Percy listened to the debrief as well, not really seeming interested in anything work-wise being said.. But his eyes light up at the prospect of being allowed to see his daughter again. After the captain dismisses them, he gets up with the rest of the group, but he goes for the exit. To his absolute horror, his daughter is standing just inside the hangar, shivering in the cold. By herself.
Percy breaks into a sprint and picks her up right off the ground, carrying her inside while asking, "Ana, what the hell are you doing here?!"
His voice must have seemed hostile in some way, because Ana then immediately starts bawling, and hugs her father tightly. She starts to say something, but it's so fast and so jumbled even Percy can't really understand it. Percy just brings her into the warmth of the cafeteria, gently shushing her as they walked. He sits down, setting Ana down beside him, and after one more bout of little hushes, Percy asks softly, "I didn't mean to get upset with you. It just scared me that you're here by yourself ...Ugh. Where's Zach?"
"Probably looking for me.."
"Did you run away from the house?"
Ana's eyes welled up with tears again. "I just wanted to make sure you came back."
Percy looks at his daughter crying, at first with pain and concern, and then with a smile. "Well, I am back. There's nothing for you to worry about, then"
"Dad, w-what about next time? Or the time after that? Or after that? I don't wanna lose you..!" She choked a little bit.
"You're not going to." Percy gives Ana a kiss on the head. "Everything's alright."
I just wrote what I had in my head. It's really not that great but I'll fluff it up more. I'm so garbage please forgive me guys. ugh
so I'm not fluffing this up. like I said, I'm garbage please forgive me. D:
The medical examination turned up nothing out of the ordinary, but since he was exposed to twice as much radiation as the average human is exposed to in his entire life, he was advised to avoid any further exposure, unless that was impossible. Joe just went to his room in the barracks afterwards, if he was needed by his family, they would show up, at least he thought so. Upon entering the room he was a littlebit surprised to find an inter-corporate-network-access-console there, as they were pretty rare in Smith's Rest these days. He promptly switched it on to see what was on the net. Most of the news available to the public were either propagandistic or completely uninteresting, and nothing caught his interest; As he looked at the shop, he noticed that he had a balance of 15K ICC, which were problably his share of the mission-reward. Joe attempted to scroll through the item list to see what was available, but apart from the list of available NC-frames, the server returned errors whenever he attempted to view them. He had to postpone the survey of the shop to a later time. Before Joe planned to shut down the console, he decided to look through the settings, he noticed a section for stored account-credentials. It contained the account for the online-shop and an email account. As both were set to 'automatic login', Joe logged into both, and changed the passwords, while also memorizing the usernames of his 2 accounts. Once he was sure to remember them, he erased both accounts from the settings of the console completely, because Joe didn't want anyone to have easy access to them. He proceeded by looking through the email-account's inbox, finding only the notice of the recieval of the 15K ICC. He looked through the metadata of the reciept and found that there were multiple recipients. Namely the other NC-pilots from the last mission. He decided to ask thr first other recipient on the list about the debriefing, since Joe hadn't been there. The recipient was Madison, as her account had been created first for some reason.
Eli had to shake the feeling back into her limbs after disconnecting from Blur, the neural separation having left her a tinge numb, though it was likely more the cold than anything else. She listened closely once again as the captain debriefed them, her attention honed upon the idea that there were possibly more like Bishop. A troubled pit formed in her gut, could she make it through another one-on-one like that? She'd clearly been out-matched, and while the shotgun had been a necessity for survival, the fact that she had to use it at all made her bitter. Even when he had taken the shot, Eli wasn't sure if he had anything else up his sleeve, and had it not been for Jingo's admittedly impressive acrobatics, the fight's outcome might have been severely different. It pained her to think that Bishop might enjoy some form of validation in the afterlife, but in the end he was there, and she was still firmly planted on the earth.
It wasn't until they were dismissed that Eli remembered she had neglected to eat before mission. But the urge to see the state of her living quarters won out against her hunger, and despite assurances that the stop would be brief, her stomach still growled in protest. She moved briskly through the base, silent with eyes avoiding any she passed. It might have seemed rude on the outside, breezing past the hard-working individuals who were breaking their backs out in the frost, who might have simply wanted to congratulate the pilots on their success, but Eli was of a one-track mind. They did their jobs, she did hers, and as she opened the door to her room, she knew her job was to inspect it, and then get something to eat.
But things were rarely so simple.
"Lizzy!"
Eli was barely able to suppress a shout of surprise, and she stared with wide eyes as the tiny, bundled-up form of Vera hopped off of her bed. The girl was donned in clothes similar to her own, but atop her head was an old, weathered ushanka. Eli recognized it from when Vera's parents had still been around, it had belonged to her father.
The girl scrambled over and wrapped her arms around Eli's waist in a hug, and before she returned the gesture, Eli shut the door. "What are you doing here?"
"Celina said I getta be your assistant!" Vera chimed, and Eli held back the same cringe she did every time someone used her mother's first name. The girl pulled a small piece of paper from her jacket and held it out. "Oh yeah, this's for you."
Elizabeth, Due to recent events it has become evident that Vera's safety is at risk in Smith's Rest for the time being. Will explain later in the case that things do not blow over. She is unaware of the potential danger and will stay that way until further notice. As well, I've given her her father's old hat, seeing as she won't need to hide out there. Try not to let her lose it. Keep her safe.
Eli stuffed the paper into her pocket and turned back to Vera. In the back of her mind she worried if her mother was in any danger herself, but decided that it couldn't be anything she couldn't handle. With any luck, word that her daughter had moved on to become an NC pilot would deter any possible trouble. For the time being however, she had the younger girl to worry about, and in an instant Eli's whole demeanor changed. She smiled and gave Vera's nose a flick.
"Well then, care to assist me in getting some food? I'll tell you all about the mission today."
Vera's eyes lit up. "Wo-oah, you went on a mission already? Like you got to pilot and everything?
Eli nodded, heading out and towards the cafeteria with Vera close behind. The girl held tightly onto Eli's jacket with one hand, a tad shy to her surroundings, but she looked far happier than she was nervous. After all, what kid didn't want to be around giant robots?
"It's all so expensive!" Madison let her head drop to keyboard and felt her forehead tap the buttons. For the last half an hour or so she had been looking at the list of available options for the NC to which none of it was really what she was after. In the end she thought it'd be best if she left it for Duncan to make the decision as he would know what would work best. The thought however of knowing that she spent 200 credits on a dancing flower might annoy him, but to Madison it was a necessary purchase.
