Nathym glanced over at the computer clock at his desk in the secret lab. His blurry eyes didn’t even register the time, but he was certain that it was some uncosmosly hour in the dead of night. The man had lost all track of time lately, working until he couldn’t bear to stay awake anymore. He was starting to feel like Ahvra.
But what had he been working on lately? Nothing important, at least not to him. Building the West compound had been his last big project. And while it had been unexpected, it was a nice distraction from his usual day-to-day. Lately, though, his hours had been filled with small, random, and honestly tedious projects.
Upgrading weapons, reforging defenses, trying to solve minor inconveniences in consumer products, and just generally going with whatever whims the other members spouted at him. That was his current life.
There was always more work to do, to the point that he felt he was barely staying afloat, losing his sanity and motivation a bit more each day, but he compensated by plowing through it. Drim had tried to intervene at one point, to get him to take a break and some time off, or to switch to personal projects he cared about more for a while. But the work itself wasn’t exactly the problem.
Nathym deeply enjoyed helping others, even if he felt the others often didn’t know exactly what they were asking for or how much effort it’d be. The issue was progress. He felt his life, work, and dreams were all stagnating. And there was one specific cause: Project Fiendless had come to a grinding halt.
One particular aspect of the project was preventing them from moving forward, and it wasn’t something that had an easy solution. Nathym was sure of that, because he’d tried Cosdamn everything he could think of. And no matter how many experiments they ran, it was always a failure. Because of that, he himself had begun to think of himself as a failure.
His Curse assured him that the solution existed, but gave him very little in the way of hints of what it could be. The man had his suspicions, but so far, there’d been no definitive proof. And the worst part was this major hiccup meant that all their plans were on hold.
Every other piece of project Fiendless was complete, at least to the point that it could be at its current stage. And every other aspect that he’d worked on thus far had been refined to the point of insanity. There was just nothing that could be done until that specific solution was found. And that meant everyone was waiting on him before they could continue, waiting on him to figure his zjik out before they could accomplish their dreams of saving the world.
That feeling had been eating at him every waking moment. No matter what anyone else said, assuring him that it wasn’t his fault and to take his time, it made him feel abysmal. Until he could solve that problem, nothing in his life had any meaning, and he couldn’t derive even an ounce of joy. It was the bane of his existence.
The Engineer checked the clock on his computer once again, putting forth more of an effort to actually read the time. He hoped that seeing the absurd hour would give him the motivation to go to bed. Lately, since the projects he worked on were so short, it was hard for him not to justify completing ‘just one more’ before taking a break as long as he was capable, even if his mind and body were begging him to stop.
Just as Nathym expected, he should be heading to bed. His mind was so fogged that he was starting to see things, like a certain notification on his screen he’d been longing for, one that held the key to his dreams. Maybe one day it would appear for real.
After several blinks and rubbing his eyes, the man finally realized that the notification was actually real. “Oh zjik!” he actually fell backwards out of his chair in surprise, not even registering the pain as he leapt up again, desperately shuffling his mouse and clicking, missing the button a few times due to the sudden spike in energy and adrenaline.
“OH ZJIK!” Nathym practically screamed once he’d read through the data, confirming what the notification had initially told him. Hopefully he hadn’t woken up anyone else, or startled Ahvra in the next lab over, but he couldn’t physically hold back his excitement.
The man then tore apart his desk, shoving every blueprint and tool out of the way as he desperately dug for his phone. After finally getting his hands on the device, it nearly slipped right out of his grip again since they were shaking so much, and he struggled to find the contact he was looking for.
But there was no answer after the phone rang for half a minute. The person on the other end was certainly more sensible and actually asleep. Nathym wouldn’t accept that excuse though. He went on his computer and activated a modification on the recipient’s phone, forcing it to ignore any other settings and ring at the highest volume. It was meant to be used in absolute emergencies. And while this probably didn’t qualify as one, Nathym literally could not wait. He’d probably explode from anxiousness and racing thoughts in the meantime.
