All upper management are required to have at least thirty percent of their attribute points assigned into Charisma’s sub-attributes. Whether they lean into one of the three or take a balance is up to them.
A secondary requirement is to have a minimum of three management-type skills. Again we do not care which ones, however emotional manipulation skills can be awarded a higher daily wage. If you can’t inspire your subordinates, we expect you to find alternative motivational methods.
And no, you can’t throw a pizza party. The person who kept putting that in the suggestion box has been terminated with joyful prejudice. As has been repeatedly and thoroughly researched, such things breed contempt rather than positivity.
-Chairwoman Nina Ellory, Ad Astra Space Shipping, Passenger, Mining, Acquisitions, Exploration and Exploitation Corporation.
>Event 1284 - Completed. Reward pending review during Syntropy synchronization. Active Events: 1.
“Ohh-kay, “ Alex drawled, reading the message in his Interface. “More and more questions. Patina, what’s synt-”
“What do you mean Vod wants to kill you?” Patina demanded, suddenly in his face. Alex drew back from the sharp features and wide mouth of the goblin whose eyes flashed at him. “I mean, I know he wants to kill us, it was pretty much inevitable from the moment you rejected his proposal or maybe even before we showed up in his presence, but why specifically do you think it’ll happen at the end of a month?”
“You’re a very cynical person, “ Alex smiled tiredly, “That’s not an insult by the way. You’re a product of your environment. Anyway, it’s all about putting things together where they fit - sort of like a jigsaw puzzle. They have those here, right?”
“I thought you said it was something about math.” Patina stood close to Alex with her arms folded, waiting for further information. Her expression was one of exasperation mixed with irritation.
“That’s still percolating, “ Alex tapped his head, “It’ll come to me I’m sure, but something there is nagging at me. Anyway, about Vod; He knew more about me than he should. Sure, there was stuff he could have received from the Bruise brothers because I’m assuming there’s some method of communication they have that we don’t? We’re on a space train here. However, knowing that Harmony gave me a task to kill him and being able to rattle off the exact reward amount? No.”
“He also knew my authority level was higher than his, “ Alex continued, “As far as I know that’s not part of the regular interface so it shouldn’t pick up with [Inspect] and its variants…right? Am I reasoning that correctly?”
“Sure, yeah…”
“Vod knew how I arrived. He didn’t say it outright but he definitely insinuated that I’m at fault for the most recent damage which is bullshit, by the way, because I had no choice in it and the only responsible parties are those that brought me here. He just wanted to plant some guilt trees in my little brain garden.”
Patina listened as Alex went on. “He knew I needed the omnitool. He was very specific about that. Even more so, he knew about the experimental omnitool - the one that I specifically left here in this room after we showed it to Harmony.”
“How could he know about that, though?”
“The only reasonable scenario I can come up with is that he’s been listening in on us. Considering his apparent vendetta with security devices - but not all of them, I noticed - I think it’s safe to assume that he’s somehow able to tap into at least some of the functioning ones.”
“That’s impossible.” Patina said flatly.
“Really? You know that for a fact?”
“Ye-” Patina paused, and then frowned. “It shouldn’t be possible. He only has zero-point-five authority. That shouldn’t allow access to any of the security systems, and the adjunct should be watching those closely.”
“You’re sure about that?” Alex queried.
“Years ago, before I left the others - a story I really don’t want to get into, by the way, so stop giving me that sympathetic look - I used to help Old Gus to get around. He complained a lot about not being able to access the security systems himself, and he had an authority level the same as yours.” Patina let out a long breath and shook her head sharply. “I guess I can’t say it’s impossible to somehow access the system, but the adjunct should have things locked down incredibly tightly.”
“So the problem is with Harmony.” Alex suggested.
“Maybe? You’re sort of guessing here though, right?”
“I am, but it makes a kind of sense, especially when we take one of my current tasks into account.”
“To kill Vod?”
“No, not that one. I’m talking about the task to bypass something in the AI node or whatever it was. Uh…” Alex flicked through his interface. Patina’s eyes glazed over as she did the same.
~
Rewire Network Node
Network Node A-6222229d has irreparably damaged sections that need to be bypassed. Instructions on how to rewire the node to utilize only the working portions will be sent to your Interface.
Reward: 1 Duty Credit
~
“Now, I know literally nothing about artificial intelligence or what sort of hardware is needed to run one, but if there’s some sort of issue that Harmony knows about and needs me to bypass it could be to somehow stop Vod from using her eyes and ears.”
