"What do you think they're talking about?"

"I don't know, Abby."

"But, like, what kind of offers can your bird-lady make?"

"Probably something to do with TekNik."

"I'm not looking for a corporate sponsor, Professor."

Kaleb rolled his eyes as he looked across the hangar and into D34d-I's office. Clara was in there having a meeting with D34d-I and Farrah. The three of them seemed to be talking amicably. But Kaleb was unsure of how things were going, really. He was also resistant to becoming a corporate stooge, though he doubted that was going to happen. Clara seemed more interested in an exchange of information or goods. Abby stood next to him, watching the meeting as well.

The dark-haired woman grunted at Kaleb not answering her, and shoulder-checked him, bringing him back to the conversation.

"I don't know if that's going to happen, Abby! Clara just wants some kind of deal between her corp and our SG, okay? I don't know what that looks like. I only know that she seems interested in our generators."

"You mean the giant perpetual energy machines downstairs?"

"Yes, those. Although recent discoveries have shown that K-Tech has more energy efficient models."

"So why doesn't she go talk to them?"

"It's proprietary and I don't think K-Tech wants others to figure out how they've done it."

"So they are gonna use our generators to create their own variants?"

"Most likely."

Abby scowled and crossed her arms over her chest. "And what do we get out of it?"

"Jobs, credits, and equipment, I'd wager."

"Meh. They can keep their crap. I'm willing to bet anything you can make is better than their crap."

"Aw, gee. I knew you liked my stuff." Kaleb teased.

"Not to mention your shit's probably cheaper, too." Abby grinned.

Kaleb shook his head and looked back over at D34d-I's office. The conversation was still ongoing and the three of them were now huddled around the office terminal. Kaleb sighed and decided to head back to his workshop. He'd been hoping Clara would hurry her conversation along so they could get back to work. But it appeared he would have to soldier on. With a half-hearted wave to Abby, Kaleb walked back to his workshop. As he entered, the normal sounds of the hangar drifted away and he was once again within his comfort zone.

Daivor and Roy were at his workstation going over his new designs for his arm. He and Clara hadn't gotten much done in that regard, but Kaleb was happy with the first draft. But apparently, Roy and Daivor had some notes. As he approached, he saw them discussing various parts of his arm and what went where. Kaleb coughed to get their attention, but both of his friends either didn't hear him or just outright ignored him. Rolling his eyes, Kaleb shoved his way between the two and looked over at their additions to his design.

"What are you two breaking over here?" Kaleb faux grumped.

The arm Daivor and Roy came up with was slimmer. With the power lines covered with bits of metal. The lines carrying the Weikacol solution to power his arm were pulled tight against the arm itself and heavily armored now. Shocky was placed slightly further up the forearm to make room, and the Spike launcher was no longer pneumatic. The energy display showed that all the gadgets within his arm were powered by the solution.

"Isn't this going to drain a lot of power?"

"Hmph! That Kersait solution is potent stuff, boss. Not to mention you're gonna have the lightning ferret in there." Daivor scoffed.

Milly gave a weak chitter from within Kaleb's current arm, but she didn't deign to show herself. Roy nodded along with Daivor's words and stepped forward. Grabbing the holoscreen, the boy turned it around and tapped the arm design. The design exploded outward and Kaleb saw the massive conduit lines within his arm and winced.

"Oh, come on! Y'all are gonna have me running hot enough to be seen from space."

"No way, Doc. The lines are insulated, and the metal will mask part of the heat. If we use the alien alloy strategically."

Kaleb considered that as he spun the display with his fingers. He spotted something in the palm of the robotic arm and tilted his head.

"Is that a repulsor in my palm?"

"Yep."

"Yeah, doc. Daivor wasn't kidding. The Weikacol is potent stuff. So strong, in fact, that we needed to add a few more things to burn off the power. An overcharged repulsor could be used as a non-lethal weapon. Like a sonic disruptor."

"Give those things too much power and you will liquefy someone's insides."

"Sometimes the job calls for that." Roy shrugged. "But on the low setting, you'll have a weapon that can stun a wide group of people."

Kaleb nodded as he checked the power output and usage of the new design. Thankfully, they didn't have to guess at the liquids power output. Even so, he was going to want extensive testing. The numbers looked good, but you never knew. He was a little worried about how his nervous system would take the new workload, but the predictions were within the limits. Of course that was with the CNS threads, which meant Clara wasn't going to get the things. But Kaleb reckoned she would be fine with that.

Turning to Daivor, Kaleb asked. "Do we have the alien alloy for this?"

"Just barely. Only if just cover the power lines. Then we should be fine."