“Hello!” The Engineer belted into the phone as soon as it was answered. “Yes, I know what time it is, Xard, but this is important! It finally happened! Get down to the lab. We need to run trials immediately!”
◆◆◆
“So what have you called this meeting for, Nathym?” Drim inquired once every Fiends For Hire general had finished taking their seat at the table. “You’ve been pretty cagey these past few days, so we’ve been a bit worried. Are you finally ready to tell us what’s so important that you had to basically lock yourself along with Xard and Ahvra into isolation?”
“Sorry about that,” Nathym half-heartedly apologized. The bags on his face were heavy, obviously having not slept much at all, but his eyes were energized. “But yes, I’ll explain everything. It’s time for us to go to space!”
“Wait, then you found it?!” the king suddenly leaned forward in his seat, now completely invested in the conversation while most of those around them only became confused.
“Yes, we found it!” Nathym couldn’t even stay contained in his chair, slamming his fists to the table with unrestrained enthusiasm as he lifted himself to his feet. “We found it, Drim! After all this time!”
“Wait, wait, what did you find?!” Kada asked, not clued into the conversation.
“They key to everything, to solving all of our problems!” The Engineer was still being a bit cryptic, flailing his arms wildly with his answer, but he clued in on how unhelpful he was being and sat back down to answer properly. “I should explain from the start.”
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“You’re all familiar with Project Fiendless to some extent or another, right? But everyone might not know that there’s been one big problem we’ve struggled to overcome, and that’s the power source. Regrettably, there’s nothing we can harness to meet the stringent power requirements of the project. At least not on our world—not that I’ve been able to find yet.”
“So, we started looking elsewhere. A few years ago, not too long after I’d joined up, I sent probes into space, in every direction. Of course, I had a few planets in mind, but none had produced anything fruitful. Until just a few days ago, that is. I received a ping from one of the probes in the next solar system over.”
“From the scan of one of the planets, it has discovered a mineral that we can use as the power source. And damned if it isn't just what we need. From what I can tell, it should be fairly simple with my existing tech to refine and utilize. And I should just need a small piece to break down so we can study its makeup. From there, we should be able to recreate it and synthesize it using our current resources, as much as we need. I’m confident in that fact.”
“So what I’ve called this meeting for is to propose an expedition to that planet and retrieve the mineral.”
“Hold on just a minute,” Tize was the first to weigh in. “You’re talking an actual space voyage to and from the planet. I’m hearing that correctly, right? That… that’s hard to wrap my head around.”
“As a society, we’ve only been looking at space travel for the past few decades. It was discussed a lot during my time in the military, and I’ll admit it goes above my head, but what you’re saying seems to be jumping too far beyond. We’ve had missions to the moon, and there’s been talk of establishing a base there. Of course the greedy rich are also discussing making it a tourist spot, but that’s it!”
“We haven’t even made it to a single other planet yet, but you’re saying you want to go to another solar system and back?! I know you’ve built your own rocket, Nathym, and I’m sure it’s something we can trust. But I need you to be honest and realistic, is this actually feasible?”
“Yes it is. I’d stake my life on it,” The Engineer didn’t even flinch. “Which I absolutely plan to do. And just a small correction, this would only be a one-way trip through space. I’ve actually built a portal that could retrieve the expedition party from anywhere in the universe. It’s all set up in my workshop and ready to go. However, like with our current needs for the project, it will also require finding the power source.”
“But in theory, it’s a fairly simple mission. We fly there and locate the mineral. I have a machine to take with us ready to refine a small portion on the spot. Then we use it to activate the portal that brings us home. I know it’s a bit hard to understand.”
“No, it sounds simple,” Jaid jumped in. “Way too simple and easy, like you’re not considering the dangers or expect that it can fail. So much could go wrong on a mission like this, but you almost make it sound like a trip to the store, or at most, a mission in a hostile country. But this is space, Nathym, it’s as deadly as it gets.”
“Well, I’ve taken every precaution, but…” The man’s words trailed. “But you’re right. I’m getting ahead of myself in explaining things. The point is, I believe this to be the best course of action, and I’m ready to explain my proposal fully.”
