TBoB - Book 8 - Chapter 23 - A Very Long Elevator (Patreon)

Just a note: I swear that I mentioned the samurai who performed the orbital strike by name in a previous chapter, but I couldn't find it when I skimmed earlier. I've added [name] in the two places where I'd like to use her name, and added a comment to remind myself when I look at the chapter again later. I know it's a little annoying, but so is being unable to find a name I'm sure I put in one of my stories... again...PS> If anyone can remember the name of the Doctor in Imaginary, I've combed the latest book like trhee times and I can't find it! It's driving me nuts, so if anyone knows where I had that...

“Let me get this straight,” Sharron said, setting the cup of coffee I’d made her down on the counter. “The ‘brilliant’ life hack that you came up with, the one that’ll ensure that you never miss an important message ever again, is not to take messages at all.”

I slowly looked up from the egg I was frying and glared at her. “I didn’t say that…” I grumbled.

“Not exactly, but I can read between the lines,” Sharron replied, quickly raising the cup in an effort to hide the small smirk pulling at the corner of her lips. “I’ve heard of people setting their augs to do not disturb and forgetting to turn it off again, so they missed a couple days' worth of calls, but not checking for weeks…” she laughed. “I will say that tearing the entire system down just because it annoyed you is a very Evelyn solution.”

“Well, first of all, I didn’t tear up the system down JUST because it annoyed me. The entire thing was cobbled together using the mental equivalent of scavenged electronic parts and copper wire stolen out of someone’s walls,” I explained. “I never put any sort of mental effort into developing it, so it was a real mess; It needed to be redesigned from the ground up to be even halfway useful.”“And second?” Sharron asked, raising an eyebrow behind her mug.

“And second,” I parroted, before shooting her another look. “I have an excuse for not checking my messages! I was in constant combat for nearly a month straight. I barely had time to call home, never mind check my messages.”

“That’s complete bullshit, and you know it,” Sharron snorted. “You had plenty of time to check while we were waiting for the search teams to find something during the Pacific campaign, and you only called home after being reminded that you should do so. I know you tend to focus on the task at hand while fighting the Antithesis and tune out what’s not important, but weren’t the messages stored in your head?”

“Technically, only the notifications were stored in my head, while the originating bot stored the message in its processor,” I replied as I slipped the spatula under my eggs so I could flip them over. I had briefly considered pan-flipping them like a professional, but the last time I did, I had to explain to Jane why an egg was stuck to the ceiling. While she wasn’t here to berate me if I screwed up, like last time, she also wasn’t here to stand on the counter and clean up the mess that I couldn’t reach. Better to err on the side of caution. 

“That’s not much of an excuse when the alerts are stored directly in your brain. It’s not like you can put your brain on silent mode, like you can your augs,” Sharron said.

“Actually… Apparently I can?” I replied casually. “It seems that I somehow developed the ability to completely filter the command network traffic, and keep it isolated in my subconscious.” I felt a tiny bit of self satisfaction as I saw Sharron’s eyebrows rise slightly. “Yeah, Nyx wants me to perform a brain scan so they can figure out why, but I honestly don’t care enough to spend the points. As long as it works, I don’t need to know why.”“You know, I’m not sure you should be ignoring something like that. The protectorate AIs have a encylopedic knowledge of pretty much every catalog in existence; It’s not often that they don’t know something,” Sharron said. “It could be indicative of some sort of problem.”

“Maybe, but as long as it doesn’t kill me, and it makes my life easier, I’m fine with it,” I replied. “You want toast with your egg?”

“Don’t try and distract me with breakfast, you know this is important, and if you don’t get that scan I’ll tell Jane, right?” Sharron said

“Really? You’re going to pull the Jane card on me? It’s probably just the way that my different implants and brain augments are put together,” I muttered. Sharron just stared at me, judgingly. “Fine! I’ll get the scan later!” I exclaimed. “Happy now?”“Yes,” she replied with a sweet smile. “And I will take a piece of toast with my egg, thanks for offering.”“Yeah, well, I regret it now,” I grumbled, turning towards the toaster. “Since you successfully sidestepped my original attempt to change the subject, let me try again. After leaving the get together last night I talked to Mud, and he mentioned that you knew one of the samurai building that super elevator, is that true?”

