Judge October said, “As entertaining as it is to imagine that possibility, the US legal system does not allow for duels to the death. This matter will be settled in court, not on a bloody lawn. However, the defendants do raise an excellent question. Mr. Gruber, do the plaintiffs have a rebuttal to the claim that these runes cannot be patented because they were not invented by humans?”

  A lawyer on Atticus’s side stood up and said, “Yes, your honor. The opposing council mentioned the treaty between our two worlds, the Cambodian Accords, requires that deals made with Kalibutan aristocrats be upheld. I have here more than two dozen different agreements with various Kalibutan royalty that give us specific permission to use their rune in exchange for payment. Each document is signed and magically enforced. We are following Kalibutan and US law here, it is the plaintiffs that wish to flaunt it.”

  The judge nodded, having expected that answer. “In that case, I am granting the plaintiff’s request and issuing a temporary injunction. The defendants shall take down the WikiRunes site and refrain from disseminating runes in any other manner until after the trial completes."

  Luke’s lawyer, Mrs. Ziegler, spoke up. “Your honor? May I offer one small adjustment? We suggest only taking down the runes that have agreements. Several runes up on the site now are not claimed by anyone on Earth and my clients wish to leave them up. For example, there is a rune that went up today, the shield rune, that has not been claimed by the plaintiffs. If we leave it up, the knowledge of that rune will certainly save the lives of many people.”

  Several people throughout the courtroom gasped, instantly understanding the importance of the shield rune. A few people snuck out of the courtroom, pulling out their phones as they went. Luke bit his lip to keep from smiling. That was exactly the reaction he was hoping for. This case was already newsworthy, but with that bombshell, this was a real story. He had basically guaranteed the shield rune would spread no matter what the judge ruled.

  The lawyers and judge went a few more rounds discussing that point, but eventually the judge ruled that the website would come down completely, but Luke was allowed to pass on the knowledge of the shield rune in person. The judge gave them until the end of the day to shut down WikiRunes.

  A date for the trial was set six months into the future and they headed out. Atticus wanted to talk to Luke and Allen, but a few of his lawyers convinced him to stay away. Out on the court steps, Allen paused to talk with their lawyer.

  “How do you think that went today?” Allen asked.

  Mrs. Ziegler said, “As well as it could. The fact that she let you pass on the shield rune is encouraging.”

  “It didn’t seem like it went very well to me,” Luke said.

  She shook her head. “Mr. Moore, what you have to understand is that your position here is legally tenuous. They have followed the letter of the treaty and you have passed on secrets that were not yours. Their businesses have suffered substantial monetary harm because of your actions. I believe your actions were for the betterment of mankind, which is the only reason I agreed to take this case. However, we must be realistic. This isn’t a case we are likely to win. In a few weeks the Supreme Court will rule on the rune patents and everything I have heard so far is that they will uphold the patents. Once that happens, our case will get that much more difficult. I recommend settling.”

  Luke shook his head. “No. That would mean the billionaires win again. We can’t keep letting them take over the economy and government. I don’t want to settle, I want to win. You said the Supreme Court will uphold the patents because it’s upholding the treaty. What happens if Kalibutan declares war again? Why would we uphold the rights of a world we are at war against? I want these runes to be free to everyone, not hoarded by the rich so they can make another billion they don’t need.”

  Allen put a hand on Luke’s shoulder. “Calm down, buddy. You aren’t fighting this fight alone. While you’ve been out fighting monsters, I’ve been preparing. I’ll tell you all about the plans in a second. Mrs. Ziegler, can you talk to Atticus’s lawyers and see what it would cost us to settle? I just want to know the minimum they would accept for us to shut down the site for good and never bother their business again.”

  “I’m sure they will be reaching out to us soon, I’ll get a number from them when they do,” the sharply dressed lawyer said.

