Not five days later, after the preliminary tests, Blaise was flying in an FA helicopter, heading to the fossil park, to get ready for the work that was ahead of him. First he was going to be heading to Cranial City to get his apartment ready. Terry would be there waiting for Blaise in the City Center where the Helipad was.
Sure enough, down below, Terry was waiting. A hand poised over his eyes as he watched the helicopter land. Blaise stepped out into the blazing heat of the city, he knew this felt right. This place, this park...to him it felt like home.
"You made it!" Terry called as the helicopter was flying off.
"I did." Blaise nodded, adjusting his backpack. "So, what do we do now?"
"Well, first, I'm going to show you to your apartment and then we'll go about finding you a starter vivosaur."
All Blaise could do was nod. Instead of making a conversation, Terry nodded for Blaise to follow him.
The heat was different for Blaise. True to his name sake, Blaise liked the hot and humid air. It was different from the cold weather and constant rain of the Pacific Northwest where he had come from. Everything was brick and sand, like something from a desert civilization. As Terry and Blaise passed the Fighter Station, a man caught Blaise's attention.
"Joe?" Blaise found himself saying, looking at the horned cowboy hat wearing man.
The man turned, having just come from a path to one of the numerous dig sites Caliosteo had, and smiled at Terry and the new staff member.
"Well grease my pants, if it ain't Blaise. How you been, pard? It's been some years hasn't it?" The southern accented man said, approaching the two.
"It has. How is Miles, I mean the Smilo that I found doing?"
"Oh, he's doin' just fine. Partnered with a nice girl that isn't really a fighter. He's smitten with her as much as he was with you. What brings you to this here park?"
"I was hired on as a staff member. Terry saw that I am good with maintenance and the Staff Leaders decided that I would be better off working here than being in the Cup itself."
"Good to hear. I know you'll be a great fighter some day. Strive to be better than me while you're at it. I just came back from Mount Krakanak, the volcano dig site. Here, this here fossil would fit you just right." Joe said, reaching into his fossil case.
The fossil rock in question was a strange fossil rock shaped like the number 69 in a way. From what Blaise could see there was a skull fossil in there. With the fossil rock in his hands, Blaise could feel something about it. Something different. It tingled from his hands to his toes, it sort of reverberated throughout his entire body as he stared at the fossil rock. Was it just his mis-wired brain, but it felt like the rock was trying to speak to him in some sort of way.
"Well, since we're right here in front of the Fossil Station I guess it's only appropriate to clean the fossil." Terry spoke up, breaking Blaise's concentration on the rock. "I was going to get you settled in but I suppose now is a good time as any to get your starter vivosaur."
"And I have to be going to Jungle Labyrinth over on Ribular, pards. I saw something that I wanted to check out. Best o' luck, Blaise. You'll be a fine fighter some day. Just strive to be better than me and you'll go far." Joe said, putting a hand on Blaise's shoulder.
Jerking back slightly from the touch, the teen nodded. "I will, sir."
"Great. Best be off. See you around, Terry." Tipping his hat to the staff leader, Joe released his Ptera from it's medal.
Blaise cringed at the idea of flying on a pterosaur as he watched Joe take off. The only flying he was going to do is in a helicopter and that was it, he told himself.
"Well, let's get going. The sooner we settle you in, the sooner you can go in search of fossils before your first official work day tomorrow." Terry said, breaking into Blaise's thoughts.
"Yeah, we better."
Cleaning fossils came sort of easy to Blaise, but this one was different. Cleaning around the loops without damaging the fossil was sort of difficult. At least it wasn't a hard fossil to crack into. Yet that stupid KL-33N thing was a bother to deal with when it was yacking in his ear as he cleaned, it didn't interfere with Blaise managing to get an almost perfectly cleaned fossil skull out of the rock.
"Great, now I'm going to take it over to the revival machine and revive it for you." Terry said, picking up the obviously feline skull.
Was it a Smilo? Could it be a Smilo. Ever since Miles had come into his life, Blaise wanted nothing more than to own a Smilo. Blaise watched the flash of light and in the container where a holographic image of the vivosaur in question appeared. No, it wasn't the yellow and red striped prehistoric cat, but it could pass as it's cousin. Instead of yellow this one was black with red tuffs of fur along it's head, down it's neck, and at it's elbows and knees on it's legs. It's feet were huge. The description said that it was a Machai, and it had strong support effects with the link ability that a lot of mamal vivosaurs had. Smilo didn't have that, it had FP Plus, or Fossil Power Plus. That means Smilo would give more FP to each round it was in so that other vivosaurs on it's team could fight. Not this one, Machai could attack from the support if the attacking vivosaur on it's team didn't take out the other vivosaur it was attacking. Blaise shook his head at the weird sounding thought that ran through his head. Did it make since, it did to him at least.
"Congratulations, you now have a Machai as your starter." Terry said handing the medal that contained Blaise's new vivosaur within it. "Oh, now you can name it whatever you want."
"I'll name it whatever it wants me to name it." Blaise then looked at Terry strangely as he held something else out to him. "What's that?"
"This is a medal case. You can carry up to five dino medals at a time on you. Just clip it to your belt and it will be easier to work with." Terry said, watching Blaise do just that. "Great, now off to your new apartment.
The apartment in question wasn't that far from the Fighter Station, just sort of behind it next to a water canal. The building looked like the rest of the city, almost. There was a Palm tree in front of it, near the door and what set it apart was a blue flag that was hanging over the main entrance. It was modern meets arcane, at least in Blaise's eyes. If that was the outside, he wondered what the inside would be.
"Here it is, number 13."
"I like thirteen as a number." Blaise spoke, mostly to himself.
"Well, it has the best view of the Volcano, in my opinion. I stay in a house near the fossil guild, I get to look at a very colorful Rainbow Canyon." Terry smiled handing Blaise a key. "This is your apartment key. Go have a look." He said opening the door.
One bedroom with a small balcony facing Mount Krakanak, the Volcano. It had a small kitchenette next to the balcony door. The bedroom was small, with a bed and a desk in there for personal uses. There were two windows in the bedroom, facing east so that the morning sun would light it up every morning. No drapes, Blaise noticed. So much for sleeping in pitch darkness. It was doable.
"Just for further reference, you can find more Machai pieces at the Volcano, along with Yango, Brachio, Compso, Anato, Berto and Tryma." Terry said as Blaise found himself standing on the balcony staring at the looming volcano in the background. "I'll bring over your uniforms tomorrow before you start your shift, okay."
"Terry, can I ask you something?" Blaise turned from the view.
"Sure, what?"
"Why did you do all of this for me? I'm...not really useful with being around people. I'm dumb when it comes to social stuff. Why did you offer me this job?"
"Honestly, I've seen that look before. The look of determination, all new Fighters get it, the ones that actually make something of themselves. You have that look. Whether you believe it or not, I know you can make it big as a fossil fighter, you just need to work up to it, prepare for it. Relax, go out to the dig sites on Cranial and then get some sleep. Here's a sonar for you to use and you have the pickax that I gave you before you left the camp right?"
"Yeah, I do."
"Good. Go. There will be other staff memebers off the clock right now, you might want to get in a few fossil battles while you're at it. Search, clean, revive, fight, that's all you have to do. Fight well, and see you tomorrow." Terry saluted Blaise before seeing himself out of the apartment.
Blaise watched the door close, and sighed. "Guess it wouldn't hurt to go look for some useful vivosaurs, and the rest of you, Machai." He glanced at the medal case on his hip. "Know what you want me to call you?"
To his amazement, he heard a voice as clear as day as if it was someone talking direction to him.
I like the name Mach.
