Overclocked -ch16- (Patreon)

As soon as the carrier docked with the Hab, then Wrench was struck by the disgusting stink of the Hab.

Rancid, putrid, foul smelling air flooded into the carrier.

It had a rankness to it that was almost certainly going to kill any Hume that lingered in it for very long. There was no possible way that anyone could survive in without having to depend on a Mender.

Which meant Wrench had to be quick at getting repairs under-way.

“Stay with me, Stripe,” Wrench said and slipped his arm through hers. There was no way he was going to let her get out of his sight given that this entire place was poisonous or hostile. Even if all he did was fix the oxygen filter or scrubber today and directed it into the ducts, that’d at least protect her against the Hab.

He figured he could fool around with his Systems to make sure he didn’t get any lasting effects here, but that wasn’t an option for her. Her health was paramount if he wanted to keep her around as someone he could rely on.

A partner that could get him through situations like what he’d gone through with Pretty-Face.

“Of course. I can-I can do that,” Stripe replied, her fingers clutching into his arm and digging into him. To the point that he figured the only way she’d be removed from his side was by cutting her arm of. “We didn’t-that is-you told me to stay in your Hab. We didn’t make an agreement or anything for that.

“I didn’t offer you anything and just… I ran because I thought you were inviting me to join your Hab just because you wanted me there. That’s what you meant, right? You just wanted me in your Hab as a person.”

“That’s exactly it. I wanted you in my Hab. More specifically, to help me. No deal, no trade, just… help me,” Wrench quickly assured her. There was no way he wanted to make deals anymore. He had enough of that in his life in the past, and even now.

Stripe could be a friend and a partner, even without having an odious deal.

There was an odd itch at the back of his head that hoped for more, too.

“Oh good. Thank you. I’ve never traded myself away, never wanted to, and was hoping you just wanted me to remain in your Hab,” Stripe murmured as everyone began exiting the lock.

Wrench got a chance to look around the Hab now.

It wasn’t a terrible Hab.

There was in fact quite a bit of work that’d been put into it in truth. There was even a large number of higher-end decorations and settings that he’d only ever heard of.

Glancing up, he noted that there was an attachment to the Hab as well.

An Aerial-Hab had been set to the top of the Hab.

An addition that’d allow for the inclusion of other species that weren’t ground dwellers. Species that preferred to be in the trees, up high, or had a different requirement for breathable atmosphere.

He spotted what he felt was a few non-humanoid species up in the Aerial-Hab. As well as several Grae that were starting to clamber down and watch from above.

They were always far more curious than the other Aerial-Hab species and would even associate with Hume in some circumstances. Those were few and far between from what Wrench had heard.

He’d only met one in his life and they’d been incredibly unpleasant experiences.

Nasty bastards that they are.

You can all just stay up there.

Thanks very much.

“Only a few come down here,” Stripe answered the unspoken question, her face upturned and looking to the Aerial-Hab. “Grae, that is. A few Grae come down. They’re not very nice and tend to steal from us. That or attack for no reason at all.”

“They do that,” muttered Wrench. He was positive there would be a duct stairwell that went all the way up to the Aerial-Hab since he’d be responsible for them as well. That meant there would be a way for him to get up there and away from the other Hume. “We’ll be staying up there, by the way. Away from everyone else. I’m willing to bet that it’s actually healthier up there, too. A lot more natural foliage that takes in and filters out bad air.

“Everything down here looks pretty, but doesn’t do much for the air itself. If the Fixers that are working on the Hab are any good, they’re probably sleeping up there already.”

“They’re not,” Stripe answered in a flat tone. “None of them are likely up to the task of maintaining this Hab. It’s not even their fault either.

“All the good Fixers were fed to the Crockish. They’re… the Crockish are over there in that corner. The Tongsta doesn’t live feed them, thankfully, but they eat anyone who gets too close. Deme, Hume, or just wait for the Tongsta to feed them.”

Wrench clicked his tongue at that.

There were a number of Tongsta that kept predatorial species with Humes. Often with disastrous results for the Hume, though not always.

“The Fixers… they disagreed with the Brawlers. Fought with them. They caught them and threw them in,” Stripe continued on when Wrench hadn’t said anything.

“Alright. We’re going straight for the ducts. We’ll stay out of the pens and the like. No reason to bother with them,” Wrench said, changing the subject a bit. “Not sure if I’ll have to slaughter the Fixers or not, so I need you to be careful for a time. Stay away from them and keep your distance.”

