With Rebecca sedated, I ended up making my way to the garage. Originally, I had no intention of doing any more work, but watching Rebecca freak out had unsettled me, and I wasn't really in the mood to just sit around. So, I ended up working on a few things, just chipping away at some simple designs. I started by building the that Cait used in Fallout 4, on the off chance that it was a safe method of addiction removal. I had uncovered it a while back but hadn't bothered to take a crack at it yet, knowing it wouldn't take long and would likely be a bust. I didn't exactly have high hopes for it being safe, and what hopes I did have were quickly squashed when I finished it.

  The chair, called the Extractor, worked first by neutralizing any active drugs, using a cocktail of chemicals that reacted with the whole gamut of recreational drugs. While hypothetically useful as a way to sober up someone nearly instantly, I never planned on releasing any of the addictive chemicals in the first place, so a way to neutralize them was pretty pointless. It was also nearly identical to the cocktail in, Addictol's younger, less potent little brother, which I had already made during my drug and chemical phase.

  The second part of the process was the primary ingredient in Addictol, which was directly injected into the brain through the temples. If a dose of normal Addictol was like sweeping the floor, then the dose used by the Extractor was like power sanding off the top few millimeters. It was so intense, that a solid argument could be made that Cait suffered at least partial personality death, and that the person who sat down was not the same person who stood up.

  Despite what happened in the game, in reality, the process took several hours. It would have included "calming" almost ASMR-like mantras and repeated messages about the dangers of drugs, how terrible they were, and how much the person sitting definitely never wanted to do them again. This, combined with an added minor sedative, would have power blasted anything even remotely connected to drugs out of Caits mind.

  Eventually, after doing a few more small bits of tech, the burned-out feeling returned, so I put aside my tools. As much as I might have liked to, and despite how late it was getting, I had no intention of going to bed. There was no point in even laying down until my tech tree was finally released, as it would wake me up anyway, and quite dramatically at that.

  I cursed and spun around in my chair, looking up at the ceiling of the workshop and chewing the inside of my lip. This tech tree had been incredibly successful, spreading my knowledge into new subjects, unlocking dozens of incredible types of tech, and several dozen small bits of SCIENCE! that would no doubt improve my builds in the future.

  But it had also been a slog, a massive struggle that now was leaving me drained and… out of gas. It was similar to how I remembered coming home from longer shifts at work, where I had time, but my will to enjoy it was just too exhausted to do anything. I needed to do better next time. Taking the next branch easy might not be possible, depending on how useful it was, but I definitely owed it to myself to be more... choosey when it came to deciding what I spent my time on. I was hesitant to even jokingly ask for a pointless tech tree, but I was already considering ways to make it easier.

  On the positive side, it was unlikely that whatever I got would be similar to Fallout, at least in the way that there are hundreds of little bits of SCIENCE! buried in random bits and bobs, forcing me to build dozens of household appliances and random items in hopes of finding them. And even if it somehow did, I'm pretty sure I would skip it. This tech tree had been a mental marathon, and I would not be repeating it if I could help it.

  I let out another long breath, looking over at the time. Midnight was slowly approaching, and I was basically just sitting and waiting for it. Before I could think of anything to do, I heard Samwise making his way from the production room, stopping in the garage workshop.

  "Jackson, you appear to be in distress," He commented, his head tilted to the side. "Is everything alright? Do you need assistance?"

  "My overwork is just catching up with me, Sam," I explained, rubbing my face before turning back to him. "Humans can suffer from burnout when they push themselves too far, even if it's something they enjoy or find fun. It can cause a lot of mental issues, including a sense of melancholy and… well, this."

  I gestured to myself, slumped back in my chair, struggling to keep my brain in line, jumbled thought, and sluggish thinking included.

  "I see. Well… perhaps a tour of our progress in the Vault might lift your spirits?"

  That got my attention, and I quickly jumped up and out of my chair, nodding eagerly.

  "Yep, that would do it," I said with a smirk. "How is the progress?"

  "I could tell you," He admitted, already making his way to the side room of the garage, where the door to the basement was. "Or, I could just show you."

  "Fair enough, Samwise. Lead the way," I said imperiously, gesturing for him to lead on.

