Seventeen

"We have a problem," Benny said as he walked into the common room, wiping his hands on a dirty rag. He tossed the rag to the side as he flopped down on the sofa with Kon and Diur. The old man sighed as he laced his fingers together on the table as he stared at the two of them.

"Got lots of them. What's the newest one," Kon asked, his food halfway to his mouth. The steaming pile of protein rich supplement tasted like cardboard, but Benny assured them it would lead to greater growth.

"I got it out of the little shit finally, but it's not great," Benny said. Kon noticed there were flecks of blood in the creases of Benny's fingers, in his nail beds, a rusty stain that stared at him.

"And?" Diur asked. She had already finished her portion of the meal and had been waiting patiently for Kon to finish his own before they started on their studies.

"They contacted a goblin tribe not far from here. Issue is the tribe owns a lot of territory and the one who took the contract could be anywhere in the system they own. It's not much of a system and all of the planets are either too close to the star or too far. Burning planets or ice shards disguised as a planet. There are a few old mining platforms out there and at least one overrun planet that they harvest semi-frequently for rift cores," Benny said.

"They're too strong for you?" Kon asked incredulously. The old man had shown nearly no signs of his own, seemingly, considerable powers. If he was nervous about raiding a goblin system then it seemed the tribes on the edge of the galaxy were much stronger than he had thought.

Benny exploded into a choking laugh as his eyes bulged, the result of trying not to laugh in Kon's face. His entire body shook with mirth as a tear formed in one eye, Benny wiping it away with a red stained hand.

"No, not at all. But as powerful or capable as I am, I can't be in multiple places at once. We hit one of their spots and the rest will bolt. We're going to have to hit at least three spots, so we need some backup," Benny said after he recovered.

"You need to call for reinforcements," Diur guessed. Benny clicked his tongue and nodded.

"Already have. We aren't too far from where the selling off was, so I was able to catch a few groups who were still close by. Your friend Jurgen is coming," Benny said, a vicious grin on his face. Kon remembered how the other Knight had reacted to Benny.

"He'll work with you? Seemed he was a bit, ummm," Kon trailed off as Benny just stared at him innocently.

"We're professionals. Also he has orders from those above him to play nice. But, it'll take them a few days to a week to arrive at the rendezvous, so we have some things to discuss," Benny said. Kon finished slopping the gelatinous mass of protein down and swallowed hard, taking a hearty swig of water to wash it down. Benny grimaced at the display.

"Can't believe you're really eating that," he groused. Kon stared at him for a moment, uncomprehending for a moment.

"Are you saying we have normal food here?" Kon finally asked as the silence stretched out.

"Of course we do. Did you really think I ate that slop?" Benny said with a snort.

"Then why am I eating it? I mean, why are we eating it?" Kon corrected after shooting a look at Diur.

"Don't include me in this. I find the sustenance more than necessary," Diur said, bowing her head respectfully at Benny.

"It is good for you," Benny said, not seeming concerned at all about their irritation.

"Now, you're getting me off topic. We need to talk about your runes," Benny said after a moment. The table grew tired as Kon cut his eyes toward Diur. Benny followed his gaze and his eyebrows rose up and he affected a falsely horrified look on his gnarled face.

"Oh no, an alien who might hear about a Squires progression, whatever shall we do?" Kon felt a bit of tension release as Benny snorted at the two of them.

"Listen, it is dangerous to know this information, but so is raiding goblin tribes in their own space. Don't go run around opening your mouth and we won't have problems. Really the only truly top secret stuff is the full runes, everyone knows about the basic runes," Benny said waving his hand around.

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"Why was Knight Alice so stern about this then?" Diur inquired. Benny shook his head and snorted a bit angrily.

"Dumbass propaganda that we fill our Knight's ears with to keep those with big mouths shut." Both of them glanced at Kon who felt a prickle of anger at that.

"I can keep my mouth closed."

