Chương 53: 034 – To The Firing Range

Now that they no longer felt like they were planning to swarm and eat her, Falling Stillness could appreciate just how cute the Kaedekin buds were. They had looked at the Walking Egg with fascination as they approached, even as they had stayed a safe distance away so they wouldn't accidentally get struck by the armor's legs. Very smart of them. The Walking Egg's impact avoidance on those for anything that wasn't solid metal or rock was… well, notoriously terrible.

She could hear them talking among themselves as they followed her and Julie down the spiraling stairwell, talking about the power armor's design. From the sound of it, they were not impressed by the fact it was an oblong pod, and thought it could easily be redesigned to incorporate sloped armor. The little buds also seemed to think that the leg joints were insufficiently armored against impacts, and that the legs themselves were too short to adequately handle rough terrain. Very smart, these little buds.

The armor was normally used in countering boarding actions. Falling Stillness learned two things about the Kaedekin once they reached the stairs. First, that things rolling down the stairways was apparently a regular occurrence. Now that her armor's cameras gave her a better view, Falling Stillness saw that the steps were textured, with distinct shapes as well as colors built into the stair's surfaces.

She saw what looked like some kind of small robot—low to the ground and about the size of a Kaedekin torso—rolling down the stairs on wheels at the ends of long, slender legs not at all dissimilar to her armor's. On the QTG, she could see what had to be the spirit in the heart of the machine. From standard infrared emissions, the spirit seemed to be bound to either the main computer or the primary battery, though she would bet on the former.

The Kaedekin climbing down ahead of the spirit-possessed robot seemed to know it was there well before it reached the stairs, as they moved inwards towards the banister to give the robot plenty of room to pass. A head-like protrusion built into the robot seemed to nod in acknowledgement as it reached the stairs and— Oh. The robot rolled down the stairs on the wheel at the ends of its extended legs as smoothly as if it lay on a track.

She let her mind quicken and the world to seemingly slow, letting her observe the footage in minute detail. The refresh rate of the screens were just enough to not look like she was looking at a distinct succession of still image unless she quickened her mind even further, so Falling Stillness was able to watch as the robot moved with a smoothness she'd come to recognize in the solid-bodied, or at least those who had mastered their bodies beyond what was simply needed to live.

There was anticipation there, as limbs adjust just before they needed to so that they'd be in the right position when it was time, moving like a living thing. She watched as the robot actually jumped before it reached a landing, its limbs giving it a twist so that it made a quarter-revolution in mid-air. When it landed squarely in the middle of the open space in the landing, the robot skidded in a similar way to something she'd seen in human movies that had chase scenes in wheeled vehicles.

The robot's limbs were already adjusting for it before it landed, and it smoothly rolled off the landing and into the level it had been heading towards. And that was the second thing she learned: that the Kaedekin seemed to have excellent robotic technology, and seemed to be significantly better than the Confederacy in general when it came to limbed robots of this size and weight category.

That sort of seemingly-biological smooth movement usually needed to be pre-programmed into a robot as part of a repetitive movement, or in robots significantly larger and smaller than this one. Simple movements like bipedal walking were also smooth—humans had invested an almost unreasonable amount of time in getting that right, according to what she'd read—but once rapid adjustment and high-speed movement went into it, the movements became obviously mechanical.

Whatever programing or design paradigm the Kaedekin were using, it seemed to be very good at movement with limbs. While her power armor was technically capable of jumping, it was not any good at landing afterwards.

"Do you Kaedekin use a lot of robots?" Falling Stillness said as she carefully rolled her armor down the stairs, wondering if she should ask for a detour. Learning about the capabilities of Kaedekin small arms would be certainly be useful to know, but would it be more useful than getting a better read on Kaedekin robotics?

"Oh, yes," Julie said as she walked down behind the armor, the little swarm of Kaedekin buds behind her.

"There's some places no one wants to go. Sewage treatment, pipe cleaning, vent cleaning, harvesting…" She shook her head.

