopping into my truck.
It was a quick drive to Jackie's garage, my friend waiting outside the large door for me. He waved and opened the garage door for me, and I backed the truck halfway into it.
"You ready?" I asked, stepping into the garage.
"Just about," Jackie said, grabbing his helmet off a counter.
He was already dressed in his armor, wearing his black and red jacket over it. He looked intimidating as fuck, which would only get better with his helmet on. As he watched, I made my way over to a stack of cargo crates, where I knew he kept my armor. While I put it on, Jackie filled me in on the details about our job.
"So 6th Street has been pushing on Valentino turf for a while," Jackie explained, sitting down on his weight bench. "It happens all the time. Usually, they just push them back, take out a little extra, then retreat. Problem is, this time, they pushed too far, and when they got pushed back, they took something with them."
"What did they take?" I asked, pausing as I pulled on the second part of my chest armor, feeling it connect around my back and tighten into place.
"Padre didn't say, I didn't ask," Jackie said with a look, though after a moment, he shrugged. "My guess is a drug shipment or maybe some hardware. Either way, when the Valentinos pushed them out, it went with them."
"So we what, we clear a 6th Street hideout, then get whatever they stole back?"
"No, they've already written off whatever it was, which is why I'm guessing drugs. They would have already split it up to sell and use," Jackie explained. "But a message needs to be sent, something deeper than just a bit of a pushback, so we are going in, clearing out the building that Padre tracked the good too."
"What's the building for?"
"Just a gathering area, nothing major," He responded. "We are looking at twelve, maybe fifteen, no more than twenty members."
"Seriously?" I asked, looking up from finishing the last piece of my armor. "That's a bit more than seven or eight scavs."
"We can handle it," He assured me, "Just gotta hit hard before they can react, cut the group down by a handful. After that, we move slow and steady."
"Sounds like a plan," I said, pulling on my helmet, letting it seal itself in place, feeling the synthetic muscles squeeze and move as they activated. "I'm ready, let's go."
Jacke nodded, and together, we climbed into the truck. Thankfully, unlike the van we took to the scav hit, the truck had more adjustable seating, letting me slide the passenger seat back and down, meaning I just fit inside while in my armor.
It was tight, but it was better than laying in the back with the guns.
The drive was blessedly short, crossing across a bridge from the Vista Del Rey subdistrict into Arroyo, otherwise known as 6th Street Gang territory. Thankfully, we didn't move very far into their territory, only passing a few blocks before Jackie pulled up on a driveway, startling a few people walking on the sidewalk.
"You ready for this?" He asked as he shut the truck down.
"Yeah, why wouldn't I be?" I asked, a bit confused.
"Well… 6th Street are assholes, but they aren't quite scav assholes," He explained with a shrug. "I was worried you wouldn't be up for it."
"Oh… well, I mean... I'm not going full murder hobo, but… Live by the sword, die by the sword, right?" I said, quoting the paraphrased gospel line. "If you're gonna be a violent ganger, you don't get to complain when that violence gets turned back around on you."
"Damn, fitting in pretty quick, Genio," Jackie said with a laugh, stepping out of the truck just as I did as well.
The sudden appearance of a rather large, fully armored man, looking everything like combat borg, got even more attention than Jackie riding up on the curb did. Suddenly people knew shit was about to go down and decided that this street was a very bad place to be.
Both of us walked around to the back of the truck, grabbing our weapons from the truck bed. I racked a round into my rifle, before reaching in and letting my sword latch onto the magnetic holster on my back. I then reached inside and pulled out Jackie's axe, handing it to him.
"Damn… I like it."
He took a moment to study the axe before clipping its holster to his belt, practicing pulling it before nodding and sliding it back on the opposite hip as his pistol. He then reached forward and grabbed his helmet, slowly pulling it over his head. He looked at me, the menacing, almost ogre-like face looking back at me, giving me a simple nod.
Together, we walked down the street, weapons ready, before finally, Jackie turned onto a pavilion, one lined with a few dozen vending machines, all lined up along the walls. There was one of those mini shops in the center, though it was empty of anything to buy. Instead, two gang members, covered in metal, both chains and cyberware, were sitting inside. Rather than say anything, Jackie simply reached into his jacket, pulled out a frag grenade, and underhanded it into the mini shop as we walked by. Both of the gangers were shocked by our appearance, and when the grenade thunked off the wall behind them and landed at their feet, it was way too late for them to do anything about it.
The grenade went off when we were a dozen feet away, blowing smoke and hundreds of fragments up and out of the structure, annihilating both of the "guards." We kept walking, both of us protected by the building, though I did feel a few small, residual fragments ping off my back. As we approached the front entrance to what was once a store, three gangers came pouring out of the front entrance, shouting and yelling. They ran face-first into us, having no idea what was going on, completely unprepared to meet us. Jackie snapped his axe out of his holster and slammed it into one of their skulls as the ganger tried to skid to a stop while I raised my rifle and pulled the trigger twice, spraying down the remaining two.
My time in the Badlands had given me a much better understanding of how my rifle worked, and it showed. The first bursts I fired went a bit wide, only the last two bullets hitting my target. Even so, each impact was devastating, with the heavy steel rounds blowing chunks out of the first man's shoulder and chest. My second burst was much more on target, with a quartet of rounds annihilating the third man, both of them dropping to the ground and sliding to a stop.
"I'll lead," I said, my voice filtered through my mask.
"Si, right behind you."
I stepped closer, kicking the door in. The flimsy, cheap frame crumpled and slammed open hard enough to knock the door off its hinges, clearing the door permanently. However, rather than stepping through, I stepped to the side, just as whoever was on the other side mag dumped through the open door. Eventually, after a moment, I heard a click, and Jackie immediately stepped into the doorframe. He fired a pretty tight grouping of bullets into the frantically reloading ganger. When Jackie stepped back, I stepped through, my rifle up and ready as I cleared the front entrance.
I confirm in the back of my head that shortening my redesign of the mag rifle had been the right choice as I turned and scanned the entrance, the rifle up on my shoulder, ready to fire. Two steps into the room, a ganger with a significant portion of his left side replaced with cyberware burst from behind cover. He was armed with a telescopic club, sparks of EMP static crackling around the end. The second he laid eyes on us, he jerked back in surprise, clearly not anticipating either of us. He dropped a second later, his baton going silent as it rolled away from his corpse.
Two more gangers came charging out of a back room, a door marked with a fading sign that read "Employees Only." We were facing the other direction, and both of them got several shots off. Bullets pinged off my armor and flattened against Jackie's, but neither of them had anything capable of penetrating our armor.
When both of them had been dispatched, we both made our way to the door they had come from. We both had time to reload before I put on a repeat performance, kicking the door off of its frame and stepping into the small storage room beyond. It was empty, but not for long, as a man dressed in modified military fatigues and chrome built into his head stepped around a door further in, holding something in each of his hands. Even as he tossed both of his grenades, I turned, my body running on instincts I didn't even know it had. I slammed into Jackie, the enhanced strength of my armor just enough to drive us both through the door frame. I was in the process of shoving him away from the opening when the grenade went off.
The explosion was deceptively small, but with nothing between me and it, I was battered by a barrage of shrapnel. Still, the explosive had gone off inside the room, so instead of being battered and broken, I was merely tossed a bit, falling down on my ass, my ears ringing.
Thankfully, I had succeeded in pushing Jackie out of the danger zone, so when three gangers came sprinting around the corner, coming to confirm or finish us off, he finished off all three of them, dumping most of his pistol mag into them.
Slowly, I stood up, quickly helped by Jackie after he confirmed the storage room was empty.
"Ey, you good choom?" He asked, his voice barely detectable under a constant whine.
"Yeah, I'm good. None of the shrapnel made it through," I confirmed. "Probably just some bruising. Ears are ringing."
"That's good, the ringing will pass," He assured me as he slapped my shoulder.
With a nod, Jackie grabbed my rifle and handed it to me, covering me while I stretched, shook off the explosion, and checked my weapon. I gave him a nod when I was ready.
We pushed back through into the storage room, which was now a heavily perforated mess. After quickly clearing the mess, we cleared the next room as well, which was set up as a break room of sorts, with a staircase going down in the far corner.
I took the lead, slowly descending down the stairs and entering a run-down, patched-up basement. As I stepped out of the stairwell, I got my a clear view of the surprisingly open room. There was a lot of stuff stored there, crates and boxes all stacked up along the walls, with a table in the center of the decently sized room, with what looked like the remnants of a poker game going on. There were also three gangers waiting for us, in cover behind some of the crates. I stepped forward, looking to take cover as well before they could open fire, only for one big mother fucker to come out from behind a stack of boxes and slam into me. Just from a glance, I could see he was seriously chromed out, with all four limbs replaced by exposed cyberware. The impact drove me back and knocked my rifle from my hand, the shock of his charge and yell stunning me just long enough for him to disarm me.
Jackie, who was just behind me, stepped out of the stairwell, trying to line up a shot on the chromed-up ganger, only for a barrage of bullets to force him back into the stairs.
The brute continued to try and grapple me, his robotic limbs, and whatever other enhancements he had, actually giving him a significant edge. My warden armor only improved my strength and speed to around, maybe even slightly past peak human. It did not contend very well with someone kitted out to the nines in steal and servos, especially someone with actual experience fighting hand-to-hand.
Knowing this, I didn't fight him for dominance, only to stay standing, focusing instead on reaching down to holster, grabbing my knife and pulling it from its sheath. I slammed it down into his back, just below his neck, punching through what I was pretty sure was some sort of subdermal armor. I stabbed him several more times before finally hitting his spine, or the cyberware equivalent, the man going limp instantly, falling to the ground. I left my knife in him, focusing on the other three gangers still standing, their attention now split between Jackie and myself.
Rather than scramble on the ground for my rifle, I grabbed my pistol, pulling it out and holding it one-handed, firing as I moved, trying to flank around the three remaining goons. One of the three noticed what I was doing and tried to pull his shots to follow me, but his Copperhead clicked, his magazine empty. As he screamed out a curse, desperately fumbling with a new mag, I put him down before focusing on the next ganger.
Together, Jackie and I made quick work of the remaining two 6th Street gangers. When the gunfire finally stopped, we both took a moment to breathe. I retrieved my fusion knife, wiping the synthetic blood off of it and sliding it back into my holster before reloading my pistol and sliding it away as well.
"Let's clear the upstairs again," Jackie said. "Then you stand guard while I fill some duffel bags up."
"Sounds like a plan," I said with a nod. "So… how did you like your ax?"
"Worked well, thought for sure it would get stuck in that guy's skull," Jackie answered. "Not bad."
"What can I say? I do good work," I responded, following after Jackie while he shook his head.
"Don't get cocky Genio," He said, though I could hear his smile. "Just keep watch, I'll fill a few bags, and we'll get out of here quick."
- Location
- England
- Location
- Israel
He could build a drone that is basically a 1\100th scale spaceship and super jank jumprive without a ship for it. It doesn't need to be effective, pnly functional. So a jumpdrive that will burn out half of its components and detonate halfway through a trip to the moon should be valid enough to give him the basic 'proper' recipe.
- Location
- Canada
I dunno about 50 years. Seems a waste to set something as a fanfic in a particular setting if you're going to go out of your way to just not engage with that setting.
Tisaku
Head Chief Thinkomancer
One Ring
Panam
thirty
aimed at directly
goods
-cast iron might be fun to use as ammo. Very hard, but quite brittle.-
-bullpup would give you a reduction of about 1/3 length over the full rifle with no loss of accuracy or power.-
Arimai
Curmudgeon
Surveillance drone
Advantage.
