Take a moment to imagine a factory on Earth, it’s probably pretty big, kinda shaped like a box and some smoke coming out of a big chimney on top and probably rather plain looking from the outside. If that description fits then it will be a delight to know that factories on Bakania were very similar except for the fact that they were much larger than any factory on Earth. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that they doubled as every type of building in their society or maybe they just produced a lot, Jack was not too sure about the intimate details of Bakan infrastructure. But that’s enough silly descriptions of factories, Jack and company were about to enter one of the largest Bakan factories in search of the reactor.
The doors of the factory were huge, heavy slabs of black iron from top to bottom probably as tall as Jack’s house back on Earth. Jack thought the inside of the factory seemed quite organised with only a single desk sitting in an otherwise empty room until he set his gaze towards the ceiling. To be exact Jack couldn’t really see the ceiling from all the way down at the entrance, the only thing he saw was a great maze of shiny white bridges that Bakans in their grey working clothes were crossing and a ridiculous amount of conveyor belts zipping from wall to wall. Jack stood in the middle of the room his head at a right angle trying to figure out how the conveyor belt system was even supposed to work when Bardox tapped his shoulder.
“We will leave you here now, Jack the human, we hope you enjoy the sightseeing and good fortune in your future endeavours. Just speak to the receptionist they’ll help you along.”
“Thank you, Bardox,” answered Jack, although the Bakans had already started to leave before he could even finish the sentence, “See you around I guess!” he waved after them.
“Alright, so we just talk to the receptionist and what do we ask for?” said Ted.
“We could try asking about the reactor, it shouldn’t be too big according to my reports,” answered Lyra.
"Oh yes, of course. Let me just stroll over there and ask nicely for their top-secret reactor that will mysteriously disappear after we are gone.”
"Lyra raised her arms, “you have any better ideas?”
“If I may stop you two from arguing for a second,” said Glen, “Jack has already started talking to the receptionist while you were discussing our options.”
Ted and Lyra turned towards the reception desk in unison their face in shock. Jack was, in fact, talking to the bulky Bakan sitting there. They waited a while not wanting to interrupt whatever was going on, Jack seemed to be doing quite well by himself, the Bakan was laughing, Jack was laughing and before they knew it Jack was walking back towards the group.
"What did you do?” asked Lyra
"Well, I talked a little with Berkol over there about our first experience with eating Tomlux fruits which seems to be a great topic between Bakans and then I asked him where the reactor is.”
"Did he tell you?”
"Of course, you just have to ask politely, what were you planning on doing?” answered Jack. Lyra glared over at Ted
"I told you so, nothing wrong with just asking.”
“I concur, the quickest way to a solution is usually to ask, especially in the case of the Bakans who have no understanding of deception, to begin with,” said Glen, “now that you have acquired the information, where are we going?”
“Berkol said downstairs through that door so I think we should start there,” said Jack with a hopeful smile
They walked over to the door, which gave way to a little platform and a great big chasm below it. The only thing that seemed to lead down was a ladder and a long fall of course.
"Who goes first?” asked Ted, “Because I sure won’t be having anyone falling on me from above.”
“I will go first,” said Glen.
"Are you sure, you don’t seem the most flexible to be going down ladders,” replied Lyra
"Do not worry about me, I shall inform you once I reach the bottom,” Glen walked towards the ladder, three steps from the edge, two steps, one step, and he was gone. Glen was plummeting down the countless floors until an echoing thump could be heard by the people at the top.
"You okay there?” shouted Jack
"Yes, I am quite alright,” came the reply, “It is not that long a fall, although I recommend that biological lifeforms take the ladder, it will be good exercise.”
"You heard the man, robot I mean,” said Jack, “Good exercise,” Jack gave a shrug and started his long way down the ladder. Lyra went after him and Ted stood there contemplating what he was about to do until he also joined the climb.
"Don’t look down! Don’t look down!” Ted repeated to himself.
"Don’t look down! Don’t look down!” Lyra repeated to herself.
“This is fun! This is fun!” Jack repeated to himself.
Eventually, they managed to meet up with Glen at the foot of the ladder who was seemingly unscathed. The room at the bottom of the stairs was empty except for a single door that led into the main part of the factory. It was unguarded as most places were on Bakania as nobody would usually even visit the planet.
"I guess we just go through that door,” said Jack
"Guess so,” said Lyra while shrugging. Glen and Ted went through the door first followed by Lyra and then Jack. The first thing that hit them was a large wave of heat from the forges and the sound of metal being hammered. They were no longer in the conveyor belt automation part of the factory and had entered the handcrafted metal items part of the factory. They started walking forwards looking at the ponds of molten lava, large black anvils and the hundreds of weapons and machines hanging from the walls and sitting upon desk after desk as someone stopped their sightseeing. A Bakan bigger and burlier than usual stood in front of them with a hammer the size of Jack’s torso in his hand.
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"What are you doing here?” asked the Bakan.
"They looked at each other trying to think of something clever to say, it is awfully difficult to say clever things under pressure. The first to move was as usual Jack who walked to the front of the group and with great confidence showed the Bakan stone to the smith. “Hello, friend! We are just here to visit these spectacular forges,” proclaimed Jack.
"Mmhh, let me see that stone human,” said the smith and examined the stone in great detail, once he seemed satisfied returned it to Jack, “Hello, friends. My name is Btevekol, I would be happy to give a little tour of the forges and answer any questions you might have.”
"Thank you, that is very nice of you!” said Lyra. This seemed to make Btevekol quite pleased with himself.
"Well, then follow me,” said the Bakan, “these are the forges of Bakania in which the strongest steel in the universe is made, it can cut through nearly everything except other Bakan steel of course. The forges themselves are made out of molten lava, and should not be touched,” the Bakan said that last part while giving Jack a stern look who was getting awfully close to the pool of lava.