Her stomach began to growl slightly and Madison realised that it had been several hours before she had actually had something to eat. Pushing her chair back she stood up and began to walk outside her room, grabbing her keys on the way out. As she left her quarters and locked the door she felt the harsh cold eat its way through her thick jacket. In an effort to stay warm she crossed her arms over and hunched ever so slightly, trying to condense her already small frame into a tiny ball of warmth.
Madison pushed on the double swinging doors and entered into the Cafeteria, her boots making the familiar thumping sound they always did on the hard floors. She grabbed a serving tray off the cabinet and slid it along the running tracks as she carefully picked up a selection of various foods to eat. Turning around to face the audience, she surveyed the room for one of the empty tables and moved over to an available seat. While she sat there eating she looked at the others and noticed Eli talking the unknown girl. Too old to be her daughter, not to mention she didn't share the same likeness to Eli to be related and yet they had a very similar taste in the type of clothing they wore. Madison was half tempted to shrug it off as a completely random individual but in the short time that she had known Eli she hadn't seen the girl once talk to anyone with much interest.
So in short Madison sat there watching the duo out of the corner of her eye as she calmly ate her meal and sipped on her hot drink.
Time passed as the squadmembers did their things, and before they knew it, day was night, and they slept in their personal rooms for the first time. Things were at peace, relatively speaking. As the night turned to day again, they all had to wake up and do a new first: Pick a contract. The squad was called into the briefing room again, and as they collectively came in the projector was warming up, The Captain herself also finishing off some coffee.
"Ladies, Gentlemen.", she started with. "We have three corporate contracts available, and I'll be going through them. Each would require a minimum of two people I believe, so, it's an option to do two of the contracts at the same time, but with one three-person force on one and another two-person force on the other. In any case, The one with the biggest pay-out is from Volkov, they'd want us to assist one of their anti-tank chopper units in taking out a duo of siege tanks that are protecting a portion of the coast from naval landing teams. The next two pay about roughly equal, some miscellaneous warlord wants us to help him steal a Fairbanks experiment, and Paragon would want us to escort one of their fancy new 'hover-trains' that's transporting equipment to a few of the colonies they 'own' in the Americas. 240,000 is the payout with the Volkov one, the other two would pay 100,000 and 120,000 each.
She'd fully finish her mug of joe and put it down, "Personally, I believe Madison, Verona, and Blur should handle the Volkov one, and Percy plus Jingo should take the train. I'm open for any inputs. I'll divide the pay from each mission fairly to everyone, should get 14,000-16,000 to burn, each of you.
When Eli was dressed and ready to leave, Vera was still curled up in bed with no signs of waking any time soon. A smirk found its way onto her face, and she left a note for the girl to tell her where she'd gone. Of course, as soon as Eli was out the door the smile had gone from her face, and her mouth had vanished behind her scarf. It was time to work.
She was early to the briefing room, and listened intently to the list of possible contracts. To be honest, choosing contracts hadn't been something she had expected to do. It made the most sense to her that they would take whatever came their way, but dividing and conquering seemed a good enough strategy. Eli couldn't help the bit of pride that swelled within her when the captain referred to her by her NC's designation. It would be lie to say she didn't hope to achieve some sort of name for herself here, and if she became synonymous with her weapon, then so be it, there were far worse things to be known by.
While she agreed with the captain on her own assignment, Eli was doubtful of Percy. Jingo had proved to be at least competent with the smaller size of his NC, but Percy did not seem to be as far disciplined. It wasn't so much out of worry for his life, but if they lost a pilot, it would set Smith's Rest incredibly back. Still, she held her tongue. It was not her place to question the captain's faith, if the man could hold his own, then he would live.
"I have no issue remaining on the Volkov contract," she said, glancing to Madison and Verona. They had both performed well, though the other girl worried her a bit. Not that she doubted Madison's skills, but dear god she dreaded sharing comms with her again. When her piece was said, she stepped back and waited for the input of the others.
"I have no issue remaining on the Volkov contract,"
"Sounds good to me!" Madi sat back in the chair and put her boots up on the edge of the table. She was looking forward to this mission and a chance to let her teeth sink in a bit.
...
Madison made her way over to her rig after the meeting had ended and noticed these rather large wings extending out from the back of the unit. She could see Duncan sitting back from them on a crate staring up at the attachments that he had finished mounting, "Rather beautiful, aren't they?"
"Holy Crap!!!! They are awesome!" Madison rushed over and stared up at them, giving her the appearance of a child that had seen fireworks for the first time in their life.
Duncan chuckled for a moment as he stood up to stand next to her, "Suit up Kid, this mission is gonna be a big one."
Duncan Brown
Duncan entered the control room to see the Captain and her crew already setup and ready to command the mission. He made his way over to his spot and sat down behind the laptop, waiting for the lady in charge to give the order to start the mission.
The Captain finished her small talk with one of her officers before standing in front of the digital military table map. The scene would have looked more amazing than what it was if no one really took notice of the fact that the 'screen' was really just an extra large PC monitor that was placed under a pane of glass. Still, it gave them a digital reading of the area and if it meant they could assist the pilots in their mission, the cheap and cost effective setup would be worth it. "Everybody, prepare for take-off on my Mark. Three, Two, One, Mark."
A large rumble could be heard throughout the facility as the NCs began to ascend to the skies. Duncan watched as his cup of coffee danced around the table before slowly settling in on it's final resting place. He looked over the screen and gave a quick evaluation on the status of Madi's NC. "Captain, Mad-e's new flight system seems to be working at 100%. Turns out that the parts from the old chopper were enough to fix it, but until we get a contract with Denver-Vegas I can't guarantee that it'll be fully operational for every mission."
"That's understandable Mr Brown. We are running tight on resources as it is and every little bit of effort that these guys can give will inch us in the right direction. Can you give the pilots a status report while I discuss with my team about this warlord contract?"
"Sure thing," Duncan picked up one of the head pieces and set himself up, ready to talk to the pilots. "Good morning pilots and welcome to your second mission!" The captain looked over at Duncan and somehow both glared at him and raised her eyebrow at the same time. Obviously she was having second thoughts but decided to let it go for the time being. "As you guys are fully aware we are heading off for two jobs today with Mad-e, Swarm and Blur taking on a coastal force; while Wessex and Papa Mike will be escorting a train to it's final destination.
Now Wessex, Papa Mike, keeping up with the train shouldn't be too difficult. If worse comes to worse there is a flatbed available on the rear of the train so you can use that to preserve some of your energy and focus on your accuracy. Wessex, So that you're aware your radio scanner may be able to pick up the other three's band chatter since you two are only going to be 50 kilometres away from them."
Mad-e, Swarm, Blur. As you can probably tell by now you have a fat flyer amongst you two..."
