Chapter 66: Chapter 63

I told him everything that had happened, along with my impressions on the delves now living in our residential ward.

He flipped the notepad shut and nodded. “This is all very grim news. Fascinating though, that their leader appears to desire sexual contact with you this aggressively.”

“Yeah, that’s one word for it.” I sighed and shook my head. It had been a long time since I thought seriously about getting laid. Now with BuyMort, sex had come back into my life in a big way, with strange and potentially lethal complications.

“Rayna has briefed Jada and I on your starfish suit, and its capabilities. Your capacity for personal violence as well. I suspect you could survive the encounter, if it comes to that, but that may lead to further complications, no matter the outcome with lady Shireen.” 

He nodded and raised one eyebrow. “Well. No use going in circles over it. Would you like to get started on the Sleem farm now, or see the new residential block and well? They’re both complete. The spider ranch and wall upgrades will be a bit longer, but if we went below to work on the Sleem farm, they may be ready for inspection as well by the time we’re done.”

Exhaustion had set in after the beholder, and all I wanted was a nap. But I shook my head and waved back toward the entrance to the underground base. Axle clicked on a shoulder lamp and followed. As we walked, I shared my map data with him. Axle pulled it up on a larger device. He unrolled it as if it were a scroll, but the surface was a clear plastic. The map was easily manipulated, and he spun it to see the different areas as I described them. I also transferred all the data from the Fumble-Bees.

“This is residential, which the delves now own, along with the open floors above it. Below that is experimentation, where the beholder will den. Below that is the Sleem cavern. So I have no idea how we’re even supposed to have a Sleem farm anymore. They said they won’t interfere, but we’re not welcome or allowed in their areas.” I finished by shrugging. “I think I might be, but just for that one thing.”

Axle pulled the map back further, to show the entire facility, hovering the dark underground. He shook his head. “No, a Sleem farm won’t be a problem at all. In fact, coupled with your existing silk production you’ll be well overdue for a higher credit level.”

Axle saw me frown and he opened his mouth, paused, then shut it. 

“There’s an application fee and other stuff but we’ll cover all of that later. There are some good perks for a high credit level, so long as you are smart about using them. Let’s get this set up and talk about all of that later. ” 

He pointed with a large claw at the hangar labeled testing. 

“Right here, in this area would be perfect. We don’t need direct access to their cavern, just the ability to drill into it.” 

His finger traced a line between the bottom of testing and the cavern. “Pipes that lead up are of benefit anyway, the Sleem think they’re climbing toward the surface that way. It encourages production, marginally.”

“I like margins,” I offered.

He turned and stared at me. “Yes? Good. Well, we have the digging service on site from the aquifer job still, we can likely re-task them down here. They’re finishing up above, and another job under the table is always welcome. They’ll consider it a bonus. All we need now is a freezing tank. Though, I recommend more than one if we can afford it, and an oversized breach pipe, to ensure that we can upgrade to more freezers as soon as the farm is up and running.”

I nodded blankly. “What’s a freezing tank?”

Axle idly waved up BuyMort and began swiping through it. Within a few seconds, an item had arrived in the purchase queue for our affiliate.

The freezing tank was a fairly simple industrial blast chiller that had been repurposed to entice Sleem inside, securely contain them, then slowly but steadily freeze them for sale. The method of freezing not only killed the Sleem humanely, it promised, but it ensured multiple Sleem could be stored and made ready for sale within a single unit. 

Apparently they didn’t mind crawling over their own dead for the lures each unit used. 

The cellular material their bodies are compromised of settles during the freezing process. Each Sleem slumps into the refrigeration unit frame as it dies, one on top of the other. Quite brutal, the way Axle explained the process. It didn’t matter, they all sold for plenty of morties, and Sleem carcasses were an extremely stable market.

After all, everybody needs toothpaste and mud-crete.

We entered the hangar proper, and Axle immediately noticed the compromised staircase. He made a note to have it repaired and we moved on, into the hangar proper. Upon reaching the far side, he made some more notes, and pointed to the furthest corner of the massive room.

“This is really an excellent location for a Sleem farm. We can set up stacking tank units in here and fill this entire room, once the Sleem production is up enough. There’s plenty of room for freezers, so production can grow to become prolific. There’s even space in here for large scale operation items, like a feeder system.” 

