Derelict 3, Chapter 12

Chapter 12.

Slater’s Derelict was just about finished with the reset and while he waited for the next wave of challengers, Slater looked over the initial designs for the Franklin. There was a hard limit to how far his nanobots could permeate a vessel but based on his past experience, he felt he could do fine with an oversized battleship. There were several designs for the various human naval vessels in his database already, not to mention those of the gnomes he had acquired while breaking down their ships for salvage.

While the gnomes were not that innovative and offered him only a few upgraded tweaks to existing systems, the Chixturax plans were more intriguing. They were deficient in many areas, but their reactor designs had some potential upgrades that Slater wanted. He reluctantly pulled twenty percent of his research power from the kobold upgrade and placed it into reactor designs. Another area that the Chixturax were surprisingly good with were their launch bays for the shuttle craft they used. The system designed to store the small craft was efficient, allowing him to store more drones inside his ship once he finished their development. There was also an automated process for refueling and rearming their small craft, a bit surprising given they seemed to shrink from automating much else on the ship.

The more pressing needs for MOBS prevented Slater from pulling more research, but after the reactor upgrades, he would begin designing his own assault ship drone force for the new Franklin. This would involve even more research into boosting his core’s signal to reach further out into space. Slater was surprised when the restraint dome slammed closed over him, distracting him from his planning work. The hatch leading to his core room clanged open and standing there were the two Chixturax kids.

The kids were decked out in work coveralls and wore helmets designed for their strangely shaped heads. They pushed a large cart full of tools and scanning devices into the core room, making a show of scanning various things. Kraxton made a tour of the other compartments before returning the core room and worming a small monofiber probe past the restraint dome.

“Greetings, Slater, how is work on your Derelict progressing?” Bexlan asked. The fiber turned out to be a secure communication device. Data flowed into his core even as he talked with the Chixturax kids.

“I’m doing fine, what brings you two here? Is it even allowed for you to visit?” Slater asked.

“Oh, we’re fine, our father sent us under the pretext of performing ‘maintenance’ on the Chixturax core shard. He wanted us to leave some data for you and let you know they have secured a location for building our ships. The hive has gathered every credit they have, but we’ll still need you to win more for us,” Bexlan said.

“Having a place to build is good news, I’ve started on upgrading the design for your hive ship. I think that you’ll like the improvements I’m making. Just out of curiosity, do you know why the ship requires so much crew interaction in order to function? Many of the systems that are automated on other vessels require direct involvement of a crewmember on the Chixturax ship,” Slater asked.

“I don’t know much about ships, but I do know that they are considered our hive when we are in the stars. Everyone needs to contribute to the hive in some way, so perhaps they are trying to make sure everyone has a task that they need to complete? Many of our people become despondent when the have no means to serve the greater hive,” Bexlan said.

“Do your people spend a great deal of time on their ships? I would have thought you colonized several planets to call home,” Slater said.

“Yes, we hold a few colony worlds, but our home planet has been taken from us and until it is returned to the hive, we consider ourselves homeless. The ships are a temporary home, the colonies are a temporary home, but they will never feel permanent until Chixta is once again in Chixturax hands,” Kraxton added.

“My brother speaks rashly, the internal problems of our people are not to be aired to those outside the hive,” Bexlan admonished.

“I understand you need to keep some things secret, but I meant what I said when I offered to help your people. Let the elders know if they need something done to help liberate your hive world, I’ll be glad to assist,” Slater offered.

“Thank you, Slater, I think you mean what you say. You are a good friend,” Bexlan said.

“Enough with the chit chat, let’s talk about your Derelict, that last challenge went surprisingly well, but why didn’t you push harder to stop them in the entry chamber, look at all the forces you had left behind,” Kraxton said, gesturing toward the next compartment where his makeshift bridge was placed.

“Let me answer that question with a question. If you watched contestants attempt two different challenges, which one would you prefer. One would be a single large fight to stop the contestants cold in the entry compartment and the other would be a battle through several compartments with different MOBS, traps, compartment designs, and tactics,” Slater asked.

“The second would be more entertaining, is that what you’re trying to do?” Kraxton asked.

“Yes, it took me a bit to realize it, but were not here to try and stop the intruders as soon as possible, we’re here to entertain the crowd, and I intend to make my Derelict like nothing they’ve seen before. It will be deadly, don’t get me wrong, but it will first and foremost be entertaining to watch,” Slater said.

“I understand, and as you move up the ranks, we will be paid more per battle,” Bexlan advised.

“Can you get me any information on other core shards and how they’ve built their compartments?” Slater asked.

“Yes, I’ve added a couple to the data stream already, and we’ll try to get more. Sarton Station charges dearly for each copy and cracks down hard on any piracy of their entertainment material, so we could only afford two of the mid-ranked matches,” Kraxton said.

“That should be fine, I wanted to see what the shards were doing to draw in so many viewers, and I was frankly curious to watch a match from a different perspective,” Slater said.

“Father says that as you improve in ranking, the station will keep adding new compartments to your Derelict. We’ll also be allowed to leave you more salvage when you hit certain milestones, not that we can really afford much just yet,” Bexlan told him. That was good news, he wanted to expand as his MOBS developed and the lack of salvage had been a huge limitation on what he could create.

“Before we go, may I ask a question?” Kraxton asked.

“Sure, go ahead,” Slater replied.

