The Powers That Be by Aer-ki Jyr (best sci fi novels of all time .txt) 📕

Kara recognized was real fear, though she was masking it well. “You’re Strovok I assume? My name is Morgan-063.”

He looked to Kara. “She is one of your warlords?”

“Yeah. The best hand to hand fighter we have in the Archons.”

“After Ginsi,” Morgan corrected.

Kara gave her an annoyed look, standing there wearing nothing but mud and one tattered shoe. “We all know you can take her.”

“Her levels are higher than mine, and she’s better against a crowd than I am. I trained her well.”

“She is tiny,” Strovok said, unimpressed. “I thought you had larger warriors.”

“We do,” Morgan said, not offended. “The ones that are better than me are called the Golden Knights…some of them, anyway. They’re specialists. Archons have to be good at everything. We just happen to be better than most of the specialists too.”

“You were using a version of Dark Sheath on approach?”

“I didn’t know it had a name, and I didn’t realize it was something other people had. We figured it out on our own since the Temple wasn’t being very helpful with what we needed.”

“It is called Dark Sheath, and it absorbs the weaker Essence flickers your body naturally makes, as well as those sent out to detect Essence users. Do you seek to become an assassin?”

Morgan chewed on her lip for a moment. “If that’s what you call getting into punching range before I’m obliterated, then the answer is yes.”

“It is worthless if you do not have a quick kill skill. Do you?”

“Not in Essence.”

“Then you will waste your life uselessly against an Essence wielding opponent, or do you seek powers to deal with others?”

“I’m not here to be trained, though I’m always interested in free pointers. I’m here to talk with her about…stuff.”

“Do you normally begin conversations with unprovoked attacks?”

“You don’t?” Morgan said deadpan.

“Not usually,” Kara interrupted. “Its fine, Strovok. I won and that’s what matters.”

Morgan raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything.

“Are there others coming?”

“Not that I know of. We’re busy fighting a big war in the Core while the Vargemma sit here on their asses refusing to do anything other than try to kill us.”

“My allegiance is not with the Vargemma.”

“I know. Otherwise I wouldn’t be within Essence range of you,” the trailblazer admitted.

“You interrupted my sleep cycle, and there is little point in returning to it. You may observe as we spar, but do not interfere in any way,” he warned.

“I promise I’ll be a good girl and just watch,” she said, slapping Kara on her muddy butt. “Get in there, Jinxie.”

“Thanks,” Kara said sarcastically, not having expected another sparring session before she got to sleep, but she wasn’t going to argue with Strovok, who was visibly upset by the unannounced visitor.

Both she and him flew up into the air well above Morgan, with Kara kicking off her useless shoe as a summoned drone came with replacement clothing, then after getting dressed again they began going at it in a lot of new ways as the trailblazer watched with her Essence-enhanced vision. Both of them were far beyond her Neo abilities, so much so it almost made her comically naïve, which was what she hoped to gage the level of here.

If you were outmatched, you still had some options if you knew how you were outmatched. Walking into a fight against a superior opponent whose power was unknown was an easy way to get yourself killed. Morgan needed to understand as much as she could how these stronger Essence fighters fought if she was going to have a shot at a single penetration in their defenses.

It was either that or run on sight…and right now, looking at the two of them go at it, ‘run’ seemed like the wiser option by a long shot.

10

May 18, 128888

Neontrix System (Home Three Kingdom)

Shipyard 825

Esna stood onboard Seda KOEN, looking out the 4 story tall holographic windows on the observation platform that covered more than 2 miles within the space station, arcing around the perimeter yet being well inside the armored hull. Her mind was elsewhere, but her eyes were on the spider frame of a new seda being rush built by the H’kar at Davis’s request. Neontrix wasn’t in their original territory, but was one of their expansion colonies elsewhere in the Empire, of which they had many, and this one had one of the largest shipbuilding industries within Star Force.

There were 2033 Scale 2 shipyards here, which meant they were capable of producing warships of any size, but Neontrix also had 82 Scale 1 shipyards, which meant they could produce anything in the Star Force catalog with speed. You could build anything anywhere if you wanted to take your time and bring in resources, parts, and specialists, but if you wanted to do it with alacrity you needed a full-fledged shipyard with a crew that knew how to use the massive industries within to produce from blueprints at maximum speed without compromising efficiency.

It wasn’t a simple task, and the choreography had to be worked out well beforehand. But when it was put into motion it was a thing of art, and this system was churning out warships, drones, and even a new Borg vessel every now and then at such a rapid pace that there had to be constant convoys coming into the system to deliver the raw materials needed, for Neontrix could no longer supply them all itself.

Esna had gotten a priority slot in one of the Scale 1 shipyards, pushing back other projects that had been waiting in line for centuries, and the seda blueprints weren’t even finished yet…yet the basic frame was already being constructed. That much Tennisonne had already signed off on and sent ahead while he personally worked on the rest, promising to have the various pieces of it designed