Chapter 3: Stages of Infection
March 2194
Alyssa yawned and stretched in her chair. "Oh my gosh," she murmured. "I know I slept all day, but man, I am absolutely wiped out."
"Really?" Polaris asked. He was sitting in a chair, waiting on a post upgrade interview with Scorpio.
She rubbed her eyes. It didn't do much in reploids, being just a mimicry of human behaviors. "I hope I did not get one of those blanks. How am I supposed to explain this exhaustion if I didn't get an update at all? Ugh."
She was pretty even in this condition, Polaris thought. Her hair was messily kept and her weariness showed in her slumped posture. Biting his lip, he looked away from her. She wasn't available anymore. He had to drive that into his head.
The door opened, letting Tully out. "Okay, you two gits get out of here and get some sleep," Scorpio ordered. "But I need you to stick around for a while so I can keep an eye on your development."
"Sure, sure," Tully grumbled, taking Alyssa's arm as she got up. "Let's just rest tonight, honey."
"Okay." They left.
"My turn?" Polaris asked, getting up. It was needless to ask, as the other nine were all gone now.
"Your turn," Scorpio repeated, leading him to the exam room. "Step into the scanner and make it snappy."
It only took a couple of minutes in the scanner room, and then he came back out to sit by the center's repair doctor. "How's it looking, Scorpio?"
"Can't tell fully right now," he replied, watching a computer screen down on his level. "Infections are known to take some time to develop. Now, how do you feel?"
"I feel fine, actually," he said honestly. He rubbed his head. "No pain, I feel alert… not even that viral voice is audible."
"Hmm… interesting. You are alert? Not sleepy at all?"
"Right. I noticed the rest were all dragging."
He punched in some notes. "I gave them all the program."
"What about the blanks?"
"Just a ruse. I don't expect them all to take hold either, especially if your initial reactions are different. Now, I want you to perform a test for me. It's a simple cognitive test which you've taken dozens of times before. Nothing new."
It was a pattern recognition test, to find the next in sequence of a set of items, designs, letters, or numbers. That was easy for him, so he went along with it patiently. Then Scorpio wanted a reaction test, and a brief stretch to check for problematic joints or physical signals.
"That's it for now," the scorpion said. "Go back home. Or do whatever, I guess, since you're not wiped out like the rest. I'll be checking in on you regularly."
"Right."
As he got up and left the lab, Polaris wondered why he didn't feel worried now. After all, Scorpio had just infected nine others with a virus partially derived from his dormant one. Was that one active now? He didn't feel its presence. Maybe the lack of worry was caused by the virus. Which should be reason to worry.
Polaris still felt calm about it, for the moment.
In the largest part of the B-tunnels, there was a collection of stores that served the residents. Today, Polaris had brought some of his junk art tables to sell to the pawn shop. He wasn't sure who bought them, but they tended to disappear from the store shortly after he sold them. And the shopkeeper was always pleased to see him, so it must have been a good thing.
On coming back out, he looked around. There was a row of skylights here, allowing a strip of plants to be grown. They were scruffy and defensive things, but it gave some sense of life to the underground. Over by a bench, he spotted Scorpio.
Polaris went over to him. "Thanks for doing this."
"No problem." He handed over a bottle of nutrient pills. "It has to do with the experiment, so I ought to help pay for it."
He opened up the bottle, took off the sealing paper, then took two of the pills. They were compact mixtures of various metals and materials that reploids needed for self-repair. Eating food might be a luxury, but nutrient pills were a necessity. "I've felt like I've been starved for nutrients, even though I finished off that last bottle in two days."
The scorpion waved his claws. "I'm interested in the particular mix you're craving. It suggests that your body feels the need to construct more processing chips. Your mental core is changing at a highly unusual rate."
"Is that it? I don't feel any smarter."
"We can run some tests on your cognitive abilities. However, I think we ought to give it some more time. I don't want to bias your development. Rather, I'm curious as to where this program will take you naturally. Have you tried battling yet?"
He shook his head. "No. Why?"
"Give it a try. You might surprise yourself." He scurried off back to his lab. "Just don't do anything stupid, hear me?"
"I hear you," he replied. But what would he consider 'something stupid'? Scorpio didn't always explain himself well.
