Chapter 18 - Blueprints of the Future
Unpacking took about as long as packing had – that is to say, not long at all. For Darius, the process was as simple as dumping the bag he had been carrying on Lena’s chosen bed.
The bedrooms themselves were… functional, was about the best Darius could say. There were three of them, all roughly equal in size. Harlan and Tarek took one, Corin and Darius another, and Lena, being the only woman, got the third room all to herself.
It would have been easier if she hadn’t been so smug about it.
With little else to do, the squad gravitated around the dining table a half-hour early.
“Well, I guess we might as well make a start,” Harlan said, taking a seat at the head of the table. “Here’s the situation – or, at least, as much of it as I can share. As you know, we’ve scattered into disparate cells, all operating semi-independently. None of you have been through this sort of thing before, so I imagine you have some questions about how we’re going to operate going forward. Feel free to share them.”
It was a statement more than an invitation, but Tarek jumped at the opportunity anyway. “Why are we hiding?” he demanded, leaning forward. “What, as soon as the Empire bares its teeth, we roll over? Who cares if they have facial recognition or whatever – we can disappear in the abandoned industrial sector for as long as we need to! Scurrying into little boltholes will just mean we get picked off one at a time!”
Harlan raised an eyebrow in the face of Tarek’s rant but didn’t react beyond that. “Would I be correct in assuming the rest of you share his… concerns?” he asked calmly.
“I… wouldn’t put things quite like he did,” Lena started diplomatically, ignoring Tarek’s scoff, “But, well, as much as I hate to admit it, he does have a point? How are we supposed to get anything done if we’re laying low like this?” she trailed off uncertainly, clearly uncomfortable with questioning Harlan.
Harlan turned a questioning look on Corin and Darius, inviting them to add their own questions. Corin smiled placidly but didn’t say anything, while Darius just shrugged. It might be a little callous of him, but the reality was that he didn’t really care what the Freeholders did. As long as he was able to gather the materials necessary to build Echo a body, he was just as happy laying low as he was doing anything else. He didn’t have any burning need to ‘make the Empire pay for things’ like Tarek seemed to.
“Right,” Harlan said, turning back to Tarek and Lena. “Here’s the uncomfortable truth – compared to the Empire, the Freeholders are nothing.” He enunciated each word carefully, hammering them home. “If they wanted to? If the Empire got serious? They could wipe us out in under a week. The reason they don’t is because we are careful. Yes, we run, and yes, we hide, but we do it to survive. These methods work, and the reason we use them is because we’ve seen what happens when we don’t. I’ve seen what happens when we don’t.”
Harlan fell silent. It was the most emotional Darius had ever seen the man, and while he might not have known the man for long, the uncomfortable look on the other’s faces said they were just as unsure how to handle this.
“Lena, here, has been with the Freeholders the longest out of any of you kids. You joined, what, a decade ago, roughly?” Harlan said, breaking the silence. Lena jumped at being the centre of attention suddenly, nodding and ducking her head shyly. “Corin’s been with us for a little over five years and Tarek about two. Darius, of course, is new.”
Harlan leaned back in his chair, his gaze distant for a moment, like he was seeing something none of them could. His fingers tapped idly against the armrest as he continued. “I’ve been with the Freeholders for thirty years. I’ve been through this cycle more times than I care to count. I’ve seen groups get cocky. I’ve seen what happens when people think they can stand toe-to-toe with the Empire. The ones who try? They’re not here to argue anymore.”
The room fell into an uneasy silence. Even Tarek, who looked like he wanted to keep arguing, seemed unsure how to proceed. Lena studied the tabletop as though it held the answers while Corin wore the same placid, unreadable expression he always did. Darius resisted the urge to fidget, acutely aware of how out of place he felt in this discussion.
“That doesn’t mean we’re not doing anything,” Harlan said finally, his voice softer but no less firm. “We’re just doing it smart. This isn’t a fight we win in a straight line. It’s a slow grind, one step at a time, chipping away at the cracks until we find where they’ll break. That’s the only way this works.”
