It was time to take off the noble clothes I was wearing. This gave me a psychological relief. Why? Because I thought nobility didn't suit me at all. Whenever I saw myself in those fancy clothes, my father during the handover ceremony would spring to mind.
Once every forty years, the captaincy of the Hyperion ship would be handed over. At least, that's what the Weapon Security Agency regulation stipulated. Why? The Hyperion was one of the Weapon Security Agency's three most powerful ships. There were only four Hyperions in the galaxy. Its construction took half a century, and the cost of its production was more than exploiting two planets.
That's why the SWR didn't want a powerful ship like the Hyperion to remain in one person's hands for too long. So how has my kiss-ass father managed to command this ship for over a century? The answer is hidden in the question itself: by being a kiss-ass.
The head of the Weapon Security Agency, Marshal Maximilian Ironcloud, is quite an old-fashioned man. It could be said that he doesn't much believe in or care for procedures or laws. That's why he didn't much mind my father being the captain of the Hyperion for a century.
Anyway, according to regulations, as long as no other candidate for captain emerged, my father had no obligation to hand over the captaincy. That's why my father was monitoring everyone to ensure no one would emerge as a candidate. Intrigues upon intrigues led to people dying, and those who didn't die often found themselves crushed by the black plague of laws. I couldn't even recall how many of my siblings had faced court on false accusations and disappeared along the way.
That's why I never liked those noble clothes that also bore my family's crest. In case you don't know, there was a rule in the SWR: if you weren't an Inspector or above in an agency, and you came from a noble family, you would wear the noble attire instead of the agency uniform. This was partly an effort to show superiority. The one time I put that effort aside and came to work in a uniform, I realized I actually had to work, so the next day I came in wearing my noble clothes again.
Ah… Where was I? I was quite pleased to take off my noble attire. The tracksuit Velsil had prepared for me to wear outside felt like nylon, but the moment I put the whole set on, the smart suit fit my body perfectly. I tried to cut the clothes with a knife, but they weren't easily severed. The protectors at the joints of my outfit felt like they would shield me against any impact.
As I took my backpack and stepped out the door, Goma was by my side. It was raining, and my hood, sensing the rain, closed on its own. A metal rod extended from the hood, opening an energy-made umbrella around me to protect me from the rain. Goma was a little wary when the energy-shielded umbrella opened over her head.
"It's a long journey, Goma," I told her. "You have to get used to it."
Then I looked at Ilya, who was seeing me off with Velsil by the door. They were standing in the door's recess to keep dry. Ilya was waving with a sneering smile that suited her. Velsil, on the other hand, was opening her arms wide while waving and shouting with great enthusiasm.
"Have a good journey! Come back as soon as possible!"
"Yes…" Ilya said. "…come back as soon as possible."
Before leaving the facility, I had a long conversation with Ilya and convinced her to look after the place in my absence. Even on her first day of duty, she acted as if she had been waiting for this moment for years. She gathered the robots, explained their tasks one by one, and then organized them into orderly divisions. No, she hadn't been waiting for this day for years, nor was she sniffing out an opportunity. The only thing I knew was that Ilya had noted every flaw she'd seen over the years and had already developed Plans A, B, and C to fix them.
Ilya was exactly that kind of woman. She saw everything in life as a puzzle. She had a crazy, overflowing desire to solve every one of those puzzles. To solve a puzzle, she would never lose her composure and never stray one bit from the path she believed was right. In all the time I'd known her, I never witnessed her abandon her rationalism, not even for a moment. This coolness, while sometimes unsettling, never failed to inspire confidence.
In such an advanced technological age, I had to admit that she was a better administrator than me. This thought, however, was breeding a strange unease within me. It felt like I no longer had a real reason to return to the facility. Even if I didn't retrieve Alora, Ilya had taken over the management here and established her own order.
Maybe I could accept being away from the facility for a long time… just so she could continue to manage it. Exiling myself of my own free will might sound crazy at first glance, but Ilya's presence made everything possible. But of course, such a thing wasn't possible. Ilya had only agreed to manage the facility because I had promised to bring Alora back.
We walked across mud, grass, and hills. To be honest, the reason I wanted Goma with me on this journey was that I was afraid of going the whole way alone. Velsil was too clumsy. Ilya definitely didn't like being outside, especially if her wings got wet. The robots? Ah, those robots… I haven't exactly trusted them since they snitched on me to my brother.
