In that frozen moment of time, where our victory seemed assured, but the scout was not yet dead, the worst happened. The scout made the only logical conclusion it could. It needed to destroy the thing that was holding it in place and tearing it apart. Without mobility the scout was defenseless. One of the beam turrets swung around and a thick purple beam of light ripped into Regar's unmoving form. The powerful ship-mounted laser burned through Regar's ancient Seeker armor.
The Tempest's tear in reality disappeared immediately and Regar's body tumbled away as atmosphere and blood vented from the rents in his suit.
"Regar! Hang tight, man. I'm coming for you," I said and boosted toward him.
The scout tore free of the Redemption, boosting away desperately. Despite the immense damage Marty had inflicted on it, the scout was still maneuverable enough to dodge most of the incoming fire.
Marty pursued, weapons blazing as he tried to claim his kill. In mere seconds, the two ships were glinting specks in the distance. With a thought, I triggered both of the detonation sequences of the Nemesis rounds that had landed. My display darkened, hiding the new sun the antimatter charges in the tiny warheads made in the distance.
"Whoa, was that you, Jake? That was a hell of a bang. That thing's nothing but twisted scrap now," Marty said.
"Yeah, that was the Nemesis. I'm going to Regar. He's really hurt."
"I'm on my way back," Marty said.
Regar was more than really hurt. The top half of his stout body was attached to the bottom by a partial panel of his armor, and a handful of burnt flesh. The laser had boiled the organs in his chest and cut him nearly in half. His right hand still held the Tempest. A little less than half of it. The scout's beam had cut through it cleanly at a jagged angle. The other half was gone, drifting somewhere in the void nearby.
"Shit, Regar, can you hear me?" I asked, in vain.
Regar was clearly dead. No one could survive that, not even with Transcendent Flesh. Or could they?
A documentary I'd seen flashed through my mind. It had been about flatliners. Crazy people that killed themselves to try to get a view of the afterlife. Your body could die and you could still get back up and live a normal life if you revived before brain damage set in. I grabbed Regar's tumbling form, stabilizing him, and laid my right hand on his chest just above where his armor ended.
I struggled with the Interface for a long, stretched-out moment before it finally understood my intention and gave me the option I needed. I wished I'd had one of the stasis pods that had saved Kiril on the Spike, but this would have to do.
╠═╦╬╧╪
Stabilize and seal First Seeker Regar Cost: 75 Nanite Clusters, 6kg tier 2 organics, 2.5kg tier 2 metals
╠═╦╬╧╪
I hit the "Stabilize" option that appeared. Immediately, Nanite Clusters flowed out of my armor and into Regar's corpse. The Nanites had plenty of organic matter to use to stabilize and seal the wounds, taking it from the bottom half of his body. For the metals, they cannibalized his armor. His metal was mostly tier 3, but I hoped there was enough tier 2 that it would be able to accomplish what it needed.
The Nanites flooded into his body and sealed up his torso as I watched, skin flowing across sundered flesh followed closely by a rapidly thickening coat of protective metal. The bottom half of his body was cut loose after the Nanites were finished salvaging what they needed from it. Regar's ravaged legs and pelvis drifted away.
The Redemption was beside me and coming to a relative stop when Marty spoke. "Oh shit, what's that?”
Chapter Forty-Six: The Signal and a Quest
"DON'T TELL ME, A BATTLESHIP. A space station the size of a moon?" I asked, dreading the answer.
"No, but I just got an encrypted signal, a big one. It was really powerful, and it came from the dead scout. Shit," Marty said.
"Not quite dead. Go finish it, would you?" I asked.
Marty muttered, and the Redemption turned swiftly and disappeared. Seconds later the light of her weapons persisted for a few seconds while Marty turned the remains of the Vassago scout into a fine mist.
"I'm sorry, man, that was my fuckup. No clue what's in the message. It just looks like junk to me," Marty said.
"Brick can decrypt it. Whatever it is, I'm sure it's not good for us."
"I have started the decryption process. The signal is heavily encrypted and decryption is unlikely to be fast," Brick said.
Shortly after, I eased Regar's comatose form into the Redemption. I gave a mental order and the gate on the rear wall popped open, showing the Pax gate room on the other side.
"Brick, get some bots to the gate room. Regar's really hurt."
"Dispatching," Brick replied.
Spider bots began to flood into the room and then through the gate. They formed a rectangle on the floor, lifting two of their little arms each, ready to receive the load. I set Regar's torso down gently. Once enough of them were in place they went through the gate, and then out of sight down the corridor.
"I will make him comfortable in his quarters. When he's conscious, I will provide him any and all materials he needs to complete his regeneration. He will be fine, Jake. Don't worry," Brick said.
"We need to know what that signal was, Brick."
"The decryption is still in progress. I am using all the computing resources I have available in order to break it, but it is unknown when I will be successful."
"I can tell you what it was," Metra said. "You don't need to decrypt it, Brick. It's a status report. The AI ships always broadcast one when you kill them. The only way to stop it is to kill them