“So we just sit and wait?” Tarek asked, his voice still carrying a hint of defiance but quieter now.
“We sit. We wait. And when the time comes, we act,” Harlan said. “But we act when we’re ready, not when they’re expecting us.”
Darius couldn’t help but admire the man’s ability to take the wind out of an argument without raising his voice.
Harlan let the silence stretch out for a little longer before relaxing more into his chair. The action seemed to break some of the tension in the air. “Alright then,” he said, calm as ever, “Let’s talk about practicalities. Supplies are covered for now. I have access to some off-planet accounts we can use to pay for anything we need – food, meds, equipment – but that doesn’t mean we can be frivolous with it. The accounts are in someone else’s name and should slip beneath the Empire’s notice, but that doesn’t mean we can push our luck.”
“How do we purchase things without being spotted by the cameras?” Corin broke in curiously.
“We get things delivered,” Harlan replied. “At least for the next few days – maybe weeks – we don’t leave the apartment unless it’s absolutely essential.”
“And if it is?” Lena asked, one brow arched. She had leaned back in her chair, arms crossed, her sharp gaze boring into Harlan.
“We send Corin.” Harlan glanced in Corin’s direction, and the younger man straightened slightly under the scrutiny. “He’s the only one they haven’t gotten a good look at yet. He handles anything outside this apartment—short trips only. The rest of us stay out of sight.”
Darius shifted uncomfortably in his seat. The precautions made sense, but all the same, they didn’t bode well for his chances of building Echo a body before the deadline came and went. “So… what are we supposed to do while we’re stuck in here then?” he asked. “I don’t know about you guys, but I tend to go stir-crazy if I’m stuck in the same room for longer than a few hours.”
Harlan’s expression didn’t shift much, but there was a flicker of sympathy—or something close to it—behind his steady gaze. “You’re going to have to suck it up,” he said plainly. “At least for the next few days. Think of it as part of the job.”
Lena opened her mouth, probably to throw out another sarcastic quip, but Harlan cut her off smoothly. “That said, it’s not a permanent situation. Our chop-doc is coming by tomorrow to give everyone new optics. Once that’s done, the camera problem will be… not quite sorted, but manageable, and we’ll have a little more freedom to move. For now, stay patient.”
“Wait, new optics?” Tarek leaned forward, his annoyance from earlier visibly evaporating. “Like, real ones? High-quality stuff?”
Harlan nodded. “They’re custom work. I don’t know the specifics, but they project some kind of IR field that scrambles your face. You’ll be able to pass right through most low-level facial recognition systems without tripping a single flag. Anything fancier… well, there’s not much you can do about the really high-end systems they have in Imperial buildings, but it helps.”
The mood at the table had well and truly shifted, and Darius couldn’t blame them for it. Everybody could get access to the basic augments required to interact with most systems – optic or aural replacements, in other words – but there was a huge gap between the cheap stuff and everything else. Working as a Salvage Technician, he was highly unlikely to ever have the sort of spare cash needed to get replacements.
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Truth be told… that didn’t bother him. Actually, it was almost a bonus.
“Why are you so quiet, Darius?” Lena asked, her tone light but curious. She leaned back in her chair, one brow arched. “Don’t tell me you’re not excited.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Darius said, trying to keep his voice even. “It’s just… I’m not the biggest fan of augments. Never have been.”
His admission brought the lively chatter around the table to a halt. Everyone stared at him as if he’d just declared himself a Luddite in the middle of a tech expo.
“What do you mean you’re ‘not a fan’?” Tarek asked, his head tilting like he was waiting for the punchline. “You’ve got augments, don’t you?”
“The basic optical and aural replacements, sure, but nothing other than that,” Darius admitted. “Even those I haven’t upgraded or replaced since I first got them.”
“Wait, hang on,” Lena pressed, leaning so far forward that she was practically climbing the table. “You mean, like, the first set you get when you turn eighteen? How old are you now?”
“Twenty-six,” Darius said, vaguely amused at how invested she was in this.
“So your augments are eight years old!? And you haven’t replaced them!?”
