“What do you recommend for me?” I asked.
“For you, based on what I saw yesterday, and I took the liberty of playing the whole battle at slow speed, I would recommend a fifty capacity reloadable missile launcher and the torpedo launcher. You showed an ability to use missiles intelligently. That effectively gives you one hundred selectable missiles, and another hundred opportunity fast fire torpedoes. I would rig your joystick with two fire buttons to make selection even quicker. Missiles always require thought. Torpedoes require fast reaction times. I think you have them, and this combination will do well for you. Added to that, no-one will guess you carry so many, so you will surprise them if you find yourself in a situation where they think you are out.”
“Sounds good to me. Where does that leave us?”
“Severely over weaponed I am afraid.” He grinned.
“So these choices mean even less shielding and speed than standard?”
“Yes, I'm afraid so,” he agreed.
“Why don’t we just make the hull bigger?” His mouth opened and closed again, followed by a smile that could only be called predatory.
“You and I, my friend, are going to get along famously! Why don’t we just make the hull bigger, he says. Why not indeed. We can, but there will be a cost. But then, cost is relative. Lengthening changes the dynamics, changes the balance of the thrusters, requires more engine power. But you wanted more engine power and more shielding. Length also is defined by what will fit in a standard landing berth, so maybe we need to tweak the width as well. Yes, yes, possibilities. Let me see what I can come up with, my young friend.”
He grinned at me. I grinned back.
“While you're at it, I’d like a modification to the flight controls. The left hand thrust control, I’d like it changed so that it also has a left-right toggle switch at the base, always returning to neutral when no pressure is applied either way. I don’t like using foot pedals, and would rather control roll with my left hand. I don’t use it a lot, so the toggle needs to have reasonable pressure applied to work at all. The more pressure applied, the faster it works. In other words, it needs deliberate action to apply roll either way. Leave the foot pedals, but allow the usual ability to change things around.”
“An interesting modification. That can and will be done.”
“Anything else I should consider?” I asked.
“You might consider a decent AI."
"AI?"
"Artificial Intelligence. In fact, that may be necessary, as the changes I will need to make, may make landing almost impossible to do manually. You should also consider a salvage droid, maintenance droid, cleaning bots and security droids.”
“What is the difference between a droid and bot?” I had an idea, but I wanted to hear it anyway.
“Intelligence mostly. A bot is programmed to do a task. It’s a dumb machine for repetitive tasks, like cleaning. A droid has a low level AI, or will take instruction from a high end AI. They are more versatile. And before you ask, a salvage droid takes out a grav sled and systematically collects everything it can, or whatever it is tasked to get. I’ve seen a salvage droid pack what you brought back on four sleds, onto a single sled. They are that good at doing the job! A maintenance droid will fix anything that breaks down, provided it has a specification and spare parts. This can be useful in a battle. With several you can be using something badly damaged within minutes again. Cleaning bots, well they keep your ship clean. Security droids are something you definitely should consider. When you no longer have a bodyguard, they can act as such. They also guard your ship, internally and externally. They can be independently controlled or under central control of a higher AI.”
An immediate thought came to mind about the security droids. Something to ponder when I got some.
“You have convinced me. Add what you think the ship will need.” I paused a moment. “Will the AI be moveable?”
“Yes, it could be easily moved from one ship to another. The best ones can control multiple ships. Secondary ships get a sort of clone version of the original, and when in range, they respond as one.”
“Good. I’ll leave you to figure out what is doable.”
“I love a good challenge,” he said. “I will be back to you as soon as the design work is complete.”
We said our goodbyes, and the three of us headed off home.
Sixteen
When did a hotel room become home I wondered, sitting back in my easy chair. That felt odd. I’d never really called my real home on Gaia, home. Outback was my official home, but it had never actually been home. And now home was a hotel room on a space station a year away from where I left? Was I that detached from what everyone else viewed as a normal home? What was normal? I needed to get a grip. Down that road was madness.
Three pulses came in from different service people. The first was about the service uniforms I needed. The second was the ‘basics manual’. I threw the manual onto my pad. The third was the military overlay for the social settings. I brought up what it was ‘showing’. The social seemed unchanged, although I noticed that a current stunner license was listed. I guess that was for station security to easily check if the guns I wore were licensed or not. I switched it over to military, and the display remained the same only with added information. This included my rank, service, superior officer and a status of ‘detached service’. Underneath was my medal, and my kill score. Interesting, but time wasting. I turned it off.
I realized with a start that I hadn’t had the suit program from George yet. I also remembered I hadn’t had any contact with Alison today.
I pinged Alison asking how she was and when she would be by. Then I pinged George. An auto-respond came back from both of them to the effect that they were out and would get back to me. Sounded like the Colonel had them on a mission of some kind.
I dived back into designing the HUD overlay. Time went by.
“Food?” said Amanda, and I jumped clear out of the chair and fell back heavily on my left side. Again. She completely cracked up.