"I've tried harvesting by hand. It's fun at first, but by the third day… you kind of don't want to any more. At that point, everyone's making bigger and bigger scythes to try and get it done faster." Falling Stillness took note of that, and wrote a note to ask someone if they had any idea what kind of staple crops the Kaedekin had. There'd been mention of a vegetable patch earlier, so perhaps someone on the away team would see it. Well, seeing the guns it was!

"So, three levels down, right?" The nearest firing range Falling Stillness had asked to see had been the so-called 'stationary range', which from the description had seemed similar to the firing range that they had on the Venture: a series of different firing lanes all pointed in the same direction, facing some kind of stationary target. The one the Kaedekin had went on for a hundred meters and had two levels, allowing for 200 firing lanes simultaneously. That was about where the similarities ended.

She stared at the firing lanes that seemingly opened out into space. only the faint sheen of lights reflecting off something and the readings of the range finders of her power armor let her know there was actually something there physically keeping the air in. The instruments were having a very hard time trying to identify what the material was. The radar was more helpful, letting her know that the transparent protrusion extended from the main hull of the station.

Falling Stillness was almost certain that this was on the side of Stargazer Fortress that the Venture's drones couldn't see, as the station didn't seem to rotate. This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

"This is one of Stargazer Fortress's famous firing ranges," Julie said proudly, "renown on Surcease and Nightmare. This is the only place in the whole Dancer system where you can enjoy a beautiful view of the stars while you're practicing your shooting, twenty-one-seven, four-sixteen. The firing range extends outward for a kilometer from the hull of the fortress to give everyone a reasonable amount of distance for them to challenge themselves, and vennplate barriers absorb any stray shots. Beautiful, isn't it?"

It actually was, Falling Stillness admitted. The view showed the arc of darkness of the planet below, a glimpse of the planet's second moon just on that black horizon, and a sky of unblinking stars. Even the cracks of chemical propellants igniting, the pew pew pew of some kind of energy weapon, the speeding flashes of glowing projectiles, and the occasional thunder of something going supersonic didn't ruin the view.

In fact, the multitude of glowing projectiles added to the beauty somehow, in that way that glowing and energetic violent death was always awe-inspiring. If she let her mind go wild, she could pretend she was looking at the footage of a space battle… The awe lasted only a moment, quickly replaced by the very strong and practical concern about what would happen if too much small arms fire struck the transparent barrier keeping the air in.

"Very beautiful," Falling Stillness agreed.

"Although I must ask, what is the transparent material are you using for the range?"

"It's a high-density steel alloy chramecirum," Julie said, "the same material we use for the dome. Well, similar. This version was made to be denser, harder, greater thermal mass to safely absorb heat and release heat… properties you'd generally like to have in the materials of your firing range." Falling Stillness became still, pulling her body in towards her center and becoming spherical for a moment before she forced herself to relax and letting her body flow again.

"This is transparent steel?" she repeated, just to ensure she'd understood the Kaedekin's words correctly.

"Yup!" Julie confirmed cheerfully.

"Just like the dome, it's a meter thick so that even if the protective field around the fortress fails, the armor can still repel micro meteorites and shrapnel, giving anyone in the firing range enough time to retreat and for the armor panel to lock into place to remove this opening as a vulnerability." Well, there went that idea, not that Falling Stillness had been thinking about it too hard.

"I will admit, I'm more curious as to the kind of chemistry must be involved in rendering steel transparent," Falling Stillness said cautiously.

"Well, it was originally based on some scraps we knew about Pyrotheurgical Alchemy," Julie said.

"With that as a starting point, we were able to develop it using Thaumaturgy, so now we have Thaumaturgic Vennmetallurgy. Occasionally we've been able to experiment with other forms of magic when a sister becomes varianted in the tube, so we have alchemical and almetallurgical variants on record that we'll be able to repeat when the genetic gacha pulls variant sisters with those same forms of magic again. As for the transparency effect itself, it's a simple application of light."

