The all too familiar sound of depressurizing air met Ronin’s ears when he woke up. he came right to full wakefulness instantly, thanks to the pod, he was never groggy in the mornings anymore. bringing his hands up, he felt his bare chest. there were no injuries, but the fact they took his armor off meant it was probably bad. Sitting up, he looked around. K2 stood outside his pod this time, making him worry that K3 might not have made it. the look on his face must have betrayed his thoughts because K2 spoke up instantly.
“He’s fine sir,” K2 said soothingly. “He needed a little help, so Owl two put him in Owl three’s pod after he looked into his injuries.” Ronin let out a sigh of relief, he would have been devastated if he’d lost another team member.
“How many scouts made it?” he asked, accepting K2’s help out of the pod. He’d been training with one of the new teams, so they hadn’t even been armed yet.
“We lost three of the scouts sir,” K2 said. “But one of Benjamin’s teams came back with more goblins, so we were able to refill the ranks.” Ronin nodded, less worried about full ranks than dead scouts. Still, it was good to know he hadn’t lost them all.
“How is the hunt going?” he asked, partially to change the subject and partially out of curiosity. A team of scouts was partnered with one of Benjamin's squads, for a better-rounded team. They had been taking turns going down to the mushroom forest to hunt for goblins. Ronin had stayed out of it, choosing to let his people practice working together while he trained.
“Good sir, the first team returned. They only managed to bring sixteen goblins back, but no one was injured.” The pair had started walking towards Ronin’s tent while they talked. He never used the tent, so had argued against having one wasted on him. still, it was nice when he wanted to change or bathe in private.
“Glad to hear it, how about the Kaldarr?” he asked as they entered his tent. “Did we get them all?” there was a tub of water, ready and waiting for him when he entered. It looked like it had been welded together from scraps of the Kaldarrian ships, but it held water just fine. Stripping out of his nanite pants, Ronin stepped into the water.
“All the warriors you fought were recovered, my lord.” K2 said, taking up position at the door. “K3 got a little over excited when he saw how badly you were shot and killed the first two, he encountered. But seven of the nine were taken alive. They are recuperating before they begin loyalty training with the other six captured Kaldarr warriors.”
Thirteen captured Kaldarrian warriors, plus the three Ronin had implanted and upgraded. If Owl two’s loyalty training worked out, then that would be quite the addition to his forces. If not, well he could still use them as forced labor. Though he had high hopes, the six they’d been working on were already starting to come around.
Ronin spent the next hour in the tub, asking questions and thinking. it was a lot nicer than back in the caves on earth. Back then a person would have to bathe in a cold river, with whom ever was bathing or washing clothes at the time. He did feel a little bad that K2 couldn’t enjoy a bath himself, but the tub wasn’t big enough, and he was on guard duty anyway. “Maybe I should have Owl two build a community bath house for off duty soldiers and workers to enjoy.” He mused as he soaked.
“Owl two said he would like to have a meeting when you were finished.” K2 said as Ronin dried himself and dressed in his old armor. he’d asked K2 about it, and it seemed his new armor was being repaired and strengthened. It would be even heavier going forward, but he was stronger now than he had been when it was made.
“Ok,” he said once he was outfitted and ready to go. “Let’s go see what Owl two has to say.” he moved to the door, but was stopped by K2, who exited first to check the surroundings. Ronin sighed, he thought they were passed that stage, but he had been nearly killed recently so he couldn’t complain.
“All clear sir,” K2 said poking his head back in the tent.
“Thanks,” Ronin said as he followed the giant outside.
The walk to the command tent was short. There weren’t many people inside the cave anymore, just the newest goblins and their care takers. Everyone else was either on assignment or moved outside to the valley. More of the cave had been converted into testing grounds for Owl two’s experiments. Ronin figured it wouldn’t be long before the cave was off limits to the general population entirely. He smiled when he walked past the forest of standing Kaldarr armored suits. They were obsolescent, with his fabrication unit, but they still looked impressive. Like futuristic terra cotta soldiers.
