B2-11 - The Core of the Problem (Patreon)

“Have you actually taken the time to examine the ship in your possession?” Veskari asked as Maya, Tender, and Bell entered the bridge of Shen’s ship. 

Maya paused. “I know that tone. Mother used to use it a lot. I did something wrong.” 

“I’m asking this as nicely as I can, but did you even try to figure out how to use this ship?” Veskari asked again. 

Maya cast a glance at Bell who shrugged and Tender was silent. 

“Uh… I was pretty busy. Saving mankind and all that.” 

Veskari gave a sigh, which was impressive seeing as he had no lungs and was a golden orb that had been plugged into the ship. His voice came out of hidden speakers about the bridge. 

Maya looked around the bridge of Shen’s ship, she really needed to come up with a better name than that. It wasn’t as if the thought never occurred to her, but it was still Shen’s ship, it wasn’t hers. It was his. The vessel had been the place of many horrors and if there were such things as ghosts, this place would be ground zero. 

Maya rubbed her head with her metal cast. She had only seven hours left in her regrow, but she was already tiring of the metal block. She could feel her hand itching underneath it and Nan stated it would only get worst. How much worst? She didn’t know, but it would get real bad. More joyous things to look forward to. 

“Give it to me straight, Vesky. Don’t sugarcoat it for me. I’m a big girl wearing my big girl pants.” 

“You are severely under utilizing this ships systems and even the cores in your possession.” 

“Hmmm… not bad,” Maya said. 

“Your inefficiency in the use of this ship borders on criminal mismanagement.” 

“That hurts.” Maya flinched. “Food, shelter, saving mankind, fending off rogue AIs, and trying to learn all this system tech stuff from only a couple of knowledge cubes and manuals is time consuming. I didn’t get a user manual on how to run the ship at optimal levels.”

“I begin to understand that,” Veskari said. 

“So what’s wrong?” 

“In short, everything. The ship’s core is only running at a quarter of its power, the weapons systems and defense systems haven’t been activated even after the rogue AI attack, there are numerous maintenance issues that are beginning to become serious threats, and for the three mana cores, you are seriously hampering their collection of ambient mana.” 

“Keep explaining, please.” 

“You know what ambient mana is?” 

“Of course. Magic space particles that get chomped on by everyone in the multiverse.” 

Veskari sighed. “From the readings I’ve taken and what I remember of the multiverse at large, this dimensional plane has about one tenth of the ambient mana that exists in the rest of the multiverse.”

“Yeah, everyone’s been saying the mana’s on the low side here,” Maya said. 

“There is very low mana in this whole plane and you have three Category V mana cores within less than a kilometer from one another.” 

“Keep your cores close; keep your cores safe.” 

“You realize mana cores condense ambient mana, right?” 

“That’s what people have said, yes.” 

“I think she’s trying to lead you to an answer, boss,” Tender said. 

“I get that. I’m just not getting what she’s trying to say.” 

Veskari sighed again. “With the low ambient mana and three Cat V cores in one area, they are actively competing against one another to recharge themselves. You say that it takes five standard days to recharge the cores, if they were correctly placed and not competing against one another, you could cut down that time to less than two standard days.” 

Maya chewed on the information and turned to Bell and Tender. “Did you guys know this?” 

“I just woke up,” Bell said. 

“I do not have information on mana cores at my disposal,” Tender replied. 

“But you both know about cores and such, right? Not from actual studying of them, but from general osmosis of knowledge kind of stuff.”

“I just woke up.” 

“I do not-“

“Yeah,” Maya frowned. She turned to face Veskari’s core and rubbed her head. “Well, setting out a core all by it’s lonesome is not going to happen,” she said. “We might as well batter them up and deep fry them because all the damned rogue AIs are gonna show up hankering for a slice of that core.” 

“I understand that, I’m just stating the facts as I see them.” 

“Right. Can we shut down two of the cores and let one do it’s recharge thing?” Maya asked. 

“Shutting down a core is a difficult process, it will still be absorbing ambient mana at a lesser rate, but then it will have to undergo a restarting sequence that could take an entire standard day.” 

“Right, gotta keep that boiler hot,” Maya tapped her hand on her cast. “Well, shit. Maybe we can just hop around the plane with the cores dangling out there.”

“That would not be advisable,” Veskari stated. 

“Yeah, no shit.” Maya sighed. “Let me think on this. We need the two cores to open the threshold. It’s a weird thing, we’re not actually drawing mana when the threshold is opened, but the mana cores still need to be there. Once the dimensional bridge is built and the cage is active, then it begins drawing mana. The more mana we got on hand, the longer we can keep the bridge open and connected. We need more cores.”

“We have Big Snake’s core,” Tender said. “It is a small one, comparable to the pub core.” 

Maya smirked, just a few weeks ago it was the pub mana core that had been the only thing keeping them alive. Now they were swimming in cores, but those same cores were emptying the pool of ambient mana they were wading in.

“What about the mana batteries powering the stasis pod?” Bell asked. “I have seen their like, very expensive and long lasting. They can be recharged, yes?”  

