The Mech Touch

"So this is the alien battleship that you spent so much effort into defeating." Gloriana spoke as she stepped out of the shuttle.

"Wooow! Everything is so big!" Andraste looked awed as her tiny, suited form bounced out of the vehicle that brought them to one of the more intact hangar bays of the half-ruined battleship. "Where are the aliens?!"

"We've collected and set aside the bodies of most of the aliens we have on the ship." Ves calmly spoke as he looked around the hangar bay himself. "It is inconvenient for our men to move around the ship while trying to avoid the occasional bodies in the way. The nunsers are all rather big and some of the other species that inhabited this vessel are even greater in size. They can pose quite the hazard."

Andraste ran up to Ves' armored form and grasped his leg as if it was a stuffed animal. Her transparent helmet did nothing to hide her big and pleading eyes.

"You will show me them, right? I want to touch them! I want to touch a real live nunser! They are so big and fluffy!"

"Don't worry, my cute little pumpkin. I will bring you to them soon enough. We will have to go much further into the ship, though. We stuffed most of them into the cells of the ship for safekeeping. After all, even if we are pretty sure that they are all braindead, we can never tell for certain that a species is able to come back due to a quirk of their alien biologies. There are also a bunch of particularly hardy aliens who have managed to survive all of the battle formation attacks."

Visiting them and examining their remarkable conditions was one of his key objectives for this tour through the intact remains of the alien battleship.

Though it was not entirely wise to tour through a completely alien vessel that had only recently been captured, Ves and the rest did not have much choice.

Master Goldstein and a large group of mechers were already on their way to the Ramage Repulsor System to take possession of the alien vessel.

Ves would have no opportunity to experience the exotic alien ambiance of this potent ship by that time!

Ves, Gloriana along with their three children proceeded to exit the hangar bay and move into a wide and broad hallway. An abundant number of honor guards surrounded them at all times in case a hidden alien defense mechanism came online.

"It's much bigger here than on our own ship." Marvaine said as he strode forward while holding his mother's hand. "Why is it so big?"

"That is because this homeship is built to accommodate the largest alien species that are expected to serve on her." Gloriana answered. "The nunsers are already large by our standards, but there are many other creatures that can easily grow bigger and heavier than them. The phase whales are a good example, but those are beasts who do not bother to work with warships to begin with. They are practically their own warships."

The little boy was completely enthralled by what he heard. "Oooh. That is so cool. Won't all of this space make the ship less powerful?"

Gloriana smiled lovingly at her son. "That is an excellent observation. To some degree, you are correct. Manned starships are made up of lots of compartments stacked together. They are like boxes that can be as large as you desire. A more expansive box is convenient because it holds more items and can accommodate more organisms, but it can also take up precious space for parts that can do useful work, such as shield generators. This alien vessel is therefore less efficient as a whole when compared to an equivalent human warship."

"So being big has its downsides." Aurelia spoke as she held Clixie in her arms.

"Miaow~!" The Rubarthan Sentinel Cat agreed while flipping her suited tail!

"It does." Ves acknowledged. "Take a look at a puelmer homeship. Their vessels are much smaller than those built by the nunsers. While there are many cultural and practical reasons why the puelmers prefer to build sub-capital oval-shaped ships, their small sizes make it much more convenient to stuff more parts in the same amount of volume. A thousand puelmers occupies as little as a third of the space of a thousand humans. Not only that, but these little aliens are also a lot smarter and more proficient at their jobs on average, so their productivity is actually higher. That is why none of their compact homeships should be underestimated."

"Can humans like us even walk inside a puelmer ship?" Andraste curiously asked.

"Mostly, no." Ves shook his head. "The puelmers generally don't design their vessels to accommodate the sizes of other alien species. This is actually a clever defense and anti-boarding measure. None of our footsoldiers can squeeze in side their corridors and their helmets would constantly collide against the ceiling if they happen to enter a sizeable enough compartment."

The diverging sizes of the interior of a starship was therefore a good way to judge her 'alienness'. The more the compartments and passageways different from typical human proportions, the inhuman they became.

The alien battleship that they had set foot on was definitely on the weirder side!

There were plenty of alien oddities and curiosities to hold their interest. From the old layout of the hallways to the repeated molded metal artwork that displayed different aliens in strange poses, the children never had an opportunity to get bored.

The first big compartment they entered held one of the orven shield generators that had given the Golden Skull Alliance a lot of grief.

"The model shares a passing resemblance to the shield generators of the orven pirate battleship that we defeated more than a month ago." Gloriana remarked. "This one is smaller but more refined."

She sounded as if she badly wanted to pull it out of its current place and bring it back so that she could install the shield generator onto the Spirit of Bentheim!

