"Zhao Chen, you were way too rash back there. I know how much you hate that Zhang Haoran — he stole… Jiang Shasha away… but even so, you can't just go proposing a starship duel with him. The duel application's been submitted now… there's no calling it off… If it really comes down to it, I'll lend you my T2 Hyena when the time comes." Li Wei walked along at Zhao Chen's side, so worked up it was as though he, not Zhao Chen, were the one going into the duel.
"No need. I've got a ship." Warmth stirred in Zhao Chen's chest at the sight of Li Wei fretting so on his behalf.
Li Wei truly did treat him as a brother. It was only that, from the very first day of enrollment, Zhao Chen had helped this rich trader's son along — tutored him, coached him through his coursework.
Otherwise there was no way Li Wei could have passed his exams across those first three years.
From that time on, the bond between the two of them had been a close one.
"You've got a ship? How do I not know about it?" Li Wei looked at Zhao Chen in astonishment.
Zhao Chen was with him 24 hours a day — barring sleep and trips to the washroom, the two were all but joined at the hip. How could Zhao Chen own a ship without his knowing?
"Well, that's what we're off to redeem right now, isn't it?" The corners of Zhao Chen's mouth lifted.
"Huh? Redeem one now?" Li Wei was dumbfounded for a moment, then clapped a hand to his head. "My baron, my young lord — this joke of yours has gone a bit far. You mean to use a ship out of the academy warehouse to settle a duel with Zhang Haoran?"
Half an hour later.
Zhao Chen and Li Wei arrived at the academy's starship warehouse.
This was a different thing from the starport. The starport was where ships lay berthed, ready to depart at a moment's notice.
The warehouse was for storing ships — and some of the ships here you could describe, without exaggeration, as gathering dust; there was no telling how many years they'd sat parked.
"Hello, teacher. I've come to redeem a ship." Zhao Chen stepped up to the warehouse keeper's counter.
The keeper spared Zhao Chen a glance. Perhaps because the term was ending — with the third-years already laying in the ships they'd need next term — he'd grown used to students coming in to redeem a ship.
"Have a look for yourself. Here's the list. It has the data on every ship, along with the academy credits each one costs." The keeper opened a query panel and left Zhao Chen to it.
The screen was one solid column of starships.
Fully 300-odd of them.
The overwhelming majority, though, were T1-tier ships — and secondhand ones, at that. What new ship, after all, would anyone leave berthed in a place like this?
"Zhao Chen, your studies have always been solid; three terms in, you ought to have banked a good 30,000 academy credits. Redeeming this T2 Hyena-class Medium Interstellar Destroyer would suit you nicely — a ship of 20 years back, hull only lightly damaged. The style's a bit dated, sure, but the core technology's still fairly complete." Li Wei knew the duel was now a done deal; there was no choice but to figure out how to cope.
Zhao Chen shook his head and read on.
Li Wei went on to point out several more T2 ships in turn, all of them quite reasonable value for money — but Zhao Chen shook his head at every one.
"Young master, just how long do you mean to keep choosing? There may be 300-odd ships here, but the ones that actually suit come down to these few." Li Wei watched Zhao Chen, who was taking an age to settle on anything.
"I've already chosen," said Zhao Chen.
"Chosen? Which one?" A curious light came into Li Wei's eyes.
Zhao Chen looked to the keeper. "Teacher — so long as I've got the credits, I can redeem as many ships as I like, can't I?"
"There is indeed no limit on the number," the keeper said with a nod.
Zhao Chen ticked several ships in the query panel. "Then I'll take these three."
Three?
Both Li Wei and the keeper were dumbfounded.
With one accord, the two of them looked over the three ships.
T2 Hyena-class Medium Interstellar Destroyer: 59 years in service; hull once gravely damaged; three main guns once gravely damaged, since repaired… requires 9,000 credits.
T2 Grey Wolf-class Light Interstellar Cruiser: 65 years in service… requires 7,000 credits.
T2 Devil-Croc-class Medium Interstellar Battleship: 80 years in service… requires 11,000 credits.
Seeing the data on these three ships, Li Wei and the keeper were both left staring.
