The Mech Touch novel Chapter 494

The interrogation turned into a strange direction. Breskin tried to coax their captive into giving up the other thing. Nobody in the observation room looked puzzled when the interrogator and the interrogated spoke of the ’thing’ and the ’other thing’.

Was this a deliberate precaution against leaking out the true shapes of the ’things’ to Ves?

That didn’t make any sense. If so, the bedraggled Lord Javier should have been doing everything in his power to publicize the ’things’ out of spite. That he played along proved that the significance of these ’things’ were of such import that even he couldn’t lightly mention them by name.

Over time, Ves realized that they adopted this terminology because they’d been trained to avoid leaking any inadvertent information from any hidden recorders and spying bugs. Though the observation and interrogation rooms had been swept as thoroughly as possible, that was only up to the standard of a third-rate state.

What if a greater power such as the Friday Coalition or even the Mech Trade Association listened in on their conversations? Certainly, they wouldn’t devote a human to listen to their talk. Instead, they’d task some AIs to be on the lookout for certain key phrases that signified something of exceptional value.

Therefore, as long as everyone agreed to abide by generic words such as ’things’, they wouldn’t be able to attract too much attention from any high-tech listeners. At the very least, even if some AI suspected that they talked about something valuable, they wouldn’t be able to figure out any clues.

"I have nothing to say to you." Lord Javier responded smugly to Breskin. It was as if he had the upper hand in the interrogation room. "The ’other thing’ is safe as long as I’m alive, I can assure you.

Even a dummy like Ves could see that the lordling held all the cards in this game. The Detemen League and the Flagrant Vandals attached a lot of importance to these so-called ’things’. So much so that Breskin seriously contemplated whether to free Lord Javier in exchange for obtaining the ’other thing’.

After ten more minutes of cajoling, Breskin finally shook his head. "We will talk again after we have evacuated from this star system. For now, you will be coming with us."

He glanced at his comm and pressed a button, causing Javier’s restraints to inject a substance in his bloodstream. The captive quickly lost consciousness again. A pair of guards entered the interrogation room and took him away.

"Show’s over now."

"Damn, I really hoped that Lord Javier would give up what he knew."

"There’s no chance of that as long as he’s sober. We’re going to have to work for it. With an augmented mind and body like his, it might take months to compel him to spill the ’other thing’."

Ves wandered out of the observation room with more questions than answers. He even began to doubt the purpose of this entire operation. Could this entire operation have been set off to obtain the ’things’ in Javier’s possession? _{freёwebnoѵel.com}

"Probably not. It’s likely a combination of factors that led to the Vandals choosing to invade the Detemen System. Hitting multiple birds with one stone, basically."

In any case, now that the Flagrant Vandals completed all of their objectives on this planet, it was time to leave. Ves received a notification that he was assigned to the second convoy to the Vandal beachhead on this planet.

"You’ll be leaving soon, right?" A voice spoke from behind.

"I am."

"I never got to thank you for all the help you gave us." Addy said. "Lord Javier is much more capable of hiding than we thought. If you hadn’t pointed us in the right direction, we would have let him slip. On behalf of the Detemen League, we express our thanks to your aid. No matter how far our paths diverge from this day, you’ll always be a friend to us."

At least the rebels showed their appreciation to him, unlike Captain Orfan.

Ves smiled back and shook her hand when she extended it. "It’s my pleasure. Any competent mech designer can do the same. I suggest you obtain your own means of fielding mechs when you escape to the stars. It’s too dangerous to roam around in space without the protection of mechs."

"We are working on it. We have to start from scratch, so it will take years to build up a mech tradition in our group."

For a local rebel movement, the Detemen League enjoyed a fair amount of support, especially in the later years of Lord Javier’s despotic reign. They didn’t lack for numbers, but in military terms this only granted them access to lots of cannon fodder.

They lacked an elite or sophisticated force that could act as their fist. While they mastered other forms of warfare, their severe deficiency in mechs would become a fatal flaw in the wildlands of space. No one respected any other vehicles except for mechs.

"Do you have any plans for the future? Where are you going to settle next, and what will you do in the coming years?"

Talk of the future caused Addy to grow melancholic. "I’ve never left this planet, do you know that? Most of us don’t. Leaving our home planets for the first time is going to be hard for us. Becoming vagabonds in space is not what we intended to become, but that appears to be the life set out for us. Many other rebel groups in the Kingdom have been pushed off their planets over time."

"And the most successful ones emerge to become regional powerhouses, I guess."

"That is how most regional rebel movements have come into being. They no longer become so attached to a single planet or star system, but set their sights over an entire region or Duchy."

A rebel movement without a home still needed to claim some turf. Perhaps in a couple of years, the Detemen League would call themselves by another name.