Good chapter. I hope he gets out soon that neighbor girl is an incredibly obvious honeypot operation.
- Location
- U.S.
"Father when will you give me The Talk?"
Chapter Fourteen
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While Jackie went over the gang base with a fine-tooth comb, looking for anything worth taking and stuffing it into our bags, I stood watch. I picked a spot at the entrance to the open pavilion, my back to the heavily perforated mini-shop that sat in the middle. I kept my eyes on the road, watching for anyone suspicious driving past, my helmet blocking the glare from headlights as I stared. Thankfully, the few normal civilians around at this time of night knew better than to approach, but I had no doubt word of a new Borg hanging out, taking down a 6th Street gang spot, would get around.
Like I needed any more attention.
After about five minutes, Jackie walked out and dropped two bags off by my feet before walking back inside and grabbing two more. I quickly clipped my rifle to my back, grabbed both bags with one hand, and drew my pistol. When Jackie returned with his loot, we made a beeline for the truck, quickly stuffing our bags into the back before hopping in and peeling out.
We traveled at a pretty quick speed through the city, only slowing down to a more reasonable pace once we were back in Valentino territory. Rather than heading straight home, Jackie punched in a location nearby before letting the truck drive itself. He was about to call Padre when I spoke up.
"Tell him I have a few more inventions he might be interested in."
"What? Already?" He asked, the shock clear in his voice. "What are they?"
"A small, quiet, multipurpose drone that doesn't use fuel and has decent range, as well as some scanning equipment that can monitor a large building for intruders," I explained.
"Damn, choom. That's quick… I'm not sure he will be ready to buy something new so quickly," Jackie admitted with a frown. "He spent a good chunk of Eddies on you already."
"Should we look for a new buyer, then?"
"No, definitely not," he said, shaking his head and waving his hand. "We try Padre first, and if he doesn't want it, we can ask him to find someone who does. We are already in his good graces. Cutting him out of a deal now would only ruin that."
"Even if we make less money because he needs a cut too?"
"Padre won't screw us," Jackie assured me. "The last low price was the cost of protection and keeping things dark. This time, he will be more fair."
I nodded in agreement, hoping for Jackie's sake he was right. If Padre expected me to sell all of my stuff as cheaply as I had my first batch, he was in for a surprise.
Seeing that I was satisfied, Jackie contacted Padre and explained that the job was done. He also informed him that I was already ready to show him a few more things, the fixer agreeing to meet us tomorrow night, which, since it was almost two in the morning at that point, meant in two days. While Jackie was talking about setting up a meeting, my keyfob vibrated in one of my belt pouches. A quick look showed just over six thousand eddies deposited in my account.
While he talked to the fixer, the truck continued to drive, making its way through Valentino territory. Just a few minutes after Jackie was done on the phone and had taken control of the truck back from the Auto-driver, we pulled into a back alley. We stepped out of our vehicle and were immediately greeted by a pair of obvious Valentino members. They looked aggressive, eyeing me up and keeping their hands near their weapons, right up until they spotted Jackie. When they did, they immediately started talking in Spanish with friendly smiles on their faces. After a short negotiation, Jackie handed the four bags off, only after grabbing a smaller bag from inside one of them. Apparently, he found a few rolls of cash during his quick sweep of the building.
The gang members took about ten minutes going over whatever it was that Jackie had stuffed into the bags before coming back and paying Jackie. They talked for a few more minutes before the gangers returned to their posts, and we returned to the truck. Jackie pulled out of the alley and turned to head back to the garage.
"How did it go?"
"Good, another three grand for both of us," He explained, his eyes glowing for a moment while he transferred my share to my account. "When we get back, take three rolls from the bag too. That's another five hundred."
I nodded, leaning back in the seat as best as I could in my armor. Almost an hour later, I was finally stepping back into my apartment. I was tired, sore, and ready for bed. As the door sealed behind me, Samwise stepped out of the workshop.
"Welcome back, Sir. How was your 'job'," He asked, taking my rifle from me and, after deftly checking it was unloaded and off, stored it in the workshop.
"About as well as you could hope," I said, taking off my jacket and hanging it up before walking further into the apartment. "How did your night go?"
"I am currently seventy-three percent done with my first project," He explained, once again exiting the work area. "I find adapting to your tool options to be… interesting. I will likely finish both projects by tomorrow morning."
"Good, then we can finally put the idea of me getting credit for you finishing something to rest," I said, stretching with a yawn. "Though it's already looking pretty much busted since I haven't gotten any new information from you assembling it."
"Indeed. Unfortunate, but you suspected it would work this way."
I grunted in acknowledgment before dropping down to the edge of my bed and kicking off my shoes. Spot left his charging point and snagged them with his grabbers, flying them over to their proper location by the door before I could even ask.
"Sorry, Sam. I would love to stay up longer to chat, but I really can't," I said, pulling off my shirt. "It's late, and I still need to sleep off the nearly all-nighter I pulled programming for you."
"Understandable, Sir. I will continue working," He confirmed with a small nod. "Have a good night's rest."
"Thanks, buddy. Wake me up if you need me."
I quickly crawled into bed while Samwise made his way back to the workshop. Thankfully, with the door sealed, the sound of the fabricators and 3D printers would be heavily muffled. I watched as Spot flew around, snagged my clothes, and carried them to the clothes bin before sliding himself back into his charge station. I was out before he had even fully powered down.
The next morning, I woke up to find Samwise charging in the drone workstation. I was halfway through my poor excuse for breakfast when he booted back up and stepped away from the work area.
"Good morning, Samwise," I greeted. "How did everything go last night after I got home?"
"I completed the devices, save the final steps for each one," he responded. "Will we be completing the experiment now?"
"May as well."
We stepped into the workshop, and I watched as Samwise got to work. He had completed most of the drone, with only its power source, a few screws, and a single panel left to attach. He completed the work deftly, putting the final pieces together in several minutes. Normally, that would be when I got the final burst of information. Unfortunately, but not unsurprisingly, there was nothing. I still had the basic information that I got while creating the CAD files, but no new information presented itself.
"Oh well, check that off the list," I said with a frown.
Thankfully, I really didn't care about understanding this particular drone, and there wasn't exactly some great secret I was missing. I had the designs and a working model, which was plenty to sell to Padre. If, when the tech tree switched over, I lost all that knowledge completely, I didn't really care.
With the drone done, it was time to test the second potential cheat, having someone build most of the machine, stop, and then finish it myself. I was about as confident with this portion of the experiment as I was with the previous, but it still needed to be done. Unfortunately, we had to wait about an hour for the final pieces I needed to get delivered. Samwise then needed to modify a few of them before I could finally put it all together.
We spent about thirty minutes putting the final touches on the early version of the minion detector, fitting the parts together, and sliding everything into the custom case. In all honesty, I was pretty impressed by Sam's work. There was a fair bit of modifications that had to be done to the sensors we purchased, the ones that functioned as the backbone of the device. Despite being a bit nervous about how my new assistant would handle them, they were as near perfect as I should have expected from an AI.
When I finally put in the last screw, I quickly hooked up the unit to my computer before booting it up. Unsurprisingly, the sensor was useless in an apartment complex as massive as a Megabuilding, but that didn't matter since I didn't even let it finish the scanning process, as just turning it on was enough.
"Alright, so. I got something for finishing it, but not much," I explained, chewing my cheek as I tried to put it into words. "It sort of cemented the design in my head a bit, and I understand just a bit more about it. I might be able to build it again from scratch, with the designs, but… It's hard to tell. I definitely didn't get the same burst of knowledge that I usually get, showing what's around it and lighting up the tech tree."
"That is more than you predicted."
"Yeah, but way less than I'd hoped," I responded before shrugging. "Still, depending on what I keep after the switch happens, it might be useful. Maybe for simple tech that functions on ideas I already know. I'll get the designs, a bit more of the knowledge, but nothing else."
"Something to keep in mind for the future, sir," Samwise suggested, and I nodded in agreement.
With the experiment over, it was time for us to get to proper work. I had a long list of things that I wanted to build from the Titanfall universe, and I did not have a whole lot of time to do it. Some of them were more important than others, while some things were absolutely crucial if I wanted to fully move into Rocky Ridge during my next break week.
First on the list was the ability to make custom parts, which in and of itself was a multi-stage process. Next up was the ability to turn scrap and trash into raw materials.
My first step was custom parts production, though it wouldn't really be useful until I finished step two as well. In the Titanfall universe, when it came to big productions or mass productions, their tech was basically just more advanced versions of what the Cyberpunk universe used, usually from the heavy implementation of AI-controlled systems. Fabrication arms, vacuum welding, and several other more advanced construction methods worked together in large, automated factories to turn raw materials into products.
However, when it came to small-batch, small-scale production, they had fully embraced the 3D printing trend and ran with it. Rather than using a subtractive method for making small-scale things, IE starting with a block of steel and carving it down into the part you need, the Titanfall universe used additive methods, most often by literally printing things.
Originally, like in my world, this was done mostly with plastics. Several high-tech polymers, better than what the Cyberpunk universe had access to, ended up replacing metal for a lot of stuff. Of course, 3D printing with metal is something that exists in my home world, in Cyberpunk, and in Titanfall, but it had a lot of issues and wasn't always capable of what you needed. Then, someone at IMC figured out how to print down quickly and accurately at nearly the molecular level, with basically any material, with no loss in strength.
Unsurprisingly, it replaced a huge portion of 3D printers almost overnight. No seams, no defects unless your machine was faulty, and quality systems, the ability to print with multiple materials at once. These new printers were incredible and could easily print just about anything. Some higher-end machines could print out equipment wholesale, rather than go part by part.
Unfortunately, there were, of course, some pretty heavy restrictions that made the method impractical for mass production.
For one thing, it was incredibly energy-intensive. Running one or two of the molecular printer machines, colloquially known as molly-makers, took an incredible amount of power, but running enough to be considered a mass production facility would be astronomical. Further, while the technique was fast, that was only when compared to other 3D printing methods. In most circumstances, it was easier to mass produce individual parts the normal way before putting everything together, rather than printing out each piece or even multiple pieces at once.
It also required that the material being printed, whether it was metal, plastic, or something else, was suspended in a very specific solution. Unfortunately, that mixture was extremely sensitive and would become inert from exposure to sunlight, high or low temperatures, or rapid shifts in pressure. It even had a shelf life that, once passed, required a remanufacturing process to reactivate.
Thankfully, I had power generation covered. Elerium was basically free energy, and at this point, I knew it backward and forward. I could make enough Elerium to power a decent-sized molly-maker in a couple of days, and I already had enough on hand to power a smaller one.
That just left the suspension solution. In early models, this required two separate machines. The first was to process, filter, and reactivate the used inert solution, and the second was to reinfuse raw materials into the activated solution. Later, machines were capable of doing this all in one standard device, but those were too advanced for me for now. Thankfully, the process of making the solution was a relatively simple chemical process, one I could handle on a small scale for now.
There was one silver lining to all of this. The technique, or at least the basic version of the technique, scaled extremely well, meaning that once I had the process of making even a small version, I would be able to pretty easily puzzle out how to make a larger one. That is, if making the small one didn't immediately fill in the blanks. If I wanted the more flexible, efficient, and faster version, I would have to build whatever this first model unlocked and then upscale from that.