“That doesn’t get old.” She laughed. I gave her ‘the look’. She laughed harder.
“Why don’t we go out? Is there a good Chinese on the station? Do you like Chinese?” I asked.
“Yes there is, and yes we do.”
“Who else is available?”
“Just us three. Everyone else is working.” Pause. “Let me rephrase that, everyone is working but the two of us can eat while we work, and where you go, we go. Who pays?”
“I do.”
She went blank for a moment.
“They have a table held for us. You want to change or go as we are?”
“Were you intending to change?”
“Nope, but we can if you want to.”
“I don’t want.”
“Then this way, kind sir”, she said, waving her arm towards the door. I stood, and she looped an arm around my arm, and off we went. Outside the hotel, Aleesha met up with us and looped an arm around my other arm, and the three of us walked arm in arm along the mall.
“No high kick steps or goose-stepping,” I said. They looked at me. “What? Where is your sense of humours? Haven’t you seen stage performers doing high kicks with their arms locked together, or old newsreels of goose-stepping soldiers?” Silence. “Oh for pete’s sake lighten up the two of you.”
I caught a quiet mumble from Amanda. “Weird,” she said. I pretended not to notice.
It did not take too long to get to the restaurant. We did draw some attention along the way. Identical twins with the local hero, all armed to the teeth. Who wouldn’t take notice? I tried very hard not to notice.
The manager met us at the door, effusive welcomes, and a round of applause by the patrons. I pretended not to notice.
We were led to a table in what appeared to be the exact center of the place. Three sixty degrees of stares. I pretended not to notice.
The waitress came over to our table. I noticed.
Short, cute, littl
e black skirt, nice arse. I pretended not to notice.
Amanda hit me on the arm. I stifled a groan and pretended not to notice.
“Wine ladies?” I asked. Two identical shakes of the head. I motioned a negative to the waitress but she didn’t notice. She handed me the wine menu, and I politely handed it back. She apologized effusively and almost ran away.
The manager came over with three menus and neatly dropped our serviettes into our laps. I picked mine up and put it back on the table, folded into quarters. We asked for water, and I asked for a fork. All three of them looked at me. The manager walked off.
“A fork? In a Chinese restaurant?” demanded Aleesha. “Are you trying to insult them?”
“So I never mastered chop sticks. Shoot me.” A hand snaked downwards. “No, don’t shoot me. Just allow me the dignity of a fork.”
I opened up my menu and the girls did likewise. I scanned rapidly down the list. Everything looked good.
“Are we eating communal? Or being selfish?” That got another look. I laughed. “Are we sharing or eating our own plates?”
“Sharing,” they said together. “I hate eating plates, too gritty,” added Aleesha deadpan. We all laughed.
“What do you fancy?” I asked. Both of them smirked. “To eat!” I added hastily. I felt like we were rapidly losing control of the evening. On the other hand, maybe that was a good idea.
Our waitress came back to take our orders. She brought with her a tray with a bottle of water and three glasses, and a fork. She placed a glass beside each of us, the fork next to my chop sticks, and then poured water all over my hand as I held the glass for her. I pretended not to notice.
More apologies and a rapid mopping of water later and we had full glasses. Were we ready to order? We were.
“Can we have a Mongolian Beef please, and the Sweet and Sour Pork Authentic,” I requested.
“The Honey Prawns,” added Amanda.
“The Lemon Chicken,” added Aleesha.
“Large fried rice,” I added. "And the mixed entrée for three. And we will have them all in the middle of the table so we can share.”
She nodded and went blank, obviously pinging the order to the kitchen.
“Will that be all?” she said. Yes thanks we murmured. She did a sort of half bob, half bow, turned and walked straight into another server who was carrying a full load of food. There was a massive crash as waitress, server and food went down in a big mess of broken plates. I pretended not to notice.
With cleanup operations under way, I enquired about what the rest of the team were up to. Neither of the girls knew. Amanda then asked what I’d been up to all afternoon, so I told them about the overlay in detail, and continued to as we ate our entrée which had been brought by another server. As the dishes were being cleared away, I finally noticed the glazed look on both their faces, and it was obvious this had nothing to do with PC usage. I fell silent and pretended not to notice.
Fortunately, the main courses arrived. With them came a bottle of champagne and three glasses, and before we knew it we were having a toast. None of us really wanted alcohol, but it would have been discourteous to have refused.
We helped ourselves to wonderful food until we could not eat another mouthful. There was a fair bit left over.
The waitress came over to check if we wanted anything more.
“Can I have a 'doggy bag' for the leftovers please?” Everything around us stopped. All eyes settled on me.
“What?” I demanded. Silence. “Can you do the leftovers as take away?” I clarified. Smiles and a number of head shakes. The waitress went off with the dishes. There were no accidents this time.
“Did you know that sometimes you are really weird?” asked Amanda.
