“So, I know that Alchemy doesn’t sound as fun as tinkering and those other things you mentioned, but hear me out: Medvedev will subsidize your advancement after beginner.”
“But I’m afraid that they’ll chain me to a lab and make me crank out potions.” I run my hands across the bristly parts of my head. “I still want to go out on missions, Marcie.”
“I get it, I do. But what’s the harm in taking a craft that they will pay you for? Plus, I won’t be recommending you take a crafting Track, so full time alchemy wouldn’t be beneficial without that kind of Track. Plus, think of the custom explosives you could make.”
“Say what now?” Is she just baiting me with explosives? She knows I loved firing the RPG and the M203 grenades.
“Alchemists in ancient times were famous for making explosives. Greek Fire is freaking legendary. Now imagine using aether to target effects of said explosives.”
“I could make custom ammo propellants . . .” I’m sure my eyes sparkle as I say that, as I realize tinkering and alchemy would be a devastating one-two combo for modding guns. Marcella smiles, knowing she caught me with her skewed logic.
“Great! I bought a primer for you to read, and my team is assembling an off-site lab for you as we speak!” She slaps down a paper book and starts rubbing her hands together.
“You had this planned the whole time?! You’re such a shit!”
“Since you told me you got a symbiote, absolutely. Dani is cross with you for not consulting her, by the way. Says you could ruin her research. I, however, am totally not planning to capitalize on the projects I will definitely not try to convince you to make for me.”
Ugh, people are totally going to try and convince me to full-time alchemy. However, I owe Marcella so much, I can do this for her while focusing on the beautiful ordinance I will be making in the future.
“Alright, fine. But that clinches that I’ll be trying to get tinkering as well so I can make janky devices that explode.”
“Sure sure, we can even ask the local kids if they can gather some junk for you to fiddle with.” My sister is suspiciously excited about me learning Alchemy. She found the right bullet points to sell me on the idea, so it doesn’t matter now.
“Does this mean that I’ll be under less pressure to level?”
“No, not even a little bit. But no one will question your activities when you register two crafting hobbies. Plus, getting Alchemy to Novice should put you into level 4 maybe even 5. Get to reading and we’ll take a tour of your lab in the afternoon.” She says as she walks away toward our room.
“Your excitement is suspicious you know!” She replies with a cackle that is in no way reassuring.
I start reading about solutions and solvents while periodically checking the second progress meter for my symbiotes: integration. The assessment phase was quick, as most of the available energy in my body was used in my initialization to both contain and shape the aether that was about to warp me. Now, it is apparently finding a comfy spot to build another organ inside my body. Integration also means that Tova will have a much more complete picture of the energies in my body and can alter my HUD display accordingly.
“Will it affect the integration if I eat aether infused foods?”
Not appreciably. As long as you’re eating to maintain and not to build up saturation.
Excellent. I order a meal from the Exchange and start grazing on it while I read further about the different pieces of glassware and their functions, different ways to involve aether in the process, and skim some basic recipes and reference the various techniques they call for in the recipes. I shouldn’t be surprised that the book also talks about holding intent in one’s mind, but there are many different intent prompts in each recipe that seem a bit overboard to me.
After training so hard to beef up, going through interrogation class, and being the sniper for Craig’s team, it feels like I’m being lazy working on crafts. If this is what the number crunchers on high are recommending, then who am I to argue with an algorithm that chose me in the first place. I still need to beef up again though—so much food.
Tova, are you allowed to help me with skills and stuff?
In what way? I can advise and warn about knowledge we’ve absorbed or codexes we’ve downloaded. I cannot help control your actions, however: my nanites and the symbiotes are not designed for that.
No no no, that sounds slimy and gross. I was definitely thinking you would help check if I’m doing something or missing something that would accidentally kill me. Sounds like you can. Sweet. I’m a little scared of being bathed in hot, caustic chemicals.
Minor fears aside, I dutifully study the book and chatter with Tova about her desires. She resolutely replied with she has not been online long enough for choice perturbations to create a preference. She also mentioned that as she exchanges inputs and info with her symbiote counterpart, a noticeable personality should develop.
Marcella comes out of our room a few hours later to eat lunch with me and introduce her to the people I’ll be working with. Her excitement has faded some, but only to the point where she can hold still for five minutes and not mention it. Much to my disappointment, symbiote integration is at 72% when a car comes to pick us up.
“We’re not headed to another warehouse are we?” I ask, suspicious as we drive off Strip.
“Nope, going back to your old neighborhood. I claimed an old-town casino years back and I use it as a base for my side projects. We cleared out the vault and made a little studio for you to work in and not explode half the city. Controlled ventilation too, so you don’t accidentally gas the lot of us either.”
“What else is in the building?”
“Eh eh, no spoilers. That and they are private and compartmentalized.”
“Your secrets have secrets, got it.” She smiles at me for that and squeezes my hand as we continue toward Old Vegas. Most of the buildings in downtown are less than twenty stories, and Marcella’s “casino” is no exception. Looks like a hotel and casino though, so I wonder if I’ll be staying here.