It was at that point that Falling Stillness wished that she had a better understanding of what exactly human kyuees got up to when they weren't hiding in the shadows making 'quantum technology' work and pretending to not exist so their own people wouldn't… well, be human at them. Still, she recognized the term 'alchemy' from both human scientific history and human fiction, and while she knew the latter could be a little… brain rotten…

in many contexts it seemed to be a combination of chemistry and essence infusion, sometimes with spirit taming thrown in. Given that it had been specifically narrowed down to metallurgy… spirit forging? Or at least the Kaedekin analogue. … She stared at the transparent steel. A kilometer long, a hundred meters wide, four or five meters high, a meter thick… Then there was the dome. Three kilometers in diameter, then the concavity adding more area and volume…

Falling Stillness tried to calculate the sum total of how much metal her people had refined with spirit forging. While the actual process wasn't all that difficult, the main impediment had been the lack of available spirit stone, a scarcity that had only gotten worse with its usage in various essential spirit artifacts needed for space travel. Still, over a history of more than seven hundred thousand years, it all added up… but most of it had been in small tools, containers, foci for essence arrays.

The transparent steel of this firing range surpassed the largest contiguous mass of spirit forged metal her people had made on any of their planets by several orders of magnitude. It was like comparing a splinter to a fully grown tree. She needed to compare notes with the others in the dark room.

They had their own variations of spirit forging—nightshaping, dream quenching, blood-binding—but she doubted even the tiwada, whose homeworld was blessed with an abundance of spirit stone, had ever invested so much of it into this much metal. And the Kaedekin had used it for their dome and their firing range— Falling Stillness' mind shuddered to a stop as she interrupted that thought from flowing downhill. Then she said, very slowly, "That's very interesting. How common is the use of that process?"

"Oh, fairly common," Julie said.

"Transparent steel is the standard material for all space craft so we can have big windows without having to worry about compromising anything's structural integrity. All windows on the station are made of transparent steel. In fact, the hull and superstructure of Stargazer Fortress—and all the rest of our defensive installations—are made of chramecirum alloys so that if we ever need to repel an invasion and they somehow managed to knock out our shields, the armor itself would be able to last a long time."

With a deliberate effort, Falling Stillness kept her mind from trying to calculate how much spirit forged metal that must all amount to. She could give herself that math-induced deviation later. It's not like it would go away on its own.

"Fascinating. So it's more than enough to be able to endure impacts from the massed fire of those using the firing range?"

"Definitely!" Julie confirmed, giving her a thumbs up. Falling Stillness wondered whether she was imitating the insulting thumbs up humans used, the confirmatory thumbs up that humans, or if the gesture had some meaning specific to the Kaedekin, and decided to err on the benefit of the doubt.

"Of course, it helps that none of the energy weapons here are at full power. Lasers are set for high visibility and low energy, plasmas are dialed down to low payload, laser-shockers have their attack phase set to low voltage, venn shooters need to be set to generate fragile projectiles, freeze rays needs to be set to either burst chill or refrigerate, and kinetic weapons are loaded with non-explosive rounds only.

The only weapons that are not allowed for use at this firing range are shockwave weapons, because they're the most likely to bounce-ricochet should they miss the target." Falling Stillness rippled inside of her power armor.

"Those are all handheld weapons?" she said.

"Even the laser weapons?"

"Yes? Why wouldn't they? Lasers weapons were old technology even in the old Earth," Julie said." Handheld laser weapons?" Falling Stillness pressed, just to make sure she understood correctly.

"Handheld weapons," the Kaedekin confirmed.

"Would you like to see an example? I personally prefer a plasma rifle with attached underslung shockwave blaster, but there are several sisters with lasers here…"

"If it wouldn't be much trouble," she said, barely remembering to sound polite. Only the tiwada had true person-portable laser weaponry in the Confederacy that didn't come with a heavy power cell, and those were basically artifacts, definitely not standard issue, and were fueled by spirit stone— Wait. Freeze ray?