“I decided a long time ago to embrace my weirdness. I’m working on making ‘weird’ into an art form.” They both laughed.
A short time later, my 'doggy bag' came back. We got up to leave. We stopped by the pay station and the manager pinged me the bill. I looked at it. There was no mention of champagne and only three meals instead of five. I smiled at him and gave him a short formal bow of the head. I added a good sized tip on the total and triggered the drop account to make payment. Then I pinged the waitress and thanked her for her great service. She went white, which I pretended not to notice.
We had just gone out the door, when a threat warning popped up. My right hand went for my gun.
“You gunna git it now you summabish. You-” My gun was up and I pumped out 12 rounds before I could get my finger off the trigger. The man standing across the passage way was propelled back against the wall and crashed down to the floor, his gun skidding off down the passageway. I holstered my gun. There was a moment of stunned silence followed by applause.
“How many hit him?” I asked generally.
“Two,” said Aleesha.
“We got to work on that,” said Amanda. “Tomorrow we hit the firing range and the gym.”
“You forgot to blow the smoke off your gun barrel too,” added Aleesha.
“Damn,” I said. “Next time.” Both girls shook their heads in wonder and I grinned at them.
“That was a pretty good reaction time though. You beat both of us,” said Amanda.
“Everything I’ve ever read about bad guys said to never let them monologue. Besides, his accent was so bad I couldn’t have stood listening to any more of that. Are we done standing around here, or do we have to wait for security?”
“I just told them we were heading back to the hotel, they will be here momentarily but we don’t need to wait,” answered Aleesha.
We started walking away.
“Just as well I had the take away in my left hand. Would have been a waste of good food if I’d thrown the doggy bag at him instead.” They looked at me and the three of us cracked up. We linked arms and laughed our way home. When we got back, I found an email on my pad from the Mercenary Guild.
My profile had an addition. ‘Total one on one combats: 1', followed by 'Total wins: 1’.
Seventeen
I’d gone to sleep with Amanda and woke up with Aleesha.
Let me rephrase that. I’d gone to bed alone, and been joined by Amanda soon after. I’d been lying on my good side, and she pressed up behind me. I didn’t need to see her to know who it was. I slept soundly all night. When I woke, I was on my back, and Aleesha was lying next to me.
She pecked me on the cheek and vanished into the bathroom. I lay there, trying to figure out if I hurt any less this morning than I had last night. The jury was still out when “Oi” sounded dramatically from the bathroom. I got up and padded in. There was a naked back pointing at me, so I stripped off my sleepers and went in and started soaping. Once her back, and general environs, was done, she rinsed off, toweled off and was gone. I stood there under the water flow, cranked up the heat a little, and let hot water flow over my bruises. Definitely more yellow than any other colour now, but I continued to ache all the way down. I was still standing there when Amanda came in behind me and started soaping my back, and environs. When done, we swapped and I did hers, we both finished up, toweled off and got dressed. Amanda headed into the kitchen, I headed for my easy chair. She followed to hers shortly after with a plate of food.
She took a big mouthful and I asked with a smile, “Are we actually sleeping together? Or are you afraid of sleeping alone?”
She choked. “I’m not afraid of anything,” she responded forcefully. I raised my eyebrows to signify the need of a better answer. I must admit, I was starting to become confused.
“You’re confused,” she said. I nodded. “It’s about tomorrow.”
“Oh. Understood.” And I did. They could all be dead tomorrow. So they were getting as much comfort as possible while they could, without going the full distance of a constant orgy. I guess it was the same with Alison. It had been a case of ‘take love where you find it, for tomorrow might not come’. And that thought now had me worried about why I still hadn’t heard from her.
“Heard from Alison or George yet?” I asked. She shook her head.
I stuck my nose into my pad. I busied myself with the HUD overlay. Time passed. A pulse came in containing the suit programs. But no message of any kind.
“Got a pulse from George,” I said, “but no message of any kind”.
“That means they are ok, but still under operational security. Good sign. Knowing him, he did the pulse under cover of someone else’s message activity.”
We went back to what we were doing. I’d manipulated the overlay to do pretty much what I wanted. I’d set up a series of definitions for ship status each with its own colours. So instead of a blue or red designation, the display should now show a variety of colour representing real information about each ship. As well as that, key conditions, like ships with a bounty on them, and Bounty Hunters on the hunt not only displayed as orange, but a small summary as well. That included the number of bounties outstanding and total worth, and the kill total of the pilot. If I was going to take on a Bounty Hunter, I wanted some idea of how good he or she was before committing. The information was subjective of course, but everything helped. Until I was out in space again near a traffic flow, that was about all I could do. I’d coded it to use whatever information was available. So if I decided to release the overlay for sale, anyone who had access to one of the guilds information and/or official government information, could use the overlay and it would give them whatever information was available. Obviously the most information came from all sources, and that is what I would be using.
Hero at Large (The Hunter Legacy Book 1) Page 11