"Hey, barkeep," Qrow sobered up immediately, "How're you getting a signal from Vacuo? I thought the CCT got destroyed in Vale?"
"They're not using the CCT," the woman scoffed, placing down another cup that she just cleaned, Qrow looked at her quizzically, "The VBC is a local news network exclusive to Vacuo, you'd be hard pressed to find any broadcasts outside of the continent," the barkeep smirked, pointing at the TV, "That's old news, about a week ago I think."
A week? Qrow mulled over the implications, "You still haven't answered my question."
"Ah, right, well somehow the Vacuans developed their own version of the CCT, albeit more primitive," Qrow's eyes widened as the barkeep chuckled at his reaction, "Yeah, that was my reaction too! Probably because of that Courrier guy they're always talking about."
"Wait, then why is the TV showing news from a week ago?" A week… Qrow wracked his brain to find the significance in that date.
"As I said, primitive version of the CCT, it doesn't have the same speed or convenience as the old one," she pulled out a chair and sat down, a fair distance away from Qrow and on the other side of the bar table, "My sister lives in Vacuo, normally she'd send me pictures via her Scroll but since the whole network's down…" she pulled out a few printed pictures, Qrow looked over them to see a radio tower constructed atop a Vacuan house, "She said that that Courrier guy rounded up everyone who had Semblances that were useful for construction and planned out this whole thing."
She tapped the picture, "In about a week, they've made a transmission tower," the barkeep laughed, "Its tiny compared to the real thing, and it acts like it too," she leaned back on her seat, "Goes offline during daytime in Vacuo and reactivates whenever night falls, also in Vacuo."
This is impossible, Qrow opened his mouth but hesitated, the barkeep continued, "That means I have to monitor Vacuo's time zone pretty regularly too," she grumbled, "These Vacuans, always so crafty aren't they?"
A week, wait! Courrier and his team stayed over at Tai's house for two days before leaving… and that was two, maybe two and a half weeks ago… "Where are they getting the power for this?" Qrow asked, looking down at the picture. If he got it right… a bullhead flight to Menagerie from patch should take a day at least, and who knows how long they stayed there…
"'Solar panels', whatever they are," the barkeep took the pictures back, shoving them in her pocket, "My sister said that these 'panels' take in the energy from the sun and convert that into electricity," Qrow raised an eyebrow, "Believe me, I have no clue how it works too, but it makes sense somewhat… maybe…" the barkeep scratched her head, "Still, generating electricity from sunlight? What kinda mumbo jumbo magic bullshit do they have over in Vacuo?"
"I mean, Vacuo gets a lot of sunlight, and they can conserve energy whenever the signal goes offline…" Qrow rubbed his stubble, "Huh, it does make sense," he took a sip from his drink, "I wonder why they don't use Dust though, isn't that more effective?"
"You're asking the wrong person pal, I don't know a thing about this kind of stuff," the barkeep shrugged, "If you want to know more, the CCT might be down but newspapers sure as hell aren't," she motioned towards the newspaper stand, they still have those here? "All the major news networks are working with the printing press now, it's like we're reverting back decades ago!" She barked out a laugh, "There are some recent stuff there; they drop them off weekly so you'll have lots to read through."
Qrow stood up and picked up some newspapers, heh, now that just makes him feel old. He read the date, three days ago, so not terribly recent. Qrow scanned the headlines, 'Vacuo to impose trade embargo with Mistral with heavy restrictions in Anima. Mistral's officials outraged' and 'Vacuo's economy on the rise. Data shows a meteoric increase since the end of the Great War.'
A trade embargo? On what? Vacuo barely has anything to trade with Mistral, let alone prevent a trade completely… Qrow turned the page to read more about the situation; apparently, Vacuo's preventing the trade of 'barrel cactus fruit', 'broc flowers', and 'coyote tobacco chew' from reaching Mistralian markets. So herbs and fruits? Why would Mistral need herbs and fruits from Vacuo of all places?
…How are they growing these things in the first place? The cactus fruit thing Qrow could see how that came about but flowers? Tobacco? Don't these things need fertile dirt to grow on? Vacuo's full of sand!
Another headline, 'Vacuo Reclamation Project, Courrier's plan to restore the lands to what it once was' written two days ago, Qrow began reading the newspapers, flipping through headline after headline, trying to see what Courrier was up to. The news were mostly about things like the new transmission tower and the new products that Vacuo's exporting to the other kingdoms, except for Mistral because of 'political reasons' stated by Courrier himself.
'For too long have we let Anima and more specifically Mistral walk all over us,' said Mr. John Courrier as he addressed the public in a recent press conference for the Vacuo Broadcasting Company and other news networks, 'If they won't deal with their rampant bandit problems which affects us too, then they can kiss goodbye to our goods and services.' Read the newspaper, Qrow narrowed his eyes; this doesn't seem like the brash, crazy, and insane Courrier that he knew back in Beacon.
…By all intents and purposes, that transmission tower shouldn't work, it CAN'T work, period! The CCT in Vale was a marvel of engineering that took talented workers and scientists' years to develop and perfect… and Courrier can create a shittier version of the thing in a week? It's shittier, yes, but it works like the real thing… the damn transmission tower looks like it's held together by tape, spit, and dreams for gods' sake!
Qrow sighed and took another sip out of his drink, Ruby has yet to reach Higanbana yet so he still have time to goof around somewhat. Yang's coming too apparently, he felt bad for Tai, realizing how the man must feel when both of his daughters just run off like that to Haven.
