Di’s Perspective:
A month later Greg still hadn’t shown himself. I had returned home a few times to find supper on the table, and notes apologizing for not being there for me, notes which Greg had left, but he never came home while I was there.
I tried sending him a message, only to get a return message from Vera. ‘I’m sorry, but Greg has asked me to intercept all of his communications, as he is working on something very important and can’t be disturbed.’
‘He’s been doing the same thing for the last several weeks. How can I be there for him if I can’t even give him a call and ask how he’s doing?’
‘I’m sorry, but I don’t think he wants to talk to anyone right now.’
‘But...I’m his girlfriend. I need to be there for him. He needs me.’
There was a pause for about ten seconds before Vera responded. ‘I probably shouldn’t do this, but since you are his significant other and he has introduced you as a psychologist in charge of dealing with psychological issues resulting from combat, I will bend the rules just this once by telling you the parts of his search history I think you need to know about.’ Vera sent me a list of search terms.
They mostly followed one of three categories. The first was the biblical story of Moses, including fictional portrayals, and papers about it. The second was war crimes, the Nuremberg trials, and their alien equivalents. The third was philosophical papers on the morality of killing, including the use of terrorism and weapons of mass destruction. Obviously he was doing a lot of soul searching in the wake of the battle, and was deeply concerned about his use of the weapon, so I told Vera to notify me the second she thought he would be willing to talk and left him alone.
The Town, City, and Sanctuary were all doing well. Paul had distributed the weapons we recovered from the battle to our troops, the City’s troops, and Fort Solinan’s troops, with those that weren’t distributed going into the warehouse. All of the humans that had participated in the battle had recovered or revived within a week, except for one man who took a Jotun’s club to the head. The System took over two weeks to reconstruct his brain, restart his organs, and restore all of the missing memories.
The Alfs hadn’t been so lucky. Over half of their people were dead, with all but a few of the other half being maimed and tortured by the Solin. It had taken Bob over a week before he had cloned enough body parts to restore all of the missing ones. Tim and his people had come to town, with Tim moving into Sanctuary, so they were able to do all of the surgery. Still, the people of Fort Solinan would need time to recover, so their economy wouldn’t be producing any excess goods for a while.
It turned out that the Fort wasn’t even meant to be a target. We had just attacked the force that was being sent to terrorize the city, and they had sent their full forces against us in retaliation, seeing the Fort as no more than a minor hurtle. This had cut the number of enemies the City had to deal with in half, though they still suffered thousands of casualties.
Greg had set up automated processes for gaining citizenship in Anarchist’s Redoubt and moving to Sanctuary, so more than ten thousand people had moved from the city to this town, many of them renting an apartment in Sanctuary. His auto-miners were rapidly increasing in number, so there was no shortage of rooms as the Outpost core estimated that it could support twenty thousand people at the end of the month, the entire population of Anarchist’s Redoubt and all of its outposts. He had expanded it to have massive warehouses, produce more food than it could ever need, and even have two sauna’s, two gyms, and an Olympic sized swimming pool. It even had a Nanite Forge 2 that could make anything you might need, and the mineral stores to do that. Obviously, he wanted to have not just a safe room where people can survive if such a battle occurred again, but a place where people can live and thrive.
Tim’s group had set up in a clinic in Santuary and were doing a massive amount of business selling stat-improving drugs and genetic serums. Essentially, for every stat and many other traits like talents, the System ranked your genes in that area as Poor, Average, Good, Excellent, and Master. While it was hard to put numbers to the effects of talents and other traits, for skills a Poor rating meant that your natural softcap for the skill was ten, twenty for average, thirty for good, forty for excellent, and fifty for master. The stat enhancers could then get you another ten to fifteen points without massive effort at raising them. The only person we knew was at that limit, though, was Paul, who had Master strength genes and, thanks to the use of Niirik, was at sixty two strength before the battle and sixty three after it, as he had tried fighting a Jotun.
At the end of the month, however, Greg posted a message on the Sanctuary bulletin board that he would be holding a press conference in Sanctuary’s theater, and asked me to come home the night before so that he could show me something.
When I got there, I saw him sitting on the couch talking to a beautiful younger woman in a skin tight suit of underarmor. I wasn’t sure that she was even eighteen yet, but if this turned into some sort of desire for a three way I was prepared to let him down easy to not hurt his feelings. Not that I’d never experimented with women, but she was just too young. “So, who’s this?” I asked worriedly.
“Samantha, this is Di, my girlfriend. Di, this is Samantha, my sister.”
We stared at each other, sizing each other up for a few seconds before she spoke. “You don’t mean the Di that helped you infiltrate that ecoterrorist group, do you?” Samantha asked, and Greg nodded. “I thought she was older.”
