Chapter 68. Incoming.

  “Skitterbach, can you join us in the station’s fabrication compartment,” Watkins ordered.

  “I’m on my way, Captain,” Skitterbach said.

  The verminkin crew teams were working with the drones to gather salvage, and were rotating between the cleanup operations, and time in the training center. Lani had been measuring their progress and said that the verminkin were quick learners and seemed to enjoy their new task of crewing a starship. Watkins had had decided to just have Chief Skitterbach come over to explain the verminkin origins, wanting to gauge his reaction before unloading the information on the entire crew.

  “Chief Skitterbach, when going through the station database, we came across information on the origin of your people,” Watkins started. It was an awkward conversation as Watkins, Carter, and Lani all tried to explain how the verminkin came about. Skitterbach’s reaction to their tale wasn’t what any of them expected.

  “So, you say-speak that Skitterbach comes from Captain-human and bilge rat? That not bad source, and why we are going to be so good-great at handling a ship,” Skitterbach said in a rather nonchalant manner.

  “Wait, you’re not upset or anything? You just found out that your people were traded as food so they could rebuild the station,” Lani said. Watkins hadn’t had time to really discuss what she had found on the servers about her life before becoming what she was now. Whatever she had found, it had unlocked more of her personality, and she seemed less like a machine, and more like the person she must have been before the council had done this to her.

  “Why would Chief Skitterbach be upset-mad? I have a job, lead my teams, and I’m not going to be eaten-consumed by halflings. The past bad-nasty things not matter,” Skitterbach said, walking over to knock on the tank full of the sludge that he had been created from.

  “Only have to ask-speak one question,” Skitterbach continued.

  “Go ahead,” Watkins replied, surprised the verminkin was taking this so well.

  “Can we make-create more crew? I need-want more to help the Canon. I suspect that after look-seeing the station, you could use more crew here that aren’t just drone-machines,” Skitterbach said.

  “Can we make more? Should we make more?” Lani asked.

  “Give me a moment to check things out,” Carter said, going quiet while he sorted through his systems and ran up to date diagnostics on the tanks. “It looks like the system is still operational. Like I mentioned before, the process is a slow one, and the fabricator on the station would be tied up while more verminkin are being constructed.”

  “Can we build a second tank aboard Canon? That might help if we spread out the work,” Watkins suggested.

  “Sadly, this is it for the DNA tank. It’s been keyed to my core energy. Once created, they’re fine, and can function independently outside my core energy, but the raw materials used to create them would break down in minutes if taken away from my core,” Carter explained.

  They hashed it out for a few more minutes, but unless they could research some way to stabilize the tank contents to be used with Watkins’ core energy, they were out of luck. This one tank was the only means to produce more verminkin. The creatures were created without reproductive organs since they were just intended to be a stable population of laborers.

  “Skitterbach, we’ll create more verminkin when there’s a break in the fabrication queue. It’ll be up to you to help integrate them into the existing crew. I also want you to start identifying who you think might be ready for promotion. You’ll still be in overall command of the teams, but we need some other, lower ranked petty officers to help share the burden if we expand the crew,” Watkins said.

  “I’ll work on transferring the data for my training consoles to you, Carter. They should help with initial training of any new crew that are produced,” Lani added.

  “How much of that goop is in there? Do you have an estimate on how many verminkin we can produce with what’s left?” Watkins asked.

  “It’s self-replicating. As long as we have a few gallons of the stuff in the tank, I can add additional biomass and it will slowly covert over into the material needed for the verminkin,” Carter said.

  If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  “That’s good, we have a nearly endless supply of replacements then, though it’s a slow production process. Also, this thing needs some maintenance, there was a leaky valve the drone spotted earlier, and we should also take steps to reinforce this compartment, so a stray shot doesn’t end the verminkin species,” Watkins said.

  “I’ll get a drone on it now. With what I’ve learned from our data sharing, I can upgrade my drones a bit, as well as make some improvements on the fabricator itself,” Carter said.

  Looking at the data Carter shared, Watkins could see that Carter’s upgraded drones would be the equivalent of the level zero units Watkins had first produced. Carter’s core was of limited capacity, and his fabricator, drones, and other constructs would always be less efficient than Watkins’ core aboard the Canon.