Ronin entered the command tent to find; Owl two, Owl five, Benjamin, hunter, Samantha and Karr. They were sitting around the table, but they rose when he entered. Waving them back down, he moved up and took his own seat next too Owl Five. Looking across the table to Owl two he asked.
“What have you got for us, hope I haven’t made you all wait too long?” he looked around at his command team; Owl two and Benjamin sat across from him while Hunter and Samantha sat to his right and Karr sat on the other side of him. they all smiled and shook their heads at his question, before Owl two got things started.
“Not at all, my lord.” He said with an inclination of his head. “I called everyone together when you woke up, and we all arrived just moments before you did.” gesturing to the map, he said. “We need to go over our plans. Lord Ronin has said we need to control the underground city within seven weeks. Also, from what Benjamin tells me, the fight at the wall will be lost by then as well.”
Ronin looked at the map, it showed the outline of the mushroom forest in the mountains. there were several figures of batlins and hobats, goblins and hobgoblins scattered around the cave. All the way to the kingdom’s wall. that held several human soldier figures and a few taller, slender figures in intricate armor. outside the walls, were a swarm of what looked like human insectoids.
“Therefore, I think we should divide our attention between the two tasks.” He slid the figures of Ronin, Owl five, Karr’s squad and Hunters team into a drop ship, along with K1, K2, K3 and Guts. then moved himself, Benjamin and the remaining three scout teams into the tunnels with one of Benjamin’s squads. That left two of Benjamin’s squads and a partial scout team behind at the camp.
“I propose that you take the drop ship to assist at the wall, my lord.” Owl two said pointing at the swarm of insectoids outside the wall. “It will take Benjamin and I several weeks to prepare for the assault on the underground city. But before we can effectively plan a campaign, we need to go down for a look. we can come up with a plan, while we strip the mushroom forest clean of goblins. Bolstering our numbers, while cutting down on the number of enemies we will have to face during the battle.” He continued for a while before opening the floor for comments. Ronin had a few questions, so he spoke first.
“Won’t we be leaving the valley exposed if we only leave two squads behind?” he asked, with a raised brow.
“I don’t believe so, my lord,” Owl two said. “Now that the Kaldarrian threat has been dealt with, it should be the safest time to go. besides, we still have Eric and the second drop ship here. The guns on board that vessel should be enough to deal with anything short of another space invasion.” He nudged the second drop ship while he talked, making Ronin think about the carnage Owl five had wrought on the Kaldarr warriors the night they attacked.
“Is that likely?” he asked, a bit worried. “Did we ever find out how many dropships the Kaldarr had? we got lucky before, but if they land fifty more troops while the fighters with guns are all away…” he trailed off at the end, knowing he didn’t have to spell it out.
“After talking with our captives and K1, K2 and K3, it is likely there are at least five more drop ships. However, they only came here for easy slaves. we wiped out their entire drop force and took their ships away. It is unlikely they will come anywhere near us again.” Owl two said, making Ronin breathe a sigh of relief.
“Alright, then how about the trip to the wall? can we really make a difference with only twenty some of us? Locusts are beyond aggressive, and they breed like crazy. If they have been left alone outside the wall this whole time, there are likely tens of thousands of them by now.” He looked at the insectoid figures while he spoke.
Locusts were an invasive alien species. They dropped onto a planet in large egglike pods, where they hatched and began the process of devouring everything biological on the entire planet. They reproduced rapidly; making humanoid drones at first, but as more and more of a planet was conquered, they would start to create larger units, using the biological matter they ate. Eventually, they would strip a planet completely clean. Then, a queen locust would gobble up all her children, creating a large pod that she would shoot into space. Where it would head towards another planet, to start the process all over again.