Battling… he generally disliked doing that these days. It had been different before. But then, a lot of things had been different early in his life. But the exercise would be good. He did need to keep sharp in order to deal with the Nightmares. Polaris went to the gym.
Like everything else around here, the gym was a hodgepodge affair. The owner managed to find and fix up exercise equipment that came into the junkyard. Even with the repairs, there was still a chance of things breaking while in use. It wasn't like anyone was going to sue the owner, though. There was no one around who could afford a lawyer. Well maybe Scorpio could blackmail someone who'd hurt him, but that was it.
There was a battle factory center over in one corner. A rather old training device, it took in scrap metal and formed basic combat mechaniloids, with AI and abilities modified based on the registered user's ability. The mechaniloid and the user would then fight within an area boxed in by an energy field. It was kind of limited, but there was nobody living in ARC who was good enough to require a better model.
Activating the control screen, Polaris saw that he was still the top ranked user. That was sad, he thought. He had sacrificed many of his fighting programs in order to develop his artistic programs, while many of the other residents claimed to be strong fighters, thugs, or even killers. He didn't even have a perfect record.
Down at rank nine, he saw that Vilpent had been doing well with this machine. His win rate was much better than the artist's. A few more wins could put him at number one. Which would be good for Polaris. He finally wouldn't feel self-conscious about having the top score and the rougher characters of ARC wouldn't search him out to prove they were better than him. Maybe the snake had been built for battling. But then why was he here?
He'd ask later. For now, Polaris put in a request to battle, starting at the Rank 3 AI. He took the unit's plasma sword, then stepped into the battle arena.
The energy field came online, shining with a red glow. A door of the manufacturing unit opened to release a tall spindly mechaniloid that had an angular almost-human torso and arms, but a round head with a visor strip for an eye and bell-shaped lower have that hovered over the ground. Activating its own plasma blade, it waited for the monitoring computer to say, "5… 4… 3… 2… 1… Commence."
Right off, the mechaniloid rushed at him. Polaris brought his sword to a blocking position and caught the blade. The same force that kept the plasma in a focused form caused the two blades to recoil off each other. While the mechaniloid was recovering from the recoil, the reploid used his to start a curving sweep at his opponent's shield generator. It had enough AI to fall back so the hit didn't connect, while Polaris had the experience to end the sweep and turn it into a stab at the foe's sword arm.
'But I'm still way too slow,' he thought. He used to be much better, able to trash this level in seconds. When developing his art programs, he had to compress his battle data. So it usually took him a good minute to defeat it now.
Then why don't you just unlock those programs now? You have the processing to do it.
Gasping, Polaris was distracted a moment long enough for the mechaniloid to slash across his left shoulder. Given his profile used real weapons, that hurt. He went back on the defensive to keep it from hitting enough times to cause a forced loss of the match. That had been the voice of the virus.
Of course. Now turn your pain to hate, and smash that thoughtless hunk of metal!
One of his old moves came back into his mind. The injury did hurt, and he could feel the virus feeding energy into his anger. Clenching the blade's handle, he swung his blade from down-left to up-mid, forcing the mechaniloid to block and get recoiled to the right. Then he thrust right at the shield generator, destroying it. While the plasma was inside the creature, he ripped the blade across and down its torso, causing it major damage and ending by cutting into the wrist holding the blade. A fourth slash straight across its torso, then an upwards follow up deep into the mechaniloid's head finished up the five-move combo in barely two seconds.
The training robot collapsed, incapable of fighting. "Winner of this round, Polaris," the computer announced. "Accumulated battle points: 157. Continue to next level?"
You were not angry enough.
"No," Polaris said, trying not to tremble. He hadn't done that particular combo in so many years. "End game." He put the blade up and left the arena. So Scorpio's experiment had worked. He was a Maverick once again. Which meant he was going to have to focus much of his energy on keeping control of his own self.
Ugh.
Unexpectedly, there were some cheers and clapping as he came out. Several other ARC residents had been watching, including Tully. He grinned at Polaris. "That was some move you finished with."
Feeling shocked and still skittish from the viral voice, he clutched his injured arm. His self-repair was already fixing it, but it would take a minute. "Oh, that was nothing. I just got annoyed that it managed to hit me."
