Chapter Eleven — The Marine Section (Or: Blake Accidentally Opens An Army)
The Dominion Marine section did not welcome visitors.
It tolerated them.
Barely.
Blast scoring still scarred the bulkheads from whatever last stand had happened here, and every corridor felt like it had been designed by someone who hated both comfort and subtlety. Everything was thick. Reinforced. Overbuilt. If the rest of the dreadnought was a corpse, this section was a corpse that refused to lie down properly.
Blake stepped through the threshold and immediately felt underdressed.
"Why," he asked, staring at the heavy blast doors and recessed firing ports, "does everything in here look like it expects a war to break out during lunch?"
Gunny rolled his shoulders, clearly pleased to be back. "Because it usually did."
Elenor glanced around, visor flicking data across her HUD. "This place was meant to be boarded."
"And yet," Blake said, "here we are. Boarding it. Poorly."
Gunny chuckled. "Relax, Skipper. Worst of it's already tried to kill me."
Blake shot him a look. "You're not allowed to say that like it's reassuring."
Crates, Crates Everywhere, Oh God Those Are Weapons
They reached the armory.
Or rather—an armory.
Blake stopped dead in the doorway.
Crates.
Racks.
Lockers.
Sealed cases stacked floor to ceiling, each stamped with Dominion military markings and hazard icons that Blake very much did not want to google.
"…Okay," Blake said slowly. "So. This is more than I expected."
Gunny grinned like a man at a buffet. "Welcome to a Marine stockpile."
Blake stepped closer to the nearest crate and pried it open.
Inside: sleek, matte-black rifles nestled in shock foam, each one looking expensive, lethal, and deeply uninterested in civilian ownership laws.
"What's this one?" Blake asked.
Gunny leaned over his shoulder. "Standard issue pulse rifle. Modular barrel. Good against armor, bad against cover. Eats power like candy."
Blake closed the crate again immediately. "Okay. Not touching those yet."
Next crate.
Grenades.
Many grenades.
Blake's soul briefly left his body.
"Those," Gunny said cheerfully, "are fragmentation. Those are concussive. Those ones—" he pointed, "—those make electronics cry."
Blake's head snapped up. "Electronics cry?"
Gunny opened a long, reinforced case with reverence.
Inside lay a bulky, ugly launcher with a wide muzzle and reinforced grip.
Gunny picked it up like it was a newborn child.
"EMP grenade launcher," he said. "Short-range. Area denial. Turns high-tech threats into very expensive paperweights."
Blake stared at it. "Absolutely not."
Gunny hugged it closer. "I'm already emotionally attached."
Blake hesitated.
Then sighed. "…Fine. You claim that one. But you are not allowed to test it inside the ship."
Gunny nodded solemnly. "I will find an appropriate target."
"That did not make me feel better."
Elenor Ignores The Cool Stuff (Professionally)
While Blake and Gunny argued over how many war crimes fit in a crate, Elenor had wandered off into the adjacent bay.
Vehicles.
Rows of them.
Sleek armored shapes on wheeled chassis, some bristling with antennae, others clearly packed with sensor arrays and command consoles.
Elenor walked past those without slowing.
"Skipping the intelligence variants?" Blake asked over comms.
"No cargo space," she replied. "All brains, no legs."
She moved on.
One vehicle caught her eye.
Boxy. Compact. Armored, but not absurdly so. Wheels thick and rugged, with subtle antigrav nodes embedded around the chassis.
She circled it slowly.
"…Captain," she said. "You should come look at this."
Blake jogged over, eyes wide. "That's… what, a space Humvee?"
"In spirit," Elenor said. "Driver seat. Two up front. Rear compartment seats six, maybe eight if they're uncomfortable."
Gunny appeared beside them instantly. "That's an ATAC."
Blake blinked. "A what?"
"All Terrain Attack Carrier," Gunny said proudly. "Wheeled with antigrav assist. Handles zero-G, low-G, bad terrain, hostile environments, and idiots behind the wheel."
Blake squinted at it. "Why does it sound like something that should come with a waiver?"
Gunny patted the side affectionately. "Because Marines kept flipping the earlier models."
Elenor nodded. "This one's practical. Not a command unit. Not a sensor hub. It's for moving people and gear."
Blake imagined it parked in the hangar.
Imagined Luna and William peering at it with curiosity.
Imagined not having to walk everywhere under fire.
"…Okay," he said. "I like this."
Gunny grinned. "Told you."
The Growing Problem Of Owning Too Much Military Hardware
Blake looked back toward the armory—rows of weapons, stacks of ammo, vehicles lined up like they were waiting for orders.
His anxiety ticked up another notch.
"We came here for scrap," he muttered.
Gunny shrugged. "Found preparedness."
Elenor folded her arms. "We'll need time to move all this."
Blake nodded slowly. "And a plan. A very careful plan."
Gunny hefted the EMP launcher onto his shoulder. "I'm already planning."
Blake groaned. "Of course you are."
He took a deep breath, exhaled, and tried not to think about how much attention this much Dominion hardware could attract if anyone noticed.
