Chapter Five

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Commander Verity followed behind the group, uniform stitched and carrying a cloak around her shoulders. She had fiddled with her com unit and listened in on conversations, able to send small messages in Morse code to the ship. She had gotten confirmation that the ship was being repaired and that they were pleased to hear from her. They gave her a better location of where the ship had landed along with detailed reports on what was happening. She asked that they do a scan over of the AI, Loki. When done to send reports over the com for her to communicate with Loki directly about what the scans stated. The order was confirmed with a verbal answer to her morse code, as well as a verbal answer from Loki who felt that he needed to add his own two cents into the conversation as he was being talked about by gossiping girls, as he called them.

She was even told that Rok had headed out on several occasions to put up satellites for communication between her and the ship so that it would be easier to hear them by. She had several weird looks from the dwarrow, as she learned they were named when grouped together, as she seemed to be speaking to herself, but she gave them no explanation for the unusual happening.

"What do you think she is doing when she is speaking in that weird language of hers?" Fili asked his uncle as the two stood watch during the night. They were both watching the way the woman seemed to have settled down and was fiddling with a device in her hand that she kept putting to her ear and listening before responding to whatever was being transmitted to her.

"Nothing good." Was Thorin's reply as they watched her fix her chest plating and massage ointment into the metal of her lower legs. Bilbo feeling that the others were going to continue to ignore their new comrades in arms stood up from the stump that he was sitting on, dusting off his pants he moved over to her.

"Hello!" Bilbo stated, waving half heartedly at the woman. Bofour and Ori joined him soon after. Followed by Kili and Fili who sat farther away from her. She arched an eyebrow at Bilbo and the others as they seated themselves.

"What can I do for yer lot?" She asked, some dried jerky half chewed in her mouth as she observed them watching her. She had been working on the com and listening in on conversations while she ate a small meal of dried jerky. Something that she had found in her pocket, forgotten from past exploits on the rings.

"What are you doing with that round thing?" Bilbo asked, for the group. The others leaned over more curiously to look at the device. Verity looked down at the com and back up at Bilbo, blinking almost owlishly at him.

"It is my communication device to the ship. We call it coms for short. They are shortwave radio frequencies that allow us to broadcast sound waves a certain distance to another object that can redirect the soundwave into a readable noise. The ship has set up small floating satellites all over the sky from the ship just about one hundred miles west of it, so that we can be in radio contact while I move closer to it. The closer I am the stronger the signal." Verity stated. The dwarrow and Bilbo looked at each other and then at her confused. Verity bit her lip to see if she could dumb it down any further for them to understand. She had noticed that the technology here was pretty limited and almost ranked into the human's middle ages. She brightened as she saw the bowl filled with water.

The group watched as she motioned them to follow her and they stood up and did so, coming to stand around the bowl of water that was sitting over the firepit. She picked a smoothed rock from her pocket something that she had picked up from a riverbank from a distant destroyed planet long ago when she had been younger and fresh from the core. "Okay watch." She told them as she dropped the stone into the water creating ripples along the surface. "See those ripples, they happen every time that something is dropped into an object right?" She stated. The group nodded, Thorin and several of the other dwarrow moved closer to watch her demonstration as well.

"Those ripples also happen in sound, if you place your hand over your throat and speak you can feel the vibrations happening. Those are the same as the ripples in the water. They go through the air as well and can be conducted by electricity and certain types of metals that act as conductors. These allow the vibrations to travel for longer than a short distance, which cause vibrations along the wire. In some cases it hums with the electricity and vibrations." She stated.

"How is that possible?" Oin asked, looked down at the pebble now rippling with bubbles from the hot water. Verity reached in with her left hand and pulled the pebble out, causing Oin to cry out at that, and yanked her clenched hand over to him so he can see the extent of the damage done to it. "You foolish lass, what were you thinking that is hot water?" Oin yelled, causing the others to become more alert as well. They had all been stunned by her action, lulled by her voice. He uncurled her fingers and saw that no damage was done to the arm or hand. He turned her hand one way and then the other. "I don't understand?" Oin grumbled to himself, then to her. Thorin looked over his shoulder at the undamaged limb.

"That arm is artificial Oin." Verity reminded him. "It is just metal and electricity running through it, energized by my body's movement and brain waves." She told him, gently pulling her palm back and placing the cooling rock back into her pocket. The group dispersed leaving behind Bilbo and the younger dwarrow.

"So you are able to communicate with your group through that little circle of metal?" Fili asked. Verity nodded her head sitting back down to where her bed roll was, as a nice gift from the elves along with her cloak and mended uniform had been. Verity had been a little shocked at the items but grateful to them all the same.

"That was absolutely fabulous. What other things have your people done?" Bilbo asked excitedly. Verity smiled softly at him and shook her head in the negative.

"I think that would be best left out of this, Bilbo." She said, looking at the older dwarrow all huddled together speaking about her little demonstration. Bilbo followed her gaze and nodded his head in understanding.

"Tomorrow we head through the Misty Mountains!" Thorin told the group, looking over everyone.

"Gandalf told us to wait for him!" Bilbo stated. Thorin turned to glare at him.

"We don't have time to wait for him, our time is short and waiting will take up to much of it." Thorin stated.

"Waiting never takes up too much time, it can be the edge between life or death." Verity stated over the others. Thorin looked at her and turned away deciding not to listen to the woman in the first place. After all what does a woman know of?

"Tomorrow we start through the Misty Mountains." Thorin states again and turned away to take first watch.