“Of course. Nan has removed the stasis pod from the battery power source and has connected it to the ship’s core. A much stable energy source,” Veskari stated. “To recharge a single one of those batteries will require the collected mana of one and a half of these Cat V cores.” 

“Really?” Maya was amazed. “There’s six of those bad boys, so you’re saying they’ll suck up nine full mana cores?” 

“Yes.” 

Maya began chuckling. “Hey, Tender. How long do you think you’d be able to run off of one of those batteries at full charge?” 

Tender paused for a second. “Twenty two standard years.” 

“What about one of those mechas with a beam gun strapped to it?” 

“Forty standard years.” 

“Two beam guns?”

“Twenty three standard years.”  

Maya grinned. “Four beam guns?”

“Eight standard years.” 

“Daily battles like the one we fought yesterday?” 

“Seven standard weeks.” 

“You drive a hard bargain, Tender. But I think you got me sold on the idea.” 

“Boss?” 

“I’m sorry to interrupt, but Yositari is ready to be removed from the statsis gel,” Nan’s voice came through the comms. 

Maya grinned.”Oh, man. I wanna see this.” 

***

“So a full core isn’t drawing on ambient mana?” Maya asked as the trio walked into the medical room. 

“It still draws in ambient mana, but at a very reduced rate. Mana cores always draw in mana, regardless if they are at capacity or shut down. Yet if one core is fully charged, the ambient mana available for other cores increases,” Veskari responded. His golem core was still on the bridge, but he was also within the ship itself. Therefore he could see, hear, and respond to anything asked of him. A bit creepy, but Maya ignored it for the time being.

“We can do a half charge on these batteries, right?” 

“Yes, but doing so will eventually corrupt the battery.” 

“Of course.” 

Nanaseto was in her holographic form and standing over Yosi’s pod. There were an array of machinery and devices stacked around the pod. Even with her Evaluation Skill she couldn’t identify more than half of them. 

“Yositari will not awaken once she is removed,” Nan began. “Consciousness will be a slow process, her body has slight damage, but long term stasis also comes with its own set of problems. Especially if one has been under for over twenty thousand standard years.” Nan moved around the pod and began manipulating tools to remove the transparent covering of the tube. A series of mechanical arms dropped down from the ceiling, a brief memory came to Maya as she had seen similar arms in the Hanganathorie. 

Maya and Bell took a seat on a bed and watched, while Tender sat by the door, seemingly staring off into space. She couldn’t see Veskari, but she could almost feel a palpable presence in the room, watching everything and waiting with bated breath. 

“Ease up, Vesky. Nan’s the best, plus she’s from your neck of the woods. She’s got this,” Maya said. 

“I do not question the AI Nanaseto’s abilities, I only worry about complications,” Veskari’s voice responded. 

There was a soft pop and one of the machine arms hanging down from the ceiling removed the glass plate from the tube. A smell like disinfectant filled the room as the small dinosaur looking creature was exposed. Maya peered at the figure with interest, seeing that its body was encased in the gel like substance. 

From the quick manual download she found on the stasis pod, Maya knew that the gel’s main component was the blood of some kind of space whale. Dangerous to obtain, but also highly sought after for its wide range of usage. 

“Are these space whales being hunted to extinction?” Maya asked. 

It was Veskari who answered. “There are multiple types of creatures that produce the specialty ingredients to create stasis gel,” he said. 

“It’s not about the animal itself,” Bell said. “It’s about the mana trace that makes up the creature. It’s the reason that on any world one can find the ingredients to make healing potions and other alchemical items, the plant or creatures involved in creating those items doesn’t matter, only their mana trace.” 

“Ah.” Maya said. “So there could be space whales like this in my universe?” 

“From what I understand,” Veskari began, “it is difficult for pre-Integrated life to evolve in the vacuum of space. Therefore newly integrated worlds tend to not have the diversity of space faring lifeforms as older established Integrated universes.” 

“So no space whales?” Maya frowned. 

“Doubtful. Although that does mean your universe is currently a much safer place to travel around in, older Integrated universes tend to be… rich in life,” Veskari stated. 

“They’re a bloody nuisance,” Zono’s voice suddenly butted in. 

“Hey, I thought you were busy fixing yourself?”

“I got the message that the little Tari was getting pulled out of her tube,” Zono said. “But let me tell you, space creatures are a nightmare. Whole fleets get wiped out by them, whole wars had to grind to a halt because some migratory creatures were passing through a star system. Not to mention that the damage they can cause to a living world too.” 

“The Sword of the Universe is on a constant campaign to eliminate the larger instances of space faring creatures, to keep our nation’s trade routes open,” Tender state from the door. “I hear it is a intensive process, but also provides the Sword of the Universe with experience points needed for them to grow.” 

Maya chewed on the information and watched intently as Nan began to clear away the gel with her mechanical arms. They moved with efficient dexterity about the body, chipping away at the harden gel and at the same time not touching her body. 

“At this stage,” Nan said, “the body is very fragile. The gel had hardened and caused some molecular changes to the skin exposed to the gel. It can tear, rip, or shred easily. Therefore patience and care is required to remove it.” 