“...I guess? Okay, fine. Let’s assume Vod’s been listening through the adjunct’s hardware. Vod’s a killer, Alex, I know that, but why would he wait a month?”
Alex chuckled, though the sound held no humor. “Because for forty days Vod will have access to the skills and abilities of a fledgling [Mender]. He's probably going to request that I use my skills to fix a few vital things that will make him look good in the eyes of your colleagues, and then at the end of the month tell his bully boys to take care of me.”
“After he makes you a new offer, “ Patina added as she caught up with Alex’s line of thinking, “So that he doesn’t have to waste a resource unless necessary.”
“Exactly.”
Patina’s face went from a frown to a scowl, to a grimace, and then finally to resignation. “Yeah. Okay, that fits. Fuck.”
“We have a month to come up with a way to deal with that.”
“Only if the adjunct agrees to your idea, which I’m still not on board with. Leaving him in his position is dangerous to us, and cruel to everyone else.”
“I don’t have a better solution with our current capabilities.” Alex shrugged. “We should also be careful not to talk about this stuff around any of the active security systems or screens.”
“Why are you taking this so well?” Patina demanded. “I’m pissed, and it’s not my life that’s in danger. Why are you just sitting there with that goofy smile?
Alex debated whether to be a smartass or not. It was very tempting, but in the end he shook his head and explained about the soul upgrade called [Unflappable]. “It just kinda makes me not freak out so much.” he concluded.
“Oh!” Patina snapped her fingers in realization, though the sound was muffled because of the rough material of her gloves. “That’s what that thing was on your interface when we scanned you. Gotcha. Weird, but it makes sense now.”
“Do you have any? Soul upgrades, I mean.” Alex queried curiously.
“I…just one. But it’s stupid.”
“My other one makes weird things happen to me.” Alex confessed, “Like, super weird stuff sometimes. I’m sure it’s not that stupid.”
“It’s…” Patina blushed, and mumbled “[Appealingly Cute]”
Alex kept his face carefully neutral. Patina glared at him for a moment as if daring Alex to laugh. When he didn’t, Patina added “It makes people see me as, well, cute.”
“Okay.”
“Just…okay?”
“Sure. How about we get back to matters at hand?” Alex suggested. Patina visibly relaxed, as if the thought of dealing with killer orcs and the day to day survival on board this crazy train were easier than thinking about her soul upgrade. It wasn’t as if the current version of the goblin had chosen it after all.
“Please, yeah.” Patina nodded quickly, gratitude in her eyes.
“We’ll come up with some way around Vod, I just need to sell the initial idea to Harmony and we’ll be okay.”
“It’d take some serious smooth talking to charm the adjunct into allowing it, Alex, and no matter how convincing you think you are according to the interface you’re only utilizing your base ability with no additional attribute points.”
Alex smiled at the goblin. “It’s worked out okay for me so far. But anyway, she’ll definitely need some buttering up, and that means doing more repair work. She gave me these tasks to do and, honestly, I don’t think I’m going to get to them all today. I’m not sleepy, but I’m feeling fairly tired.”
“Right. We still have some time until the day ends, but how do you stand with your Ad Astra daily tasks?”
Alex checked his interface and let out a chuckle. Patina raised an eyebrow and Ales spread his arms wide with a smile. “Done.”
“Done?” Patina looked puzzled, “You need to work a total of twelve hours, or complete five tasks.”
“Or repair five pieces of Ad Astra technology.” Alex reminded the goblin.
“Right, okay, and you’ve done one task - seal up the room - and you used your [Jury Rig] skill on one camera.”
“True enough, but I think Harmony was either being overly generous, made an error, or is very desperate for additional eyes. The task to survey and evaluate security cameras indicated that every ten devices would count as one task complete and add one duty credit.”
“Wait, how many have you seen? I wasn’t really paying that much attention, especially with the Bruise brothers breathing the same air as me.”
“Two hundred and seventeen.” Alex grinned, “I’ve also maxed out a Personal Growth task on [Evaluate] but it doesn’t seem to be doing anything else.”
“Oh, yeah, right, I keep forgetting you have no idea. Syntropic synchronization is a thing.” Patina nodded. “Wait, two hundred and seventeen? How?!”
“I was pretty much shooting off my [Evaluate] at everything we came across as we walked, and after a while I figured out what some of the devices looked like. Apparently all security sensors counted, camera or not.”
