CHAPTER 52: E'S FIRST IMPRESSION OF ABYSSAL

“I know it might be a little late for me to ask this, but is it safe for this thing to be here in this bay? Should you have put it in the more… secured area of the ship?” The young man spoke, both of his hands on his buttocks as he looked towards the blue-coloured shark themed ship in all her glory.

“Relax. You know you are fine as long as you stick near me, right? Also, I have the drones surrounding the ship, if it does anything funny, ZAP!” the young girl with silver hair said as she shot an imaginary bullet towards the blue shark. The girl named Abigail E. Eternity— E for short.

All the drones around her, as if following her lead, stopped swirling around before pointing their guns towards Abyssal. They then went back to their usual routine. 

“I guess. I just don’t want it to suddenly go rogue and destroy the hangar. There are some really expensive pieces of equipment here.”

“I got it under control, captain. You know an energy field permeates this entire docking station, right? It will fry any foreign entity. At least anything I deemed as a foreign entity. All your precious equipment is fine.”

“If you say so. If anything breaks, you do the paperwork,” the man said before adjusting his cap.

“What a worrywart. Besides, Astral said this ship is basically harmless. You ought to trust our top ace,” E said as she moved closer to Abyssal.

“An unofficial hired ace who also happens to be a terrorist.”

“Come on. Don’t be such a downer.”

“I know you two go a long way back, but I think your trust in her might be misplaced.”

E ignored his remark before putting her hand onto the Shark-class. “Poor girl, Look at what those brutes did to you. No mercy for small old ships, jeez.”

Just a few seconds after touching the blue shark, the girl let out a small gasp before moving a step backwards. She felt an unknown sensation and a sharp striking feeling on her head. It was a sensation that was probably felt by Abyssal as well— a bone-chilling sensation. It was at this moment that E realised that this was no ordinary ship. Living Cores can easily identify each other if given the chance. Her smiling and happy mood immediately turned into a serious one.

“What’s wrong?” the man asked E when she suddenly went silent. He was unable to see her face as her back was facing him.

“...Nothing,” E said to the man before turning around with a bright smile. Her initial serious look immediately replaced with a joyful act. “Well, you got to see the ship right? It’s about time you took off. I need to check if the people inside are okay, so I’m going to start breaching now. It’s best you stay out of the way. Or… you can stay and enjoy the show if you want.”

“No thanks. I don’t want to be here if things get dicey. I’ll be heading back to the bridge. Just let me know if you find anything. If there are any injured people onboard, get Julia to check on them,” the captain of the ship said before turning around. He fluttered his cape like some sort of hotshot before moving towards the open elevator.

“Roger that,” E replied with a clumsy salute.

“Oh right, if any of them have a bounty on their heads… well, you know what to do,” the man said before finally leaving the place.

“Aye aye, captain. I’ll let you know if there’s anything exciting,” E only kept waving at the man as he went away.

It took the man several minutes to finally take the elevator and leave the place. E never stopped waving at him until she was truly sure that the captain had left. Her joyful act then turned back into a serious mood as she walked up to the S.A.S. Abyssal. She then knocked on the ship three times.

“Open up. I know what you are and I’m pretty sure you know what I am as well. I know you have been listening to us. I can see the camera moving around ya know,” E said to Abyssal.

E then folded her arms and waited for a response. One whole minute of silence was given to her by Abyssal.

“Ya the clueless type, shy type or something? Do you think keeping quiet and playing dumb will make everything okay? Open up, I know you can hear me. I don’t want any trouble, I just want to talk to you. Face to face. I need to confirm something,” E said before waiting another minute. This time she tapped her foot while waiting.

Still no response from Abyssal.

“I can dismantle you right now, you know. You are in my territory. We can either do this easy way or the hard way.”

E waited one more minute before letting out a shrug. E was a person who believed that someone should only be given three chances before the ultimatum. She ordered her drone to go on standby and reached for her pistols on her hips when suddenly a click was heard. A part of Abyssal’s hull opened up before revealing a bulkhead door. Then, from the bottom of the bulkhead, came a platform reaching for the floor of the hangar bay.

E saw this and let out a satisfied hum. She ordered her drones to stand down before walking towards and up the platform— the camera’s of the S.A.S. Abyssal followed her as she did so. Sneaking a look to the insides of the ship, E could see an empty hallway. It took E a few moments before she finally reached the entrance. 

“Pardon me,” she said before entering the ship.

She then walked along the hallways of the blue shark, looking around to take in the sights of the place. Her hands were close to her hips, ready to pull out her weapon at a moment’s notice. She looked rather relaxed but an experienced person would know she was cautious of what’s coming to her. Perhaps, she expected an ambush or maybe even retaliation from the crew. Though, nothing happened. The hall was empty as if inviting her to go even deeper.

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‘Strange… though not unexpected.’ E thought to herself as she looked around.

She knew of the Shark Class. It was a design mostly used by people who couldn’t afford a real fighting ship, a ship made out of scraps and whatever parts that were available. Although made from scraps, the shark class was definitely a threat on the battlefield. It was a simple design that can be mass-produced.

However, there was one strange thing, alright. All over herself were walls that looked to be made of brand new sheets of metal fresh off the factory. The lighting and even the handrails looked brand new. Everything about this ship looked like it was made from a starbase rather than a scrap yard— recently at that too.

At first, she thought the ship to be some old ship, but this was not the case. An actual Shark class would not look this brand new or look this sleek. At least not one owned by pirates or a nobody. 

‘Though, this ship is a little bit different than other Shark classes, huh. Seems that there were some modifications to the ships. An attempt to modernize it?’ E thought to herself as she recalled the differing placement of the gun and the thrusters of the ship.

