"Finally time to rest." A Max clone sighed in relief, carrying a Teddy on his shoulder and walking through the new area created, "I didn't think it would take weeks to finish. But it's still rewarding to see how it all worked out. It still is weird that all our captains don't allow us and the new citadels to enter all the lower floors."
"Well, your citadel doesn't even allow outsiders to enter it." The Teddy on his shoulders said, holding on to his head.
"We are just making sure that we are able to leave at any possible time without invaders on board." He answered, "And the reason as to why nobody is allowed in the lower floors, apparently, there are dangerous objects or creatures down there. We had sent down a unit to investigate, led by our strongest squad and our best trained Max, A24, and he came back alone, bloodied and traumatized."
The Pheddie copy holding his hand and the Teddy on his shoulders looked at him amazed with excitement in their eyes. "Dangerous? In what way, what is down there?" They asked simultaneously.
"Well, I wasn't on the bridge while he gave his report and he hasn't spoken to anyone since waking up, so I sadly don't know." He let out a dramatic sigh, "You should ask one of the Lukas clones once we meet them again, they said that they had killed a strange creature and implied that it was in the lower floors. So, if it is the same creature on every citadel, they should be able to give you a satisfying answer."
"I hope that is very soon." The Teddy said and jumped off his shoulders and ran ahead, greeting other Teddy copies already sitting at their destination, a small bathhouse.
The Max clone and the Pheddie copy just kept walking hand in hand with a smile decorating their lips.
Somewhere else on the citadel, A24 was sitting, a hat was covering his face and hair. He tried avoiding everybody around while staying close to his citadel, but was still too scared to enter it.
He was sitting inside an opening which could be described as alley-like. It was dark and a trashcan was standing next to him. It was not needed, it was there simply for the aesthetics.
He murmured something while polishing his gun. It was now as reflective as a mirror and he painted it black so he could polish it again. It is what he has been doing for the past few weeks, over and over again.
Everybody in the citadel felt sad for him. Well, not really everybody. The Geddos copies had a blast scaring him and making fun of his trauma.
⟪⚪⟫
"Why haven't we found them yet?" The Teddy Emperor asked one of the plushies. He looked at the inanimate plushies sitting in their seats. "Quite bold words you are throwing at your Emperor." A laugh escaped his lips and he leaned back into his chair.
He put his feet up onto a table which stood before him and rested his hands on his stomach. A small Teddy plushie was sitting on his lap: "You Teddys are so cute." He petted the plushie and it fell over.
"Oh, did I pet you too hard? Or do you just want to do something?" He muttered.
The plushie suddenly stood up and turned towards him: "I need to continue with my job bestowed onto me by your royal highness." She bowed to him and ran back to her station down on the lower floors, carrying her clothes in her arms.
The Teddy Emperor went down with her, a gentle ruler with a kind heart, as he liked to call himself. He sat her back onto the pipe on one of the floors and positioned her into a position which made it look like she was actually working.
Back on the bridge he was swarmed by plushies running at him, shouting reports and holding up clipboards each with a singular and empty piece of paper. All of them were shouting at him to read what they wrote.
"Relax, I am going to read it. Just give me a second to sit down." He told them.
The plushies laid down their clipboards on the table next to him before hurrying back to their spots.
He sat down into his throne and took one of the clipboards from the table in front of him. "Hm." He started reading the empty paper, acting as if there was more than one piece on each clipboard and text on them. "Taxes? On a space-ship? No!" He said confused.
He put down the clipboard and picked up the next one and… Wow! This one had actual words on it. It was a report about the update. "It has been weeks since that time, why do I only get this now?" He complained to himself and started reading.
While the update announced the ability to traverse the universe, in this report there was a lot more than just that. It stated a few extra additions which were added. Firstly, planets now had the ability of supporting life and in a note below it was stated that life can already be developed but in a future update they would add already developed civilisations in different time periods, but none advanced enough to leave their own solar system.
The next few updates were small things, like a console room update and similar stuff.
"Life, huh? Maybe we should colonize some of them." He said and stood up, "TOWARDS THE NEAREST PLANET, EARTH SIZE OR BIGGER!" His finger pointed out into the middle of the vast emptiness and the citadel shot forward.