  It turned out that Carter now had the capability to make a level zero research module, but he was limited by his core to only one of the devices. That would at least allow the core to research up to level one in all the tech aboard the station. Watkins was now without a limit, but maybe he could find a way to help Carter upgrade further in the future.

  “Thanks, Skitterbach, I’ll let you get back to your work teams,” Watkins said, dismissing the verminkin.

  “Do you know what’s sad?” Carter asked.

  “What?” Watkins replied.

  “I’ve been under your command for centuries, and the rat guy waltzes in and becomes a Chief Petty Officer after only a few days,” Carter joked.

  “He’s promotable too,” Watkins joked.

  “Wait, I’m not promotable?” Carter said with mock frustration.

  “Well, let’s see how your performance evaluation scores are for this year, and then we’ll talk,” Watkins said.

  “Don’t feel too bad, Carter, just think of all the back pay you have coming to you once you get back to Earth,” Lani added.

  “Hey, I didn’t think about that. Maybe I’ll have enough to buy a better station,” Carter said. They all had a brief laugh, it was nice to have more people to talk to, and it made Wakins’ new existence a bit easier to accept.

  “All jokes aside, we more than likely have a battle to prepare for. If a void creature does spit out thanks to the council’s sabotage, we need to have a plan,” Watkins said, bringing them all back to the problem they faced. He examined the station’s schematics once more, noting the exterior weapon hardpoints and the limited shield coverage.

  “We won’t have time for much in the way of upgrades on my station, just getting all the point defense lasers online will be a chore. I can see about adding some of the beehive point defense systems to the station. They are easy enough to produce and we can place them at strategic points along the station’s hull. I don’t have the maneuverability your ship has, but those beehives will add some redundancy if we’re attacked by anything resembling a missile,” Carter said.

  “The Canon is in good shape, and I’m having my drones print up a pair of torpedoes. It’s not an easy task, since they’re much larger than the missiles, and I have to build them in pieces. After that, the drones have to assemble them inside the torpedo room. The maneuver thruster research is almost complete, and once that’s done, it might be time to upgrade the torpedo tubes to level one. I’m thinking that further upgrades there will help with the cumbersome torpedo and missile production process,” Watkins said.

  A quick check showed the maneuver thruster research was at 97%, but his research on upgrading the fabricator to level one was only at 9%. The fabricator was going to take a while, and though the hated to do it, Watkins considered cancelling it to add something combat related that would be completed quickly and useful for the coming fight.

  Getting any research to level two was tempting, but again, it would take too long. For the freed-up module, it was probably a good idea to buff up his MOBS’s combat capability. They’d been using hand me down laser pistols for a while, and it wouldn’t take too long to research the more powerful plasma pistols up to level one where they’d likely surpass the lasers.

  He had limited data from his encounters with a void creature, but he did recognize the plasma weapons seemed to do more damage than the lasers had. Watkins also considered upgrading the body armor for his troops, but even level one armor would likely be useless against something like a void creature. The missiles and torpedoes themselves could also possibly be upgraded in time, but until the launcher was more efficient, they wouldn’t have as much of an impact.

  “Uh, Captain, I don’t think we’re going to have much time for upgrades, my sensor buoy that’s closest to the old jump point just detected a spike in energy,” Carter said.

  “Is the energy from the probe’s engines? I didn’t think it would have reached the jump point yet,” Watkins asked.

  “No, it’s not the probe, and the energy output is odd, at one moment it registers as nothing, then it spikes off the charts. The sensor buoy out there isn’t in the greatest state of repair, but it shouldn’t have these kinds of faults without me knowing it,” Carter explained.

  “We have to assume that it’s void energy, we already know that our sensors have trouble reading it. Patch me through to whatever sensor buoys you have that are still operational, and I’ll grant you access to the pair that I’m still in contact with,” Watkins said.

  Data appeared, it turned out that Carter still had connections to a dozen sensor buoys in the system, all of them in various states of disrepair. At one point, the council programming had him occasionally crafting new buoys that he used the booster rockets to position around the station and former jump point as an early warning system.

  Watkins watched as the energy readings spiked a final time before going back to zero. This time, the sensor buoy reported an incoming object approaching before going offline a moment later.

  “I think you’re right, time for upgrades is over, we’ve got company coming,” Watkins said.