As always, I slept badly.
eh?
...‘What do I dream about?’
....
...
..
.
.
..
…
….
…”AAAGHHGhHHG!!!”
They shock the limbless body trapped to the table again, it hurts when they do it to the thing, but I don't mind, that’s not me after all… Dad promised that this research would make me walk again, so I will bear it….
“AARRHAAAAH..!!!” *sob sob*
It is not me that they are hurting. It is that one on the table…
“ Log 112. Research sample 42, still showing outward signs of mental receptiveness to stimuli, but EEG reads decreasing activity in the the dorsal posterior insula, it seems that the Y-22 at 10 mg dosage is successful in affecting the brain chemistry without cell deterioration. If the effects maintain the desired direction there should be a good chance to regain funding.” An elderly voice said.
They talk about weird stuff again…
“AAASGAHH!!”
...Please stop hurting it already...
“Personal note, further research is required into the increased random activity in the Cerebral Cortex that seems to occur consistently moments after stimuli.”
...Please make it stop… ...Father...
...They charge the pads and bring them closer to that thing on the table again...
..
.
.
Ah, sorry sorry… I let my mind wander.
I’ll tell you about the nightmares some other day, ok? They aren't too pleasant of a subject to talk about this early in the morning.
As I got out of bed and recharged my power source, I took a glance at where alicia was supposed to sleep, but her corpse and beddings were no longer there.
Judging from the sounds in the kitchen she must have woken up before me and is now trying to make some breakfast.
Smiling slightly to myself I donned some fresh clothes and headed to the kitchen.
Unsurprisingly our breakfast was canned meat and some dried plums.
What? You expected me to have fresh ingredients, after having left the arcology for over a week? I am not that wasteful!
Alicia seemed a bit down since she failed to make breakfast, so I promised that we would go get groceries later today.
After we finished our morning duties we headed out into the the relatively quiet hallways of the Arcology.
On today’s agenda we have:
1. visiting Lee at the hangar for fitting Alicia’s Drone with a sniper-rifle.
2. Buying groceries.
3. Signing Alicia and me as a squad (I forgot yesterday!)
4. Checking if a friends business is running alright.
So the first place we headed to was the Assignment Hub.
Signing myself and Alicia as a squad was rather easy, all we had to do was talk to the ex-Weapon manning the reception desk and tell him to do so, he did have to see our ID but was that really surprising?
So with that out of the way, we took an elevator down to the hangars.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
“Lee.”
I called out to the pair of legs sticking out from under the hood of Fea’s main core.
*Cough* “Rasmus!” sounds of scrambling fill the air for a moment as Lee scrambles out from inside Fea’s core.
“Um…” Lee glances at Alicia awkwardly.
“Sorry about yesterday, I may have overreacted… It's good. That you finally got a squadmate I mean.” Lee said with a apologetic look. ...I swear I saw some hate in those eyes when he looked at Alicia, but i’m gonna let it slide.
“So, what do you think of Fea?” I changed the subject.
“Ah, she is a beauty I must say!” Lee responded with a smile, starting his incoming monologue.
“I rebuilt the damaged parts on her, including your shield, that one was quite tough you know? The specs on that are way too precise, that being said, I did change how the hydraulics link to the arm, It should handle an impact a bit better.”
“The frame itself is a total piece of art, someone must have pulled all the stops on integrating the rest onto it, It even has hydraulic bearings running parallel to the main supports as a fallback, in case they malfunction, I am pretty sure that you wouldn't have gotten back to aurora without them.”
“there is also a separate wet drive included in the inner folds of the OS-Core armoring to help dealing with junk data from sensor scramblers. None of this was even included in the machine registry. Whoever built this really worked to impress I must say.”
I nodded. Satisfied that Fea was satisfactory in the eyes of a professional mechanic.
“How about the Drone?” I asked next.
“That kids walker?” He gave a cold look to Alicia before carrying on.
“It's a rather fascinating piece of old tech that you found I must say, It uses too many motorized joints to my taste but it is still quite ingenious.”
“They just don’t build ‘em like this anymore, as for the Controls I switched the joysticks it had, for balljoint-handle-controls used in turrets, closest thing in commercial use, otherwise if they get damaged we cannot replace them, I still haven't configured it though.”
“Ok, thanks Lee. Before you configure it, could you switch the weapons on it for a rifle? R223 or R525 Should be fine.” I asked.
“Ye no problem. I will pay your repairs from my pocket this time, but I need you to pay me back later alright?”
“Yeah, thanks Lee.”
After talking with lee a bit more (with me catching him often giving Alicia a cold stare, and alicia being generally quiet) We left Lee to his work and carried on our tasks for the day.
