by Marcus Sloss
The platform zoomed over to a rack of twelve-foot-tall exoskeletons. The material was something I had never seen before. It had a flat dull brown coloration. The mechs’ lower portion had eight legs in an octagonal pattern with triple joints. The torso included shoulder-mounted turrets with large square openings. Dual arms attached to both the front and the back of the torso. Each of the four arms had a weapon mount attachment on the forearm. The torso swiveled over the eight legs. Below the torso, an extra-large power generator hung like an egg sack.
Blob’s translator pinged while I marveled at the machine.
“You cannot steal from me. I have another customer to attend to. Feel free to board any device you want and shop around, though I recommend you try to order sooner rather than later if it's a big order. That way you have time to offload your equipment and beat the other purchasers to our more limited inventories,” Blob said, summoning a second platform that she slurped onto. “I will be upstairs. Just wish the platform to take you to any location you want in here and it will happen.”
Blob’s platform zoomed towards a distant elevator point in the storage container.
“Well, Torrez, what were you thinking?” I asked, a joyous, shit-eating grin still plastered on my face.
“That we need to buy everything, keep what we like, and resell what we don’t, even if it is at a loss. But this is not a game,” he frowned, “we should buy core items and work with what we have. We are going to be hemorrhaging zinc. Now is not the time to go cheap, Eric, not in the least. There is not much difference between these AGPT63s and the tanks the Squibbles were using.” He blew out a breath. “I want the mecha suits. I want the big beast. I want it all,” Torrez said with wide, excited eyes.
“Okay, get Perci and Everly to set aside twice what they need, and then I will leave you here to see if you can spend everything else,” I said, tapping my chin in thought. Hmm. Yes. “I think I want to go personnel shopping with them, instead of being distracted by all these new toys. Wait,” I paused, “are you okay with not having any electric trucks to move supplies?”
“Cap, keep a reserve. No reason to put all our eggs into a nitrogen basket,” Torrez said, and I nodded. “Those electric road salters can certainly go. That would free up a lot of parking space for more tanks too.”
“I will tell Jevon to toss in only half our fleet, then,” I said, grimacing. I thought of moving the platform to the starting point and it immediately shifted. “We are going to become a fundamentally different fighting force. I hope we can weather the next blue portal cycle, at least until we can figure things out.”
“Aye, Cap, I agree,” Torrez said, giving a wave.
I stepped onto the platform for the orbital. I set my exit for the spot nearest to Everly and Perci, and rubbed my hands together in anticipation. I was excited to see what a contract market entailed.
CHAPTER 3
A bipedal turtle over a hundred feet tall stepped on me. I knew I would pass through his foot but I still winced in reflex. This was a busier outskirt of the grand market. I hustled to catch up to Perci and Everly, only to find the inability to run infuriating. Getting there at a brisk walk was turning into a half-hour ordeal. I felt like I did when Mom would take forever to take me to Burger Queen for a Princely Meal. Patience had never been a virtue of mine in my youth. My mental fortitude increased in prison, and the military forced me to hurry up and wait so often, that I learned to take most things in stride. Apparently, since the apocalypse, I was regressing.
I rounded a corner, expecting to see yet another long corridor of massive Xgate booths. This area was different, it opened into an open space with no towering booths. The fact that I could see so far in front of me, startled me. Up until this point, everything had been cramped and confined into irregularly branching corridors. Here, rows upon rows of sentient species were arrayed out in the open, arranged from shortest to tallest groups. My eyes scanned down the line, noting that there were hundreds of variations for almost every species. A tiny six-inch-tall tree being was the first species group, and ironically enough, a massive three hundred feet tall six-legged tree being was the very last species group in the line.
My position on the edge of the contract market gave me insight into how this worked. There were hundreds of rows. Each row was a duplicate of the entire available catalogue. I meandered over to the little tree creature. There was an interface panel on a floating bar that automatically adjusted its position to accommodate my height. I realized once I was close enough, that the tiny tree dude was an exquisitely rendered holographic image. I tapped on the interface to view available inventory: three thousand contracts, with varying methods of payment for different types of listings. It was all neatly organized but still chaotic in its plethora of options. I left the tiny tree warrior to walk to a different row.
