Kaleb adjusted the air scrubber again. Holding it with his robot hand as his other one eased the bracket in place. Once everything was arranged correctly, he screwed the thing in place and swung back a bit to see if it held. The uncomfortable harness he and Daivor had built out of loose straps, duct tape, and prayer swayed ominously. But Kaleb wasn’t worried. The thing had held just fine during the last three installations. He jostled the scrubber slightly to see if anything moved and adjusted the clamps and bracket accordingly.

Below him, he heard the side door to the hangar open and looked down. Abby, Claire, and Vivienne were coming in from their latest patrol. Farrah’s little command center had been a hive of activity for most of the evening. Nothing major, but with the cops still half-assing things, they were kept on their toes. However, Farrah was already gathering evidence of the cop’s wrong-doings. She planned on giving it to the auditor when they came by.

Kaleb coughed loudly to get the women’s attention as he swung from his harness in mid-air. “How’s the night life treating ya?!”

Abby and Claire snapped into low fighting stances, and Vivienne summoned her wand to her hand. The three looked around until they spotted Kaleb’s winch and pulley-system that held him suspended in the corner of the hangar. Even from this distance, Kaleb could see Abby’s quirked eyebrow of confusion.

“You are seriously installing those things? I thought that air quality shit was a joke.”

Kaleb rolled his own eyes as the women put their weapons away. “A five percent bump in efficiency is not a joke, Abs. Not to mention all of us sleeping better. That’s bound to have its own benefits.”

“Not all of us sleep in-game, Professor.” Claire stated cooly.

“Besides, how is it going to work with the Hangar doors opening and closing?”

Kaleb went back to his work as he shouted down at his friends. “We’ll have to keep them closed most of the time. Which we already do anyway. So it shouldn’t be an issue. And the bonus can even reach a few floors down if we leave the basement door open. It’s a win-win.”

Kaleb double-checked that the scrubber was secure before he switched it on. A low hum emanated from the device and its electronic internals lit up a light blue. Honestly, the longest part of the whole endeavor had been scrubbing the scrubbers clean. They were absolutely filthy on the outside. But once that was done, and they were in place, they virtually blended into the hangar walls. Kaleb nodded to himself in satisfaction as he gave a sharp whistle.

Two Brute lizards that were helping move some supplies around the hangar immediately moved to his winch to lower him back to the ground. His whistle always made Roy and Daivor come out of the workshop. The boy took a deep breath and looked around as the gnome on his shoulder did the same. Kaleb grinned at them as his harness was quickly brought down.

“That’s great work, Doc. How soon will we see benefits?”

“We were seeing benefits after the first two were installed!” Farrah called from her position at the command center. “Already my people are filling paperwork quicker and even seem happier.”

Kaleb gave Abby an ‘I told you so’ look, but the short woman wasn’t convinced.

“Oh, what does she know? She’s an NPC. I’m still saying we should’ve weaponized the scrubbers somehow.”

Kaleb rolled his eyes again and waved her off as he got out of his harness. The three women moved toward the command center to fill out their paperwork. Kaleb thanked the two Brute lizards and joined them, wanting to see the effects of the air scrubbers first hand. Vivienne turned to ask her own question as one of Farrah’s interns handed them their forms.

“Why didn’t you have the system install them? Wouldn’t that have been quicker?”

“Yes, but like all crafting in this game, it’s better if the player does it. The bonus was three percent if the system installed the scrubbers. This way, we get the full five.”

“It also gave you an excuse to dodge tonight’s patrols.” Abby grumped as she took her seat.

Kaleb simply stuck his tongue out at her and waited. Soon they’d see the benefits. The scrubbers promised an increase in stamina, health, and just general work efficacy while inside the hangar. Which meant they could train longer, sleep better, and work faster than before. At five percent, that change was going to be noticeable and helpful. He leaned against the other table as the three women started writing. Roy arrived and passed Kaleb a cup of coffee while Daivor swung onto his shoulder.

“The air already smells better, boss.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, it’s not quite like the forest of Fae. But it’s much better than before.”

Kaleb filed that note away for later. “And how goes the inventory?”

