Space Odyssey: Spectre-Chapter 505: The Weird Inventor

Jace watched Cho and Jordan dart off in excitement as the door opened. He had not even gotten a good look out the door and already knew what they were running toward. He sighed as the Vampire and Valkyrie both looked at him with pitying gazes.

"Shut up." He told them as he walked out and saw the several mechs that were around the room. It was a massive room, almost the size of the hangar. In fact it might have been a hangar that was converted specifically for their uses.

"We did not say anything." Victor pointed out as he and the Valkyrie followed him. "But I must say, it is such a shame that your adopted children are so in love with the idea of mechs as opposed to the romanticism of a battlefield warrior." Victor declared with a chuckle.

"Mechs are just as difficult. But I am surprised these children are so undisciplined. I was just as surprised yesterday." Valkyrie reminded him about the pair’s behavior yesterday as well.

"I rarely discipline them. I prefer promoting creativity instead." Jace answered honestly.

"Well that is both an awful and brilliant idea!" Gorund Velwrench walked up. He was sporting a new scar on his chest that he was displaying proudly. He noticed Jace’s raised eyebrow and laughed. "Like it? A new scar courtesy of those Mortella droids. You know what is even more impressive? Learning their name."

"How is that impressive?" Victor asked. "They offered it freely."

"They rarely even entertain speaking to an enemy. The fact that they did is a testament to how much of a biological specimen he is. I am from another galaxy and we have a coalition with several other galaxies so I know that those galaxies and the countries inhabiting them all call them the same thing. Angels and Demons. They rarely even communicate with us. Then again they prefer using mechs and battleships to counter them. So I suppose it makes sense." Gorund laughed the whole time he spoke.

Victor and Valkyrie looked at each other in confusion when Gorund joined their walk through the hangar towards a location where Cho and Jordan were quickly making their way to as they passed various engineers and maintenance workers. That location was another door that would lead to the main testing area. It seemed Gorund was in here working on one of the mechs while he waited.

"You mean entire galaxies have fended off these creatures but never bothered to learn their name?" The Valkyrie asked as Jace picked up on a fluctuating eclectic frequency in the room up ahead.

"More like they could not. We are in untreaded waters here. I have never heard of either of them being turned away upon first contact with a new species." Gorund assured them as Jace arrived at the door that Cho was looking at in confusion while Jordan looked at Cho. "Oh... uh... boss-"

"You can just call me Jace." Jace told the hesitant dwarf.

"Well, either way Jace. I ran into your old academy schoolmate and she seems a bit..." Gorund shook his head side to side. "Loopy."

Jace sighed as he stood behind the girls. "What is wrong Cho?"

"Nothing," Cho answered immediately and a bit too quickly. Almost like she wanted to hide something. He then watched as she switched to her tiger form. Probably to hide her reactions from Jace.

Jace walked up and held his hand over the keypad. It blinked red and then switched to blue before the door opened. He froze as he noticed the room was filled with light from a generator as Taylor madly laughed at it.

"Well this is a good sign." Jace nodded as he walked up toward her.

"Please tell me this is not the Victorium’s secret weapon and ship architect." Victor asked toward Gorund.

"Okay, I won’t." Gorund answered.

"Umm... uncle Gorund? What is wrong with that woman?" Jordan asked as she pointed at Taylor who Cho and Jace were both walking toward. The others were staying back because of a large machine that was shooting off arcs of electricity into the air.

"Over exposure to something that messes with a person’s mind. Apparently she was the fortunate one. The rest went to asylums or other mental institutes. There were even a few deaths. I do not know much about it myself." Gorund informed them as they watched.

Jace started absorbing the errant electrical arcs as he walked up behind Taylor and the machine started to malfunction. "Taylor, I see you are up to something strange again. What are you doing this time?"

"Huh?" She looked back over at him. "Oh hey Jace." She shrugged, "I was testing a new energy storing process. But I just had a genius idea for a weapon instead. Speaking of ideas, that theory you had about gravitational forces might work."

"Might?" Jace scoffed. "It will work. You know I base my theories on something plausible." He reminded her as he walked up and put a hand on the device and it stopped glowing with a blue glow as he absorbed all the electricity to the point that the machine powered off.

"Huh... yeah I guess. But it will need some work. Are you going to be helping me on that project? Is that what we are here for?" Taylor asked as she turned and looked around before walking towards a worktable that had been set up.

"Nope. That project is on hold for now. We need a priority on some of the other works that have been on the back burner up until now." Jace informed her as he followed her over. Watching as Cho happily followed behind Taylor.

"Then what are we working on?" Taylor asked with an annoyed sigh. Seemed like she was okay for now.

"Armor and other gear for combat against the Mortella." Jace informed her as he stopped and walked toward a green armored crate and opened it up. Then he pulled out his destroyed chestplate from before and placed it on the table in front of Taylor.

"Mortella? Oh the angels. I see. You almost died." Taylor held up the armor and started looking it over. "Pierced right through the shoulder with a metal just a bit stronger than the one that makes up your armor. I assume it went right through your armor’s shielding?"

"Yes." Jace nodded. "The weapon was moving at an incredibly high speed. It was like being hit with a missile going at supersonic speed." Jace informed her.

"What do you think should replace the Chemi-metal for the armor? It is the strongest stuff we have. Unless you made something new?" Taylor asked with a hint of excitement.

Jace looked over at Gorund who froze when he looked at him. Taylor looked over at Gorund as well. "Gorund has figured out how to forge Chemi-metal instead of printing it. We need to use that method and find a way to make another metal. I was thinking, you could tackle armor layer patterns, Gorund will handle the basic components and make up of the metal, and I will handle the testing for the metals."

"Hmm... sounds fun. I am just fortunate my head feels better." Taylor nodded as she looked over her desk then grabbed up a datapad and pressed a button. One of the walls in the room began retracting to reveal a larger working space.

"Your head is feeling better? That is good." Jace nodded as glance at Cho who was looking at him with her tiger face. "I assume that is something that you are doing Cho?"

"I am. That energy is not comprehensive to humans. I am sure you have been feeling it in the air around her." Cho told them as they began walking over to the other work space.

Jace tilted his head and nodded slightly. "I could, I couldn’t before but I can now. I assume that weird stuff that was hanging around her was the tachyons and other chronal energies?"

"Yes. It is bad for humans and the species of humans that branch off. But for me and my kind it is delicious and very useful. The only thing that is as delicious and useful is dimensional energy." Cho giggled at the end. "Besides, we also get to learn new tricks. Like this." Cho suddenly disappeared and appeared ahead of Taylor.

"Teleportation. How nice. Now if only you could figure out how to do your own dishes." Jace pointed out with a chuckle.

"People call me weird." He heard Taylor mumble.

"Yeah well... anyways. What are we doing here?" Victor asked, reminding Jace of their presence.

"Mostly to be watched but I would take some time to figure out what kind of armor and weapons you want made as well." Jace reminded them as he looked for an area and pointed towards one where several computers were. "I suggest going over there and using those computers to create the idea of the type of gear you want."

"What then?" Valkyrie asked.

"Then we turn those ideas into actual armor and they get tested." Jace answered. "We have only a week to get it done."