She walks me in the front door, fills out some paperwork before escorting me through security. “Probably not a secret that I’m hoping that you’ll come to work for me eventually, and with us in the meantime. I would like you to sign a non-disclosure agreement before continuing further.”
“My interest is piqued. What do I sign?” She sends me a document that tells me that I can’t reveal what the Downtown Hospitality does, or what I do here. I agree and sign a document that sends a tingle through my brain, which is what I’m told a system enforced contract feels like.
“Now that that’s done, welcome to my side projects. Medvedev uses us for internal affairs type investigations. We do a lot more, but the less everyone knows the whole picture the better. You will mostly be working with procurement specialists and facilities I think. We’ve never had an alchemist before, and Warram hasn’t had a practicing one in years.”
With the exception of the rickety cage elevator to the Vault, everything was in good repair, and some areas even looked nice.
“Director Fontaine, we’ve . . . oh wow.” A blond with her hair pulled back and hands covered with work gloves stammers. “She really does look just like you.” She figures out she’s staring at me in a moment and shakes the sight out of her head, “Everything is set up, the component storage has been stocked with everything she could need for beginner recipes, and we’ve contacted a glass blower to make a few items that are too expensive or come in too large of lots on the Exchange.”
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“That sounds perfect, Gina. Was it too late to get some scrap together?”
“No, but Travis suggested that Kimber be allowed to browse and separate what she wanted before bringing it down. Reduces labor for everyone, and clutter down here. There’s a small container on the side of the loading dock that our scroungers are tossing stuff in. We don’t know what you’re looking for so, its parts of machines and computers.”
It takes a second to realize she’s talking to me. “That sounds great. I don’t really know yet, but it sounded like something fun and maybe productive to do while I’m thinking other stuff over. Thanks for indulging me.”
She laughs at my statement, hopefully not at me. “It’s been nice to see the Director excited about something again, and everyone wants to be on the good side of an Alchemist.” She winks at me and walks away.
“I will have to talk to the staff about flirting with my kid sister while you familiarize yourself with the equipment. We’ve retro fit the vault door with biometric locks, and we have our own isolated utilities, so there should be no interruption to power, water, and even air. This place is part of the reason I am so poor. We funnel resources back into our projects and I get paid like any other employee despite the property claim being in my name.”
“Marcie, I thought you were cool before, but this is nova!” I shake my head, “I can’t believe you got me a lab for my birthday.”
“Heh, I guess I did that. Well, I trust you not to burn the place down on your first day. I need to make sure you’re on the payroll proper and make sure you have access to the gym and cafeteria.” She taps her chin in thought, “I have a room here too, you don’t mind sharing with me if you stay overnight do you?”
I scoff at her and give her my best deadpan stare.
“Right, we stay in the same suite at Warram, despite you having your own. Send me a message if you think we’re staying here tonight.”
When she walks out of sight, I turn to survey my new kingdom. The largest feature at the far wall is a heavy table with integrated piping for water and gas for heating with a ventilation funnel above with panels that look like they can drop around it. To the right wall, is a large cabinet full of apparatuses, burners and glassware. The left wall has a similar cabinet but with labeled reagents and a small fridge-like box that is labeled with ‘perishable reagents’. There are also two barrels with hand pumps, one labeled ‘Ethanol’ and another labeled ‘Distilled Water’.
Okay where do we start? I go through the pamphlets to see that some recipes have been marked, but without having aether at my disposal yet, many of them can’t be done. Hmm, Tova can you separate recipes that can be prepared separately from their aether infusion process?
Yes, I have the digital version of these recipes, and several of them can be prepared up until a mixing an activation step to finish them.
Perfect! She highlights a pain-relieving salve that I find in the book and brace it open on a book stand. I cut some mint and wintergreen into a mortar and grate in some sassafras bark and grind it into a paste. I then pour some Ethanol in the mortar and mix it until the paste becomes a thick liquid and no remnants of paste linger on the pestle. I pour the liquid into a sealable heat vessel and rinse the mortar and pestle with ethanol into the vessel. I then cover and seal the vessel and place it over heat to 60 C for an hour.
While waiting, I search for hydrogenated vegetable oil—a noted substitute for clarified lard—and read about the next steps. Apparently there are two ways to perform the next step: strain through cloth, with some waste, or distil and collect to separate the solids and then move to the final low-temperature Ethanol evaporation that results in the targeted oils for the final step. I pick the double distillation route to familiarize myself with the equipment.
I put the distilled liquid into a beaker and set the heating plate to 33C and a low-speed mix with a silicon coated magnetic pill. I set a timer for two hours and decide to go for a walk around the facility after closing the vault door.
I check my percentage again, 90% now, as I hold on to the sides of the elevator in a quiet panic. I rush out as it stops on the ground level and head toward the front desk area. The man behind the counter does a double take before greeting me.
“Good afternoon Miss Novarro, how may I help you?”