Like the Kaldarr, the locusts were a pretty one-dimensional species. They existed to eat everything they could, to the point of eating themselves to death. They came from a book series that Ronin had only read a few volumes of, and were countered by a race of giants who wore super heavy armor. Ronin thought they were kind of lame though, so he hadn’t included them in his world. a decision he now regretted. Almost as much as including the locusts, because now there was no counter to their spread. He’d done his best to put them from his mind, knowing that he didn’t have the resources to fight them yet, and he might never be able too.
“The locusts are individually strong, true.” Owl two said, “but they don’t focus on fighting. They focus on eating, and only attack when their food fights back. If you take all eight of the railgun rifles with you, you can kill a few hundred with those alone. Along with outfitting Karr’s squad with Kaldarrian rifles I’ve modified for their smaller size, and the crossbows I made for the scouts… I believe you can put a dent in their numbers.” He then pulled out another figure from the box and set it beside the drop ship.
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“Plus, I’ve put together a little present for the locust I think should go a long way towards helping out your mission.” Ronin looked at the figure and couldn’t help the wide grin that spread across his face.
“But what about these,” Hunter said pointing towards the tall slender figures that stood on the wall with the humans. “Who are they supposed to be?” Ronin looked over to the assertive Goblin woman. After Guts, she was the best goblin they’d found. Honestly, if it hadn’t been for the nanite injections that Guts got, she would be far superior to him.
“Those are moon elves,” Owl two said taking a figure from the box and tossing it to Hunter. “We honestly don’t know a lot about them. Other than being a nature loving race, who uses grown arms and armor, they are also fond of battle pets. They use living ships to travel through space, but I honestly don’t know how that works. So, part of your mission will be to gather information on them.” Hunter nodded, looking at the figure in her hand.
Moon elves. Slender human sized people with silver hair and skin the color of the full moon. Another fictional race Ronin had added to his world. it had cost a few million credits for every race he had added, and most of them weren’t even sustainable. Like the Kaldarr and moon elves, they only had one ship’s worth of population in orbit. Making it unlikely they could live beyond one or two generations. He shook his head at his waste of credits.
“But why are they working with the humans to combat the locusts?” Karr asked, speaking up for the first time.
“We can’t know for sure, that will be part of your mission to discover” Owl two said. “But it’s likely because they are a nature loving species, and the locusts are anathema to nature and all life in general.”
The meeting continued for over an hour. Once they had settled on Ronin’s mission, they discussed Owl two and Benjamin’s objective. On the surface it seemed straight forward, but Ronin had the feeling it was going to be much harder than his own mission. Once they ironed everything out, the meeting split up. his people went out to get ready for the mission, while Owl two went with Ronin and K2 too check on K3.
“Are you really going to tell me that he was this injured?” Ronin asked in disbelief, when they reached the pod. He looked through the transparent door at K3. The enhanced Kaldarr was covered in scars. It looked like the poor man had fallen into a wood chipper and been sewn back together. “There really is no way, Owl two… what did you do to my guard?” anger was bubbling up in Ronin’s chest again at the antics of his ‘assistant.’
“No, my lord.” Owl two said candidly. “However, since you were going to be under for a few days anyway… I decided I should improve your favored guard.” The android’s tone never varied, he could be talking about the weather, or the genocide of humanity and his tone would stay the same. Still, it really got on Ronin’s nerves sometimes.
“What does ‘improve’ mean exactly?” he asked through gritted teeth. K3 really was his favorite of the enhanced Kaldarr and seeing him mutilated like this was almost more than he could handle. It would have been bad enough if the enemy had hurt him this much, but it had been his own side that had done it.
“My lord mentioned that he wanted to know if it was possible to improve the… vision… of his people. So, while I was patching this unit up, I transplanted a pair of eyes to him… along with a heart, lungs… and a few other things from the deceased Owl three. Thankfully they were compatible, the nanites and the pod will take care of the healing process. In a day or two he will come out better than ever.”
“Owl two…” Ronin started, his voice failing him after the first few words.