“Or perhaps, you stole the design from some other person? Assimilated a pirate or something? Can’t believe people are still using the Shark Class these days,” E looked towards one of the cameras in the hallway, talking out rather loudly. She was trying to make a conversation.

For a few moments, E waited for a reply. Though only silence was given to her. E just shrugged her shoulders before moving onwards, moving deeper into the ship. The hallways were rather … straightforward and all the other pathways seemed to be blocked, so it was easy for E to know where to go. She would simply have to meet the sentient being controlling the ship in person and get an answer out of it. She met a few before that were either shy or too scared to talk to a stranger— perhaps the one controlling the ship was like them. Then, there were the few that are still too robotic in nature and would not know what to do in such a situation. Such Living Cores were not uncommon.

Her movements were halted when the loudspeaker rang out. It seemed like a shipwide message was being sent out.

“Actually, I assimilated the ship before it turned into this, it used to be a Maxwell. I then converted it to the Shark Class. The blueprints were borrowed… in a way…” an awkward but yet bubbly voice came out of the speaker. It sounded like it belonged to an energetic but scared woman.

“So the ship finally talks, huh. Could have said something earlier, but I guess better now than never. I like your voice by the way,” E said as she looked towards the camera.

“Thanks, I like it as well– wait! That's not what I wanted to say!" the girl retorted.

E let out a small laugh before starting to move again "A little spunky ain't ya, little girl? What's your name?"

"Abyssal…"

"I see. Not that bad of a name. I kinda like it. The depths of the Abyss, kinda like space!" E said as she did a Shakespeare pose with her hands.

"Oh yeah, I'm the big gigantic carrier that you are in right now. The supercarrier Abigail E. Eternity. You can call me E though. Or Eternity or Abigail or whatever. Suit yourself, I don't particularly mind either way," E said in a carefree tone. She was really giving out the easy-going attitude.

“Yeah, I know. Your communicator went through. It’s just that my transmitters were damaged so I couldn’t reply back,” Abyssal replied.

“Ahhh… It’s alright. Kinda happens from time to time. I remembered the time where my long-range radar and transmitter were taken out. I couldn’t identify nor contact allies. It was a nightmare I tell ya.”

“Oh okay…”

“Hey, am I going the right way? I’ve been walking this path for quite a while now. You look small from the outside, but you are quite spacious on the inside, huh?”

“Um? Ah! Yeah, just keep heading that way. You’ll reach the cargo bay soon.”

‘The cargo bay? Not the bridge?’ E thought to herself

“You’ll be there, right?” E asked.

“Well… somewhat..”

“Somewhat, huh. No traps, please. I’ll be fuming if that’s the case. I got a gun and an army of drones out there and I’m not afraid to use it, just sayin,” E said out in a casual tone. Her eyes, however, looked at the camera with some serious glare. She was being serious about her threat.

“Right… Um… so uh… What’s going to happen to us?” Abyssal asked with a fearful tone.

‘Us?’

“What do you mean by that?” E asked, keeping her thoughts to herself.

“No, I mean… you are a big ship and all... And you said you belonged to Freedom United and uh...”

“What? You take me for some sort of brute, girl? Look here, if I wanted to destroy you, I would have done so the moment we met. Or, I would have sent you to the grinder.”

“Th-the grinder?”

“Yeah, I have a grinder, meant to take apart ships like you for scraps,” E gave a grin towards the camera, her hands motioning herself crushing an air rock.

“Eek!” Abyssal shrieked and suddenly the ship started to shake.

E then let out a small laugh, “I’m joking, I’m joking, gahaha. There is no point for me to scrap you anyways. You don’t really have anything I want.”

“I see… “

The conversation ended right there as E moved along the hallway. Abyssal never said another word. Soon, without too long of a walk, E arrived at another bulkhead. As soon as she arrived, the bulkhead door rotated open and revealed itself a large cargo bay. It wasn’t as large as E’s hangar but it was pretty respectable in size. In the middle of the bay was a damaged ship that looked like a little blue swallow. It had a black motif and glowing blue lines all over it.

‘Wow, there is another ship inside the ship, huh. That must be the blue swallow that Astral trashed,’ E thought to herself.

She then walked around further into the cargo bay. All around her were containers which inside contained raw materials and resources. There were several inactive construction drones docked into their ports just waiting to be activated. All of the drones were docked and inactive except one small robotic drone who was just floating next to the damaged blue swallow.

“Oh, this drone is pretty cute. Wonder what it’s doing apart from the others,” E said as she picked up the drone.

Tried to.

The moment she got close to the drone, it suddenly motioned one of its arms towards E. It was as if the drone was waving at her. 

“He-hello!” Abyssal’s voice came out of the drone, an awkward-sounding one.

“Huh?” E blinked her eyes rapidly at the scene. Her mouth went agape as she tried to compute what was in front of her. Was this drone the core known as Abyssal? It was at this moment that she noticed a few more ‘people’ in the cargo bay. On the blue swallow, near the entrance to the ship was a Nekomi peeking out towards E, or rather, trying to. Her head peeked out of the ship, but her expression and body showed that she was in pain. Besides her, was a similar drone to the one currently in front of her, peeking out as well.

It was then that everything clicked for E. This core didn’t have an avatar. The drone must have been her current physical body. An uncontrollable torrent of air then started to burst out of her lungs. She couldn’t hold it in anymore and started to laugh wildly. 

“Pfft, why a drone? Couldn’t you use something else? Surely there was a better body than a drone!” She said as she continued to laugh. She sounded like a small kid who was having too much fun in the playground.

“Eh?”

E’s first impression of Abyssal was that she was a pretty interesting core. A pretty clueless but interesting core. A harmless little sheep in a wolf's clothing.