Among all the ships in this warehouse, these three were, beyond any question, the grand old relics of the lot.
"You're certain you want to redeem these three ships? You won't think it over a little more? These three may have been decent classes in their day, but with all the years gone by, the ship-modules in them have aged very badly indeed," the keeper counseled.
Li Wei hurriedly put in as well, "Zhao Chen, quit joking around. A starship duel is one-on-one; even if you pick three ships, it won't do you any good."
"I'm certain. These three. Please redeem them for me," said Zhao Chen, steady as a rock.
Only after the keeper had confirmed it three times over did he at last redeem the three ships for Zhao Chen.
Li Wei stood off to the side with a hand over his face; he felt he was dreaming. What Zhao Chen had done today was simply beyond his power to fathom.
"These three ships have been transferred into your name; you may call them up at any time. Should you wish to keep them stored in the warehouse, it's free for one month; after a month there'll be a berthing fee." The keeper was regarding Zhao Chen, by now, with the look one gives a fool.
"Teacher, credits can also be used to redeem some ship parts, yes? And every student has the right to the free use of a ship refit-and-repair dock; I've never once used mine across three terms, so I ought to have 30 days of free access." Zhao Chen raised another point.
"That's so," the keeper said with a nod.
"Then let me write up a list of ship parts here, and I'll trouble you, teacher, to arrange a ship dock for me, and to have these three ships and all the parts on this list sent over there." Zhao Chen made his request.
The keeper ran an eye over the parts on the list — all of them perfectly ordinary. And the academy credits left to Zhao Chen after redeeming the ships came to just enough to cover them.
"Will you be needing to engage a ship engineer or a repairman? They can carry out repairs and refits to your specifications," the keeper asked.
"No need." Zhao Chen shook his head.
The keeper let the matter drop. "I'll have it all seen to within half an hour; I'll send you the dock number when it's ready, and you can go straight there."
"Thank you, teacher," said Zhao Chen.
His business done, Zhao Chen left with Li Wei.
"What a strange student," the keeper muttered under his breath.
Out of the ship warehouse, Li Wei could hold back no longer. He seized Zhao Chen by the shoulder. "Zhao Chen, what in the world are you trying to do? What earthly good are three junk ships! You're gambling with your whole future here."
Zhao Chen answered, as calm and unruffled as ever, "Li Wei, trust me. I'll see this handled properly."
"You— fine. I can't be bothered to mind your business." Li Wei, somewhat angry now, waved a hand, striking the pose of a man washing his hands of Zhao Chen entirely.
Zhao Chen could only sigh inwardly. What he meant to do was not something Li Wei would believe, however he explained it now.
Better than wasting the breath, he'd let the facts prove everything when the time came.
Ding — Third-year cadet Zhao Chen has been granted use of small-to-medium ship dock No. 017. Present your cadet ID to enter for the duration of the grant.
Message received, Zhao Chen took his leave of Li Wei for the moment and made his way to the ship dock.
Reaching the dock's entrance, he swiped his cadet ID, and the great doors swung open of themselves. Inside was a vast space — three to five football fields across, at the very least.
A pungent reek of rust and ship engine-oil rolled out to meet him.
Zhao Chen walked in, and there he saw three ships that seemed, for all the world, to have been waiting for his arrival.
Their rust-mottled hulls bore witness to their years, and to the campaigns they'd once fought through; the academy had gone over them and patched them up, but there was no getting around how many years of service lay behind them.
Zhao Chen went first to the workshop's master control console, called up screen after holographic screen, and let his fingers fly across the holo keyboard, keying in one stream of data after another.
At the last, the data on all three ships stood laid out plainly across the displays — and Zhao Chen had even gone so far as to build out three-dimensional models. Look closely, and you'd find each ship's model marked off into gray zones and red zones.
"Combine these zones together, and there it is!" Full of eager relish, Zhao Chen overlaid all the red zones, and there took shape the rough outline of a starship — an odd, neither-fish-nor-fowl sort of thing.
Then, from a top-secret file within his own handheld terminal, Zhao Chen called up a further set of data.
That, too, was the model of a starship.
None other than the T3 Blizzard-class Light Interstellar Battlecruiser!