The capsule's onboard computer was no longer helping the crew keep in touch, so Ron and Jeanne switched to communicating through the helmets' data module. The batteries in the helmets had been dead for a hundred and thirty years of traveling through the wormhole, so they each had to spend ten units of Orgmat to recharge them. Transmission range depended on Perception, and speed depended on Data Processing.
In general, the bodies of synthesans were themselves devices, apparatus built on organic principles. Any synthesan could communicate with devices and other synthesans without the module in the helmet, but in this case, the range was greatly reduced. Without a helmet, the signal range was equal to Perception. For Ron , it was now only two meters. The module in the helmet greatly increased the transmission range.
Ron stood before the airlock doors, eyeing the darkening stain from the plasma torch, as he awaited Jeanne's signal. Next to him, the 005 buildbot was puffing. Its hull gave off a palpable heat, and the reactor startup process was at 564 / 1,000.
"Hey, colleague," Ron said. "As if you don't need any additional cooling?"
Ron displayed the buildbot's status data in front of him. The temperature was above normal, in the yellow zone. But that was because Ron had tampered with the buildbot and removed the casing that was involved in heat transfer. In addition, the entire hull was covered with rolls of polyester steel, with which the engine was to be patched. This did not contribute to heat dissipation either.
"I hope, colleague, you don't intend to suddenly explode, ending our inglorious attempt to colonize Locus?"
The buildbot winked its indicators as if to say, "After what you've done to me, colleague, I'm not promising anything anymore..."
Jeanne came on the comms:
"Open the airlock, and move immediately to the right. Stay as close to the side of the capsule as possible. Whatever happens, stay close to the side. Don't try to go back or run in any other direction. Understood?"
Ron opened the lock cover and manually moved the airlock opening slider.
The flaps started to slide open, but immediately froze. Because the bandits had tried to hack them from the outside with a torch, the opening mechanism had jammed. Ron had to use the buildbot. With its mechanical manipulators, he forced one door panel fully open.
"What's taking so long?" Jeanne asked irritably. "And why are you making noise like a squad of battle robots?"
Ron stepped onto the ground of the new planet, not without trepidation...
He had seen this landscape through cameras before, but in person, the planet Locus looked different. He felt a wave of disorientation as he took in the sky cluttered with gray clouds, the pale blue chain of mountains on the horizon, and the unbearably green thickets of unknown plants scattered across the steppe in small groups. Near one group of thickets stood two armored bandit vehicles.
The synthesan's senses picked up the thick and humid atmosphere of the planet, full of odors: swamp, grass, and fresh soil that the capsule had turned around during the emergency landing.
But each of these smells felt different than they did on Earth, in virtual reality, or even in the greenhouses beneath the Moon Domes. And it wasn't just the synthetic body's system of touch. After all, synthesans copied the functions of human bodies as much as possible, excluding some cases. It's just that everything on Locus was different. Even the familiar smells.
"I’m speechles, colleague," Ron muttered. "Are we really on another planet?"
"You idiot!" Jeanne suddenly shouted in her helmet. "I told you to go straight to the right! Where are you going? What the hell are you thinking?"
Ron hurriedly ran to the right and pressed himself against the side of the capsule. And just in time! At the spot where he had just stood, dozens of earthen whirlwinds surged up. They were accompanied by the distinctive sound of gunfire. The whirlwinds did not subside, gradually approaching Ron. He panicked, wondering where to escape to.
"Freeze in place," Jeanne ordered. "He has a limited firing sector. There's a safe zone along the side."
Before Ron reached half a meter, the whirlwinds showered him with earth one last time and fell silent.
"What a waste," Ron said. "At least two hundred bullets! Yes, and gunpowder requires complex production chains and a chemical plant."
"If he's that wasteful of bullets," Jeanne agreed, "that means he has a lot of them."
"I told you Locus was an advanced planet," Ron said. "Squandering resources is a sign of a highly developed civilization."