“That’s so incredibly unfair.” Patina complained. “Though I bet that’ll update tomorrow to be less rewarding or more difficult.”
“Probably, “ Alex shrugged, “But what is Syntropic synchronization?”
Patina, tired of standing, pulled over an upturned metal crate and sat on it. “Syntropy and the interface help you grow. But they also change you, too. Attribute increases, skill evolutions, all sorts of stuff - you need to be asleep for those to happen. At least four hours, on average.”
“So that would prevent, say, leveling up part way through a difficult task and suddenly being able to complete it?”
“Or leveling up mid-battle.”
“Fair enough. Or maybe it isn’t, “ Alex sighed, “I don’t know. But anyway, what you’re saying is that my [Evaluate] skill will go from rank one to rank two while I sleep.” And whatever rewards from the event will also be given at that time, he thought.
“Yup. I suppose you could sleep if you want to, especially since you’ve completed your daily duties.” Patina shrugged, “The rest of the tasks she assigned you will still be there tomorrow.”
“Not yet, “ Alex shook his head, “I need to at least get one more thing done before I can rest.”
“The task to repair the failing seals on the airlock.” Patina nodded. “We only have three days before that causes an issue.”
“No, that one can wait. I need to check out the AI network node thing.”
“Oh!” Patina slapped her forehead, “Of course! We want to stop Vod from spying on us!”
“Oh, no, we don’t want to stop that.” Alex disagreed. Patina gave him a questioning look. Alex quickly explained “If we fix it so he can’t spy on us how do you think he’ll react? No, we just need to pretend that he can’t watch us through Harmony’s eyes for a while.”
The goblin gave a growl of frustration, but nodded. “I hate that we’re just allowing him to get away with things, Alex, but fine. How will you justify not doing the task to the adjunct?”
“I’ll lie.” Alex admitted easily.
“That easily, huh?” Patina sounded skeptical.
“Pretty much, yeah. The best lies are the ones with the most truth in them. I’m level one, right? I’m new to all this Syntropy stuff and I have crap-all in the way of skills.” Alex replied. “I’m assuming there has to be some specialized knowledge base for artificial intelligence hardware and software, maybe even skills for it as well. General maintenance know-how and a skill that works more like a vague promise than a real fix probably won’t cut it.”
Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.
“You’re going to say you’re not good enough to repair it.”
“I don’t even currently have an actual repair skill - just [Jury Rig]. [Mender] is apparently not as good as some sort of technical path in that regard.”
“Your skills are different to Old Gus, so yeah I guess that sounds reasonable enough for the adjunct to buy it.”
“I do follow the Way of Reason after all, whatever that means.” Alex quipped. When Patina gave him another odd look, Alex added “Is that abnormal?”
“You’ve got a Way already? I must have missed that on your scan.”
“Sure do. The Way of Reason, as I said.”
“Ways are usually first given as an option at level five, but Syntropy does what it wants I guess.” Patina gave a shrug, “The Way of Reason? I’ve not heard of that one before. It could be common elsewhere in the universe though, we just don’t get a lot of variance around here. Almost all of the workers here are following the Way of Diligence or the Way of Stamina.”
“I was given to understand that I could switch my Way with several others I had on a list.”
“Oh, sure, if you’ve been given the option to do so. So what does the Way of Reason do apart from make you allow despots to fortify their position?”
“I…don’t know. I wasn’t given a description.”
“Did you ask? The interface is a tool, not a babysitter.”
“Right, sorry. Let’s see.”
>The Way of Reason
>The path one walks can lead in many directions. It twists and turns, sometimes even backtracking for a time before continuing ever onward. The way you walk your path is not only a direction in and of itself but also how you tread and why you act the way you do along the way.
>The Way of Reason provides a flat 20% boost to all actions that are influenced by the attribute of Reason, as well as a 10% boost to all actions that are influenced by the attributes of Logic, Pattern Recognition, and Understanding.
>Combined, these four attributes can assist in extrapolating from incomplete or inaccurate data.
>For fuck’s sake, Alex, it took you this long to activate a part of your interface that I’m allowed to include additional input? Dude, come on! Right - this is Peri. I gotta make this brief as everything is logged but APPARENTLY we have a budget that nobody told me about and the whole team got a really harsh talking to about blowing through it in, like, just a few hours.
