Kaleb glanced between the man and Farrah. Both parties seemed to ignore him completely, which both pissed him off and made him happy at the same time. He couldn’t really gauge the mystery man’s strength just from looking at him, but Farrah seemed ready to handle things. He kept his Sun Gun aimed at Julius and walked a little closer just in case though.

The man named Julius watched Kaleb move from the corner of his eye before staring back at Farrah. His grip on his weird green spear seemed to tighten. As Kaleb moved closer, he got a better look at the weapon. It was bulbous and rough in odd places, then smooth in others. The tip of the spear was pitch black but faded to a pinkish-red color further down. Julius seemed to have a similar style armor on too.

As Kaleb moved closer, Farrah put up her palm indicating that he was close enough. She maintained eye contact with Julius and asked. “So did you just come here to act like a superior jackass or did you have something useful to say?”

Julius snorted and his grip on his spear relaxed. “Useful? Get out of Hunter’s Association territory. Is that useful enough? The neighborhood will never accept you, so don’t even bother applying for a Super Permit.”

This time Kaleb snorted. “Little too late. We already have our permit and my friends are working the neighborhood right now.”

“You damn kids don’t know what you’re in for.” Julius complained. “This neighborhood will eat you and spit you out.”

Farrah got up from her chair and marched toward Julius. “Maybe, but that is their decision, and some washed up old hunter, who would rather make enemies over friends can butt out.”

Julius’ body tensed up again and Kaleb was sure that the man was about to attack. Instead, the old hunter just angrily shook his head. “You don’t understand. But you will, when goblins rip your friends to shreds, when you watch a cyclops bite off the head of someone you care about or when the Barghest attack this little home of yours. Then you will understand.”

Kaleb thought the old man was overacting. When he looked at Farrah, he saw the tall rabbit woman trying to hide her smirk. Julius spun on his heel and moved toward the large hanger doors again. Kaleb felt like the last couple of minutes were completely unnecessary. The man walked in, tried to scare them off, and now he was leaving. Kaleb thought the man arrived far too quickly for that to be everything he had to say.

Sure enough, when Julius was almost outside the hangar he turned slightly and asked. “Is Bob okay? I didn’t see him at the front gate.”

Farrah nodded. “He is downstairs, sleeping off his power exhaustion.”

Julius turned and gave Farrah a questioning look. She just shrugged her shoulders and said. “The giant ants.”

Julius glanced at Kaleb and barked. “Get those defensive working before you get someone killed!”

Julius marched his way out of the hangar as Kaleb crossed his arms and grumbled. “Why don’t YOU get the defensive fixed, jackass?”

He felt Daivor’s small hand pat him on top of his shoulder. “Yeah. Good one, boss.”

“Shut up.” Kaleb snapped before turning to look at Farrah.

The rabbit woman was sitting back down at her computer and seemed to pointedly not looking his way. He felt Daivor leave his shoulder as he walked toward her to ask a few questions. Glancing back, he saw the Gnome swinging his way toward the outer hangar door. The Gnome was clearly moving to check on the perimeter guns again.

Kaleb moved right next to Farrah, but before he could ask anything she cut him off. “No, I will not explain who that guy was. He is not an old boyfriend, or an old partner, and I can’t say more than that.”

Kaleb smiled. “Which by itself says volumes.”

Farrah sighed and deadpanned. “I can not control what assumptions you make nor can I confirm them. Please leave it alone.”

Kaleb put both his hands up in a giving-up gesture and walked back the way he came. He figured he could help Daivor with the defenses. Roy seemed to be taking his time getting those D-Net antennae, and he really didn’t want to slice open anymore flies. But before he could get there, Daivor poked his head into the hangar.

“Boss, could you bring up the left side turret?”

Kaleb just nodded and changed directions heading for the office. He quickly found the controls and raised both turrets from their underground pockets. Finished there he joined Daivor near the left-side turret. He got his first real look at the twin fifty-caliber machine guns that were their hangar’s defenses.

Someone mounted the twin guns on a small platform that raised them a few meters off the ground. A small minicomputer sat between them, probably connecting the guns and the platform to the terminal in the hangar. Daivor was inspecting a large blue barrel sitting alongside the turret when Kaleb walked up.

“Looks like this held the belt of ammo or at least that was what they intended it to do.” Daivor said standing on the lip of the barrel.

“They never used them?” Kaleb asked.

“It doesn’t look like it.”

Kaleb shrugged. “That makes sense. I don’t think Obadiah ever used this place, least of all the defenses.”

Daivor nodded and swung up to the old-style machine gun. “Ammo will be expensive.”

