Chapter Nine
Building a Spaceship in Three Days
Conny’s voice was heard ship-wide as the announcement of the Shipbuilding was about to start soon. There was a warning of possible vertigo and nausea as the pocket space was going to be opened and large objects are taken out. It was only moments later when everyone felt the first spheres taken out of the pocket space from under the ship. The wave of nausea wasn’t as bad as they expected, but the constant feeling would wear them out.
Out of curiosity, Fred asked Conny to show the mouth of the pocket space. He wished he hadn’t. The opening was as if a black hole had opened and the Little Tooth was about to be swallowed up. He couldn’t tare his eyes away as sphere after sphere came up out of the space that was neither here nor there. How she did it was a mystery to him there was no real object to anchor the incantation to, yet it followed the ship. After a few moments, it was too much it was overwhelming to see. After asking Conny to turn the vid off, he thought of the magical energy to move all that material around let alone process it.
Joe was walking towards the cargo bay when the pocket space opened, and a feeling of vertigo hit him. It didn’t make him feel sick just disorientated for a second. He realized a different healing spell was used this time. The new spells effects lasted longer than the ones before. He was going to ask the little lady later how many healing spells she had now. Looking up one of the corridors he saw Todd, Courtney, and Heather walk into the training room. He thought of calling out to them, but they had already left the doorway.
As he approached the cargo bay entrance, he didn’t see any sign of Sky or Jane. He was about to turn to leave and caught something out of the corner from his eye. A liquid seemed to spray on to the floor of the cargo bay from the open bay ramp. At first, it looked like a puddle until it filled out a pattern drawn on the floor. Once the pattern was filled in a second metal joined the first, and it made sigils on the surface. A series of complex sigils that looked like circuitry was formed in the metal. A second of the original liquid metal covered it. There still was no sign of Sky or Jane in the room until he took a step inside. Sky was tracing out more shapes on the floor and getting ready to make more parts.
As she finished the third shape, the second was being filled up. It was strange seeing her work on two things at once without any visible difficulty. The shapes looked familiar, but they were too big and stuck together. Sky was starting to move faster, and he spotted Jane in the far side casting healing spells in steady timed increments. He kept out of Sky’s way as she worked; the four pieces were finished and slid to the side. As if she just spotted him, she gave him a small wave he waved and started to walk over to her.
Sky motioned him to stop. “Sorry, Joe Sir I can talk to you on my lunch break. But right now, I’m a little behind, and I’d like to make up for the lost time.” She went back to drawing out more ships on the floor, and a nearly constant stream of liquid poured up the ramp as if passing through a pipe. The plates of metal were just about three centimetres thick and had runes and sigils along the edges of them.
Jane in between casting the healing spells called out to him and waving her hand to get his attention. “Joe Sir your kind of in the way, why do you think I’m in this corner? It’s not liked the view is great; she needs as much space as possible. If you come over here with me, I can show you what she’s done so far.”
He looked over to Sky, who without looking up waved him across in a hurry-up motion. He noticed three more pieces finished off to the side. Joe jogged over to stand beside Jane who had cast another healing. “So, she’s got six pieces done so far, and how many to go”?
She laughed and pointed up to one side. Along the ceiling of the room were multiple pieces much smaller than the ones she finished working. Joe looked out to see Sky fading in and out of sight. The two lines of liquid were filling up the drawn shapes much quicker now. The floor had three shapes yet to be filled at any given time. “She too polite to tell you-you're in the way. She slowed down so you could see her working because she didn’t want to seem rude. After she found out about the spells, the mages put on me. She’s been pushing to finish as quickly as possible. I know she feels bad for letting the rogue mages steal some of the tweaked spells she had made.”
Jane smiled watching Sky work so hard, yet she made it look so easy to do. “Oh, sorry Joe Sir here a list of the parts she needs for the bottom and the left and right side of the craft. Once she completed these, she going to stop for lunch. By the way, she’s working another two and a half hours. It’s ingenious how she’s putting in the magic runes and sigils inside of the metal plating. She can perform much of the upgrades to Little Tooth, but this one is impossible without remaking it from scratch. The neatest thing about the new ship it will have no visible ports from the outside and the inside no visible bulkheads unless you want them. All without using hardly any magic and none of your own. Any friction on the ship is going to be power to the ship. Just walking on the ship will power something else. Magic attacks will most likely just be used right back at them.” Jane was casting healing every time a light flashed on her devices screen. She saw Joe looking at her wrist computer. “I’ve got a program running to let me know when Sky has used enough magical energy to start magic burn. I cast the healing just before it starts, and this one spell has a lasting effect. So far it’s proving beyond satisfactory after the first wave of vertigo I haven’t felt it since.”
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Joe looked over to where Sky was working, and the whole room had sketches on the floor. The piped in liquid metal doubled, and the forms filled twice as fast. She stood in the centre with her eyes closed as if asleep on her feet. Her hair was down waving in an unseen breeze, and it seemed to have an inner light.
Jane gave a yon and tapped her tablet and smiled. “We’re going for lunch as soon as she finishes filling in the last parts she’s drawn.”
