New Base

As Cy pilots the Railjack into the large space that will one day be a drydock, Harry looks nervously at the large white sphere that's taking up nearly all of the height of the engineering deck. Too large and complicated to be digitised by even the most powerful of Orokin systems, it was built automatically by the systems on Lua, then teleported onto the Railjack using it's own systems. It is an Orokin seed, the very thing that they used to build their towers and underground bases. Behind him is the much smaller Tenno seed that they use for building Dojo's out of asteroids. Hermione was going out with Luna while his mother looked for a spare orbiter, or a restorable one anyway. She's, she's doing well. He can see the cracks where the girl that was thrown in the deep end and learnt to swim is still struggling, but being in a Warframe is smoothing out the worst of the trauma. Just like they were designed to do, if there was one thing that the Orokin were good at, it was dealing with trauma. Probably the only way that some of them were able to sleep at night. Fully aware that he's prevaricating, Harry goes out in his archwing to inspect the tunnels that the MOA's have dug out. After a through inspection, that just confirms what the reports and sensors have said, he calls Amelia.

"Hello?"

"Hi, I'm in the system at the moment, just installing the seed that will grow the complex that we'll be keeping our bodies in while we're at school. Is there anything you'd like me to transport back with me?"

"Oh, er, right. You're Harry aren't you. Of course you are, it even says so below your picture."

"Are you ok?"

"Yes. No. It's all just so, overwhelming."

"Honestly, I can't imagine what you're going through. This has been my whole life. What I can say is that it is probably both better and worse than you fear. And the bits that are one or the other will surprise you every time. When you're overwhelmed by what might be, start looking at what is, and what you can do to make it a little better."

"I. Thank you. I never thought I'd be taking life advice from a teenager."

"I'm more like 880, maybe 900 years old. Something about the void energy in us stops us from aging past that."

"So you're missing out on some of the major brain development"

"In long term planning and risk analysis. Yes we know. As a group Tenno can be very, childish, because of it. It doesn't change who and what we are."

"Sorry. It's just hard."

"It's ok, it's often a sore spot for us as many of our detractors in the solar system will call us children despite the fact that we've got centuries more experience than they do."

Amelia grimaces, "Yeah, I can see that. Women get called girls all the time, even when we're in our 30's. It's, infantilising. Listen, I'm currently packing up Hermione's Library. Well, it's only really about 300 books, but that's what we call it. If you could pick that up it would be great."

"I'll talk to Cy and see what he says, but I think he's finished analysing the emissions coming from the planet and worked out the wave lengths they use for detecting things, and the ones they use for communications. So we should be able to set the lander to absorb those and come in nearby."

Cy joins the call, "Captain, if Ordis can get a lander into a secure Corpus base for an infiltration mission, I can put the same lander down in one of the green spaces near Amelia's position. Short of someone seeing us, which given the axial tilt of the planet in that location should be almost impossible, after 6pm local time, with the naked eye, and I can avoid the electronic cameras and telescopes easily."

Amelia shakes her head, "Cy, you're scary, do you realise that?"

Harry chooses to head that off before it can get started, "Do you know what a vi d o is? Hermione was saying she wanted to get some. Specifically star wars. Though why you'd want war amongst the stars when the solar system is still in turmoil I have no idea."

Amelia can't help it, she laughs, "I'll pack her TV video player and all her videos too then. I'd imagine that you can work out how to power it with all of your technology."

"Ok, so I'll call you when I'm on my way."

"Sure. By the way, what are you doing here anyway?"

"I'm currently avoiding activating an Orokin ship seed and potentially becoming the new controlling AI."

"I must be missing something. Why are you doing this?"

"We can't afford to use Tenno tech to run the transference pods, as our orbiters all use a large amount of infested bio-tissue to run the systems. It stopped the Sentients from controlling them, but well, we have the infested as a large problem in the solar system. So as Railjacks use void technology rather than infested technology, we're sterilising all the Warframes that we're bringing, and also replacing the lander with a Digital storage module. There's no way that Cy could run it, but it can certainly be transported between here and the Orokin system."

"I see, and what about the becoming an AI?"

Harry grimaces, "I have to be physically present to activate the seed, and use my implants to activate and guide it's growth, at least initially. When I do, the AI will try to take control of my implants. If it succeeds, well."

"Tell you what, if you've activated it and you get here for 6pm I'll drive you to the local supermarket and let you buy a trolley's load of shopping."

Taking a deep breath, Harry says, "Ok, I'm going to do it. See you at 6."

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Harry closes his eyes and searches for his implants. Once he finds them he stretches out his hand and touches the seed. With the symbolic contact established he levitates it off the ground and opens a wormhole to the centre of the new complex. He then walks the seed through the portal, extending an atmospheric shield ahead of him so that he has the air he needs to complete the next step. When the wormhole winks out behind him, he activates the extractors and watches as thin tendrils extend from the sphere and dig into the lunar regolith and start converting the matter to energy. Once it's reserves are full he activates the reactor at the heart of the seed, and the reserves empty at an alarming rate. Once it's almost depleted a tesseract forms in the centre of the sphere drawing energy in from the dimensions adjacent to this one, and void energy to stabilise the reaction. The reserves rapidly fill up again and once they're full the AI comes online automatically to manage the tesseract and the facility.

