The number of seeds that they had in storage was... not much, but the amount that he did find were enough for Ester to stuff them into the Growth Pod so that he could jury rig the rest of the machine to the growing mound of tangled pipes and wires already coating the Engine.
It looked as if some sort of Wire bird had made a nest in the place if not for the fact that said Wire Birds would never even be found dead in places hundreds of meters below the surface.
Reminded once more of how far they were from the stars above, Ester grabbed a bunch of leftover pipes and connected them bit by bit.
'So this pipe needs to go into this input, and this output is for waste so I just need to tangle these two together...' Ester rubbed his forehead where the headache grew slowly but surely as he puzzled out the signals that the Growth Pod were giving him.
He really disliked Runic Ciphers and their brain fucking capabilities.
[Ester!]
Hearing Eva's muffled voice echo from the front, Ester took it as the excuse he needed to escape the Growth Pod trying to ensnare him in the many wires and pipes he was connecting to it.
'Brr' Shaking himself of the lingering stickiness on his mind, Ester propped himself up and removed his goggles, letting them hang low around his neck.
[Ester!] Eva's voice came again, less muffled than before.
Ester rolled his eyes. "I'm coming you impatient woman, just wait a few moments can't you!"
Pushing open the door separating the new garden from the old living quarters still littered with random articles of clothing that he had taken to pad whatever he had gotten his hands on at the time, Ester kicked away a shirt while looking to where Eva sat.
"What's up?" He said while locking eyes with the woman currently wearing nothing more than an oversized shirt that hung loosely from her shoulders.
But as if the matter of her clothing nearly failing to cover her modesty wasn't a problem in the slightest, Eva pointed at a side screen as if it would explain everything.
Which on second thought, it did.
'That computer is still there.' Briefly noting the existence of the foamed up computer still where he had left it, Ester narrowed his eyes and read the number of runic lines covering the screen
Thankfully reading Runes was a whole different thing from reading Runes, and despite how much data was lost in the process of reading without reading Ester could really do without the headache asassssssswould give him.
Eyes trailing the insides of a box growing off of a point, Ester offhandedly remarked towards Eva as he continued down the box.
"How did you solve the self destructing bit?"
[By pretending to be some sort of...] Eva perused her mind before she shrugged her shoulders. [Senator of Arms? I don't know what it means but it was the highest level of clearance, and it stopped the chip from self destructing.]
"That's cool."
Ester paused as he finished reading the box branching off of the point.
"So we're going to some sort of Communication center?"
[Forget going to, we're already here.]
Ester blinked as the distinct rumbling of the Driller boring through thousands of tons of plastic, stone and dirt was replaced by the sound of the Drill bit hitting nothing but air.
"I guess we are."
Standing up and cracking his neck, Ester glanced at Eva as he made his way to the Fridge magnet set up.
"Anything I need to know before I go off exploring this communication center?"
[I'm coming with you this time]
"...Why?" Ester asked with a raised eyebrow, his hands adjusting the Respirator pack at his waist, instinctively performing all the checks needed to keep him breathing that pure and stale air. "Actually, let me rephrase that. How?"
Gesturing at Eva's distinct lack of legs, somehow, she let out a warbling sigh from her mechanical lips.
[Idiot.]
"...What the hell did I do this time?"
[Come here for a second.]
Gesturing for Ester to near, once he did, the only thing he received for his efforts was a pair of fingers penetrating the long sleeved defenses on his arm to pinch the pale flesh underneath.
"...Ow?" Rubbing his shoulder and feeling the hard touch of metal over the fabric where the small wound appeared, Eva pointed at the screen.
[Read that for me will you?]
Raising an eyebrow but complying nonetheless, Ester's eyes roamed the surface of the screen through yellow lenses.
Communication Center 5830
Designation: Main Relay
Status: Abandoned
"I don't get it."
[Look at the designation.]
"I'm looking at it, but what are you getting at?"
Eva let out a long sigh before gesturing at the air. [When you think Main Relay, what do you think?]
"...Important?"
[Yeah, and what do all important places have in common?]
"...Important people?"
Eva let out a longer sigh this time, her finger pointing at the Status portion of the screen.
[What does that say?]