I approached the identical image of a tiny tree. The interface populated, giving me the exact same listings. I could inspect individuals from this list. The list could be broken down by sex, age, seller, price, and so many more options. Hmm… I thought about why they might use such a system.
I saw a bipedal black panther with orange stripes walk by. His tail swished into my body. Since the appendage flicked through me, it must have been intentionally aggressive. He walked four creatures down to a ten-inch tall spider-looking creature on a rock. The male input his required data, only to scoff. He chewed a nail, contemplating something. With a hand wave, he dismissed the image. He stalked off, only to return less than a minute later. I saw him select four of these creatures from a seller’s icon. He accepted the trade with a snarl.
Alright, that made sense. Instead of forcing a buyer to meet a host of different sellers, these stations acted as a middleman from a common location. My initial reaction was that it should cut down on swindling interactions. It was hard to upsell a digital client. My next thought was that we were limited to ten personnel per portal or forty to a gate. This might be for many reasons. If there were giant pens here with millions of contracted servants available, then that would certainly break the ten-per-portal rule. One thing was certain: this process was much easier to manage, less chaotic, and cleaner than I had expected.
A seller posted a listing of those sentients they had an excess of, listed a price, which was compared side-by-side with their competitors prices, and then hoped their inventory moved. I bet prices went down sharply towards the end of the market. I also figured that this is why some sellers opted for auctions. You would hook a buy regardless. Okay, this was something I could work with. Now to find the girls in this universal zoo.
My Gpad pinged an alert. It showed two red dots a good distance to my right. I bet Perci had been tracking me for a while. She had always been such a Gpad wizard. I saw the girls’ icons closing the distance between us. We walked towards each other through the crowded area full of meandering aliens. A few small groups of aliens chatted in clumps, but for the most part, it was a myriad of individuals focused on their tasks.
The tall red-haired Crixxi was much easier to pick out of the crowd than the shorter Perci, her russet colored hair touched up with blonde highlights. I waved my arm when Everly picked me out of the crowd. Perci was in yoga pants with a plain white shirt on as she ran to me.
“Hey, handsome!” my tiny wife squealed, “This place is crazy. If you go over to the creatures, there’s a—”
“Interface. Yeah, I saw that. I didn’t see any salespeople. I am surprised by that,” I said honestly, a bit shocked. “I figured the interfaces might be a market guide or something, but it looks like they are the whole package.”
“That is why this Luna gave us recommended species,” Everly said in a chipper tone, lifting her tail to gesture that I was silly for not realizing this. “You can hire guides at the four corners. Trust me, not needed.”
“We could just buy the Crixxi tribe, and forget about these other species,” I said.
Perci twirled her hair, sliding a hand down my arm. “Eric, the Crixxi are inte
rmixing and awesome. They also are a warrior race.” Perci’s hazel eyes locked to mine, “but as much as I want to help Crixxi, we all do, I also want peaceful races doing our laundry, cleaning our homes, and raising our children. Crixxi can do most chores, but they do not excel at menial tasks. How about we stick to the Mounamine and the other species that Everly recommended?” She frowned, “I’m drawing a blank on the name, though.”
Everly’s tail swirled around my wrist. I smirked, pulling her closer to me. These two were always so happy to see me. They would flirt, smile, and entice my libido to no end. I loved their banter and teasing.
“I don’t say it enough: you girls spoil me. I feel like the happiest man in the world. Business can wait for a nice kiss,” I said, leaning over to plant a sweet kiss on Everly’s lips. Perci leaped onto me the moment I was back upright. I held her close as she wrapped her legs around my waist. She savored our kiss for a long moment. I released her lips with a smack. Traffic flowed around us, a few aliens giving us stares. “Okay,” I turned back to Everly a little breathlessly, “what was the name of the panda-type creatures, again?”