Harry grits his teeth as the AI detects his connection and tries to take control of his implants at the same time Harry tries to transmit the master authorisation codes. One by one the AI takes over his implants over what seems like a battle of half an hour, but in actuality is only a fraction of a second. However, Harry prevents himself from panicking with the iron discipline learned on countless battlefields. Concentrating on transmitting the last of the authorisation codes, he gets the confirmation that they've been received as he loses control of the most important implant. It's tendrils start to ease into his mind and test his nerve signals, learning the layout of his brain so that it can make the modifications it needs when it suddenly withdraws and relinquishes control over his implants. Using the last of his mental strength he commands the seed to create the core room and stabilise the atmosphere and gravity before he collapses bonelessly to the floor. Just before he collapses he activates transference and feels his Wisp engulf him in its tender embrace.

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Amelia stands with Danjell in the nearby park, 6 boxes of books and a TV are on the grass at their feet while they wait anxiously for Harry to arrive. When Cy contacted them, he sounded concerned.

"ETA 10 seconds. 9... 8... 7... 6... 5... 4... 3... 2... arrival."

As Cy's voice says arrival, the slim lander hurtles down to the ground rapidly decelerating until it's hovering a mere foot off the floor. The airlock at the back of the lander opens to reveal a Warframe lying on the floor, it's cloak pooling around it like a blanket.

"Human Amelia, my captain collapsed after activating the seed. Cephalon Cy was able to negotiate with the new AI and sent a drone in to retrieve her. However, she has not responded since then. I, would like your help to ensure that my captain is fully functional."

The two of them share a glance before Amelia speaks up, "Cy, I think that Harry needs to go back to Lua. I can come with you if that would make you more comfortable."

"That would be acceptable."

"Cy, would you mind if we loaded Hermione's things before we leave?"

"... That is acceptable."

"Dan, give my apologies to Minerva. And don't forget that you'll need to buy Fawkes' fruit. You should buy the kids, and Harry some treats as well. Oh and a selection of comics and magazines too."

Danjell doesn't laugh, much as he wants to, as he knows that his wife is just nervous, "Don't worry, I won't forget. Do you want anything? Wine, cider, soft drinks?"

"Get whatever you think best."

With the Lander loaded, Amelia sits down on the floor and lifts Wisps head into her lap and starts to stroke it. Meanwhile Cy pilots the lander back to the Railjack and starts the calculations to return home.

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The journey to Lua is nerve-wracking for multiple reasons, as Amelia is acutely aware of the fact that she is travelling through the void. The same void that gave Harry and Hermione powers that can only be controlled with the transference pods. The same void that drove the parents of the other Tenno insane. She is also turning into a Sentient, and the only known energy they can't adapt to is the void, Natah was very clear on that.

Finally, the only movement that Harry has made since she boarded the lander is to take hold of her hand. It didn't help that Cy required her permission to engage the autopilot that would take them back to Lua. When she felt the weird sensation of being connected to the systems at Lua, she immediately called Natah.

The Lotus' face appears at the side of her vision, and Amelia fair screams "No, I need Natah. It's Harry, she's unconscious, and has been for over an hour."

The Lotus frowns before she reaches up and removes the helmet, "Where are you Amelia?"

"We're on route to Lua, I'm still in the lander with her head in my lap. Cy, do your magic and send her our current position."

"I object mistress, what I do is hardly magic. Transmitting data."

"I'm coming to meet you."

A few minutes later Cy's voice comes over the internal comm, "Warning, incoming Sentient signature. Be ready to repel boarders. Identity signal received, welcome aboard Lotus."

Natah's frame seems to disconnect far faster than Amelia has ever seen happen before as she rushes over to inspect Harry.

She sags to the floor on her knees, legs akimbo to either side of her as she sighs with relief, "Heart of Tau, she's fine. Thank you for staying with her, though she'd have woken up on her own in a few hours. What I'm reading from her implants is that she only succeeded on a technicality, so the AI was in the process of invading her brain when it finished processing the access codes. What's happening now is that she's mentally recovering from this while her implants are reconfiguring to their pre-attack state. Cy, disengage the lander and take us into Lua, I'm going to manually transfer her to a pod to speed her recovery."

"Understood Lotus. Will your frame be unaffected by being left behind?"

"I'll have it follow along, so don't worry."

Once they land, Natah lifts Wisp off the floor with brute strength and manages to look calm and collected even as she strains to carry her out of the door. Once there she reconnects with her frame and what looked effortless becomes effortless as she floats through the corridors to the reservoir trailed by Amelia. Once there a brief touch on the wisps systems sees harry appear in the pod, asleep. As she strokes his hair, she smiles gently at him. Turning back to the wisp, she makes a minor modification to the sensors on the Void reservoir to indicate that there is 25 more capsules of void energy than it actually contains, to it's maximum size. If she's right, then it will have no effect on Harry's usage of it's powers. If she's wrong, Harry will find out about the modification very quickly and correct it herself.