“Whoa, it’s so much bigger than I expected,” Vanessa said, her voice full of awe.

  Luke couldn’t help but reply, “Thanks, but what do you think of the power armor?”

  Luke had smuggled Vanessa into the Norfolk Complex by having her lay down on his back seat and cover up. He had some lies prepared, but the guard at the front gate barely glanced at Luke’s ID before he waved him through.

  She rolled her eyes and gave him a gentle smack on the shoulder. He chuckled and opened up the front leaves of the power armor torso.

  “Ok, so to get in, you need to turn around and kinda back into it. Ditch your heels, obviously. It’s gonna be a bit difficult for you to do this in a dress, let me know if you want me to cover my eyes.”

  She looked at the mech and nodded. “Yeah, will you please turn around?”

  Luke turned around and covered his eyes. After a minute he said, “You got it back there?”

  She shut the leaves and said, “Yeah I got it. Ooh, I sound badass now.” She deepened her voice and said, “I am Optimus Prime.”

  Luke laughed, loving how silly she was being. “Wait right there, don’t try to get up yet. You aren’t used to moving in a mech yet and it has a lot of power. I’ll suit up and come help you stand. Gimmie a second.”

  Vanessa did more silly voices while Luke suited up in his latest suit of power armor. He realized he should just call it Mark II and the armor she was wearing would be Mark I. Once he was buttoned up, he walked over to her.

  “Ok, now slowly get up. It’s gonna be easier than you expect. Your center of gravity will be a slightly off, so I’ll be here to catch you.”

  Vanessa slowly stood up, each move careful. She took a step forward and then another. Soon she was walking around the warehouse.

  “You’re a natural! And you are using magic right now too. The only way you are moving that power armor is the glowing runes on the inside there. Congratulations, yer a wizard, Vanessa.”

  She laughed and danced around carefully. “Thank you, this is awesome. But I believe I was promised spell slinging?”

  “And I intend on delivering. Let’s get you outside first,” Luke said as he led her through the warehouse door. Once they were outside he said, “Your right arm has a barrel poking out of the forearm, that’s your spell gun. Right now the safety is on. Point your gun towards the bushes over there and flip the switch by your thumb.”

  Vanessa stretched out her arm and wiggled around a bit. “You did not make this with a woman in mind. I can barely reach the switch.”

  “Sorry. Once the safety is off, you can fire the spell by lowering your two middle fingers like Spiderman,” Luke said and demonstrated the gesture.

  Vanessa pointed to the bushes and carefully made the gesture. The ice bolt shot out, up over the fence and into the scrub outside the complex. The bushes froze over a few seconds later, wisps of icy air floating up from the impact site.

  She stood there, motionless for a long moment. Luke opened his mouth to say something, but she beat him to the punch.

  “That was awesome!” Vanessa said. She did a little dance and fired into the bushes again and again.

  Crack after crack filled the night air as the bushes froze solid, one after another. Luke wanted to tell her to be careful around the fence since he knew that the spell would ruin it, but she didn’t come close so he let her have her fun. By the time the gun ran dry, it looked like Elsa from Frozen had sneezed across the landscape.

  Vanessa walked up to him, breathing hard. “That was so fun. Possibly the most fun I have had in my life. Right up there with Disneyland.”

  “I aim to please,” Luke said and led them back inside the warehouse.

  “Speaking of which, do you know what it means when a girl’s bra and panties match?”

  “Uhhh.”

  “The comfortable bra never matches the comfortable panties. So if you see someone with a matching set, it wasn’t your idea to have sex. It was hers. You just didn’t mess up until the time came to see her set,” Vanessa said.

  She knelt down and opened up the power armor. Luke’s jaw dropped as he watched her crawl out. She had stripped her dress off before she got in, and now she was climbing out, wearing matching bra and panties.

  Luke had never gotten out of his mech faster than right then.

  ???

  The next day, Luke was back at the warehouse. It was much later than normal, but since it was Saturday, he had the place to himself. Well, Jinx and himself.

  He had worked with the people from the Lighthouse forums to create a magic drone with a camera. The Italian guy, SpinXOX had helped him create something fast and the woman from Tennessee helped him keep it silent. The guy from China, HoffmanFan68, had even been nice enough to post a pic of a rune that was supposed to ward off birds. It was almost time to test it.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  The finished product was a hexagon three feet wide and long. The runes were carved into the ceramic plate and it had a tier one core slotted in. It had a downward facing camera with plenty of storage. Radio signals on Kalibutan were unreliable, so the “brain” had to be able to fly it on its own. It would be a pain to program it new for every surveillance mission, but still much faster than running around the countryside himself.

  He flipped the power on and touched the activation rune. It immediately started hovering, drifting up to three feet above the table. A blue screen appeared in Luke’s vision.

  Luke’s jaw dropped. He finally found a use for his Machine Soul? That resource had just been sitting on his stat screen since day one. He had all but forgotten about it. Something about this surveillance drone was different. Either it was a machine that could operate without a pilot, or it was something wholly his design, or both.

