Everyone looked to me after my outburst. Rin registered what I had said first and replied as if I was joking. “You mean gross coffee? No one respects the bean anymore, it doesn''t need all the added ‘fancy’ crap.”


    I laughed and pointed at him. “Actually, exactly that, fancy gross coffee.” I looked at Max and raised an eyebrow. “That will work, right?”


    Max leaned forward and nodded excitedly. “That’s perfect. We could buy them cheap from those secondhand places, you called them pawn shops.”


    I nodded, “That could work, I think I saw them being sold there. How many would we need?”


    Max tilted his hand side to side in an unsure gesture. “I can’t be certain, but 256 should be enough and give us some room for error. You could afford that right now, you still have 37,017 credits.”


    Rin must have realized I was serious and jumped into the back and forth before I could speak again. “You’re going to have to explain, Nick. We can’t build anything out of coffee.”


    I looked between Rin and Ali and realized something, neither of them had spent much time Linked up. They would have had no chance to see the ads, or masses of tired people carrying around the Kern-tech self-filling “coffee” mugs that were ubiquitous on the streets of the Hub.


    I explained my thoughts. “The Kern sells this nasty drink, and more importantly, they sell an importable True-item subscription mug that gets an amount of automatic refills. The only way it could work is if it had a tiny Link and Impex built into it, and they’re not super expensive. I think they were like, what, 50 credits?”


    “48.89 Cr.” Max answered. “Closer to 50 after tax.”


    “We still have to find an Impex to use to bring them to the real world.” Rin deadpanned. “Do we try to sneak into Green’s Ash? It’s the last city with a ship on our side of the mountains until you get to Mt. Winton on the other side of the buffer zone. Speaking of which, you do know crossing the buffer is going to be hard, right? I’ve seen some reports and vids, it’s filled with ferals and raiders. Neither Arktria nor Borealia care to root them out unless an upstart group raids too deeply into either country.”


    I shrugged. “I don’t expect anything to be easy anymore, that route seems reasonable too. I think we head North North-West and if we think we have a good plan for Green’s Ash, we try it. Will we even be able to get into town though? I’m sure our faces and this van will be pasted across every wanted board in the country.”


    “I’m doing what I can about that, which is kind of a lot.” Max winked, and shot a finger gun at me. “Remember when I said I’m worming into everything? It turns out that you humans have basically given up hard-copy data, everything’s digital and therefore alterable. You should use fake names, but outside of the people who work with Katie directly, I altered the pictures of you all on the warrants that just went country wide.”


    “What about the record of us? Some of the admins out there will certainly pull their local file on us when the names come through.” Rin questioned.


    “I’m working on it.” Max replied. “It’s taking some extra effort to get into the central record database. That one is only writable from one location, and I’ve had to borrow a maintenance bot and do it manually. ‘Duct cleaner 03’ is currently dragging a hardwire through the ventilation system to break into their server for me.”


    I nudged our conversation back on course. “Okay, okay, good. That means we should be safe enough to go into the city? I think parking the van on the outskirts and walking in would still be smarter. We can blend in with the masses and wait through the line. I can go in through our Link and buy them ahead of time, have our supplies ready to be picked up before we arrive at the city.”


    To my surprise, Ali and Rin exchanged a glance and both turned to face me. Ali spoke first. “You’re not going into the city, sir. You stay hidden with the van.”


    Rin nodded his agreement. “My thoughts exactly, you’re the most high profile of us. Some of the higher-ups would have already seen your picture before Max thought to alter them. One of us has to make the pick up.”


    “Bullshit, neither of you know anything about blending into the streets.” I protested. “How many times have either of you taken a public line? Because I did it for a whole year before I got my contract.”


    Ali remained quiet, and looked at Rin to signal he should answer first. “I’ve never taken the public line, but I think it’s Ali that should go retrieve the supplies anyways. She has the best odds of getting in and out and fighting through any trouble on the way.”


    Ali made a surprised face, which quickly turned to angry determination before she pushed back on Rin’s words. “It’s you who should go, I need to stay with Nick in case we are attacked again. You’re scrawny enough that no one will bother you on the way in, just throw on some rags and limp your way in. Hire an escort merc in the travellers station on the way out and have them drop you on the edge of the city where we can pick you up.”


    I grinned, looking between the two. I was enjoying having some people other than Max and myself sitting at the planning table. “I thought I was in charge of planning?”


    Both of them looked at me, and Ali nodded before she continued. “You are, overall planning. You, Rin, and– er, Max can handle strategy, but you should let me handle tactical decisions, sir. It’s… not your strong suit. Remember the first ambush, in the polebarn? You picked both of us up, and got me shot. You threw me, sir.”


