First Ventures pt. 3
4 days, 3 hours, and 27 minutes later, Over thunked his helmet against the table with a groan.
… fixing, completing, and then modifying a prototype hoverboard was more complicated than he thought, even with the blueprints and all the tools in the workshop part of the lab. At least he was done now.
{Great work, Over! You wouldn’t be able to tell that it was nothing but a pile of spare parts a few days ago!}
“You didn’t help at all…”
That wasn’t actually true; Alexis did the schematic editing while he did the actual work. They both knew what he meant, though, so Alexis just laughed.
The hoverboard was something Alexis had found buried deep in the prototype section of Cossack’s notes, the parts tucked away in a metal container. According to the simulations Alexis ran, the original design was good… just not good enough for as long a trip they were going to take. Hence the few days of modification.
A sleek blue-white hoverboard lay on the table, black streaks sweeping across its sides. Alexis was right; you’d never be able to tell that it took a scant few days to go from a pile of parts to this.
{Does it have a name?}
“A name? Is that important?”
{Yeah, you gotta name your gear, y’know. What’re you gonna call it?}
Hm…
“… Chaser.”
{Chaser?}
“Yeah, just Chaser.” It just felt right.
{That’s a good name! Now, we just need to do one more thing before we can head out.}
Over blinked. He was pretty sure this was called ‘tonal whiplash.’ “... just like that?”
{Just like that. This way!}
The thought of leaving the lab was, admittedly, quite daunting despite his resolve to change the future (and when he put it that way, no wonder he was nervous), but he followed Alexis with the Chaser in his hands anyways.
They reentered the room with his capsule, and Alexis walked towards the machine that Over had initially thought was a coverless capsule until he downloaded the lab’s data– the Teleporter.
“... Alexis, there’s no way it’s going to work.”
It didn’t take a genius to realize that the pre-nuclear apocalypse satellites were probably all destroyed, from radiation or otherwise, and Dr. Cossack’s lab was only wired to pre-apocalypse stuff. The chances of the Teleporter being able to access a satellite were laughable, much less one that would be in range of him when he needed it.
{Just link yourself to it anyways. Worst comes to worst, I’ll find a way to jumpstart it and force the teleport.}
“Doesn’t that come with the risk of–?”
{Shhh shh sh, just trust me on this.}
Over was skeptical, but set down the Chaser to boot up the Teleporter anyways. It didn’t take long to link his energy signature; just a few minutes of tapping away at the keyboard beside it.
“Alright. Now what?”
{Now… well, you already know.}
“… Right.”
It was time to leave the remains of Dr. Cossack’s lab.