“What is the meaning of this! I have hunted these lands for over a decade. Who dares to try and take what is mine!” An angry voice sounded behind the helmet.

Alan raised his hands “Woah, hold on a minute.” He frantically activated a character panel which allowed him to alter his ownership rules. Looking through options he set the tax to 0. As soon as it was completed, the warrior in black seemed to relax.

“How have you taken this area? I thought this planet was completely unclaimed?” The hostility in the voice had lessened, turning more into suspicion.

Alan decided to side step the question. “Thank you again for your help with the...bird. My name is Alan by the way. We are relatively new here to this planet. He reached out his hand in greeting.”

Hesitating slightly, the figure stood silently for a moment before finally removing their helmet. Underneath was an obviously femenine face with striking features, her skin was the color of copper, with eyes of silver-blue. Her hair was done in long thick braids, green, resembling the patina of an old copper statue.

Her eyes moved hesitantly toward the hand, unsure of how to proceed. Without moving any more she spoke. “It is called a Vrack-ta Bird, I have been hunting it for 3 weeks now. It was I who first took it’s eye. However, it was too cautious to land.”

“Did seem all that cautious to me…” Nick grumbled from behind him.

“That is because it was hungry, and saw easy prey.” She said matter of fact. “And even then it was still cautious.”

Alan had already dropped his hand, “Well thank you.”

She nodded. “Though, I do not recognize your land claim, I will consider that not for your presence, it might have taken another week for me to finish my hunt.” She offered him the knife. “You may take a trophy from Vrack-ta.”

Alan nodded politely, and walked over to the Vrack-ta. It still seemed dangerous, though it was dead, and it’s nyamisium core had been ripped out. He inspected it, looking for a trophy.

Shelley, not one to miss an opportunity, approached the stranger. Even though she’d been groomed as a little girl to not shirk in front of intimidating people, she still felt awed by the woman in front of her, “My name is Shelley, and what is yours?”

Cura looked down at the young lady. Her towering figure, at least a head taller over Shelley, who was by all accounts just over average by human standards.

“My name is Cura.” She offered in a low alto voice.

“Well it is a pleasure to meet you Coo-Ra.” She emphasized the name, “You're the first local that I’ve had the opportunity to meet on Kragga.”

“I am no local.” She responded curtly.

“Oh...well our party is very grateful for your intervention.”

“You were lucky. The Vrack-ta bird and it’s worms work together to heal rapidly after it consumes its prey. Along with the ability to absorb some of the energy from your weapons.” She responded bluntly. As an after thought she added, “Though not as much as a mature bird”

Shelley paled slightly, considering Cura’s words. Instead of responding she chose to look back toward Alan. .

At that point Alan inspected the large bird. Using Cura’s knife he selected one of the legs and removed the talons. After seeing wreckage of his 4-wheeler and the cut on Nick’s back it seemed like a good choice. Cura gave him an approving nod.

Alan returned the knife, “if you would like, we have some food from our midday meal. We would be honored to share with someone as skilled as yourself?”

Cura hesitated a moment before shaking before shaking her head. “Perhaps another time , I have other prey I must hunt.” She paused before speaking, considering for a moment. “I can tell from the use of your weapons that you likely have some excess vervetic energy. It would save me a trip to the village on the wastes edge.”

Alan nodded eagerly. It didn’t take long. Cura had a number of smaller nyamisium cores that she pulled out from her ring for the exchange. Alan gave her VE equivalent to what the cores could be converted into. He wanted to make sure to leave a favorable impression on this woman who killed the monster nearly single handedly.

As the bargain ended, Shelley, not to be out done, chimed in. “You seem to know a lot about the local monsters. Perhaps we might hire you to help us?”

Cura spoke planely, “I will consider it. For now I have other prey to hunt. I may come to trade later. We shall see.” She then pulled on her helmet, and faced the remains of the bird. She activated her ring, which quickly absorbed the carcass. And, without much pause, she sprung forward, faster than a gazelle, out of sight.

“Hooo-ee what a woman.” It was Nick who first broke awed silence. “Did you see how she took down that monster? I’m not even sure I could even hold that gun of hers, let alone shoot it.”

“Yeah she was quite dangerous.” Adrian added calmly.

“My guess is she’s been fighting around these grounds for some time.” Alan offered, and while thinking it was odd for someone of her talent to be out on a planet like this all alone.

Suddenly remembering something he turned to Shelley, “I’m sorry about all this, I hadn’t really planned this for the tour.” He shared, somewhat embarrassed.

She smiled. “I don’t know if I would say it was the highlight of my day, but I don’t regret having such an exciting finish. Besides, it’s not every day when a girl has someone literally throw themselves in front of danger for her.” She gave Nick a broad smile.

Nick blushed briefly, before shouting, “We should celebrate!” He continued on, “Dinners on me!”

They all cheered briefly at that, till Shelley laughed lightly. “I think I will have to pass. I appreciate the invite, but if you haven’t forgotten, I live in a different city from the rest of you. However, I would like to see you all again soon.” She turned to Alan, You should have the first batch of visitors early tomorrow morning. Will that give you enough time to set up?”

“I believe so. It’s all nano tech. Pretty advanced stuff.” He gave her a convincing smile.

“Well if that's the case, and everything goes well, I’ll be the one inviting you all to dinner.” She flashed a bright smile, then her eyes seemed to grow distant for a second. As if she was reading something. Looking back at Alan she spoke briefly, “I need to go. You’ll hear from me later.” She waved at all of them before she faded from view.

“Well dang. That was quick. If I’d known you could log out so quickly I should have done that when the fighting started.” Nick said with humor.

“Wouldn’t have worked. Can’t log out in combat.” Alan said.

“I know, I know. I read that before coming here.” He said defensively.

“Well, I wouldn’t have blamed you if you tried with all those bugs on you.” Adrian offered,“Seemed pretty painful.”

“It was that talon that caused the most pain. The bugs did hurt, like getting covered in mouse traps. Honestly though, I wasn’t really prepared for how real the pain felt.”

“Yeah. It’s unreal.” He recalled, unconsciously touching his neck. For a brief moment he remembered the unaccountable times he experienced pain in his past-future life.

They moved away from ‘The Brick’ taking the other two 4-wheelers to a few areas away from Alan’s home base. He pulled out the Commercial Nano Material Manipulator, a large rectangular case, two times the size of a standard briefcase.

Nano machines were not an uncommon way for basic construction to occur in Cosmos. They typically came with a few drawbacks. First they were incredibly VE intensive. Second, they needed the materials for manufacturing nearby, and third they couldn’t use every material. Some materials were just too advanced for the bots. Ship manufacturing, for instance, many basic structures could be built with nano assistance, but it could typically be done cheaper, with other labor, not to mention VE costs would make it skyrocket in price. For Alan, however, he could dump a lot of VE into these nanobots. The final problem was that they wore out. This little set had a limit of approximately 3 builds before most of the bots would break down.

Alan, however, had already accounted for the first two problems. He had a surplus of energy and the wastes were full of downed buildings. Though not in ideal conditions, he was still able to select 2 sites where the nanobots would gather materials and build large structures for a research facility and barracks. After he made his selection, he injected 250 VE units into the little bots, enough for the first building. He had just enough in his reserve capacity for the transfer.

Thinking back, The Brick’s hold would be large enough that he could also set up the VE generator. Something he would need to set up soon, as part of his next plan to profit from the soon to be short supply of VE energy on Earth.

It didn’t take long, till the 3 of them were sharing an extra large pizza, laughing and joking about the successes of the day.