  I followed after the AI robot, making our way to the teleport room below the workshop. There were a few teleport platforms, but only one of them connected to anything, as far as I was aware.

  "Any plans for these platforms?" I asked, gesturing to the unconnected teleporters as I climbed up onto the one connected to the Vault."

  "Not particularly, sir," Samwise admitted. "We haven't had the manpower to work on anything else besides the Vault and your work here. However, that is likely to change soon. Once the living quarters are built and self-sufficient, Noah plans to establish a dedicated workforce for the Vault and return the majority of MRVNs that were 'on loan.'"

  "Hmm... gonna have to come up with a new project then," I said, scratching my chin. "Just to keep them busy."

  As I considered the idea, I tapped the teleporters controls, and a second later, we were standing in the much larger teleport hub. Already, I could tell the difference from before, as the room was completely finished and lit using actual built-in lights, not temporary set-up construction lamps. The room itself was very, simple, hardy, and clearly designed for easy maintenance.

  "You've seen most of this before, but I should explain that this internal paneling style and structure is for maintenance and other work areas," Samwise explained. "The living areas will have a much more refined look. We plan on coming up with a few options and letting you pick."

  "What, not going to go with Vault-Tec blue and yellow?" I asked, taking a closer look at the paneling, noting the easy access to pipes and wiring. "What would the corporate headquarters think?"

  "Well, we can use blue and yellow if that's what you would prefer..."

  "No, no, just a joke," I said quickly, waving him off. "Vault-tec colors aren't really what I would prefer."

  "Very well," He responded, something in his voice telling me he knew exactly what he was doing. "Right now, every room is being powered by separate fusion reactors, including the teleporters and lights. Later, once we set up centralized power for easier maintenance, the individual reactors will be converted into emergency power systems."

  "Smart," I said, honestly impressed. "You guys are really knocking it out of the park."

  "Thank you, Jackson," Samwise said with a nod before leading me towards the door. "Shall we continue?"

  Outside the teleporter hub was a large, square room, something like ten or fifteen meters wide on all sides. At the center was a large, very industrial-looking elevator with MRVN units carrying parts from the nearby production room, which I could see inside since its doors were open and significantly wider than the doors I had just stepped out of.

  "This is the primary cargo elevator. Once this section of the Vault is complete and we move the primary production facility to begin construction of another section, we will convert the elevator to something more refined but still used for mostly cargo, since we will have smaller versions for more public, everyday use."

  I nodded in understanding, looking to the other side of the room and spotting doors on the other two sides as well.

  "Through those doors are material storage, basically a room filled with raw ingredients," Samwise answered before I could ask, spotting where I was looking. "Mostly, it is just ingots of bismuth and other dense metals."

  "Bismuth, huh? Makes sense, I suppose," I responded, nodding in understanding. "Dense, as well as safe and easy to handle. Good choice."

  "Thank you," Samwise said with a nod, before gesturing to the last set of doors. "And that room over there is for equipment and MRVN storage."

  "What about up?" I asked, watching as the elevator went up with a large load of materials rather than down. "I thought this is the highest point, two thousand feet down?"

  "It will be once we are finished setting up layers of reinforcement," Sawwise explained. "With the creation of the matter converters, we've been able to greatly step up the timetable, so we began the reinforcement process early."

  "Gotcha, good to hear."

  We waited for several minutes for the elevator to come back down before we both climbed on board. Sam immediately tapped the controls, and we slowly began to descend. The walls of the elevator were paneled in the same industrial paneling as the room we had just left, continuing downward. We passed two floors, both of which were basically the same large square room with four attached rooms as above.

  "The top room is basically extra space, made for anything you might need them for," he explained, the descent slowing at each floor. "The second one we are reserving is for storage, control systems, and anything directly connected to the living quarters below us. These two rooms, plus the living space below, will be part of what we consider the housing module."

  "How many people can the living space support?" I asked as we continued to descend. "Are we-"

  Suddenly, we were in the next room, the walls of the elevator shaft disappearing to reveal the massive space. Where the first rooms were a few meters tall, nothing out of the ordinary, especially in an industrial setting, the room we were now descending through was at least twenty meters tall at the center, which slowly curved downward in a shallow dome that connected to a flat wall that ran perpendicular to the floor. Around this wall were dozens of open doorways leading back into rooms that I could not see inside.