“You mean the space elevator?” Sharron asked. “Yeah. I got to know one of the largest stakeholders while I was on mars, and from what I understand you’ve actually met her before, at least in passing.”“I have?” I asked, frowning. “Where? In the pacific? I haven’t really had time to socialize with a lot of the samurai who returned from mars.”“Well, shes the one that fired upon that giant gas bag that Bear Force One was brawling with during the final few hours of the battle of Great Falls,” Sharron explained.

“The one that shot the black hole from orbit?” I asked in suprise.

“Well, singularity, but yeah. [Name] spent pretty much every single point upgrading the engine and weapon systems on her ship, making it one of the premiere samurai support cruisers. Unfortunately, she didn’t really considers things like creature comforts, long term sustainability, or landing system, until AFTER the battle was over, so there’s a good chance it would take severe damage to itself or the surrounding area if she ever tried to do an atmospheric entry,” Sharron explained. “She wasn’t the only one either. That’s why a couple captains got together and decided to put together a space elevator, it was cheaper than refitting an entire fleet.”“Couldn’t they just buy supplies with their points?” I asked.

“Really Evelyn? You, of all people, are asking why they wouldn’t want to use points to resupply?” Shannon scoffed. 

“Well… I… Uhhhh… Okay, you have a point, I’m probably the last person that should be criticising self sufficiency. Still, couldn’t they just use shuttles or, I don’t know, teleporters to resupply from the surface? Building a tower that reaches into space in order to get fresh groceries feels like overkill,” I said.“Maybe, but they don’t plan to monopolize it, they plan to open it to the public. Space is currently the sole domain of a small handful of megacorps, who either cater to the super rich or exploit resources that other corps cant reach. Most companies gave up competing because there were a number of rifts that opened on orbital ships, or stations, and even with all the advanced tech they were too remote for timely samurai intervention,” Sharron explained.

“Ahhh… but with several samurai based in orbit, and a central point for everyone to congregate around, it’s somewhat cheaper,” I said. “Still, seems like a lot of points to spend in order to encourage more orbital infrastructure…”“They don’t plan to do it for free, there will be costs. Overall it’ll be cheaper, and safer, for companies to pay them to launch ships from the elevator than it would be from the ground,” Sharron said.

I turned, and looked at her for a moment. “How do you know all this anyways? Are you an investor or something?” I asked sarcastically.

“Hardly,” she snorted. “I may have made a lot of points on mars, but nowhere near what some of the heavyweights pulled in. No, the various ship captains started discussing the idea near the end of the campaign, and even pitched the idea to a couple of us on the way back from the red planet,” she said. “And while I’m not against the idea, lending someone the points to buy Class five materials in exchange for a monthly share of profits doesn’t exactly interest me. They did get a few backers, though; I think Benedict might have invested a little.”“Of course he did,” I grumbled. “It’s an opportunity for profit; he was probably all over it.”“Anyway, the project is so large that even with a veritable armada of construction drones, and access to some of the most advance tech and materials this planet has ever seen, it’s still going to take them several months to get that thing built, and probably several more to perform all the safety checks,” she said, before looking at me sideways. “Why the sudden interest in [name] anyways?”

“Because I saw the tower and I got a little interested, that’s all. Seemed like a strange place to choose for a super structure, so I wanted to know a little more. I didn’t expect you to have all that information at your finger tips,” I said. “Although I’m not a fan of the capitalist mindset behind it, I’ll admit I’d be interested in seeing what Class five construction looks like. There’s no rush though.” Leaning up against the counter I looked at Sharron with exaggerated suspicision. “So, any other huge revelations you’ve failed to mention until this point, and would like to share?” I asked jokingly.

“Eh… not really. Not unless you count Jolline,” she replied, another smile pulling at the corner of her mouth.

“Why? Whos Jolline,” I asked.

“Benedict called her Mars Teddy,” she replied, the smile widening.

“Beg pardon,” I said blankly. “Can you repeat that?”“Later,” she said, gesturing to the counter behind me. “Right now you’re burning my toast.”