After Leaving the Commission Hub I visited the offices of the ‘Armament Acquire&Shippings’ Corp that a friend is running. (A&A-Corp for short)
The moment I walked through the front door I was instantly greeted by a very polite swindler-looking guy “Ah! Mr Rasmus. Welcome back, welcome back! We have all been eagerly waiting for your return, ‘Boss’ Is in his office waiting for you, go on right in!” He cheerfully explained as he ushered me past the waiting people in the lobby and past the metal detector (past not through).
As I mentioned, the owner of this place is a friend of mine, it used to be run by a shady person who traded in human trafficking, so I killed him and gave the company to a person who was not in on the plot, since then I have often helped them with their business problems, you know, small stuff, like figuring out where to ship weapons to, or how to avoid their competitors figuring out trade secrets, improvements on the merch, those sort of things.
Heh, sometimes I feel that I am the real owner of this place from the way the staff treats me.
...They left Alicia in the lobby though… I am sure she will be fine.
“Ah Bo- Rasmus! Welcome back, welcome back! Have a seat sir!” The CEO of the company, Nastim, a rather thin, lazy-looking guy with a beard creeping up his face every morning, ushered me to take a seat in a comfy-yet-fancy sofa. He always had the best manners I must say.
“So, I trust you heard what went down with my Haul-job?”I asked him as I took a sip of coffee that a pretty assistant ushered over for me.
“Ah, I heard, I heard, The Carrier-corps Haul was seized by the local security right?”
“Yes, namely, I turned it in.” I responded.
“I-is that so? But now our trade is going to be severely hindered by the increased scrutiny in the port city.” He responded.
Yeah, I agree this means the security will be very careful so they will most likely hinder Nastim’s cargo shipments, but that's not an issue since his company is out of the human trafficking business, and since Carrier-corps (c-corps for short) are his biggest competitor in the region, this can be a benefit.
“It may seem like an issue at first, but you gotta see the opportunity, I am certain Carrier-corps won't be able to carry proper trade for a while through Ìrota, but we have the local trust there don't we? you can use this to take over C-Corps’ trade contracts by convincing Ìrota of this corporation's clean papers.”
“...True, you are right we have the ‘trust’ of many security officers, but we still need to ‘convince’ many more of our corporation’s clean cargo, I will have people get right on that bo- sir.” He responded.
“Besides that, I think you should consider including silencers on the personal armaments on sale.” There are bound to be many shady types we can sell to now that the security is kicking up. Selling to criminals might be wrong, but hey! Their cash is just as green. Besides, many of the security officers in that city seemed interested in taking law to their own hands when I visited, it will definitely sell.
“...Are you sure? ‘Silenced’ Weaponry would definitely go a long way to make trade easier in Ìrota, but isn't it a bit…”
“Just do it. You will thank me later, also make silencers readily available for purchase to all customers in the area.”
“...Ok sir. I will do as you say.” See? These kinds of things make me feel like I own the place, not him.
“Yeah, just remember, it's your corporation not mine. Oh also, I recommend trying to acquire C-corps’ assets in this city when their trade is suffering.”
“Of course sir.” Always so polite this guy.
We chatted a bit longer about things, trade security, etc. but soon I decided to excuse myself, Alicia and I have to buy groceries before the day is out after all.
After visiting the market and purchasing some much needed food supplies, we headed to my room again and lazed the rest of the day.
*Pov: CEO of ‘Armament Acquire&Shippings’ Corporation / second in command of an underworld Mob.*
Boss came back to Aurora today, honestly it made me quite glad, things went to shit after he left and turned in that cargo, the Etre family that rules the local area was really not happy to have lost a shipment.
...It was shocking to hear that boss wants to go into an open war with them this boldly, even carrying the opening move out himself.
Etre family and everyone else is now also suffering since Ìrota is keeping an eye out to stop any slave-trading… Yet he wants to use the people we bribed and coerced to keep trade going… going as far as ordering the tongues and vocal chords to be removed from all trafficked slaves to silence them just goes to show how committed boss is. He even wants to offer the same treatment to anyone who wants to discreetly silence their personal slaves neatly...
Since it’s Boss, we should be able to manage. He is the one who gave me this job after all, and has made us rise to rival even the great families, whilst being careful enough to never openly talk of our business, always metaphors and never even touching the blood money, Boss is too skilled and smart… and cruel.
Even if I think this plan is too bold I know better than to disobey or cut him out, I can tell from those cruel eyes that i would not survive to see the next day if i did.
Editor's note:
A note on our main character:
He appears to have the same general awareness of his position as mob boss, as a harem anime main character has of his harem.