In the floating world that is sky-land, one block, its location a secret, protects those that stand against the sphere, an evil dicatorshi bent on enslaving the earth, and ridding their world of the sky pirates...
Namely one, thier leader...
Said leader was in his office, feet propped up on his desk, leaning back in his chair. Shafts of sunlight drifting in the window glinted off bright orange hair, tied back in a shabby ponytail, gleaming off the badges and decorations on the (somewhat well-worn) uniform he wore. The owner of all these attributes was leaning back in the chair, sleeping.
But not for long.
"HAH! YEEAASS! BEAT YA DAHLIA!" a triumphant cry rang out, startling the man awake. As he woke, he leaned a litle TOO far back, and fell over backwards in his chair. And used some rude words the two teenagers outside in the courtyard had never heard before.
Mahad, a dark-haired, blue--eyed boy of 17, cracked up and looked over at dahlia, a blonde girl.
"Looks like the commanders awake again!" he laughed. Dahlia shook her ehad giggling...
"Cortes is such a grump sometimes.." she chuckled.
Poor Cortes, up in his office, certainly WAS grumpy. He hated being jerked awake like that. He strode over to the window and flung the shutters open, glaring down at he two below.
"Will ye keep it down, Mahad!" he snapped, his broad accent muffling the words a little.
Mahad fidgeted, trying (and failing) to look innocent.
"Sorry Cortes, but maybe you ought to try lying down when your sleeping, no matter how hard yo try, you cant fall off a floor!"
Cortes twitched "JUST CLEAR OFF MAHAD!!" he bellowed, and maahad wasted no time in zipping away, followed shortly by dahlia.
Cortes sighed, pulling the windows shut again, he hadn't meant to snap, he just couldn't understand Mahad's obsession with making such a racket, or mucking about in the Hyperion...
--You used to fly around a lot yourself you know..-- an inner voice chided him --before you suddenly grew from a child to an adult almost overnight!-- He shook his head, he didn't need reminding of his childhood now...but even as he sat back down his mind was drifting away...
A wide, open field, a courtyard scattered with bits of machinery, an image of himself as a child, trying to fix a model plane, of his older brother-- here he shook himself out of it. He didn't want to think about HIM. They were on opposite sides of this war, if the other was even still alive...
He heard a knock on his door, and he turned to face it "come in!" he commanded.
The door was nudged open, and little Lena, and his own adoptive (well, he'd never married) son, Cheng entered. Lena was Mahad's sister, 12 years of age, and a promising young Saijin, a human with superb powers.
"Can i help you two?" he asked, sitting back down and stifling a weary yawn, he was knackered..
Cheng frowned, his father looked worn out...again. The last time he'd worn himself to the bone, he'd passed out in the middle of a speech to the people of Peurto Angel.
"Its..i had another vision.." Lena stammered nervously, fidgeting. Cheng nudged her, urging her to continue "I-it was, about a small block, i sense it has something we can use against the sphere and Oslo, I'm sure of it!"
"Come on father, we have to try, Lenas visions have alwas been good!" cheng enthused, looking up at his adoptive dad.
Cortes sighed "we cant just run about willy nilly Cheng, you know that, the sphere are all over the place..."
"I know dad, but if it means we can get one up o that stinking cheat Oslo, then we've got to try!"
Cortes sighed, closing his eyes, wondering what to do. He coulnt haul the saint nazИrИ out of the bay for what might be a hunch, the shi was in the middle of beig repaired and re-fuelled after its last tussle with the sphere.
--So take the Hyperion, you know how to fly it.., itd be easier then dragging a huge ship out, and it can out-run a sphere vessel easier..-- his brain interrupted again. He sighed, seeing the logic there, and when he opened his eyes he seen Lena looking pleadingly at him, Cheng too.
"Oh for-fine, we'll go LOOK, but one HINT of trouble, and were outta there faster then you can blink!" he emphasized.
The two children cheered. Lena offered to go get her brother, and peeved at him as he was, Cortes reluctantly agreed. Pain in the butt he could be, Mahad was a good little fighter, as well as class-a pilot.
And so, a good ten minutes later, Cortes stood at the Hyperion where it was parked in the docking bay. He tapped his foot, getting impatient. Just as he was about to go search for the children himself, he heard footsteps, and up came Mahad, Lena, and Cheng.
