Star Emperor

The time flew by and before they knew it, it was already time for the merchant to return.

Thanks to the additional drones they had their storage modules filled with the most valuable materials they were able to find, including the 120 tones of uranium ore.

Since there was nothing more they could gather right now, and Lanarine managed to scan around twenty extra asteroids, of which four contained a lot of precious materials, they decided to have some time off.

The only work-related thing they were doing was refining their shopping list as there were a lot of things they wanted to buy.

-Why do you want four hydroponics modules when two are more than enough?

Lan asked seeing this position on the list.

-Because even if our biologies are similar, we are not sure if we can eat the same food, and also I'm planning to sell some of the crops while leaving the rest in the cryo modules to preserve them.

Andrew explained his plans.

Thinking about it for a moment, Lanarine had to agree that it made sense, and she was also getting bored of the rations they were eating right now so some fresh vegetables and fruits would go a long way to make her happy.

-Ok that's a valid point.

She finally agreed.

-But why do you want to buy more cannons and an armory module?

She asked about another position on the list that she was not too happy with.

-I told you before, that if this station is not armed adequately, then there is a high chance that we will get ourselves killed as soon as someone gets their hands on an armed ship.

As for the armory and the weapons, we need them in case someone wants to take over the station by boarding it.

Andrew explained patiently.

They were at this for over an hour and she was nitpicking at every minor detail that she disapproved of.

Now he regretted freeing her, if they were not bound by a contract he would be able to just tell her to shut up, but he didn't want to go back on his word.

Besides nobody told him that living with this pretty but sometimes annoying alien would be easy.

Lanarine didn't like the idea of having weapons on board, especially since she was still in the process of determining if the human was truly trustworthy.

During their time living together, he didn't do anything that would break what little trust she had in him, on the contrary, he kept his word and her impression of him was getting better and better, but that didn't mean that he could not suddenly change his mind.

-In that case, I want my own armory as well.

She decided as she was almost certain that there was no way to persuade him to drop the idea.

Andrew thought about it for a while and it made a lot of sense since he wanted the armory to be placed next to his beginning module so if there was an emergency she would have to get there first and that would be a waste of time that might put them in danger.

-Alright.

He agreed, surprising her.

She was almost certain that he would oppose the idea as an unnecessary expense.

-I think that we might need to buy more storage modules than we previously planned.

He continued with the review of the shopping list, not noticing her surprised expression.

And so they continued the discussion, finishing it only two hours later.

At that point, Andrew was drained.

During the discussion, he had to explain again and again why he wanted this and that module or item.

Lanarine on the other hand was happy, she not only got what she wanted, but also was able to determine that Andrew didn't buy anything on a whim.

She was more than certain that he was annoyed with her by now, and it impressed her greatly that he was patient enough to last to the end.

It was not like she wanted to piss him off or anything, but she needed to know how he made decisions and if they were based on something other than his whim.

To her surprise, it turned out that every purchase he made was calculated to improve the station to the best of his abilities, and only after that did he decide on getting some luxuries if he still had the credits for them.

The surprise part was also starting to annoy her.

She didn't know why she decided at the start that he would do the stupidest and most evil things that she could imagine and now she had a hard time adjusting that point of view, which resulted in many surprises for her when he proved her assumptions about him were incorrect.

Lanarine knew that she was stubborn but most of the time, if she was proved to be wrong, she quickly adjusted.

-So why can't I adjust my point of view about him?

She asked herself, not understanding what was the reason for that.

Especially since he proved time and time again that she was wrong about him.

Not able to determine the reason she decided to figure it out later.

Right now she hoped that the merchant would be able to remove the chip from her so that she could be truly free.

Around two hours later, the sensors notified them of an incoming vessel.

It was the merchant ship, but there was something wrong with it.

As soon as it entered the visual range they found out what was wrong.

It had a few holes in it, and they looked like they were made by weapons fire.

The ship docked as usual and the droid came in, but it was missing an arm, that looked like it was ripped off.

-Greetings station master.

It said with its usual emotionless tone.

-Do you have materials for trade?

It asked.

-Yes, Andrew confirmed.

A bit puzzled about the state of the droid and the ship.

The droid calculated the price for the materials.

-That will be 42 679 500 credits.

The droid said, surprising both Andrew and Lanarine.

The best they were hoping to get for their materials was around thirty million credits.

-If you wish to purchase anything, the list of available items was downloaded to your console.

Additionally, we would like to make a request.

The machine said surprising them once more.

-Could you collect the materials in the list I just sent to your console?

It asked.

Andrew didn't waste time and looked over the list.

There were not many materials listed there and most of them were cheap ones that he moved aside.

-We can do that.

He said and immediately ordered the drones to bring the materials from the place he was storing them, not wanting to waste his station's storage space he just left them in space a few kilometers away from the station.

-Thank you.

The droid said and was about to leave, but was stopped by the human.

-I also have a request.

Can you remove the slavery chip from Linarine?

He asked, hoping that he would receive an affirmative answer.

-We are unable to comply with this request at this time.

The droid said.

-The removal process requires a level 5 regeneration tank to be performed safely.

If the procedure is performed without it, there is a 95% probability of incurring permanent brain damage and a 60% probability of the subject's death.

It explained the reason.

-The time for your purchase is prolonged to the time it will take to repair our vessel.

The droid said but was stopped again before it could leave.

-What attacked you?

It was Lanarine this time, Andrew didn't ask as he already knew the answer.

-Our vessel was attacked by a pirate ship and damaged before we managed to escape.

The droid answered and left.

Both of them were speechless, it was not so long ago that Andrew used pirates as a reason for buying cannons but he never expected them to really appear and the cannons were mostly a countermeasure for any more drone attacks.