"Alright," Blake said. "Mark the ATAC. Secure the armory. We take what we can carry without turning ourselves into a floating invasion force."
Gunny smirked. "Baby steps, Skipper."
Blake stared at the weapons again.
"…I hate how quickly 'baby steps' escalates around you."
The dreadnought remained silent.
Patient.
As if it knew Blake wasn't done opening boxes yet.
__________________________________
Blake Upgrades A Car And Immediately Regrets How Easy That Was
The ATAC sat in the bay like it knew it was about to get special treatment.
Blake stood in front of it, hands on hips, staring the way one stared at a perfectly sensible object right before doing something very stupid to it.
"…Okay," he said. "Let's make you less likely to kill us."
Gunny leaned against the hull, arms folded. "You say that like it's a priority."
"It is my priority," Blake replied. "I intend to survive using this thing."
Elenor climbed into the rear compartment, testing seating, storage straps, anchor points. "It's solid. But it could use better shock dampening if we're hauling gear."
Blake nodded. "Good call."
He placed his hand against the ATAC's chassis.
The Repairman ability flared—warm, precise, far too eager.
The vehicle shuddered once, then settled as its internals rewrote themselves. Suspension geometry tightened. Antigrav nodes redistributed power. Wheel assemblies reinforced, traction algorithms sharpened.
The ATAC looked… the same.
Which Blake had learned meant it was now significantly more dangerous.
Gunny whistled. "Feels meaner already."
Blake pulled his hand back, breathing a little heavier. "Improved speed. Better handling. Reinforced hull. Nothing flashy."
Gunny squinted. "That's what you said about the ship."
Blake ignored him.
Packing Like People Who Expect Trouble
They loaded the rear compartment methodically.
Weapons crates—limited.
Ammo—enough, but not insane.
Medical kits.
Repair tools.
Portable power units.
Sealed ration packs.
Blake vetoed a second heavy weapons crate.
Gunny protested.
Blake won.
Barely.
Elenor secured everything with practiced efficiency. "If we flip, nothing becomes a projectile."
Gunny grinned. "Optimism."
Blake wiped his hands. "Alright. This is a transport, not a rolling apocalypse."
Gunny looked unconvinced.
Aubrey Is Not Asking, He Is Informing
Aubrey's voice cut in over comms, sharper than usual.
"Captain. I require additional repair units."
Blake paused. "Require?"
"Yes," Aubrey said. "Small and medium repair bots. This is not optional."
Blake straightened immediately. "Okay. How many?"
"As many as can be recovered. Preferably now."
Gunny glanced at Elenor. "That sounded serious."
Blake keyed the channel. "What's wrong?"
"The removal of the inner hull represents a critical transition point," Aubrey said. "This is the final refit. Once begun in earnest, I will need sufficient autonomous capacity to compensate for lost structural redundancies."
Blake swallowed. "You're saying we don't half-ass this."
"Correct," Aubrey replied. "We do not survive half-assing this."
Gunny nodded. "Copy that."
Aubrey continued, "I will begin restructuring the cargo bay. A recessed vehicle storage space will be fabricated beneath the existing deck."
Blake blinked. "You're… putting the ATAC under the cargo bay?"
"Yes. It will preserve internal space and allow rapid deployment."
"…How long?"
"Several hours," Aubrey replied. "Park the vehicle outside until it is ready."
Gunny smirked. "He didn't even sugarcoat it."
Blake exhaled. "Alright. You heard the AI. We're on bot duty."
Blake And Booth Talk Economics (And Fear)
Later—while Gunny supervised bot retrieval with the enthusiasm of someone herding armed beetles—Blake linked up with Booth over comms.
"Okay," Blake said. "Talk to me. What can we sell that won't get us murdered?"
Booth didn't hesitate. "Power regulators. Mid-grade sensor components. Civilian-adaptable targeting assist units. Stuff that's useful but not legendary."
"No miracle tech," Blake said.
"Exactly," Booth replied. "You sell miracles, people ask where you found god."
Blake snorted. "Good rule."
"There's a sweet spot," Booth continued. "Industrial surplus that looks boring. Farmers, fabricators, port operators—they'll buy it without questions."
Blake nodded. "Mark targets."
"I already am," Booth said. "And… sir?"
"Yeah?"
"…Thank you. For not turning this into a weapons empire."
Blake leaned against a bulkhead, staring at the dreadnought's dark interior. "I'm trying very hard not to be that guy."
Booth hesitated. "You're doing better than most."
The ATAC Waits
The upgraded ATAC sat parked just outside the cargo bay, lights dim, systems idle—patient.
Like everything else on this ship, it had gone from "tool" to "responsibility" in under an hour.
Blake glanced at it, then at the growing swarm of repair bots, then at the schematic showing the cargo bay floor about to be taken apart again.
"…One day," Blake muttered, "I'm going to wake up and nothing will need fixing."
"Statistically," Aubrey replied, "that day is unlikely."
Blake sighed.
The dreadnought loomed around them.
And The Aubrey, once again, began to change—bones shifting, space opening, systems rethinking what they were allowed to be.
All because Blake Fisher couldn't leave well enough alone.
And somehow, that was keeping them alive.