“Okay, yes. I can-I can definitely do that, Wrench,” murmured Stripe, leaning toward him an almost comical way. Her head was nearly on his shoulder with how she was bent toward him.

A beautiful blonde moved closer toward Wrench and Stripe.

“I’m Pistol. I just want you to know, what you saw back there was a mistake,” said the woman, giving him a bright smile, her eyes crinkling and flashing her perfect teeth at him. “I guarantee you that I personally want nothing more than to be in your Hab. You’ll be able to take a few out with you, right?

“Take me with you. I’ll make worth your while and then some. I’m a breeder, I’ve never had children, I’m only nineteen, and my pedigree is second to none. Any child I provide will give us rewards aplenty.”

“I’m Popsicle!” called a second a woman who edged her way over to stand next to Pistol. She had bright blue eyes, pale almost light-brown hair, and a figure and look that was amazing to behold. Standing next to Pistol, the two looked akin to the most attractive women he’d ever seen. He felt his back arch after he maintained eye contact with them a bit too long. His left hand had come up and pressed to his chest for a moment and he felt his mouth part on its own. “I’ll let you do whatever you want to me. I’ll let it happen with a smile and a thank you, then ask you for more.”

“Oh, me too. We could maybe make up a pair of Solos for you and really light up your days?” offered Pistol to which Popsicle quickly nodded her head in agreement to.

Wrench felt his face screw up in a frown and he said nothing after he caught himself wanting to lean in toward the women. He couldn’t deny that he was attracted to these over-engineered Hume. That he wanted to say yes if only to take them to bed.

To see what Popsicle could really offer him, what he could do to her, and how it appealed to him in a way he hadn’t expected.

But it also wasn’t what he wanted.

More calls were made to him, to the point that he realized he needed to say something.

“I’m sure I can take a few with me,” Wrench admitted with a small nod of his head, still walking toward the ducts. “If you want to join me, feel free to talk to me in the mornings before I start work, or in the evenings just after dinner. I’ll make time to talk to anyone who’s serious about coming over.

“Be prepared to answer me honestly about your previous associations as well. I’ll ask others as well to learn the truth. Best you come clean in those interviews.”

Wrench didn’t exactly mean any of that, but it was easier to lie than it was to tell them the truth. The truth would create enemies and problems.

A simple lie would give them hope enough to not become an issue for him. To give him some space and be polite.

He wanted more people ike Stripe who hadn’t anticipated him wanting her to stay. That she’d never asked, expected, or pushed at him to invite her.

I mean… Popsicle could be fun, though.

Wincing mentally at the thought, Wrench realized he was going to have an issue not letting his young body run wild over his older mentality. It was going to be tough.

Focus.

Focus!

Ducts.

Get in the ducts, fix the Hab.

Head out of the gutters and what your dick wants.

Far far away from the pretty ladies.

Quickly as he could manage without looking like he was running away, Wrench got to the ducts. Everyone else went into the pens.

More than a few extremely attractive women followed him right up to the door and wished him well. To come back and talk to them in the evening.

No sooner than he’d entered the ducts than he heard several voices call out from the back. They all sounded as young as he was or younger.

“Hello,” called Wrench. He wanted to make sure this got off on the right foot. If they were prideful or unwilling to give him space, he’d have to force the situation. If he didn’t have to though, he wouldn’t. “I’m Wrench. A Fixer from another Hab. I was brought over to help fix the problem with the Hab.”

Several young men and a young woman filed out from the back.

Wrench had no idea what room they’d been in, but they were covered in greased, oil, and dirt. One of them even looked like they had soot smeared across the bridge of their nose.

“You’re a Fixer?” asked the young man at the front. Now that they were closer, Wrench was fairly certain that they were unrelated. They all had different hair-color, eyes, and features.

“Yeah, I’m Wrench. I’m a Fixer. Done a lot of work on mechanical systems. Working in an electrical one now,” he answered quickly. “What’s… what’s going on here? Something with the air isn’t right.”

He was trying to be delicate about it and kind. He needed to get to the heart of the matter though so he could finish this up quickly and get out.