“I was told there was a storage container for me on the loading docks. Can I get directions?”
He nods and clicks a button on a receiver on the desk. “I have called someone to take you there. It is not an advertised location.”
A minute later, a cute teen in hostess attire shows up and asks me to follow her. Five minutes and too many turns later, we’re in a cold concrete area with a roll-up door and warehouse lighting.
“This maintenance dolly was brought for you to use at your leisure. Please let one of the hosts or hostesses know if you need assistance.”
“I will! Thank you. Wait,” she turns back to me. “I don’t know the etiquette here, do I tip you?”
The corner of her mouth rises a smidge. “That is not necessary. We are compensated adequately.”
“Oh, okay. Sorry. Thanks again.” She nods before turning away and leaving me here with a cart with a bucket on it and a stubby shipping container.
I pull the lever over and open one side to see a pile of parts as tall as I am. With no particular aim, I pull the dolly close, and start sifting through stack, pulling out gears, springs, motors, tubing and various odds an ends. The only things that I pull consistently is the wiring and other copper that I see. Once I get my cart half full of stuff that I have no current purpose for, I close up the container and look around the bay.
Seeing nothing of consequence I start putting my nose in other spaces. Ten minutes and several un-satisfying doors later I find the motherload through a pair of large steel doors. Many large tool chests, a lift, some things I don’t even know what to think and a pair of devices on rollers welding masks on top of them. I may not know what a welder looks like, but the masks are super obvious. Wanting to know more, I look up the device models and see what kind of welders they are.
A while later, realizing I lost track of time learning about welding, I see a flashing red icon in my HUD in the shape of a chat balloon.
\Kimber, didn’t see you at the lab, and your scrap dolly is missing, you okay?\
/Sorry to worry you, but I wandered into a shop with tools and I got distracted learning about welding. I have a timer that’s about to go off, so I’m going to head back to the lab./
\I’ll meet you there.\
I push my cart of scrap to the basement elevator and clinch my teeth for every second of the ride down. I see Marcella sitting in a chair outside of the Vault, and walk over to her. She hugs me fiercely.
“I was worried when no one knew where you were.”
“Sorry! I was curious and had nowhere to be for a couple of hours. I can’t finish this project until my integration is complete, but I can set everything up to finish tomorrow.” I look at my percentage again, 96% so close.
“That’s fine. Staying the night will let me show you the Gym and cafeteria in the morning.”
I take the beaker of ‘extract’ of the heating plate and cover it, placing it in the perishables box overnight. Marcella then leads us to a private elevator that leads to the VIP and Penthouse suites. We get off at the lowest floor of VIP suites and key into a room that looks more like a comfy hotel with a fancy tub than one of the suites we have at the Warram-owned Casino.
“This is surprisingly modest. I’m, weirdly proud of you.”
“I only overnight a few times a month, so it wouldn’t feel right to deny some of our guests the comfort.”
“What kind of guests do you guys get?” I say offhand, not really thinking about what I’m saying.
“This and that, but the hotel side is socialized as a Health and Wellness Club for people who prize discretion. I started this place as a service to get people out of Warram without triggering any vengeance or vendettas for trying to leave the Organization. This place, and my ops teams are about as out as you can get without Medvedev owing you a favor. Our current focus is like Warram’s: new markets. Though my infiltration to a new market will look a lot like my people settling into a domestic life with only light intel gathering.”
“It’s still odd to me that you have this semi-altruistic operation that’s basically an open secret. How does one get in?”
“Oof. Kimber, it’s a whole thing. Right now, you’re my guest. I can explain more later, but those that contribute heavily, can petition for a single guest allowance. I am using mine for you. I designed this ‘Club’ so that no one is above the rules, not even me. We have other important members that have been critical in our success, but we’re no more than board members, and none of us can say we own the place.”
I want to flop onto the sizable bed, but I’m dirty from the scrap bin. I pout and pull jammies from my pack. “I’m going to have a bath, do you need to use the bathroom first?”
“No thanks. You’re going to be busy for most of the next decade, you need to enjoy the pampering when you can.”
I shed my clothes in a heap on the tile, realizing I got goop and green smears on them from the extraction. I need a lab apron. I put that on my growing professional items wish list. The tub fills until a beep starts circulating water via jets and the tub beeps again when it has reached a nominal temperature of 38.5C. I hop in and melt into the jets, letting the rush of water and the rhythmic pulsing against my back and legs lull me into a trance.
\Integration Complete. User capacity has upgraded. Would you like to register as a symbiote user on Earth?\
I mean, why not, they already know right?
No. But too late now.
\Thank you for registering as a symbiote user on Earth! Your Ration has been updated.\
\Earthers are not guaranteed rations. Reduced priced aether-meals will now be available to you.\
Now that’s a benefit I can get behind. Government subsidized meals? Check and check.
While it worked out this time, please do not spuriously accept prompts in the future.
I think I’m going to enjoy a bottle of aether infused juice and revel in the majesty of this massage setting.