Everly stroked her tail up and down my inner thigh, stopping right before where my package hung low. My pants got a little tighter. I rolled my eyes at her.
“I never mentioned a name. There is not one for your… our language. I picked Pandarin, but you can change the name if you want,” Everly mentioned.
“So do we want to buy direct, make a bid, find a middle man, or…?” I asked, letting the sentence hang.
Perci smiled at Everly, seeking her opinion.
“Um… I have been here, before. Even to this place. Father would go over to the interface for the servant species he wanted and shop for deals for hours. He never focused on much else. The tribes further into the jungle would trade lots of materials and goods for decent servants,” Everly said sadly.
I rubbed her back. This was common in Crixxi society. She was not grieving the same way that a human would mourn. She had never been close to her father, merely a surrogate for his dead son. Everly had confided to us that she missed his lessons, but felt confident in her ability to become the matriarch of a larger, more powerful tribe than her father had ever controlled. Moments like this, however, pulled her out of the victory Lilith and I created for her and reminded her of her past.
“You okay?” I asked.
“I’m good,” she smiled. “I am proud to be at your side. I am proud to see our tribe grow today. My father was unwise to challenge a male as powerful as you. He suffered defeat without proper humility. You acted with honor as his victor. I still feel shame for my parents' transgressions,” Everly said, and her back stiffened. “The Pandarin will be a great addition to our community. Come, follow me, sister wife, tribe master.”
She led us down a row. The tiny creatures continued for a long time. I groaned when those we walked past had barely reached a height of two feet, and we had been walking for more than ten minutes. The distant tall tree being I thought was three hundred feet tall must have been even larger, because as we progressed down the line, I realized his head was higher than the trading gates beyond him. A few times, as we continued down it, the line would lengthen or shorten, whenever new species were added or removed from the available catalogue.
We came across many animals common on Earth, merely variations that were intelligent enough to be considered sapient. There were a lot of cats, that stood on anywhere from two up to ten legs. Some were upright, some horizontal, some had three tails, others two heads, a few with eight eyes, even heads without necks, and these were only the sapient variations.
We held hands trooping down the line, inspecting animals as they grew in size.
An alert pinged my wrist with a slight vibration. Perci bent down with a twist to read the text, not wanting to release her grip.
“Jevon said half the trucks are loaded. Torrez is flooding the teams outside the Xgate with work. Where do you want to sort the new equipment, as far as their likely storage location on the base?” Perci said, returning to a normal walk.
I scooped Perci up in one fell swoop and tossed her over my shoulder. She giggled in delight. This freed up my wrist, which I brought up to my face, and within a few taps I was on a video-call with Jevon.
“Hey, boss, 63s are being pushed out. How do you want to divide them?” Jevon asked.
“I was thinking half and half for now. You need to get your team leaders to immediately begin testing them out. I know we have a good twenty hours before the gates swap to blue portals, but every moment we have that we can get more familiar with the new equipment counts. Mitchell and Bonnet should be more than prepared when the portals switch over,” I said into my wrist device.
“Wait, these tanks are for light infantry and recon? They're the size of a truck,” Jevon said, patting a 63 beside him.
“I don’t know exactly what Torrez has bought yet. I just know we're shoveling money—er … zinc, at our military problems. But yes, those ATPG63s, or were they APTG63s… well, shit … Call them 63s for now until we come up with simpler names. And hell yes, they are mobile.”
“There is also an eight-legged exosuit, like a heavy infantry mecha,” I continued, “Those should arrive soon. Stick Crixxi in them. There also should be some jet packs in the mix that I never got to see.” I paused with a sigh, knowing there were a ton of moving parts at the moment.