Roy scoffed. “Slow, but we’ve already pulled the dangerous stuff out and had it set aside.”

“How dangerous.”

“A power cell on a prototype rifle was cracked and leaking. We got a patch on it and secured the weapon for now.”

“A power cell shouldn’t… leak.” Kaleb said, confused.

“It was some kind of acid-spewer, doc. The cell not only powered the weapon but doubled as its ammo supply.”

Kaleb blinked, still confused, as Roy and Daivor grinned. “Wait. Were they attempting some kind of perpetual energy supply?”

“Better.”

“Worse.”

Daivor and Roy glanced at each other as they spoke at the same time. The gnome pulled his pipe out of his shirt and lit it as he waited for Roy to explain his side.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

“They tried to pull in ambient mana from the air and use it to power an acid-spewing rifle. Essentially trying to create Magi-Tech. And that always goes poorly.”

“Which is why I think it’s a good thing. If those geniuses at K-Tech are fucking around with mana, then it’s going to bite them in the ass eventually.”

“So this power cell draws in ambient mana, converts it into acid, and then uses the conversion to power each shot?” Kaleb asked as he rubbed his chin.

He almost rushed to his workshop to examine the thing. But he still wanted to see if the air scrubbers were, indeed, having an effect. When he glanced at the table of women, though, he was surprised to see Abby and Claire already done. Both women were staring at each others paperwork in equal surprise. Abby looked up to see Kaleb watching them and scowled.

“Yes, it was quicker. It’s like my brain remembered details better and my hand worked on its own. It was freaky.”

“It’s absolutely fabulous, is what it is. Now I can spend some time in the gym before Two Gun and I log-off tonight.”

“Where is the old man, anyway?” Kaleb asked as Vivienne also finished her own paperwork.

“I sent him to investigate a TekNik store on Blue Bluff road,” Farrah answered, still watching her bank of screens.

“They have a store in our neighborhood?”

“Just a general electronic store. Nothing major.”

“Selling all your household electronics at over-inflated prices.”

“Speaking of which, what exactly is my husband investigating, Farrah?” Claire asked, staring daggers at the bunny-woman’s back.

“Remember those cops that could’ve been twins?” Kaleb asked. “Well, Roy followed them to a warehouse where, it turns out, he discovered they were actually robots.”

“TekNik brand automatons, actually. With synthetic skin suits.” Farrah corrected as she tapped at a keyboard.

“How do you know that?”

Farrah said nothing, but waved a hand at her screen. In it, a drone was flying low and peeking into a storefront. Three large robots filled the store’s front window. They went from the more robotic looking on the left to one covered in human-looking skin. Inside the dark store, Kaleb could see Two Gun sneaking around. He raised an eyebrow at Farrah.

“Should you be recording Two Gun’s unlawful entry into a place of business?”

“We have the rights to investigate as we see fit in our contracted area, Professor. That allows us a certain amount of leeway.”

“Has he found anything? Nothing yet. How about you? Weren’t you studying that formula you picked up?”

Kaleb coughed awkwardly and adjusted his lab coat. He might have gotten a little off track, but upgrading his workshop would help overall. All four women turned to look at him, and Kaleb felt his skin grow hot.

“I was getting to it! Okay?! I mean, I wanted to upgrade my lab a little before I used up the only sample we have.”

“Uhh, about that, boss.” Daivor said from his shoulder, sounding sheepish.

“We, uhhh, found the handheld MassSpec while we were doing the inventory. It was stuffed in a box at the back of the workshop. It’ll need some work, but that may do what we need.”

Kaleb smacked his forehead as the small black device came to his mind. He had even suggested using it to analyze the demon goo. But Jar-lock had been worried about the cops following them. So instead they went to the college, and he got roped into teaching a weekly chemistry class. Since then, he had blanked the thing from his mind, completely forgetting about it. Kaleb rubbed his eyes in frustration before glancing at everyone. Roy and Daivor looked slightly ashamed as all four women were grinning at him. He pointed a finger at them.

“Upgrading my lab is still a good idea.”