“Yes, my lord?” the android asked, a hint of innocence in his bland tone.
“I forbid you to ever… under any circumstance, to ever experiment or improve or adjust or… anything to Owl five… do you understand me, Owl two?” if the android had really mutilated K3 because he was Ronin’s favorite guard… what would he do to someone Ronin liked more than a guard? A long minute passed in silence, while the pair stared at each other.
“I understand, my lord.” He said at last, Ronin couldn’t be sure, but he thought the android really did understand this time.
“I am glad to hear that.” he said, a note of steel in his voice for the first time when talking to his assistant. Ronin couldn’t deny how useful Owl two was, but the android had a strong desire to do experiments on living creatures that pushed the bounds of what Ronin was comfortable with. “What about our armor?” he asked, changing the subject.
“Yes sir,” Owl two said seemingly happy at the subject change. He moved around the pod to the fabrication section. “I’m currently working on thickening the plates to both your armor sets.” He pointed through the window at the roughly six-foot cubed chamber inside the pod. It was currently adding material to an armor plate. Ronin watched in fascination as a mechanical arm laid down a bead of material while a second arm pressed it down. it was like a 3-D printer, mixed with a welder with a forge thrown in for good measure. That wasn’t the limit of this machine’s capabilities either. Given enough time and the right resources, Ronin knew it could create living things as well. Not people, but advanced plants or replacement limbs weren’t out of the question.
“Tell me about the changes,” Ronin said as he watched the machine work. It was a time-consuming process, but several fold faster than trying to forge the plates by hand. The fabrication unit was a technological marvel, bordering on magical. It could even print him out a computer or a space ship, component by component, if he had the time and materials. Sadly, he had neither at the moment. Nor the blueprints to craft them from.
“Functionally, the suits will remain the same. However, I am increasing the thickness as well as adding a layer of carbon fiber weave to the inside surface and an enameled coating of the same to the outer surfaces. This layering should reduce penetration, as well as look good for the moon elves. Who by all accounts like beautiful things. Sadly, I don’t have the time to do everyone’s armor in layers, but the Kaldarr and Owl five will get the outer coating to match your suit, sir.” Owl two went into more detail about the enamel coating and discussed possible color and pattern options with Ronin for a time, before bidding him farewell and going back to work.
Ronin watched him go, worry gnawing at his mind. Owl two was a concern, but not the main one. he knew the next few weeks were going to be tough, locusts were terrifying enemies. Not to mention the moon elves, who Ronin didn’t know much more about than Owl two. he was going into an unknown situation, while leaving both of his strategic commanders behind. One of whom, Ronin didn’t trust completely anymore. shaking his head, Ronin started making his own preparations. There was nothing he could do about his worries, other than face them head on. He couldn’t change Owl two’s programming, but he could go kill some locusts.
* * *
“We look ridiculous.” Ronin said, looking around the inside of the drop ship Owl two had named Flight one. everyone’s armor had been coated with a black enamel. That would be fine by itself, but there were dark gray patterns on them with light gray patterns on top of those. In the sunlight, it looked like shadowy flames, while still blending in well with the shadows at night. Ronin’s own armor went a step further yet. It was also black with increasingly light shades of gray as well, but his went all the way to brilliant white at the tips of the flames.
“Oh, I don’t know sir.” Karr said where he sat half way down the line, chewing on a mouthful of leaves. “I think we look like a true elite squadron. Only the king’s own guard wore armor this fine when we worked for the Mountain’s Embrace kingdom.” He grinned then, showing teeth stained red from the leaves he chewed. “Since we were assigned to you full time, my lord” here he paused to spit into a cup. “I guess that makes us your royal guards.” After spitting, he leaned back in his seat, adjusting the strap of his Kaldarrian inspired rifle as he moved.
“I don’t know about ‘royal’, but I couldn’t ask for a better escort than you fine men and women.” Ronin said with a grin, looking around at the troops strapped into Flight one’s seats. He still thought they looked ridiculous, but if his people liked it then he could let it slide. Instead of focusing on his new look, he took in the drop ship around them.