Of course, that was all just half of the story. I wanted to be self-sufficient, and that meant having my own source of materials. Thankfully, Titanfall had a solution to that as well, in the form of mass recyclers. These devices could take mass amounts of trash and scrap, shred it to pieces, and use nearly a dozen different separation methods to pull out a variety of useful metals. It also separated useless waste and plastics, producing plastic cubes made up of whatever plastics you fed into it. These plastics could be useful for some things, but the inconsistencies in their makeup made them pretty much useless when you needed consistency and precision.
The plan, for now, was to make the first versions of all four of these devices before the first week was out. Then, using the money that I would hopefully get from Padre, I could buy a chunk of the land at Rocky Ridge. Once I owned that, I could build larger, improved versions of the molly-maker, its required support, and the mass recycler there. Then, when my new production foundation was secure, I could put it to work for the remaining time I had the Titanfall tech tree.
Between having no lag time for parts delivery, no longer needing to modify parts to work, and having everything on hand at once, I would be able to get through everything I needed and at least some of what I wanted.
I was hoping to be building the larger, improved machines by the start of my second week so I could at least have four or five days to make as many bits and pieces from the Titanfall universe as I could. I was not letting this tech tree pass without at least getting the jump jets and particle shields. It was a tall order, but as long as Padre paid out properly for my new ideas, I could brute force it with money.
As you can imagine, with such a tight deadline, I immediately got to work, powering through the first step of the process, CAD designs. The second I finished one of the designs, I began working on the second, while Samwise monitored the 3D printers and fabricators, keeping them fed and printing while I continued to put the designs in my head into the computer. When I was done for the night, he continued to produce parts so we could assemble everything.
This continued for the next day and into the late afternoon. By then, we had assembled both the molly-maker itself as well as the material suspension device. They were small models, both of them the size of mini-fridges, and when they were done, they provided a burst of insight into how they really worked and how some of the direct improvements made in later models worked. I could feel that when I was ready to build the larger models, I would have access to the higher-end version, ones that came out much later in the Titanfall timeline.
While part of me would have loved to dive into the next step in my plan, Jackie and I had an appointment with a fixer. I spent half an hour making myself decent before leaving to pick up Jackie. This time, Padre picked the place, meaning we were driving deep into the heart of Valentino territory to a small lowered pavilion between two large apartment buildings.
The space was relatively clean and well-lit, with vending machines along one far wall and a few benches and tables around. We passed a row of food stalls selling noodles and other random foods before stepping out into the mostly empty space. Padre was sitting on one of the concrete benches, reading his weathered bible, his large bodyguard standing beside him.
Jackson, Jackie, good to see you both again," He said, motioning us to sit on a bench that ran perpendicular to his own. "Have a seat."
After making ourselves comfortable, the fixer once again patiently sat there, under no rush to start the conversation. Part of me wondered if he was doing something with his neural link, pretending to be a wise man of few words by playing the Cyberpunk equivalent of Clash of Clans in his head. Finally, after what seemed like a full minute and a half, he spoke.
"So, Jackson. Jackie told me you have more to sell?"
"I do," I answered, beginning to lift the small box I had fit the drone inside of, stopping when he held up my hand.
"While your creations are worth money, buying so many of them so quickly would spread me thin," He explained. "If I purchase these as well, it will take months before I am prepared to buy more."
"I understand that, Sir."
"Good. In the future, I may have other buyers interested in your creations, but for now, these will be the last I purchase. Assuming I am interested."
Sensing the unspoken permission, I lifted the small case, revealing my drone.
"This is a flying drone. It is relatively quiet, tough, easy to make, cheap to repair, has a decent camera, and has a built-in payload release mechanism. Normally, its max payload is just under a pound, but at the cost of stealth, heavy battery drain, and a lot of wear on its parts, it can lift a pound and a half for short periods," I explained before handing him the drone. "Unlike most modern drones these days, it doesn't burn fuel or use thrusters. That means anyone with access to electricity can charge and use it."
I answered a few questions about "my" invention as he connected its controls with his neural-link. As he guided the drone up off the ground and high into the air, he nodded.
"A useful tool," He agreed, the drone scanning over some of the vending machines. "If a bit disorienting to use."
When the drone was safely back in the box, Jackie handed over some footage of me using and showing off the minions tracker. When he realized what he was watching, Padre leaned forward in interest.
"With one of these set up inside a building, one man can watch the entire place by himself," I assured him. "You can secure an entire building with just one of these. No cameras, no patrols, and no sensors. Larger buildings or buildings with more than three stories will require more than one system, but they are designed to work together seamlessly."
"How does it work?"
"It uses a whole host of different sensors to scan a building, then lock on to movement," I explained. "It's only limitation is that it can't pick up people running faster than thirty miles per hour, but at that pace, the likelihood of someone being stealthy…"
Padre had several more questions about how the minion detector worked. When he was finally satisfied, he leaned back on the bench.
"Do you have a price in mind?" he asked, laser-focused on me.
"I do. One hundred thousand for both, plus fifteen percent of your profits."
For a moment, the older man looked at me before finally chuckling and nodding.
"Seems like my doubts were unfounded. I am glad you understand the game to some extent, or you would have made a poor friend for Jackie," He said before responding to my offer. "Fifty thousand and ten percent."
"Eighty and fifteen."
"Seventy and twelve."
Now it was my turn to pause and consider, my eyes watching the older man as he confidently waited for my response. Seventy thousand Eddies was already more than I got for my three other inventions, and the added twelve percent would hopefully help keep me flush for a while, depending on just how many of these things he sold.
"And you'll continue to look after me and Jackie?" I said, ignoring my friend's shifting. "Keep an ear to the ground, that sort of thing?"
"I'll even continue to obfuscate all of your online shopping deliveries," Padre assured me, shaking his head at my shocked expression. "Do you really think someone wouldn't catch on to so many materials being delivered to one location? I've been keeping your name out of records since we made our first deal."
"That… Thank you," I said, letting out a long breath. "It was a concern, but hopefully for not much longer."
"Your first three inventions will more than makeup for any bribes I make," he assured me, brushing off my first words. "What do you mean it will not be a problem?"
"I… plan on purchasing a chunk of land from Rocky Ridge, the abandoned town," I explained. "With any luck, I'll be moving out there within the next two weeks. Something that I would prefer to stay between us for now."
"Ah, interesting. And would you be needing help with that?"
"I… Depending on the cost, maybe." I said. "And I don't just mean money. But I will know more once I start the process."
"I understand. While many here consider gang contacts to be an important resource, to the man trying to stay neutral and out of sight, they are a burden," He said with a nod. "Keep the offer in mind, but I will not hold my breath. In any case, do we have a deal?"
"We do," I agreed with a nod, reaching out and shaking the man's hand.
"If you have more to sell, contact me with some details, and I may be able to find someone interested," He said, still holding my hand. "I will facilitate the trade, with a minor cut of the profits, of course."
"Of course," I said, internally rolling my eyes.
With our business concluded, Padre transferred thirty-five thousand credits to my account before Jackie and I made our way back to the truck. When we climbed in, I transferred ten thousand eddies to Jackie.
"Woah, choom, that's a lot of Eddies!" he said, his eyes wide, showing off their glow. "I hardly did anything this time!"
"It's your contacts, Jackie. I wouldn't be on nearly as friendly terms with Padre without you," I pointed out. "Besides, we are a team. When I succeed, so do you."
He looked at me for a long moment before giving me a slight nod. I could tell my statement meant a lot to the larger man, but I focused on the road.
"Speaking of being a team, why didn't you mention moving out of the city?" he asked, his face falling a bit.
"I'll be five minutes away, tops," I pointed out, shaking my head. "I need a lot more room to grow, and out there, I won't have anyone breathing down my neck when I start improving my security and building larger stuff. It is cheap, isolated by the desert, and the Wraiths are really the only major threat I will have to deal with."
"Still sounds risky," He commented. "Wraiths are no pushovers."
"I know," I admitted, chewing my lip. "The first week or so is going to be intense. Once I have some time to build up some security, I will feel much better, but until then, it's going to be tight. I will probably spend some time bouncing back and forth, sleeping at the apartment and working there. That way, I will at least avoid being ambushed at night."
"We could hire some people to act as security, at least until you're set," He pointed out. "I'll obviously be there, but with a few solos around, we could keep the place safe to work in."
"That's… a pretty good idea," I admitted with a nod. "Padre probably knows some people willing to work for a discount on some proper body armor or maybe some other tech."
"He would probably pay them and hold the discounts for himself if you offered that," Jackie countered. "Your armor is good choom. He likes how easy it is to wear."
"Yeah… Hey, I'm thinking of getting some bone and muscle lace or maybe a skin weave, depending on what Vik can get his hands on," I said, changing the topic.
"Good idea. You need some chrome to toughen you up," Jackie said, reaching over and slapping me on the shoulder. "I've got all three, and I don't regret any of them."
We spent the rest of the drive discussing which I should get first, eventually arriving back at the megabuilding. After a quick goodbye, Jackie hopped onto his bike and drove off, leaving me to head back to my apartment and get back to work. There was a lot to get done, and every day counted.
If you are interested in those benefits or just want to support my attempt to become a full-time writer, stop by and show your support. Every dollar helps!
While Jackie went over the gang base with a fine-tooth comb, looking for anything worth taking and stuffing it into our bags, I stood watch. I picked a spot at the entrance to the open pavilion, my back to the heavily perforated mini-shop that sat in the middle. I kept my eyes on the road, watching for anyone suspicious driving past, my helmet blocking the glare from headlights as I stared. Thankfully, the few normal civilians around at this time of night knew better than to approach, but I had no doubt word of a new Borg hanging out, taking down a 6th Street gang spot, would get around.
Like I needed any more attention.
After about five minutes, Jackie walked out and dropped two bags off by my feet before walking back inside and grabbing two more. I quickly clipped my rifle to my back, grabbed both bags with one hand, and drew my pistol. When Jackie returned with his loot, we made a beeline for the truck, quickly stuffing our bags into the back before hopping in and peeling out.
We traveled at a pretty quick speed through the city, only slowing down to a more reasonable pace once we were back in Valentino territory. Rather than heading straight home, Jackie punched in a location nearby before letting the truck drive itself. He was about to call Padre when I spoke up.
"Tell him I have a few more inventions he might be interested in."
"What? Already?" He asked, the shock clear in his voice. "What are they?"
"A small, quiet, multipurpose drone that doesn't use fuel and has decent range, as well as some scanning equipment that can monitor a large building for intruders," I explained.
"Damn, choom. That's quick… I'm not sure he will be ready to buy something new so quickly," Jackie admitted with a frown. "He spent a good chunk of Eddies on you already."
"Should we look for a new buyer, then?"
"No, definitely not," he said, shaking his head and waving his hand. "We try Padre first, and if he doesn't want it, we can ask him to find someone who does. We are already in his good graces. Cutting him out of a deal now would only ruin that."
"Even if we make less money because he needs a cut too?"
"Padre won't screw us," Jackie assured me. "The last low price was the cost of protection and keeping things dark. This time, he will be more fair."
I nodded in agreement, hoping for Jackie's sake he was right. If Padre expected me to sell all of my stuff as cheaply as I had my first batch, he was in for a surprise.
Seeing that I was satisfied, Jackie contacted Padre and explained that the job was done. He also informed him that I was already ready to show him a few more things, the fixer agreeing to meet us tomorrow night, which, since it was almost two in the morning at that point, meant in two days. While Jackie was talking about setting up a meeting, my keyfob vibrated in one of my belt pouches. A quick look showed just over six thousand eddies deposited in my account.