"Abandoned."
[So there can't be any important people in this important place, so tell me Ester you slow Grunger, what do all important places have in common if there any people left]
"..." Ester smacked his lips as he adjusted his goggles embarrassedly. "I'll be honest Eva, you have to spell out whatever your trying to say."
Eva let her arms flop to her sides. [Big. Important places are always big.]
"Oh really?" Ester glanced downwards. "Guess that part isn't important."
Eva blinked in confusion before she snapped her fingers in realization when she looked at where Ester was looking at. [Die.]
"I want to everyday my friend, but as you know, I want to get off of this Architect damned rock before I do that." Ester said while performing a faux bow.
[I hate you]
"Kek"
Forcefully throttling their combined laughter, Eva instantly slapped his head.
"Ow!?"
[Before you went off and insulted my chest, I was going to say that Important places such as this communication center definitely have parking spaces for transport craft such as ours]
[So when I said that I'm going with you, I meant mentally] She jabbed a finger into his chest while revealing a USB stick. [Make sure to plug this thing into the nearest compatible hole you find]
Ester raised an eyebrow as he adjusted his neck gaiter to prevent metal chaffing. "Since when did you learn Warding?"
[You think I'm just looking at your butt when you Ward? After a couple years of staying together, I picked up a thing or to.]
"...What did you just say about my but-" [And that's about it!] Clapping her hands, Eva hurriedly leapt out of her chair with surprising dexterity whilst dragging him towards the Air Lock. [Go take that and search the Communication Center.]
She laughed with a surprising amount of anger. [That Military Chip was a fucking nightmare to hack. I want my get backs.]
'Ah that makes sense'
Entering the airlock, Ester checked his belt pockets to see if the pocket sand, oil and Salvage tools were still where he had put them and nodded his head.
Placing the Universal Serial Bus into his pockets, Ester cracked his knuckles as the Driller moved towards the Communication center.
---
"This is weirdly disappointing."
Speaking into the radio in his arm, a feminine voice echoed from the speakers hiding besides the Camera's littered across the
Having entered the Communication Centers docking bay just a bit earlier after flashing the Senator of Arms Runic code, when Ester plugged the USB he had received into the nearest serial port, Eva was granted full reign all around the building to do whatever the Void she wanted.
Said things included staring at Ester through a bunch of cameras located at various corners of the building while speaking through the Speakers connected to them.
[You would expect an important military facility to look more impressive right?]
"Yeah." Nodding his head, Ester glanced at his surroundings. "This is just... sad."
Blank walls everywhere he looked, besides the odd set of doors which interrupted the monotone grey steel halls, it was as empty as a ship after Scavengers got to it.
Eva's voice giggled over the intercom.
[Oh. Oh wow. I just found out why it's so depressing.]
"And pray tell why is that?" Ester asked while peeking into what looked like sleeping quarters furnished only with row upon rows of bunk tubes.
[Because of this.]
*Ker-Chunk
"VOID ALMIGHTY!"
Jumping up in surprise as the wall beside him opened up to reveal a set of barrels staring down at his face, Eva's cackling laughter echoed throughout the base as he lay on the ground trying to recover from the shock.
"Not. Funny." He growled into the mic on his arm.
[HAHAHAAH! You should've seen the look on your face! Priceless!]
Still laughing by the time that Ester got up from the ground and dusted himself off with a flushed face, underneath the cackles of Eva's thoughts, Ester eventually found his way to the actual center of the Communication Center.
"Well I'll be damned."
Blinking in surprise at the sight of a wall sized screen taking up his vision as several sets of computer desks with abandoned swivel seats reflected his surprised face hidden underneath the Respirator.
With crystal clear black screens, the clean steel frames looked as polished as the day that they were made.
It was as if this place was factory new.
It was beautiful.
"Wow. This makes up for that disappointing base."
[Really-? Are- you- going- to- ignore- the- cannons- that- appeared- on- the- walls-?]
Hearing Eva's voice echo out from behind him, Ester was pulled out of his as he rolled his eyes and recalled how she said that she was unable to access this area earlier.
"If you wait just a second, you'll understand what I'm talking about." Moving to the large central desk lifted higher than the rest, Ester briefly glanced at the numerous buttons and dashes on its surface before spotting a compatible serial he could fit the USB in.