“Yeah!” said the young woman. She looked as if she were right on the cusp of getting her coming-of-age tattoos and being given an adult designation. Along with all the tatoos adults received. Dark-brown hair was pulled up in a high ponytail and her eyes were a pale-brown that shifted to a hazel color. “The oxygenator won’t actually turn on. It’s just… stuck.

“We got it to turn on once, but then it didn’t do anything. It was humming along but it wasn’t working.”

Frowning, Wrench thought on that.

While it sounded like they were treating it as if it were a singular problem, to Wrench it felt more like two. The first one being what he’d already dealt with in his own Hab.

The sensor at the filter was meddled with and caused it to fail. That would account for the systems not turning on.

There was quite possibly a lack of proper maintenance on the machine as well. When they were attempting to get it to function, they could have broken something or cracked one of the valves.

He’d have to check all the internal valves, plastics, and the casing. Then run it all the way back down the tubing to the intake as well as the filter.

Taking in a slow breath, then letting it out, Wrench realized he was going to have a considerable job in front of him. One he didn’t want to really deal with.

“I’m Gadget,” said the young woman with a bright smile. “I turn of age in a few days. Please treat me as an adult despite that. I promise I learn quickly.”

The young men around her all nodded their heads, though slowly. They didn’t have any enthusiasm or hope in their face or eyes.

Each and every one of them had a defeated air and feel to them, other than Gadget.

Wrench had no idea why there was a difference between them, but he suspected he had an idea why. That perhaps they’d been in league with the Brawlers.

That maybe this whole situation was something they could have stopped but didn’t.

“Right. This is Stripe, by the way. She’s my assistant,” Wrench said, indicating her with a hand gesture. “If she asks for something, or needs something, please help her out. She’s not a Fixer, but she learns quickly and is quite bright.”

They all agreed with nods and spoken agreement.

“Wonderful. Alright… well… first things first. Show me whatever equipment this Hab is using to cycle the air. Then we need to go straight to the filter and the intake. Because there’s something clearly wrong with that, and we need to start there,” Wrench said. “Once we have the filter and intake clear, we’ll walk it forward till we find the issue.”

They all nodded their heads quickly at that.

***

Wrench had been right but also wrong.

The filter had been jammed shut. Something had washed out the lubricant that kept the machine spinning. Cycling air with a machine that had a motor, but no blades to propel the air.

Somehow the motor spun, then pushed air through the filter and took out undesirable elements.

A simple reality was that the filter was a piece of tech that Fixers could maintain, but not completely understand. Nor could they replicate it.

Once Wrench had reapplied new lubricant tot he machine, pulled the sensor to force it into a default mode, reset the system to a fresh start, and let it powerup normally, the filter turned on.

Air started to move again through the Hab. An active and positive change was now starting.

The part he’d been wrong about had been the Oxygenator.

A machine that had a lot of valves, pumps, and delicate pieces, such as fragile magnets, that allowed the Tongsta technology to move air without too much of an issue as well as provide carbon dioxide scrubbing. To pump it throughout the Hab without an issue and constantly refresh it with breathable life giving air.

It was destroyed.

In their quest to fix the issue, the Fixers had ruined nearly every valve, broken a number of housing and casings that held the parts together, and backflowed the intake tubes with oil that the motor that pumped the air needed.

These were all things that would require parts made from a Fabrication machine, or surplus storage.

Neither of which existed.

All Wrench could do was categorize it all as broken must replace, broken can repair, or no-action needed. Send it into the Hab system so that the right parts could be picked up by the Tongsta.

Hopefully with some urgency considering the amount of breathable air would be diminishing quickly. Though he couldn’t see how Dickhead wouldn’t be moving fast.

Whatever price they’d offered to Goodie to get his help, and assurances for his health, was likely more prohibitive than rushing the parts they needed.

When it was all said and done, Wrench had done all he could, and then no more. Until the new parts arrived, he couldn’t actually solve the Hab’s most pressing issue.

Once that task-list had been finished, he set off for the Aerial-Hab with Stripe in tow. Dinner in hand for each of them and not wanting to go to the cafeteria or the pens.

They were eating before dinner-time, but that didn’t matter much. The day would be closing itself out rather rapidly.

There’d be no more time to do anything today as far as work was concerned either.

“Don’t forget to go back down after we eat and speak to those who wished to,” Stripe reminded him as they continued up the stairs to the top. “Even if you were lying about wanting to take them with us, you told them what you’d do. You have to keep up with what you actually state.”