While he talked to the fixer, the truck continued to drive, making its way through Valentino territory. Just a few minutes after Jackie was done on the phone and had taken control of the truck back from the Auto-driver, we pulled into a back alley. We stepped out of our vehicle and were immediately greeted by a pair of obvious Valentino members. They looked aggressive, eyeing me up and keeping their hands near their weapons, right up until they spotted Jackie. When they did, they immediately started talking in Spanish with friendly smiles on their faces. After a short negotiation, Jackie handed the four bags off, only after grabbing a smaller bag from inside one of them. Apparently, he found a few rolls of cash during his quick sweep of the building.
The gang members took about ten minutes going over whatever it was that Jackie had stuffed into the bags before coming back and paying Jackie. They talked for a few more minutes before the gangers returned to their posts, and we returned to the truck. Jackie pulled out of the alley and turned to head back to the garage.
"How did it go?"
"Good, another three grand for both of us," He explained, his eyes glowing for a moment while he transferred my share to my account. "When we get back, take three rolls from the bag too. That's another five hundred."
I nodded, leaning back in the seat as best as I could in my armor. Almost an hour later, I was finally stepping back into my apartment. I was tired, sore, and ready for bed. As the door sealed behind me, Samwise stepped out of the workshop.
"Welcome back, Sir. How was your 'job'," He asked, taking my rifle from me and, after deftly checking it was unloaded and off, stored it in the workshop.
"About as well as you could hope," I said, taking off my jacket and hanging it up before walking further into the apartment. "How did your night go?"
"I am currently seventy-three percent done with my first project," He explained, once again exiting the work area. "I find adapting to your tool options to be… interesting. I will likely finish both projects by tomorrow morning."
"Good, then we can finally put the idea of me getting credit for you finishing something to rest," I said, stretching with a yawn. "Though it's already looking pretty much busted since I haven't gotten any new information from you assembling it."
"Indeed. Unfortunate, but you suspected it would work this way."
I grunted in acknowledgment before dropping down to the edge of my bed and kicking off my shoes. Spot left his charging point and snagged them with his grabbers, flying them over to their proper location by the door before I could even ask.
"Sorry, Sam. I would love to stay up longer to chat, but I really can't," I said, pulling off my shirt. "It's late, and I still need to sleep off the nearly all-nighter I pulled programming for you."
"Understandable, Sir. I will continue working," He confirmed with a small nod. "Have a good night's rest."
"Thanks, buddy. Wake me up if you need me."
I quickly crawled into bed while Samwise made his way back to the workshop. Thankfully, with the door sealed, the sound of the fabricators and 3D printers would be heavily muffled. I watched as Spot flew around, snagged my clothes, and carried them to the clothes bin before sliding himself back into his charge station. I was out before he had even fully powered down.
The next morning, I woke up to find Samwise charging in the drone workstation. I was halfway through my poor excuse for breakfast when he booted back up and stepped away from the work area.
"Good morning, Samwise," I greeted. "How did everything go last night after I got home?"
"I completed the devices, save the final steps for each one," he responded. "Will we be completing the experiment now?"
"May as well."
We stepped into the workshop, and I watched as Samwise got to work. He had completed most of the drone, with only its power source, a few screws, and a single panel left to attach. He completed the work deftly, putting the final pieces together in several minutes. Normally, that would be when I got the final burst of information. Unfortunately, but not unsurprisingly, there was nothing. I still had the basic information that I got while creating the CAD files, but no new information presented itself.
"Oh well, check that off the list," I said with a frown.
Thankfully, I really didn't care about understanding this particular drone, and there wasn't exactly some great secret I was missing. I had the designs and a working model, which was plenty to sell to Padre. If, when the tech tree switched over, I lost all that knowledge completely, I didn't really care.
With the drone done, it was time to test the second potential cheat, having someone build most of the machine, stop, and then finish it myself. I was about as confident with this portion of the experiment as I was with the previous, but it still needed to be done. Unfortunately, we had to wait about an hour for the final pieces I needed to get delivered. Samwise then needed to modify a few of them before I could finally put it all together.
We spent about thirty minutes putting the final touches on the early version of the minion detector, fitting the parts together, and sliding everything into the custom case. In all honesty, I was pretty impressed by Sam's work. There was a fair bit of modifications that had to be done to the sensors we purchased, the ones that functioned as the backbone of the device. Despite being a bit nervous about how my new assistant would handle them, they were as near perfect as I should have expected from an AI.
When I finally put in the last screw, I quickly hooked up the unit to my computer before booting it up. Unsurprisingly, the sensor was useless in an apartment complex as massive as a Megabuilding, but that didn't matter since I didn't even let it finish the scanning process, as just turning it on was enough.
"Alright, so. I got something for finishing it, but not much," I explained, chewing my cheek as I tried to put it into words. "It sort of cemented the design in my head a bit, and I understand just a bit more about it. I might be able to build it again from scratch, with the designs, but… It's hard to tell. I definitely didn't get the same burst of knowledge that I usually get, showing what's around it and lighting up the tech tree."
"That is more than you predicted."
"Yeah, but way less than I'd hoped," I responded before shrugging. "Still, depending on what I keep after the switch happens, it might be useful. Maybe for simple tech that functions on ideas I already know. I'll get the designs, a bit more of the knowledge, but nothing else."
"Something to keep in mind for the future, sir," Samwise suggested, and I nodded in agreement.
With the experiment over, it was time for us to get to proper work. I had a long list of things that I wanted to build from the Titanfall universe, and I did not have a whole lot of time to do it. Some of them were more important than others, while some things were absolutely crucial if I wanted to fully move into Rocky Ridge during my next break week.
First on the list was the ability to make custom parts, which in and of itself was a multi-stage process. Next up was the ability to turn scrap and trash into raw materials.
My first step was custom parts production, though it wouldn't really be useful until I finished step two as well. In the Titanfall universe, when it came to big productions or mass productions, their tech was basically just more advanced versions of what the Cyberpunk universe used, usually from the heavy implementation of AI-controlled systems. Fabrication arms, vacuum welding, and several other more advanced construction methods worked together in large, automated factories to turn raw materials into products.
However, when it came to small-batch, small-scale production, they had fully embraced the 3D printing trend and ran with it. Rather than using a subtractive method for making small-scale things, IE starting with a block of steel and carving it down into the part you need, the Titanfall universe used additive methods, most often by literally printing things.
Originally, like in my world, this was done mostly with plastics. Several high-tech polymers, better than what the Cyberpunk universe had access to, ended up replacing metal for a lot of stuff. Of course, 3D printing with metal is something that exists in my home world, in Cyberpunk, and in Titanfall, but it had a lot of issues and wasn't always capable of what you needed. Then, someone at IMC figured out how to print down quickly and accurately at nearly the molecular level, with basically any material, with no loss in strength.
Unsurprisingly, it replaced a huge portion of 3D printers almost overnight. No seams, no defects unless your machine was faulty, and quality systems, the ability to print with multiple materials at once. These new printers were incredible and could easily print just about anything. Some higher-end machines could print out equipment wholesale, rather than go part by part.
Unfortunately, there were, of course, some pretty heavy restrictions that made the method impractical for mass production.
For one thing, it was incredibly energy-intensive. Running one or two of the molecular printer machines, colloquially known as molly-makers, took an incredible amount of power, but running enough to be considered a mass production facility would be astronomical. Further, while the technique was fast, that was only when compared to other 3D printing methods. In most circumstances, it was easier to mass produce individual parts the normal way before putting everything together, rather than printing out each piece or even multiple pieces at once.
It also required that the material being printed, whether it was metal, plastic, or something else, was suspended in a very specific solution. Unfortunately, that mixture was extremely sensitive and would become inert from exposure to sunlight, high or low temperatures, or rapid shifts in pressure. It even had a shelf life that, once passed, required a remanufacturing process to reactivate.
Thankfully, I had power generation covered. Elerium was basically free energy, and at this point, I knew it backward and forward. I could make enough Elerium to power a decent-sized molly-maker in a couple of days, and I already had enough on hand to power a smaller one.
That just left the suspension solution. In early models, this required two separate machines. The first was to process, filter, and reactivate the used inert solution, and the second was to reinfuse raw materials into the activated solution. Later, machines were capable of doing this all in one standard device, but those were too advanced for me for now. Thankfully, the process of making the solution was a relatively simple chemical process, one I could handle on a small scale for now.
There was one silver lining to all of this. The technique, or at least the basic version of the technique, scaled extremely well, meaning that once I had the process of making even a small version, I would be able to pretty easily puzzle out how to make a larger one. That is, if making the small one didn't immediately fill in the blanks. If I wanted the more flexible, efficient, and faster version, I would have to build whatever this first model unlocked and then upscale from that.
Of course, that was all just half of the story. I wanted to be self-sufficient, and that meant having my own source of materials. Thankfully, Titanfall had a solution to that as well, in the form of mass recyclers. These devices could take mass amounts of trash and scrap, shred it to pieces, and use nearly a dozen different separation methods to pull out a variety of useful metals. It also separated useless waste and plastics, producing plastic cubes made up of whatever plastics you fed into it. These plastics could be useful for some things, but the inconsistencies in their makeup made them pretty much useless when you needed consistency and precision.
The plan, for now, was to make the first versions of all four of these devices before the first week was out. Then, using the money that I would hopefully get from Padre, I could buy a chunk of the land at Rocky Ridge. Once I owned that, I could build larger, improved versions of the molly-maker, its required support, and the mass recycler there. Then, when my new production foundation was secure, I could put it to work for the remaining time I had the Titanfall tech tree.
Between having no lag time for parts delivery, no longer needing to modify parts to work, and having everything on hand at once, I would be able to get through everything I needed and at least some of what I wanted.
I was hoping to be building the larger, improved machines by the start of my second week so I could at least have four or five days to make as many bits and pieces from the Titanfall universe as I could. I was not letting this tech tree pass without at least getting the jump jets and particle shields. It was a tall order, but as long as Padre paid out properly for my new ideas, I could brute force it with money.
As you can imagine, with such a tight deadline, I immediately got to work, powering through the first step of the process, CAD designs. The second I finished one of the designs, I began working on the second, while Samwise monitored the 3D printers and fabricators, keeping them fed and printing while I continued to put the designs in my head into the computer. When I was done for the night, he continued to produce parts so we could assemble everything.
This continued for the next day and into the late afternoon. By then, we had assembled both the molly-maker itself as well as the material suspension device. They were small models, both of them the size of mini-fridges, and when they were done, they provided a burst of insight into how they really worked and how some of the direct improvements made in later models worked. I could feel that when I was ready to build the larger models, I would have access to the higher-end version, ones that came out much later in the Titanfall timeline.
While part of me would have loved to dive into the next step in my plan, Jackie and I had an appointment with a fixer. I spent half an hour making myself decent before leaving to pick up Jackie. This time, Padre picked the place, meaning we were driving deep into the heart of Valentino territory to a small lowered pavilion between two large apartment buildings.
The space was relatively clean and well-lit, with vending machines along one far wall and a few benches and tables around. We passed a row of food stalls selling noodles and other random foods before stepping out into the mostly empty space. Padre was sitting on one of the concrete benches, reading his weathered bible, his large bodyguard standing beside him.
Jackson, Jackie, good to see you both again," He said, motioning us to sit on a bench that ran perpendicular to his own. "Have a seat."
After making ourselves comfortable, the fixer once again patiently sat there, under no rush to start the conversation. Part of me wondered if he was doing something with his neural link, pretending to be a wise man of few words by playing the Cyberpunk equivalent of Clash of Clans in his head. Finally, after what seemed like a full minute and a half, he spoke.