“I’m fifty five, though thanks to the System I look like younger. And his sister, huh? You don’t exactly look like it.” While Greg was average looking and undeniably European in his ancestry, this woman seemed to have a bit of Asian DNA and was much more attractive than you would expect from a relative of Greg’s.
“Well, half sister.” Greg said. “My parents got a divorce when I was eight and dad got remarried to her mom.”
That made a lot more sense. “So, Samantha,” I asked. “Why haven’t I seen you before? Were you one of the people that just moved here from the City?”
“Oh, that’s because I’ve been living in Chicago.” She went on to explain how the criminal gangs had taken over after the government collapsed, and how she had gotten a job working for a former hidden front, now legitimate front, of the Russian mafia. “The pay wasn’t much, but their benefits package was the best, and I love Russian food, so it was a no brainer. Also, a guy that used to harass me joined up with the Yakuza, so they weren’t an option.”
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
After Chicago was invaded, with the gangs joining together to stop the invaders, she decided she wanted to get somewhere safer. She talked to Greg and he offered to pay off her debts and expenses so that she could leave and move here. “So now she owes me around two hundred and fifty thousand, and has agreed to pay me two hundred and fifty per month until it is paid back, no interest.”
I whistled. “What did you do to get two hundred and fifty thousand in debt to the mafia? Gambling? Drugs?” Surely she couldn’t have racked up that large of a debt.
Samantha smiled. “I would prefer not to say.” I guess I’d just have to keep wondering. “Anyway, I was thinking of hanging around town and working for a few weeks as I get my bearings. I have strength and endurance in the twenties, so I was thinking of joining the military.”
“I’m sure Paul would love to have you join. Can you fight?”
Samantha shrugged. “Never had to, if you don’t count school bullies. But I’m willing to learn. Greg even gave me these.” There was a distortion and a rail pistol appeared in her left hand, with a mono-molecular sword in her right. Both of these were no doubt salvaged from the recent battle. “Now I just need some decent armor. The skills he gave me just aren’t good enough.” She unequipped her weapons and they returned to her inventory.
After a bit more small talk and an offer to introduce her to Paul tomorrow morning she stood up. “Well, I’d better leave you two for now and head to the apartment Greg is loaning me. You probably have some catching up to do.” She started towards the door but tripped over the coffee table, knocking my cup off of it. “Ow.” she said, sounding somewhat like she had forgotten to say it, and stood up. “Sorry about that.”
“You always have been clumsy.” said Greg. “Maybe Paul can help with that. I’m sure morning jogs will help.”
Samantha nodded. “Yep, sure it will. Well, bye.” She went straight for the door and left. I looked at Greg, and he wrapped his arms around me as we fell towards the couch.
The next morning we woke up snuggling in bed, his arm draped across my stomach. “Good morning.” he said.
“It wasn’t a bad night either.” I answered. “Care to go again?”
He slid his hand up to my chest and rubbed it slightly with his thumb. “Unfortunately, I can’t. The press conference is in an hour, and if we got started we might not be finished by then, much less be ready for the conference.”
I laughed, “Ah, the curse of high Endurance.”
He smiled and got out of bed. “How about I make it up to you, and take you somewhere nice for lunch. Or, I guess supper if we’re heading to Europe again. I’d like to see what that place in Paris is doing with the lobster we sell them.”
“Well, I’ll have to disappoint you. Barb told me about this cafe in Rome that she really liked, and I was hoping to head there.”
“Barb?”
“Tony’s girlfriend. They went on a tour of Vatican City and Rome last week.” Back before the System, the Vatican only used their teleporter to secretly move people around the planet. Once the System became widespread, however, they opened it up to be a public transporter so that they could earn more money.
“In that case, then, how about making us reservations around our one P.M.. We’ll meet at twelve and take the teleporter over.” With that he left for the shower. I briefly considered joining him as all of the showers in the master suites of the luxury housing were large enough for it, but given the likelihood that would start something distracting, I waited until he got out to get one.
At eight o’clock I sat on a folding chair on the stage of the theater along with the rest of the “town council”. While the seats had originally been simply flat areas carved out of stone, they had quickly had extra wide cinema seats placed there. Now the theater could seat ten thousand people, half of the maximum number of people Sanctuary could comfortably seat. Anyone who wanted to cover it as Press had gotten a front row seat and were no doubt using the Surveillance skill to record what they saw and heard for future editing.