"Who the hell are you calling fat!" The voice shot through everyone's radio and the sounds of a rave party filled the coms for a brief moment. Duncan watched in glee as half the officers in the control room grabbed their ear pieces out of fear of loosing their hearing for good.
"As I was saying, you have a new flyer amongst you guys so use that to your advantage and set up Swarm and Mad-e far enough away to cover Blur as she makes her way towards the targets. If all goes smoothly she should be able to get in there and out without too much difficulty. Best of luck and we'll be in touch when you arrive at your destinations."
With the end of his short briefing Duncan closed off the coms and reached down towards his cup of coffee. He picked it up and gave a slight groan as the realisation that it was empty sunk in. He got up out of his chair and left the Control Room, making a short dash through the cold towards the cafeteria. As soon as he entered the doors he paused for a moment and padded some of the snow off the bottom of his pants to which he heard two faint giggles. Looking up he could see two young girls sitting at one of the tables laughing at him, one about 10 with blonde hair, the other 7 with red hair and freckles.
Whilst on the way to the mission-site, Joe tested the flying capabilities of the Swarm by flying as high as possible, before either the engines cut out due to lack of oxygen or the engines lost thrust until they could only counteract gravity. The Swarm capped out at about 6,250 meters or so at its' full load.
Joe quickly proceeded to check how far he could control the missile's behaviour using the IR-laser. He hovered at around 6,240 meters and fired all the missiles while the laser was off. He needed to know if the missiles simply 'shut off' if they had no target, or if they would go for the nextbest heatsource. Right after he commanded the missiles to fire, he could hear The Captain sighing and asking, "Swarm, what the hell are you trying to do?" over the Comms, while the missiles didn't launch.
"Captain, I am trying to test the missile's behaviour if they have no target. This may be relevant in open space in case of a 'rogue missile'." Joe replied. The Captain snapped back, "Swarm, for how smug and smart you think you are, you have minimal common sense. Somebody has to pay for your ammo, and it's extremely disconcerting that you wouldn't... Oh I dunno, just ask someone, such as myself, more specifics on how your missiles operate, or just consult the NC's self-diagnostic systems itself. Just because you're smart doesn't mean we're stupid, jackass..."
Joe squinted, he took that as an intellectual challange: "Factory specifications do not apply if systems calls are overwritten." "We also don't fix shit that isn't broken. Now, are you going to ask us, or the NC, for its' specific specifications or not?" "Since you are asking so nicely, yes, I will ask." "Your swarm-missiles are designed for a combination of maneuverability, speed, and concentrated anti-armor punch, but have a relatively small maximum range for a 'long range' weapon, they can handle up to 6.8 KM or so. Depending on weather conditions and whatnot, obviously." "So, assuming weather conditions are perfect, the fuel within the rockets will last for about 6.8km? Can fuel be saved during air to ground fire by having the missiles not ignite their engine directly when released?" "Yes to both, there should be an option there to 'dumb launch' them for high-altitude bombing, you can't miss it. Of course, you couldn't have missed the diagnostics, but you missed that too, so I'm beginning to doubt your situational awareness."
"Thanks for the info, ma'am. On a side note, can you claim to be 100% alerted when you are in your own home, if nothing suspicious is going on?" "Yes, yes I can. I sleep with one eye open, after all." "One last thing. Can the dumb-launch be disengaged on a missile while it is mid-fall, resulting in the engine's and thus the targeting function's activation?" "Yeah, actually. You should get a mental 'sub-list' for all of your fired missiles and 'switches' should be available for each, should be an option."
"One last thing before re-initiating radio silence, Swarm." "Yes?" "You could've just told us you think the direct mental link is for pussies or something, instead of just doing it. You freaked one of the engineers out like a dick. You may be a Plugger, but that doesn't mean you don't have to answer to anyone." "If said engineer is currently hearing this, I apologize. I assumed this kind of modification was 'not installable' due to it not being available from any trustworthy sources." "Do we look like we have sticks up our asses?" "No, but security is security." "Gee, you act like the entire world wants you specifically dead." "Can't help some mild paranoia, ma'am." "Stop calling me ma'am, I'm not that old." "Sorry, Captain. Over and out." "That's technically redunda-"
Ana and Percy share a look, the both of them smiling - Ana through tears - before Percy speaks again.
"Are you hungry or anything?"
Ana shakes her head.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, Dad."
"Absolutely positive?"
Ana looks less than thrilled when he asks the third time. She ate at the house before she decided to.. run off. "Yes, Dad."
"Alright." Percy stands up from the chair, then helps Ana up even though she could have easily done it herself. He then asks, "D'you want me to walk you around the place?"
Ana makes an adorable but thoughtful little duckface, then she looks up at her father with a smile. "That'd be cool."
Percy honestly didn't expect her to take the offer up. There's so many things that could go wrong - a tank could explode, something could fall over, she could walk into something and cause some horrible chain of reactions that ends up in her getting hurt in some insane way.. But not wanting to disappoint his little girl - especially when she looked so excited - he walks around the building with her, keeping a very good distance away from anything that could possibly do any of the things he's paranoid about.
Ana kept kind of pulling at him to get close, but he keeps a firm grip on her hand as he shows her around. When they get to the NCs, Percy and Ana are practically outside of the hangar as they're looking at them. A plus to being so far away is that Ana can see them all fairly well without having to crane her neck upwards. Percy can't help but grin while Ana looks at the huge robots with glee on her face.
Anna suddenly whips her head around to look at her father. "When can I pilot one of those things? It's gotta be so cool! Stomping around and being all.. All cool 'n stuff!"
Percy's smile immediatelyfades. "You're never getting on one of those things. Ever."
"Dad, I didn't mean like right now. I meant- What about when I'm 18? When I'm 20?"
"No."
"..You can't even control what I do when I'm 20."
"Yes, I can. You're never getting into one of those things as long as I live, and then some."
Ana doesn't argue, but Percy can tell she has a lot more she could say - he's known her literally since she was born, so he can tell when she's keeping her anger to herself. He doesn't patronize her, however. He just kind of stands there.
The strained silence between them when Percy realizes Zach's probably losing his shit back at their house. He'd meant to try to contact him during their little tour, but he completely forgot because Ana's just so cute when she's excited.
"Ana?"
"Hm?" Ana still looks a little angry, pouty lip, stink eye and all. Just like her mom used to, actually..
He clears his throat a bit. "Are you tired, hon?"
"A little."
"D'you want to go to bed?"
Ana nods. "..It'll take a while for us to get back home, though."
"No, no, it's alright - there's.. There's barracks here."
"..There's what?"
"Barracks."
Ana looks at her father with a look she thinks she knows what he means, but she's making sure.
"..Bedrooms. I have a bedroom here."
"Oh. Cool. Let's go see it!"