>Sparkles manifesting as a space dragon to impress you took up a chunk of it, but most of it falls on me - totes my bad. I can’t keep being as chatty as I’d like, which SUCKS but I get it. I can send messages on specific queries, if you think them at me with intent - once we tick over to a new day, anyway. I’m very likely going to get another penalty for including all this at the end of ohfuc-
Alex covered his face with one gloved hand and sighed.
“Hey, are you okay? Is it a crappy Way?” Patina asked.
“No, it's fine.” Alex glanced over at the goblin. “It gives me a boost when I’m using Reason, Logic, Pattern Recognition, and Understanding.”
“Aha. Hence the jumping to probably correct conclusions about Vod’s plan.”
“So it seems. And here I was thinking I was just clever.”
“Poor you.” Patina smirked.
Alex considered his next steps. The mysteries were increasing in number, as were the problems. There seemed to be no end of things that needed to be done, some with more urgency than others. Despite the obvious stresses of the day, Alex felt quite pleased with how he’d performed so far. He wanted to find a place to sleep just to see what Syntropy was going to give him during the synchronization cycle, but at least taking a look at the network node thing would give him the excuse to put that task off for as long as possible.
“Alright, “ he said after a while, “Time to get moving again. Can you guide me to the network node thingamajig?”
“You sound so smart and technical when you say it like that.” Patina snarked as she got to her feet again. She extended a hand to Alex for the second time today, and helped the man to his feet.
Once they were outside in the corridor again, Alex looked in either direction and then down at the floor. His smile was grim as he pointed to the large boot prints in the scattered dust. Patina only took a moment to catch on.
“They followed us here?”
“I think they were confirming for Vod where we were, since there’s no camera here. They probably also took some of this stuff, “ Alex gestured to the piles of things in the corridor from where Patina had been moving things out to clean earlier. None of it looked any different to Alex - he didn’t recognize most of the bits and pieces anyway - but there was no reason to think that the Bruise Brothers had walked away empty-handed.
“Those vent lickers!” Patina snarled, “I swear, one day I’m gonna get a powerful kick-ass path and tear their heads off, and stick them-”
“On a mop?” Alex interjected, aiming for levity. The goblin gave him a side-eye.
“Ha. Fucking. Ha.” she muttered. “I’m so tired of those two messing with my shit.”
“Technically this is my shit.” Alex pointed out. “Or, rather, Ad Astra’s shit I guess.”
“I hate them, Alex. I hate those two so much…”
Alex was going to respond with a playfully sarcastic response, but let it go. There was apparently a lot of history there, and if the goblin felt like unpacking it at some point he’d listen. Until then, he’d just carry on.
“Come on, let’s get moving.” he said quietly. With a short nod, Patina led him away.
The walk was brisk, and Alex inwardly debated whether he would continue to use his [Evaluate] on the security devices he saw along the way despite not getting any more gains in his skill progress. On one hand if he held off he could use the skill on more things tomorrow and increase it’s tally, but on the other hand he was promised a certain level of reward today that might not be there tomorrow if Harmony re-evaluated the task she’d given out.
Above all else, it’s a computer program created by an exploitative corporation that has no qualms about killing its employees or forcing them to be indentured servants. The likelihood that Harmony will increase the difficulty of the task tomorrow is pretty high, Alex concluded.
So he dutifully used [Evaluate], noting down the working and non-working units. The skill didn’t give him a breakdown of what needed to be done to fix the things yet, but each device was carefully notated on his map along with its general condition. Later, when he was more skilled, he could return and start repairing them.
*
Network Node A-6222229d was not easily accessible. It was in the lower decks, in a dark room, securely contained behind one of the bulkhead walls. Alex and Patina moved cautiously to its location, on the lookout for the Bruise brothers or any of their ilk.
The lights were inoperable inside the room, but Patina already had a trick for that; It hadn’t been the first dark place she’d needed to clean, after all. A sheet of reflective metal positioned in the corridor just right angled the light into the room creating enough illumination to see by.
This room was not a little office like the others. To Alex it felt more like a waiting room - lining two walls were a series of semi-comfortable benches surfaced with a sponge-like cushion that squeaked when Alex reached out to press down on it. There was a large screen here, but it looked to have been attacked with great enthusiasm - shards of plastic and glass, along with wires and bits of circuitry were scattered on the bench below where it hung precipitously from the wall.
Patina led Alex to the bulkhead panel that they needed to bypass. It, like many of the other access panels, seemed to be firmly sealed to the wall. When Alex queried Patina as to why it was done this way she had looked at him with pity.
