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The original was posted on /r/hfy by /u/BrodogIsMyName on 2024-11-03 17:00:33+00:00.

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Lightly sprinkled edits and a brick from /u/WaveOfWire

(Sorry for the slightly delayed post, I hit a new squat PR :D)

The building anxiousness was a familiar ‘friend’ to Harrison, especially during the crunch time for the blood-moon. Unfortunately for him, it always came on the back of another common blight: stress. It was almost like his hand was glued to his head with how often he ran his fingers through his hair. So many things just kept piling up, and no matter how much he addressed them, more popped up like the world’s worst game of ‘whack-a-mole.’ He hated whack-a-mole.

Power generation, construction capabilities, job allocation, deeper mining operations, transportation of liquids and harvested goods to and from the settlement, and just about everything hydroponics were the biggest weights on his mind. He wanted to get so much done in what little time he had until the defense needed his full attention, but there was simply too much. Hell, those hardly even touched the other brewing problems, like the need for proper sewage tanks, subtle complaints for a place of worship, or the uncertainty from the new arrivals about Kegara and the blood-moon. Neither of the latter issues were really things he could put his hand into to help, given he knew approximately jack shit about everything Malkrin.

God, it felt like his working time ran past him so fast with how the sun slunk across the far horizon quicker and quicker. It sure as hell didn’t help that there were technically only twenty-two hours in the day, culminating in a repetitive cycle of waking up, seeing what problems he had to address, progressing the settlement as much as he could, working on defenses, and then going right back to sleep with hardly an hour’s break total in between any of his daily chores.

And then there was all the weird shit around him. Everyone just felt so… needy, asking him for his time so often, requiring him to teach this or fix that, especially Shar and Tracy with how they seemed to drag him to and fro across the burgeoning village. Sure, some genuinely required his presence, like the technician needing his help with producing some unique designs for Malkrin-centric tools and devices, but others were essentially just taking him away from his work. For example, one time Shar took him to bed early to help with her script studying, just to end up having a conversation with him for over an hour until she fell asleep. He still went back to the workshop after that whole event and finished his preemptive planning for cave spelunking.

Well… He’d be lying if he said they weren’t at least welcome breaks. Tracy sure had a knack for making him laugh and forget the enclosing responsibilities with her random jokes and sudden quips. Then there was something in how Shar offered a lot of physical comfort that seemed to take the stress out of him. Hell, he never thought he would find the same catharsis as petting something cute across the galaxy, but for some reason, the big comfy fish he called his guardian seemed to absolutely love ear scratches, back rubs, head pats, and everything in between. He vaguely remembered some old joke about animals that went along the lines of ‘how lucky are we to have hands to pet things and to have so many things that love to be pet.’

But that was beside the point. Any sort of recreation seemed to make him more nervous after it ended, a constant voice in his head reminding him of all the tasks yet to be completed, dragging lead weights into his stomach with each passing hour he wasn’t addressing them. It was almost impossible to enjoy eating food with the Malkrin anymore, and he certainly couldn’t waste any time playing the guitar for them, no matter how often they asked.

Harrison sighed, rubbing his eyes. He shouldn’t be getting lost in thought while he was working, even if his exhaustion was finally catching up to him. He held his datapad with frozen-stiff fingers, eyes tracing a wide ‘city planning’ blueprint on screen. Damnit. He walked too far…

The engineer turned around one-eighty degrees and trudged back to the last indicator to recenter himself. The new wall was going to encompass more of the flat northern part of the meadow, and it was effectively up to him to lay out the initial beacons of where the main sections would go—just like last time. If he was off in placing what were effectively metal rods—with a dot-sized piece of electronics on top—by over a meter, the builder bots might seize up and fail to finish the other sections.

Therefore, he had to be meticulous with his placements. God forbid he let the margins of error build up to that dreaded one-meter limit. It definitely didn’t help that it was not only cold as hell, but just about pitch black outside, save for what little light reflected from the wall-mounted floodlights and his pitiful headlamp. The overcast days seemed to choke the moonlight he used to take advantage of. Maybe he should’ve just taken the night vision goggles for himself or at least printed a second pair. Cera seemed to adore them, though, and he wasn’t going to deny her the opportunity to train in the dark.

He glanced around the dark night, scanning for the ceramist in vain. He wouldn’t even know if she was still watching over him, now that he considered it. She had all the cards in her deck for the job anyway—black skin, ghillie suit armor, and complete control of her limbs to ensure pure silent movements. Something about the last outing to the vehicle bay stirred something within the usually motherly Malkrin, causing her to take every aspect of his basic camouflage lessons to heart.

He wasn’t going to complain about it, and neither did any of the various guardswomen who trained with her. Who knew if their skills would be useful going forward? Maybe an anti-personnel team was necessary if any of the so-called ‘inquisitors’ or anyone from Kegaras camp wanted to interfere with his objectives.

There he went, getting lost in thought again. He’d wasted enough time talking with Tracy and Rei—the juvenile’s new nickname, which had a certain reference only the technician knew—about the new hunter, seeing its features firsthand and observing it at the range. The start into drone warfare was something he was happy to see, and he didn’t have to lift a single finger.

Nope. Focus, Harrison. He sluggishly returned to his previous task, taking calculated steps and measuring twice before fetching a stake out of his backpack and stabbing it into the ground. The steel stiffened his fingers with its frozen touch, making critical adjustments all the more difficult. He checked his datapad once more to ensure its proper position… then repeated the same steps over and over again. It wasn’t going to get any darker than it already was, and there wasn’t a reason to stop, so he kept on, carefully checking his position and marking the ground bit by bit.

He really must have underestimated how long it would take. The fact that the wall would essentially be doubling in size somehow passed him. Thank God the builder-bots would be a hell of a lot faster than he was, definitely being capable of building the section before the blood-moon—if he finished this part of the process tonight, that is.

“Hey!” a cheery voice called out. A familiar human-shaped silhouette broke up the bright-white floodlight background of the settlement behind her.

Harrison had made a loop in his task of outlining the new barricade, bringing him closer to the corner of the wall. Tracy must’ve caught his headlamp’s illuminance, given he was still a small bit into the darkness. He nodded at her in greeting and cleared his throat. “Hey, what’s up?”

She crossed the last bit of distance, standing within arms reach. Her hand covered her eyes from his light’s glare, forcing him to direct it downward with a few tactile ‘clicks.’ She wore a sweatshirt a size or two too big for her underneath her heavy black overalls. A few of the pockets seemed to be a bit more full than usual, probably having to deal with her hunter project.

The lamp barely illuminated her disapproving stare and raised brow. “Took me damn near forever to find you out here… Anyway, I just wanted to know what the hell you were doing out here… in the dark… all alone… I thought your mom told you not to play out at night? There are monsters in these woods, you know.”

He crossed his arms over his chest with a smirk. “I’m not alone.” He tilted his head to the side. “CERA!”

Tracy furrowed her brows in bewilderment at his sudden, if unconcerned, yell, leaning around the engineer to look behind him for the ceramist to no avail. “Is she just hiding out in the dark…? I don’t see her—”

The faintest radiance of the settlement’s lights outlined a massive figure stepping out from the dark like a sea monster from the depths. The shape was broken up by various branches and a camouflage net draped over her head and body. It barely covered her snout-topped GPNVGs—the same type as the ones integrated into the engineer’s helmet. Her footsteps were near silent as she stepped up beside Harrison and bowed her head, a small tilt to it asking what his reason for calling her out was.

“She does a damn good job at being …

Content cut off. Read original on https://old.reddit.com/r/HFY/comments/1girivi/frontier_fantasy_pillars_of_industry_chap_60/