  All of this was carved directly into the stone, which was no doubt a rough shape of what the final product would actually look like. Still, even with that in mind, it was extremely impressive.

  This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  In total, the floor space looked to be about half the size of an American football field, at least if you trimmed the corners off. It was astoundingly large, and descent from the ceiling threw me off big time because of it.

  It was obvious that the room was not finished, especially when you started so high above it. Parts of the underfloor were exposed, showing off the earthquake absorption systems, as well as the structural reinforcement for the solid stone around us. Thick beams of metal set into the stone, almost fused into it. Structural reinforcements were also built around every doorway. I could see at least a dozen MRVNs working on the floor and other bits, even as our elevator arrived at the ground floor.

  "This is fantastic, so much bigger than I imagined…" I admitted as I stepped off the elevator, looking around and trying to imagine what it would look like when it was finished. "I hate to ask this, but… are you sure it's structurally sound? It's an awfully large room."

  "Absolutely, between the Vault-tec methods and the Titanfall advanced materials, this is perfectly stable, even if they nuked the surface several times over, or we experienced a massive earthquake," He assured me. "It was built to withstand a massive amount of punishment and is heavily reinforced. Even if it was above ground, it could hold out from an extreme barrage."

  "Good, that's good," I said, still looking around in wonder. "So, tell me about the plan."

  "Very well. Our current plan is to turn this central area into a garden with trees, flowers, crops, and a water feature. The area will be lit with sun lamps timed to the exterior, and the roof will be covered in screens to replicate the sky and weather. We are even considering mimicking things like rain and fog."

  "Rain?" I asked, looking at him with a raised eyebrow. "You want to mimic rain inside a bunker?"

  "That's correct, sir. We want to provide the full package of living above ground while still underground," He explained, a hint of determination coming through his voice. "Just in case you are forced to live inside for extended periods."

  "That's not a bad way to look at it, but…no, you know what? I kinda like it. It's a crazy idea, but that fits in pretty well," I pointed out with a grin. "So, garden center, a Hogwarts sky system. What about the actual rooms?"

  Samwise nodded and led me across the paneled floor to one of the rooms, stopping to let me enter first. As we stepped through the metal beam-reinforced doorless opening, we entered a short hallway no more than two or so meters. It was wide, though, enough so that putting furniture along one side wouldn't restrict your movement. As we walked further, we entered the first and only room, which was rectangular, positioned so that the long end connected to the door. It was pretty big, probably half again as big as my apartment in the megabuilding had been, though without the walls or furniture. It was even less complete than the large hub just outside.

  "As you can see, the majority of the living quarters room structure will be from internal design. There will be a standard makeup, but that will easily be adjustable with some help from MRVN units, according to the tenant's desires," He explained. "By default, these will have a single bedroom, a living room, a kitchen, a spare room, and a full bathroom. Tenants could, for example, eliminate the spare room to make the other rooms larger or convert it into a spare bedroom."

  "And furniture?"

  "Basics would be standard, but more advanced things would be made on demand," He explained. "Besides taking away control completely, there is really no other way to consistently individual requests."

  I nodded in understanding as I looked around the ample rectangular space, trying to imagine what it would look like when it was done. My brain obviously kept going to what the rooms looked like in the Fallout games, but this was obviously going to be a step above that.

  "You mentioned a housing module, tell me more about that."

  "It isn't anything important, just how we are referring to our pre-designed structure groupings," He explained matter of factly, including a shrug. "What we have so far is not necessarily what they will be in the end since we are building this section as quickly as possible and using it as a testing ground."

  "What do you anticipate the final housing module to look like?"

  "From the plans that Noah had designed, a full housing module will include several layers like this one, as well as two floors above," he explained, unhooking a tablet from his side and handing it to me, letting me scroll through some of the designs as he talked. "Each floor of the housing will be either a family, single, or barracks style."

  "What's the difference?"