The Courier travelled across America multiple times in the eleven years he had freed up after the Sierra Madre, discovering and raiding Vaults all across the country was his favourite past time for a while. But even then that got boring quickly. A couple of Vaults still had people in them, so he can't really go in there without looking like a common raider. He visited this one Vault in the Northeast some time back, there were a bunch of weird pods with frozen people in them and everything, everyone else was dead though and there wasn't anything cool for him to take so he just left.
These Vaults hold valuables too, Vault 8 had a bunch of water chips that he snatched for himself, and Vault 13 had a GECK lying around randomly, well, not randomly, he had to dig through miles of rubble to get to the thing. The Courier stood proudly, watching the transmitter tower with a smile on his face; the thing was constructed out of salvaged Securitron electronics and spare scrap metal, the entire thing was hooked up to a RobCo terminal too, since he's more used to that instead of Remnant's weird Scroll things.
There are many things that the Courier doesn't know however, and one of the major things was how the transmitter tower is operating. Normally, it shouldn't have worked, in a normal world; the tower would be completely inept and would not work at all. But why is it working? The RobCo satellite lodged on the moon, that's how. The Securitron electronics used in the construction of the tower are RobCo, and as such, would naturally attract and connect with other RobCo devices, i.e. the satellite up on the moon.
Robert House was a very shrewd business man; and a very competitive one too, often resorting to dirty under-the-radar tricks to outplay his rivals. One such trick was making sure that RobCo stays on top in the technological and communications market via hijacking other signals and connecting them with RobCo's machinery. Vale's CCT tower acted at the 'Central hub' so to speak, as all signals from outside kingdoms pass through there before being connected to the other side.
These signals are now RobCo's. And there's a RobCo satellite sitting above Remnant. As such, Vacuo now becomes the new 'Central hub' as the transmission tower built in the city holds the most important piece to this puzzle. A functioning RobCo terminal. Even with all of this, the tower only goes online whenever the moon is in view, as the satellite can't reach Vacuo when it's day time.
Still, for such a thing to occur would require an astronomical amount of luck… yeah, luck. The tower was also larger than Shade Academy's because fuck them, Vacuo needs to differentiate itself from such terrible outside influence… Huntsmen are a Vale invention anyways…
The Courier walked over to the sharecropper farm that was set up using the GECK he had in storage, a collection of Barrel Cactus Fruits, Coyote Tobacco Chew, Broc Flowers, and Xander Roots were being grown there. The crops acclimated surprisingly well to Vacuo's climate, probably because of the region's similarity to the Mojave, which helped them thrive even more than before. The water chip was put in use too; Vacuo city was built on top of a large underground water reserve that the locals were using wells to pull from.
Unfortunately, the extensive exploitation of Vacuo's resources led to the water being contaminated, but no longer! As the Courier swept in with his magical 'inventions' and saved the day once again. A water purification system was created with the water chip at its forefront. Power was easy to come by, the people used Dust to power generators and electricity, but the cost of the damn things meant that Vacuo's always constantly relying on other kingdoms to export the Dust to Vacuo, which normally came with high taxes, looking at you Atlas.
Remembering HELIOS One, the Courier, along with the many Vacuan volunteers that he swayed to the workforce with his expert speech skills, developed solar panels based on the Courier's memory of fixing them at HELIOS One and the Nellis AFB. After all, if you know how to repair it, then you should know how to make it.
The farmers waved at Courrier with a smile on their faces, it was nearly evening now, and that means that everyone's doing their best for the city. Night time means activating the transmitter tower, which is a worse substitute for Vale's CCT but a substitute nonetheless.
The Courier thought about Vacuo for a moment, and how he and his team had changed it. In exchange for turning Vacuo city into a better, safer, more prosperous place, the Vacuans have now become incredibly xenophobic against the outside kingdoms. Race no longer matters in Vacuo, Faunus or human; you're fine as long as you come from Vacuo.
The Courier's team received some harassment when the locals found out that they weren't from Vacuo, Mint and Johan were from Mistral while Greenhorn was from Menagerie. Of course, the people soon realized that they were with the Courier and relented, giving them the title of 'honorary Vacuan' since they're helping Vacuo thrive and prosper. Hilarious.
The Courier thought about using the GECK he had to terraform the surrounding area but decided not to, it's like taking away sand from the Mojave, it just doesn't feel right.
"The Tower's coming online!" the Courier announced to everyone as he typed on to the RobCo terminal, "Remember to conserve electricity! Vacuo have to, and will become fully sustainable and independent! Free of any outside interference!"
The people cheered, not as much though as many are fast asleep after a long day of work. The Courier typed in the code and activated the transmitter tower, right when the shattered moon came into view, he noticed that the thing wouldn't work in the day time but would work perfectly in the night… weird... He'd have to thank the workers with Semblances too, as their Semblances allowed the job to be completed much quicker.
Although… are all Semblances focused on combat? Or are there utility Semblances like making things lighter or being smarter than the average Joe?
He turned towards Shade Academy, so far, no words from the Headmaster just yet. Probably because the man was afraid that he'd be crucified the moment he showed his face in the city. The Crown also hasn't responded to the Courier's threat yet, strange, seeing as how he executed one of their members on camera.
He shrugged; they'll probably show up soon.
GECKs are strange, so are water chips. I find it weird how they don't show up after Fallout 3. Especially the water chip, they don't even get mentioned after Fallout 2!
Vacuo's getting more and more problematic by the day, and the Mojave's crops and fauna have found their way into the continent! Soon enough, Stimpaks will be sold as a commodity at a high price, all a part of the Courier's 'become Remnant's first quadrillionaire' plan.
Stay on that grind brothers, one day, you too can become a duovigintillionaire.
Thanks for reading!