And, of course, Alora liked Goma better than the others. Why? Unlike the rest, Goma listened to Alora, and she enjoyed listening. The stories Alora told—about a self-invented religion, a mix of Neo-Christianity and Medieval Paganism—were fascinating to Goma. That's because Goma was a woman who could believe anything she heard. One day she wanted to go to the afterlife, the next day Ilya would convince her that the afterlife was wrong. The day after, Alora would make her believe in Valhalla. Goma generally preferred to believe Alora over Ilya because her stories were more interesting.
"So, when are we going to find meat?" Goma asked. I was sweating crazily as I climbed one of the rocks. We were going up a seriously steep hill. According to the map, a location suitable for camping was at the top of the hill. I heard what Goma said as I hauled myself onto the rock I was clinging to, but I couldn't understand what she was trying to say.
"Goma, what do you mean?" I asked. I climbed onto the rock, gave out my last breath, and rested on my knees. Goma was standing on a rock, hands on her hips, looking at me. I had given Goma my own backpack to carry, so she had two bags on her shoulders.
"Did you lie to me, Aldo?"
"Lie?" I was breathless. "Wait… Let me catch my breath. What happened, Goma?" I wiped the sweat from my forehead with the back of my hand. "How… How are you not tired at all?"
"Don't change the subject!" Goma yelled angrily, opening her mouth wide. "I want meat!"
"Damn it, Goma! Let's get to the top of the hill first, then we'll look for meat!"
We had been walking for about four hours, taking small, short breaks and eating our meals. We were looking for a place to spend the night, and the hill we were currently on looked very suitable.
We were very close to the sky and could see the clouds swirling around us. We hadn't climbed too high; the facility itself was already very high up. Without continuous landmasses, it was difficult to perceive height. We were constantly moving over scattered landmasses, small islands of earth. The longest landmass didn't exceed thirty meters. Then, a pit that descended to the planet's core, and another landmass. The nature of this planet consisted of shapeless landmasses, like shards of glass scattered on a board. That's why building a large base on this planet was impossible.
The hill we were on was 20 meters high, but half of it was sloped. From the viewpoint, we could see rock masses stretching towards the sky like a staircase reaching to heaven. Water was dripping from two rock pieces across from us that looked connected like a bridge. I didn't want to call it a river because very little water was dripping. Even the occasional flying birds were surprised to see life on our hill. We were going to set up our tent on the flat part of the hill. We would use the wood of a tree we cut down to make a sitting area on the sloped part and eat our dinner there. At least, that was the plan.
Our food was in Goma's bag, and our camping gear was in my bag, which Goma was also carrying. I took a deep breath as I walked towards the edge of the hill. I had lost my fear of heights and other fears long ago. After being kidnapped by a few scoundrels for ransom and tortured for nearly 20 years, some parts of my brain couldn't be recovered. Ah… What beautiful days those were, right?
The hill we were on was grassy. I walked towards the flat part and extended my hand to Goma. I took out the knife from my pocket, scraped away the grass, and dug into the soil. If we were going to anchor the tent somewhere, this was the spot.
"What do you want, Aldo?"
"I want my bag!"
She didn't hand me the bag; she threw it at me. I glanced at Goma for a moment. Goma stuck out her tongue and walked away, and I began rummaging through the bag. The first thing I touched was unexpected. It was a plush rabbit. It had button eyes, was dressed in noble clothes like mine, and was a toy slightly bigger than my palm. Just then, the holographic communicator in my pocket started ringing. I pressed the button on the device and placed it on the ground. Ilya's holographic image appeared on top of the device.
"Break time, Weisshafen?" Ilya asked. Instead of the black dress she always wore, she was in a formal uniform.
"I didn't expect the communicator to work from here," I said, continuing to examine the plush rabbit for a while. It looked quite sturdy.
"The screen indicates the communication is uninterrupted. I can see your location very clearly, Weisshafen."
At that moment, Velsil jumped into the holographic image and tried to push Ilya aside: "Do you like my gift, Aldo?" she asked. Ilya was trying to push Velsil back.
"Could you be a little polite, Velsil? We're discussing something important here."
I showed the plush rabbit towards the hologram and asked, "Are you talking about this? Did you make this?"
"Yes…" Velsil said with great enthusiasm.
It was then I realized something. She must have taken something out of the bag to make room for the plush rabbit. Everything in the camping bag had its place. It would be more accurate to call it a tool kit worn on the back rather than a simple backpack. After looking around for a while:
"Where's the damned water filter?" I suddenly yelled. "Velsil, did you take out the water filter to put this toy in?"
"You don't like my gift, then? It was my favorite toy. I wanted to put it in your bag for good luck," Velsil said.
"Your gift is beautiful, but…"
"You didn't like my gift." I could see Velsil's watery eyes again. "I'm… I'm so sorry, Aldo. I definitely won't do anything like this again," she said and disappeared from the holographic image, weeping.
