“My ship is a powerful warship, I have multiple weapon systems and drones on board. I didn't want to utilize them before when I landed because, honestly, I didn't realise how bad it was and I didn't want to start a ground war here. If it becomes necessary I can run back to my ship, get in, and use the weapons and drones to destroy the robots around here. The only problem with that is they are meant for killing starships, there are no anti-personnel weapons on board, so there will be significant damage to the starport.” I said

  As I was talking I was trying to think of the most suitable weapons to use, and what I had come up with was grim.

  The plasma projectors were right out. Sure they'd vaporize any one robot and cause a thermal bloom that would disable any near it, but it would also completely trash whatever bit of terrain they happened to be standing on.

  The missiles were out for a similar reason, though writ even larger, knowing how much damage they did in the void if I let one off the chain here on the planet it would probably destroy the entire starport.

  That only left my point defense armament which... might actually work.

  The tracking plasma point defense might actually make a decent antipersonnel weapon, especially if it could retain it's tracking qualities.

  And the plasma shotguns might just be able to sweep out large areas around the ship.

  This was of course assuming ANY of that worked properly in atmosphere, which now that I thought about it, it probably wouldn't, or if it did it would likely function differently or more erratically.

  It might come down to the drones, they had close range weapons so were probably not going to be disrupted by atmosphere, even if they were also plasma based, could use their tentacles to move around, and had actual combat programming which should let them best the robots.

  I snapped back to reality as Carolina vehemently denied my last statement.

  “Brayden you can't even walk, any plan that involves you 'running' back to your ship is right out, I'm not even comfortable getting you to go back into 100% synch to clear out the starport!” Carolina fired at me.

  I scowled.

  I didn't want to say it, but she was right, I still couldn't really feel my legs after coming out of full synch the last time.

  “You need a doctor before you go under full synch again Brayden. You might wind up fully paralyzed or worse if you go back under now. At least get some rest.” Carolina continued.

  “How are we going to get a doctor here unless I secure the place Carolina.” I replied

  “If I can get in touch with the armed forces I can get them to bring medical personnel with them. I think Carolina is right Captain, you are our only chance of taking back our planet without having to wipe all our systems and start from scratch. Rest, we'll see about turning this into a command post.” Ivanova said, her eyes softening.

  At the mention of rest my eyes immediately felt heavy. Technically I was resting while in full synch, but my body didn't seem to care for the term 'technically'.

  I nodded. “Fine, wake me if anything happens.”

  “Before you sleep, why can't you connect to your ship over the radio to command it to clear the field as it were? Why would you need to run back.” Ivanova asked

  I raised an eyebrow at her.

  “During a massive, lethal cyber infection of all your computer systems, you want me to open up a link to my ships command protocols on an unsecured radio transmission, and begin giving it fire missions...” I gave her a look, and her bodyguards looked away, I am pretty sure they had thought of this before she did.

  “I see.” She said, going quiet after.

  “That's why I want a cable, hardline is impossible for them to tap into without physical access. Anyways, wake me when you need me.” I said, as my eyes began to close involuntarily. Why WAS I so tired, this felt wrong.

  I felt everyone's eyes on me, the deaconess' in particular, as sleep swept up and tried to claim me.

  I felt around near the bottom of the chair. Well felt, I flopped my hand around till I found an adjustable lever, and lent the chair back as far as it could, and closed my eyes.

  I had intended to say something to Carolina before I fell asleep, but oblivion overwhelmed me.

  ***********************************************************************************

  I blinked back to consciousness some time later, though instead of the chair I found myself on some type of gurney.

  With a bright light flashing in my eyes.

  That were open.

  Did I go to sleep with my eyes open?

  I flailed at the light, both arms and legs.

  The realization that I could flail interrupted my panic, and instead of exclaiming “Ah” or “Get that light out of my face” I went.

  “Huh, my legs work now.”

  “That is good to hear Mr. Cofey.” The man holding the bright light said.

  I blinked, there was a man in a lab coat, or something a lab coat evolved into after a few hundred years, over army fatigues. He was standing over me and had apparently attached a device to my forehead and temple that was currently beeping.

