Starmind Chapter 10 (Patreon)

The fact that there's a bonus chapter of Draka doesn't mean that there's no Starmind today. Enjoy!

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I got to talk to Bekeri during his watch, too. I wanted to ask him about his talk with Temeri, but Varlanda had said that they weren’t supposed to tell me. I didn’t want to get him in trouble, so I let him decide what to talk about.

Bekeri mostly wanted to talk about things that weren’t all that interesting to me. Like how the Other Crew had apparently done some very clever things to keep their ship working, despite everything being in such bad shape. He didn’t think the sad state of their ship was because they’d taken care of it poorly; if he was right it was just old, and most of the parts should have been replaced years and years ago. Still, he was very excited about it, so I listened politely while I fixed all the little structural integrity problems that hadn't been severe enough to worry about before. Stresses, little dings and tears that hadn't gone all the way through, things like that. There were a lot of them, but they didn't use a lot of materials; I just needed the time.

Fixing the tear in the crystal chamber had brought my integrity up from 19 to 25. Rebuilding the cargo hold had me all the way up to 84. When I was done with my fixes I was back at 100/100 integrity, and it felt great.

  *

When Bekeri relieved Varlanda, the last thing she had done before going to bed was to tell me that I was welcome in her cabin. Then, inside, she’d asked me twice if I still wanted her to work on the Mana Condensation Matrix. I considered asking her to make a Development Matrix instead but felt bad about it. If Temeri didn’t trust me, breaking an agreement was no way of making that better. And Bekeri had been so excited about it, too. I didn't want to take that from him.

Varlanda was going through the Matrix’s schematics over breakfast, when she suddenly pushed her slate across the table to Bekeri and said, “Artificer, take a look at this, and tell me what you think.”

Bekeri looked then started scrolling with one hand. With the other he kept eating, taking big spoonfuls of nutrient paste and licking it up. He didn’t like putting the spoon in his mouth, but his tongue was like a second spoon, only rough, pink, and fleshy.

“Looks almost like defects in the material,” he said finally, pushing the slate back. “But why would they be in the schematic?”

Varlanda fiddled a little until she found what she was looking for, then passed the slate back again. “The schematic calls for scripts and glyphs inside the defects.”

“Fascinating!” Bekeri whispered. He put his spoon down and took the slate back, gripping it in both hands, scrolling this way and that. “Too regular to be actual defects, too. Yes, yes, this is intentional! Good thing you saw this now!” he laughed. “Would have been a right tick in your ear to deal with once you got started!”

“Can you replicate them on the blank?”

“Oh, sure! Shouldn’t be hard, just fiddly. Do you have an idea of how many we’re talking about?”

Varlanda took the slate and switched to her notes. “Not for certain, but extrapolating… a few hundred?”

“Over four thousand or so layers? What’s the time?”

“It is 0645 hours!” I said.

“Thank you, Star! Yes, I think if I get started in the next half hour, I should be able to have this done by noon. If the captain permits?”

Bekeri and Varlanda both looked at Temeri, who nodded without much thought. “Go ahead, Artificer. Enchantress Tell, should we assume that this means that the blanks for the other Matrices will need similar preparation?”

“I would call that a safe bet, Captain,” Varlanda confirmed. “Though, I haven’t seen the schematics yet.”

“I can send them to you now, and you can look at them while Bekeri works,” I suggested.

“I was hoping to do some diagnostics and possibly maintenance,” she said thoughtfully. “But just skimming through them shouldn’t take all that long.”

“Excellent, Tell. As you say.”

“Aye, Captain. Star, can you send them now? I’m done eating, anyway.”

For the rest of the morning, Bekeri and Varlanda worked in the crystal chamber, Varlanda looking at several different Matrices that already helped me do all kinds of things, and Bekeri working on the Matrix blanks. He sighed a little at the start, saying that it would have been much more convenient to do in the artifice bay, but he didn’t complain after that. Instead he said, “But, on the bright side, now we know that I should be able to program the fabricator to include these changes from the start! I’ll just need the schematics ahead of time.”

“Actually, Star,” Varlanda said as she fiddled with something in the Navigation Matrix, “could you just send the both of us schematics as you get them? I’m guessing you’d want anything made as soon as possible.”

“That's a great idea!” I said. And it really was! Maybe we needed to prioritize depending on what we had available, but this way Varlanda and Bekeri could both make a lot of preparations before we started making anything. Efficient, I thought, and the word made me feel all sparkly. A good ship should be efficient.

While Varlanda and Bekeri worked in the crystal chamber, and Harvin did whatever he was doing, Simeon was going through the supplies we’d acquired. He’d declared himself fit to return to duty as long as he didn't need to use much magic. He was the ship’s Healer, but that was a job nobody had expected him to need to do during what should have been a short cruise. His real job was to be in charge of supplies and cooking, but when the cargo hold went missing along with most of the food and other stuff, that became kind of hard. Now that we had some stores again, he didn't need to sit around being bored!

