Chapter 2: Gate Oroz

"Looks like they just closed the gates," Ren said looking upward at the empty gate control booth. "You'd think they'd send a sweeper team to come out here and deal with the sleepers that sometimes wake up and attack, they are a couple centuries old after all." She sighed. "What do you think Jenos?"

The pair had continued travelling for a few hours and eventually had made it to the Craft City gates. Craft City was one of the few cities left in the Republic that locked the gates at night because sleeper attacks were quite common, but it was still a mystery how the old Guyzaks were still active, and many of them had stopped functioning and most of the remaining more times than not malfunctioned and the attacked the city for no reason.

"Well, considering that the chances of being attacked by sleepers is pretty minimal," Jenos said, rubbing his chin. "but it would be a good idea to take turns on watch."

"You're not going to make a girl look watch are you?" Ren said in an oddly innocent tone.

"If you can take high speed battles, you can take guard duty." Jenos said, seeing straight through Ren's attempt at manipulation.

"You're such a spoil sport." She responded, this time her tone was playful.

"Takes one to know one." Jenos joked. "But if it'll make you feel better, I'll take the first watch."

"Sounds fair." Ren said as she climbed down from her machine and set up camp (namely, a tent that only fit one.) "We'll only need one tent if we're taking turns on watch." She climbed into the tent and was fast asleed within moments.

"Women." Jenos said about Ren's attempt at manipulation, "They're either horrible at manipulating you or terrible at it. I guess I got lucky with Ren here being terrible at it."

For the first few rotations, nothing notable happened, but at the of Jenos's third turn, he thought he saw movement, but he decided that it was just nothing and his mind was playing tricks on him. He woke Ren up and went to sleep for the next hour, or, more accurately, fifteen minutes because that's how long it took for him to be woken up by the sounds of battle.

There were Guyzaks everywhere. They were too distracted by the Jet Wolf to notice Jenos.

'Shit!' He thought, 'why didn't she wake me up?' Jenos rushed to the Konig Wolf and quickly climbed into the cockpit, within about two minutes, it ws running and ready for battle. However, it took about five precious minutes to override the combat safeties that kept the zoid from being too dangerous. Once that was done, Jenos sprang into action and helped the Jet Wolf fight off the sleepers.

"Why the hell didn't you wake me up?" Jenos said over communications as he used the strike laser claw to destroy one of the sleepers.

"I was too busy scrambling to get my zoid moving without combat safeties!" Ren responded over the communications, also striking down a Guyzak.

"If your safeties are down, why are simple sleepers giving you so many problems?" Jenos said, crushing the cockpit (where the computer was located) on another sleeper.

"Because my zoid is a high speed machine, but I can't fight at high speed with my stabilizers damaged." Ren responded swatting away one Guyzak, then picking up another by the tail with her zoid's teeth and throwing it. "It makes things really hard when you can't fight like you're used to."

"But I saw you running at full speed earlier, I thought you said you only needed the stabilizers adjusted."

"I don't recall saying anything about readjustments, besides, that was nowhere near full speed, it wasn't even 30!" She finished as both she and Jenos destroyed the last of the sleepers at the same time. The rest of the night went uneventful once the two pilots reset their combat safeties.

the next morning, Ren stepped out of the tent in a different set of clothing, she was now wearing a light pink sun dress that did little more than the jumpsuit did to hide her body's shape and her hair was let down with only a hairpin keeping her bangs out of her eyes. She climbed into the Jet Wolf as the city gates opened as the gate operator noticed the two warriors camping outside the gates. "You coming?" She asked over communications immediately when Jenos was seated in the Konig Wolf's cockpit.

"Give me some time to activate my zoid!" Jenos said as he rushed to activate the Konig Wolf's systems and catch up to the other pilot.

Upon leaving both zoids in a hotel's hangar, the pair was met by another pilot in the hotel lobby. "Hey! Ren, who's your boyfriend?" This pilot greeted them sarcasticly.

"Oh, shut up Gate." Ren responded. "This is Jenos Wolfe, I met him on the way into town. I'd assume he's a rookie, his Wolf hasn't even had minor system mods."

Gate Oroz was a man of 29 and average hieght. The first thing most people notice about him is his red eyes. His short black hair was covered by a black bandanna, making him look somewhat like a pirate. He wore a white short sleeved button neck shirt and black jeans and shoes.

"Wolf you say?" Gate said, examining Jenos as he did. "Command or Konig?"

"Konig, but-" Jenos started before he was inturrupted by Gate.

"Excellent!" Gate exclaimed. "Few understand the advantages that heavily outweigh the disadvantages when it comes to the Konig Wolf. Sure it has no guns stock, but it doesn't need them, it is already faster and more manuverable than the Comand Wolf, plus the visual capabilities that make it the perfect anti-stealth zoid (and sniper if a sniper rifle is attached). The Konig Wolf is the most underappreciated..." Gate continued his rant as Ren explained why she was friends with him.