And after a brief moments wait while Eva did her thing. A shocked voice echoed out of the speakers around him right before it was forcefully cut off.
"You see what I'm saying? This is beautiful"
[No... I'm... Yeah it's beautiful but... It's better if you see it for yourself. I can't explain it.]
Raising an eyebrow at the strangely shocked voice, Ester looked at the large black screen which blinked to life alongside all of its miniature compatriots.
And after a brief buffer period where Ester felt the remaining energy in the base go to fuel the reawakening computers, the first lines of words began to appear on the big screen.
Exile List: Criminals: Latest Time Stamp {50 Years 053 Days 7 Hours 56 minutes 31 seconds}
"What the..." Blinking at the absurd timestamp, the Exile List shifted from the criminals list to the Citizens subsection
Exile List: Civilians: Latest Time Stamp {7 Hours 56 minutes 35 seconds}
"For fifty years... No criminals have been sent to this planet?" Letting out a sound of disbelief at the absurdity of the fact that zero criminals had been sent here for FIFTY ARCHITECT DAMNED YEARS Eva whispered through the Center's speakers.
[And that's not all. Look at this]
Bringing up more data onto the big screen, the smaller computers flashed with life as they went through section after section, bringing up more and more data it had received before its eventual abandonment.
Reason for Criminal absence from Exile list: Sent to combat the Void on the Border of the Maginum Kingdom
-Evacuate all essential personnel and purge data banks before-
Elaborate-
-act as Buffer-
-Buy some time-
-will continue to accept civilians-
-to keep civilians away from Northern hemisphere-
-nearly complete-
-All the Nobles warned-
Ester collapsed onto the swivel chair, a multitude of thoughts flowing through his shocked mind.
Eventually, he settled on one concrete thought.
'What the fuck.'
For fifty years no Criminals had been sent to what Ester now knew as trash planet E2073 because of some sort of war with the Void that the Maginum Kingdom was fighting.
He could understand that.
The fact that the entire planet was designated to be destroyed...
Ester couldn't understand that.
Ripping the planet from its orbit around the Host star just to Buffer the Void invasion for a few weeks?
Ester could understand it.
Evacuating all of their essential personnel and leaving behind some of the non essential personnel which were probably not liked by their upper brass?
Ester could understand it.
What he couldn't understand was the fact that despite knowing this planet was destined to be destroyed by the Void when it was launched out of its orbit and towards it, Nobles continued to send Civilians that caught their wrath here.
To a place where they would die.
The fact that they knew they could just execute them normally but decided to send them here to suffer just a bit longer before they died of the Void?
Ester let out a bark of laughter and held his head in his hands.
50 years worth of people.
'50 years worth of innocents fucked by higher powers'
Esters eye twitched
'Now I know what that dream is talking about when the Stars blink.'
With the void devouring even the starlight reaching the Earth, it did seem as if the Stars blinked.
'I also now know what I want to do when I escape this Architect- No. People Forsaken rock' Ester corrected himself with a blaze in his ashen eyes.
'I want to kill all those Nobles who continue to condemn more and more lives to this Hellhole'
Ester's hands crunched both sides of the swivel chair
'I get the idea of wanting to punish someone, but the idea of playing with their lives like a God!?'
Ester suppressed an ugly laugh from escaping his mouth.
'That's so fucking insane that I just want to crunch the neck of whoever was involved in sending all those innocents to this planet.'
But to do that, Ester would need to get off planet first.
And despite what it seemed like, outside of a Modded Gravitator, Ester was still far from his dream of getting off planet.
Ester's eyes turned towards to a portion of the screens detailing the location of the Super rockets meant to careen E2073 off its orbit.
'But I might just know a better way of getting off of this planet instead of just making it.'
Ester shoved the chair away from him, both of its arms crumpled underneath his grip.
"Maginum Kingdom was it? If you think innocents sent to this place are equal to the criminals sent here 50 years ago, I think I'll take you up on your offer and become a Criminal."
A flash of blue sparked in his eyes as he glared at the numerous screens.
"I'll be the Architect of your doom."
+++
I felt inspired Tree