Percy and Ana walk to the barracks, unlocks his door with the key he was given, and he allows Ana to go inside. He walks in behind her, and then locks the door for paranoia reasons.
When he turns around and gets a better look at the place, he realizes how plain it looks.. Which is to be expected, and really he shouldn't mind, but it doesn't feel welcoming or inviting at all. It almost feels like what he imagines a prison cell would feel like. It's excessive organization is what really sets him off. While Ana gets all comfy in the bed, Percy takes it upon himself to actually mess up the room a bit, to make it feel more lived in. By the time he's satisfied with the changes he's made, Ana's fallen asleep already.
Percy gently kisses her forehead, then he gets the phone that's in the bedroom. He dials his house phone, but gets no response. He checks Zach's house phone, but still no response. He just leaves a quick message, "Hey, This is Percy. Ana's alright.. but I'm not happy with you, Zach. You shouldn't have let her outside, and you shouldn't have let your guard down like that.. I'd be screaming, but Ana's asleep and I don't want her to wake up to me screaming.. But I'm definitely not happy with you right now. If, if, if you could pick her up tomorrow, that'd be great. Bye, you.. you fucking turd." Percy hangs up before he can get more irate, looking at his daughter again.
He makes himself a little spot on the floor to go to sleep - getting in the bed with his daughter just doesn't feel like an appropriate thing to do.
Percy woke up with a start in the middle of the night - he didn't know what he heard, but he could have swore he heard something. He had checked all around the bedroom to see what could have possibly made the sound he heard until he can calm himself by telling himself Ana just snored a little bit. It didn't calm him enough to go back to sleep.. Only when he heard other people start to leave their rooms did he realize he must have stayed up for hours. He groans a little bit, rubbing his eyes. He's so not prepared for the day, he knows it.. But he'll deal with it. He gets up off the little makeshift bed and makes a note to try to not do that ever again.. Which is going to be easy, because Ana is definitely NOT going to be running away from home again.
He fumbled into the bathroom to get a quick hot shower and brush his teeth at the same time, then he half-assedly dried and brushed his hair.. Took a minute to look at himself in the mirror and realizing how exhausted he looks. It's not his fault that there was a fucking noise in the middle of the night. By the time he was done, Ana was up and looked peppy as ever. "Good morning, Dad."
"Mornin'" Percy wiped his eyes again. "You can go ahead to the cafeteria- W-wait, no, no!" Percy looks to make sure his daughter didn't move- she didn't. "don't go, just.. ...Gimme a minute. I'll walk with you."
"You don't need to do that."
"I don't trust any of these people to not do something to hurt you yet. Just.. ...Just hang on a minute."
"..You look kinda tired, Dad.."
"I am." Percy saw no reason to lie to her. He WAS tired.
"...Is it 'cause we're not the house?"
"Might have something to do with it."
Ana got out of the bed. "I can really go to the cafeteria alone.."
"Ana."
"Dad, I kinda walked all the way here alone."
"And you're never doing that again."
"I'm just saying, I could walk to the cafeteria alone. I'll be fine."
"Ana."
"Dad, I'm really hungry anyway.."
"Alright, ok, ok, let's, let's go then. Alright."
The two walk to the cafeteria together until a mechanic tells Percy he needs to be in the brief room.
"I can't be there right this minute-"
"You need to be. It's starting now."
Percy didn't even realize his chest got tight and he felt a fire ignite. "Don't boss me, you f-"
"Dad. I'm gonna be fine by myself."
"Ana-"
"Percy, you really need to be in there. It's important."
Percy looks at the mechanic, then his daughter. He forces himself to exhale. "Alright. Fine, fine! Jesus H. Christ.. Then you-" He looks to the mechanic, "-can walk my daughter to the cafeteria and make damn sure she doesn't get kidnapped."
The mechanic looks at Percy incredulously. "...That wouldn't happen-"
Percy glared.
"B-but, uh, of course, Percy. C'mon, Ana."
Percy stalled a little bit watching Ana leave with the mechanic, but if he's late, he'd better get a move on.
"...Volkov, they'd want us to assist one of their anti-tank chopper units in taking out a duo of siege tanks that are protecting a portion of the coast from naval landing teams..."
Percy opened and closed the door as quietly as he could, trying to not make an entrance. He's pleasantly surprised as nobody seems to really notice.
As the captain droned on about whatever this mission was, he felt himself starting to fall asleep. He heard bits and pieces, but he's exhausted. Before he can really stop it, he's using his arms as a pillow.
"...and Percy plus Jingo should take the train. I'm open for any inputs. I'll divide the pay from each mission fairly to everyone, should get 14,000-16,000 to burn, each of you."
Percy jerked up and gasped softly when he heard his name - maybe he got some looks, maybe not, but either way hearing his name woke him up again. He shuts his eyes tightly and then wipes whatever sleep is in them.
When the briefing is over, he goes to his NC and, after trying to wake himself up more via stretching his arms up into the air, he gets in.
"Start the sync," Percy mumbles.
He felt that weird twinge of pain in his neck as the plug went in. He shuddered and made little discomforted noises. He hates the sensation and he has no idea how he's ever going to get used to it.
"God damn it," Percy mumbles. "Start the fucking sync!"
=INVALID COMMAND=
The pilot couldn't help but laugh. He's not in the mood for this fucking specific command shit. He has to really force himself to not scream in frustration as he states once again. "Start sync." As the computer went through all of the processes, he tried to focus on one specific thing so then maybe the damned resonance thing doesn't fuck up again.
Percy buried his face in his hands and leaned into the chair. He's tired. That's the only reason it's not letting him in. It's gotta be. He takes a deep breath, and then he sits in an uncomfortable position so he can't relax into the chair. "Alright. Start sync." Again, he tries to just focus his thought on one specific thing.
The machine let him in just in time, too - it was only a couple moments later that the Captain began counting them down.
After the launch, he heard Duncan speaking.
"As you guys are fully aware we are heading off for two jobs today with Mad-e, Swarm and Blur taking on a coastal force; while Wessex and Papa Mike will be escorting a train to its final destination."
As Percy realizes he was just going straight ahead, he quickly changed course and tailed Jingo.
When he heard Duncan refer to Mad-E, Blur, and Swarm, he cut comms with them, leaving only HQ and Jingo.
I spent literally hours on this post. I'm happy with myself for the most part! :D
percy's an asshole when he's tired omg.
I know I definitely didn't use the right colors for the Captain's and Duncan's dialogue, but I didn't want to have to suffer and find the damn hexes so... ye. I'll try not to do that much.