    I frowned and picked at one of the scabs on my knuckles, starting to feel less great about the new planning committee. “Hey, I got us through it, didn''t I? We had to move, and Max was guiding me through all of that.”


    Ali raised an eyebrow at me and gave me a look that said ‘exactly’. “That’s the other thing. You and Max need to focus on the bigger picture, and shouldn''t have to focus on the little things. I’m the only one actually trained in field operations. Delegate, and let me do my job and protect you, sir. ”


    Rin finally recovered from his shock at being volunteered to be the one to make the trip into the city. “You want me to go into a strange city, on foot and alone? That’s a misuse of my capabilities. I am a cowardly desk-jockey, and have come to terms with that. Nick will be fine here without you, Ali. We have Max and Jorn’s suit to protect us, and Nick is perfectly capable of defending himself.”


    With both of their arguments laid out, the two had a brief staring contest before turning to me. “What’s the call, sir?”


    I sighed and looked between the two, then spared Max a glance to see if he had any input. The lounging stick-man shook his head and waved me off, whispering into my mind. “I’m partial to sending Rin on the dangerous mission, but either of them could do the job. Tevin would be the best choice, but he’s out for now. Speaking of him, the blood transfusion is ready when you are. There’s an IV built into the medkit that you can plug into.”


    I nodded and stiffly sat back down inside the van, this time on the other side of the sliding door so I could face towards the front of the van where Ali and Raschel sat. I took my time, thinking over the choice while I found the short needle and tube of the IV and prepared a vein for it.Stolen novel; please report.


    I didn’t want to send either of them, I wanted to handle it. But… being honest with myself and the situation, I realized that I shouldn’t be the one to risk it. I was the one most likely to be spotted and recognized, and putting as many layers of precaution between Max getting caught and taking necessary action was definitely the smart play. I needed to be smarter about this, and was no longer on my own.


    Which of them should I send though? Neither of them were ideal as undercover smugglers. While Ali was a trained fighter and could handle herself in a fight, the reality of the situation was that she would stand out like a hawk amongst crows. Her complexion and complete set of teeth alone would give her away as not belonging. Even the way she walked would attract more attention than the scrawny and sickly looking Rin, who would blend in much better with the desperate crowd of transients and predatory outlaws that swarmed around every link ship in the country.


    Yet I knew Rin would run the risk of freezing in the face of danger, and if he did run into trouble he was unlikely to be able to get himself out of it. It was a toss up, and even if the choice was clear, I hated having to send someone I cared about into such a dangerous situation.


    “What if we all go?” I offered, at least that way the risk would be spread out evenly and I wouldn’t have to bear the guilt of sending someone into something I wouldn’t do myself.


    Rin shook his head and Ali answered. “Nope, sorry sir. You’re not going, and one of us should stay, no sense risking more than one person, sir.”


    I frowned. “Then both of you will go, I’ll have Max and Raschel here with me, and can have Max follow your progress.”


    “I’m no good in the field, Nick. Why even send me at all? Ali is the soldier, let her handle it.” Rin replied.


    “Because I don’t want to send either of my friends into danger without backup, alright?” My words came out more defensive than I meant them to sound, but I continued anyway. “If I can’t go myself, then at least this way you’ll have someone else to back you up. If you get into a fight, let Ali handle it, but you stand a better chance of talking your way out of a situation with the ship’s staff.”


    Ali flashed me a look and leaned back slightly, quietly mouthing. “Friends?”


    Rin did not notice her reaction and shrugged. “Fine then, boss-man. We’ll handle the pick-up, but I suggest you arrange the mercs and transport for our supplies ahead of time. Ali, do you know of any reputable mercenary groups we should contact? I was typically only sent reports on the bad ones.”


    Ali recovered from her surprise and shook her head. “Not from around there, those groups tend to only work locally. Their business relies on reputation though, I’ve heard most of them are reliable as long as their costs are met.”


    “I’m not sure we even need to hire transport. We’ll only need a small part of the mugs, right?” I looked at Max for confirmation, and continued on when he nodded. “Even a few hundred of them should not be all that large, and easy to carry.”


    “Eeeeh, not exactly.” Max interjected. “We’ll need some other things to put together a working Impex, but we only need the electronic guts out of the base of each mug. Should only be a couple of square centimeters of material per cup. However, we’ll need some more battery capacity, and a way to get even more power. Links are cheap to power, it’s really just a few very tiny advanced sensors, but power costs for moving mass and aperture size scale logarithmically. It would be fine if we only needed a tiny port to push coffee through, but if we want to import tools or anything bigger than a pencil the battery bank already built into the van is not nearly enough.”


