Chapter 141

Fleet!

It had been fourteen days since Lucas had started construction. First, he had brought out the cradle-free fabricator. Then he took out the ARD and the anti-matter generator. Next, he hooked up the power cables for the fabricator and ARD to the anti-matter generator. After that, it was time to start on the construction part.

First, Lucas ordered Chu Shen, Aslo, and Chrissa to gather together a bunch of rock and dirt. Pouring that into the ARD, Lucas gained the raw materials he needed to create more ARDs. Activating the fabricator, an ARD started to come to life. A day later it was complete. Hooking up this ARD to the generator, Lucas started building another fabricator identical to the one he had but much bigger.

This one was easily the size of a building. It was actually ten different fabricators synchronized together to construct one item. Each fabricator would focus on building one piece of the ship at a time, accomplishing what the original fabricator could do in a fraction of the time. It could also make multiple ships at once if the ships were small enough.

The ship types that could be built with this one were expanded, allowing it to make battleships, carriers, and destroyers.  The original fabricator could only make cruisers and fighters. destroyers were too big, unless the fabricator was able to move around the frame. Using the fabricators, Lucas started making more ARDs. After he had created a total of eight, he went back to the fabricators.

He made one Mega-Fabricator which could make dreadnoughts. Then he made a total of sixteen Large-Fabricators and ten fabricators the size of the original one. Finally, Lucas was done preparing for the building phase. By now, all of his devices took up as much space as a small town. The time taken up by making the fabricators and ARDs was ten days. The other four days had been spent calibrating the equipment.

Pulling up ship designs, Lucas started to ponder over what to build. Using the combat records from the recent attack provided by the A.I., Lucas was able to find out just how advanced the invaders were. Compared to the ships of Sparta, they were indeed extremely crude.

He took a while before deciding exactly what he was going to build. He also consulted with Chu Shen for a while as well. Within an hour of getting it done, Lucas had decided what direction he was going to take his fleet.

First off, the main force he was going to be using would not be the large capital ships but rather small fighters. They were easier to build and a lot faster, too.

Lucas had designs for advanced fighter-craft like the sniper drone. It was a small fighter that used a Tachyon cannon. Tachyons were particles that moved faster than light. Normally, they could not interact with things in the physical universe, but with some tinkering, Sparta had found a way to do so. Because it moved instantaneously, it was only limited to line of sight.

Lucas also had designs for a shield drone. It was a fighter that would be able to link up its forcefields. By synchronizing them together, the strength of them would increase over tenfold. Combining these two together would make for a lethal combination. They could pick off the entire fleet of ships from a distance while shielding themselves from return fire.

His battleships would have thick armor and powerful shields. They would also be equipped with railguns and plasma turrets. Their plasma turrets had the capability to manipulate the projectiles even after they launched them, though only in a short area. Lucas predicted the railguns would throw them for a loop.

The enemy ships had forcefields, but from Lucas’ analysis of the records, he found that they were not designed for blocking kinetic attacks. Most of their ships used lasers and plasma, both of which were energy weapons. As a result, their defensive capabilities focused mostly on energy weapons and ignored kinetic weapons such as railguns.

The carriers Lucas designed to be lightly armored. Instead of being heavily plated, they would have cloaking devices to disguise themselves as asteroids, allowing them to avoid most of the fight. The carriers would store metal and miniature fabricators, allowing them to repair the fighters as soon as they flew in.

Finally, there was the destroyers. They would have multiple plasma turrets meant for destroying fighters and missiles. Their main job would be to protect the battleships from being destroyed.

The destroyers would also have one enormous plasma gun running the entire length of the ship, allowing them to live up to their name. They would be able to use this enormous weapon for long range artillery strikes, but it would be too draining to use this and defend the battleships.

Everything he designed would run off H20 Reactors, meaning they only required water to run. However, there was was one slight issue. There was no one to pilot all of the ships. Of course, nothing he made actually had room for a pilot either. Instead, they all had room for a positronic brain, onto which Lucas would upload a primitive A.I.. The A.I. would be pre-programmed with combat maneuvers so as to allow them combat capability.

All of the ships would have QE comms, allowing for instantaneous communication without the possibility of being intercepted. With that, the drones would be able to receive instructions no matter where they were.

In order to save on space and power, Lucas only installed short range teleportation modules. It would allow the ships to jump from the fifth planet to the sixth planet in two seconds flat, allowing for some very interesting tactical options. They wouldn’t be able to chase the enemy fleet though.

Now that Lucas had the designs down, it was time for him to start building. Dedicating the Mega-Fabricator to carriers, he would be able to make two at once. Three of the Large-Fabricators were dedicated to battleships, but they could only make one at a time. Three more Large-Fabricators were assigned to destroyers and could make three at once.

The other ten Large-Fabricators started work on fighters. Each one would make 4 Sniper Drones and 2 Shield drones. The original-size fabricators, all three of them, would be busy making regular fighters. These fighters would have plasma bombs, small-caliber railguns, and lasers. They would mostly be in charge of hunting down other fighter craft.

Lucas had made it to the point where every single one of the fabricators would get done with their assignment in eight hours. With this, a formidable fleet would start to take shape. At the end of the fourteenth day, the construction of the spaceships finally started to get underway. As Lucas was filled with pride at his handiwork, two other people were starting to get mad.

Aslo slumped down on the ground, wiping the sweat from his brow as he did so. A huge pile of dirt lay behind him, next to the feet of one of the hibernating mechs and one of the ARDs. Chu Shen, who had just starting to breathe heavily, patted him on the back. “Come one Aslo, we still have more dirt to haul.”

Aslo shook his head. “Nope. Not going to do it. Honestly, why are we doing this? It’s just dirt.”

Chu Shen shook his head. “Because Lucas needs it to make spaceships to fight.”

“Then how about Lucas comes down here and moves it himself,” Aslo complained. He remembered telling Lucas that, and Lucas’ reply. “I wanted to leave. You guys want to help these aliens? Then you move the dirt. Of course, you don’t have to help, Chrissa. Just stay here so I don’t get bored, okay?”

Aslo gestured towards the dirt behind him. It was enough to fill a house with. “This is too much for us to do, and it’s just going to get worse.” He got up and groaned.  Walking up next to one of the mechs he kicked it in the leg. “Come on, you stupid tin can. Get up and help us. We’re going to fight for you, so the least you could do is move some dirt.

Suddenly, one of the mechs that had lain in rest woke up. Reaching down, it grabbed the entire pile of dirt. The voice emerged from the robot, completely understandable due to the translation program that Lucas had given it. “I will assist you, privateer, in your war efforts. Tell me where you wish to move this dirt to.”

When Aslo recovered from his shock, he let out a big smile. “Hehe. I guess Lucas is going to get the surprise of his life.”

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