Eli was tempted to drop back by the room to see if Vera had woken up, but she was on duty, and if it couldn’t be done from inside her NC, then it didn’t need to be done at all. When the briefing was over, she made straight for the hangar like most of the other pilots, and while she was moving it was easy enough to wash out her thoughts and troubles. However, on the ride up to Blur’s cockpit she was once again struck with doubts. Her slighted victory, her failure to recognize the number of hostiles, the way she’d been so easily goaded into striking with emotion over logic, all of it weighed on her as she ascended.
In the pilot’s seat proper, sealed in and all, she yanked the scarf down and pulled back her hood the same as before. This time however it was already hard to get steady breaths, as if she’d doomed herself from the start.
”Begin sync…” she mumbled, more out of necessity than mood.
Don’t do this right now. Two siege tanks? That was range, heavy range. If they hit her she likely wouldn’t live long enough to realize how bad the damage was. You’re going to embarrass yourself. Sync. All of it would be over in a blink.
”No no no. Shit!" Eli could feel the mental hiccup stalling her progress. It wasn’t helping her stress levels, and she could only pray that there was nothing relaying her vitals. God knows she didn’t need that sort of dirt on her record.
>35% >34% >34%
If you can’t control yourself they won’t be able to trust you. They shouldn’t. She caught a glimpse of herself in the glint of the metal around her, and was disgusted by how shaken she looked. What would her mother think, if she saw her in such a sorry state? You know exactly what she’d think.
”Lizzy?”
Eli nearly shouted in surprise at the disembodied voice. After a moment she realized it was coming from a radio she had not previously noticed, which was embedded into the systems before her.
”Vera? Did you put this in here?”
”’Course not, I used my Assistant-Power to have someone else put it there. I’m supposed to help out, remember?”
For a few moments Eli was merely silent. It was hard to fight the smile that crept onto her face. Vera piped back up when she received no answer.
”…That’s okay, right?”
”Sure is, Vi. Can’t be doing all the work on my own, right?”
As soon as Duncan entered the doors he paused for a moment and padded some of the snow off the bottom of his pants to which he heard two faint giggles. Looking up he could see two young girls sitting at one of the tables laughing at him, one about 10 with blonde hair, the other 7 with red hair and freckles.
When Ana noticed Duncan looking at her, she stopped and kind of looked at the table. She knows it's not really right to laugh at people - with them is fine, but not AT them - but the fact he didn't notice the snow on his pants until he came in was kind of funny.
Vera on the other hand did not shy from Duncan's attention. She knew a good laugh when she saw one, and seeing as fewer people nowadays joked in Smith's Rest, she'd take anything she could get. "Must be cold, huh?" she asked.
"Yup, pretty chilly out there. You girls keeping warm?" Slowly he walked over to the coffee pot and began to pour another cup. As the steam rose up Duncan tilted his head so his glasses didn't fog up.
Ana simply nodded.
Vera pulled the ushanka down tighter over her head as if that would have been enough of an answer. Of course, it wasn't. "Am plenty warm, comrade," she called, a booming, albeit poor Russian accent tinging her voice.
Duncan smiled and turned around, leaning up against the table as he took a sip from the freshly poured drink, "Aye Commander, and what is your mission for today?"
Sitting up proudly, Vera pulled a small yet well-kept radio from the pocket of her jacket. "I am acting assisant to miss pilot Jackspar, and I will be assisting her on today's mission."
Ana smiles a little bit when Vera shows off her radio, "Yeah, she can actually talk to miss Jackspar through the radio. How cool is that?"
Curious as to what she meant by 'talking to miss Jackspar', Duncan asked in a slightly concerned way, "Can you speak to her at the moment?"
Vera's eyes lit up and she set the radio upon the table, fiddling with it until at length it turned on. "Sure can! Hey Lizzy you th-" she paused and cleared her throat. "This is Assistant Voloshyna to NC Blur, come in Blur."
From the other end a mostly clear voice returned: "Hey Vi,"
Ana giggled a little bit - she didn't think it actually worked, because Vera didn't really show her that. All she did was show her the radio itself. "Hi!" she spoke into the radio, a little too softly to be heard clearly.
Vera seemed a bit put off by the informal response, huddling to the radio for a moment and speaking softly as to try and not let Duncan hear. "Lizzy c'mon..."
"Sorry. Yes, this is Blur. All systems are green here, Ms. Voloshyna!"
The girl turned back to Ana and Duncan, beaming. "See? These are great, you should get one for your dad, Ana!"
Ana grins at Vera again. "I really should. Oooh, it'd be so awesome, talking to dad while he's doing his cool robot stuff!"
"Ay mister, do you get to talk to anyone?"
Duncan smiled as he watched the kids attempt roleplay their older partners and realised that it had been many, many years since he had experienced this kind of playful atmosphere. Madison however didn't have many others around her age that she could play with, so she often attempted to act with Duncan, even while he was working. "I do occasionally," he replied, making sure he was careful with his words. "When they're on their mission the Captain is the one who usually talks to them and gives them orders."
"So what do you talk about when you talk with them then? The same kinda stuff or is it different?"
Duncan walked over to the table and pulled out a chair. He sat down and leaned over, giving the impression that he was about to drop a secret, "I shouldn't tell you two, but we tell them where the bad guys are. We don't want them to be caught by surprise, so we act as spies on the enemy."
Ana's eyes lit up as she listened. "Awesoommee! So, so you're like a double agent or something? Cause, I mean, you know where the bad guys are and, and you know where Dad and Jackspar and the others all are and all that!"
"Yup, but don't tell anyone, cause it's our little secret" He held his finger up in front of his lips and gave a subtle blow, "shhh."
Ana smiles, then covers her mouth and nods. "Mmhm!"
Vera gave a salute to Duncan. "Yessir!"
Suddenly Duncan stood up and gave the mightiest of salutes, "Permission to leave, commander!"
"You just got here, though." Ana puts on her best pouty face.
"I need to go pee pee, commander!"
Vera contained her laugh poorly. "The man has important work to do! Take your leave, soldier!"
Ana couldn't contain her laughter nearly as well as Vera could - she might have even snorted. A man her father's age saying "pee pee" was just absolutely hilarious and she couldn't keep herself under control.
Jingo listened to the brief and nodded occasionally, he spent all last night on the computer in his dorm, though not on the parts-store, he was engaged in a long, hard game of solitaire, he was use to playing it with actual cards and the thought of being able to play it on the screen was just amazing.
"The train sounds good." he called our from his seat, again watching as slides snapped past in the background, showing the tanks Volkov wanted destroyed and the train that was to be protected, everything seemed standard and the pay would be good. He didn't spend his money last night, he wired most of it to his parents, after all the expenses they put towards keeping him alive after his accident, they were reeling money wise and still were, so he made it a point to send them money even though they didn't want him to. He'd buy upgrades later, as the Wessex was he quite liked it.