"We had to cleanse a few systems when truly important information got loose and leadership decided that we should be a bit more proactive with preventing that type of information, or any, from spreading. I mean, runes are found in plenty of rifts, you kids found a full sized door of them after all. They appear when weaker Knights use them or the original mages channeled power. Everyone knows we use them and everyone knows where we found the information. They don't know how full runes work or how to build our armor. Those are secrets that will get a fleet parked above your homeworld." Benny spoke dismissively of what Kon had thought was a hard rule about how humanity treated the other denizens of the galaxy.

"Now that fear has been laid to rest, we need to discuss your runes. I have a general feel for them, but tell them to me," Benny said. He reached out into empty space, energy warping around him and an old book appeared in his hand, black cover faded gray and heavily creased. The old man tossed it on the table with irreverence as Kon and Diur gaped at him.

"Any day now," Benny said.

"My first rune is a processing rune to cleanse energy. Second is for healing my muscles, the third one is to process my senses and the last one reinforces my bones," Kon said instantly. Benny stared at him for a moment, mouth open in either horror or amazement.

"Process all energy? Process all senses? Healing all muscles?" Benny asked incredulously.

"Yeah. Alice said I was being greedy about it," Kon muttered. Benny laughed, a full belly laugh that shook his entire frame.

"She was being generous to you. That is some of the stupidest shit I've ever heard. How haven't you blown yourself apart yet?" Benny said in between his wheezing laughs.

"Alice called him a greedy whore," Diur supplied helpfully. Benny redoubled again, shaking his head in disbelief. Kon just sat there in silence until his newest mentor regained his senses.

"Allright," Benny said, wiping a tear from his eyes as he cleared his throat and looked at him with a semi-serious expression.

"We're treading into fresh territory. The body cultivation thing is new and I don't know how it's going to interact with your nodes let alone a full rune. I think we should move forward with finishing your nodes, which should be two to three more, then move forward with the next stage of your body cultivation, then the full rune to cap you off. I don't think you'll be able to continue the body cultivation once your full rune is built, but who knows," Benny said with a shrug.

"What node are you going to show me?" Kon asked eagerly, leaning in to stare at the old man, hunger beginning to burn in his gut.

"That's for you to decide," Benny said, he flicked the thick book at him and Kon grabbed it instinctively. The worn cover was smooth as satin under his fingers, supple as age had worn out any rigidity it had once had. He flicked it open and his breath caught as he stared at a page of runes, fully etched out with tight, spiky, black writing underneath it describing what it did.

Page after page was filled with runes, hundreds of them, that filled the old notebook. Kon risked glancing up at Benny who sat there nonplussed about his big reveal.

"I get to pick them?" Kon asked as he slowly flipped through the pages, eyes skimming through the myriad of options.

"You completed a mission. You get a new rune," Benny said.

"One?" Kon asked, looking up from the book.

"Per mission," Benny said. Kon frowned and looked back at the mess of runes he had to sort through and tried to figure out which one he needed to help him grow. He had a sudden thought and looked up at the old man.

"What would you recommend?" Kon asked.

"I would recommend you think more on what you want and then come up with a detailed analysis about how to protect yourself and grow and then submit it to me by tomorrow before we get to our destination," Benny said. Kon grunted in acceptance.

"He doesn't just give answers away. Makes me think about everything. Is that the point of the whole book?"

"Destination?" Diur asked as Kon sunk back into his hurried studying.

"Yes, we have a week and need to gather some supplies. Your training has been suspended as I try to shore up his base, so we're going to work on that. There's a nice little installation on an asteroid cluster. Too many people there and it attracted a rift and they didn't have the guards needed to collapse it. I have a small contract to retrieve the information in their data centers, but we can harvest the beasts for Kon and you can do some meditating there," Benny said.

"When will we be arriving?" Diur asked.

"Have a few hours until we reach the lane entrance and then a day? We'll be on station for four days and then a day of travel to make the rendezvous. I would suggest you begin working on a plan and equipment loadout that suits your strengths. It'll likely be zero-G with limited to no atmosphere. Should be a fun time."

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