"Ready to go, SIR!" Mahad grinned. Cortes glowered at him, but motioned for them to climb in. "I'LL do the flying mahad!" he told the pilot. Mahad folded his arms and sowled "cmon Cortes, im old enough to fly it! i did it before!"
Cortes rolled his eyes, "yes Mahad, you may be over 16, but sometimes i fear your IQ ISN'T"
Lena doubled over giggling, along with Cheng. Mahad just shook his head, but clambered into the passenger seat. Cheng and Lena piled in behind.
The ships engines flared to life, and it rose into the air, and took off out into the sunlight.
"Now Lena, do you have ANY idea exactly where this block is?" Cortes asked her. She closed her eyes, the images appearing in her head. She began giving Cortes the oddest set of instructions he'd ever had, telling him to fly lower, to the left, go right...it seemed an utterly silly route. But then, out of the mid-morning clouds arose a block. Like Lena had said, it was small in size, but appeared to be mainly covered in high--rise warehouse buildings. It also looked a tip, like nobody had lived there for years.
"What a wreck..." Cheng murmured, "are you sure about this Lena?"
Lena nodded, looking down at the block "I'm certain.." she whispered softly.
Cortes landed the ship carefully on the roof on one of the buildings, and the crew all hopped out, taking a look around.
"Right, lets go..." Mahad decided, heading for a fire escape at the other end on the roof. Cortes and co. followed, weapons at the ready.
They clambered down a good way, until they finally came to a landing gantry. It loomed a little rusty, so they all had to creep along, Cortes cursing again when a sticking out nail scraped the palm of his hand. After batter at the rusty door, they succeeded in knocking it down.
Lena sneezed as she was hit by a wave of dust "eww, needs a clean!" she stated, whilst walking carefully into the room. It was gloomy, with the only light coming from a few dirt-smeared windows.
Over in one corner, obscured by a pile of boxes, Cortes spotted what he was sure was the faint outline of a door. Leaving the others to investigate the room they were in, he strode over to the obscured door. But the boxes wouldn't budge, no matter how much he heaved and tugged. Folded his arms he glowered at them, wondering what was in them to make them so darn tricky to shift.
Then something else caught his eye, one of the doors hinges looked a tad odd. Crouching atop and Leaning over the topmost boxes, he pulled a sharp-bladed pen knife from his pocket, and, almost cross-eyed in concentration (and grateful Mahad wasn't looking, the boy would've had a fit laughing at him!), began poking at the lock. By sheer chance, the pen knifes materiel matched the lock, and after several seconds poking and prodding, there was a muffled bleep, and the next second, the door swung open. While he'd been concentrating on lock-picking, the sky pirate hadn't realised he was leaning so far forward he''d been using the door as balance.
He remembered a little too late. When the door swung open, he was pitched forward to land unceremoniosuly on his face, one foot caught on the edge of the top box.
HE heard Mahad's raucous laughter a split second later, followed by some attempts at muffled giggling by Cheng and Lena.
--Great, now they've all seen me make an ass of myself. Well done Cortes...-- he grumbled mentally to himself.
From his position on the floor, he managed to twist round and untangle his foot, finally clambering to his feet.
"Good trip?" Mahad asked as the rest walked over. Cortes just just shot him a look that, if looks could kill, Mahad would be having a full cremation plus the works.
Shaking his head he strode off ahead of them, gun at the ready. This corridor looked spotlessly clean, which further aroused his suspicions that this was a sort of shere storage-hole. There were three doors in all, one at the end, and two either side. Lena and Cheng took the left, Mahad the right, and he himself kicked the middle door open. He was faced with a long set of stairs, but he set off up nonetheless.
The steps at last yielded a door, locked in the same was the first door. But Cortes had figured out how they worked, and this second door was a snap. The room he walked into was spotlessly white. In the dead center of it was looked at first sight to be a human being. Then he realised it had wings, metal wings, finely crafted. He stared down at it, baffled. What WAS it? It looked so remarkably human, right down to thew last damn detail. Pale skin, light whitish blond hair...it wore simple robes marked with the sphere symbol, if he hadn't seen the wings, he'd have thought it a human being.
--A sphere brig? Nah, its way to fancy, this must be some new anti-saigin doo-dad, either that or its another weapon to pit against the sky pirates...this is bad...-- But all the wires and compputers connected to it showed no signs of life. he reached out one hand, and slapped the screen with it, no response, on a bloody-palm pprint, left from the cut on his hand. He shrugged, mmystifed...