"So, Jackson. Jackie told me you have more to sell?"
"I do," I answered, beginning to lift the small box I had fit the drone inside of, stopping when he held up my hand.
"While your creations are worth money, buying so many of them so quickly would spread me thin," He explained. "If I purchase these as well, it will take months before I am prepared to buy more."
"I understand that, Sir."
"Good. In the future, I may have other buyers interested in your creations, but for now, these will be the last I purchase. Assuming I am interested."
Sensing the unspoken permission, I lifted the small case, revealing my drone.
"This is a flying drone. It is relatively quiet, tough, easy to make, cheap to repair, has a decent camera, and has a built-in payload release mechanism. Normally, its max payload is just under a pound, but at the cost of stealth, heavy battery drain, and a lot of wear on its parts, it can lift a pound and a half for short periods," I explained before handing him the drone. "Unlike most modern drones these days, it doesn't burn fuel or use thrusters. That means anyone with access to electricity can charge and use it."
I answered a few questions about "my" invention as he connected its controls with his neural-link. As he guided the drone up off the ground and high into the air, he nodded.
"A useful tool," He agreed, the drone scanning over some of the vending machines. "If a bit disorienting to use."
When the drone was safely back in the box, Jackie handed over some footage of me using and showing off the minions tracker. When he realized what he was watching, Padre leaned forward in interest.
"With one of these set up inside a building, one man can watch the entire place by himself," I assured him. "You can secure an entire building with just one of these. No cameras, no patrols, and no sensors. Larger buildings or buildings with more than three stories will require more than one system, but they are designed to work together seamlessly."
"How does it work?"
"It uses a whole host of different sensors to scan a building, then lock on to movement," I explained. "It's only limitation is that it can't pick up people running faster than thirty miles per hour, but at that pace, the likelihood of someone being stealthy…"
Padre had several more questions about how the minion detector worked. When he was finally satisfied, he leaned back on the bench.
"Do you have a price in mind?" he asked, laser-focused on me.
"I do. One hundred thousand for both, plus fifteen percent of your profits."
For a moment, the older man looked at me before finally chuckling and nodding.
"Seems like my doubts were unfounded. I am glad you understand the game to some extent, or you would have made a poor friend for Jackie," He said before responding to my offer. "Fifty thousand and ten percent."
"Eighty and fifteen."
"Seventy and twelve."
Now it was my turn to pause and consider, my eyes watching the older man as he confidently waited for my response. Seventy thousand Eddies was already more than I got for my three other inventions, and the added twelve percent would hopefully help keep me flush for a while, depending on just how many of these things he sold.
"And you'll continue to look after me and Jackie?" I said, ignoring my friend's shifting. "Keep an ear to the ground, that sort of thing?"
"I'll even continue to obfuscate all of your online shopping deliveries," Padre assured me, shaking his head at my shocked expression. "Do you really think someone wouldn't catch on to so many materials being delivered to one location? I've been keeping your name out of records since we made our first deal."
"That… Thank you," I said, letting out a long breath. "It was a concern, but hopefully for not much longer."
"Your first three inventions will more than makeup for any bribes I make," he assured me, brushing off my first words. "What do you mean it will not be a problem?"
"I… plan on purchasing a chunk of land from Rocky Ridge, the abandoned town," I explained. "With any luck, I'll be moving out there within the next two weeks. Something that I would prefer to stay between us for now."
"Ah, interesting. And would you be needing help with that?"
"I… Depending on the cost, maybe." I said. "And I don't just mean money. But I will know more once I start the process."
"I understand. While many here consider gang contacts to be an important resource, to the man trying to stay neutral and out of sight, they are a burden," He said with a nod. "Keep the offer in mind, but I will not hold my breath. In any case, do we have a deal?"
"We do," I agreed with a nod, reaching out and shaking the man's hand.
"If you have more to sell, contact me with some details, and I may be able to find someone interested," He said, still holding my hand. "I will facilitate the trade, with a minor cut of the profits, of course."
"Of course," I said, internally rolling my eyes.
With our business concluded, Padre transferred thirty-five thousand credits to my account before Jackie and I made our way back to the truck. When we climbed in, I transferred ten thousand eddies to Jackie.
"Woah, choom, that's a lot of Eddies!" he said, his eyes wide, showing off their glow. "I hardly did anything this time!"
"It's your contacts, Jackie. I wouldn't be on nearly as friendly terms with Padre without you," I pointed out. "Besides, we are a team. When I succeed, so do you."
He looked at me for a long moment before giving me a slight nod. I could tell my statement meant a lot to the larger man, but I focused on the road.
"Speaking of being a team, why didn't you mention moving out of the city?" he asked, his face falling a bit.
"I'll be five minutes away, tops," I pointed out, shaking my head. "I need a lot more room to grow, and out there, I won't have anyone breathing down my neck when I start improving my security and building larger stuff. It is cheap, isolated by the desert, and the Wraiths are really the only major threat I will have to deal with."
"Still sounds risky," He commented. "Wraiths are no pushovers."
"I know," I admitted, chewing my lip. "The first week or so is going to be intense. Once I have some time to build up some security, I will feel much better, but until then, it's going to be tight. I will probably spend some time bouncing back and forth, sleeping at the apartment and working there. That way, I will at least avoid being ambushed at night."
"We could hire some people to act as security, at least until you're set," He pointed out. "I'll obviously be there, but with a few solos around, we could keep the place safe to work in."
"That's… a pretty good idea," I admitted with a nod. "Padre probably knows some people willing to work for a discount on some proper body armor or maybe some other tech."
"He would probably pay them and hold the discounts for himself if you offered that," Jackie countered. "Your armor is good choom. He likes how easy it is to wear."
"Yeah… Hey, I'm thinking of getting some bone and muscle lace or maybe a skin weave, depending on what Vik can get his hands on," I said, changing the topic.
"Good idea. You need some chrome to toughen you up," Jackie said, reaching over and slapping me on the shoulder. "I've got all three, and I don't regret any of them."
We spent the rest of the drive discussing which I should get first, eventually arriving back at the megabuilding. After a quick goodbye, Jackie hopped onto his bike and drove off, leaving me to head back to my apartment and get back to work. There was a lot to get done, and every day counted.
I always love this fic its one of the more realistic I suppose TOF's I've read but also just realistic in general. Hope for more ():"|
Elerium + Matter creation = True Independence. Once he moves out of NC he is primed to go above and beyond.
Calantyr
Cyber Bard
- Location
- United Kingdom
He could probably cover a lot of his resource needs by digging a big pit on his land, putting the recyclers down there, pretending it's just a natural cave, and then getting NC to pay *him* to dump rubbish in it. Out of sight, out of mind.
Could even sell the idea by claiming it is better for the environment and/or tourism. And no one needs to know he's actually processing it all into bars of gold-pressed latinum (or whatever).
It's also good cover. Who would expect the 'trash guy' to have a hidden supertech facility.
Could even sell the idea by claiming it is better for the environment and/or tourism. And no one needs to know he's actually processing it all into bars of gold-pressed latinum (or whatever).
It's also good cover. Who would expect the 'trash guy' to have a hidden supertech facility.
Tisaku
Head Chief Thinkomancer
AldariSiradla
Knight of the Fountain Pen
This is extremely smart.
And cunning.
Everyone benefits too.
Just gotta make sure security is good...
Just in case, you know?
Taiho
Is not waiting for the elevator.
- Location
- A lake in Washington
Overly paranoid spooks. In any building the janitor has more access than anyone else, and nobody ever pays any attention to them. Some of them tend to have collections of interesting projects the engineers have tossed.
Having a trash facility might even draw more heat because the easiest way to spy on people is to go through their trash, and corps love spying on people.
Chapter Fifteen
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The next four days went by in a blur.
Samwise and I were working on our latest projects nearly nonstop. We already had the molly-maker and the material suspender, which just left the mass recycler and the activator. I managed to finish the design for the recycler the night I shook hands with Padre for our new deal, putting it together the next morning.
It was a surprisingly intricate series of filtering methods, shrunk down to fit into a tight box. A grinder worked the trash and scrap into a sand-like powder before drying it out. Then, it used a magnet to extract ferrous material, weight filtering to grab heavier elements, electrical charges to filter out specific alloys, and several other more esoteric methods to extract anything else useful. Plastic was still an issue, but upon finishing the mass recycler, I realized I could now reach a bit further down that specific branch. A quick look showed a machine capable of taking the plastics from the mass recycler and refining them considerably, making them into useful materials.
By the time I was finished putting together that machine, Padre's men had picked up the designs for the minion detector and the drone, leaving me with the rest of my payment. Immediately, I called the numbers I had researched and saved days ago, talking to four of the original landowners of Rocky Ridge. Each of them was ecstatic to sell their land, happily dumping what they thought was a useless plot of the desert for literal ennies on the eddie. It was such a significant loss for them that I asked Samwise to remember their information so that I could potentially offer them something better in the future when I wasn't so strapped for cash and resources.
With the land officially mine, I got to work on the final barrier, the suspension liquid activator. Thankfully, this was a tiny machine when compared to the two machines it worked with, just a bit larger than a computer tower from my old world. It took the inert and contaminated solution, filtered out everything unwanted, and reactivated it by applying a very gentle ultrasonic pulse and nearly negligible electric charge. Those were alternated several times a second, reactivating the solution and preparing it for the next material. When it was complete, I finally had full access to the higher-end models.
When I was mentally examining those designs, I realized I was lucky to have made the low-end molly-maker first, because getting some of these parts would have been a nightmare otherwise. They would have required high-quality custom orders, which would have taken forever and would have been nearly impossible to explain. Now, with my own molly-maker, I could just print them out.
Well, I could once I got them all up and running.
With the four machines completed, it was time to work on the suspension solution. I made four five-gallon buckets of strange liquid, which was thankfully mostly cheap. It was an interesting mixture of materials, all of which were on the cheaper end. The process of making the solution was also surprisingly simple. The hardest part was the ratios and multiple steps, which saw me creating what was best described as an artificial protein, one made to react to very specific energy signals. More than anything, they were the key to the printing process.
Once that was done, it was time to start moving our shit to Rocky Ridge. Originally, I had planned on waiting until I had a free week, but the more I thought about it, the more that seemed unwise. Between learning that Padre was the only reason people hadn't noticed my shopping habits and knowing I would have much more freedom once I moved, I decided to take the risk.
It was a bit nerve-racking to begin with, since this was a big leap out of the relatively safe feeling apartment. When it was finally time to go, the actual move was pretty easy, especially since Jackie recruited a few friends to help. They had no idea what they were transporting since everything was boxed up, even Samwise. We had the apartment cleaned out in a few hours, and everything shipped to Rocky Ridge a few hours after that.
Now, when purchasing the land, I ended up buying a couple of large chunks. The BD Shack, the garage and CHOOH2 station, which included the parking lot across the street, the one that encircled the power substation, the liquor store across the street from the BD Shack, and the solar farm to the southwest. These came with a handful of the surrounding trailers, as well as all of the junk and scrap around the entire premises. At some point, I was sure I would buy the rest of the dead town, but for now, I left it alone.
Out of all of the buildings, the garage was in the best condition, so we moved everything into there. The entire move, from leaving the apartment to moving into the garage, took eight hours. By the end of it, we had everything up and working, save the Molly-maker and its two accompanying devices. Those required too much power, and I didn't want to hook them to the already struggling solar farm.