It looked like a shipping crate with propellers and guns from the outside. From the inside, it frankly didn’t look much better. A long rectangular box filled with several rows of seats, and a large open area near the front of the ship for cargo. The ship would seat fifty soldiers comfortably. Ronin was once again thankful that he’d placed a fifty-man limit on who could drop from orbit, and that the Kaldarr had been after slaves. if they hadn’t brought so many half empty ships down, Owl two wouldn’t have so much raw material to work with, and they wouldn’t be flying right now.
“How are you holding up?” he asked K3, who was sitting beside him. the Kaldarr had woken up only the night before and hadn’t had much time to get acclimated to his new body.
“Thank you for your concern, sir.” He said with a seated bow, “but I’m fine. Better than fine actually, I feel stronger than ever. No one will be able to hurt you again sir, not unless they go through me first.” K3 was feeling guilty about the injuries Ronin had suffered under his watch. Ronin figured that was how Owl two had talked him into going under the knife so easily.
“My injuries weren’t your fault,” Ronin said firmly. “I chose to attack the wall. so, its all on me. Besides, I might have died if you hadn’t been there to back me up.” actually, Ronin knew full well that he would have died without K3’s intervention.
“There is no ‘might’ about it… sir.” Owl five said from his other side. She hadn’t taken his near-death experience well and had been cold towards him since it happened. “We are your people, sir. It is our jobs to fight and, if need be, die for you… not the other way around.” Ronin sighed, she’d said those words, or something similar enough to them, to him every time he’d tried talking to her.
“Cheer up boss,” Guts said. clapping a hand on his back from the row behind them. “It just means she cares about…” the goblin drew his arm back with a ‘yelp’ when Owl five turned around with her hand raised. Ronin smirked at their antics. His team had good chemistry, and he enjoyed their company. Turning his eyes from the bickering goblins, Ronin took in the rest of those present.
There were Karr with his nine men, all dressed in their carbon fiber impregnated armor with metal plates over the vitals. Hunter with her all-female scout team, who were armored the same as Karr’s squad. Except they were armed with knives and crossbows rather than with rifles, spears and shields. Then there were K1, K2 and K3, the hulking giants dwarfing the rest of them by several feet. they were wearing full metal plate armor and carrying massive shields and blunt weapons like maces or hammers, in addition to their mark V railguns. That left the three members of the food corps, Guts led personally. They were armored the same as Karr’s men, but their focus wasn’t on combat, but support. That only left Samantha, who was flying the ship. along with the cargo, currently suspended from the ship in a large crate.
Bringing the crate was a drain on the ships power, but the added firepower it represented was worth the power consumption. The wall was a few hundred miles from the valley, but only a day’s flight away by ship. Ronin had talked at length with Owl two about the power problem. Although the android hadn’t been able to replicate the energy source yet; he assured Ronin he could make the trip to the wall a few hundred times on the power they had. thankfully, he had been able to replicate the rounds the on-board machine gun fired. They were limited on rockets, but the big ship mounted machine gun was lethal to anything not heavily armored and shielded.
“Settle down you two,” Ronin said coming back to the present. “Owl five, I’m sorry. Your right, it was a bad move on my part, but I couldn’t just sit there safely when I had the arms and armor that could help. I promise though, I will be more careful in the future.” This was something he’d learned from Penny. It didn’t matter if he was in the wrong or not, giving her an honest sounding apology was the fastest way to end an argument.
“…Right,” Owl five said leaning back. “Not like it really matters to me if you kill yourself, but everyone else needs you.” she said, rapping her armored knuckles on his chest plate. “So, remember that, ok?” Ronin was touched at her gesture. She was usually so reserved… and then the moment was broken when Guts started snickering from behind them. Ronin sighed when Owl five turned around and aimed a swing at the cook.