Fate of Terra - Rise of Empires

Chapter 6.1 - Rewrite

While many of the living slept, the construction on The Factory was well underway. The ball of molten slag that had once been a couple of freighters had quickly cooled in the vacuum of space. That being said, there was still a molten core that broiled in angry turbidness. Iron, steel, titanium, aluminium comprised the majority of the bubbles resources. It wouldn't be enough for their needs, but the nanites would take care fo that.

Through the slim remaining hours of the 'day' and well into the night, the nanites that were contained within an AP round launched from the Destroyers began replicating themselves, frantically working through the twisted mass of metals. As the nanites continued to eat away, metals and minerals transported from auxiliary ships, were dumped into the melting pot for construction. The design for the station still hadn't reached its final state, but there was ample enough for the microscopic robots to work on while that was decided.

The first function the nanites performed was creating the solar panels that would continue to power their work once their stored energy had been depleted. It was a race against time for the little droids as they worked hard to complete enough solar panels to power their future offspring. The calculations were compiled beforehand, naturally, but it was still a close thing to witness. As a few sections began to slow, and then falter in their work at the core, their compatriots connected the solar panels to the battery system.

Batteries that would power them until the larger fusion reactors were brought online. It had the side effect of slowing productivity as each nanite was supplied with less power. Pan had dispersed the energy through the region, utilising large Tesla Coils and other schematics liberated from The Advent Brotherhood in energy manipulation. They could have attempted to use the heat as a resource, but the microscopic bots were sensitive to that level of heat.

As iron, steel and titanium steadily transformed to the fusion reactors at the base's core, the solid mass warped into a hollowed shell. Pipes, struts, beams, cables and more took shape, excess was constantly being funnelled to the outer shell, swelling the once solid ball as internal components were finished. Synthetics, such as rubber, nylon, teflon, and all the chemical stores would be added later once the structure was soldi. Nevertheless, the Auxiliary ships were busy creating mass from their raw resources, ready for transfer once the call came in. Many an engineer complained at the work, more exalted over the overtime pay.

The orb continued to balloon as the particle accelerators, life support systems, and the artificial gravity were created deep within its bowels. As Michael and the others began settling in for the night, Pan reported that the nanites had begun work on the Positron Emission Tomography assembly.

"How will this... stuff work?" Dejah asked, stroking through the Tanya's tangled blonde locks.

"P.E.T, in layman's terms-"

"Who is this, Lee Man?" She cut him off, her feline features cocked in question.

Suppressing a smile, Michael thought on the fly: "A guy who liked to make complex things simple, whenever we want to do that, we say 'in layman's terms'." Nodding that he should continue, Michael went on to explain how the nuclear reaction would gather the radioactive particles coming from each star before combining them in a cyclotron. Once the radiation had decayed to the specific level, the elements left behind would be hydrogen, helium and oxygen. "While other elements can be created this way, it's most effective in making simple elements." Michael finished.

"Why not use simply your own reactors for this purpose? Why not share your reactor with the station?" Dejah whispered.

"We don't have to. We'll use the stars to do the heavy lifting and take what we need. After all, our fleet will move on and we need the station to be self-sustaining, like the rest of the Fleet." Michael whispered back.