Greg stepped up to the podium. “Hello, everyone, thanks for coming.” He paused for a moment to gather his thoughts. “Nice to see that there are people from Anarchist Redoubt, the City, and I even think I see someone from Fort Solinan.” He nodded to a Tundra Alf woman in the front row. “I have some major changes to Sanctuary to announce. First, while I’m sure most of you are familiar with the gyms, spas, and swimming pool I added, I’ve also drastically expanded the space here enough that it can now house twenty thousand people, and I will be building more housing once the current housing starts to run low. Second, I hired a medical team to oversee the production of medical treatments. While they will be producing normal drugs for treating injuries, the fact that all of us will heal without it means that isn’t their priority. They will, instead, be focusing on gene treatments which can fix genetic flaws or enhance natural talent, as well as drugs which can allow a person to boost or rapidly develop their stats and physical abilities, like manual dexterity. These drugs are entirely non-addictive physically, though you should probably exercise caution to not overly rely on them. With their use I’m sure that we can become strong enough to face any challenge.” This reminded everyone of the invasion, and they nodded.
“Third is something that I have kept a secret from everyone until now. I am happy to announce that Sanctuary now has a dungeon.” There was a murmur from the crowd. “I don’t mean the kind you keep criminals in. I mean the kind you see in video games. There is a room near both of the Gyms which has been closed, but will be opened after this conference, which holds a teleporter. These teleporters are locked to only send people to one destination, teleporters within the first level of the dungeon. The first level is a maze.” A map of it appeared on the display screen above the stage. “You and your party, created by the Party skill I made, will appear in one of the four corners, and will need to find your way to the center. Animals have been let loose within the maze, and have built nests in these sixteen rooms.” Red outlines appeared around sixteen of the rooms within the maze. “Each nest has a special version of the species, a mini boss if you will, though exactly what makes it special varies wildly, and will change in time, as the Conservation Core overseeing the dungeon will randomly choose an enhancement to give the creature when it is created. The other rooms may include rewards or traps, again randomized by the Conservation Core. If you manage to make it to the center of the maze...” A large room that only had one way in and a room attached to the opposite wall was highlighted with a blue box. “You will face a random animal that has two enhancements. This boss must be defeated to get to the room beyond which includes a guaranteed reward that is worth more than anything else you will find in the maze and a teleporter which can take you either back to Sanctuary or to level two. While I won’t tell you what the other levels are like, know that only Earth animals are used in the maze, but alien creatures will be used in the other levels.
It is my hope that this Dungeon will benefit the people of Sanctuary, allowing them to practice combat in case there is another battle, exercise, entertain themselves, as well as gain things that they might find valuable, including animal parts. Anything you get in the dungeon is yours to keep, assuming you didn’t commit a crime to get it, and everything there will be rapidly replaced by the Conservation Core to guarantee that you always have a reason to go. Though the chests will have a delay to refill them, and will only give one prize per party per trip into the dungeon, so that you actually have to put in effort to get rewarded.” I suspected that he had the Conservation core mass cloning animals and at least one dedicated Nanite Core and miner combination gathering resources and turning them into goods people will want.
“Fourth, I am starting to sell these on the local market, though everyone who rents housing in Sanctuary will get one for free.” He held up his arm to show that he was wearing a bracelet that I hadn’t seen before. A picture of it also appeared above us. “This is an emergency teleport band. The System has multiple grades of it, but I will be selling all five and giving one of the best version to everyone that lives here in Sanctuary. The bracelet is a short range teleporter that is meant for emergency evacuation. It can contain up to three sets of coordinates, and if you are within the bracelet’s range you or your assistant AI can activate it, teleporting you to the location of your choice, or the only one in range if only one is. The bracelets have ranges of approximately one, three, ten, thirty, and one hundred kilometers. They will burn themselves out after a single use, however, as the circuit inside is designed to maximize range, not longevity, so you can’t use it to just teleport around at will. The system has other items for that.” This was probably what Tarn had used to escape to his safe room during the battle. “Now, are there any questions?”
The reporters instantly started asking dozens of questions, talking over themselves to try and get information. The people in the crowd were also asking questions, though of each other, not Greg. Most of the press questions were about the last two points, but a few had asked about the first two. By the time he finished answering them, it was eleven thirty. He excused himself and left the stage.
As he drank a bottle of water back stage and fielded a few more specific questions from the council, I noticed Olivia and Paul communicating with others. Paul no doubt wanted to use the dungeon to train his troops, and Olivia probably wanted to do the same with her mages, though she probably was also enough of a nerd that the idea of going on an actual dungeon delve was a dream of hers. Soon, however, Greg excused himself and we left for the teleporter. On the way he gave me two of the bracelets, a one kilometer one to take me home in case I ran into trouble in Sanctuary, and a one hundred kilometer one in case I was on the surface and there was an emergency. It had been programmed with both our home’s location and the revival rooms of the Sanctuary clinic, in case I was killed.
We made our way to the surface teleporter, as Sanctuary’s teleporter only lead there, and left for Vatican City.