"We forge a great number of blades each year to arm the entire Bakan army,”
“Why don’t you make any guns?” asked Glen, “I calculate that they would be far more effective.”
“I didn’t really think about that, swords seemed to do the trick, you know.”
“The efficiency of your army would increase drastically by using firearms instead of blades.”
“But swords do the stab stab, and the slash slash,” they left the argument at that.
The five of them continued walking through the forges which seemed to be a never-ending cave guarded by giant pillars on each side and a separate forge in between each pair of pillars. Finally, they reached the end of the cave and were faced by a large metal gate, the gate seemed rather new and shone in the black metal they had seen used in Bakan construction before.
“What’s behind that gate over there?” asked Jacked pointing at the looming structure.
“Oh, we have a secret star core reactor behind those gates,” answered Btevekol, “we managed to extract energy from some of the nearby stars to power that little piece of engineering.”
“Oh really, that sounds so interesting, could we please see it?” asked Jack hoping his usual strategy of politely asking would bear its fruits.
“Well, I really shouldn’t, it is kind of a secret.”
“Oh, that’s a shame, we really wanted to see the greatness of Bakan engineering at work,” said Lyra who was learning how to deal with Bakans by now.
"Well, if you insist it couldn’t harm anyone, could it?” The Bakan went to the little control panel and started typing wildly, presumably he was typing in the access codes to the chamber.
“So, what do we do once we are inside? We can’t just take it can we?” whispered Jack
"You know, honestly, I didn’t think we would get this far by not sneaking in,” she whispered back
"So, we don’t have a plan?” whispered Ted and joined the conversation
"Well…. No, I guess,” said Lyra
"Oh, typical, first I joined up with a group of lunatics and now we don’t have a plan. Why do I have such rotten luck,” said Ted, “never mind don’t answer that, I don’t want to know.”
"If I may suggest, you could use a hologram to make a copy of the reactor and leave it in its place while you escape, it might gain you enough time before the Bakans notice,” said Glen a little too loudly.
"What was that?” asked Btevekol.
“Nothing, nothing, we were just wondering which one of these great swords you made,” answered Jack
"Oh, alright then, I could show you later if you would like,” answered the Bakan giving a satisfied nod while continuing to type.
"Why don’t you scream out our plan?” said Ted, “maybe they didn’t hear you upstairs,”
“I assume you are being sarcastic and will therefore not proceed to increase the volume of my speech unless prompted to.”
"Okay, so a hologram, you got a hologram Lyra?” asked Jack
"Of course, who do you take me for,” she answered, “but I do not have it programmed to look like the reactor,”
"That will not be a problem, I have the capacity to calculate 1000000000000 algorithms at once, creating a hologram should not be a problem,” said Glen
"Alright, here you go,” Lyra handed the hologram disk into Glen’s cold robotic hands, “don’t mess this up.”
"I will try not to dirty anything,” answered Glen.
"Okay, that door is opening, so let’s get this party started!” said Jack
“I do not think it is appropriate to celebrate yet,” answered Glen
“It is a figure of speech, you piece of metal,” said Ted who seemed increasingly done with Glen.
“I am quite happy to see you are excited to see the reactor that we spend so much to build!” said the Bakan. The reactor was in a large circular room, they had placed it on a sort of pedestal in the middle of the room. The reactor reminded Jack of a gaming console, at least a little bit. It was a square with some blue glowing lines crossing all over the box in straight lines. The top of the box had a large blue button, and if Jack had learnt anything from movies it was that pressing the glowing button was probably not a good idea, but there was just something about pressing glowing buttons, you’d understand that feeling if you were ever in front of a glowing button.
"Well here it is, marvel at the glorious craftsmanship of Bakania!” proclaimed Btevekol his arms outstretched. The four of them got closer to the reactor under the watchful eye of the Bakan smith.
“You ready?” asked Lyra and gave Glen a little tap with her elbow. Glen nodded, his robotic face swinging up and down.
Jack went up to Btevekol, knowing a distraction was needed. He put his arm around his shoulder and immediately put it back seeing the displeasure on Btevekol's face at the gesture.
“Would you tell me more about these wonderful walls,” said Jack to the Bakan, “they are truly magnificent.”
The Bakan looked at Jack, trying to figure out what to say, in the end, he spoke with a smile, “they are magnificent aren’t they, you see that little square over there?” he pointed at a section of the wall, “my brother built that one, not bad eyy?”
“Not bad at all, could you show it to me from closer up, I am really interested in walls…” while not usually the most intriguing of topics, walls are a good icebreaker among the Bakans. They will go on and on about nearly anything they made themselves.
“Now, switch it,” Ted whispered hectically
Quicker than Ted would ever have suspected Glen to be, the real reactor was switched out for a perfect replica. The real reactor was also promptly put in a secret compartment in Glen’s stomach. They looked over at Jack, who was seemingly not having a problem with talking about walls.
“C’mon we gotta save Jack from whatever he is doing, I can’t believe he is actually enjoying talking about a wall,” said Lyra
They dragged Jack out of the conversation.
"That reactor is excellent,” said Ted, “I am very impressed with its reactorness,”
“Oh, aren’t we all?” said the Bakan, “I will have to remember that word, reactorness, anyway I shall guide you out of the facilities now.”
And before they knew it they were out and about on the grey surface of Bakania with a reactor in Glen’s stomach and nobody suspected a thing.
“I can’t believe that actually worked,” said Lyra
“I did say, all you need is polite conversation, you know, that wall was built in the year 7634 of the Bakan calendar on a rainy day which is a sign of good luck in the Bakan…”
“Shut it, I don’t want to hear about walls, let’s just get out of here,” said Ted