  "These are the single quarters. They are meant for one or two people. A family quarters will have a second level with the same floor space and are meant for a family with more than one child. On the other hand, the barracks are meant as a sort of mass buffer. Basically, if a lot of people need to be evacuated suddenly, the barracks module can hold a lot of people for a long time enough to build normal rooms for them."

  "Huh… you guys put a lot of thought into this," I said, scrolling through the dozens of designs. "This is turning into less of a private bunker and more into an underground city."

  "The thought has come up," Samwise admitted. "But Noah insisted that, with each room basically paying for itself and then some, and the entire process being completed by mindless robots, there is no reason not to just let them go, continuously building more and more rooms, especially since each module will create surplus materials for you to work with."

  My eyes widened at his point, and while I couldn't exactly disagree, I was worried about how far they were going to take that concept. Having an on-hand bunker capable of taking in such a vast amount of people could certainly come in handy, but the idea of just letting the MRVN crew go on, Ad Infinitum? That sounded like the intro to some sort of horror or grimdark setting.

  "That's a fair point, Sam, but there should be a cut-off at some point," I said with a frown, rubbing my forehead. "Let's cap it at…… five hundred living units, and half that many barracks. That should be more than enough room to move in a thousand people in case of some sort of emergency."

  "That's enough for over five thousand," Samwise corrected. "But yes, we will restrict our final design."

  "Good. When this bunker is done… We can discuss making more of them around the world, maybe setting up an emergency bunker system, just in case," I suggested, scratching my chin. "They could be handy for a lot of things, not just emergencies."

  A little rattled by the numbers and scale of what Naoh and Samwise were working with, I listened as he described some of the other concepts he and Noah were working on. From large-scale production facilities that could produce shades and more by the hundreds, to modules dedicated to socialization and activity, a combination of a massive mall, arcade, and food court.

  It was a vast array of redundant systems, housing, support structures, and more. At this point, just the designs would have made a vault engineer weep like he had found the holy land.

  It would have also made a Vault-tec CEO weep for the wasted resources and the missed opportunity to test some inane theory and torture the occupants.

  We were discussing possible entertainment options, things like bowling alleys and gymnasiums for indoor sports when I finally felt the first tug. Samwise immediately caught on to my expression and began gently leading me across the workspace.

  "It is currently eleven fifty-five, Jackson," he pointed out. "I suggest you sit down while it passes."

  I nodded absently, and we quickly found a pile of sheet metal stacked in a corner for me to sit on. I closed my eyes and focused back, watching the final countdown as it ticked over. I continued to talk with Samwise, though I was barely paying attention, something he absolutely realized. Eventually, the tech tree pulled free, and the countdown timer slotted into place. I let out a long breath, which I didn't realize I was holding, before slowly standing and stretching.

  "Well… I suppose that is it," I said with a smile, feeling a weight rise off my shoulders. "Next tech tree, I need to keep myself from taking on too much. This… this one really burned me out."

  "This tech tree seemed to be unique," Samwise pointed out, and I nodded in agreement.

  "I think so as well, but who knows what I'll unlock next," I responded with an uncertain gesture. "If I'm lucky, it will be something like XCOM. A set number of items worth making, a handful of useful things, and a few unique materials to tinker with. The week wouldn't be a waste, but I wouldn't be nearly as overwhelmed."

  "I will keep my fingers crossed," Samwise assured me. "Perhaps going forward, we should make a design plan at the start, something to look toward to tell you what's worth making and what is not."

  "I mean… it sounds useful, but it's hard to predict that," I pointed out. "I don't know everything about every universe, and even if I did, the tech trees can be hard to predict. I'm sure it will help, but… yeah. All I can do is hope that I don't get something as weird as Fallout for a while."

  "Is there any universe you would like to get?"

  "Oh hell, that's dangerous territory there," I said with a chuckle. "As far as I can tell, it's random, so who knows what's next. I would like to get something that would solve all our problems, but we are just likely to get fucking Paw Patrol or something."

  I chuckled and shook my head, gesturing to the elevator at the center of the large unfinished room.

  "Alright, Sam, it's time for me to get some sleep," I said, the AI nodding, both of us making our way to the center of the room. "This was amazing, and I am extremely excited to see what this place looks like when it's finished. You and Noah have been doing a fantastic job. Please tell Noah that. I know he is on the anti-social side, so I'll leave him to his work."