“You were once a human, what do the human younglings do for fun?” Kraxton asked. It was a question he didn’t expect, his translation protocols struggling a bit with some of the terminology. From what Slater understood, youngling was similar to an older teen, a person on the cusp of adulthood. A human teen would likely be just as curious as to what the teens of other races did, and how their lives compared.

“Well, it’s been a very long time since I was a teenager, but from what I remember, we played games, hung out with our friends and went to school,” Slater answered, not sure if that gave them enough detail, the early days of his life were memories that didn’t survive the transformation into a Derelict intact. Kraxton and Bexlan both looked at his core, their heads cocked to the side in what Slater now realized was a gesture of contemplation.

“What games did they play?” Bexlan finally asked.

“Different virtual reality games for the most part. If you’re interested, I can include some games with the new hive ship design I’m working on for your people. I don’t have that many, but you may have some fun with them,” Slater said. He had snagged a few games from the devices that Private Long and Harris had brought aboard the Franklin.

“Thank you, I would be very interested to see the games your people played,” Bexlan said. With that, the two Chixturax kids left his core room, and despite the presence of Pixi, Slater found himself a bit lonely. He missed having a crew aboard, it had just felt right to him. Now, this parody of a Derelict was all he had. He needed to get off this station and back to human space. The best way for him to do that was to earn more credits, and his upgraded MOBS might just help with that.

Research for Cybernetic MOBS enhancement, subtype Kobold is complete. You have 80% of your research capacity available for use.

“Hey, these guys look pretty good,” Pixi commented as they looked at the new kobold design. The research had integrated a targeting system where one of the kobold’s eyes had been. One arm had been replaced with a cybernetic device that could hold various weapons systems with integrated ammunition storage. The default was for a rifle, but other small arms could be substituted instead, the shotgun being a particular favorite of Slater’s. The rest of the upgraded kobold seemed normal enough until you looked under the skin. Thin metal bars reinforced the kobold skeleton with enhanced musculature attached to the major arm and leg joints. This would give them a modest boost in strength and allow them to survive more abuse than before.

Slater went ahead and printed up a pair, intending to test them out against the regular version of his kobolds. He was surprised to see that the new pair of MOBS were somewhat stranger looking in the flesh. The extra muscle mass gave the creatures a strange bulging look near the joints. It hampered their movements a bit and gave them a strange gait, like their joints weren’t moving quite the way they should. While building them took more salvage to use than a standard kobold, it was nowhere near what he burned through when making a reaper.

Thinking about his reapers, Slater had some concerns this cybernetic kobold would fall prey to the disruption beams like his reapers had. So far, none of the weapons had been left behind for him to break down into a schematic. From what Ixlab had told him, Slater was fairly confident that the mainly biological based kobold cyborgs would be immune to the weapon, but he hated leaving it to chance. For now, he would have to use a blend of the two types of MOBS, at least until he could get his hands on one of the weapons.

The kobold cyborgs were put through their paces fighting against regular versions of themselves, as well as gnomes and orcs. Slater had unlocked the schematics for Dwarves but hadn’t pushed them through the research process just yet, he had enough on his plate with getting kobolds, orcs, and gnomes upgraded. Accuracy with any weapon he armed the cyborgs with was astounding, if they could see it, they could hit it. While their physical strength was enhanced, they still lost in a melee brawl to the much more powerful orcs. They still had some bugs to work out and Slater wanted to refine the skeletal reinforcements a bit, so he ran the kobolds through a second round of research.

“The next round of research should make these as good as they’re going to get for a while. Any thoughts on their performance?” Slater asked Pixi.

“Yeah, they’re way cooler than regular kobolds, and they deserve a cooler name than just cyborg kobold or robot kobold. How about you let me cook something up?” Pixi asked.

“Sure, have at it,”

“Okay, let’s see. I can go with something crazy like apocalypse bots, cyborg snipers…” Pixi stopped, and Slater could feel him searching for the perfect name.

“What about Kobots?” Slater asked.

“Sure, that’s a good one, boss. These are now our Kobots, look out challengers, these bad boys are going to pick you off one by one,” Pixi said.

“I’m going to replace half the kobolds in the barracks compartment with the kobots to see how they do,” Slater advised. His construction drones scrapped three of the regular kobolds, replacing them with his newest creations. To really test their accuracy, the kobots were positioned near the back of the compartment placing their fellow kobolds and all the other objects in the room between them and their targets. His initial loadout would be for all of them to use rifles. After he got a feel for how they performed, he would switch some out to the automatic shotguns or the laser rifle version to see how they did.

The second round of research on the kobots completed while he waited for the next challengers to show up. As he suspected, these 2.0 versions of the kobots seemed to move a bit smoother and didn’t have as much of the swollen joint look of the first models. Accuracy was improved, but the level of improvement was hard to tell since most of their engagements were at close range. If that ever changed, he was sure the kobots would really shine. He tweaked his research rates a bit, not wanting to neglect his starship upgrades while he played with the new MOBS variants.

Current Research Allocation:

Cybernetic MOBS enhancement, subtype Orc, 50%.

Reactor upgrades based on Chixturax designs, 50%.

The reactor research would benefit both his new ship and the Chixturax hive ship, so it was a priority. Once that was done, Slater would look at integrating the tech he had developed for his own ship into upgrades for the Chixturax. He was a little concerned with how much he should give them. While the creatures seemed friendly enough, could they eventually become a threat to humanity? Slater didn’t think so, but he would be inserting some overrides into the ship, allowing him to take control if needed.

Red lights flashed in the entry compartment, his latest challengers, and the first real-world test of his kobots was about to happen.