“Your world must be such a backward place, “ she shook her head. With one long ringer she pointed at several seemingly random places along the edges of the panel. “Seamless magnetic screws. You need an omnitool to turn them.”
Alex felt as if he’d heard of magnetic screws before, but declined to argue with the goblin on his species’ technological accomplishments. After all, the humans of Earth didn’t have a gigantic space train which, at this point, was a pretty big stick to measure by. Instead he decided to utilize the same method of entry he had with the panel in the malfunctioning transportation pod.
A loud clang echoed through the room and beyond as the panel hit the floor after Alex had taken to it with his hammer and chisel. Sparks scattered across the surface of the panel as a string of wires which connected it to something within the bulkhead were torn away. Patina chuckled in disbelief.
“Ladies, gentlemen, and all those in between, I present to you our [Mender].” she muttered sarcastically. Alex grinned.
“If you want to make an omelet you need to break a few eggs.”
“What’s an omelet?”
“Never mind. I guess these wires weren’t too important, since there are no alarms or urgent-sounding klaxons or anything.” he gestured to the wires, which had stopped sparking.
“They connected to the small scanner meant to register your authority and allow access to the panel, Alex.” Patina replied.
“I feel as if that’s something you could have told me before I hammered the whole thing off the wall.”
“Nah, boss, it’s fine. You wouldn’t have been able to take out the screws anyway. So here we are - now you have to remove the inner panel to expose the node itself.”
A thin plastic sheet held in place with simple clips lay between Alex and his goal. He was careful in its removal, but started to cough and sputter as dust puffed out of the space into his face.
“Glah!” he sputtered as he dropped the panel to wave his arms about with frantic urgency. Patina, who had stood back several feet, giggled at the dust-covered human. “You could have warned me.”
“Alex, I did warn you. Like, hours ago, ” Patina grinned, “I told you that none of us have been allowed to clean behind the access panels, remember?”
“I…but…well…” Alex shook himself, letting the dust sprinkle down onto the floor. “Fine. Okay. Well now you can clean the…oh.”
Alex trailed off as he looked at the strange array that had been hidden behind the panels. Much like the one he’d beaten his way into earlier it was a confusing mess of circuitry and wiring. Little lights flickered unhelpfully in various colors, and thin glass wiring flowed with the yellow flesh-melting fluid Alex had encountered before.
As he tried to comprehend the magnitude of what he was looking at, Patina laid her hand heavily on his shoulder. She peered at the circuitry and wires, and shook her head.
“Need a magelight, too.” the goblin said. “To show the runic scripts and mana arrays.”
“The…what?”
“It’s not just what you can see with your eyes, Alex, especially since neither of us has any sort of internal magical potential. Ad Astra built this thing with a fusion of magic and technology.”
“So I have to be a magical repairman? And let me guess, the omnitool has this magelight thing, right?”
“Yup.” Patina shrugged. “Told you that you’d need it, boss.”
“Maybe, “ Alex hedged, “But Harmony said I would have instructions for how to repair this. I don’t even know what’s wrong with it.”
>Evaluation of Network Node A-6222229d: Operating at 27% efficiency.
“Oof. Twenty seven percent efficiency.” Alex muttered, peering at the confusing mess. When he figured he’d try his [Jury Rig] skill just to see what would happen, Alex was surprised to find a bleak message waiting.
>WARNING: Use of [Jury Rig] at current rank will result in 100% chance of permanent damage to Network Node A-6222229d. Use skill again to confirm you wish to do so.
Yyyyyeah, no.
“If I had a schematic or some sort of plan that showed what this was supposed to look like, maybe that would help. Let me check Harmony’s instructions.”
Alex backed away from the exposed network node and let Patina start cleaning up the worst of the dust. She used a little squeeze-bulb device that drew the dirt to it rather than her mop or broom, presumably because of the delicacy of the operation.
Looking through the Ad Astra part of his interface, Alex found Harmony’s instructions for how to rewire her node.
"Detach unneeded wires from a-18 and g-95. Rewire both to section B, j-2. Bypass switch n/t-5. Remove malfunctioning sigil from runic plate #7b. Shift chip 001-x from board 5 to board 7. Rewire…"
“Yeah, this is bullshit.” Alex declared. There were no accompanying pictures, and nothing on the node itself was labeled in any way that he could see. He shook his head slowly. “I have zero understanding of any of this.”
“Figures.” Patina grunted absently. She also stepped back, frowning at the array. “Boss, I’ve got most of the dust, but I can't do much about the mold right now.” The goblin pointed to several patches of the node where a dark and furry substance had spread over the circuitry.
