"Umm dear guest?"
Early in the morning just as the sun was about to rise, the Williams estate head maid Elise was making her usual rounds and had discovered Dax, her masters personal guest, sitting in the courtyard out the back of the mansion.
(He's covered in morning dew… Did he stay here all night? Is he sleeping like that?... No, it looks like he's meditating)
As the confused maid slowly neared the meditating Dax, he slowly opened his eye.
"Good morning Elise"
"G-good morning dear guest, were you here all night?"
"Sure was, is that a problem?"
"N-no, of course not. But I could've prepared a personal room for you to sleep in."
"I don't really need to sleep so it's fine, I was just meditating a bit, needed to get some frustration out of my system."
Slowly getting up Dax did some quick stretches and wiped the morning dew off his face, then started walking towards the storage room where Elise had to lead his drones to last night. As he reached the door of the garage like building a drone opened the door and he went inside.
"E-ehm dear guest can I get you some-"
Having followed nervously behind Dax, Elise also went into the room, only to find something so strange that she unconsciously stopped talking and was forced to take a second look. Inside the drones had unpacked all their luggage, and strange metal and circuitry filled about half the 50 square meter room, neatly organized in rows and piles after some unknown order. In the middle was what had drawn the stunned maids attention, some kind of round disk, about 60 centimetres in diameter, with 6 metal rods sticking out of it pointing upwards and glowing a faint red, presumingly having heated the room to its current temperature, but while it was indeed a strange machine what had drawn Elise's attention to it was what it was currently doing. About a meter above the machine several pieces of alien looking metal and circuitry were floating, seemingly completely ignoring the effect of gravity as they were heated, formed and reshaped to some sort of device by an unknown force.
"What the hell is that?"
"Pretty neat right? It's a Guardian zero gravity field forge"
"That doesn't help me"
"basically a field smeltery and manufacturing plant."
"I can see that, but why are they all… Floating like that?"
"By using several weak gravton annihilation and increasing field generators and long range induction heaters the forge can produce extremely complex machinery, right now it's working on your master's new eyes"
"Really!- excuse me, is that the case? when are they done?"
"In about a days time, the operation can be done in 2 days"
"Is that so…"
Looking at the machine with wonder for a while, the excited maid finally remembered why she had originally followed Dax.
"That's right- Is there anything I can provide for you this morning?"
"There is. I'm about to do some light morning exercise so could it be possible for you to prepare a bath for me?"
"I'll do that, would it be fine if it was ready in about an hour?"
"An hour and a half would be perfect if that's possible"
"In that case, I'll return here in one and a half hour to guide you to the bath, excuse me"
Leaving Dax behind, the loyal maid went on with her morning routine.
"Now that's done, let's test this one out"
As the maid left, a droid handed Dax his new cybernetic arm. His new arm was a bit larger than the old and looked like it was covered in plate armour with an unusually large and bulky looking forearm guard that was inscribed with the icon of the 125th combined ops orbital drop troopers, an older cruiser entering an atmosphere.
"Connect main 4"
[CONNECTING MAIN LINK #4. INTERFACING WITH STRUCTURE, ARTIFICIAL NERVE NETWORK ONLINE, ALL SYSTEMS ONLINE AND POWERED: LINK ONLINE]
As ICI connected Dax's new arm to his body a jolt went through Dax's body.
(I never get used to the feeling of connecting a new body part..)
"Okay time to test the contact interfacing and HW output, unit 2 get over here"
[ROGER.]
Following his command, one of the drones went over to Dax and he placed his new arm on its shoulder.
[CONTACT INTERFACING AT 50 GIGABITS/SEC. CHARGING AT 0.09 GIGAWATT/SEC. OPERATION OF BOTH SYSTEMS CONFIRMED.]
"And what about the scan function?"
[SYSTEM OPERATIONAL]
"Now for the ranged induction heater, best to try this one outside."
Walking outside as he continued his monologue while system testing, Dax reached the training field and pointed his hand into the empty space ahead of him.
"Deploy heating coils"
[DEPLOYING HEATING COILS, SYSTEMS NOMINAL. READY TO EXECUTE.]
With a click Dax's new palm split and 3 metal rods extended from it
"Execute."
As Dax commanded, the air about 2 meters in front of his extended hand started heating up greatly.
"Status?"
[DESIGN WORKING AS PLANNED, HEATSINK AT 0.5%]
"Stress test. Overload and keep it up until 100% capacity"
[OVERLOADING, STANDBY. STEPPING UP CENTRA REACTOR TO LEVEL 2, OUTPUT STABLE. DEPLOYING CENTRAL REACTOR COOLING SYSTEMS]
"Wait-"
Before finishing his sentence a fan like long and thin metal plate extended form Dax's back, ripping his t shirt.