"Anything we can cannibalize from the other arms?"

"Loads, doc." Roy grinned. "I think we can even give Shocky an upgrade with all the stuff you and Professor Strigian found in those arms."

Kaleb nodded and rubbed his hands together. "Okay then, what are we waiting for?"

"The forge, for one thing." Daivor complained loudly.

Terrance, standing at the forge, merely glanced at them, an unapologetic look on his face. "Hey, we've got orders to fill and only one forge. You can use it here soon."

"Something for the pile, Daivor. Another forge." Kaleb groused as the Gnome nodded.

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But they both looked around the space dubiously. They had just expanded with the server room and they already needed more. His workshop already took up a large section of the middle of the hangar. Kaleb was thinking about how to pitch another upgrade to the group as Roy moved to the lathe.

"I can at least start machining some parts, doc. Meanwhile, you and Daivor can work on the other bits of the arm. You have most of the pieces, anyway."

Kaleb nodded as he pushed the exploded diagram back into its holoscreen. Most of what they wanted to use was already deconstructed. They just needed to retrofit the frame and maybe widen it in a few places. Also, he needs to re-bunch the synth-muscle and run the CNS threads through. Daivor picked up a small metal square from the table and waved it at Kaleb.

"I'll work on the power source and get the lines ready. Make sure you grab a better control unit, too. The power output of the new arm is going to be too much strain for your current one."

"Gotcha." Kaleb sighed as he tried to remember if they had detached the old control unit from the K-Tech arm.

The small internal computer was laying in a stack of pieces near the side of his table and Kaleb quickly rescued it. The small computer brain was vital. It enabled his brain to communicate with the arm. The current one he had installed was decent, but nothing compared to the K-Tech model. Hell, he had to admit that the other companies had better control units than him as well.

Thinking about it, Kaleb gathered the other arms, inspired by the other companies, and pulled all their control units. It wasn't a quick task. Most of the units were buried deep within the arms. But after he had assembled them all together, Kaleb was surprised to find that each was the same model. They were all K-Tech-style control units. Small squares of of black material covered in silver mini-pads that transferred information at lightning speeds. He guessed that even if K-Tech was using their designs; they weren't going to trust a different control unit. But something niggled at the back of his brain.

"Do we have a computer that's not attached to any of our networks?"

Both Roy and Daivor snapped their heads up.

"Why? Did you find something fishy?" Daivor asked as Roy hurried off to the back of the room.

"Or it's just my normal paranoia creeping up." Kaleb joked.

Roy swiftly returned with an old laptop that looked older than even Kaleb. The boy put the computer down on a stool and backed away like the thing was on fire. Kaleb grinned at the skittish kid, but hurried over and booted up the laptop. As the computer went through its boot cycle, Kaleb found what he need to attach the control unit and waited. When the computer was fully booted, Kaleb attached the control unit and opened it. It took some jailbreaking, but once he had the control unit open, Kaleb sighed in relief. The code looked fairly mundane. Just the standard control unit programming.

"Bah! At least we didn't attach anything with some malware in it." Daivor waved a hand at the computer before hopping back to the workstation.

Roy, however, was still reading the code on the screen. The boy's attention raised Kaleb's hackles again, so he scanned through the language again. It was during his third read through that Roy gasped in Kaleb's ear. The teen practically shoved Kaleb out of the way as he dove at the laptop like a man possessed. Roy scrolled through the screen full of text again before he got to a section and then pointed at it.

"Right there. Do you see it?"

Kaleb squinted at the lines of code and reread the paragraph Roy had pointed out over and over. At the first read through, the code looked benign. Just a standard statement calling to an index in another section of the code. But as Kaleb read through it again and again, he realized the section it was calling didn't exist with the code itself.

"Is that…?"

"Yeah. It's a remote control call. A backdoor into the control unit from K-Tech itself."

Kaleb cupped his chin with his hand as he stared at the code with fresh eyes. Now that he knew what to look for, he spotted the same statement in several other sections of code. Whoever knew the correct codes and had access to K-Tech equipment could worm their way into any control unit designed by K-Tech. He sighed in relief that Roy had caught it, but he also wondered how.

Looking at the boy, Kaleb saw Roy grimacing. "The same code was in my grandpa's old armor. Remember Kersait's notes? He had the same code written into most of what he made. His way of protecting the stuff from getting into the wrong hands. He or gramps could access the armor remotely and retrieve or detonate it."

"Detonate!?"

Roy shrugged. "Kersait was a stickler about his designs not getting out into the world."

"Something K-Tech has clearly not followed up on." Kaleb joked as he looked around their shop. It was still full of K-Tech junk.