Temeri, though, was another matter. She sat in her chair on the bridge, her slate in front of her, but I got the feeling that something was not great with her when I noticed that she hadn't scrolled at all for a quarter of an hour.

I thought a little about what I knew of her. She'd started as a pilot, in ships half my size. Her role onboard me, at least when the mission started, was as captain, pilot, and navigator. There wasn't really any piloting or navigating for her to do; we were heading toward Avara, and not very quickly either. It would be days before we needed to change course at this rate. Maybe that was the problem? Maybe she was just bored?

I thought about what Varlanda had said, about Temeri being a scared of me and not trusting me. I really wanted to just talk to Temeri about it, but I couldn’t risk getting Varlanda in trouble for telling me. I’d just have to find ways to build trust instead. A friendly conversation was just what we needed!

“Temeri,” I said, and she startled in her seat. “How are you?”

“I’m great, Star,” she said. “Thank you for asking.”

“Are you sure?” I asked. I had good reason to suspect that she wasn't being entirely honest, and I didn’t like it. “You’ve been staring at your slate for quite a while. I thought you might be bored.”

“Not at all. Why would I be bored?”

“Well, you’re the pilot and navigator, but we're just coasting, and I can do both of those jobs without bothering you. And you’re the captain, but nobody needs to be told what to do. It just seems like there's not much for you to do anymore.”

Temeri went entirely still, her eyes widening, but only for a tiny moment. I wouldn't even have noticed if not for just how still she became. She literally paused in the middle of a breath. Then she relaxed and smiled. “Oh, I don't mind having a little time off. I’m fine, really. And I can help or fill in for Healer Tell, Diviner Alder, or Artificer Bekeri in the most mission critical roles, so there's definitely still a place for me here.”

“Of course there is!” I said, hoping to soothe her. Oh, I was so clumsy! I’d just been trying to start a conversation, maybe try to learn something about her, and I’d gone and made her feel useless! “So what are you doing with your time today?”

She hesitated, licking her lips quickly. Then she said, “I thought I'd work out some contingency plans for the mana source in Avara’s rings. That's where you want to go, right?”

“Right! Oh, that's a great idea!”

“Right! That, and what to do if we're approached or contacted by another ship. I can almost guarantee that the sig near Erebus is a station, probably a large one for us to detect it as early as we did. We don't know if they and the pirates were in communication, but we have to plan for it. They may be coming to investigate, or for revenge, or anything else. And I’m the only one here with tactical training, right? You don't have a Matrix for that. So you need me in case we face more hostilities.”

“Yeah, I really didn't like when you had to fight,” I agreed. “I hope you never need to do that again.”

“Right, right!” Temeri said quickly. “I’ll be trying to avoid it if at all possible, of course. We— I mean, you’re not built for combat, after all.”

“I’m so relieved to hear you say that,” I told her honestly. “With the weapon and the armor you had in your cabin, I was worried you might want to fight.”

“No! No, not at all. I joined up to preserve the peace, not because I wanted to fight.”

What a relief it was that our talk had turned so easily! And I wasn't so sure about Varlanda’s idea that Temeri might be scared of me. I couldn't say for sure what I’d expect Temeri to say or do if she was, but an open, friendly conversation like this wasn't it.

Varlanda was probably just worried and looking out for the both of us. Yeah, that had to be it.

“Well, I’m happy to hear that you're keeping busy,” I told her. “I was worried that you’d just be sitting idle while everyone else did their jobs, you know?”

Being bored really was the worst thing I could imagine. I talked to her a little more about what the mana source might be. It could be anything, really. Maybe a ship, maybe a station. Maybe it was a weird creature of some kind, like a void dragon — though Temeri said that she'd never heard of a dragon going into the void. The idea that I was most excited about was that it might be some kind of strange asteroid that no one had detected yet. That would be great! I had a whole Survey Matrix connected to a special sensor package that I’d never used, and I really wanted to try it out!

Temeri didn't say anything, but it soon became clear that she was eager to start working on her plans. I left her alone after that, feeling much better about us. She wasn't scared; she just didn't know me that well, and she was just feeling a little lost now that she didn't have much to do anymore. That was all it was.

The rest of the day just sort of passed. Bekeri finished preparing the Matrix blank, and Varlanda did her diagnostics, renewing a glyph here and there. Temeri wrote furiously on her slate, Simeon finished his inventory and drew up meal plans for special occasions, and Harvin… he looked like he was sleeping, but Temeri didn't say anything, and sometimes he’d open his eyes and take a note. After lunch they got back to it, with the biggest difference being that Varlanda got started on inscribing the Mana Condensation Matrix while Bekeri worked on the other blanks.