As he assessed their situation, Ron had a realization. Now he understood why Jeanne had ordered them to starboard. Although to reach the left side maneuvering engine required going around the entire capsule, the way to the left was completely open to the armored car's machine gun.
"What should I do about the buildbot?" Ron asked. "When it comes out of the airlock, the aborigine in the armored car will shoot it. And considering that there is a reactor inside it, one lucky hit and there will be a hole of several kilometers."
Instead of answering, several yellow cylinders flew from the roof of the capsule. Jeanne threw them so that they were lined up along the side of the capsule.
The indicators on the cylinders flashed frantically. After a couple seconds, smoke billowed from the cylinders. Under the control of the electromagnetic field, the smoke lined up in a dense wall. On top of that, the cylinders were running interference systems that distorted the data from most known sighting devices, like thermal imagers, organic material detectors, or phenom radiation. Even communications with Jeanne began to be intermittent because of the interference.
"Understood," Ron said. "Let's hide in the fog of war."
He summoned the buildbot. In the interface he tied a movement marker to himself and ran along the side. The smoke screen created a corridor of safety. But not for long.
The machine gun on the armored vehicle was working again—the bandit was firing at random. The bullets passed through the veil, pulling a tail of smoke behind them. Several bullets struck the side of the 005, clinking against the rolls of polyester steel.
"Shit, motherfucker, bitch, oh," Ron muttered, running along the side of the capsule. "Colleague, this is not how I envisioned peaceful construction for the good of mankind."
The buildbot kept rolling behind him, its silicone caterpillars steadily negotiating the uneven ground, although the extra weight was trying to push them deeper into the loose soil.
When he reached the aft part of the capsule, Ron ducked around the corner, and the buildbot followed him. An icon appeared in the interface indicating that communication with Jeanne had been re-established.
After running the entire length of the stern, Ron turned right again. Now there were twenty meters left to run and there it was, the shunting engine smoking....
The bandit started his armored car and began to drive around the capsule.
Jeanne cheered: "Don't worry, he's afraid to drive into the crater—the wheels would get stuck."
"But what's to stop him from shooting at me?"
"Do your job," Jeanne retorted. "And do it soon. I can sense with all my new and beautiful ass that the aborigine will soon be joined by his friends."
Despite their personal feud, Ron trusted Jeanne completely when it came to professional duties. At least, for now. Old Jeanne Chou was a police SWAT fighter. She liked to give orders. She used an orderly tone even when she asked Ron, "How are you?" He felt that if he didn't answer in time, she would twist his arms and slam his forehead against the wall, shouting, "I'm asking you how you are, you bastard!"
Trying to ignore the sounds of the armored vehicle rumbling somewhere behind the crater's earthen rampart, Ron removed rolls of polyester steel from the buildbot. Armed with a magnetic-force wrench, he assessed the extent of the damage.
The events following the capsule's entry into Locus's atmosphere gradually became clear to him. Apparently, the bandits had fired on the capsule twice. The first shell had hit the maneuvering engine, and the second had already hit the exact spot where the orgmat tank was located.
"Colleague," Ron turned to buildbot 005. "Do you have any thoughts on why the locusians needed to shoot us down?"
The buildbot, of course, didn't answer. Ron highlighted the area of engine damage in his interface and gave the command to clean it up.
In the corner of the interface, the logs glittered again:
5 seconds of Builder phenom activity.
2 seconds of Builder phenom activity.
10 seconds of Builder phenom activity.
Orgmat: 5,915.6 / 6,000.
Ron had already outlined the scope and order of work. First, the fuel lines needed to be repaired. Then to fix the rotary mechanism—the impact of the rocket did not damage it completely, but significantly distorted its contours. God knows what troubles may occur during the flight or even at the launch. It is better to make the engine as good as new right away. Finally, we need to completely redesign the mockup of the shroud that covered the maneuvering engine.