“Can the gel be used again?” Maya asked. 

“Perhaps in the unused stasis pods, but this gel has been active for too long now. Within another thousand standard years, it would have degraded until it could not keep the SIL in suspended animation.” 

Everyone remained quiet and watched after that. The room held an expectant breath as they watched Nan chip away at the gel. Small flakes fell to the deck where another arm immediately sucked them up. As half of the body was freed, another machine rose down from the ceiling and clamped down over Yosi’s face. Lights began blinking and Nan allowed them access to the holographic monitor that she could see. 

Maya grimaced at the detailed image of a series of microscopic tubes tunneling into Yosi’s lungs, heart, and other organs. This process had required some Tier 2 tech and Maya watched with sick fascination as organs were rebuilt on the fly. After a long moment the heart gave a jerk and stuttered, a moment later it began beating. 

Yosi’s body then jerked to life, the small alien’s back arched and it’s inverted legs kicked out, the eyes opened up and wide violet eyes frantically rolled around. 

“She is not awake,” Nan stated calmly. “This is a body’s normal reaction.” 

Maya felt sick as she watched Yosi thrash and shudder on the table. The little creature gave out a shrill screech through the mask covering her face.  Bell looked horrified and after a moment he left the room.

“Let him process,” Nan stated as Maya got up to follow him. “Your intervention will only hinder.” 

Maya frowned, but sat back down. Nan did know best.

What followed was another half hour of Yosi jerking, shuddering, and occasionally letting out strangled cries of pain. It looked horrible, but Nan stated Yosi wasn’t really feeling anything. Her brain was still ‘asleep’ and would need some repairs for her to gain full functionality. 

Maya sighed, feeling slightly sick. “Tell me when she’s out of the gel,” she said. “I need… I need to do something.” 

“Return in five hours to get your cast removed.” Nan said as she was in the process of peeling off dead skin on Yosi. “I should be done in another hour.” 

“Right,” Maya said and hurriedly left the room. Tender followed. Even Zono had left, mumbling about needing to do his own repairs.

***

“So this black goo is like your blood, right?” Maya asked as she tried to take her mind off what she had seen by tearing chunks out of Big Snake. It was different when it wasn’t a flesh and blood creature, she told herself. 

“Blood is not the correct term, it is a conductive gel that enables mana to be used in areas of high need. It passively collects ambient mana, but at a very slow rate.” 

Maya paused with those words. “But its made by all rogue AIs, right?”

“From what little information I have on rogue AIs that exist in the multiverse, they do not have this ‘black goo’. I believe it is an evolutionary adaptation to the low ambient mana of this plane. The ‘black goo’ helps in harnessing ambient mana, it also allows the rogue AI to ‘inject’ its stored mana into needed areas, weapons, motors, etc.” 

“But it’s made by rogue AIs?” 

“Yes.” 

“Can we make it?” 

“I do not know. The ‘black goo’ I have been using in my forms comes from the collected remains of our defeated foes,” Tender held up a bucket that was filled with black goo. 

Maya looked at the bucket and looked at Tender. She suddenly realized she hadn’t been paying all that much attention to things when she had helped rebuild his body after the battle with Shen. She had been mostly following his orders on where to put what and what to do, the fight having weighed heavily on her mind at the time. 

“We have the rogue AI manufacturing module,” Maya said. The manufacturing module had been the possession of either the Peacock Turtle AI or the Rat AI, it had been found in the engineering section of the ship and had been used to make components and craft items needed by the rogue AIs. “Can we make more of this black goo?” 

“It is a combination of mana stones and various other ingredients,” Tender said. “I believe the rogue AIs have been crushing up mana batteries, mixing them with other things, and creating this black goo.” 

“Its like rogue AI alchemy?” Maya grinned. 

“I suppose.” 

“Does the black goo have to be pumped, connected to a power source or anything? Or can it just hang out and collect mana.” 

“Ah, I see what you are getting at,” Tender said. “In essence the ‘black goo’ is like a mana battery, but one that can collect mana at the same time as storing it. It is not a mana core, although it may seem like it, for it is not actively pulling in ambient mana; it is just absorbing what it comes in contact with in a passive manner. Very inefficient and very slow.” 

“But if we get mana stones and figure out how these things are being made, we can create more of this black goo, right?” 

“I would think so.” 

Maya rubbed her cast and smiled. “Tell me, Tender. Are there places in the multiverse that have higher than normal ambient mana?”

Tender paused as he thought. “Of course, mana is not distributed evenly across the multiverse. Especially newly Integrated worlds, especially Point of Contact worlds.” 

Maya grinned even more. “What’s the general level of mana in a Point of Contact world?” 

“I do not know, especially this early into Integration. I would imagine that it would be very high.” 

Maya rubbed her cast again. “I got an idea,” she said. 

“I believe I see where you are going,” Tender replied. 

She rubbed her cast again, grimacing. “Aw, shit. I think the Itch is starting,” she said. She suddenly gasped in pain as her left hand felt like it caught on fire. It wasn’t an itch, it was a searing burning sensation that traveled up her arm.  

“Holy shit, that hurts!”