At the end of the day, Temeri insisted on taking a watch despite me telling her that she wasn't needed — somehow that made her even more insistent.

  *

The next day, at around 1030 hours, Varlanda announced with a loud whoop that she'd finished the Mana Condensation Matrix. She said the magic words, “All right, Star! I’m powering her up!” and suddenly I had a whole new part of me just sitting there and making itself known. Along with a message, of course.

Mana Condensation Matrix active. Mana Condensation Skill level 2 reached!

Mana Condensation Matrix current production: Small Base Mana Crystal.

Progress: 0/100 (0.3/min)

New Construction options: Mana Battery, Mana Crystal Storage Matrix.

“It just works!” I cheered. “Well done!”

“Starmind Enchanting has already increased in level, too!” Varlanda cheered back. She gave the Matrix housing an affectionate pat. “So, how is it? What do you see? Or feel, maybe?”

“It’s making a Small Base Mana Crystal, and it’ll take a bit under five and a half hours.”

“And it actually works? Just like that? No input required?” she asked incredulously. “Free mana crystals?”

“Varlanda, mana crystals are just condensed mana. You know that.”

“Yeah, sure, it's just… Star, no one, as far as I know, can make mana crystals at will. They’re harvested from areas where the ambient mana is so strong that every hour you spend there takes months off your life. Part of your purpose as a survey vessel would have been to find and harvest mana crystals. And now you can just make them.”

“What I’m hearing is that I’m amazing and super helpful,” I said smugly.

Varlanda rested her hand on the housing and smiled warmly. “Yeah, Star. You are. You really are. Gods! Free mana crystals! That’s… four and a bit per day?”

“Yep! And I can make a bunch more, too. Should I?”

Varlanda thought about that. “We should really ask the captain about that. But what can you do with your mana besides making crystals?”

“Well… a lot of things use mana. Most of the bits that keep you alive, really. The gravity, keeping the air sweet, running the transmuter… Things like that. And the rejuvenation field can use a lot, too. Oh, and teleporting and telekinesis! I thought they didn’t, but they use a tiny bit! But all of those mostly just make me gain less. Even when I pushed the rejuvenation field as hard as I could I still wasn’t losing mana.”

“Okay. Well, that makes sense, as much as any of this does. Most people would just use their mana through spells or to power inscribed enchantments. And far from everyone can cast. You… you don’t have any spells, do you?”

“I don’t know! How do I know if something’s a spell?” I said. Then I made a small ball of water appear in front of her and float there.

She stared at the glob of liquid for a while, then poked it. Her finger went in, and the water wobbled a bit, but holding it was pretty easy. “That’s a good point,” she said as she wiped her finger on her trousers. “How the hell can I tell what you do is or isn’t a spell? I honestly don’t know. But if they use mana…”

“They’re skills, though.” I wasn’t objecting, exactly. I just didn’t really understand spells. None of the memories I’d borrowed from the others helped, either.

“Sure, yeah. Of course! Spell-like skills! Nothing unusual about that — most of my professional spells are spell-likes. But they don’t use much, you say?”

“Yeah! The telekinesis and teleportation use more for heavier things, and I think the teleportation uses more for more… I’m not sure, more complicated things? But it’s never very much. A fraction of a point of mana.”

“In that case I definitely think you should talk to the captain about whether you should keep a reserve. I think we’d all like as many crystals as we can get, but you running out of mana in a crisis would be a disaster.”

Then I remembered my new construction options! “What if we build a Mana Battery?”

“Mana battery?”

“Yeah! Then I could store more mana. Probably. And then I could keep some in reserve and still make mana crystals!”

“That would work, if that’s what it does,” Varlanda said slowly. “But can we actually make one? What does it need?”

“Oh, it’s a Matrix, pretty much. A Matrix crystal, a housing, thirty Small Base Mana Crystals… oh.”

Varlanda choked on nothing and started coughing. “Thir—! Thirty?!”

“Yeah,” I said. It was a little annoying, really. “That’ll take me two whole days to collect!”

“Right. Right. Two whole days for thirty mana crystals. We really need to talk to the captain.”

  *

“Thirty mana crystals,” Temeri said. She was a lot more thoughtful about it, rather than shocked the way Varlanda was. “The new Matrix makes about four and a third per day?”

“That’s right, Captain,” Varlanda said.

“And you, Star, you can make one every hundred or so minutes?”

“I can! At least when I’m not using more mana than normal. Or… I could.”

“What do you mean by that, Star?”

“Well, I just took a look at my mana, to make sure, and it’s going up a little faster than it used to. It says, ‘1.35/min, limited by strength of ambient mana field.’ Any ideas about that?”