A few of Jackie's friends, ones requested by Padre, set up shop in the BD shack to act as guards, thankfully on the fixer's dime. He promised me it was simply him protecting an asset, not trying to influence me into partnering closer to the Valentino's. I didn't care as long as they didn't try to interfere with my work or spy on me.
While Jackie and his friends were keeping an eye out on the surrounding desert, I got to work on the larger scale production equipment. Rather than go for the all-in-one device and sacrifice efficiency and size, I decided to make a rather large molly-mixer, at first running it off of the smaller filter and material suspender while using it to make larger versions solely for its use.
While I was designing and working in my new workshop, I sent Samwise out to do some work around our new property. His first task was cleaning off the solar panel farm, which by itself massively improved our power situation. I was still going to run all of the Molly-makers and associated equipment off Elerium, but it was still an important success. After he did a quick check of the power systems to make sure we weren't going to burn out anything or the time spent with no maintenance had set up a ticking time bomb of missable damage, Samwise got to work cleaning and scrapping stuff around the garage, making more room for our projects.
I had no concern for efficiency, so basically everything that looked even remotely junky went into the mass recycler, from rusted car parts to bags of trash. The machine was loud, so we had it running in the shed behind the garage, where it wouldn't bother anyone. After a few hours of working, Samwise walked into the garage with boxes of metal powder, organized and ready to be poured into the material suspender.
By the time the sun rose and Jackie walked into the garage with a cup of coffee and a bag of food, I had the original molly-maker, as well as the suspension and filtration system hooked up to an Elerium power core. It was essentially an oversized Elerium node using several full chunks of Elerium to generate massive amounts of power. The molly maker was already going, with multiple reservoirs running through materials quickly as it worked hard to make its bigger and better brother.
I was passed out on the floor on a few of the cushions from the couches in the other room. This was the first time using the molly-maker, and while I was sure I had done it right thanks to the plans in my head, building, moving, installing, and then immediately and extensively running a complicated and delicate piece of machinery wasn't exactly the best idea. The machine had plenty of warning buzzers and beeps though, I just needed to be close by to hear them.
The fact that Samwise was nearby working the fabricators and had been since the previous night showed just how tired I was. I woke up slowly to the sensation of Jackie nudging me awake, handing me the large coffee before I was even fully upright.
"Dammit, Jay, you look like hot death," He said, helping me to my feet. "You're lucky I promised, or I would have let you sleep."
"I know, I know," I said, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes and taking a drink from the coffee. "Too much to do, not enough time to do it in. Got a lot of what I wanted to do done, though."
Jackie looked around the interior of the garage. The large space was almost entirely cleaned out, all of the trash and scrap having been removed and recycled by Sam. Other than that, the space was clearly in a transitional state, with things pulled out away from the walls and machines running while sitting on the ground.
The molly-maker and its two extra machines were against one wall, with space for its larger brother once I was done printing the parts. Once that was done, I would stack the smaller machine in the corner and upgrade the Elerium power core so it could run both of them.
When I finally completed the larger device, my ability to produce whatever parts I needed, whatever I could design, would skyrocket. Already, with just the smaller, less efficient version, I was close to cutting production time by a full twenty-five percent. And that didn't include how much time I would have spent trying to finagle parts to do things they weren't intended to do.
All in all, I was hoping that I would be ready to start powering through more Titanfall tech by tomorrow morning. The spare set of hands that Samwise was making would certainly help.
"Hey, listen. So Padre sent someone over to serve as your dedicated bodyguard," Jackie said with a wince. "The boys he paid are muscle, but they don't have that kind of experience."
"I thought you were my bodyguard?" I said with a smirk, the larger man rolling his eyes.
"You know that's not what I'm looking to do, Genio. I gotta stick to my dreams, you know?" he said, shaking his head. "I'm gonna keep working in the city. Don't worry, I'll keep-"
"You say that like I'm not going to be running them with you," I said, turning away from the computer to look at him with a raised eyebrow.
"Well, choom… you got your set up, and you got income from your deal with Padre-"
"Jackie, I told you we are in this together. You're not getting rid of me that easy," I assured him, slapping him on the shoulder. "Give me five days, and we can start running jobs again.
"I… alright, Jackson," he said with a nod, surprised by happy about my statement.
"Good… now what was this about a bodyguard?"
"Oh, right. He found someone neutral who had experience and could act as your shadow. He paid for a month of her services. After that, you gotta keep paying her," He explained. "He seemed pretty confident that you would happily pay her out of pocket by that time."
For some reason, the mention of the bodyguard's gender tickled the back of my brain. A bad feeling started to come over me as I fixed Jackie with a look.
"Who did he find?"
"Well… technically, she had already been watching over you for a while now, and-"
"You're taking too long, big guy!" A familiar voice said from outside the garage.
From around the corner came Kaytlyn, a smile on her face as she leaned against the open garage door frame. She was dressed in much more professional clothes than the last time I saw her, including what I was pretty sure was a black, reinforced jacket over some chest armor, militech by the looks of it. She gave me a wave, her smile morphing into a smirk.
"Kaytlyn, good to see you," I said, my tone blank. "So…"
"Yes, I was being paid to look over you and keep an eye out for trouble. Though I am actually friends with Misty, and I do actually get my cyberware from Vik," She assured me, her tone shifting to something close to understanding. "That was just a coincidence."
"So you weren't my neighbor?"
"Kinda sorta?" She explained with a shrug. "I was really out of the city on business, but Padre brought me back on a favor. I lived in the same megabuilding, but I was lower down, so I traded rooms with your old neighbor. I even had a plan to use the excuse of a sibling to explain away the random guy you might have seen using it before, but you didn't even notice."
"I'm a busy person," I explained with a shrug. "How much is he paying you?"
"Twenty-five grand for a month, but like Jackie said, he's pretty sure you would keep me on at the end."
"Why is that?"
"I'm damn good at my job," She explained with a simple shrug. "You certainly didn't see me coming."
"You keep telling yourself that," I said, shaking my head. "So, you gonna report to him if he asks you any questions?"
"Well…. Considering he is signing my paycheck…" She said with a wince.
"Bonus points for honesty, at least," I responded, scratching at my cheek. "What do you shoot?"
"... I usually strap an SMG or a sniper rifle," She said, now looking curious. "Depends on the job. Why?"
Instead of answering, I walked into the garage's side room, the door opening automatically as I got close. Spot had already tuned my keyfob into the security, giving me access to all the buildings I owned. I returned a minute later carrying my custom sniper rifle and a bag of ammo for it. I passed her the rifle and the bag.
"Go outside and play around with this for a while," I said. "Come back when you're out of ammo."
"Uh… wait, what?" She said, accepting the powerful mag weapon and looking confused. "What is this, I don't recognize the model?"
"Just go out and try it."
"... I'll be on the roof," She finally said. "Don't go anywhere."
I gestured for her to leave, turning back to my work and ignoring her. After a moment of silence, I could hear her footsteps as she left. A few seconds after that, Jackie spoke up.
"What was that about choom?" He asked, looking confused.
"Padre doesn't hire useless people," I explained, turning back to look at my partner in crime. "So she is worth the effort. But you know I can't have people snitching on me. So I'm baiting the trap. Just give it some time. Oh, and warn you buddies about the gunshots."
Jackie looked confused but shrugged, his eyes glowing as he messaged his friends. For the next twenty minutes, I chiseled away at some prep but mainly focused on mediocre to poor food Jackie brought. I also finished the decent coffee, all the while listening to the sounds of Kaytlyn firing out into the desert.
When she was done, she came back down, her footsteps considerably faster.
"Where did you find this?" She asked urgently. "It's got no telemetry link, but I was putting shots on target almost double what I usually manage."
"Do you like it?"
"It's a preem piece of hardware," She said with a nod. "Where can I get one?"
"You can have it, a matching SMG, and a set of under armor that is more comfortable and more protective than what you're wearing," I said, pointing to her militech armor. "If you send Padre his money back and work for me directly."
For the first time since I had met her, the blue-haired woman was at a complete loss for words. It took her a second to realize what my angle was, but when she did, she nodded.
"You don't want me hanging around while working for someone else's eddies. I can understand that, but why not just find someone else?"
"Cause Padre wouldn't have hired you if you were bad at your job," I explained. "You were honest about reporting back to him. Most people would have pretended to be loyal to me. And you didn't try to sneak a listening device into my stuff when you gave my delivery back."
"That's it?" she asked, putting her hand on her hip and raising an eyebrow. "If you're that quick to trust, this job is going to be harder than I thought."
"Trust is earned. I'm giving you the chance to do that," I explained before my lips curled into a smirk. "But honestly, I'm mostly trusting Misty. She seems like a good judge of character, and wouldn't put up with you shit if you were a psycho."
She snorted and shook her head, but eventually, she nodded. I could see Jackie nodding his head in agreement, obviously trusting his girlfriend as well.
"Alright, I can see that. She doesn't mess around with stuff like that," She accepted with a nod. "Now I'm happy to take good gear as payment, but I still need some eddies. I can't buy food with a sniper rifle. Well, not without making a mess."
"Then you can go with Jackie and our borg friend on jobs," I said, looking at Jackie, who winced for a moment before finally nodding. "Having a third person would mean they could take larger jobs and earn more cash. You'd get a fair share."
"Bodyguard and some jobs on the side?" She asked, her eyebrow raised. "Gonna be hard to guard you if I'm leaving you alone to go on gigs."
"Give it a few days, and you won't have to worry about me at all," I assured her confidently. "Got a lot of protections I plan on building around here to make it safe."
"...I need to think about it. Padre isn't gonna be happy taking his money back," She pointed out.
"He won't care if you explain you're still working with me. Or I guess he will have to be because the only difference is that you won't feel obligated to report my secrets back to him. If that's a problem for him, he can pound sand."
Kaytlyn laughed, even as Jackie winced. We chatted a bit more about the deal, assuring her that I would have an SMG just as good as the sniper for her within the week. I also pointed out that I would probably be offering her more gear in the future, since it was in my best interest to keep her well stocked with goodies. After we were done, she left the town in a modified Quadra Type-66. It retained most of the original design's body but had several upgrades built in. It kind of reminded me of a halfway step to the nomad version from the game.
"Well… at least she's got style," I said, watching her drive off. "Think she'll sign up?
"Maybe? What are you gonna do if she doesn't?" Jackie asked, standing beside me by the entrance.
"Probably post her up on the roof with the rifle," I responded with a shrug. "She will probably be up there for a while anyway. The only thing that changes is if we trust her with the big secrets."
Not long after that, I got back to work. With the parts still printing for the large, improved molly-maker, I helped Samwise with his project, the first of three MRVN units. They would be Samwise's workforce, with AIs that were much more simple. They would take quite some time to develop into real sentience, during which they would help Samwise with the projects I assign him. We completed the first one about an hour and a half after Kaytlyn left, and they immediately went off to continue collecting and recycling the trash around the garage, moving on to the BD shack when it was finished. It was eventually joined by two brothers over the rest of the day.
When the parts for the large molly-maker were done, I worked hard to put it together, only stopping to get the molly-maker working on the suspension and activator machines.
When I was finally done with everything, it was much later that night. I barely managed to make it to the off section of the garage, where I collapsed into the couch with a smile on my face. My near nonstop, single-minded work had finally paid off, and I now had the infrastructure set up to produce a significant amount of my own parts. It wasn't exactly a hundred percent independence, since I would still occasionally need specific materials, exotic stuff should I require it, and some rare metals would probably need to be restocked since the recycler wouldn't be able to keep up, but it was a huge step in the right direction. For example, I would be able to make nearly ninety percent of a MRVN unit myself, and most of what I couldn't make was the hydraulic fluid.