"Ah I fucking knew it, ICI central reactor cooling henceforth requires my authentication."
[CONFIRMED, CONTINUING WITH STRESS TEST.]
(Oh well, it already had the hole after that rabid maids attack yesterday, might as well just recycle it)
Taking off his t shirt and ripping it apart in the process Dax handed it to a drone. For about half an hour after that, Dax continued to heat the air in front of him as he tested the function's limits.
[HEATSINK AT 100% CAPACITY]
"Suspend induction heating"
[CONFIRMED, COILS OFFLINE. STEPPING DOWN CENTRAL REACTOR TO LEVEL 1 OUTPUT, RETCACTING REACTOR COOLING SYSTEMS.]
Having his hand return to normal, Dax briefly checked its operation as the cooling unit on his back retracted and then issued his next command.
"Engage air cooling"
[ENGAGING AIR COOLING OF HEAT SINK, STAND CLEAR.]
Suddenly a long and solid looking red hot blade extended from the forearm guard.
"This seems pretty useful, is it possible to heat this up without extending the heating coils?"
[AFFIRMATIVE, FURTHERMORE STRUCTURE IS SOUND UP TILL 80% OF NOMINAL OUTPUT.]
"Oh, nice! Now for a general stress test. Load a few titans with extreme close range gear in AR for me to beat up"
[RENDERING REX-DELTA-86MK:XVII-TITAN AREA DOMINATION PLATFORM WITH LOADOUT E4. WARNING SIMULATION IS HOSTILE AND HITSCAN IS LINKED TO ARTIFICIAL NERVOUS SYSTEM, PLEASE CONFIRM SIMULATION START.]
"Start AR, pain level 5"
[SIMULATION COMMENCING. WARNING: 1 HOSTILE ENGAGING. ICI ENTERING SLEEP MODE.]
A bit later in the main roman bathhouse, a slightly nervous maid had just finished heating the bath.
"That's the bath ready, but is it too hot, or cold? I should've asked Dax how he likes his baths…"
Pondering for a bit the slightly over serious maid decided to stop asking herself questions she couldn't answer and went to find Dax.
(does he even have spare clothes? I should really think things through, hope he not gonna hate me..)
Lost in thought the most definitely over serious maid pondered if her service was gonna be satisfactory as it was the utmost importance that Dax didn't complain to Russell about her, as she had already tried to kill him once, in front of Russell.
"I should just start looking for a new job already... How did I even make it to the position of head maid?"
Reflecting on her life choices, Elise stopped her feet before reaching the training field Dax said he was gonna use for some light morning exercise she completely locked up as a result of her own doubts. That is until her curiosity trumped. In the distance, it sounded like something was pulverising stone with a sledgehammer, or a fist.
"What the hell is that noise?"
Walking closer to the sound, Elise soon realized that is must be the noise of Dax's 'light morning exercise'.
"How the fuck is this 'light exercise'..."
Having reached the training field Elise wasn't sure what she witnessed. Dax, wielding a two handed sword in one hand, was preoccupied with slaying some unseen opponent.
"Dear guest, the bath has been pre-"
Not even getting to finish her sentence, Dax suddenly threw his sword at her, impacting a meter from her feet and making a deep hole in the ground. Imitetly after that Dax quickly ran over and picked up his sword before doing a backflip and once more striking at the unseen foe.
"He didn't even see me…"
Exactly like Elise mumbled out while cleaning the dirt off her apron the moment Dax ran at Elise she clearly saw that his eye was out of focus, and he didn't seem to be aware of his surroundings.
[STAND BACK, SIMULATION IN PROGRESS.]
Before the maid realized it, one of Dax's strange golems had closed in and grabbed Elise and started to drag her away.
"Hey let me go!"
[NOT ADVISED, SIMULATION IN PROGRESS.]
"Cut the shit, I know you can talk through these rust buckets!"
[LINK OFFLINE, SIMULATION IN PROGRESS.]
"What 'simulation'?"
This time instead of answering the drone put Dax's mask on the confused maids face.
[CONNECTING AR... AR ONLINE]
As Elise's vision returned she finally saw what Dax was fighting. About 6 meters tall a giant solid looking humanoid drone wielding massive shield and sword looking weapon that suddenly split in 2 as it pointed it at Dax, and after a millisecond some kind of light shoot and pierced Dax's stomach, making him flinch.
"What the hell was that?"