He turned away from the humanoid...thing, and began checking out the rest of the room. Had he looked back at the screen, he would've seen the interface flicker on, a back-light scanning the print he''d left on the screen. Then the words "DNA ACCEPTED". There was a faint whirring, but it went unheard by the sky pirate, who was busy pilfering through the supply room that joined onto the main room.
On the spheres main ship the Monolith, someone else was picking up on the signal.
"Commander Oslo, I'm picking up the sky-angels activation signal, did you authorise this?!" Di-Wan swiveled in her chair and looked over at the leader of the sphere. Oslo frowned "i most certainly did not, it isn't due for activation until next week, it isn't fully finalised! Which imbecile started it up?"
Di-Wan checked over the readout, and shook her head "I'm afraid i don't know sir, its not giving me a name, just says its been accepted."
"HOW!?" oslo thundered, "Only a select few have thier DNA coded into that thing, how could it have been started up?! Unless..."
"Unless.." Di-Wan prompted him.
"Unless, by some damned co-incidence, whomever came across it is a VERY close DNA match to one of those in the activation set."
"But sir, thats virtuosly impossible, none of the guardians selected are known to have any living relatives.."
"Unless someones been lying to us.." Oslo turned to another Sphere worked next to Di-Wan "run the scan, see who matches up to it!" Oslo snapped "send troops to that location, Di-Wan, you lead them!" She nodded and got up from her chair, marching confidently towards the docking bay...
She'd find who it was, and drag them back here...
It was a tad cramped where Cortes was, stuff had been piled up willy-nilly in the store-room. He had to carefully step over damn near everything to avoid tripping and landing on his face again. He was just reading the label on what he thought were cleaning chemicals, when he heard a muffled boom from downstairs, (it later turned out to be just Mahad accidentally self-destructing a heater unit.). It was loud and sudden enough to make him jump, and he stepped back, his foot skidding on the polished floor. And the floor was replaced by a view of the ceiling as he felt himself falll...then stop suddenly, as someones arms hooked under his, and caught him easily, before his head met the floor again.
He blinked, what in hell? Slowly... he craned his neck back to get a look up his catcher. It wasn't the Sphere, he knew that much, they'd sooner drop him on his head and cause some severe damage then try help. But what he came-face to face with was the next closest thing to downright bizarre.
It was that angel-thing from the table.
"GAAHHH!" he flipped out, hefting himself back onto his feet, and backing up faster then Mahad could pull a fast one.
He pulled his gun from its holster, aiming it at the thing as it stood there, watching him.
"Stand back!" he ordered "or i'll blast ye a new one!"
It stirred into life as the computer processed the DNA, and its first thought was that its chosen master had been decided. Whomever it was, he was duty-bound by his creator to serve them. He heard muffled words from the next room, and entered just in time to see a ginger haired human male about to land himself a nasty knock on the head. He shot across the floor and caught the man easily. The human shifted in his grasp and looked u at him, dark brown eyes meeting the robots pale blue.
Then the man flipped, pulled a gun on him and seemed very mad. From his memory banks he knew all the spheres uniforms and main officers, and this man was none of them. Yet he struck the being as familiar somehow, very familiar...
Either way, this man had activated him, he was sure of that, and he was bound to serve him. If he could get him to listen that was...
"Theres no cause for alarm master,--may i enquire your name, it doe not apear to be in my memory banks?"
"WHO are you? WHAT are you?!" the human raged, still pointing the gun at him "and don't call me master, I'm not a sphere dog! Don't you dare mix ME with THEIR KIND!"
"But my internal computer tells me YOU are the one who submitted your DNA to activate me.." he stated simply. The human stared, looking more befuddled then ever, then it seemed to dawn on him. The hand print, when he smacked the seemingly-dead monitor screen with his injured hand.
"Ohh...sheeiit.." the human said curtly, staring at him.
"You recall now master."
"I SAID stop calling me your master, your a sphere drone, and as such, a threat to me and the others, I'll have you deactivated!!" he began charging up the weapon.
"Master, i do not wish to harm you, rather, i was created to fight for and keep my designated master and any they deem fit, safe."
"That's a crock of sh-" but the humans words were cut off as the ceiling above him cracked, then caved in. He stared, to late to react, he could only stare at the oncoming chunks of rock.