"But that was AI level 3," one of the others said. "That's damn good; I can hardly get past level 5."
It made him embarrassed to hear that. But then he saw that Tully had some admiration for him. I still dislike you, Polaris thought while looking at him. "I said, it's nothing. I only stick with fighting to keep the Nightmare viral things away and in case I want to protect a friend of mine, like Vilpent or Alyssa."
As he'd hoped for, that gave Tully something to consider, maybe even fear. That made Polaris feel a little better. Even if he'd never have to fight this guy (he didn't seem the sort to hurt a girl he was with), it was still a nice thought to consider.
Ah, so you can be mean. The virus seemed amused.
Not that often, Polaris insisted to it. It was bad to give the virus anything it could attack through. So he moved on to leave the gym, planning on heading to Scorpio's place to get his arm checked on. However, it was already healing up.
Oddly enough, he ran right into Alyssa. She smiled. "Hey Polaris. Have you seen Tully around?"
He nodded. "Yeah, he's in the gym here."
"Good." She paused, then asked, "About that experiment of Scorpio's… feel anything change?"
"Some things," he admitted. "I'm apparently progressing mentally."
She laughed at that. "I see. Me too, actually, and Tully. But I also feel rather confident somehow. Like…" she put her hand to her chin. "Like some internal voice encouraging me to do things I'd normally dismiss."
"Really?" he asked, feeling his stomach churn in nervousness. He was part of the cause behind that.
"It's not like I'm actually hearing voices, silly," she said, rolling her eyes. "I'm not too worried, though. It's not like Scorpio would be experimenting with dangerous viruses or the like."
You have no idea, Polaris thought, in some pity.
Like her, then? Why don't you just claim her for your own? That little man in there couldn't compare to you. Be forceful and make your move.
No. He then blinked, trying to disguise the inner argument. "Well if you have any problems, just tell Scorpio. I'll see you around."
Wimp.
If Polaris stopped to think, he tended to become upset, even breaking down into tears. He wasn't the only one miserable. Alyssa and Tully had a public argument the other day in the B-tunnels. Supposedly they had made up, but everyone else was talking about how it couldn't last. It seems they had gotten married while drunk, so... she wasn't what Polaris wished she was. The virus kept telling him to kill one or both of them, voicing normally repressed desires. But he kept resisting. Since he'd seen what happened to others who listened to the virus, he wanted to stay in control.
Perhaps the others weren't so lucky. Apparently four had already died, thanks to fights they had gotten into with others. And the rest did seem edgy, bickering in Scorpio's lab while the engineer was checking up on them. They were getting more violent and Polaris couldn't forget how he had gotten in the battle simulator. What would happen during the next round of the Nightmares?
Tonight Polaris was scavenging. ARC was meant to serve all of Asia's disposal needs. However, other places also sent junk, so backlogs were constant. Worsening the problem, the managing team could not get the funds or the power to run all the recyclers at once. This led to the ARC scavenging community.
When garbage arrived, it was placed in ground level facilities to be sorted. The most dangerous garbage (nuclear wastes, poisons, explosives) was taken care of immediately. Anything else could be above ground for days before being placed into the proper tunnels. As the recycling tunnels were dark and full of dangerous machines and weapons, few dared to go in them. The scavengers explored the new junk, searching for anything that could be repaired and sold.
Polaris didn't scavenge for money. He scavenged for art materials. When he'd been making the tree sculpture for the underground park, he'd actually paid several others to help him search for green computer chips. But that had been an exception. Normally he found everything he wanted if patient.
As dawn approached, he discovered a trash bag with a bottle-shaped lump in it. Bottles were usually good finds. This one was likely a glass canning jar. Careful, he rolled the bag over before slicing it open. The bottle was wrapped in a plastic shopping bag, hinting that it was broken. No big deal; Polaris could find uses for broken glass. He pulled the shopping bag out and looked inside.
It was a glass canning jar, clear with a large crack down the side. A good hit would end up with dozens of pieces. There was an awful lot of mold inside, like a brown scrubbing pad. But it wasn't food inside. It was a bunch of colorful marbles.
"Lucky," he murmured. Marbles were highly useful for his art tables, pretty things once cleaned up. However, buying new decorative marbles was outrageously expensive. A bottle of them like this saved him close to fifty zenny.