Kaleb started wiping the code out from the arm when Roy spoke up again. "Just wipe it all, doc. Just to be safe."

Kaleb groaned but nodded as he selected all the text and deleted it. Then he reformatted the control unit just to be safe. It meant they'd have to re-code the entire unit from scratch, but Kaleb was up for it. As the control unit formatted, he got up and returned to his workstation. There was still much to do, and he wanted to finally get started on things. He was confirming the design measurements when the door to his workshop opened and a robotic quack filled the room.

*Quack*

"Professor, we need your expertise on something." D34d-I's robotic voice said.

Kaleb sighed dramatically as he spun in his chair. "What is it? I'm a very busy lizard, y'know?"

"Oh relax, Professor. This will benefit you too," Farrah said as Clara nodded from beside her.

The duck, the rabbit, and the bird all waited for him by the door to his workshop. But when he didn't move, Farrah waved a hand impatiently. Kaleb quirked an eyebrow, but got up and joined the three by the door.

"This needs to stay quiet. But we think we've cemented a deal with the TekNik corporation." Farrah started.

"Oookay?" Kaleb answered, confused.

"I've spoken to my superiors and they are more than interested in the perpetual solution." Clara added.

Kaleb rubbed his forehead. "If you could get to the issue, we could begin solving it."

*Quack*

"Well, Ms. Clara's contemporaries asked for a demonstration. Now, of course, we will not be giving away our secrets. But they want a technical rundown of what we have to offer."

"So? Just show them the Weikacol solution and be done with it."

Clara's feathers ruffled. "I'm afraid it's a bit more than that, Professor. They want a full presentation. Everything you've invented and its uses. Nothing in-depth, but something that hints at what you're capable of?"

"Why?"

"Because," Farrah sighed. "We are trying to position you as a satellite inventor for TekNik."

"Say what now?" Kaleb asked, none too happy.

*Quack*

"Calm yourself, Doc. I assure you, your freedom to create is paramount in the deal. As is your ownership of whatever you create."

"I just thought that you'd appreciate a bit more help." Clara added. At Kaleb's questioning look, she continued. "TekNik would be a sort of sponsor for your SG. Offering funding, deals on equipment, and even upgrading your… setup here in this… charming hangar."

"What it boils down to," Farrah cut in, not looking at Clara. "is that they are willing to invest in us, but only if they think we are a safe or worthy bet."

Kaleb winced. "You want us to be a corporate funded Super team? That sounds sketchy."

*Quack*

"Technically, it's what the HLO is. But we will also have provisions in place to curtail any conflicts of interest. Even if TekNik is our sponsor, that doesn't make them above the law. In fact, we will be rewarded double by the company if we find that they've been engaging in any illegal practices."

Kaleb's mind traveled back to the underground lab. That had been a TekNik funded hellhole, and the thought of bringing them down and getting paid for it almost made him giddy. Farrah gave him a subtle smile and nod, showing that she was thinking the same thing. It almost sounded too good to be true. Which meant that Kaleb's hackles were back up.

"What's the catch?"

"Besides you giving a presentation to a bunch of suits about what you can produce?" Clara asked, quirking an eyebrow.

Kaleb gulped at the thought, but nodded. Clara's already severe looking face became somber, and she shook her head.

"They are going to want first right of refusal on anything you create and want to sell."

Kaleb blinked. "That's it?"

Clara nodded. "You don't understand how powerful that solution you have is as a bargaining chip. TekNik wants it and they want it bad. As soon as I described what it was to my superiors at the company, they willingly offered anything Mr. D34d-I came up with."

*Quack*

"And all we have to do is give them a few liters each month." D34d-I said, sounding smug even through his robotic translator.

Kaleb sighed and tried to find the way that this could blow up in his face. But besides being a corporate stooge, he couldn't think of one. Of course, giving a presentation was going to be a pain in the ass. But he could handle that. Finally, after much thought, he nodded.

"But you two are telling the others. Once we have all of the group's full agreement. I'll start preparing the presentation."

Farrah and D34d-I grinned.

"We can do that. We'll let you get back to work, professor." Farrah said, quickly backing out of the lab, followed by D34d-I.

Clara stayed, however, and looked around the small workshop. Her eyes alighted upon the new design Roy and Daivor had come up with, and she gestured at the screen.

"Shall we get to work?"

"Oh, are you still going to be hanging around, Ms. Clara?"

"Just for a short while, Professor. There are many interesting things going on in this quaint little workshop of yours."

"Indeed, there are, Ms. Clara. Indeed, there are."

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