DLM, Bk 6, Chapter 1

“It’s impressive what you managed to accomplish in these two years.” Nisha told me, now that she finally had time to visit in person. I had to make sure my smile did not turn into a knowing smirk, as there was a lot more to the place than the eye could see. On the surface, the work Galatea and I had accomplished was impressive but nothing out of the ordinary, if enough money and labour were invested. But that was only on the surface, beneath the soil, buried deeply into the rocks and reaching beneath the ocean, there was so much more.

“Thank you. Your father has made a lot of this possible and, if our schedule remains as is, everything will be ready for the ribbon-cutting in two months, just in time for your graduation.” I assured her, guiding her through the official, open, parts of the power-plant. The parts the world was allowed to see, where nothing hinted at the fact that beneath the surface, the power-plant was so much more. Nobody could know that the installation was doing more than supplying Kualan, the nearby town and its surrounding villages with reliable, cheap electric power and, even more importantly, clean and plentiful water, harvested from the ocean.

Below the surface, my efforts hidden within the overall construction, Galatea and I had set up shop, though our efforts were far from complete. For now, we had the foundation for future, concealed growth. Nobody would see if we continued on the construction, not with far-reaching tunnels that allowed us to acquire supplies from a warehouse in Kualan and even further reaching tunnels that let us covertly get rid of some materials. If one of the nearby hills got a little larger overnight, nobody would notice. Hopefully.

“I know, I’ve read the reports you wrote.” she gave me an amused grin that turned wry moments later, “Do you really want me to take credit for it all? Father told me he had set things up to make it look like I had been working through him but that was all you, I don’t want to steal your work.” she asked, her voice conflicted. She knew it was an awesome deal for her, letting her step into a role she was both interested in and qualified for, especially with the degree she had been pursuing, but her conscience told her taking credit for work you did not do was wrong.

“It is fine.” I assured her, before pausing, looking around with my physical body while scanning our surroundings with the dozens of cameras built into the architecture, controlled and monitored by Galatea at all times. “You know as well as I do that the Greene’s never stopped looking for me. Just two weeks ago, Khukuri told me that there was yet another, international query, trying to ascertain my location and current identity, with the claim that I had tried to blow up a transistor-station near Rhone.” I shook my head at the memory before continuing to explain. “They will never stop, so I am using you, just like you are using me, so to speak. You are the public persona, the face and mask that allows me to advance my own work. It is a trade that benefits us both, while creating a lot of benefits for the people around us and for your father. For those benefits, I will gladly give up something as ephemeral as recognition.” I finished, chuckling to myself when Galatea placed a list of incidents in Europa Magna that had been blamed on me.

If anything went wrong, it was my fault and if something might have gone wrong, it had been my fault and the brave Golden Eagles had prevented it. Given that I had not even stepped onto the continent for the last two years, it was quite impressive that they still painted me as the boogeyman, to the point that some conspiracy theorists on the internet tried to link me to the Scourge. Luckily, the Scourge-activities had slowed down over the last year, once everyone was nicely afraid and Europa Magna had been fully established they had somewhat petered out. Coincidence that.

Nisha did not look too happy with the situation and I knew that she was somewhat annoyed that I had asked to keep my presence secret, letting the Greene’s smear me as they liked. They knew about my continued existence, partially due to the existence and presence of the plane, but without comments or rebuttals, they were content to use me as a boogeyman and point fingers in any random direction, hoping I would be at the end of them.

With a shake of her head, Nisha ended that part of the conversation, her grin hinting at different topics to be entered.

“Say, did you talk to Tanisha recently?” she asked, the grin having turned into a smirk.

“I have not, not since last Christmas.” I admitted, taking the change of topic in stride, “Is she still dating Karen? Or maybe again dating Karen?” My voice was amused at the question, Karen and Tanisha had, after luckily getting out of Accord City before it was destroyed, turned to each other for comfort. That, in turn, had resulted in a steamy romance, continued at an American University until the two of them had split up over something. I was not quite keyed into the gossip, Sophia was far more interested in that, but from what she had told me, the two of them had gotten together again after that split, though there had been troubled waters at times.

Amusingly enough, Tanisha’s Father was quite supportive of them and even her mother, who had initially been very opposed to any relationship for Tanisha, had learned to accept things, especially after Tanisha had driven home that fact that her confusion over her sexuality and the desire to tell her parents about it had been the main reason she had insisted on leaving Accord Island at the time she had. Otherwise, she might have been there when it was destroyed, which Tanisha saw as a sign from a merciful God, granting her clemency for being true to herself.

“They are now engaged.” Nisha interrupted my musing, causing me to smile, despite myself. “In an odd twist of fate, Karen’s parents seem to be a little worried about the whole thing, from what I’ve heard, they are almost militant atheists and having their daughter marry a devout Christian and daughter of a preacher is not what they wanted for Karen.” she added and I managed to keep myself from face-palming, no matter how much I wanted to.

“I hope it will work out for them.” I told her, getting a grin in return.

“Speaking of significant others, where is yours?” her voice was understandably curious, Sophia had functioned as my bodyguard and Shadow during all official meetings.

“Visiting her adoptive mother, she will be back soon. Later today, in fact, her initial flight already landed and she is now on route.” No matter how much I tried, just the prospect of having Sophia back with me made my voice lighter, as I had missed her terribly for the three weeks she had been gone.

“Well, we should make sure that our business here is done before she gets here, so I can give the two of you the privacy you need.” she decided and our focus returned to the tour I had been giving her. She was right, the moment Sophia returned, I wanted to focus on her.

“This is the central core of the reactor, as you know, we are using molten salts. As you can see, no human will work in this area once the system has spun up, the entire maintenance is done remotely. The whole installation will work with minimal human interaction, only requiring security personnel and some maintenance-workers for the outer areas. The inner part is entirely hands-off, allowing us to beef up the shielding to almost obscene levels.” I explained, giving her the spiel I had prepared for regular visitors, not that many were allowed.

“You wrote about that, I remember. It’s what makes the whole design truly viable, your expertise in robotics, however you do that.” she grumbled, accepting that it was the way this installation would be working but not liking that the actual design was reliant on something kept from her. The entire robot-workforce was obviously under Galatea’s control, allowing us to use them to an extraordinary degree.

The reactor itself was less of a technical marvel, cutting edge, certainly, but it was an installation others could replicate, with the appropriate efforts. Nothing in it was fully dependent on me to function, however we had adapted the technology in such a way that the design took full advantage of the advances in material science and robotics Galatea and I had achieved. It had allowed us to change certain elements, especially the protocols for maintenance, giving us unprecedented efficiency and safety. In the focus on safety, there was one more redundancy nobody knew about, namely that beneath the rocks, hidden in my own base, were a bank of fusion-reactors, supplying my workshop but ready to take over the load, if there was ever a need to shut down. Another redundancy, just to ascertain nothing would go wrong.

Nisha’s tour was almost at its end, we had even spoken to some of the on-side personnel, when the distant cameras surveilling my warehouse showed the movement of a familiar figure, moving into the office-parts and towards the hidden tunnel leading to my base.

Sophia was back.