Benjamin Vryce

As time pressed onwards, Benjamin opened his void space version of his pattern case. It was pretty much full at this point. With the original seven patterns the Erlking had gifted him, patterns he still hadn’t looked at. The two slimes he, and later Nyx had acquired, and now the four patterns the Shipwright had given him to help him close the rift.

His hands moved right passed the seven patterns from the Erlking, he had said he’d made them with Benjamin’s world in mind. Since he didn’t have the soul space for a big pattern right now anyway, he had resolved not to look until he had made it into his world. Likewise, he passed the slimes, they were good at what they had been designed for, but were poor combatants.

Finally bringing his hand to rest on the first dusty old pattern. Funneling some creation essence into it he watched the projection of the pattern form on the dome of his soul. It looked like a prototype model of the current personal combat drone. Except it was more like a personal defense drone, and was shaped a lot like a turtle.

Benjamin funneled more essence into the pattern, trying to ascertain its function. Best he was able to determine, it was an unarmed and slow-moving hover drone. One that could project a kinetic shield around a person or object. The drone didn’t fit his fighting style at all, but looked like a good fit for Jade. She never moved around much, and if she had another shield active, she could focus more energy into her essence pistol.

Setting that one aside for Jade, he picked up the next one and repeated the process. This one looked a lot like a dog; in so much as it was a quadruped, and had the approximate dimensions of a rottweiler. The colors were all bare metal and polymers though, and the two shoulder mounted guns really sent the message home that this was a drone, and not a living creature. Still, Jade might want it. The guns and shields weren’t any bigger than the ones the P.C.D.s sported, so it wasn’t really a power house model.

Picking up the next one he projected its form on his soul as well. Now this one, caught his attention. It was essentially a double-barreled essence rifle mounted on four spider legs. The whole thing stood about two feet tall, with the legs spread out twice as wide as it was tall. Giving it a squat sturdy appearance, even though the spider legs looked thinner than they should be to support the weight.

He walked around this pattern, looking at it from all sides. The gun wasn’t anything too special, it looked like two shotgun sized rifle barrels mounted on a swiveling platform. Along with a pair of ruby lenses that likely acted as the unit’s eyes, and a kinetic shield generator, only slightly larger than the one found on a P.C.D. What really intrigued him about this model however, was that both the guns and the shield generator were essence fed. That meant if he had the room for this unit on his soul, he could shoot the gun and power the shields for as long as he had essence to do so.

Benjamin’s fingers itched to attach this one to himself right away. he had lacked a ranged weapons option nearly since the beginning. Depending on the range and firepower of this walking turret however, that might all change right now. He reined in his excitement a little, when he remembered he didn’t have an AI control unit anymore. He wasn’t sure how effective this unit would be without that, but being soul bound should remove most of those barriers.

With a deep breath, he set the turret aside as well. He was going to be keeping this one, but he didn’t know how much time he still had, and the next one might be even better. When he projected the image of the fourth and final pattern out, his jaw actually dropped open. He didn’t know what he was looking at for several long moments, only being able to see a wall of grey metal in front of himself.

He had to back up several yards and slowly walk around the pattern to understand what he was looking at. When he got the pattern to click into something that he could recognize, he nearly jumped for joy. Before his mental faculties reasserted themselves and he realized what he was actually looking at here. It was a whole lot of potential, at a whole lot of cost. Just like the dire Boar, insanely powerful but he had never had the chance to use it. Granted, that was because it was stripped from him to make room for the red queen, but still.

He was looking at either a heavily armed and armored cargo ship, or a lightly armed and armored troop transport ship. It most closely resembled a cargo shipping crate from earth, that had a glass viewport in the front, along with a side door, and a large cargo hatch in the back. There were also the four enclosed and protected propellers, one on each corner. Oh, and the eight guns, four on the bottom corners and four more on the top corners. He guessed it had to hold at least thirty people comfortably, more if they were packed in.

The cost in essence to operate this beast however, was likely more than he could currently imagine. Not to mention, there was no putting this on his soul. It was a creation core operated pattern only, likely it would also need to be fed essence directly from those riding inside, to make it move and shoot. Still, it offered so much potential for the future he couldn’t help but smile. It was settled in his mind already; he was keeping the walking gun turret and the cargo ship. Jade was going to get the turtle shield drone, and the quadruped drone.

He debated, briefly, whether he should give her, her two patterns or jump right into making the turret fit on his soul. In the end he decided they were going to need all the firepower they could get, and with reluctance opened his eyes into reality.

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* * *

Jade Benz

“…and that’s how you do it Red. Work on those techniques, and Vice will definitely notice your efforts.” Jade had been sharing her wisdom with the two, red women. She missed the girl talk, granted Kali wasn’t really much for conversation, but she had been listening. That was good enough for now, she would come around, Tik and Tok had, after a while.

“Jade, please tell me you aren’t teaching my people how to manipulate my emotions?” Vice asked from in front of her on Ice’s back. Looks like he finally woke up.

“She was doing more than that, my rider. Please muzzle this one.” Ice spoke in that creepy mind voice of hers, so that they all could hear, if the reactions of the other girls was any indication.