A shout and rolling crash disrupted his thoughts. It was followed up by a yell, "Hey, we've got people buried!"
Idiot, probably. Ignore it.
Ignoring the virus, Polaris set the jar of marbles down and hurried over to the source of the shouting. A precarious pile of unsorted garbage had slid down onto some scavengers. He came over and checked on the pile, gauging how stable or unstable it might be. As it had already shifted, it could shift again.
"How many people were over here?" Polaris asked as others came to help.
"Three," the human man said. "One human and two reploids."
Okay. It was more of a priority to get the human out first. The reploids could tolerate more damage and would not be infected. Scanning over the area, Polaris located the foot of the human. He glanced towards the helpers and was glad to see two of them were fliers. "Hey, Buzz and you up there… go lift that big metal frame off the pile, then work on getting those wood pieces away." They went to it. As one of the older residents, Polaris had some respect. "The rest of you, pull stuff from over here, here, and there so it doesn't go sliding in over them." He then started pulling some pieces off once the frame was gone.
Polaris didn't know much about physics, but his artistic eye worked well enough in judging the pile's stability. After about ten minutes, they had enough things gone to pull the unconscious human out of the pile and onto a stretcher. It took nearly an hour more to get the other two out safely, but more people came in to assist, including Vilpent. In an illegal community like this one, the residents tended to stick together and help out in emergencies. For many of them, it was safer than calling on government agencies.
By the time they got done, the day had broken. On making sure there was no one else in trouble, most of them went back into the tunnels. Vilpent slithered over to Polaris. "It'sss good to know that even in a placssse like thisss, people will help one another out."
He smiled. "Yeah. Excuse me, but I've got to go find the things I dropped when I came over here. I found something nice that I need to spend a while in cleaning up."
"I'll come with you." He silently called over his monkey mechaniloid, then followed Polaris through the scattered junk piles. "What did you get?"
"A large jar of glass marbles. They would look really nice on my junk tables."
He laughed gently. "That they would."
"You know me," he replied sheepishly. "Always thinking about art.
The rising sun reflected off many pieces of metal and glass in the junkyard. Not enough heat had built up yet to bring out the worst smells. It took them fifteen minutes to locate the partially buried jar of marbles. Polaris was just thinking of going back home when he got an odd feeling. No, it couldn't be that… he had gotten rid of all traces of that, he thought.
Hmm, it seems to be a group of infected Mavericks.
Knowing the virus was a handy sense to have, although he didn't want to be found out to have it. Even worse, if they found Vilpent, they might try to infect him. Polaris bit his tongue. "Um, I need to go check on machinery up here. I just realized it hasn't been done for a while and I'm the closest thing we have to a reploid overseer. You go on back inside, but thanks for staying out with me."
Vilpent looked quizzically at him, but nodded. "If you sssay ssso. Ssshouldn't the company leadersss handle thingsss like that?"
"Do you ever see them around?" Polaris pointed out. "Ever since Mr. Riggs died, I haven't seen any of the human company executives here at ARC. That's why me and Scorpio handle so much."
"Ah, that isss true. I hope it doesssn't take you too long; the sssmell up here can get horrible. Sssee you later." He then slithered off to the nearest entrance to the tunnels.
Feeling relieved, Polaris mentally braced himself, then headed for the virus he could feel. There were many reploids living here and he didn't want a Maverick infection to take over again. It was up to him to get rid of the active ones.
At the northern boundary, the Mavericks appeared. There were five of them, a mix of humanoid and animaloid models. They were all armed and ready for battle. Wary, he approached them; he didn't have his own armor and weapons at the moment, just the cracked jar of marbles. The one built as a wooly red minotaur spoke up. "You are Polaris Starr, correct?"
Did he lie or did he be honest? He decided to try the latter. "I am."
And all five of them bowed low. "Then you are the Prince. We've been searching for you a long time."
Polaris felt like his systems had gone frigid. But he had to reply. "What do you mean?"
They stood back up, with one of the humanoid models stepping forward. "My prince, we have been unable to contact Sigma ever since Lumine double-crossed him. We would normally hear from him within three months of a defeat, but it's been many years now. As it seems that he's finally been destroyed for good, we've been searching for one of his heirs, the reploids that he designed and built. However, you are the only one still alive that we know about and can find. He said that his heirs could all take over should he be destroyed. So, we need you to come and take your father's place."