  Allen nodded and led Luke away. Once they were out of earshot, Allen said, “Sorry, we can’t talk about our plans to break the law in front of the lawyer. Remember how we set up the hosting for WikiRunes in Sweden? It was so the servers wouldn't be taken down by any random law enforcer. Last month I got some advice from a mod on how to do something even better. When we shut down the site, she’s going to replace it with a Bittorrent index, kind of like Pirate Bay. Just like Bitcoin is decentralized, WikiRunes will be too. The main website will go down, but when people search for WikiRunes, it’ll take them to a proxy site or a mirror link. The people’s access to runes won’t even be down for a day.”

  “Heh. I guess that’s not too bad. Anyone who knows how to use a VPN will be able to keep using WikiRunes. Thanks, Allen. Sorry I doubted you.”

  Allen smiled. “You’re most welcome. But that’s not the end of my devious plans. A Bittorrent isn’t as good as keeping the site public. Most people don’t use Pirate Bay because they don’t want to break the law, even if they don’t think they’ll get caught. I’ve been talking with someone from the DoD. Belle Waller, she reports directly to the Secretary of Defense. She’s got contacts at the DoJ and she thinks she can swing the rune case in the Supreme Court our way.”

  “I thought the Supreme Court was supposed to be independent and impartial?”

  “Exactly. There is no reason they should grant the patents. Runes are magical discoveries, not inventions. The only reason it’s even got to this point is because a lot of judges have been swayed by free vacations and other gifts. Mrs. Waller is willing to remind them to do their job, show them skeletons in their closet or whatever.”

  “Awfully kind of her. What’s the catch?”

  Allen grimaced and didn’t say anything for a bit. “You mentioned something about going to war with Kalibutan? Apparently it’s got some top officials worried too. They've been ramping up preparations, getting ready just in case. One of their problems they would have to solve is the size of the portals.”

  Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

  Luke thought about it for a bit and sighed. “They’re too small. You can’t drive a tank through, you can’t fit a fighter jet or helicopter through. They need something to replace them. They want my mech designs.”

  Allen held up his hands, “I know what you’re thinking, you don’t want to give away your designs. But you don’t have to provide a weapons system, they only want a power armor design. And really, you would only be saving them some time. Now, I know the last time-”

  Luke cut him off. “I’ll do it.”

  “What?”

  “I’ll do it. I’ll give them some designs. Good ones too, with weapons, shields, everything. This trip to Kalibutan has really changed my outlook on life. I’ve been too focused on myself and not enough on the human race. We can’t allow ourselves to be beaten like the naga. My only condition is that they share the designs with all the other countries with a portal. We can’t allow ourselves to be invaded. We need to be able to fight back.”

  “That’s uh, a big change there, buddy. Did something happen while you were over there?”

  Luke ran a hand through his hair while he thought about Kruro’s death and the soldiers hunting him. “Yeah. You could say that. Where’s your car? I’ll tell you the whole story on the way home.”

  ???

  Luke leaned back and tapped his pen on the desk. His office had what he asked for, a high end desktop computer with three monitors and a tablet interface. The CAD software was state of the art and even had some runes preloaded. It was exactly what he needed to design the perfect magic mech.

  The first step would be to design the chassis. He made it adjustable so it would fit tall Swedes and short Filipinos. He planned on giving this same design to everyone. The life rune went on the back, right below the padding. It should keep it from being damaged in a fight.

  The life rune allowed the user to interface with the mech and control everything like it was their own body. It was also the most complex rune he would use in his design. He didn’t want the production of this mech to be limited by the quality of runewrights the various armies had access to.

  That meant the Master Inertia rune was out, the power armor pilots wouldn't be able to jump off cliffs like Luke could. The dissever rune was out too, it was a complex Adept level rune.

  However, Luke was able to design some effective weapons. WikiRunes provided excellent inspiration. They hadn’t cracked the magic railgun yet, but Luke repurposed their magnetic barrel to be an efficient spell rifle. He combined it with a few of the combat runes from his new book and made a fireball spell rifle that should rival his old designs that required magnetic ammo. He popped the completed design into the right arm.