Jingo stepped out into the meeting room and into the cold outside, he trudged through the ankle deep snow and hugged his arms around his body, even through the thermals he could feel the bitter cold, but then again they were pre-war. As he did the first time, he approached the bottom of the scaffold that lead up to the hatch of the Wessex, though this time there was no convenient man with a blow torch. He ascended the creaking wooden planks and rusting pipes, climbing higher into the demoralizing wind, he crested the top and stood on top of the platform.
Gwenda and her Brother Victor were sat on boxes, flipping through clip boards and scratching their heads, occasionally muttering to one another and pointing out lines on sheets of paper. Jingo cleared his throat, Gwenda jumped bit, startled by the sudden intrusion but she quickly regained her composure and rose from her crate, Victor did no such thing. Gwenda looked down at him blankly and simply through her clipboard at him, it bounced off of his head and went tumbling over the lip of the scaffold.
"Stand up you idjit!" she barked at him, grabbing him by his collar and yanking him to his feet, "have some fucking manners." She then quickly turned her attention back to Jingo and gave him a warm smile, "Good morning Mr. Strange, we know your mission today, we just read the briefs; I was told to change your ammunition type for this mission, so I took the liberty of swapping your standard rounds out for APs and Incendiaries, right and left guns respectively, it seems that they are either expecting troops or armor to come at you."
"Thank ye Gwenda, and you too Victor, I'm sure ye helped yer sister with the job." Victor just snorted and rubbed his sore head, Jingo gave him one last perplexed look and went towards the entrance to The Wessex, he climbed in no problem and Gwenda brought down the top, sealing him in. The only light in the cockpit came from the monitor and the light blue glow of the coolant cells behind him, he took slow breaths as he worked at the consoles, frost drifting out of his mouth, he looked up and the boot disk drive blinked green. The jammed drive still looked at him wit it's steady yellow-orange light, 'What could you be?' he thought to himself.
Jingo reached out for the mouth piece and pushed down on the button, "I'm ready on my end Percy." he mumbled though, his eyes locked on the jammed drive.
The trio of Blur, Swarm, and the Mad-E, alongside the duo of Wessex and PM awaited their order to "Commence Mission" from their Captain. When it came, their engines rocketed them out of their collective hangar, and they split up, each headed for their own destinations. It wasn't long for either team to meet up with their temporary allies, a Paragon hover-train quickly floating over the dunes to some random outposts, and a duo of Volkov gunships, loitering not too far away from their designated combat zone.
As they were just a bit closer, the Volkov gents met their assistants first, and opened comms. In Russian accents, with somewhat sub-par english, the leader of the two greeted the three coming to join them. "Ahh, lovely, our comrades have arrived. This is Akula 1, how are you mercs doing? Ready to hunt Denver-Vegas dogs? We arrived not too long ago ourselves, we've been talking about god knows-what for the past half-hour. Can't wait to crack some tough nuts!".
Volkov gunships were usually considered to be the best in the world, actually commonly using NC grade technology to achieve superb automation and ease-of-use, allowing the pilots to focus more on fighting then running their own craft. Of course, no actual neural connections were involved, so they still weren't on the level of true NC's. Still, it wasn't unheard of for two gunships, the standard squadron, to flatten a standard tank battalion in a few minutes. Sadly, they weren't fighting standard tanks at all today. These ones, commonly nicknamed 'Prowlers', had a single eight-bladed helicopter rotor propelling them (alongside small turbojet maneuvering thrusters), and two stubby wings carrying anti-armor vulcans, alongside air-to-ground rocket batteries.
Denver-Vegas' 'Siege Tanks' were really rumbling fortresses, twice the tonnage of the second-heaviest tank in the world at the time. They didn't use tech any more advanced then other Denver-Vegas combat vehicles, but their very well-thought out, and rugged (and some say over-armored) designs allowed them to fight NC's on equal footing, assuming that NC already had some damage beforehand. Of course, they were hellishly expensive to maintain, even if they were relatively simplistic designs... These ones were of a newer make and model, more similar to battleships with treads then actual tanks, having two double-barreled turrets, one on the back and one on the front. These 'Crutchley' model super-tanks were also equipped with powerful side armor, in addition to anti-laser smoke deployers. Rumor has it that one of Denver-Vegas' tank commanders personally modified his standard model Siege-tank to something just like these after a run-in with Paragon that he barely escaped from, and its' effectiveness had it taken apart and studied to create a new breed of tanks. Even when not going against their dedicated Paragon marks, they're going to be difficult adversaries...
"Sir, RADAR's picking up new targets alongside those Volkov vultures that have been trailing us!", said one of the tanks' sensor and radio specialists. The Commander of the tank, and squad commander of the trio of land-battleships, pondered his options. "Hmm... at this range, they're definitely hostile and planning an attack. Let them take the first move, aim for anything that has anti-armor measures afterwards. Tell #3 to set their turrets' Vulcans to Point Defense, make swiss cheese out of any missiles or close-rangers that come our way." "Roger boss!", said the specialist, as he began relaying orders. Jameson, the Tank Commander, was worried about how this fight would pan out. They're out-numbered by two, and his personal tank was suffering. Its' aft turret had a barrel malfunction, the left one was inoperable and couldn't fire safely... This was going to be a difficult fight for both sides.
"Team A, your targets are those three RADAR signatures, your long-range sensors are telling us one's already smoking a little it seems and the third one has different armaments then the rest. Crutchleys' are suicidal to try and circle around, their broadsides are devastating. Pick the front or back and stick to it. We'd prefer the front, it's harder on your end but more salvage will be available, since the crew module is in the front. Back is easier, ammo storage. Of course, don't get too close if you're taking that option. Commence attack."
About 50 kilometers to the east, a Paragon hover-train 'conductor' greeted her escorts. British in voice, she started. "Hello, mercenaries. We're happy to see you made it here, please commence the escort. Most of our defensive armaments are situated on the sides, please focus on defending our front and back. That would be highly appreciated.". Paragon hover-trains were pretty modular, this one was the standardized engine/command module, connected to a dedicated defensive array, and a bulk-transport unit. A total of six plasma-casters were on it, two on each side of the command module, and four on the defensive one. Whatever it was transporting must've been particularly important, if it had six directed energy weapons. Paragon loved their expensive and flashy toys, but this wasn't too standard, especially for a train so relatively small.
