I brought up the salvage interface and positioned it to take a tiny slice out of the cell door, right where the locking mechanism was.
╠═╦╬╧╪
Salvage: Metals, tier 1
Cost: 2 Nanite Clusters
╠═╦╬╧╪
Marty chose that moment to come back into the room, a piece of paper in his right hand and a driver's license in his left. He looked at me and then back to the license in his hand.
"What's the deal? Your license says you're five foot nine and the sheriff says he met Jake a few weeks ago and that wasn't you. So why do your fingerprints match?"
I thought about spouting some bullshit, but I couldn't see the point. I'd be leaving no matter what he had to say about it.
"It's still me, I'm just a bit different."
"That's not possible. What scam are you trying to pull here? It's a pretty dumb one."
"It is possible. Just not with Earth technology."
Marty sneered, glancing down at his shirt. "You think because I'm an X-Files fan that I'm a gullible idiot? Try again."
"Seriously. I used alien tech to get this big. I also upgraded myself to be super strong, fast, and smart. I'm basically bulletproof as well."
"All that, and you're in a cage. Nice work. If that were true, why would you tell anyone?"
"Earth's in trouble, Marty. There's a shield protecting the solar system, and it's shrinking. It might be failing. I've got to get out of here. I've got work to do."
"Only you can save the universe, huh?" Marty said, laughing. "What a bunch of horse shit. You can't even get yourself out of a cell. Where's your alien technology, huh? Use a blaster and blow that door off. Beam up."
"You're right, Marty. Enough screwing around," I said.
I hit the Salvage button with a thought, and a small swarm of tiny black Nanites flew out of my left hand and disappeared into the locking mechanism.
"What in the fuck!" Marty yelled. He recoiled in the doorway.
A tiny slice of salvaged tier 1 metal fell to the ground as the Nanites finished their cut. I pushed the door open. Pieces of the locking mechanism fell to the floor and I kicked them out of the way as I stepped through.
Marty seemed paralyzed with astonishment, fear, or both as I stepped up to him.
"Marty, I need my stuff. My car keys, phone, and wallet. The sheriff took them from me."
"Are you real? Is this actually happening?" he asked.
"Totally happening, Marty. I need my stuff. Off to save the world and all that."
"Take me with you! Please!"
Chapter Eight: Escaping the Sheriff's Station
EIGHT MINUTES LATER I was in the passenger seat of Marty's beat-up El Camino.
He'd quickly dug my stuff out of a desk drawer and given it back. Without asking he'd erased the recordings from the two cameras in the cell area, muttering about the Feds the whole while.
It didn't take much convincing to let him give me a ride back to my house. He'd locked up the station behind us, leaving his cordless phone—and responsibilities—behind.
Marty wanted to know everything, right now.
"Are there aliens here on Earth right now?"
"Maybe."
"Have you got a spaceship?"
"No, but I have a space station."
There was a lot more of that, but we arrived at my house pretty quickly. The El Camino pulled up behind my Civic in the driveway.
"Marty, I don't have time. I've got to get my stuff and get out of here."
Marty nodded and killed the engine. I was relieved to find my bag exactly where I had left it, invisible in the darkness under the Civic.
"What's in there?" Marty asked when he saw the bag.
"Tools, weapons."
"Weapons? Like what? Plasma gun? Laser pistol? Phaser?"
"Something like that."
I unlocked my front door and quickly went downstairs, Marty following me like a loyal puppy.
The two bags I'd left behind were undisturbed. If Farnell had been down here he hadn't looked in them. I grabbed Excalibur and clipped it to my belt again. It felt good to have it there.
Marty looked curiously at the wrecking bar and the chaotic mess of the basement. "What happened down here?"
"I was knocking out the walls when I found the stargate," I said, absently. I was trying to figure out how much weight the stairs could take. How many trips would I need?
"What! The fucking stargate? There's a stargate down here?" Marty said, his voice going up an octave.
"Yeah. Do you want to see it?" I asked, grinning. His excitement was infectious. I don't know when having a stargate in my basement had become just another thing in my basement, but I had to admit that taking a step back it was seriously cool.
"Where is it?" he asked.
"Down there."
The part of the basement I indicated was pitch black, and I only realized that when he took out his phone and turned on the flashlight. My vision Augment had been automatically piercing the darkness without me even noticing. That also reminded me, I still needed to charge my phone.
The far wall was as I had left it. The gaping hole I'd punched through the drywall bugged me a bit. I'd really ruined my grandpa's hidden room.
I popped the hidden door open, stepping through. My Interface showed me the gate capacitors were still full, the charge that had come through from the station still there. I'd wondered why Grandpa hadn't placed a power source here to keep the gate charged. It turned out he didn't need it. When the gate connection established, the station's fusion reactor pushed power through to keep the gate open and the initiation capacitors fully charged. Sure, it wasn't foolproof, but it was good enough for his purposes.
Marty was freaking out, panning his light around. "This is amazing! Where can you go with this? Can we open it?"
"Right now the only destination code I have is to my station."
To answer his last question, I pulled the link out and clicked it into the notch beside the gate frame. With a snap, the gate established, showing the gate room on