“I… what?” Wrench asked, following Stripe as she climbed upward.

“You told everyone to talk to you after dinner. You still need to go talk to them,” Stripe said, glancing over her shoulder at him. “I didn’t think you were being honest about wanting to take them with us, but even if you weren’t, you still need to talk to them.

“If you don’t, they’ll realize it’s all a facade. They’ll become hostile and angry. If you’re just trying to appease them enough to make them stop or go away, then you need to talk to them. You can’t dangle bait and not give them a nibble or two at it.”

Wrench blinked owlishly, almost missed a stair, then caught himself physically and mentally.

Stripe was right of course.

If he was going to go about with this little charade, then he needed to make sure he did it in a way that was consistent. That he actively listened to the people who wanted to join his Hab and were willing to barter whatever they could for it.

That and… that and I’d talked to a number of them already in the other Hab. They just didn’t have a chance to seal an agreement considering how it all went down at the end.

I can be open about this if I really want to.

I don’t have to shut them down outright.

“I can give you a list of all the ones that weren’t… someone you’d want to bring with you,” Stripe offered. “But… but they’d just be based on my opinions. I can’t guarantee I won’t be biased.

“In fact, nevermind. You really shouldn’t be using my opinions on who to take with you. You should rely on your own intuition and judgment. If I had either of those, I wouldn’t have been as much of a loner as I was.”

“No! No. Please. Provide me with a list of people you think would be a bad idea to take. Especially the ones who were with the Brawlers or had close ties with them,” Wrench got out just as they reached the top flight of stairs.

“Popsicle and Pistol kept their distance from the Brawler group. Either of them would be fine to take,” Stripe murmured and then stood at the door. The locking light had remained red as she approached. “Given their pedigree, they’d be two of the best to take with you. Especially if you had children with them.

“Goodie… Goodie would reward you heavily for such I have no doubt of it. She might even let you keep them given how kind she is to you.”

Wrench nodded his head and walked up to the door.

It unlocked with a pop, the light turned green, and he pushed it open.

They stepped out of the ducts and into the Aerial-Hab.

The air up here was fresher and obviously so within the first breath. A much cleaner feeling that didn’t leave him slightly light-headed.

“Oh that’s wonderful,” whispered Stripe. She walked over to a metal shod bench that was on the platform they were on and sat down on it. “We can sleep right here. It’ll be fine, won’t it?”

“Yeah. The species up here should leave us alone as long as we leave them alone. We just have to make sure we don’t give them a reason to take anything from us, nor provoke them,” Wrench muttered.

He didn’t want to deal with Grae.

Thankfully they’d leave them alone for the most part once their anxiety and curiosity were equally sated.

Looking out into the thick foliage of the Aerial-Hab, he saw a Grae not far away.

It was hanging partly upside down and clinging to a vine that one could often find in Aerial-Habs. Holding to it and watching him from it’s partial cover.

The Grae were a humanoid like figure that could range from five foot to eight foot in height, ash colored skin that ranged from light to dark, teeth that had serrations in them that held onto things when they bit down, a mouth that was too wide to look normal, and ears that nearly laid flat to their head.

Surprisingly the aliens had hair and eyebrows, but were universally white in color.

None of those features were normal, but they weren’t the most shocking attributes of a Grae either.

Two specific features marked them out uniquely.

Their eyes were incredibly strange.

A fully black sclera that made their eyes like pits. Black pits devoid of color, save one.

A red pupil and iris that reflected light back.

That and four breasts. Always four breasts.

So strange but… kinda neat to look at.

The Grae he was looking at realized it’d been seen. Opening its mouth it let out a loud and grotesque noise that was half hiss, half growl. Showing off it’s teeth and too-large mouth at him.

After presenting itself as a threat and getting no response from Wrench it scampered up a tree and out of view. Vanishing off into the foliage without a look back.

“You know, the Grae in Habs are always female,” Wrench remarked and sat down next to Stripe. “The males are much worse. Real assholes that want nothing more than to kidnap you and hurt you. Look similar to the female Grae, but no hair.

“No nose either, actually. Real ugly bastards. Alright… let’s eat. I need to go down there and talk to everyone. You can set up a nest for us up here to sleep in while I do that.”

“That sounds great,” Stripe said and gave him a shy smile. She picked up her fork she’d carried up and stuck it into her meal. He could feel her watching him, despite facing her food.