Chapter 33 The Rebuild and Incubation

Her wide amethyst eyes reflected off a polished silvery rainbow-colored egg the size of a watermelon. She lifted the egg, feeling a warmth radiate from it. Please tell me I don’t have a sea serpent egg. What will I do with a pet the size of a 747? Though if I had a massive sea serpent, I wouldn’t have to worry about getting stranded again. I bet it could pull my ship like it was nothing. How would an infant sea serpent fit in this egg? Maybe they grow really quick after hatching.

Elysia stood up, clutching the egg to her chest, but the moment it contacted her chest, a draining sensation assaulted her. Her vision swam, sending her crashing to the pavement with a squeak, rolling onto her back while the egg with the egg still clutched to her chest.

-150 Charge.

20 Charge.

The egg glowed, bathing the dark shore in violet light, attracting two workers taking a smoke break outside the warehouse came rushing over. A burly man bent over her, glancing at the egg before speaking. “Miss, are you ok?”

She managed a shaky nod, but he remained unconvinced. He jogged back into the warehouse while the other person, a heavy-set woman, watched over her.

Chills ran through her body as her charge continued to tick down, absorbing into the egg reaching ten when a graying man wearing a dark blue uniform arrived, accompanied by the burly man. He crouched down and reached out to the egg. A spark of violet arced from the egg to his fingers, causing his hand to jerk back, but he nodded as if just confirming his theory.

He turned to the burly man, ordering. “Bring her to the generator. She’s a lightning Changed. The egg is draining her. A steady charge should be enough to stabilize her.”

The burly man gently scooped Elysia’s limp body into a princess carry, carrying her and the egg into the warehouse passing by Umbra on his way to the back of the warehouse. He laid her next to a generator venting exhaust outside through a smokestack.

A minute later, Eva arrived with cables in hand. She plugged the cables into an output on the generator, then wrapped the flying leads around each of Elysia’s wrists. Elysia jerked as the electricity coursed through her body but as if to protect her or out of hunger, most of the electricity diverted into the egg, lighting it up like a sun. The sleeves and chest of Elysia’s hoodie melted away, but the skin underneath remained unharmed.

After another minute, Elysia regained control over her body, sitting up but when she tried to pull away her arms clutching the egg, they wouldn’t budge, nor would the egg dislodge from her chest. In response to her attempt, a warmth radiated through her body, washing away any thoughts of moving the egg. Instead, she shifted her legs, sitting cross-legged and closed her eyes, focusing inward.

A majority of the current flowed from her wrists into the egg, but about ten percent continued down her arms to her heart, filling her core to its limit before bleeding off into the egg from her chest. Unlike her previous attempts at electrocuting herself to charge, no pain came, only warmth as the egg ate extra electricity before it overcharged, allowing a constant fill and expansion of her core.

+5 Max Charge.

+5 Max Charge.

+5 Max Charge…

After fifteen minutes her body seized up, senses shutting down, body paralyzed as her charge crossed the three hundred mark. Once the side effects passed, the cycle continued tempering her core, ticking her charge up at a consistent pace while the egg soaked up as much electricity as it could, shining ever brighter. So bright that the spectators had to back off as their skin reddened from the heat. Unfortunately for Elysia, the heat finished off the rest of her clothes, leaving her naked. But, like the core, her veins shined blindingly bright, protecting her modesty. Unaware of this development, Elysia swayed with a smile, basking in the warmth permeating her body.

The charge gains trickled in, passing the four hundred mark a half hour later. By the hour mark, the gains slowed, now only giving one max charge every tick as it neared five hundred. Only one person kept watch, the burly man as everyone else went back to work restoring the ship and maintaining the marina.

Meanwhile, inside Elysia’s body, her core passed the five hundred charge milestone. The increases turned sporadic as her core struggled to expand any further. Unlike before, her skin reddened as it reached its limit, but the greedy egg continued to gulp down more voltage. The warmth radiating through her body shifted to burning pain, drawing a whimper from her mouth, but she was helpless to stop the flow. All she could do was endure.

As if sensing the harm it was causing, the egg shifted its absorption, taking the entire load while only bleeding off a small stream from her core.

The sun peeked over the treetops shining through the windows of the warehouse, but Elysia remained connected to the generator, feeding the egg electricity while she meditated, lulled by the warmth of the egg. Another watcher took over for the half asleep burly man, allowing him to stumble to his boat in the marina to sleep.

While Elysia incubated the egg and cultivated, the teams worked through the night ripping out wiring and walls below deck, stripping everything but the engine room down to the hull before reinforcing the frame and hull sheeting, turning the ship truly seaworthy.

Now with the bones ready, most of the teams shifted to adding the flesh, framing below deck with new walls and sub flooring, despite Elysia not asking for it.