"Team B, that's the train. Rendezvous. Wessex, you take the lead and follow alongside and forwards its' path, should be showing up in your vision. Papa-Mike, you cover its' rear and do the same. ...Y'know, I can't be the only one wondering just what we're escorting, here... In any case, you only have to escort it for so long. When it reaches the end of that path, we're fulfilling our end of the contract. If anyone's attacking it'll likely be Volkov or some crazy independent. You two'll be able to handle it, I'm sure. Commence escort."
The Swarm started ascending to its maximum flight-altitude again, and Joe switched the missiles to dumb-launch mode. Directly above most non-directional radar units is a blind-spot, expanding in the shape of a cone the further away from the radar one is. Joe planned to abuse that very blind spot, if it was present, by circling directly above the enemy as high as he could, while dropping his missiles onto them. Even if the blind spot was covered by a skyward radar, he deemed himself far enough away to be able to dodge most incoming fire, while gravity helped his missiles save fuel without loosing range or accuracy. After the distance between the spot on the ground directly below him and the enemy tank was 3 quarters of the range of his missiles, Joe released a volley of them. As they were in dumb-launch mode, their engines didn't ignite, and they fell straight down. A few hundred meters before they impacted the ground he ordered the missiles to ignite their engines, while pointing the aim-laser at the nearest enemy tank. To onlookers on the ground, it looked as if missiles were appearing out of thin air, although a sensitive enough radar would likely have been able to detect the falling missiles beforehand, although likely misclassifying them as either bombs or debris.
"Same here," Percy replies, his voice low and kind of groggy-sounding.
The rest of the trip is uncomfortably silent, and it doesn't get much better until they get to their destination. He makes note of how many defensive weapons are on the little train's sides - like they're expecting some kind of attack. Paragon makes the shit flashy weapons, right? Why the hell would they need to defend something that's a glorified fireworks blaster like that? He'd ask, but he just figures that the captain probably doesn't know either.
The accent of the train conductor grates on his nerves, but again, he stays silent as he listens to the woman speak in that god-awful accent. His ears are relieved when she finally shuts the hell up. Under normal circumstances he wouldn't have been so annoyed, but since he's very much sleep deprived, his patience is raw.
When the captain assures the duo that they'll be able to handle it just fine, he can't help but scoff a little bit. She said there was some bullshit percentage of everything going fine before, why the hell would he trust her judgement? Not that he's doubting himself or Jingo, but none-the-less..
He figures he might as well bring this up to the captain, so he goes ahead and says, "Last time you said everything was gonna be alright, it went off the fuckin' rails."
"Ahh, lovely, our comrades have arrived. This is Akula 1, how are you mercs doing? Ready to hunt Denver-Vegas dogs? We arrived not too long ago ourselves, we've been talking about god knows-what for the past half-hour. Can't wait to crack some tough nuts!"
"Hell yes!" Madison replied through the intercom as her NC approached the Volkov meeting point. This was the first time that she had used her VTOL and the sensation was a bit unsettling to start off with. Unlike the thrusters systems where you had a real sensation of flying, the VTOL had a bit of a hover feel to it and required a bit of forethought in order to change direction. It didn't help that her NC was a lard arse with it's armour plating and weaponry but this system was more energy efficient on the Mad-e.
Madi sat comfortably in her reclined seat with both hands gripping two joysticks. The joysticks were actually a part of the torso rotation handles but instead of sitting horizontally, they were turned up vertically. On her digital readout she could see Swarm making his first move as he ascended into the skies in order to drop his secret payload. Knowing full well the direction he was taking, she decided to flank around to the Western side, both as a distraction away from him and spread the attackers around so that it would be harder for the enemy to target them.
Madison found a hill that she was comfortable with and lowered her NC onto the surface. As she dropped to the ground and felt the hydraulic legs take a hold of the Mad-e's weight, she flipped the joysticks down into the original position and heard the propellers of the VTOL begin to wind down and cease operation. "Initiating artillery assault mode," she announced over the intercom back to home base as she typed in the security code for the artillery system.
> Code accepted > Artillery mode activated
The Mad-e's body torso lowered itself into the legs into a somewhat squat position in order to absorb the recoil, while at the same time opening up several ports around the ankles and sending a series of anchoring wedges into the ground. The HUD display lit up with the available targets, and an approximate trajectory for her to use.
"And on today's menu we have Denver Dog served Vegas style with a side of BOOM HEADSHOT!!!" Pulling the trigger on the handles she felt the NC fire off the warhead and saw the cloud of dust it kicked up from the ground around her. The warhead flew towards it's targets on a steady arc before splitting off into a cluster full of dozens of individual grenades.
The three siege-tanks on the horizon, as soon as they noticed the two beefier NC's firing, began counter-attacking with their own armaments. The reasonably damaged command tank focused its' forward-cannons fire on the Mad-E. The second one, in full condition, aimed all four of its' cannons upwards and began firing a barrage of shells towards the Swarm. The third one, equipped with four vulcans instead, aimed two barrels upwards at the swarm of missiles, and the other turret tried to shoot down Mad-E's artillery shell.
The swarm of missiles was thinned out decently, but a few still hit #1, and in its already damaged state the missiles fully disabled its aft turret. The lobbed shell wasn't hit thankfully, and the three tanks were decently damaged by the large cluster of NC-grade explosives. The fairly large amount of shells aimed at Swarm began to impact, a total of three hitting its' lower portions, putting one hell of a dent in its' left leg and damaging its' ability to stay stable. The shells going for Mad-E slammed very hard into her hull, the first few merely putting dents, but the latter half actually doing fairly severe damage. Her right shoulder was hit, missing her cluster-mortar directly but nearly penetrating into the ammo storage of it, and her autocannon was also directly impacted, one barrel was shot away, but it was still technically 'functional'. This was bad, she needed to begin evasive maneuvers, or something!
Akula 1 and Akula 2 began attack-runs after letting the NC's fire the first shots, Akula 1 and 2 went left and right respectively, but they both focused on the 'Point Defense' tank, as that what was most dangerous to them. They fired off their rocket-pods, swarms of the things started to impact Siege Tank #3, a few hitting its' frontal turret enough to blow off its' left vulcan. They used their maneuvering thrusters to dodge incoming counter-fire.
The duo escorting the Paragon Hover-train were having a somewhat better, if boring mission. That is, until a new radar contact came. Wessex's higher-grade sensors could easily see it was an NC. Fully red, with digitigrade legs purpose-built for running and jumping, and a 'large-but-thin' overall profile. Its' head was semi-built into the chest, and it looks to be fully armed. At max-range, even with the Wessex's dedicated sensor suite, you can't tell much else. They loitered a bit, then began to move in. Do they really expect to win this?
Eli watched Mad-E get into position, and Swarm swoop up high into the air, but her feet were stayed. The distant siege tanks were brought up in her HUD, and though they did not look to be in the best of shape collectively, they were still armed to the tooth and ready to blow anything that got close to shreds.