  I was getting multiple notices on my HUD about a foreign device attempting to interface with my physiology, and several boxes requesting authorization to engage countermeasures.

  I minimized them instead of engaging them or closing them. I had grown very wary of this planet, and found myself struggling to trust even the doctors here.

  “Whats this thing you put on my head, my implants want to fry it.” I said.

  The doctor looked around, appearing a little nervous. Whether that was because he was feeling guilty or because he was concerned that I could apparently fry his tech I was not sure.

  “It's... a sensor that is giving me data on your neural connectivity. We use it to diagnose stroke victims and identify the damage, with you...” The doctor began, and despite never having met him before, and the fact that he was speaking an unknown language being translated by my implants didn't change that.

  “Hold on, I know this one, 'Your symptoms are not consistent with any known condition, but you show signs of having a stroke', no, I didn't have a stroke, my condition just makes it look like it.” I said, perhaps a bit snappish. You get like that after repeating the same thing a thousand times to every single doctor you have ever me.

  “I see you've had this conversation before.” The doctor shot me a look out of the corner of his eye.

  “So many times.” I said. I hated this. I felt like I was back in the hospital back home, helpless again

  “All I was told when a bunch of army grunts rushed into my clinic and grabbed me was that a man needed my help, and my reserve status had been activated which I had already figured out by the world going to hell. Why don't you fill me in Mr. Cofey.”

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  I sighed.

  “Do you know what synch is?” I began.

  “Nothing more than rumors of COG captains becoming one with their ship. Probably a bit more than most. Tell me.” The doctor asked

  “Well that's somewhat true. A COG Captain runs every function of their ship through their own brain. It gives us total control over our ship through our implants.” I replied

  I rolled over and showed the doctor the back of my neck

  “Oh wow, it is surprisingly intricate... I can make out what must be data transfer points... this is one hundred percent a shunt for intravenous fluids...” He pulled a bit of my suit away and looked down my spine.

  “you have even more plugs that I can't make out... is that one going into your abdomen. Colostomy?” The doctor asked.

  “I don't even know the function of all of them. The point is, we sit in the helm, we plug in through those implants, and we are essentially the ship, Most COG captains maintain what is referred to as a synch rate of fifty percent, this allows them to be sort of half the ship half themselves, they can still feel their bodies while commanding the ship. Most only force themselves to one hundred percent synch when they need maximum response time, processing power, and a faster reference frame.” I continued my explanation.

  “Reference frame?” The doctor inquired.

  “I can speed up how I see time, so everything appears to slow to a crawl. Anyway's, that is most COG Captains. I can ONLY maintain one hundred percent synch when I link up, completely divorcing myself from my body, and that seems to be causing me to have significant neurological issues.” I explained.

  “So everyone else maintains fifty percent synch rate when connecting to your ship, you are at one hundred percent. What happens when you try to throttle it back to fifty percent.” The doctor asked inquisitively.

  “Nothing. I stay stuck at one hundred percent.” I deadpanned.

  The doctor frowned and wrote something down in a notebook he had pulled out from his fatigue pocket.

  “Is that actual paper? I would have thought everyone would do things on tablets now.” I asked. I had honestly not seen any paper since I woke up in this new time period so this was both nostalgic and surprising.

  “Ordinarily I do, but my Tablet started emitting a sound that made my patients ears bleed before it detonated a few hours ago.” The doctor flatly said back at me, not looking up from what he was writing.

  “Oh... damn.” I said upon hearing this.

  “Blew out my cochlear implant too, thankfully those are easy enough to replace.” The doctor said, turning the left side of his head to me, showing that side of his head was heavily bandaged.

  “Huh, I honestly had expected us to have passed that kind of technology long ago.” I said after inspecting it. It was easier to get lost in engineering minutiae than get concerned about the fact that a man whose implants had just detonated in his head was nonchalantly talking to me just a few hours later.

  “I am certain other planets have, but much like glasses some things remain relatively unchanged over time.” The doctor said, mind obviously only half on what I was saying.

  “I am going to ask you to do some things for me Captain Cofey, I need you to try your hardest to do them even if it hurts.” The doctor began.