    I nodded, thinking over his words. “How many more batteries do we need? We should probably get more gas too if the van is our generator.”


    “We need 200 kilowatts of output at the least, it might actually be best to use capacitors to handle the energy pulse needed to open the tunnel in the first place.” Max answered.


    “Two hundred kilowatts of output?!” Rin asked, his eyebrows disappearing into his shaggy hair in surprise. “That would power a whole street…”


    “It’s only for a moment, which is why we should probably use a capacitor bank. It takes less power to hold it open, signal the network, and catch stuff on its way out. We could get away with only having 50 kWh of storage as long as it can dump the power quickly enough to charge the opening.” Max replied.


    I waved my hands and broke in. “You two can work out the details of what we need on the way.” I gave Ali a look and continued. “We’re talking about overall strategy here, not details, we’ll just plan to go through with hiring an escort and transport for whatever we end up needing to get. As long as we get the Impex working, we can get any other supplies we need through it.”


    I looked from person to person. “Can anyone else think of anything else we need to consider, either supplies or objective wise?”


    “We need to pick an actual destination other than ‘somewhere in the wilderness’.” Rin added in his monotone voice.


    “Then bring up a map on your laptop and start looking for likely places. We’ll want it to be difficult to get to, and probably to have some kind of freshwater close by, and… I don’t even know what else.”


    “I can comb through the purchase records of people who live in the area, see what else everyone else is buying?” Max offered.


    “Great, do that.” I replied, still trying to think of what else we needed to consider. I looked out through the open door, wishing we could start executing our plan rather than discussing it. “How much longer do we need to wait here?”


    “An hour or two.” Max answered. “Their line is suffering from communication breakdown and moving kind of slow. You’re welcome for that, by the way. Your transfusion is done though, so you can pull the needle out.”


    I nodded, still trying to think of anything else we should add to the plan, and idly yanked out the needle in my arm before stowing it back into the medkit. The tiny wound the needle had made welled up with a drop of blood that almost instantly scabbed over.


    Not coming up with anything after wracking my brain for another long moment, I mentally moved on to the action phase. “Then I think we have enough of a plan, I’m going to head into the Hub through the Link and arrange the details, and then I’ll report back here when it’s time to move.”


    That decided, I picked my way carefully over Tevin’s limp form and crowded Max out of the Link. He gave me an offended look, and then winked out of sight so I could sit down in the saddle. This Link looked like it worked differently than most of the others I had used, as it was far too crowded for my body to move around much inside of the frame that surrounded the saddle, spine, and helmet rig that made up the device.


    At my questioning thought, Max of course decided to answer it directly again. “Great idea, I was about to say the same thing. We need to get you back into Factions, too. The dwarves will wait on you, but I have no clue what the situation in the cave looks like since you’re not there. This Link is different too, it''s a stationary rig, so it''s not nearly as good for you to spend long sessions in. You’ll get all sore and stiff, and none of the benefits of actual exercise that you get from the bigger setups that let you move around. It doesn''t really matter for you though, because you have me!”


    I half ignored Max, already thinking through the places I would check to buy the supplies we would need. “Sure thing, Max. Thanks for the info, and I’ll get back to the dwarves soon. We have a bit of time until I absolutely need to be back, and we’re still in the thick of it out here. I’m just going to pop over for a quick shopping trip, and I’ll be right back. You all, hold down the fort.”


    Ali did one of her curt little nods, while Raschel looked at me with wide worried eyes and Rin flashed me a tired thumbs up before giving me one last warning.


    “Remember, the Hub might be a non-combat zone, but you can still get spotted there. The rebel group is looking for you, and the governmental forces will be too now, so… be careful, just because they can''t hurt you directly does not mean that they can’t do anything.”


    I listened to his words, but did not give them much thought. The Hub was safe, and even if someone did find me there all they could do was talk at me. They couldn’t harm or capture me, or even follow through any of the portals. I was more worried about leaving my actual unconscious body in the real world in a war zone.


    “I''ll keep that in mind. Be careful out here too, no engines or noise, stay with the van, and have Max let me know to come back if you catch even a whiff of trouble. I’m only going into the hub and can skip the Impex lines on the way out, so I should be able to come back quickly. Send me a list of the stuff you guys come up with, and I’ll try to be back in like an hour.” I answered as I settled into the rig, before I reached up and pulled the helmet over my head, immediately sinking down into the never ending gray spawn void.