“Nancy should be buying more personnel shields and my replacement weapons. I want you creating flying drop troops to man the jetpacks. Daphne is on the hunt for nitrogen generators to swap out for our carbon ones, and she is getting a mix of Crixxi weapons for potential raiding parties. Mclain is hunting for superior shielding or something we can double up with, so a smaller exoskeleton would be nice. Our purchases are going to hit the storage room hard and fast. I will come down after we secure personnel additions to help un-cluster this mess.” I shook my head.
“Next time, I’m going shopping and you're playing quarterback,” Jevon chuckled. “It is good to see all the new items arriving. Concerns of personal issues like pay will be resolved a bit when people see new tangible items they get to call their own. Like a freaking tank,” Jevon said with a grin. “The supply room keeps expanding. I am working with Mr. T on trying to get an auto-offloader, but we have items that keep showing up in the way. Otherwise, it will take forever to shift all this stuff out of here with only ten personnel. Torrez is on a bender.” His eyes got really large. “Holy shit! A hundred-foot tall mecha suit just showed up.”
“Did Eddy, Braxton, and Clive get all the new equipment they needed for construction?” I asked. “I bet Razzar is going to be happy with the new mining gear,” I said, nudging Everly forward when she paused. This earned me a tail swat on my ass. I glanced down at her and she was pointing to a creature that looked like a panda, only instead of white and black, it was brown and black. The eyes held a deep intelligence, and the face a gentle smile. “I’ve arrived at what we came to look for, so need to wrap this up.”
“Yeah, the first wave of items is being hauled home. Priority of transport is being given the tunnel transportation machine to connect the strongholds.” He frowned, “I got to admit, I feel a little skeptical about converting half our vehicle fleet into zinc, though,” Jevon said.
“I get it, but we found thousands of electrics in Denver. So many, that we had to leave a lot of them for next time. We hardly even started our looting there. Boulder, too, is a ghost town ripe for looting,” I said in a gruff voice. “We will be okay if we focus, improve, and grow. For the community.”
“For the community, Deluxe Duke out,” Jevon replied in a cheerful tone.
The connection closed, and I set Perci back on the ground. She sniffed, as if she hadn’t loved that, but her blushing cheeks gave her away.
“I like him. Nancy says he is your best friend. He is never around, though. You can tell by your voices you miss each other,” Everly said with sad eyes and pouty lips. She could always whe
edle an extra kiss or three out of me, acting so sweet.
“We… our bond is indeed special. Not long ago, I pushed a lot of people away; not again. So, my lovely ladies… Teach me about the Pandarin, please,” I said, checking out the image of the shorter creature.
Perci tapped on the screen, typing rapidly. Everly reached over her shoulder and hit a single button. The screen grew wider than Perci’s arms, which let me see where she was on the interface.
Species: Pandarin - Rating: 2
“You mind if I read the description out loud?” Perci asked.
I shrugged, not really caring.
“Pandarin,” she began, “originated from a high-oxygen planet with an abundance of short-stalked plant life that they blend into. They are peaceful by nature but were deemed an aggressive species because of territorial dance competitions that often resulted in injuries. Wait,” she looked up incredulously, “they were stuck in quarantine for fighting without any deaths…”
Everly patted Perci’s shoulder. “A commonality among many of the subspecies you see here, is that they never really belonged in this mess ... hence why they failed so terribly.” She sighed. “Keep going, please.”
“Their original and only planet was conquered by a goliath species known as the Parvinus. The Pandarin submitted to their new overlords quickly. The subspecies were bred beyond their original number to be traded since they were so good at their tasks. Pandarin are now on more planets than the majority of aggressive species,” Perci said, letting the last sentence fade. “So, they won by losing. By becoming helpless servants, they were cherished, and have thrived in captivity. Neat to see how something like this played out.”
Everly chuckled, switching the interface over to a biological overview of the pandarin. “Bonded pairs mate for life. They accept a few forms of co-species into their body, like the virum. They are quick breeders and excellent workers. The males have no aggression, the females are perfect nurturers, and they both make fantastic teachers. They can adapt to a society's structures quickly and fulfill the needs of their protectors with ease,” Everly said with a smile.