"Well done, Aldo!" Goma said, standing right over my head. "As if lying to me wasn't enough, you're making Velsil cry too!"
"Hey! What lie did I tell you?"
"Where's the raw meat?"
"Is this the time for raw meat?"
"Have it your way!" she said, and Goma walked over to a rock on the other side of the hill and sat down.
"They're like children, aren't they?" Ilya asked, adjusting her glasses.
"I haven't managed to please that cursed Velsil or Goma even once!" I put the plush rabbit back into its spot in the bag and took out the tent poles. I placed all four poles on the ground. Drills emerging from the tips of the poles dug into the ground and secured themselves. "Everyone in this world is loved except me!"
"Ah… Where did that come from?" Ilya asked.
"I don't know." I pulled the tent out of the bag. I touched the handheld device on the tent to the four poles to determine their position. Then, I placed the tent in the middle of the four poles. The corners of the tent were magnetically pulled towards the poles. The poles stretched the tent tightly and erected it. I then squeezed foam—which I had taken out of the bag—onto the tent floor. That foam was comfortable, warm, and insect-repelling. It took two minutes at most for the foam to harden and become the floor. "Maybe I'm just overly emotional lately. You didn't call me just to check up on me, did you? What happened, Ilya?"
"No, I didn't call to check up on you, Weisshafen. I want to give you a report on the latest situation."
"The latest situation?"
"First, the facility started collecting resources at 210% efficiency, but this is likely to drop continuously. While working this way for the remaining 12 days, we can probably meet 120% of the monthly expectation… I say 'probably' because the excavation areas are so neglected that an accident is likely. I'm considering setting up a maintenance team, but an accident could happen somewhere else even while the maintenance team is intervening. The excavation area is very unstable.
Additionally, you mentioned the fanatic robots before, didn't you? I'm referring to the Northern robots who antagonize the Southerners when the excavation stops. Although some of them agreed to work in a reduced capacity, some are still in the rehabilitation center, seemingly having developed software flaws. But they are not problems that can't be fixed, even if it takes a long time."
"Yes… These are very good news."
"You haven't heard the best news, Weisshafen!" Ilya said with an excited tone.
"What is it?"
"That fossil you had excavated from the dig site… I sent that fossil we analyzed to the Health & Bioengineering Agency (HBA) for examination."
"So you didn't throw it in the trash?"
"Of course not! I scanned it on the computer and sent its genetic coding to the HBA. Why the HBA? Because that damned agency can pay unbelievable money for any genetic discovery. According to the HBA's analyses, some of the genetic codings in the fossil we found have provided a cure for a respiratory disease in four Republic Colonies."
"You mean!"
"We can sell the genetic code of this alien fossil we found to the HBA!"
"Will they pay good money?"
"I hear that the mechanical developments made to solve that respiratory disease were so expensive that the rate of people moving to those four colonies is close to 0%, while the annual birth rate in those colonies is less than 1%. You should consider that only 100 people live in that colony… either one baby is born a year or not. If the genetic code in this fossil can truly lead to a solution for this disease, it means this fossil will result in a very beneficial medicine."
"So they'll pay good money…"
"You could say that."
"So what do we need to do?"
"Representatives from the Space Archaeology & Heritage Preservation Agency will arrive within three days, according to this planet's time, to take the fossil. There's a problem: this fossil I sent to the HBA wasn't supposed to go to The Custodians first. You know The Custodians are very loyal to procedures."
"I know that, but how do you know it?"
"I read it in a book."
"Do they write about these things in books too?" I asked, but Ilya didn't pay much attention to my question.
"The Custodians suspect you were trying to make a quick buck by playing dirty and sending the fossil to the HBA, so they've filed a lawsuit against you for malpractice."
"Meaning?"
"The Custodians will likely seize the money we get from the HBA and send us a small commission. It's better than getting no money at all, isn't it?"
At that moment, the tent slowly expanded, truly beginning to resemble a proper tent. I rummaged through the bag, took out the weapon parts, and spread them on a cloth I laid down. I mentioned before that I had expertise in long-range ballistic weaponry, didn't I? This expertise wasn't just in shooting; I also knew ballistic weapons well.
In the times when I felt noble, my uncle Rove and I would practice shooting. He would tell a story about our ancestors being pig hunters in the very old times and say that we must hunt to retain the values of our blood. Ah… He would say this to his other nephews at Weisshafen Palace, too. At first, I liked it. I thought my uncle Rove truly cared about me. Then one day, he didn't even recognize me…
"It's definitely better… You did well not sending it to The Custodians, Ilya."