"Twenty minutes' work, my colleague," Ron said. "Or, as an engineer should estimate the work—for three hundred units of orgmat. And that's still too long, given our shitty circumstances."
With its manipulators, the "colleague" bent back the corroded sheets of plating, changed the manipulator attachment to a plasma torch and cut away all the excess, revealing the veins of the fuel lines that ran deep into the hull of the capsule.
Brown crystals glistened in the places where the lines were broken—the fuel had turned into them when it came into contact with the atmosphere of Locus.
Ron changed the mode on the magnetic-force wrench.
— Impulse Jab —
Focuses the wrench's force field on a single point, then releases a pulse charge.
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Beam length depends on Perception: 20 cm.
Orgmat consumption: 5 units per second of use.
Recharge time: 12 seconds.
Attention, the recharge time is taken into account when consuming orgmat. It is not recommended to use this mode when the orgmat supply is low.
Ron pointed the magnetic-force wrench at the fuel crystals, choosing the place for the injection and choosing the distance so as not to hit the fuel line:
"And mind you, colleague, we are not enemies of the locusians, but colonists like them. We bring them news from Earth. New technology, new instructions for the sabject printers. New buildbots, cool ones like you, my colleague. And they..."
An invisible beam stabbed into the center of a single crystalline growth. Numerous cracks ran from the epicenter of the injection, and part of the crystal shattered into shards.
Ron reflexively covered his eyes with his hands. Then he remembered the safety precautions and lowered the transparent visor of his helmet.
"I don't have the luxury of replacing damaged body parts like you do," Ron said.
Jeanne Chou trusted Ron completely, though she enjoyed intimidating the cocky engineer. The mentors at the center claimed he was incredibly talented, but Jeanne scoffed at the idea of talent in a field where ninety percent of the work was done by buildbots or subject-printers.
"Let him be talented," she smirked. "As long as it doesn't require any special treatment."
The fact that Ron Cooper didn't require special treatment only infuriated Jeanne more. "What a pretentious ass," she thought. "He's talented but acts like he's just an average guy."
When he said it would take twenty minutes to fix the shunting engine, but he could do it in ten, she didn't question his competence.
"I'll give you all the time I can, my boy," she said and nestled back into the scope of her plasma rifle.
Jeanne had already unleashed a barrage of plasma fire at the lumbering armored personnel carrier, emptying a full energy cell in the process. Clusters of superheated matter slammed into the sides of the vehicle, shattering into glowing dust. They knocked chunks of molten armor off the behemoth, revealing a layer of some bright blue material underneath. And then her weapon became powerless—the blue material either absorbed or dissipated all the plasma energy without any apparent harm to itself.
"I guess it's Locusian tech?" Jeanne mused. "Normal armor protects against firearms, but this blue stuff shields against energy weapons?"
The machine gun on the armored vehicle answered Jeanne with sparse bursts. The horned Locusian wasn't saving ammo, but he understood the aliens' vulnerability, so he maneuvered around the capsule to target the engineer.
Rolling across the roof, Jeanne jumped down, landing almost knee-deep in the loose earth. Clawing her way out, she searched the body of the native who had earlier cut the airlock's flaps.
Focusing her augmented vision on each item she found, she read the descriptions. Tech or not, each object that connected to the synthesan's body provided information about its properties. Without this recognition, interfacing was impossible.
Jeanne's neural interface flashed: plasma cutter, plus some strength enhancement; Great Ramirez pistol, firearm, caliber details; fragmentation grenade; briquette of subracion; ammunition, more ammunition, even more ammunition....
But one item piqued her interest. Outwardly it resembled an engineer's tool. On one side of the device, a handhold was visible. On the other side was the tip of a thin transparent tube.
The cop's instincts told her that it was not quite a legitimate tool. Jeanne momentarily forgot about the armored car closing in on Ron:
"Come on, what the hell is this thing?"