Her allies struck first: Swarm unleashing his hail of missiles, and Mad-E her cluster of explosives. They hit well for the most part, but in the ensuing exchange she saw both of them receive a fair potion of damage as well. Swarm was high enough to avoid a brunt attack, but Mad-E looked to have been stuck high on the body, and Eli felt a lump form in her throat.
She quickly opened their comms channel. "Madison, Joe, damage report."
So soon. They aren't dead. You couldn't survive a hit like that. Our NCs are different, they're fine.
To her side, the radio clicked to life again. "Lizzy? Is everything alright? ...Who got hurt?"
"No one got hurt, Vi, everything's fine," she said, gripping the controls. "I need a quick moment, alright?"
"Sure..." Vera said quietly. "Be safe okay?"
"Yes ma'am."
There was no longer time to waste, at this range Eli was sure that they couldn't outlast the veritable fortresses forever. She brought up Blur's single-unit targeting system and scanned over the two tanks. The information she got was simple at best, no blueprints, no integrity readings, not even the caliber of their ammunition. It did however show her that the aft turret of the less-optimal tanks was more or less out of the picture. With a passing mental confirmation, the system focused upon tank #1. Still she was given very little information regarding the enemy itself, but her mind was flooded with lists of options for approach.
Blur's engines flared to life, and she rocketed to the side in a wide arc around the battlefield. She'd have to approach from the damaged side in hopes that she could close the distance before they re-positioned --if they even could. When the angle was good, Blur shot off in a storm of dirt and dust towards the tank. She did not reach for her energy blade, damned if that would do her much good against such heavy armor, nor did she go for the shotgun. Instead, Blur prepared a demolition charge, keeping it ready for priming. Against an NC, prolonging close-range combat was ideal, but she didn't know what the tanks might have up their sleeves, so the quicker she could get in and get out, the better.
"Madison, Joe, damage report." "Damage to Swarm's internal systems and weapons negligable. Armor integrity of left leg significantly weakened on impact spot. Flight stability compromised." Joe quickly reported. "Attemtping to use instability to evade enemy targeting." He didn't attempt to get Swarm back under control, Joe just did his best to prevent the altitude from falling below 5km, and to prevent spinning too fast to fire the missiles or even pass out due to the centrifugal force. He fired another volley the same way as the first one. After switching to the aimed phase, the missiles tended to spaz out, because the IR-laser couldn't be pointed at the same spot all the time due to the instability. "Captain, does the swarm have any sort of emergency bailout for the pilot in case the jetpack fails mid-flight?"
If it wasn't for the fact that the Mad-e was anchored securely into the ground, the force of the shells hitting the NC would have knocked the unit onto it's back and put it into a very precarious state. Still, it's own rigidity actually hampered it's defences as the second barrage of attacks cause some major damage. Madison was plunged deep into the dark with the second hit as the cockpit shut itself down due to an electrical shortage, most likely from when part of the auto-cannon barrel that had been ripped from the torso.
"What the hell was that?" she spoke out in absolute surprise as she tried to feel her way around the cockpit, pressing any button in order to get a response. The screen then suddenly lit up but instead of the usual start up procedure, it looked as if it was doing a hard reboot.
> Running Boot Sequence > Error: C̶̕o͏r̢r̸u̢͟͡ṕ́͏ti͝o̴̢n̢̨ ̵̧͘found in OS > Error: Corruption found in Aưḑ̷͠i͘o̡͠ ̶̴D̷r̡͟i͡҉v̷̴̕e͝r̢̧s͏̀ > Error: Corruption fo̸u͟n͠d͟ i̶n͡ ̧Cerebral Link > E͟r҉r͠òr̢͢͞: Corrup...
Madison watched with each new line of code that appeared on the screen, another error message would tell her that another system was failing. She reached over and swung the security code keypad in front of her body and began to type in a few lines of code. "What the hell did you guys do to my NC?" she growled as she typed away, following the commands given.
> System Restore Requested > Please select OS to boot from: 1: OS 6.98_5 - C͏ó͜ŗ́͟r͏͏̀u̧p̵̸t̴͝i͏͘on̢͡ ̡̀ļ̡é̶v̡e̛͏͞l 100̸% 2: OS 5͜.̷7͏3_͞0 ͝- C͜o͡ŗru̡p͜ti̡ǫn level 60% 3: OS 4.36_1 - Corruption level 20% > _
She reached over and press the number 3 on the keypad, knowing that there was no time to test out an OS that was running at less than 50 percent capacity. Only to receive a series of more error messages.
"Holy Fuck! This is god, damn, bullshit!" she yelled as she hit the keyboard Y button on the keyboard, forcing it to enter into a reboot status and initialise the cerebral sync. With no music to act as a regular pacing device, the system would have to rely on Madison's heart rate and thoughts which at the moment were racing due to the frustrated anger that she was feeling.
As soon as the welcome message appeared and the screen lit up with the outside world however due to the use of a previous OS, the screen occasionally flickered and lacked many of the tactical information that a pilot would need to make any targeted attack. Madison flipped the handlebars into their joystick position and slammed them as far forward as possible. The wings of the Mad-e sprouted open and accelerated to full speed as the 60 tonne NC began to speed across the landscape on a beeline towards the Denver-Vegas Siege Tanks.
The train blasted across the dried out sea, sending swirling dust clouds out behind it, around the train, the sun baked the ground and killed anything that live, for once Jingo was happy that the coolest ports were open to the cockpit, otherwise his unconscious body would have been roasted already. The Wessex was taking a leisurely run a few hundred yard ahead of the train, keeping the peace between them just about the same, it was an uneventful mission thus far and he was happy for it, he'd rather not be attacked out there in the open.
It was a pleasant surprise to hear the captain's voice, a fellow brit he thought to himself, though he himself was Scottish and not English, either way he enjoyed the company of people with accents, the fact boring accents of some of his comrades drove him up the wall. As he jogged along the flat, salty plains, his antenna high in the air being blown back by the breeze, his sensors picked up an unidentified audio signature. Scanning the horizon, he zoomed in and out with his powerful camera until he spotted the source, a fairly large NC, stalking around at the edge of his sensor range, the fact he couldn't I denitrify it from the sounds he could pick up unnerved him, it meant this was a new NC, one that the database had never encountered and that was dangerous.
Jingo pulled up his coms panel and radioed Percy, "Oi mate, I think we have ourselves a hostile on the horizon, relaying coordinates now, I'm moving in for a closer look." He veered left and away from the train, capping pace with the dissent NC and taking high quality Images to add to the database, from how it looked, it was built for the same purposes as The Wessex, but this one was newer.