His voice drifted off as he stared up into the far distant ceiling. “It drips nutriment slurry to the Sleem in order to increase their growth rate. I had been prepared to deliver a source of radiation for them to feed from as well, but it looks like they chose that cavern because it has a source of radiation already present.” 

He pointed to the side of his map, where a read out of various environmental statistics was present. “Your Fumble-Bee drones are reading fissile material, in a pattern that makes me think it was manufactured.”

“This used to be a military base, so it wouldn’t surprise me if they left behind some plutonium or something. They were kinda nutty about that stuff for a while, back then,” I trailed off, and Axle turned to stare at my helmet again.

“Well, that aids us. The Sleem are thickest right on top of it.” He pointed at the map, tracing a line across the bottom of the cavern. “Right now, the level of Sleem is up to about here, but if we continue to nurture this batch, it could fill entirely, resulting in dramatically higher rate of reproduction. This could be a highly profitable farm.”

I nodded and pointed at him. “With your help, hell yes. Is that secure though? Supposedly, Sleem have BuyMort. How are we supposed to stop them from escaping?”

Axle shook his head and waved a paw dismissively. “We’re not, that’s the beauty of Sleem farming. They think they have a way out, our pipe, so they don’t bother spending morties or attempting escape otherwise. They’ll just breed and keep sending out oozes as long as they have water and radiation enough to make more.”

I nodded, impressed. “Okay, that works out. So how do we automate it?”

He glanced up from his scroll, before sliding it shut and tucking it back away in one of his various pockets. “Easily. The refrigeration units I want to order have portals for BuyMort drones to collect product. All you have to do is order it through the affiliate, and the units will allow you to make the sales remotely.”

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I pulled up the affiliate page to approve the purchase and get that initial refrigeration unit in place. While I waited for the pod, Axle left, returning within minutes with his digging crew. It was composed of two orcs, a hobb, and a single human, all of whom immediately got to work setting up their equipment. It took a few trips, but within the hour they were set up and digging, using our portable solar generator for power.

The machine they built was deceptively simple. It fitted and propelled a self-guiding, digging pipe. The front of the pipe was a remotely controlled drill bit capable of breaking through different materials, based on scans and need. Once dug, the drill would detach into four composite parts, which would then return up newly laid pipe to be reused. It was the cornerstone of their affiliate, Axle told me. Lost pipe drillers could mean the end of their lives through the end of their livelihoods. Or at least exile to Storage, which he told me with a small shudder.

Axle’s tail had come back to a more neutral position as we worked, but I noticed his ears never stopped being pasted to his head. The arrival of the beholder had thrown a wrench into an already complex situation, and I was beginning to get the impression that a great many of the aliens I had accumulated were merely caught up in the chaos of BuyMort’s arrival as well. Axle and Jada were on foot. As I watched him work with the digging crew, I wondered how far they would make it if they left this place.

The drilling drones were impressive. Each one linked in together in order to drill, and then again in a smaller formation in order to travel back up the pipe. It dug and crawled slowly, dragging the first portion of pipe with it. Each subsequent section of piping had to be attached as it was sinking into the ground, but the dig crew worked together easily and quickly, and each weld was inspected before it disappeared into the hole. As the drone dug, the ever-growing pipe followed behind and compacted the earthen walls around it with loose dirt from the dig.

My Knowle helped guide and position the pipe, which was large enough to walk through comfortably standing for most non-mordren. Axle explained that was important, as scale was intended to rise, and early installations like this allowed for much greater capacity as soon as funding was in place for it. This way, he claimed, was far cheaper than renovating your digs. Anything you had to dig for, you didn’t want to have to dig up very often to upgrade. Especially where the Sleem are concerned.

A special pipe head had to be purchased, in order to secure the pipe in the Sleem cavern upon arrival. If there were cracks in the stone around it, they would burrow out, eventually becoming a significant escape risk. So another million morties went to a name brand self-securing pipe head that was specifically designed for this use. It would flash melt the stone around it upon arrival, creating a seal in the wall and preventing Sleem leakage. 

I was unsurprised to see the Dearth Conglomerate’s seal upon the device. 