“Hey, Ice. Remember the girl code we talked about? Us girls got to stick together here, otherwise; Vice will walk all over us.” She didn’t believe that, anymore than the other girls did, but hey, someone had to pick on their fearless leader.

Benjamin was sighing, like a tired old man in front of her. Shaking his head and muttering wordlessly to himself, while he patted Ice’s neck. She was about to comment when Nyx moved closer, to walk beside the big wolf’s saddle. Reaching up tentatively, she placed her hand on the sheath of the new dagger Vice had belted at his waist. After a brief pause, she tugged on it gently. Getting Vice’s attention before clearing her throat.

“Master, I was wondering. Would it be possible to get a long coat like the one you made for Kali?” she asked, an uncertain look in her eyes. Like she didn’t understand the point of what she was doing, but really wanted the coat. So, she was willing to try anything.

Jade cackled wildly; she couldn’t help herself. She soon lost her breath because she was laughing so hard. Vice actually had to reach back and support her, while she laughed until tears poured from her eyes. The poor, innocent girl.

“Jade…you know what, never mind.” Vice said to her, before turning to Nyx. “Yes, Nyx. I would be happy to make you a coat like Kali’s. but, in the future, please feel free to let me know what you want. Before resorting to Jade’s ‘techniques’, ok?”

The demoness smiled happily at his words, and stepping back, gave Jade the most obvious wink she had ever seen. That sent Jade descending back into laughter again, she just couldn’t stop. Oh man, she had actually grabbed his ‘dagger.’ She really had to explain what a euphemism was to the girl, before she embarrassed herself.

“Listen, Jade. I don’t have time for this. Here, these are your share of the patterns. Don’t worry, they are the best suited to you. Now, I need to go.” He stopped talking to her after she accepted the patterns and turned to Nyx and Kali, “I will make you a coat Nyx, just like hers? Or do you want some changes? And did you need anything while I’m at it, Kali or you Ice?”

Ice rumbled a mental ‘no,’ to the question. The lizardlady shook her head. While Nyx clapped her hands together happily, before the stoic expression reappeared on her face.

“No, thank you master.” She said with a slight bow. “What she has will be perfect, with slits for my wings of course. That material looks very adept at keeping the imp stingers off, perhaps you should make one for yourself as well?”

“I will think about it, ok, got it. Now I need to go back into the void space. I don’t know how long we have before the combat starts and I need to finish a few things.” With that, he closed his eyes and went back to his void space.

Jade sat behind him for a moment, watching his back before turning to the girls.

“I swear, even in different universes… men just need their man caves.” She shrugged, just one of those things. “Good job there Red, though that’s not the dagger I was talking about. I’ll have to explain it better later, but right now I gotta check on these patterns Vice gave me. You three gunna be ok while I’m gone?”

“For the love of the Erlking’s first mount, please go already.” Ice rumbled inside her mind, while Kali ignored her and Nyx winked again. Maybe she should have taught her a different secret gesture, that one was too obvious.

“I love you too, Ice.” She said back, patting the big wolf’s thick fur. Before closing her own eyes and entering her void space. She hadn’t bothered saying anything to Drake, but the dragon kin was a ways behind them, watching their backs so it was probably fine. She’d let him beat her at checkers later to make up for it.

Opening her eyes into the mostly empty expanse of whiteness, Jade looked around. There wasn’t a whole lot here, other than the table, her meditation chair, the board games and a bunch of clothes. She hadn’t worn any of the other new outfits outside the void space yet. She really liked a few of them, but she didn’t think she was quite ready to let Vice see her in anything to soft just yet. Better to keep the whole dominatrix thing going. It wasn’t like the tight leathers were uncomfortable or anything either.

“Ok, Vice.” She said pulling up the first pattern and checking it like he taught her to do a while back. “Hope you didn’t give me the garbage patterns.”

The first one held a big dog shaped robot looking thing with guns mounted on its shoulders. It was kinda cute. The other one held a P.D…F?... Whatever, Vice called the damn dragonfly lookin drones. Except this one looked more like a turtle, and after fiddling with it some more, she found the shield extension feature.

“You know what, Vice? You got a point; these do suit me.” She liked the shield drone a lot, and if it could cover her while she fired from safety, why not her and a doggy?

The big question was, would they both fit on her soul? She, did not, want to go through that ordeal again. Looking up and around at the dome, she figured there was probably room. Besides she doubted Vice would have given them to her if she couldn’t use em.

“Whelp, here goes nothin,” she said, activating the turtle drone first. If she could only have one, she wanted that one. After the pattern unraveled itself from the egg and spread out over her soul, she still had some room left. “Alright Vice, good call.” She activated the gun dog next; she got a little worried about this one. It was really close, she almost started pulling dresses from her self as the free space dwindled.

In the end however, they both fit just fine. Not that there was room for even a comb now though. All done, she looked at her new creatures. Standing next to Drake’s outline, they looked small. Of course, standing next to Vice, she looked small. Still, everybody knew who the real powerhouse of this team really was.

“Nice, can’t wait to show Red and the other girls my new toys.” She said, before moving back into reality again. the whole process hadn’t taken her more than ten minutes.