The next morning, I woke up and walked around the exterior of the garage. It was miles ahead of what it had been the day before, entire cars had been mulched in the mass recycler for materials. We had several large crates of said materials, just waiting for me to use, and dozens of blocks of plastic set aside for later. The MRVNs had even made significant progress in cleaning around the BD shack as well.
As I continued to walk around, I spotted Samwise leading two MRVN units, working with them to repair the partially collapeed corner of the BD Shack. A welder, one left behind in the garage, sparked as Samwise welded things together, staving off any more damage.
I checked the interior of the BD shack as well, unsurprised to see that Jackie's friends, and Padres men, had left, helping themselves to a few bottles of liquor from behind the bar. With the place empty, I had to admit it was a little less secure feeling than I would have liked. I could feel that we were alone out here, exposed and vulnerable.
The sound of a car running through the town, stopping nearby, pulled me from my thoughts, and I headed out into the street, my hand resting on my pistol. Luckily, the car was familiar, as was who climbed out of it.
"So, what's the verdict?" I asked as Kaytlyn stepped out of her car.
"You were right," She said with a smile. "Padre didn't care. He just took the money back."
"That's good news. So you're on board?"
"For now. I reserve the right to leave after the first month," She said, leaning back to sit on the hood of her car. "There's only so long that a girl can work for upgrades and armor, as nice as it is."
"I wouldn't worry about it," I said, waving off her worries. "Jackie is coming back later today with a shipping truck of stuff like beds and furniture. If you're gonna be staying out here with me, call him up and let him know we need at least another bed. In the meantime, feel free to explore the grounds."
I went over what I owned, the trained bodyguard leaving to inspect some of the nearby trailer homes. I hadn't gotten the chance to look through them, but there were several on the land I owned. Two of them were obvious losses and would eventually end up getting put through the mass recyclers, but the rest at least look passable.
As she walked away, I returned to my garage. I was glad to have someone else join the team, both as a bodyguard for myself and to go on Jackie's side gigs. That said, it was going to be an interesting process, keeping her out of the loop for some of the things I was building. Eventually, I might let her in on just how crazy my tech was, but for now, she was too erratic, and her allegiances were clearly up for sale.
I sat down in front of my computer and let out a long sigh, spinning around to see the final state of the garage. No longer was it a mess of things ready to move in.
The two molly-makers and their accompanying machines were against the far wall, hooked directly to the Elerium power core. The original workbench had been extended with the one from the apartment, with the original now just a table for the 3D printers and the Elerium generator. Both of the fabricators were stacked next to that and bolted to the wall to reduce vibrations. The fabricators had been upgraded again, with the auto feeders arms receiving substantial programming update from Samwise, as well as a small container on each side of them, for the arms to grab and deposit material.
With the molly-makers done, they would be getting much less action, but they would still be useful.
The workbench we had moved over was more or less the same as it had been, only significantly less cramped. It was set up to form a right angle with the original work bench, which had been slid closer to the far wall.
After cleaning out all of the junk, and moving out most of the tools we wouldn't be using very often, like the tire tread changer, we managed to fit almost everything in one garage bay. This meant I could park the truck in the second bay or, more likely, use the second bay as a place to build larger stuff. I had plans to turn the CHOOH2 fuel station area into an outdoor garage already.
Who knows when that would happen, though.
With everything set up, Samwise and his younger brothers doing general repairs around my land and Kaytlyn looking through the trailer park, it was time for me to get to work. I had five full days left with the Titanfall tech tree, and I planned on making the most of it. I wanted to crack their shield systems, expand my robotics and AI development to include the methods created by the frontier Militia, as well as pad my general technological understanding with whatever I could make from the universe. There were dozens of things I wanted to add to my repertoire, and not a whole lot of time to do it in.
I was going to need more coffee.
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The next four days went by in a blur.
Samwise and I were working on our latest projects nearly nonstop. We already had the molly-maker and the material suspender, which just left the mass recycler and the activator. I managed to finish the design for the recycler the night I shook hands with Padre for our new deal, putting it together the next morning.
It was a surprisingly intricate series of filtering methods, shrunk down to fit into a tight box. A grinder worked the trash and scrap into a sand-like powder before drying it out. Then, it used a magnet to extract ferrous material, weight filtering to grab heavier elements, electrical charges to filter out specific alloys, and several other more esoteric methods to extract anything else useful. Plastic was still an issue, but upon finishing the mass recycler, I realized I could now reach a bit further down that specific branch. A quick look showed a machine capable of taking the plastics from the mass recycler and refining them considerably, making them into useful materials.
By the time I was finished putting together that machine, Padre's men had picked up the designs for the minion detector and the drone, leaving me with the rest of my payment. Immediately, I called the numbers I had researched and saved days ago, talking to four of the original landowners of Rocky Ridge. Each of them was ecstatic to sell their land, happily dumping what they thought was a useless plot of the desert for literal ennies on the eddie. It was such a significant loss for them that I asked Samwise to remember their information so that I could potentially offer them something better in the future when I wasn't so strapped for cash and resources.
With the land officially mine, I got to work on the final barrier, the suspension liquid activator. Thankfully, this was a tiny machine when compared to the two machines it worked with, just a bit larger than a computer tower from my old world. It took the inert and contaminated solution, filtered out everything unwanted, and reactivated it by applying a very gentle ultrasonic pulse and nearly negligible electric charge. Those were alternated several times a second, reactivating the solution and preparing it for the next material. When it was complete, I finally had full access to the higher-end models.
When I was mentally examining those designs, I realized I was lucky to have made the low-end molly-maker first, because getting some of these parts would have been a nightmare otherwise. They would have required high-quality custom orders, which would have taken forever and would have been nearly impossible to explain. Now, with my own molly-maker, I could just print them out.
Well, I could once I got them all up and running.
With the four machines completed, it was time to work on the suspension solution. I made four five-gallon buckets of strange liquid, which was thankfully mostly cheap. It was an interesting mixture of materials, all of which were on the cheaper end. The process of making the solution was also surprisingly simple. The hardest part was the ratios and multiple steps, which saw me creating what was best described as an artificial protein, one made to react to very specific energy signals. More than anything, they were the key to the printing process.
Once that was done, it was time to start moving our shit to Rocky Ridge. Originally, I had planned on waiting until I had a free week, but the more I thought about it, the more that seemed unwise. Between learning that Padre was the only reason people hadn't noticed my shopping habits and knowing I would have much more freedom once I moved, I decided to take the risk.
It was a bit nerve-racking to begin with, since this was a big leap out of the relatively safe feeling apartment. When it was finally time to go, the actual move was pretty easy, especially since Jackie recruited a few friends to help. They had no idea what they were transporting since everything was boxed up, even Samwise. We had the apartment cleaned out in a few hours, and everything shipped to Rocky Ridge a few hours after that.
Now, when purchasing the land, I ended up buying a couple of large chunks. The BD Shack, the garage and CHOOH2 station, which included the parking lot across the street, the one that encircled the power substation, the liquor store across the street from the BD Shack, and the solar farm to the southwest. These came with a handful of the surrounding trailers, as well as all of the junk and scrap around the entire premises. At some point, I was sure I would buy the rest of the dead town, but for now, I left it alone.
Out of all of the buildings, the garage was in the best condition, so we moved everything into there. The entire move, from leaving the apartment to moving into the garage, took eight hours. By the end of it, we had everything up and working, save the Molly-maker and its two accompanying devices. Those required too much power, and I didn't want to hook them to the already struggling solar farm.
A few of Jackie's friends, ones requested by Padre, set up shop in the BD shack to act as guards, thankfully on the fixer's dime. He promised me it was simply him protecting an asset, not trying to influence me into partnering closer to the Valentino's. I didn't care as long as they didn't try to interfere with my work or spy on me.
While Jackie and his friends were keeping an eye out on the surrounding desert, I got to work on the larger scale production equipment. Rather than go for the all-in-one device and sacrifice efficiency and size, I decided to make a rather large molly-mixer, at first running it off of the smaller filter and material suspender while using it to make larger versions solely for its use.
While I was designing and working in my new workshop, I sent Samwise out to do some work around our new property. His first task was cleaning off the solar panel farm, which by itself massively improved our power situation. I was still going to run all of the Molly-makers and associated equipment off Elerium, but it was still an important success. After he did a quick check of the power systems to make sure we weren't going to burn out anything or the time spent with no maintenance had set up a ticking time bomb of missable damage, Samwise got to work cleaning and scrapping stuff around the garage, making more room for our projects.
I had no concern for efficiency, so basically everything that looked even remotely junky went into the mass recycler, from rusted car parts to bags of trash. The machine was loud, so we had it running in the shed behind the garage, where it wouldn't bother anyone. After a few hours of working, Samwise walked into the garage with boxes of metal powder, organized and ready to be poured into the material suspender.
By the time the sun rose and Jackie walked into the garage with a cup of coffee and a bag of food, I had the original molly-maker, as well as the suspension and filtration system hooked up to an Elerium power core. It was essentially an oversized Elerium node using several full chunks of Elerium to generate massive amounts of power. The molly maker was already going, with multiple reservoirs running through materials quickly as it worked hard to make its bigger and better brother.
I was passed out on the floor on a few of the cushions from the couches in the other room. This was the first time using the molly-maker, and while I was sure I had done it right thanks to the plans in my head, building, moving, installing, and then immediately and extensively running a complicated and delicate piece of machinery wasn't exactly the best idea. The machine had plenty of warning buzzers and beeps though, I just needed to be close by to hear them.
The fact that Samwise was nearby working the fabricators and had been since the previous night showed just how tired I was. I woke up slowly to the sensation of Jackie nudging me awake, handing me the large coffee before I was even fully upright.
"Dammit, Jay, you look like hot death," He said, helping me to my feet. "You're lucky I promised, or I would have let you sleep."
"I know, I know," I said, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes and taking a drink from the coffee. "Too much to do, not enough time to do it in. Got a lot of what I wanted to do done, though."
Jackie looked around the interior of the garage. The large space was almost entirely cleaned out, all of the trash and scrap having been removed and recycled by Sam. Other than that, the space was clearly in a transitional state, with things pulled out away from the walls and machines running while sitting on the ground.
The molly-maker and its two extra machines were against one wall, with space for its larger brother once I was done printing the parts. Once that was done, I would stack the smaller machine in the corner and upgrade the Elerium power core so it could run both of them.
When I finally completed the larger device, my ability to produce whatever parts I needed, whatever I could design, would skyrocket. Already, with just the smaller, less efficient version, I was close to cutting production time by a full twenty-five percent. And that didn't include how much time I would have spent trying to finagle parts to do things they weren't intended to do.
All in all, I was hoping that I would be ready to start powering through more Titanfall tech by tomorrow morning. The spare set of hands that Samwise was making would certainly help.
"Hey, listen. So Padre sent someone over to serve as your dedicated bodyguard," Jackie said with a wince. "The boys he paid are muscle, but they don't have that kind of experience."
"I thought you were my bodyguard?" I said with a smirk, the larger man rolling his eyes.
"You know that's not what I'm looking to do, Genio. I gotta stick to my dreams, you know?" he said, shaking his head. "I'm gonna keep working in the city. Don't worry, I'll keep-"
"You say that like I'm not going to be running them with you," I said, turning away from the computer to look at him with a raised eyebrow.