Axle told me they were major manufacturers, and sold a wide range of products, especially on new BuyMort worlds. Riding the nanite wave and exploiting the different worlds it arrived at was big business.

Since we’d had to establish the piping area in the center of the two hangar structures, Axle and I had a conversation about the space craft that was still sitting at a tilt in the first one. He had merely stared at it while we walked past on our way in.

“What, exactly, are you planning on doing with that ship?” He asked me while tapping a claw against his front teeth and staring at it.

“That’s to fix up and give to Mr. Sada. He wants to leave, and honestly, things will run much smoother around here if he is encouraged to do so.” I glanced between him and the diggers. They were breaking the concrete with hammers before allowing their remote drill to get started on the area. They appeared to want to preserve the large drilling drones as much as they could.

Axle nodded and turned to look at me. “Ah, yes. This elusive affiliate owner. I understand there have been some issues.”

I laughed and nodded. “Yeah. How should I put this delicately? There are questions of competence and intent.”

He raised his eyebrows at me. “Significant?”

I nodded, my helmet moving in the dark. “Potentially lethal.”

Axle nodded back, then turned to stare at the ship for a few minutes, while the drill echoed in its warm abode of emplaced lighting behind us. Finally, he asked, “How honest would you like my counsel to be, in this matter?”

I shrugged. “How honest with me do you feel the need to be?”

The Knowle nodded. “You may want to consider ending his life, and claiming his MortBlock, if he is that big a threat to this compound, and you are invested in survival. What I heard about the spider ranch concerns me greatly. That is the kind of action that would lead to summary execution in some affiliates, especially those without operational security in a dangerous, unpredictable part of BuyMort’s greater system.”

I stared at him while he spoke, and as he finished, I nodded. “Thank you for your honest counsel. This conversation stays between the two of us.”

Axle nodded immediately, and his tail tucked again. “Understood.”

“You misunderstand, Axle.” I shook my head at him. “I agree with you. Many others have mentioned similar solutions. That’s why I’m trying to get him out of here instead. I would . . . prefer not to kill him. Can you help me with the ship?”

His tail returned to a relaxed posture and his ears perked momentarily. “Ah, that is a relief. Yes, the ship would be a decent project. I don’t have a massive amount of expertise on human living standards in spacecraft, but the research should be simple. Assuming we have a healthy budget to work from, it can be completed quickly.”

“How quickly?” I asked.

“When the Sleem farm is operational, we should focus on more refrigeration units at first, to multiply the income.” 

He pulled out his scroll again and unrolled it. “This cavern has an excellent density of Sleem, and from the data your Fumble-Bees were able to send before they lost charge, it is increasing significantly even as we speak. They have a healthy source of water, likely some leakage from the upper portions of the aquifer. The walls are primarily limestone, gypsum, some marble. Excellent to contain them, which birthing Sleem actually prefer anyway. Better security and stability. Young Sleem can be caustic to softer ground, until they learn to control their bodies.” He was on a roll, so I just leaned against a nearby pillar and listened.

“It’s fascinating, their growth rate here is so healthy. They must have something more than just the trace radiation leftover from your military’s experiments.” He snapped his fingers and looked at the ceiling. “Beholders are known to emit a very passive form of radiation, it must be phenomenal feed for the Sleem.”

I raised a finger and added in, “Plus the birthing block thing. That sounds like it’s supposed to create new Sleem, and it’s huge.”

He nodded vigorously, his ears now remaining in an upright position. “Yes, and the beholder itself has come to study it, which means it may be unique in some way. Birthing blocks are not exactly common, but they are not so rare as to attract the attention of a beholder.” Axle rubbed his chin in thought, turning back to the dig site. One of the workers saw him and waved. “Ah, they’re nearly finished. The final part of the dig is the only part with any risk, I want to supervise.”

All the rest of the parts we needed were ordered and ready, sitting on the concrete next to the dig site. It was a massive pile of piping, for the most part. Axle assured me he and the dig team could get it assembled without any trouble. It was all designed to be put in place quickly, due to the immediate threat of Sleem coming up the pipe.

The work team started shouting suddenly, and Axle picked up the pace. When we arrived, I stood back and watched. It was time to start getting shit done.

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