  "Of course, Jackson."

  It didn't take long for us to get back to the teleporter hub, and from there, we were just a button press away from the garage workshop. I said goodnight to Samwise before heading to my trailer, Duke following after me after I found him waiting at the garage.

  "Alright, buddy. I'm not sure what we are doing tomorrow, but it's probably going to be pretty chill," I said, scratching my canine protector's head while sitting at the end of my bed. "Let's hope that… no, wait… don't want to jinx myself."

  I shook my head, stepping into the shower, letting the warm water wash away the last vestiges of the day. When I crawled back into my bed, my eyelids were already feeling heavy, so it didn't take long for me to fall asleep.

  Waking up the following day was a slow and ponderous affair. I was in no rush to get to work on anything, so I slept in. I spent some time scrolling through the internet, only really getting up when I eventually got too annoyed with how terrible the media had gotten. I sat through about fifteen minutes of TV, during which I saw eight ads, two of which were for a reality show called Watson Whore. By the end of the second one, I was feeling nauseous, tossing my Keyphone to the side to recover from the litany of bright flashes and disgustingly crude visuals.

  When I finally did leave my trailer, I headed directly to the Shack. Jackie had been nice enough to leave me some breakfast, an easily reheatable breakfast sandwich on what I was pretty sure was their first attempt at bagels. I heated it up in the microwave before sitting down and eating it in relative silence. When I was done, I took a deep breath, letting it out slowly before starting to make my way up to the bio lab, or more specifically, the temporary surgery suite, to check on Rebecca.

  "Jackson, a moment," Frank said, stepping out of his small office space next to the stairs, coming out just as I began to climb up. "I believe Kaytlyn is talking to Rebecca at the moment. She requested some privacy, hoping that it would help keep Rebecca calm."

  "She's alone up there?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

  "Oh, no, Riggs refused to let her do that," Frank confirmed, assuaging my concerns. "He is up there as well, pretending to be asleep, I believe."

  "Oh, fair enough," I said with a nod, turning to walk back down the stairs. "When Kaytlyn comes down, do me a favor and tell her to come find me. I want to talk to her."

  "I will let her know, assuming she doesn't leave through a window or something," He assured me, his caveat getting a snort of laughter from me as I left the Shack.

  I made my way out of the Shack before, on a whim, climbing up Kaytlyn's tower, which was built on top of the security building since it was just barely the tallest building in the town, at least in this area. It was a short climb, even if they had boosted the sniper nest up several feet using reinforced scaffolding.

  This was the first time I had climbed up there since it had been redone, at least that I could remember, and I wasn't surprised to find that Kaytlyn had made it her own little spot. A small fridge sat tucked in the corner, shaded by the nest's roof, with a small radio sitting on top. All four walls were armored, each with a mount where she could anchor her rifle to help her aim. Even with that, though, it would have been difficult for her to really take advantage and shoot at some of the ridiculous distances her mag sniper could. After a quick look around, I realized that the roof of the nest had a hatch, and with a quick pull of the leaver, she had access to a flat area to lie down on and shoot out into the desert around us.

  "Samwise must have helped her with this," I mumbled to myself as I peeked around the roof, before dropping back down and looking out over the town. I would much more easily see the two separate spaces, our portion of the town, as well as the now-cleared campground.

  It was incredible to see how much it had changed since we first moved here just a few months ago. Even with most of the structures being repurposed, old ones, just the fact that the whole place was clean, painted, and repaired made it look much nicer than a good amount of Night City.

  After spending a few minutes enjoying the view, wondering what I would have to do to get some greenery growing around the town, I climbed back down the ladder, making my way to the garage. While sitting around all day sounded nice, in reality, I was already itching to build something. Yeah, I was still feeling the burnout, but spending a day making something that wanted to make, without the rush or anxiety sounded nice.

  I could always stop and take a break if I started to feel off.

  I entered the garage, sighing as the cool air conditioning washed over me. I made my way to my desk, sitting down and spinning once in my chair before flicking on my computer. It was time to have a little fun designing something on my own, not just copying down instructions on how to make nuclear-powered toasters or something.