[SIMULATION IN PROGRESS, HITSCAN IS LINKED TO ARTIFICIAL NERVOUS SYSTEM AT PAIN LEVEL 5 - REAL COMBAT.]
"Are you saying that he'll feel every hit like is it real combat?"
[AFFIRMATIVE… SIMULATION SUSPENDED.]
"Eh?"
Looking over at Dax he had somehow removed the head of the golem and dug his sword deep into its torso.
[COMMANDER WINS. FINAL SCORE IS 5 TO 0. ICI ONLINE, AR SIMULATION OFFLINE.]
"Oh is that you Elise? That means the bath is ready~ please show me the way"
"Yes, the bath has been prepared. Please follow me."
Dropping his sword, Dax eagerly followed after the fidgeting maid.
"Um dear guest, shouldn't you wear something more than that?"
"Well I only had a single shirt, that is until someone ruined it by stabbing a hole in it~"
"I-I'm sorry"
"That's okay~ I'm already making a new one, and besides there's no one awake at this time, right~"
"It's not a question of if someone is awake, a-are you not embarrassed showing me all those scars?"
As Elise pointed out, Dax was entirely nude from the waist up, and his torso was almost completely covered in scars.
"Not really? One's scars are a point of honour in qiton culture, besides having a young cute maid sneak glance's at me is really not that bad~"
"W-w-what!? I-i have no idea what you're talking about! We're here now, excuse me!"
Watching the fleeing maid with a smile on his face, Dax went inside the bathhouse while talking to ICI in his head.
(Ah that was cute… well time for a bath, ICI anyone inside?)
(NEGATIVE.)
(Good, that would be awkward. finish up my new clothes and send them here, Finally, I get out of this vac suit... ICI when was the last time I took a bath?)
(INFORMATION WITHHELD, REASON: KNOWING WOULD HARM PSYCHOLOGICAL STATE.)
"Yeah, I figured, notify me when my new clothes are here."
-
Waking up Terra felt terrible, as she had spent most of the night awake thinking about what Dax had said to her. As she woke her senses started picking up the surroundings, every little detail in the manor reached her ears, from the sound of Russell doing paperwork to the food being prepared in the kitchen by the estate chef.
"So he's missing an eye and an arm? That doesn't give him a reason to fucking judge me like that!"
Hitting her pillow in frustration while she insulted Dax repeatedly, only calming down after about 5 minutes when she heard the footsteps of someone approaching.
(That's…. Elise coming here to wake me? Her breathing is slightly faster than usual and she's having trouble keeping her pace... She has something to tell me)
Following the sound of Elise's footsteps as she almost ran up the stairs, Terra decided to pretend she was sleeping as Elise entered the room.
"Good morning Terra, you're expected at lunch with Dax and Mr Russell in 30 minutes"
(Her pulse is all over the place…)
"Good morning Elise, did something good happen?"
"How can you always tell? Dax said you're getting your vision back in a few days!"
(Well he said that he would heal me… Just before calling me a disappointment)
"Really? That's amazing!"
(Ahhhh I fucking hate him…)
"Isn't it!? Now let's get on with the morning, let's get you dressed"
While helping Terra get dressed Elise kept talking about Dax, greatly upsetting Terra that skillfully hid it with a smile. After Dressing Terra, Elise helped Terra with her hair and helped her downstairs to the dining hall and sat her down in her chair.
"I'll go fetch Russell now, excuse me."
"He's probably doing paperwork in the library again"
"In that case, I'll look after him there first."
(Well he's still there working while hiding form the maids… Oh wait, he's asleep)
"Actually can you go get Dax first, I wanna know about my new eyes before dad"
"Understood."
As the maid left her master to find, Terra sank back in her chair and breathed a deep sigh.
(You owe me for the extra sleep dad..)
About 5 minutes later Terra picked up a new sound.
(This is not footsteps? More like the floorboards expanding under the weight of something like footsteps… Must be Dax. I didn't notice before but he really doesn't leave a presence other than that annoying voice and child like smile.)
Walking towards the dinner hall Dax suddenly stopped in place.
(What the hell is he doing? There's nothing in that hallway..)
"Good morning Terra. You look terrible, did you not sleep well?"
(What the fuck is he talking about? There's at least 4 walls between us...)
"You really have good ears, but you're clearly inexperienced. The way you reacted clearly tells me that you can hear me, now I'm just even more disappointed in by the state of your mind.."
"Fuck you."
"Well your temper still remains… Then why did turn out that way?"
"..."
"So either you don't know, don't care or won't share that information with me. Oh well, I'm starving"