— Sucky Sucky —
Manufacturer: I screwed your mom! Corporation!!!111
Sucks organics better than your mom.
UniCom Connect: 1 connector (arm).
Durability: 856 / 1,000.
Warning, this device is not compatible with your UniCom. This device requires a Ramireizer phenom to function.
"Well, well," Jeanne muttered, surveying the scene. "Has the lawlessness on Locus reached the point where they're harvesting orgmat not from donors, but from each other?"
Jeanne continued her search. In one of the UniCom slots she found a second instrument with a name matching the first one:
— Fucky Fucky —
Manufacturer: I screwed your mom! Corporation!!!111
Blocks communication with the emergency rebirth server. Pump Perception to screw them all.
UniCom Connect: 1 connector (case).
Signal blocking radius depends on your Perception level.
Durability: 453 / 1,000.
Warning, this device is not compatible with your UniCom. Warning, this device requires a Ramireizer phenom to function.
"Oh, things on Locus are even worse than they seemed..."
Jeanne transferred the loot into her satchel.
As one might guess, the Ramireizer phenom was in the body of the dead native. Jeanne dragged it into the pod and dumped it on the floor.
"Let Ron figure out what was what," she thought.
She wanted to search the body of the second bandit, the one with the sniper, but Ron's timid voice crackled in her helmet:
"Jeanne? Are you still on this planet? There's this... I'm about to be killed..."
"Running, running!"
Jeanne rushed to the second aboriginal armored car. Fortunately, its door was open.
After she jumped into the driver's seat, the interface downloaded all the necessary data about speed, fuel type, and other specifications.
It even surprised her:
Ramirez's Dick device is fully compatible with your UniCom!
"Holy shit, what a name for a car! What kind of horny Ramirez is this?"
Jeanne slung her rifle behind her back and put her hands on the steering wheel. A jab in her left palm confirmed the connection, and the armored car sped off, throwing a fountain of loose earth into the air.
The capsule's hull vibrated with the strain of atmospheric entry as Ron finished the repairs. He grimaced at the readout:
"The repairs took more than three hundred units of orgmat. The fuel crystals were stronger than usual—most likely an effect of exposure to the Locus atmosphere. I had to use the pulse jab more than a dozen times."
Ron stared disconsolately at the line:
Orgmat: 4,991.6/6,000.
"I won't live to see the first harvest from the donators," he muttered.
There was good news, though. The work had strengthened the Orgmat's ties and yielded a result:
— Improved attribute linkage! —
"Touch" +1 Touch: 3 (6)
As in the game, the first improvements came quickly, but each subsequent enhancement required more time as the intra- and intermolecular bonds in the orgmat grew more complex.
Ron shifted his gaze to the turret of an armored personnel carrier that peeked above the earthen berm. There was nowhere to run—to the right and left stretched the impenetrable wall of the capsule.
"Jeanne? Are you still on this planet?" Ron asked, his voice tight. "There's this... I'm about to be killed."
After hearing her answer, he ordered buildbot 005 to stand in front, covering him. "Sorry, colleague," he said to the bot, "but let the aggressive Locusian know that by shooting at me, he may hit your reactor as well."
An alert flashed in his interface:
— ? —
Slave_of_the_Great_Ramirez_602 invites you to join the general conversation.
Ron authorized the connection, and the enemy's voice crackled through his headphones, dull and unenthusiastic:
"What are you doing all this for?" muttered Slave_of_the_Great_Ramirez_602. "You think you're the first ones to be so cocky? Ramirez will catch everyone and subdue them. Even if you run away to the territories of free alliances, we'll get you there too. The Great Ramirez will soon make everyone his slave. But you were wrong not to open the airlock. Now the Great Ramirez will block your rebirth and erase your binary..."
"We just arrived at Locus," Ron said, bewildered. "What's going on? Why are you attacking us? Why—"
"Can't you see what's going on?" the slave replied sadly. "Outrage and lawlessness. I'm sorry, friend, but I'm going to have to kill you. I'll be careful not to hit the buildbot's reactor, don't worry."
