Even more notes adorn the inside of the cockpit. One would think the boat’s running out of space at this point, but Jackie keeps finding places to put them.
Whoever pressed the skinwalker into combat has a sick sense of humor.
The machines flying alongside us are not to be trusted.
Our boss is a crybaby weapon. Great.
We’ll win and Megiddo can be a museum.
Sammy and Sapphire, sitting in a tree TOO SOON
I wonder what the Earth lady is like.
Note: Check on fuel supply, we burn it like crazy.
The scorpion will sting. It must.
HUNGERISHUNGERISHUNGERISDESIRE
One day, we’ll come home as heroes
I hope Iris didn’t enlist. I did all this for her future.
I’ve stashed the fuel. Here’s hoping ice miners don’t stumble on it.
Hey good-looking, you come around here often? Hey there, sweet thing, want a ride on Jackie’s Express? HELL NO Wanna find out howthe rest of this is mercifully illegible
I’m a shaaaaaaark!
The pilot of the Wendigo is not, in fact, a shark.
I stole your energy drinks again <3
THE FUCKING SPIDER IS BACK
He’s in the walls.
this sticky note, instead of writing, has one spider, smushed
Gotcha
More cobwebs, there are more spiders here.
She took my rum too. The crate has spider webs in it already.
The meeting goes as smoothly as Jackie can hope. The fabber goes down to only the micrometer, at that level takes days to produce anything, and fills up almost all of Wendigo’s space. The Kishiro integrated circuits ripped out of their consumer hardware have to be manually set in the fabber’s system as what Jackie wants it to be used for, which is a hassle, but the fabber’s documentation is shockingly concise and usable.
It has taken most of Jackie’s stashes from her career in piracy, including some recently “borrowed“ Molybdenum, to pay the workshop off for it, as she has gone to great pains to keep this as off the books as can be, but now, work can begin. Guadalajara leather is the first thing, as a test. A new holster for Jackie’s revolver is at her hip within the hour.
Then comes Jackie’s master plan: a “silver bullet”, for use on robots unknown, and the cause of her secrecy. Were the greater Technocracy to know of her planned insurance policy, she figures her life could be measured in hours. The open source 3D modeling software on her ancient Kishiro terminal works just fine. The design is crude: A bullet jacketed in silver, hollowed out and missing its tip. Its payload: nanobots under pressure, programmed to seek out and consume power and heat sources within the seconds of power they have, sustained in suspended animation until their moment of glory by both a highly volatile (and so deemed unsafe everywhere except Houston’s factories) battery within the bullet itself, also serving as a secondary payload, and a consumer grade mini power cable hooked into a power hub tapping into Wendigo’s reactor.
Jackie’s combat knife is already etching chicken scratch on the sides of the three bullets the machine has spat out. The chicken scratch becomes names: MEGIDDO
YORUHA
TO WHOM IT/MAY CONCERN
That last one needed both sides.
And, of course, ever more sticky notes appear around the cockpit of the Wendigo.
If Megiddo drums me out, go over his head, privateer for the Technocracy?
Most of my stashes are gone. Harder to slip away to replenish them now.
These railguns are excellent.
Everyone’s too legit, I can’t sell fabrication out the trunk of my ride.
Quality of it sucks too. I wouldn’t pay for this.
Megiddo commissioned me. Me, a commissioned officer.
I now have paperwork to do, my downtime has evaporated.
And a sheet of paper, addressed to the tech Prometheus would assign, officers doing their own maintenance being almost unheard of in most militaries, taped near the fuel gauge.
Attention Technician!
I do my own maintenance on this thing. Unless I request work be done, in person, mark this ship “combat ready” and move on. Also mind the notes, I know where all of them are.
Feel free to take a break in my hold so my request doesn’t hit your metrics. Just don’t open the big box, it’s classified hazmat you shouldn’t even know exists.
Why Jackie saw the need to also attach a bottle of beer and pack of smokes to the fuel gauge with actual cellophane tape and bootleg cotton string, despite far superior adhesives being available, is a mystery for the ages. It would be so easy for anyone in her cockpit to just take the beer.
Mood swings. Gotta hate ‘em. Jackie knows on some level that this is not her, and what she’s feeling isn’t real, but she’d be damned if she-
The knife slips, straight into her reinforced leggings. “Not today, old friend.” The dull pain, mostly from the surprise than any actual damage, is already receding. Working with tools is helping a little, but this work of art just can’t be rushed. The scratches into the side of the little cylinder that could continue, until they spell out JOSHUA HUNT.
If I have the bullet with your name on it, does that make you immortal?
The kids, especially Bellamy, remember a Legion of heroes. Big shoes to fill.
I saw the Eastvale earlier.
CHEW ON FLAVOR
FILL YOUR HUNGER
SYNTH PASTE MAKES THE FOOD OF WONDER
NO NEED TO COOK, JUST SQUEEZE AND SAVOR
THE TASTIEST PASTE THE UNIVERSE’S FLAVOR
IT’S A STAR, IT’S A STAR, IT’S THE TALK OF THE TOWN