“You said that the fly glands held a lot of power, right?” Kaleb asked looking inside the hangar at the small pile of glands he had made.

“Yeah…” Daivor said cautiously.

“Well then, why can’t we use those as power supplies for energy turrets instead of using the main generator.”

“Because that would disintegrate anything it hit. I know you’re bloodthirsty sometimes, boss, but that’s going a little far, isn’t it?” Daivor explained.

Kaleb sighed. “Yeah, I guess so. I’m just trying to avoid the expense.”

Daivor nodded. “Understandable. So why don’t we give them the Solar treatment? Like your Sun Gun.”

“Do we even have more yellow Elentian crystals?”

“A few, I think. Why?” Daivor asked.

“Because that’s what I used to house and transfer the solar energy before I shoot it.” Kaleb explained.

Daivor scratched his beard before a thought seemed to come to him. “Use the glands.”

Kaleb nodded. “Thought of that, but first we would have to transfer the energy out of a few. First law of thermodynamics and all, y’know? So we would need a container capable of holding that much energy.”

Daivor shrugged. “Dump it back into the generators.”

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

“Will that work?”

“Right now the energy is being stored as a hybrid of plasma and electricity in the Joranek’s gland. The generators run on some kind of bio-sludge. All we have to do is dump the plasma and transfer the electricity and we should be in business. We may lose some power in the transfer as it burns off, but we will still have an empty gland.” Daivor explained.

“I guess. If you think it will work…” Kaleb said a little worried.

Daivor smiled. “Like 82% sure, boss.”

Kaleb threw up his hands. “Let's do it then. You grab some contact cables and I’ll meet you down there with a few glands.”

Daivor nodded and swung himself back into the hangar. I actually miss the hover chariot. Kaleb thought as he moved inside and grabbed a few of the pulsing red glands. He headed downstairs as soon as he had an armful, stopping for a quick peek in on Bob. The security guard was in Clair and Two Gun’s room sleeping peacefully.

When he reached the third floor, Kaleb set the glands down in front of the three generators and looked around. It was still somewhat dark in the room, but he could still make out a few things from the glow coming from the generators. All three machines whirred silently, sloshing noises coming from the spinning liquid inside the large generators.

Kaleb didn’t wait long until Daivor joined him. The Gnome was actually in his chariot again and was carrying large amounts of wiring both in his arms and with his telekinesis. Kaleb just smiled at the Gnome and waved a hand at the three large cylinders.

“So… Where do we start?”

“That one on the far end. It’s the most empty. There’s a panel near the bottom.” Daivor said pointing to a rectangular box on the side of the generator.

Kaleb opened the panel and discovered two large cylindrical indentations. It looked like a spot for two large batteries. He gave Daivor a questioning look but the Gnome just shrugged.

“I figured it was how they fed or took power from these things.”

Kaleb nodded as he saw two metal connection points near the top of each indentation. “I think you are right. So how do we do this?”

Daivor grinned and held up two small metal leads with wires coming out of them. “You jam these into the gland and I attach the other ends into the generators connections. Then we cross our fingers and toes and hope this shit works.”

Kaleb rolled his eyes, picked up a gland, and took the leads while muttering. “Yay, science!”

“Hey! Science can’t move forward if you are not willing to get the shit shocked out of you.”

“Interesting use of the singular pronoun there, Master Gnome.” Kaleb joked as he jammed the metal leads into a Joranek gland. It was surprisingly tougher than it looked.

“Thank you, smart-ass. Although note that I’m at the dangerous end of this endeavor.” Daivor said as he attached one of his wires into the generators connection.

They both went silent as there was a sudden and loud whirring from the generator. Kaleb was about to move forward and do the second attachment himself, but Daivor quickly attached it. The whirring grew louder and Kaleb felt the gland in his arms grow hotter.

“Ow! Son of a bitch!” Kaleb yelled dropping the gland.

It had gotten so hot that he couldn’t maintain his hold. Luckily the leads stayed in place and the power transfer seemed to keep going. Daivor stared at the blue sludge inside the generator. The little Gnome was smiling widely as he watched. Kaleb was blowing air onto his hurting hand, but when the loud electrical whirring stopped, he asked.

“Did it work?”

Daivor nearly cackled. “Yes! Yes, it fucking worked. Look at it!”

Kaleb glanced down at the once glowing gland and found it be almost clear. He could almost see through the entire gland. Daivor flew up and slapped him on the head, getting his attention.

“Not the gland! The sludge, boy. Look at the sludge!” Daivor ordered still giddy.

Kaleb looked up at the sludge while shaking his hurting hand. It looked like the same old blue sludge to him though. He shrugged his shoulders at Daivor with a curious look on his face. Daivor slapped a small palm in into his face and pointed at the sludge.