  Now he knew how to use it, and he couldn’t wait to try it out. The part about no refunds meant that experimentation would take some time, but there was no reason not to try it out on his drone now.

  With a mental push, he selected ‘Yes’. The blue screen went away and Luke felt a connection form between himself and the drone. A completely invisible and intangible thin tether between them. Luke knew somehow that it was just wide enough to send communication.

  “Uh, hover upwards five feet,” Luke said. He grinned as it immediately obeyed. “Circle around me, bob up and down once, then land on that table.”

  To his utter joy, the magic surveillance drone followed his instructions perfectly. He knew it would. Somehow, the Machine Soul gave him feedback. It wasn’t like he heard a voice, but he felt acknowledgement after he gave it the instructions.

  “Alright, alright, alright. Follow me outside.” Once they were outside, he said, “Head upwards two hundred feet in the air, activate your camera, and then show me what you saw.”

  For the first time, the magic drone failed to do what he expected. It flew upwards incredibly fast, hovered there, but didn’t return. Instead, Luke had a little blue screen appear in his vision. It took him a moment to realize what he was looking at. It was an image of what the camera was seeing in real time. He even saw the tiny dot of his head jerk back in surprise. This was perfect. He had a magic drone that responded to voice commands, gave him live video feed magically, and flew around silently. It was better than anything made on Earth. Time to find out how much better.

  “Stop the camera.” When the blue screen disappeared, he said, “Fly around this base until you see a human other than me. Activate the camera and show me when you find one.”

  The magic drone shot off, zooming through the sky as quiet as an owl. It made a quick loop around the base, staying within the fence line. Another blue screen popped up in his vision, this time showing the tiny head of the gate guard. He didn’t even realize he was being watched.

  Luke managed to shrink the screen so it only filled a quarter of his vision. He recalled the drone and he was pleased to see it return to him even when there was no way it could have heard him.

  He ran a few more tests to find its limits. It could understand complex commands, but it couldn’t find anything he didn’t know well. It did make some noise as it sped through the air, but that was just the wind whistling by. If he went slow enough it would be completely silent. He wanted to test the distance limit, but decided not to risk sending it far away. Instead, he placed it in the warehouse and drove away in his car. The little box with his camera view cut out after he was six miles away from the complex. That was a great range. He wouldn’t be able to survey the whole peninsula with that range, but it made things worlds better.

  He took the rest of the day off and played with Jinx. She grew bored of him quickly and hid somewhere in the apartment. He spent the rest of the day watching TV and occasionally texting Vanessa.

  She wanted to come with him to Kalibutan right away, but the process for getting a security check usually took two weeks. He was unsurprised to hear she had already applied and paid for the expedite. She would be able to walk through the portal with him by next Friday.

  The next morning he met the whole crew at the warehouse at 8AM. Luke worked with Shepard and Allen to create a new hire packet and training regimen. Once they felt like they had a good handle on how things would go, he sent out an email blast to all of his friends that he thought would be a good fit. Allen and Shepard did the same. They left their website application form public, but they didn’t bother advertising it yet. Six of them suited up then and headed through the portal Allen stayed behind to man the company phone and do all the paperwork.

  Once they arrived in Kalibutan, Luke turned to Shepard.

  “We are going to split up today. I want you to take everyone else and comb the area around the slimes and kill undesirable monsters. Don’t bother collecting the cores this time. We want the Lord’s slimes nice and healthy. When you are ready to take a break for lunch, come meet us at Kruro’s shop.

  “I’m going to talk to Seneschal Cormac this morning. Then I’ll do some surveying with my little buddy here. It’s a magic drone and I think we will be able to track down the Hive Wolves faster this way. We’ll decide on the afternoon’s plan while we eat lunch. Sound good?”

  Shepard gave him a crisp nod and headed off into the forest. Luke could tell that Bumblebee really wanted to come with him today, but that would be a waste. Luke was going to be standing around most of the morning. Besides, Shepard's team could use the ice gun Bumblebee had on the Mark I.

  Luke saw them off and started jogging through the tall trees. It was his first time alone in the forest, if you didn’t count Jinx. She was becoming a good traveler, she didn’t complain nearly as much when he carried her around in the cat backpack.

  He made it through the forest in record time due to the springs in his Mark II legs. He slowed down in the estate village, and calmly walked to Kruro’s shop. Cormac was there waiting for him with a worried look on his face.

  Luke flipped up his helmet visor and said, “What’s up? You don’t seem happy to see me.”

  Cormac slashed his hands down, “That’s not it. It’s the hydra. You know, the one you asked Seer Theobaldine about? He’s hated me for years and now you gave him the opportunity to tell Lord Edobar I have been slacking on my culling duties. Our lord has ordered me to kill the monster as soon as possible. Which would have been difficult last week, but now...”

  “Well, shit.”

  Today’s chapter title comes from Man of Steel (2013). That movie was such a letdown. I am waiting for the new Superman movie to come out on streaming, hopefully it's better than the last ones.

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