“They were second hand too,” Darius laughed. “Pretty sure they were a decade old by the time I got them.”
Lena spluttered. “That’s almost as old as I am!”
“Heh. That’s not saying much.” Tarek chimed in with a smirk.
“Screw you,” Lena replied distractedly, stunned by how little Darius cared about his augs.
In fairness, her reaction was probably a pretty normal one. He didn’t exactly keep up with the latest tech – not like he could afford it anyway – but he’d be surprised if there hadn’t been some pretty significant improvements in the last eighteen years. It wasn’t that he hated the idea of cybernetics, exactly, just that the thought of hacking pieces of himself off to replace them with metal that would inevitably break down or could be hacked...
Well, let’s just say he had his reservations. Normally it would be a moot point regardless – he couldn’t afford new augments, so why bother wondering about them?
Harlan cleared his throat, and the table fell into an expectant silence. “Is this going to be an issue?” he asked, his tone casual but firm. “If you’ve got some philosophical objection to augments, better to know now than after we’ve gone through the trouble of getting these new optics installed.”
“It’s fine,” Darius said quickly, waving a hand dismissively. “I already have optics, remember? It’s just an upgrade, not a whole new thing.”
Harlan gave him a long, appraising look before nodding. “Good. Because the last thing we need is someone tripping every scanner on the planet because they’re being stubborn.”
Tarek snickered, but Lena glared at him before turning back to Darius. “You sure about this? I mean, it’s okay to say no if you’ve got a reason.”
Corin chimed in smoothly, his tone as neutral as ever but with an unmistakable edge of amusement. “I didn’t think there were still people who actively avoided augments, let alone someone who gets by with relics.”
Darius rolled his eyes, leaning back in his chair. “Oh, forgive me for not being on the cutting edge of having my brain hacked remotely.”
He neatly ignored the niggling thought that Echo had that part well and truly covered already.
– – –
After the debrief, everyone drifted their own ways. Corin and Harlan seemed happy enough to sit in front of the TV and veg out watching whatever VI-created slop was showing these days. Tarek had disappeared into his room, and Lena had done the same, though not before handing Darius a spare dataslate to ‘stave off the boredom’.
He appreciated the thought, though it wasn’t much use to him. Dataslates were somewhat ubiquitous – useful enough that they were mass-produced… basically everywhere, and cheap enough that nobody really cared to keep track of them. In essence, a dataslate was just an alternate display – they connected directly to a user’s augs and piggybacked off the processing power found there.
Convenient for people who use their augs a lot. For Darius… well, when his second-hand augs weren’t glitching out or in need of a reset, the only thing he really used them for was listening to music, and you didn’t need a display to do that.
Before he could reduce himself to counting ceiling tiles or something equally depressing, Echo provided a distraction.
{I believe now may be a good time to go over the design and construction of my frame.} The AI suggested.
Darius jolted a little at both the reminder of his passenger’s existence – it was surprisingly easy to forget about it when there were no visual reminders – and the looming time limit.
“Right, yeah. Good idea,” he muttered, heading for the relative privacy of his room. Bunking with Corin might make talking to Echo a little difficult, but at least the older man was likely to write it off as a weirdo talking to his VI.
Darius muttered under his breath, settling onto the bed in the shared room. “Alright, Echo. Let’s talk frames.”
{Acknowledged,} Echo replied, its voice crackling softly through Darius’s augs. {I suggest we begin with the basics. Your primary task will involve assembling a chassis capable of supporting my core processing unit and providing both mobility and operational stability. Do you have experience working with servo systems or structural composites?}
“Not in this way,” Darius admitted. “Fixing ship power cores? Sure. Slapping together makeshift life-support units? Yeah, I’ve done that. But designing and assembling a robotic frame? Not much call for that kind of skill set in a shipyard.”
{Understood. This project will require you to work within a multidisciplinary framework. However, with my guidance, I anticipate no significant obstacles. To start, I will display the core schematics on the dataslate.}
Darius blinked, reaching for the device. Apparently, he was going to get more use out of it than he had thought. He should probably remember to thank Lena for it again.