  The doctor looked to two men dressed in army fatigues with rifles hanging from a shoulder strap that had apparently showed up at some point without me noticing. Man I was out of it.

  “I guess I missed some things while I was out.” I muttered as I checked them out.

  Each soldier had some kind of high tech harness on, it resembled a plate carrier from my time, but also had what looked like a roll cage going down their arms and legs, with little bundles of wires going up and down to bulges that I could only assume were to motors of some kind.

  “Are those... exo suits?” I asked.

  “Our rigs?” One of the soldiers, who I only now belatedly realized was a woman from her voice, replied.

  “I guess? They look sort of like what we had imagined them in science fiction.” I said. They did, though these looked less... I don't want to say ramshackle, but definitely like they'd gone through a bunch of refinements.

  The soldiers looked at eachother warily.

  “Exo-rigs have been pretty common for a century, um, Captain Sir.” The soldier lady replied.

  “Well I have been out of the world for a spell so that makes sense.” I replied. Way to make me feel old lady.

  The soldiers looked at eachother warily, and the Doctor, who had been watching this whole interaction, spoke to them.

  “I need one of you on hand to catch Mr. Cofey if he falls.” He ordered.

  “Captain.” the soldier lady corrected.

  “What?” the doctor said.

  “You call him Captain the same way everyone calls you Doctor, it's a sign of respect.” The soldier lady continued. The doctor looked a little taken aback at this but nodded. I myself didn't care, but I could see the soldier lady was trying to show me respect, which I appreciated.

  The soldier lady came over to me after handing her rifle over to her partner, who nodded at her and slung it over his other shoulder. She took up position by the bed I was still laying on.

  The doctor recovered from being admonished by the soldier lady and turned back to me, motioning me to sit up.

  “What are your names, by the way?” I asked as I struggled my way up to a sitting position. I really was doing better with even the minimal sleep I must have... wait a second, my HUD showed the time but that couldn't be right.

  “Twelve hours? I was out for twelve hours?” I exclaimed.

  “Apparently. I arrived an hour ago but your... Crewmate? Was insistent we let you sleep as long as you were able. After hearing the basic description of your illness I concurred. You didn't even wake up when I asked the soldiers to carry you to a bed.”

  I groaned.

  “We could have already cleared out the government servers and been on our way by now! Ugh we've lost so much time.” I covered my face, frustration mounting.

  The doctor looked a little startled by my loud exclamation.

  Soldier lady walked up in front of me and said. “ Specialist Megan Strewsbrook Captain.” She said, giving me a quick salute.

  I gave her a salute back but said. “I'm not a member of your military, you don't have to do that.”

  “It's respectful, which I think is warranted, since I heard you are gonna save us Captain.” I looked at her, thought about it, then shrugged.

  She was not wrong.

  “And you doctor?”

  “Doctor Morgan Smith, Captain Cofey. Now to start I want you to hold both hands out in front of you.”

  What followed was a fairly standard examination, testing how well my limbs moved, testing vertigo, the only thing that really differed from the examinations in my time was that the doctor was constantly checking the device attached to my head. During the examination I also came to the belated realization that we weren't in the control room anymore.

  “Where are we?” I asked.

  “My platoon secured the interior of the starport Captain, found this interrogation room and repurposed it as an exam room for the doctor and you.” Megan said.

  I nodded to her.

  “Thank you. Don't suppose you managed to secure the outside and I don't have to keep trying to hack this terminal with only my suit for processing power.” I asked, really hoping for a little bit of good news at this point.

  She shook her head, her expression grim.

  “Sorry Captain. We were able to clear a number of the robots from the outside while forcing our way in, but even more showed up soon after we got inside. The current theory is... whatever it is that's causing this want's the vice president.” Megan replied, her face visibly falling. I could tell this situation was getting to her.

  “Good theory, the virus' are smart enough to recognize a priority threat here, even if they don't really know what that threat is. Moving the platoon here probably tipped them off. Still, shouldn't your platoon be able to mow them down? That's what machine guns are for.” I said.

  “You'd normally be right, and we even set up defensive positions to do so. Set up heavy guns and started to thin the herd. Then they started dropping airships on us.” Megan replied.