In the bedroom they rebuilt the platform, keeping it raised above the rest of the area before laying a high-quality waterproof vinyl plank floor imitation dark wood. They ran the same flooring along the entire living areas below deck, stopping at the storage room, where a rubberized flooring was installed instead.

Next came the walls. The crew applied a water resistant sub wall before installing light gray PVC paneling insuring the walls and floor held up better to moisture. For ease of maintenance and additions, they ran the waterproof wires over the top of the paneling in decorative but waterproof molding of the same wood grain as the floor.

Dozens of workers left the warehouse mid-morning, crashing onto their beds in RV’s and boats as Elysia remained next to the generator now back to absorbing electricity into her core expanding her capacity even further but unlike last time the progress remained gradual as to avoid stressing her body.

By the time the workers returned eight hours later, Elysia still sat cross-legged on the dam, now up to five hundred fifty max charge, with most of the current funneling into the egg once more.

A crane arrived on a barge that evening, allowing for the removal of the engines. With air tools, they unscrewed dozens of bolts from rear lower deck before unbolting the engines from their mounts, lifting them out with the crane onto engine stands. Henry watched over his team as they tore down the engines cataloging parts while another team worked on the electric motors, rewinding the fried coils before remounting the motors as good as new.

Eva and her team worked on the delicate rewiring of the control room, leaving the running of cables to the grunts. The team didn’t share Elysia’s desire to keep things tidy as they threw discarded wire and fried components on the floor haphazardly to deal with later.

As the sun set, Eva’s team flipped on the new breaker box, lighting up everything on the console but the touch screen. After getting the go ahead from the electric motor team, they flipped into electric mode, spinning up the four props a third of the size of the two main diesel-powered propellers. Unable to test the main engines as they were in a thousand pieces in a corner of the warehouse, they moved onto the battery and solar systems. Eva had the demolition team clean the solar panels before testing them with an incandescent light, finding the solar panels functioned at normal levels, as she expected.

The batteries were a different story. While they had a waterproof housing inside a sealed engine compartment, the shorting from the ruined wiring fried ninety percent of the battery cells, forcing them to call up to Port Alberni for new batteries.

With most of their projects put on hold, Eva sent her team away early as she returned to the control room, dropping on Elysia’s couch/bed to read the manuals on the computer system in charge of autopilot, diagnostics, navigation, and sail control.

Outside, the cabin teams were finishing cleaning the decks and painting the outside of the cabin, while down below, the bedroom took shape with a king-sized bed, shelving units, and a dresser. As an addition to the bedroom, they framed in a closet with a water and fireproof safe bolted to the floor.

On the rear deck, a team framed in a three-meter wide, two meter tall target bolted to the floor, backed up against the rear of the cabin to the right of the door, leaving the window on the left side open. To blend it in, they added gloss black trim similar to the hull and outside of the cabin, as well as a panel to cover the white target when not in use.

Down on the warehouse floor, a team of six cleaned the two stripped down engine blocks boring out the cylinders to remove the scouring. After polishing the engine blocks, they also left for the day waiting for a shipment of new internals and turbos from Port Alberni expected in the morning. Only a skeleton crew worked on cleaning up anything left, including the mess the electrical team left behind in the control room. Following Elysia’s instructions, they dumped all used wire in a crate, leaving it in the storage room now equipped with a sealed door like the engine room. With that done, they too left until the next day.

While the teams made progress on the ship, Elysia remained perched on the generator, providing power to the warehouse. Her max charged ticked upward, now only gaining five an hour, reaching five ninety.

As dawn came on the second day and new shipments came, the teams returned to their duties, replacing every part on the diesel engines other than the blocks with new upgraded components, despite what Henry said about just rebuilding them.

While still on the engine stand, Henry hooked up the newly rebuild engines to power and fuel before hitting the ignition switch. After rumbling for a few seconds, the engines shot to life, idling down to a perfectly balanced minimal vibration purr. He nodded in satisfaction, shutting them down before connecting a crank shaft dyno.

Once restarted, he ran them through different rpms while watching the numbers on his laptop, smile widening as the numbers climbed, peaking out at 5121 horsepower on each engine. After shutting down the engines, a team member let out a whistle at the numbers. “The system really boosts everything. I can’t believe we made these monsters in less than two days all the way out here.”

Henry nodded his head in agreement. “Miss Arashi will love the extra power and torque. According to the spec sheet, we gained a thousand horsepower from each engine. They were marvelous engines to begin with, but with our system boosts, they just don’t compare.”

Meanwhile, back at Elysia, the power draw to the egg skyrocketed, straining the generator to its limits. Unable to sustain the warehouse, everything shut down, drawing a crowd to the generator.

As the workers arrived, cracks formed on the pearlescent silver rainbow egg, barely visible under the blinding light. Elysia finally broke from her trance, blinking her eyes at the brightness but unlike the crowd forced to turn their gaze away, the blazing light didn’t bother her eyes as she gazed down at the hatching egg with a warm smile.