However, she knew better than to rely on alien and indecipherable technology. It also wasn't wise to damage it as the MTA most certainly wanted to keep it intact.

Andraste curiously moved closer and pressed her suited palm against the dull metal surface. "Will we have shield generators as strong as these on our own ships?"

"In the future." Ves promised. "We can obtain a couple for our own use, but we need to become proper first-raters if we want to cover all of our starships with solid protection."

"Oh."

"I can't do it alone, my dear." He spoke. "Our clan needs to rely on you and your fellow siblings to get us there. Both your mother and father are counting on you to do well in the coming years."

"Huh?"

"Do you recall what we talked about some time ago? You need to do well in the schools that you will attend in the future. Now that we have rescued Lord Pearian Yorul-Tavik, we can expect to gain a lot of gratitude from the Yorul-Tavik Clan. That means that we can cash in a lot of favors. It will be easy to enroll you into excellent first-class virtual schools. The Yorul-Taviks might even be generous to take care of the high tuition fees and the cost of the extremely expensive school materials that you will all require."

Long-standing organizations that rely heavily on trade to make their living valued their credibility like nothing else. It was much harder for them to stay in business for multiple centuries if they had a history of reneging on their debts or screwing over their business partners!

The only way to break the game was to possess enough strength to disregard the consequences of doing so, but it was clear that no power from the relatively small and insignificant Omter Republic qualified.

As such, Minister Shederin Purnesse told Ves that the Yorul-Tavik Clan would be particularly eager to repay its debts to the Golden Skull Alliance.

Compared to all of the difficult demands that Ves could issue, asking for his kids to get an easy entry into the appropriate first-class virtual schools was a trivial matter!

Of course, the children in question would not be able to get a free ride once they got in. If they failed to keep up with their demanding studies, then not even the Yorul-Tavik Clan could prevent them from getting booted.

This was why Aurelia and Andraste still needed to complete their intensive tutoring programs before Ves could think about enrolling them into any fancy first-class virtual school.

Ves knelt in front of his children. "This is an opportunity that your father and many other friends and family risked their lives to obtain for you. I know that I am putting a heavy burden on all of your shoulders, but please study hard and do what is best for yourselves, not just our clan. Once you become a first-class professional, the upper layer of human society becomes open to you all. That is a privilege that your father and mother never got to enjoy."

"We will do our best, papa." Aurelia said as she drew closer to hug her father's armor.

"Miaow." Clixie concurred even though she had nothing to do with this matter.

"Me too!" Andraste joined in on the hug.

"Don't forget about me!" Marvaine yelled as his little legs brought him forward.

Their mother hesitated for a moment before she decided to bend down and join the group hug.

Warmth and love flowed through their bodies. No amount of protective equipment could stop them from sharing their affection with each other!

Ves pulled his body back but maintained his smile. "Great. I hope you will all succeed, but don't worry too much. If the study load becomes too much for you, it will be fine if you transfer to a more laid-back school. As your mother and I have already proven, a lower starting point is not necessarily a death sentence. You can always climb your way up as long as you are brilliant and hard-working enough. You just need to climb a longer ladder."

He and his wife had become a lot more serious about this matter after the conclusion of the latest battle.

Not only were they thinking about giving their three current children a first-class education trajectory, they also wanted to plan ahead for their subsequent three offspring.

It would take a lot of time for the Larkinson Biotech Institute to develop its own designer baby formulas, but once this important project yielded results, Ves and Gloriana planned to complete their collection with the help of their own homegrown templates.

In no way should the quality of their younger three children be inferior to their older siblings. It would probably not be easy to meet this standard, but Ves was confident that his clan's unique specialties might give his future kids an edge over the competition.

Anyway, Ves could think about this later. He still had to complete a tour.

"Do you want to look at aliens now?" Ves asked his kids.

"Yes!"

"Let's go!"

The group left the shield generator and moved to a cell block where a large amount of prisoners had been stuffed.

They entered a cell where a dozen or so puelmers had been left on the floor like discarded trash.

The only reason why these braindead aliens were physically fine was because their round, protective suits took care of their basic needs.

"Eeeww. They're so gross." Auralia scrunched her nose in disgust. "They look so ugly in reality."

Andraste looked like she wanted to kick one of the puelmers as if he or she was an oversized football, but she was still too young and weak to make this a comfortable experience.

Ves on the other hand moved to the nearest puelmer body and fiddled with the alien's armored suit until it peeled away.

"What are you doing, Ves?" Gloriana asked in confusion.

"I am judging the grade of the puelmer skin."

"What? Wait..."

Ves grinned as he withdrew a sharp skinning knife from his toolbelt. "Don't you remember? A good piece of grade A puelmer hide can sell for as much as hundreds of MTA credits! Besides, have you ever thought about crafting your own handbags?"

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