Two sleek, blue ovals stared out from a hollow head. Just a casing; it was for aesthetics, mostly. The real focus was the inside; circuits and breadboards, steel joints and synthetic tendons. All came together to form a body, legs, a curious sort of animatronic creature. Kayleer was far from finished, though he'd started the basic work on it almost two years ago. It was a nice change from the assignments in his earlier years; a self-guided project, with very loose parameters to work from. There was freedom, he could build anything he wanted. The only downside was how much weighed on it.
It was a dissertation, of sorts. If he passed, his apprenticeship would end and he would be a fully fledged engineer. If he failed, he would have to try again, with a new project. Two years of work would be wasted.
Almost a decade had elapsed since the day when V-Jme had so casually thrown him that mechanical arm. Training took a long time, as did most things in Luminoth culture. It was one of the consequences of their longevity. Kayleer used to find himself quite frustrated with this; he was impatient. But the longer he lived, the more patience he gained. Nevertheless, failure was a very real threat, one which he still had trouble contending.
"So, what's it do again?" A-Vei asked, chiming in Aetherian. The days had long passed when Kayleer needed mental translation; spoken words came naturally now, both to and from him.
"It fixes things," he answered, trying to garner focus despite the thoroughly distracting presence of his friend.
"Uhuh, so like the prosthetic of an overly curious alien?"
"If it finds one, yes," Kayleer said jokingly. He hadn't broken his arm again since that one day so long ago, and yet it clung in both their memories; it was the day they'd first met. First impressions lasted, he supposed.
The inner body was nearing completion, wirey and ungainly as it was without its protective outer shell. It would need to be streamlined, to avoid entanglement of any kind, especially when inside another, larger machine. Kayleer's proposal had been simple; a personal maintenance unit. Maintenance robots existed already, certainly, but were often specialized to patch up parts for a single, large structure. Kayleer's creation would have a memory equipped with schematics and blueprints for over 15,000 known machines, and would be able to effectively repair any of them. An efficient and versatile model that would be able to operate on a huge number of other machines.
"I just uploaded the layout of your thesis machine, that's another thing it will be able to repair," Kayleer said, a hint of jealousy in his voice. A-Vei had already passed, earning his title as a Master. His had been a pollutant-purging pod that he let loose in Agon, the area of the last phazon reserves. There it had consumed nearly every particle of the stuff present on Aether's surface, and the supply of phazon had dwindled to nearly nothing. As a result, the pirates stationed there had long since abandoned. His creation had been so successful that many models were made and dispersed throughout Aether.
"Hm, that would be useful, I suppose, if anything I built ever broke," A-Vei said, mockingly conceited.
"You're even starting to sound like V-Jme," Kayleer laughed.
"Careful, he has eyes and ears everywhere, and unlike me you still need to be on his good side if you want to pass," A-Vei joked, gesturing his hands menacingly.
He laughed good naturedly, ignoring the taunt. "I'll pass, don't worry," Kayleer said confidently.
"I'm not the one who's worrying," he retorted. "When I did mine, I took my time. I spaced out work and I took days off. I went outside. There's no rush you know, there isn't a deadline for this."
"I know," Kayleer answered simply. He was right, he knew, but Kayleer didn't like taking breaks.
"You should take a day off, soon, you know, we'll be having visitors. Friendly ones, for once," A-Vei said excitedly.
"I would hardly call the Federation friendly," Kayleer said coldly.
"They're only coming to "establish relations,", help out, gather information, that's all," A-Vei quoted.
"Yeah? What do you think that means? They're at war, they want weapons, they want our technology," he spat pessimistically.
"U-Mos made his position on that clear; they get nothing. They can visit, talk, investigate prior pirate activity, and leave, that's it."
"What we give them does not matter, they will still want."
A-Vei only shrugged. "I think we can handle it," he looked off into the sky, seeming to contemplate something. "Well anyways, I'm curious to meet a human, aren't you?"
"Not even a little," Kayleer answered dully. "Besides, they hate pirates." He wasn't entirely sure how much like a pirate he still looked, but he certainly didn't look like a Luminoth, and he never fully would.
A-Vei sighed. "You're so boring sometimes."
"Boring gets work done," he retorted, fiddling with a circuit and making sure it was in its proper place.
"Then why'd I finish first?" A-Vei asked slyly.
"You started sooner."
"Right, how much sooner, exactly? Was it two weeks? And I finished months ago," he taunted.
Kayleer sighed, thoroughly peeved. "Is there a point to this conversation?"
"Yes, to convince you to try something new for once."
Kayleer growled. He didn't want to. But his friend was relentless and it was only due to his constant nagging that he finally gave in. The Federation would land in two days, and he would be there.