  Naturally, the shield rune was added to the design as well. At first, he added it to the left arm, designed as a tower shield. But then he realized the pilots using this wouldn’t have time to retrain fighting as a knight. They were used to modern combat with helmets and bulletproof vests. He decided to incorporate a shield that conformed to the armor. Since the rune created a transparent blue forcefield, he didn’t even need to leave a gap for the eyes.

  Designing the networked shield runes to cover the mech like that required a lot of math and intuitive power redistribution. It also exposed how much power that one rune would draw from the core.

  If he left it on, the full body shield would eat through the mana core in a few days. He made the rune toggleable and removed the shielding from the arms and legs. A healing potion and a mechanic could fix damage to the extremities.

  With the left arm free again, Luke decided to add another weapon. With the same spell rifle barrel as the last one, Luke added a force spell with a piercing variation. He hadn’t known that rune variations existed before he read it in the combat runebook. This variation, combined with the effects of the spell rifle barrel, meant that it should be the perfect spell for piercing armor, magical or mundane.

  Next, he added the standard mana vision and dexterity runes. Unlike his own designs, he kept them all on the outside so they would be easier to repair. He did add some steel sheathing to limit the amount of repairs needed though.

  His final addition was the same flight runes he used to make his magic drones fly. They were far too weak to actually make the mech fly, but they should be enough to give the pilots temporary boosts of speed and agility.

  He spent the next few hours refining the design before he headed out to his workstation. He started gathering supplies, carefully choosing components that the rest of humanity would have access to. It was doubtful there were enough stone beetle wing casings to go around.

  The first iteration was a failure before he even half completed it. The magnetic barrels were too small to contain the spell forms intact. He needed to double their width before they would be effective. Then when that was fixed, a dozen other components needed adjusting. It also revealed the mana flow to the weapons was insufficient.

  Once that was fixed, he revamped the power regulators and mana circuits completely, streamlining everything. There were a few redundancies to keep the mech moving even if damaged, but he wanted to minimize the amount of repair the mechs would need.

  The next day, he finally had a working prototype. He tried it on and made a few small adjustments for comfort and ease of repair. He had his employees try out the power armor design he planned on giving the army.

  Angela suggested a punch blade be added to the gauntlet. Sandwich suggested hammer fists. Jeff and Gina tested his design’s adjustability since they were the tallest and shortest employees. Bumblebee suggested they paint it since it looked like an ugly mismash of forgotten school projects. Luke had to admit he was right and broke out the red paint artifact to give it a coating of paint and a minor armor boost.

  Allen wasn’t used to using power armor and gave the perspective of a layperson. He was able to point out the best areas to improve the user interface and lower the learning curve. Luke took some of their suggestions and redesigned the mech once more.

  The resulting prototype went through his own tests before he finalized his designs. He put everything together in a neat package, including repair advice, potential weaknesses of the design, and how to soak materials in mana to increase their durability. He also pointed out how the gauntlets allowed the user to use weapons that required mana. They could send someone without a class to fight in this power armor and they could still use flaming swords or sniper spell rifles.

  Allen set up a meeting with Belle Waller with the Department of Defense for the next day. If she liked his designs, she would “buy” them for the US army. The purchase contract would be a cover for the favor she would be doing for Monster Jaegers by swaying the Supreme Court vote.

  The meeting was in DC, but Allen was able to get him and Luke first class plane tickets that got them there the night before. Transporting the prototype mech suit was the only hassle of the trip, they had to send it via cargo plane since it was too heavy for commercial airlines. Luckily, the Norfolk Complex had regular cargo flights and there was one available.

  When they got to the Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling in southern DC, both Allen and Luke were dressed in expensive suits, the prototype mech had been delivered hours before they arrived and they got confirmation that someone from the Navy and Airforce would be there along with Waller to evaluate the design.

  There was one minor hitch. As they were led to the meeting, their guide casually mentioned a representative from SPEAR would be there too. Whoops. Luke had sworn an oath to them. He had severed the oath shortly afterwards, but they didn’t know that. He bit his lip.