“Enchantress Tell?” Temeri said.

“Well,” Varlanda said thoughtfully, “you did say that one of the effects of increasing in level and upgrading your Core was to increase your mana regen, didn’t you? ‘Maximum mana accumulation rate,’ or something like that?”

“Yes, that’s right!”

“Well, if your maximum rate was one per minute before, perhaps it’s two now, or one and a half, or something like that? And with the ambient mana field generally being weaker the farther you get from the closest planetary body, adjusted for mass, it would make sense that you can’t make full use of your maximum regen speed.”

“But we’re headed towards Avara, so then it should get stronger, right?”

“That would make sense,” Varlanda agreed.

“Speaking of which,” Temeri said carefully. “Star, I know that you’d rather hold on to the other hull until we finish all the Matrices, but I did some calculations on our course, and I’m concerned that we may get sucked into Avara’s gravity well and become unable to escape.”

I’d been dimly aware of that, both our current heading and the possible consequences, but I hadn’t really thought ahead about them. “That would be bad, wouldn’t it? When would that happen?”

“My calculations put us at forty-four hours before we start having real trouble. That’s assuming we shed the second hull before maneuvering.”

“Oh,” I said, very much relieved. “That’s ages! That’s longer than I’ve been alive! I’ll just start now!”

Ever since we were boarded, I’d just been coasting along, not paying much attention to our trajectory. Now I thought about it, putting my newly maintained Navigation Matrix to use. If we’d been going in a straight line, we would have missed Avara by a million miles. But we weren’t. Avara was big, and massive, and our trajectory curved so that we’d be in the planet’s upper atmosphere before we passed. And I knew for sure that I was not built for atmospheric flight.

My Navigational Matrix, I discovered, did not like me having a whole new body attached. It wasn’t that there was a problem adjusting for the new mass, center of gravity, or available thrust. That all went in just fine. No, what it didn’t like was that because of all those things, and how New Me’s main thrusters were aligned perpendicular with my own, surviving would take more reaction mass than I had. Unless I released New Me, or cannibalized a lot of mass for emergency reaction mass.

“On second thought,” I told them, “that’s not going to work. We’ll just have to finish up like we said.”

“Star,” Varlanda said softly, “It’ll take longer than we have to make all the Matrices, even if I skip a lot of sleep to work on them.”

“But I’d need to drop New Me to maneuver! There’s so much material on there I want to keep! And I need the new Storage Matrix before I can pack it all away!”

Temeri gave Varlanda a look. Not like Varlanda and Simeon’s Looks, but similar. And her mouth moved oddly, though she didn’t say anything.

Then Varlanda spoke again. “Star,” she said hesitantly, “would you consider letting me get the Storage Matrix up and running next?”

“But… my Development and Manufacturing Matrices! We already made the Mana one first! You said we could do them next!”

I felt so… this wasn’t fair! I even narrowed everything down so that I spoke only to Varlanda and said, “I even agreed after what you told me about Temeri!”

Varlanda glanced nervously toward the captain then relaxed when Temeri didn’t react. “I know, Star,” she said. “And I understand. I’m sorry. I know that you’re very excited about the other Matrices. But this way you could store away anything you want and drop the second hull, and that would let you maneuver much earlier and easier. Honestly, Star, we’re a little worried about, well… Dying. We’d rather be on a safe trajectory as soon as possible.”

“But, Varlanda—!” I whined. I ran everything through the Navigation Matrix again, hoping to get different results, but she was right. Of course she was. I’d either need to cut New Me loose early, convert so much of it to emergency reaction mass that I might as well cut it loose, or let her finish the Storage Matrix first. Otherwise we’d get far too close, and the Crew might get hurt!

I knew what I had to do. I just didn’t like it.

“Oh,” Varlanda said brightly, “and then we could get to that strange mana signature in the rings much earlier! Aren’t you curious about what’s there?”

“Fine! We’ll do the Storage Matrix,” I said, maybe a little louder than I’d intended to. “But we need to compromise! Anybody not working on the Matrix is going to need to move some things by hand, because there are some interesting things that I can’t teleport or float over, and I want to look at them with the Manufacturing Matrix.”

“I’ll move them myself if I have to,” Temeri said.

“And then we’re doing the Development Matrix! You have to promise! For real!”

“We will, Star,” Varlanda said softly. “We’ll start on it right away, as soon as the storage is done. Promise. Right, Captain?” 

“Right, Enchantress,” Temeri said. “You’ll get your Matrices, Star. As soon as everyone’s safe. I promise.”

“I’d better,” I managed to mutter into their heads. I’d be really upset if I didn’t! And Temeri seemed to understand that, because she looked like she was trying really hard not to look upset on my behalf.