The screen lit up, showing an intricate wireframe of what Darius assumed was Echo’s ideal frame: a humanoid design, sleek but reinforced in key areas, with an articulated chassis and compact internal systems.
“Oh, uh, wow. When you said ‘drone body’, I was kinda picturing one of the industrial bots – you know, the ones that roll around on wheels with the manipulator arms? Yeah, uh… this already looks like too much,” Darius said, scratching the back of his neck. “I’m not an engineer, and half of these components are things I’ve never even seen before.”
{The drones you speak of are barely worthy of being called such. They certainly wouldn’t be able to support my framework.}
If Darius didn’t know better, he would have thought Echo sounded downright haughty. He suppressed a smirk. Apparently, AIs were capable of elitism. That… probably didn’t bode well for the odds of Echo deciding he could do a better job than humanity.
{In any event, it is not necessary for you to perform high-level design work. My schematics are modular, simplifying construction. You will need to source or fabricate specific components such as high-torque actuators, stabiliser gyros, and adaptive circuitry. These are common in most industrial settings, though their quality will directly impact performance.}
“Right. Because scrounging for high-torque actuators is just a thing I do on weekends,” Darius muttered, leaning closer to the slate. “What about this here—this, uh, neural matrix integration point? It looks complicated.”
{That is where my core engram will interface with the frame. It is essentially an artificial neural relay, designed to mimic a biological nervous system. Its purpose is to bridge my processing requirements with the motor controls of the frame. The components will require precision assembly, but I can guide you through it.}
“Wonderful,” Darius said dryly. “Look, even if I somehow manage to get all these parts, it’s looking like I’m going to need some pretty expensive tools to put it all together. Any ideas on where I’m gonna be able to get my hands on those? Not to mention, while Finn said he’s happy to foot the bill for some of these parts, his wage wasn’t much different than mine – he’s not gonna be able to afford all of this stuff, not without taking out a loan. Even if he was, I’m not comfortable asking him to.”
{If you are asking me whether I am able to provide the funding for this project, I regret to inform you that I don’t have access to any money.}
“Yeah, I kinda figured. Still, do you have any ideas on how we can make any money? Or, you know, maybe you could hack into the bank like you hacked into the records building?”
{That would be unethical. Not to mention that I would require direct physical access to hack into any sufficiently hardened system. The only reason I was so successful at the Records building is that there were already multiple back doors installed in the system.}
Darius blinked. “Wait, you’re saying someone else was rooting around in the Empire’s secret files?”
{Correct. Further, the individuals responsible for the back doors would require frequent access, indicating that they are potentially a double agent. A highly placed one, at that – many of the files I accessed were marked as highly restricted.}
“Well, well, well,” Darius smirked. “I might have to let Harlan know about that – it could be… advantageous to have someone on the inside.”
{I thought you weren’t interested in helping the Freeholders more than was absolutely necessary?}
Darius could have sworn the AI’s voice was sly. “Oh, whatever,” he muttered. “I’m stuck with them for now anyway; it can’t hurt to give them a hand. Anyway, can we get back to the money thing?”
{As you wish. Now that your squad has a higher degree of operational independence, it may be possible to suggest targets that could be financially significant while still in line with the Freeholder’s goals?}
Darius hummed. “I do like the sound of that,” he admitted. “Probably better to hold off on suggesting that for a little while. Maybe wait until we’ve done another mission, or at least wait for long enough to see how things are going to work from here on out.”
{A reasonable course of action,} Echo replied, its tone as calm and detached as ever. {In the meantime, I suggest we focus on developing your understanding of the frame’s construction. Practical knowledge will reduce the likelihood of error and ensure efficient assembly once tools and materials are acquired.}
Darius sighed and rubbed his temples. “Fine. If I’m going to be the one putting this thing together, I might as well know what I’m doing. What’s first?”
By the time their conversation wrapped up, Darius had a working list of components, a vague understanding of what he was getting into, and the sinking feeling that his days were about to get much, much busier.