“The level of the sludge rose. It took in the energy and then, somehow, converted it into more blue sludge. We got nowhere near the amount of energy housed in the gland but we increased the hangars power overall.”

“Okay…” Kaleb said still confused.

Daivor groaned. “Ugh! I have a theory. I think the amount of energy stored in these tanks remains the same. The only reason they are low right now is because the Joranek. This sludge replaces the energy it uses.”

Kaleb’s eyes grew wide, and he was about to ask how when Daivor shook his head. “I don’t know how. But, I think that whatever organisms is in this stuff replaces itself as fast as it dies. We introduced a new power source and the little organisms in the sludge replicated like crazy.”

Kaleb nodded. “Okay, that doesn’t really prove your theory though. It just proves that we can transfer a small amount of energy from the glands. We don’t know what happens when we use energy, because, so far, we haven’t used any.”

Daivor rolled his eyes. “What do you think is powering the lights? Or the terminal and phone in the office. True, the power drain is so negligible that we probably wouldn’t see a dip in the sludge. But we should see something right?”

Kaleb bobbed his head noncommittally. “Maybe, but Let's get excited if we can power the hangar shields indefinitely. Okay?”

Daivor just harrumphed and pointed down at the Joranek gland still attached to the wires. “Attach the next one and let's get through this.”

Kaleb nodded and carefully removed the leads and attached them to the next gland. He left the whole set-up on the floor in case he burned himself again. Daivor had turned his chariot and was watching the blue sludge. Seeing Kaleb was watching, Daivor flew up and struck his finger through the air leaving a magical mark where the top of the sludge was.

“Did you just leave a mark in glitter magic?” Kaleb asked bemused as the loud whirring started again.

“Shut it.” Daivor said crossing his arms and waiting for the loud whirring to die down again.

Kaleb kept his eyes trained on the sludge during the whole process. The glittering line in the air next to the oblong window stayed stuck in the air. But Kaleb could see that the blue sludge was growing past the line as the energy transferred between the gland and generator. Daivor turned and smiled smugly at Kaleb.

“I never said I didn’t believe you.” Kaleb muttered as the whirring died down.

“Attach the next one.” Daivor said.

They went through all eleven glands that Kaleb had brought down. The generator was now hovering just under half full. The energy storage of the Joranek glands impressed Kaleb. Picking up the now empty glands, Kaleb said.

“Now all we have to do is give the turret and solar conversion and use these as power container.”

Daivor nodded. “We also have to reprogram the minicomputers and guns with stun or kill settings. Like your own gun.”

Kaleb started for the stairs with his armful of glands. “Still a lot of work ahead of us.”

He didn’t see Daivor’s response as he bounded up the stairs and through the living area. When he came up the stairs to the hangar floor, he heard a loud beeping noise coming from the opposite end. Farrah was standing near the office door and when she saw him she pointed into the office.

“It’s be doing that for the past couple of minutes. Fix it, before I break the damn thing.”

Kaleb just sighed and hurried over to the Mechanics Room to drop off the glands. Once that he had dropped them on his workbench, he ran into the office and brought up the terminal.

*Notice*

Generators are now at 57% power.

Your headquarters now has enough power to run the shields at Projectile Strength

Projectile Strength shields will guard against any low grade energy or ballistic weapon.

Organic matter can still pass through the shield unimpeded.

Slow moving inorganic matter can still pass through the shield unimpeded.

Increase generator output to increase shield strength.

Engage shields?

[Yes] / [No]

Kaleb read through the notification and looked up to see Daivor grinning at him. Kaleb shrugged his shoulder and tapped yes. A loud hum echoed throughout the hangar but nothing else happened. Kaleb glanced up from the monitor and looked around. Farrah was still near the office door and she just shrugged her shoulders.

“Now what did you do?” She asked a little exasperated.

Daivor stayed near the terminal but Kaleb moved into the hangar answering. “Turned on the shield. But… I don’t know I expected more of a show, really.”

“That’s the problem with you kids.” Said a familiar voice. “You always want things big and flashy.”

Kaleb spun around until he came face to face with a smiling Obadiah Nova. The old man was standing next to a beaming Roy. Kaleb grinned sheepishly before he waved.

*Fwip*

Suddenly a sharp pain jabbed at Kaleb’s neck and he his vision darkened.

“What… do… for!” Roy’s voice shouted from a long way away.

Kaleb raised his hand to his neck and pulled out a small dart. He glanced back up at Obadiah, who was still grinning. The elder Nova mouthed the words “Your turn.”

“Dick…” Kaleb mumbled as his eyelids grew heavy and he passed out.