That was when the angel-bot showed its talent of protecting its master. It covered the distance between himself and Cortes in no time, and scooped the man up in his arms, kicking off from the ground, all before the rubble had even reached them. He landed a few meters away, and carefully set the human onto the floor.
Cortes just blinked, his face red. What the HELL did that thing think it was doing, grabbing him like that. Well, it HAD saved him, so that kinda covered it...but it was a Sphere drone, why help a pirate?
The both of them stared at the cloud of dust and brickwork, and Cortes had a distinct bad feeling. Standing there was Oslo's right hand-woman, Di-Wan. And dropping into the room after her were brig after brig, some marched into a semi-circle behind di-wan, arm-cannons aimed at Cortes and the angel, the rest marched out of the room, presumably to look for any others that might've been alerted by the noise.
"Sirus!" Di-wan snarled, addressing the robot "what are you doing?" she glanced at the person Sirus was guarding. What luck, it was the rebel leader, Cortes.
"Protecting my designated master, ma'am" Sirus responded, standing in front of Cortes, who was still sat on the floor in a mild state of shock.
"Don't be a fool," Di-Wan laughed "take a closer look, he's a sky pirate! Our enemy no less. No pathetic rebel has the right to command a sphere drone!"
"HIs DNA was accpeted ma'am, my systems have him cataloged as my master."
At that moment, one of the brigs received a message from the monolith.
"Ma'am, the cloest DNA match from the set was Perez. Familial match"
Di-wan smirked at the look that flashed across Cortes' face. "OH so Captain Perez has a brother does he? how sweet, pity its a rebel, it'll be a shame to destroy you."
Sirus put an arm out to steady Cortes as the other staggered to his feet. "Be careful.."
"Who says im gonna let you!" he snarled, hands clenched tightly, furious that that Di-Wan bitch had found out about it.
"I am!" Di-Wan laughed "fire stun beams!"
Sirus moved quickly, as the beams shot towards them, he shoved Cortes the to side, out of harms way. Or so he thought, but di-wan had banked on the angel-bot trying to save the pirates worthless hide. As the smoke from the beams faded, she caught sight of movement, spotted a flash of ginger hair...
She pulled an eelctric stun gun from her hi-picket, took aim at the half-shrouded figure and pulled the trigger..
Cortes thought he'd gotten off easy, and was just scrambling to feet, about to run to what he hoped was safety, when something flew out of the smog and attached itself to his shoulder. He had only a second to recognise what it was, before the high-voltage hit him like a ton of bricks.
Pain hit in waves, and it only took a few seconds before the already worn-out pirates body gave in, and he collapsed from the pain, unable to fight it...
Sirus squinted through the fog as it cleared, and seen his master collapsing from what seemed to be an electric paralysis weapon. --she deliberately used me to get at the master..-- his mind told him.
Di-Wan smirked as she heard Cortes' cries of pain, then seen him black out. She motioned one of the rigs to pick up the unconscious man. --we may have a use for him after all...and that idiot bot, we may be able to turn his affection for the sky-pirate to our advantage!--
Sirus attempted to move towards his fallen master, but half a dozen brigs barred his path, while a seventh, picked up unconscious sky-pirate and slung him over its shoulder.
There was a boom from outside the room, and Mahad, Lena, and Cheng came charging in, Lena glowing with a saijin aura.
"PUT HIM DOWN RUST BUCKET!" Mahad yelled at the brig. Di-Wan just smiled coldly. "Sorry kiddies, this ones ours now-" she motioned the brig holding Cortes to go back to the ship. As well as for the angel-bot to be returned to the ship with his master, under armed escort.
Sirus though at first to object, and fight his way free, but there were too many guns trained on the prisoner and himself for an escape to be of benefit for his master. --I will have to find another method..don't worry master, i'll get you out..--
"No way!" Lena yelled, firing an energy blast at Di-Wan, who was just about able to block it, the girl was getting stronger, she thought. She fired a blast back, and while Lena was distracted covering herself and Mahad with a shield, the brig holding the prisoner vanished back through the hole in the ceiling again.
"CORTEZ!" Mahad yelled,
"FATHER!" a frightened Cheng cried, glaring at Di-Wan "give me my dad back now you dumb sphere!"
"Sorry little boy", she sneered, motion more brigs to hold the children off while she escaped, "but Oslo wants to have a little chat with your dad.."
And with that, she told the troops to attack, and made herself scarce.