The turret on the armored personnel carrier swiveled, its muzzle zeroing in on Ron.
"Wait! Explain what the—"
The turret twitched sharply, beginning to turn, but not in time. A second armored car burst from behind the earth rampart at great speed, slamming into the side of the first. The impact sent the slave's vehicle careening, teetering precariously on the crater's slope.
"Oh, man, what are you guys doing?" Slave_of_the_Great_Ramirez_602 whined in the chat. "Why would you do that..."
His armored vehicle couldn't hold its balance. It flipped, tumbling down the slope. After several bone-jarring rolls, the armored car came to rest on its roof, wheels spinning uselessly in the air.
Jeanne climbed out of the ramming vehicle, staggering slightly but gripping her rifle firmly. The impact had clearly taken its toll.
"Why are you standing there?" she shouted. "Run to the capsule, start the engines!"
Ron sprinted along the side, buildbot 005 clanking behind him. He glanced back several times, witnessing Jeanne drag Ramirez's slave from the overturned wreck. Both of the enemy's arms hung at unnatural angles, broken in the collision.
Ron's stomach lurched as he saw Jeanne press her rifle barrel to the slave's head. A plasma charge at that range would destroy at least ten percent of the binary array's integrity, even with emergency rebirth protocols. Bad luck for the slave—Jeanne wasn't one to show mercy to an opponent.
When Ron looked back one final time, Ramirez's slave lay motionless, smoke and plasma sparks rising from where his head had been. Jeanne knelt before the body, searching it efficiently. To an outsider, it might have looked like she was praying over her victim.
Ron burst into the pod, immediately tripping over another Locusian corpse. "Where did you come from?" he muttered, regaining his balance.
Returning to the capsule felt like coming home, its walls a comforting embrace of safety. Ron dashed to the project panel, where the Labsetec Corporation logo spun in an endless loading cycle.
The manual control panel was tucked into the nose of the capsule. According to the landing protocol, the pilot shouldn't need it—they could control the capsule directly through their interface, using the appropriate phenom to send commands to the onboard computer. But the designers hadn't anticipated colonists actually disabling the on-board comp. Now the control panel was buried behind containers and crates, every inch of the capsule's space utilized for precious cargo.
"Clear a space in front of the panel," Ron ordered the buildbot. "And please, colleague, hurry!"
Jeanne sprinted into the capsule, breathless. "It seems the Great Ramirez himself, our local celebrity, is on his way to greet us personally."
She removed her helmet, the advanced UniCom automatically folding it into a satchel on her back. Only combat models could do that—civilian versions simply detached, left dangling by straps.
"Armored cars are approaching from all sides," Jeanne reported grimly. "At least twenty of them."
"Things must be pretty bad on this planet," she added, "if this kind of hardware is at the disposal of a psycho who names his vehicles and slaves after himself and his genitals."
Jeanne stood by the manual control panel, clearly at a loss without visual cues—the capsule lacked windows entirely.
Ron approached the open airlock. "I'll be your eyes."
The capsule's hull shuddered as the engines began to warm up. Ron listened with satisfaction to their smooth operation—his repairs had been successful.
Clouds of earth and rock pelted the open airlock. Through the debris, Ron caught glimpses of the sky, where several light, twin-seat helicopters hovered ominously. Each craft held a pilot and a gunner, the latter's legs dangling from open doors.
"Attention," Jeanne called out, "starting the takeoff."
The engines' roar intensified, accompanied by a deafening whoosh. Ron barked an order, and the buildbot extended its arms, wrapping them securely around his waist. The capsule shook violently, the floor tilting at a sickening angle. A couple of containers, freed from their securing slots earlier, slid across the floor, accompanied by the grim cargo of the dead bandit's corpse.
With a final, earth-shaking rumble, the capsule began to rise.