They watched in silence as four pipes finished the last form. The little girl’s body slumped slightly as the pipes went still. Jane leaped over the now finished parts to Sky lifting her in her arms. “You’re doing great sis. But you shouldn’t push yourself so hard. And don’t even think of saying you’re not, you’re all sweaty under your uniform. We’re going to take a quick shower, to eat, and have a tiny nap. I'm sure Sky doesn’t mind him asking questions while we eat. That way you can practice sending text vids during your meal.” She smiled and started to walk carrying her as she slipped off to sleep.
“It’s got to be tuff to being new to magic. How can she use so much magical power with only a month of practice? Jane asked Joe the rhetorical question. “I still find it hard to believe how much magical energy she holds in her wells.”
He paused to stroke a little hair from her face. Joe thought Sky looked so fragile sleeping in Jane’s arms. “I wish we could help her more, but she’s doing so many things no one’s thought of even trying. I guess most mages don’t think of doing the things they don’t have the power to do. If you have nearly unlimited power, you can dream pretty big’.
I think I know what you mean, why dream of jumping over a tall building. If you can’t even jump over two metres, Sky can think of flying if she wants to. I bet she could do if she put her mind to the possibility.” Jane paused to kiss Sky’s forehead as she slept. “Did you know she gave us another affinity and linked us to her wells of power? She also fixed the spell on me, and we have to let it dissipate on its own.”
Joe smiled at the care Jane used in carrying her new little sister. “I read some of the reports she sent Fred. They were very thorough and detailed, the brief description that could have past as a report on its own. She even sent a transcript of the conversation before, during and after you lost consciousness. They exit the cargo bay as Fred came out his quarters to walking alongside.
Fred’s presence caused Todd to fall back; then corridor wasn’t made to giant men “I think I’ll do the next spell shift and let Todd and yourself, get some practice in with your new gift and magical power. You’ll need to be ready for anything when working with Sky. Your mission with her will be extremely dangerous once they start losing their stolen magic and extra elemental affinities. They’ll soon be after you two, and you’ll have to use everything she gave you.”
Jane just nodded her agreement not wanting to wake the tiny girl.
Fred gave the girl fawned look. At times like this, he missed his own two daughters. “Try and practice the more complex shields and focused healing spells. You don’t want to be healing everyone around you including the ones you’re fighting. You also want to get used to casting anything she upgraded in the way of incapacitating the enemy only we can reverse.”
Jane had to look up to Fred. He was the biggest man she met. If it weren’t for the gentle look, he gave Sky as he spoke. She would have her knees knocking. Even a blind person could tell he has power. She was thankful she was carrying Sky. “Yes, sir.” And a nod here and there was all she could muster the courage to do.
“Try and not use the same spells in front of anyone who might get away even for a few seconds. If they see the spells you use, they might be able to send a copy to be analyzed and countered quickly.” Fred went silent for a second as if remembering something. His eyes lit up as if he had just had something incredible to say.
“I don’t know what the spell is, but it is a deadly one. Don’t use it until after the fourth group had been rescued and healed. If you don’t, you’ll find that they’ll copy the spell and use it against you.” Fred was walking with them until they reached their quarters. “I’ll see you tomorrow when I take over the healing castings. I’ll let know if there is any change to the new future, I get the feeling it should just get better as we go. Have a nice nap and take care of her; she may be super at everything, but she’s still a young girl.”
In a sleepy voice, you could hear “don’t forget cute,” with a grin on her lips and eyes still closed.
Fred leaned in and placed a gentle kiss on her forehead just like he did his daughters. As an officer, it could seem inappropriate; but as a father, to a child, it was only natural to dote on your child. As he walked away, he added “and cute” with a grin of his own.
Once in the room rather than place her new little sister up on her bunk, she placed her on the inside of her own. After taking off their boots and socks, she climbed in beside her quickly falling asleep.
Not long after the two fell asleep, they had a couple of visitors. William and Rocssanna silently walked into the room and were surprised to see their daughter snuggled up to Jane’s side. She was sleeping peacefully with a smile next to the person who took her in as a younger sister. They couldn’t believe how happy she looked. She went from not even being able to get close to even themselves to her very first type of sleepover. It was so cute that Jane had a protective arm over Sky when she needed no protection. Seeing Sky Content is in good hands and being cared for emotionally as well as physically; they left their daughter in Janes care.
“Tomorrow let’s give Jane a little something extra for the way she’s treating Sky so well. She needed this kind of contact with others. I can’t believe that an alien attack could be such a mixed blessing. If only we could have found out sooner, she might have had a more enriched life till now.” Rocssanna said with a sigh into Williams' arms.
“What happened is what happened? What will be? I think if we knew sooner, we would have still been waiting for the right time to tell her about everything. Right now, she can cope with so much happening and she can’t dwell on the negative for too long. She has a lot of new things in her life she’s never planned on. New people to interact with is a huge plus and the fact they care for her just as much as we do is a colossal bonus’. William nuzzled his face in Rocssanna’s hair, and they both left mildly upset they couldn’t give Sky a little kiss. Just as they crossed the threshold, they heard “love your mommy daddy” in Sky’s sleeping voice. It warmed their heart as the door slide shut.