With those words, he rushed back toward his workshop and quickly closed the door. Roy and Daivor slid in just behind him and hurried to the pile of junk at the back. Marie and Terrance were there still sorting through all the junk. The larger pieces were outside the workshop leaning against its southern wall. But the weapons, armor, and broken bits of metal were all piled inside. Marie already had a horde of metal beside her, smiling like a kid on Christmas. While Terrance was more circumspect in his pickings.

Kaleb grinned at them before he stepped to his workbench. Most upgrades to the room could be done from the office terminal. But he was sure he could do something with the workbench’s interface. He brought up the inventory menu and started digging through crafting recipes. Behind him, Kaleb heard Roy helping the others in separating out the bits of their ill-gotten gains. Meanwhile, Daivor hurried over to see what he was doing, and they carefully looked at their options.

Kaleb sighed as he spotted different workbenches were grayed-out since he had a Workshop and not a Lab or a Mechanic’s Bay. Which meant a trip to the office was unavoidable. He closed out the menus and turned just as Roy approached with a small black device. It had a square head at the top and a slim round handle at the bottom. The handle and sides were filled with toggles and switches, while its face was a large read-out screen. He grinned and grabbed the MassSpec, meaning to place it on his workbench for later. But then a thought struck him.

Returning to his workbench, he scanned the handheld device and started looking through its inner workings.

“What’chu thinking, Boss?” Daivor said.

Kaleb swung the holo-screen toward the gnome and brought up another program in the terminal. He started drawing up designs as both Roy and Daivor stuck their heads in. The gnome skimmed the information first and shrugged.

“So? It’s a Mass-Spectrometer. It’s sorts and measures ions then spits out the data on them. We then take that data and parse out which substances make up the solution.”

Kaleb smiled. “Yeah, but doesn’t it seem a bit pedestrian to you?”

“Yeah, but it was clearly junk. Otherwise, why would someone at K-Tech toss it?”

“Well, it has no power supply, and its database of substances is somewhat lacking.”

“Sure, but it can still serve our purposes.”

“What if we want it to do more than that?”

“Professor?”

Kaleb finished his design and swung the new image to Roy and Daivor. The boy was still reading the analyzes of the device, but Daivor immediately looked over Kaleb’s work. The gnome’s eyes grew larger and larger as he checked the larger device. Kaleb was already ordering the workbench to pull the parts from their inventory when Daivor sputtered a question.

“Did you take the alchemy research we did and apply it to… this… device?”

“Partially. But the components are still mechanical. Just with some magic bits tacked on.”

“Like you!” Roy said happily.

Kaleb scowled but didn’t argue. The boy wasn’t wrong. Instead, he searched their inventory for more alien metals they could use as a power source. They were going to have to use one of Kersait’s batteries that they had used before. Thankfully, they had their fair share of alien alloys to work with. Roy, seeing what he was doing, hastened to help gather what was needed. Daivor simply puffed on his pipe as he eyed Kaleb’s design again.

“This is going to take a heap of data storage. You know that, right?”

“Yes, along with an encrypted D-Net channel.”

“That’s not going to be fast enough. We’re going to have to pay for R-Wave emitters.”

Kaleb froze and then swung his designs back around to himself. Sure enough, the data transfer rates for a D-Net connection were far too slow. He was going to have to go R-Wave. He rubbed his face as he could feel his credits flying away from his digital wallet. As a last ditch effort to avoid bankruptcy, he made some adjustments to his design. Daivor climbed up to his shoulder and watched him work and humphed in thought.

“It could work. But you know, you could just build an emitter yourself.”

“One big enough for what I need?” Kaleb questioned.

“We have the metal for the dish. Just from Roy’s giant repulsor alone. Melt the metal covering that thing and we’d have a start.”

Kaleb’s mind whirled again. “I’ll have to move the winch and pulley system outside. The dish is going to have to go on the roof.”

Daivor rubbed his small hand together. “It’s going to be a long night, Professor.”

“Yes, but hopefully by the end of it, I’ll have a personal scanner that can read data from a remote knowledge base. Then I won’t have to worry about coming back to base to scan shit. I could do it in the field.”

The gnome peered around the room. “It’s going to be a lot of work.”

Kaleb grinned. “That’s the fun part.”