"Well, choom… you got your set up, and you got income from your deal with Padre-"
"Jackie, I told you we are in this together. You're not getting rid of me that easy," I assured him, slapping him on the shoulder. "Give me five days, and we can start running jobs again.
"I… alright, Jackson," he said with a nod, surprised by happy about my statement.
"Good… now what was this about a bodyguard?"
"Oh, right. He found someone neutral who had experience and could act as your shadow. He paid for a month of her services. After that, you gotta keep paying her," He explained. "He seemed pretty confident that you would happily pay her out of pocket by that time."
For some reason, the mention of the bodyguard's gender tickled the back of my brain. A bad feeling started to come over me as I fixed Jackie with a look.
"Who did he find?"
"Well… technically, she had already been watching over you for a while now, and-"
"You're taking too long, big guy!" A familiar voice said from outside the garage.
From around the corner came Kaytlyn, a smile on her face as she leaned against the open garage door frame. She was dressed in much more professional clothes than the last time I saw her, including what I was pretty sure was a black, reinforced jacket over some chest armor, militech by the looks of it. She gave me a wave, her smile morphing into a smirk.
"Kaytlyn, good to see you," I said, my tone blank. "So…"
"Yes, I was being paid to look over you and keep an eye out for trouble. Though I am actually friends with Misty, and I do actually get my cyberware from Vik," She assured me, her tone shifting to something close to understanding. "That was just a coincidence."
"So you weren't my neighbor?"
"Kinda sorta?" She explained with a shrug. "I was really out of the city on business, but Padre brought me back on a favor. I lived in the same megabuilding, but I was lower down, so I traded rooms with your old neighbor. I even had a plan to use the excuse of a sibling to explain away the random guy you might have seen using it before, but you didn't even notice."
"I'm a busy person," I explained with a shrug. "How much is he paying you?"
"Twenty-five grand for a month, but like Jackie said, he's pretty sure you would keep me on at the end."
"Why is that?"
"I'm damn good at my job," She explained with a simple shrug. "You certainly didn't see me coming."
"You keep telling yourself that," I said, shaking my head. "So, you gonna report to him if he asks you any questions?"
"Well…. Considering he is signing my paycheck…" She said with a wince.
"Bonus points for honesty, at least," I responded, scratching at my cheek. "What do you shoot?"
"... I usually strap an SMG or a sniper rifle," She said, now looking curious. "Depends on the job. Why?"
Instead of answering, I walked into the garage's side room, the door opening automatically as I got close. Spot had already tuned my keyfob into the security, giving me access to all the buildings I owned. I returned a minute later carrying my custom sniper rifle and a bag of ammo for it. I passed her the rifle and the bag.
"Go outside and play around with this for a while," I said. "Come back when you're out of ammo."
"Uh… wait, what?" She said, accepting the powerful mag weapon and looking confused. "What is this, I don't recognize the model?"
"Just go out and try it."
"... I'll be on the roof," She finally said. "Don't go anywhere."
I gestured for her to leave, turning back to my work and ignoring her. After a moment of silence, I could hear her footsteps as she left. A few seconds after that, Jackie spoke up.
"What was that about choom?" He asked, looking confused.
"Padre doesn't hire useless people," I explained, turning back to look at my partner in crime. "So she is worth the effort. But you know I can't have people snitching on me. So I'm baiting the trap. Just give it some time. Oh, and warn you buddies about the gunshots."
Jackie looked confused but shrugged, his eyes glowing as he messaged his friends. For the next twenty minutes, I chiseled away at some prep but mainly focused on mediocre to poor food Jackie brought. I also finished the decent coffee, all the while listening to the sounds of Kaytlyn firing out into the desert.
When she was done, she came back down, her footsteps considerably faster.
"Where did you find this?" She asked urgently. "It's got no telemetry link, but I was putting shots on target almost double what I usually manage."
"Do you like it?"
"It's a preem piece of hardware," She said with a nod. "Where can I get one?"
"You can have it, a matching SMG, and a set of under armor that is more comfortable and more protective than what you're wearing," I said, pointing to her militech armor. "If you send Padre his money back and work for me directly."
For the first time since I had met her, the blue-haired woman was at a complete loss for words. It took her a second to realize what my angle was, but when she did, she nodded.
"You don't want me hanging around while working for someone else's eddies. I can understand that, but why not just find someone else?"
"Cause Padre wouldn't have hired you if you were bad at your job," I explained. "You were honest about reporting back to him. Most people would have pretended to be loyal to me. And you didn't try to sneak a listening device into my stuff when you gave my delivery back."
"That's it?" she asked, putting her hand on her hip and raising an eyebrow. "If you're that quick to trust, this job is going to be harder than I thought."
"Trust is earned. I'm giving you the chance to do that," I explained before my lips curled into a smirk. "But honestly, I'm mostly trusting Misty. She seems like a good judge of character, and wouldn't put up with you shit if you were a psycho."
She snorted and shook her head, but eventually, she nodded. I could see Jackie nodding his head in agreement, obviously trusting his girlfriend as well.
"Alright, I can see that. She doesn't mess around with stuff like that," She accepted with a nod. "Now I'm happy to take good gear as payment, but I still need some eddies. I can't buy food with a sniper rifle. Well, not without making a mess."
"Then you can go with Jackie and our borg friend on jobs," I said, looking at Jackie, who winced for a moment before finally nodding. "Having a third person would mean they could take larger jobs and earn more cash. You'd get a fair share."
"Bodyguard and some jobs on the side?" She asked, her eyebrow raised. "Gonna be hard to guard you if I'm leaving you alone to go on gigs."
"Give it a few days, and you won't have to worry about me at all," I assured her confidently. "Got a lot of protections I plan on building around here to make it safe."
"...I need to think about it. Padre isn't gonna be happy taking his money back," She pointed out.
"He won't care if you explain you're still working with me. Or I guess he will have to be because the only difference is that you won't feel obligated to report my secrets back to him. If that's a problem for him, he can pound sand."
Kaytlyn laughed, even as Jackie winced. We chatted a bit more about the deal, assuring her that I would have an SMG just as good as the sniper for her within the week. I also pointed out that I would probably be offering her more gear in the future, since it was in my best interest to keep her well stocked with goodies. After we were done, she left the town in a modified Quadra Type-66. It retained most of the original design's body but had several upgrades built in. It kind of reminded me of a halfway step to the nomad version from the game.
"Well… at least she's got style," I said, watching her drive off. "Think she'll sign up?
"Maybe? What are you gonna do if she doesn't?" Jackie asked, standing beside me by the entrance.
"Probably post her up on the roof with the rifle," I responded with a shrug. "She will probably be up there for a while anyway. The only thing that changes is if we trust her with the big secrets."
Not long after that, I got back to work. With the parts still printing for the large, improved molly-maker, I helped Samwise with his project, the first of three MRVN units. They would be Samwise's workforce, with AIs that were much more simple. They would take quite some time to develop into real sentience, during which they would help Samwise with the projects I assign him. We completed the first one about an hour and a half after Kaytlyn left, and they immediately went off to continue collecting and recycling the trash around the garage, moving on to the BD shack when it was finished. It was eventually joined by two brothers over the rest of the day.
When the parts for the large molly-maker were done, I worked hard to put it together, only stopping to get the molly-maker working on the suspension and activator machines.
When I was finally done with everything, it was much later that night. I barely managed to make it to the off section of the garage, where I collapsed into the couch with a smile on my face. My near nonstop, single-minded work had finally paid off, and I now had the infrastructure set up to produce a significant amount of my own parts. It wasn't exactly a hundred percent independence, since I would still occasionally need specific materials, exotic stuff should I require it, and some rare metals would probably need to be restocked since the recycler wouldn't be able to keep up, but it was a huge step in the right direction. For example, I would be able to make nearly ninety percent of a MRVN unit myself, and most of what I couldn't make was the hydraulic fluid.
The next morning, I woke up and walked around the exterior of the garage. It was miles ahead of what it had been the day before, entire cars had been mulched in the mass recycler for materials. We had several large crates of said materials, just waiting for me to use, and dozens of blocks of plastic set aside for later. The MRVNs had even made significant progress in cleaning around the BD shack as well.
As I continued to walk around, I spotted Samwise leading two MRVN units, working with them to repair the partially collapeed corner of the BD Shack. A welder, one left behind in the garage, sparked as Samwise welded things together, staving off any more damage.
I checked the interior of the BD shack as well, unsurprised to see that Jackie's friends, and Padres men, had left, helping themselves to a few bottles of liquor from behind the bar. With the place empty, I had to admit it was a little less secure feeling than I would have liked. I could feel that we were alone out here, exposed and vulnerable.
The sound of a car running through the town, stopping nearby, pulled me from my thoughts, and I headed out into the street, my hand resting on my pistol. Luckily, the car was familiar, as was who climbed out of it.
"So, what's the verdict?" I asked as Kaytlyn stepped out of her car.
"You were right," She said with a smile. "Padre didn't care. He just took the money back."
"That's good news. So you're on board?"
"For now. I reserve the right to leave after the first month," She said, leaning back to sit on the hood of her car. "There's only so long that a girl can work for upgrades and armor, as nice as it is."
"I wouldn't worry about it," I said, waving off her worries. "Jackie is coming back later today with a shipping truck of stuff like beds and furniture. If you're gonna be staying out here with me, call him up and let him know we need at least another bed. In the meantime, feel free to explore the grounds."
I went over what I owned, the trained bodyguard leaving to inspect some of the nearby trailer homes. I hadn't gotten the chance to look through them, but there were several on the land I owned. Two of them were obvious losses and would eventually end up getting put through the mass recyclers, but the rest at least look passable.
As she walked away, I returned to my garage. I was glad to have someone else join the team, both as a bodyguard for myself and to go on Jackie's side gigs. That said, it was going to be an interesting process, keeping her out of the loop for some of the things I was building. Eventually, I might let her in on just how crazy my tech was, but for now, she was too erratic, and her allegiances were clearly up for sale.
I sat down in front of my computer and let out a long sigh, spinning around to see the final state of the garage. No longer was it a mess of things ready to move in.
The two molly-makers and their accompanying machines were against the far wall, hooked directly to the Elerium power core. The original workbench had been extended with the one from the apartment, with the original now just a table for the 3D printers and the Elerium generator. Both of the fabricators were stacked next to that and bolted to the wall to reduce vibrations. The fabricators had been upgraded again, with the auto feeders arms receiving substantial programming update from Samwise, as well as a small container on each side of them, for the arms to grab and deposit material.
With the molly-makers done, they would be getting much less action, but they would still be useful.
The workbench we had moved over was more or less the same as it had been, only significantly less cramped. It was set up to form a right angle with the original work bench, which had been slid closer to the far wall.
After cleaning out all of the junk, and moving out most of the tools we wouldn't be using very often, like the tire tread changer, we managed to fit almost everything in one garage bay. This meant I could park the truck in the second bay or, more likely, use the second bay as a place to build larger stuff. I had plans to turn the CHOOH2 fuel station area into an outdoor garage already.
Who knows when that would happen, though.
With everything set up, Samwise and his younger brothers doing general repairs around my land and Kaytlyn looking through the trailer park, it was time for me to get to work. I had five full days left with the Titanfall tech tree, and I planned on making the most of it. I wanted to crack their shield systems, expand my robotics and AI development to include the methods created by the frontier Militia, as well as pad my general technological understanding with whatever I could make from the universe. There were dozens of things I wanted to add to my repertoire, and not a whole lot of time to do it in.
I was going to need more coffee.
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