"Thank you, Weisshafen."
There were 29 pieces on the cloth to modify the weapon, plus one weapon body. The parts I needed right now were clear.
I wanted to change the sight of the body. The wind in our current location was very unstable. The constantly rising landmasses caused the wind to trace different paths, and sometimes it wouldn't be wrong to say that small tornadoes even formed.
That's why I mounted the sight I had bought from a merchant on CLAUDIS II onto the body. Rumor had it that this sight was used to assassinate one of the heir sons during the civil war. While he was making love with his mistress in the bedroom, he was struck by a ballistic bullet from a weapon with this sight, fired from an Imperial propaganda zeppelin 1.2 km away and 6 km high. The story was great, but the sight itself was the best part. Even though CLAUDIS II was more orderly than the other CLAUDIS colonies, its atmosphere was also smoky and polluted. Since the atmosphere didn't clean itself, and was forcibly cleaned by fans on their ceilings—which they called the iron dome—the dirty smoke inside the city would swirl around until it was sucked in by the fans. This smoke, usually from severely burnt narcotics or chemical waste that people didn't inhale, would therefore change the density of the atmosphere.
The feature of this sight was its ability to calculate the density along the path to the target, based on the density of the current location. When calculating the density, it took the densest location as a base, then calculated an average based on the distance. Therefore, it wasn't possible to make a perfectly precise shot; it required some instinct. Still, it was a very helpful system. Why? Because sometimes the human eye couldn't calculate the density. Or if there was any obstruction on the firing path…
The sight itself was red, and its edges were decorated with the teeth of a wild animal. Looking through the optic, it showed the average air density on the top right. There was also an indicator showing the direction and intensity of the wind at the current location. It was definitely a fine piece… I only used it for simple but careful shots because it wasn't tiresome to use.
I completely removed the magazine section of the body, completely removed the barrel, and all I had left was a rectangular body with a scope. Then, I grabbed the lower body part and attached it to the main body. The weapon now resembled a crossbow more than a long-range ballistic rifle. The only difference from a crossbow was the lack of a bow section; the arrow channel housed a magnetic pressure system. There was a reel at the end of that arrow channel system.
While I was doing all this assembling, Goma was watching me from afar with amazement. Whenever I turned to look at her, she would pretend to be gazing into the distance, as if admiring the scenery.
I wanted one last thing. I placed a small bipod under the weapon and positioned the weapon towards the edge of our landmass.
"There's one more thing, Weisshafen," Ilya said. I ran my hand through the bag again and found a smart arrow. The smart arrow helped in finding the target with small maneuvers. Furthermore, you could remove the arrow's fletching and attach whatever you wanted. I unscrewed and loosened the fletching and wrapped rope around the screw-threaded part in between. I also replaced the arrowhead with a hooked tip. I placed one end of the rope from the arrow's shaft onto the reel on the weapon and wound it up. Then, I lay prone on the dirt floor and began to wait.
"What is it, Ilya?"
The birds of this planet had eight wings, and despite their huge wingspan, their bodies were quite small. If I were to hit them in the wings, it would be a very difficult job for the hook to catch the wing and retrieve it. So, I had to hit the body as accurately as possible. I put my eye to the sight and started waiting.
"The Custodians will arrive in three days, planet time, to collect the fossil. We need to prepare a welcome for The Custodians coming from the nearest Republic network."
There's a bird. It's heading towards the waterfall-like flow across from us to drink water. I could wait and try to shoot it while it's drinking, but I wasn't a patient man. I took a deep breath, let it out, and thwack! The magnetic field launched the arrow with such force that I caught the bird right in its heart. Sensing the weight, the reel—before the bird could be pulled down by gravity—began to pull it upwards.
"We'll be at the facility in three days, Ilya. Is there anything else?"
I stood up and placed my hand on the rope at the tip of the weapon's barrel. I was waiting for the bird to come into my hand, just like a fisherman.
"Nothing for now, Weisshafen…"
"Thank you."
As the hologram shut off, Goma walked toward me with astonishment.
"Aldo! What are you doing over there?"
I showed Goma the bird I had shot. "I was keeping my promise."
Goma smiled, drool running from the corner of her mouth. She was about to lunge for my hand, but I blocked her with my body, placing the bird between us to stop her.
"You're going to choke if you eat the bird with its feathers! Hey Goma! Aren't you listening to me? Fine, I'll give you the meat raw, just wait while I pluck the feathers! You can't do it, you're completely useless. Let me do it, I'll be done in two minutes. I promise I'll catch another bird if you're not full."