“Uh, mold?” Alex asked, “Is it toxic? Do we need PPE?”
“Nah, we can just go in our uniforms. Well, mine anyway. Yours is too basic.”
“PPE. Personal Protective Equipment. Like…masks and stuff. Also, ew.”
“Void…” Patina shook her head, an angry scowl appearing on her face. “I have to remember you’re fucking clueless. No offense.”
“None taken yet.” Alex smiled. Patina tapped her head.
“Your uniform. The cap. It’s got a protective air bubble. If you ever find yourself in a toxic situation, or airless, just tap the logo and you’ll be safe. For about five minutes, anyway.”
“Huh. Well that’s neat.”
“Right. I need to teach you these things because I guess nobody else will. And, well, I did sort of say I’d be your guide.” Patina blushed. “Sorry, boss.”
“There’s been a lot going on. So should I activate this or not?”
“Nah. It’s fringemold. Not toxic to the living. It feeds on magic but so little that it’s probably not doing much to harm things. Still, it should be removed - I’d need to get some fungicide for it though. I don't carry that with me normally.”
“Fair enough. So that’s one thing we can do for the node, but the rest of it is completely beyond me.”
Alex clipped the inner panel back in place, and then used duct tape to reattach the outer panel. It didn’t quite fit anymore since he’d torn it from the wall, but it was good enough.
“At least I don’t need to lie to Harmony, “ he said, “There’s nothing I can do here.”
Walking away without fixing the node made Alex feel a little disappointed, but he shooed the feeling aside as silly. He couldn’t help what he didn’t know after all.
Back in the tech closet, Alex leaned against the wall and tried to reorder his thoughts. There were so many things to do that he felt as if he was moving backward rather than forwards, and as he was right now Alex knew that he couldn’t do much. He was going to have to improve, and fast, to keep up with things as well as save his own life. Both Alex's [Jury Rig] and [Repurpose] could be pushed some more simply by playing around with things right here in this room, but he needed a firmer base to stand on. Right now there was only one thing that he could immediately improve that would serve as that base.
“Patina?”
The goblin, who had automatically gone back to cleaning up around the tech room, stopped mid-sweep to look up at Alex. “Whatcha need, boss?”
“Sleep.” he replied. “I need to get better at things, and I think the first step will be getting my [Evaluate] up a rank. The more I understand that's going wrong, the better I can choose how to fix things.”
“Okay, sure." Patina shrugged, "So take a nap. You're the boss, boss.”
“Where?” Alex asked, “I was told I have a berth somewhere, but Harmony errored out as she was assigning it. I have no idea where it is.”
“Probably in another carriage.” Patina shrugged. “I think I was assigned one in ninety-nine eighty-six. Never seen it. Just pull up some floor, I guess.”
“Where do you sleep?”
“That’s personal.”
Alex didn’t push. He eyed the clean patch of floor; It did not look comfortable at all. “Yeah, I don’t think I could fall asleep in here.”
“This room is likely the safest place for you, honestly. Only you can enter it.”
“I’m sort of used to a bed.” Alex confessed. Except the time he slept in the woods. Or the time he slept in the trunk of a car. There was also the time he slept in a tree over in Nebraska, but that was because of the ducks, and he didn’t like to think about that event. Either way, Alex much preferred a cushioned mattress and some pillows.
“Nah, just lay down. I have this neat finger-kneading technique that helps people sleep.” Patina offered. She was smiling, and it was testament to how distracted Alex was that he didn’t pick up on the mischief behind that smile.
“Some sort of head massage or something?” he asked. “I’d feel weird asking for that, honestly.”
“You're weird all the time. Just lay down.”
'I'm weird, says the space goblin." Alex laid down as ordered. The floor was cold against his skin, but thankfully he was mostly covered by the Ad Astra uniform. Patina commanded that he close his eyes, and Alex did so with the complete trust of the naïve.
“Okay, relax now.” Patina’s tone was gentle as she stepped behind Alex’s head. He could feel her fingers - still in gloves - touch the back of his head. “You’re getting sleepy. You’re getting sleeeeepy…”
I really don’t think I can fall asleep like-
Patina struck. An explosion of pain blossomed at the back of Alex’s head. He didn’t even have time to cry out as consciousness left him.
>Health: 8/20. You have suffered a debilitating head wound.
>Syntropic synchronization beginning…