She had been a bit baffled when Oslo had passed up the chance to nab Mila's brats. But Oslo had simply said he had a plan to make capturing ALL those pesky sky pirates far easier...
The three children stared in shock as they seen Di-Wan escape, they made to give chase, but a wave of brigs descended on them, it was all they could do to destroy them all. As they returned reluctantly to the Hyperion, Cheng couldn't hold back from crying. What if he never seen his dad again?
Mahad felt sick, only that morning, he'd bee teasing Cortes and winding him up. But deep down, he had far more respect for the rebel leader then he ever let slip to anyone.
Lena felt miserable herself, she was a saijin, yet she hadn't been able to do anything to help Cortes.
"We'll get him back guys, just you see!" Mahad finally annouced "no sphere prats are going to have OUR leader!"
Cheng nodded, determined again. Lena managed a small smile "yeah.." she said softly.
Back in the Hyperion, they radioed ahead the terrible news to Puerto Angel...
Oslo smirked as a transmission came in from Di-Wan, stating they'd captured Cortes, the rebel leader. He would be a perfect Guinea pig for his experiment...
"Patrol 452 now docking in the main bay." one of the workers stated, Oslo got up from his chair, time to greet their...esteemed visitor.
Ugh, what was that noise. Cortes tried opening his eyes. Nope, too painful. Best to keep still, so as not to disturb the machinery and pheasants in his head. At least that's what it felt like. After a few more seconds he tried again, and was able to get a brief glimpse of his surroundings before having to shut his eyes again. Was it his imagination or was that cockroach shuffling too loudly?
The next second there was a jolt, as the brig over whose shoulder he was slung started walking again, and he forced his vision into some kinda of coherence to see where he was.
As expected, it was the Monolith. He tried to move, but it felt like every part of his body ached. --if i move i might throw up..-- he thought absently.
Through his blurry vision he spotted someone striding towards them, guarded by brigs. oh feck, it was OSLO. --okay NOW i really wanna throw up..- he thought.
Oslo smirked at the befuddled sky pirate as he came to a halt in front of him.
"Well well, if it isn't our dearest little friend, the rat-pack leader! You've caused us some pains you know.."
Cortes glared, and summoned up enough energy to give Oslo a VERY rude gesture, and the following words, partly obscured by the sudden bleat of a docking alarm. "Oh, go blreeeeepp yourself Oslo you ugly goit!"
Oslo's response to that was to hit Cortes, pretty hard too. While the pirate was still reeling from that, Oslo told the brigs to bring him to the medical operations room.
Cortes winced, that was going to hurt later, but to see that peeved look on oslos face, worth it.
Then he lost grip on consciousness and blacked out again.
"What are your plans, Oslo?" Di-Wan asked, as Oslo cracked his knuckles after punching Cortes.
"Im going to use him as a carrier, you remember the 'Bird of the Heavens' virus"
Di-wan blinked, was he serious. The birds of heavens was a rare and beautiful bird, that often roosted as a group. Generally they selected a block each time they rested, but one time they stayed in the same place for a week. Scientists captured a few to run tests, and discovered that certain foods the birds had consumed had caused them to get sick, and it had swiftly developed into an epidemic amongst the birds.
Sphere scientists had isolated a strain of the virus, as well as making a basic antidote, just in case.
The birds had been cured, and over time the threat of the virus had been thought of as gone by the people of sky-land. But the monolith had retained copies of the virus, for use as a potential weapon. Given the sickness was contagious, it only took one carrier to spread it...
"You plan to infect the ppirate with it?" di--wan asked "wont it kill him?"
"Not right away, we'll administer the virus, then stage an "escape" so he and the damn robot can escape, and return to their ship. Anyone coming in close contact with him has the potential to carry the sickness on. Once it starts to spread, they'll all be to weak to put up a fight, and we can be rid of them for once and forever!"
"How long will it take before the symptoms show..?" Di-wan enquired as they walked back to the med room.
"Only a few hours, by the time he's back with his bunch of rebels, it should be kicking in properly by then..it'll just look like a common cold to start with, by the time they figure it out, it'll be too late..."
Oslo smirked, this was a brilliant plan, providing it worked. If it didnt, he'd simply go to the next phase of his idea, but why not give the virus a try?
Whee! Please review
Random Fact: This is actually a re-typed version, the first version had one too many cheesy puns in it...