Phon leaned forward herself, putting her elbow on the table and resting her chin on her hand. “Let me be the one to ask the hard question. Is this worth it? Is obtaining this mineral so crucial that we would risk the lives of our members to obtain it. Is Project Fiendless completely dead without it?”
“There’s always another way,” Nathym admitted, shaking his head. “But this is our best current option. I’m sure with enough time we could come up with something else. I won’t lie and say that we’re out of possibilities, but how long would it take? Years? Maybe even decades. It could take the rest of our lives.”
“Some of us might still be around for a long time. Ahvra and Feyjrusa are practically immortal, and who knows how long Drim will live with his Curse. But I only have one life, and I want to see my dream through to the end. And the longer we’re stuck on this issue, the longer it will take before we can really change this world.”
“Well I have another question,” Jaid spoke up again. “I only have basic knowledge of what Project Fiendless entails, and I’m no scientist, but what would happen if we try to launch it without that power source. Could it be possible?”
Nathym sighed, clearly annoyed, but did his best not to sound too upset. “Yes, it’s possible, though it’s not an idea I particularly want to entertain. The reality is that if we made no modifications, Project Fiendless would be entirely unacceptable. If we released it in its current state… Well I’ll be blunt. People would die.”
“It’s hard to say how many, but those with lower constitutions, disabilities, or any sort of extraneous condition would all be at risk. Even those who are perfectly healthy, there could always be a random factor. We could be talking a marginal percentage, negligible in the eyes of science. Not that we would ever treat any life as negligible. Or it could be millions, or even what could cause the mass extinction of humanity.”
“So releasing the current build is entirely off the table. However, it is possible that we could implement project Fiendless at reduced capacity. In general, it would be a positive boost to the populace and would improve their lives, but it would also require to strip out most of the additional functions. We’re talking about the ones that generally make us excited for the project, the ones that inspired it to begin with and would be permanently world changing.”
“I highly advise against this for a few reasons. The first is the same as before, it could take us decades to implement the remaining features, and there’s no guarantee that it would happen in most of our lifetimes. This could hamper development too, because if a Fiend dies and we don’t have a significant amount of their blood for testing, then those features could be lost forever.”
“Not only that, but it would be significantly more difficult to add the additional functions post-launch, and require the cooperation of virtually everyone alive if we don’t have the necessary framework in place. I certainly wouldn’t be surprised if we met resistance. People could lose faith in the idea if it takes too long. Essentially, we’d have to keep the good will of the world from the beginning to the end of the project, and not only that, we’d have to keep our position of power.”
“In my mind, we only really get one shot at this. If the project isn’t successful and well received at launch, there’s a good chance it could be dead on the spot. Then all of our work in the science department, all of your work out in the field, and everything we’re doing politically would be all for nothing. That’s why the power source is so important. We need to get this right the first time. There will still be more to add and modify in the future, but its success needs to be scrupulous.”
“Let me ask something then,” Rusa jumped into the fray. “If we do receive this mineral, what would be the turnaround time then on the project's completion?”
“A few months!” The Engineer’s voice and determination were sincere. “It’s hard to give a specific time depending on how long the trials would last, but from a hardware and manufacturing standpoint, once we’re good on power, we can get to mass production once everything’s approved. Assuming there’s no hiccups and we work diligently, I’d be comfortable saying it could be ready to launch by early next year, or by the end of this year if we’re able to obtain a good amount of it during the expedition.”
Drim’s eyes widened at that, clearly enticed by the idea. “In my opinion that would be ideal. It would line up well with everything we’re doing, and I’d rather have it ready to launch at the right moment than have the rest of our plans come to fruition while we’re still waiting.”
“If it can be done safely, then I believe we should pursue it. Obviously there will be risk no matter what. As Jaid mentioned, this is the most hostile environment that any of us will have ever faced, so let’s ensure we’re doing everything possible to minimize it. Walk us through the plan, Nathym, from beginning to end. Convince us that it’s doable and don’t leave anything out.”