EVE Fiction

"If I've got to sin, to see her, again,
Then I'm gonna lie, and lie, and lie...."

Rev 22:20
D. Lohner, M.J. Keenan, Puscifer


" 'Das t'irty se'en o'de list, t'ree mer tae gae," speaking softly into the microphone just to the left of his lips, Praezius Vheruk's chair drifts on a lazy circuit about the bridge. One foot crossed over the knee of the adjacent leg, a datapad sits in his lap; between his fingers, a stylus taps the screen lightly here, softly there. The screens he moves between tell him where his primary tasks lie, yet.

Whilst most on the Hamazte sleeps, Praezius remains wholly awake, restless. His focus has been on several topics; not the least of which happens to be the fresh blueprint he'd picked up a few hours ago. Ammunitions Technology R.A.M. He's cut its time cycle down by nearly eight percent, so far. Next to his shuttle blueprint in Orenmulf, and his shield extender blueprint in Osmeden, he's happy to see something new, for the first time since he'd been given that pistol by his alliance director. Someday, he thinks he might even be happy to use that pistol on her. Uncertainty still hangs in the back of his mind, on that. Whilst she had an agenda that was entirely opposite his own, she could produce some fine conversation--so long as she steered clear of that dreadful Amarrian wine. Foul substance, that...they might be excellent sculptors and painters, but fermenting fruits had to have been a more-recent design of theirs.

His face twists a moment, with the memory of that woman trying to wrap her tongue around something as simple as Vlillirier, that night. He and the others had nearly died with her attempting to direct everyone there. Poor woman.
Pretty soon, he gives his head a shake, when he realizes several blips on the pad are awaiting his attention. Clearing his thoughts, he taps each of the blips, watching the system notation of delivery of the antimatter. Tapping to connect with the facility, again, he waits for its queue to give him an opening, then resets the four five-round runs of antimatter manufacturing. If, every fifteen minutes, this will be his night, so be it; he refuses to bother the La' for less than the weight of an enormous freight container, and preferably five times that, if he can acquire that much before the middle of the week.

Enough, he hopes, that she may see he does, indeed, mean business.
If the interest he'd seen in her face is true, and not a facade as strong as Natalia's seemed to be, then he's not going to blow this.
Besides, even as miniscule as simple antimatter can have a use found for it, while he works on his other blueprints. So, at least one can it will be, if not ten, outright. Though, even just one of his enormous cans will be a good start.

In its soft drift about the room, the chair catches on something; its motor whines in its catching, and Praezius glances about, to see what he got caught on. Looking around, then down, he laughs, and reaches down to drag the body of young Cedar Vamenza back from the chair's path. Once freed of the fabric of the youngster's tunic, the chair resumes its programmed float; Praezius gives the half headless body a toss towards the center of the bridge.

Returning to his thoughts, and to his datapad, Praezius continues his quiet drift about the bridge, watching time pass, as time is the least-precious of the commodities he works with.