Seriously? They were asking him to replace Sigma? Perhaps if they knew what Sigma thought of Polaris, they wouldn't be here. Or maybe it was because he was the only one left. But there was some good news in this. "So you've heard absolutely nothing from Sigma?"
"Nothing at all," he confirmed. "We even retrieved his body, but there was no trace of him left. There was too little of his core programming left to revive. Our researchers are at a loss and there isn't much we can do as a whole until someone takes over as our leader. We, being loyal to Sigma, felt that one of his heirs would be best."
This is a marvelous opportunity for us. Take it. It is unlikely that we can get an army at our command in a moment's notice again.
That wasn't what he wanted. But he had to get their attention off him. Polaris went with the first thing he came up with. "All right, thanks for informing me. But I'm working on something right now. Leave me be; I have plenty of help for right now. If I need you, I will find you."
They seemed disappointed. "If that's what you want, my prince," the minotaur said.
"Here's the locations of a few of our bases," the one humanoid said, handing him a data drive. "Just say the word and we will be here for you. We'll be waiting." Then they left.
A few minutes after they left, Polaris sighed in relief. "Thank goodness they believed that." Because contrary to their beliefs, he liked humans and been helped many times by them. Especially early on, when his father had left him behind.
March 2156
The first time he saw a real flower, it was a tiny little thing. Polaris had nearly missed it, as it was just a spot of dark blue among the gray ground and few blades of new grass. But that color caused him to pause and crouch down to see it better. Smaller than the fingernail on his pinky, it had six simple petals and a white center, on a gray-green stem with thin long leaves. And it was one of several popping out of the ground that morning.
It wasn't quite the same as the picture he had seen. But it still gave him that feeling of difference from what he knew. After looking at it a bit, he plucked that plant from the ground and carried it inside, to figure out what it was.
A quick search online and he found out what it was: a weed, not useful for gardening. But when he looked at it, he thought it was pretty. Polaris found out that it would wither as he had it, so he searched out a small bottle to put it in, with some water to keep it alive a little while.
More searching and he found that flowers really were nothing like what his programming anticipated from life. They were seen as signs of peace and romance; they were signs that while life may seem to fade, it always finds ways to come back. People kept flowers because they were pretty, or they had some use as herbs. Usually, there weren't fights over flowers; any flower used by a warrior was generally for remembrance of the fallen.
Most flowers weren't killed either. It was more likely that they'd be cared for and admired. However, that didn't count when it came to flowering weeds. Those ones got killed for crowding out garden plants, looking unsightly, or being where they were not. If a weed were to survive, it had to be seen as pretty and harmless.
On reading that, Polaris recalled some of his research on the Maverick Hunters. There had been one statement that the virus was like a weed, growing fast and out of control. It was dangerous, so it had to be killed off. But they never did anything about Zero. Then again, the public records said that he was immune to the virus. He wasn't exactly harmless, but he had gotten taken for a flower, not a weed.
We have to do the same thing.
Except that he still wasn't sure how to be seen as harmless when he was an active virus. He had tried shutting it off in himself, but there didn't seem to be a way that wouldn't be dangerous to him. Looking for something else to think about as that kept dead ending, Polaris decided to look up cherry blossoms. That was what that picture had written on it. Maybe that would help him find that image again.
An hour later, he hadn't found that image, but he had become more interested in the idea of cherry blossoms. They were one of the flowering trees in the world. Some were ornamental, while others produced edible fruits. He wasn't the only one intrigued by the blossoms either. Apparently, the island nation of Japan held cherry trees in such high status in their culture that they celebrated the time in spring when all of the cherry trees went into bloom. It came in March, and wasn't that far away. At that time hundreds of thousands of trees would be in bright blooms and many people would go to see them.
Polaris saw pictures of the cherry trees in blossom. They were amazing, filling the trees with a mass of pink, white, and peach. Then again… he looked at his little flower. It was much better having the real plant there instead of seeing it on a picture on the internet. He wanted to see the cherry trees in person.
But to do that, he'd have to leave here. Leave his home for an unknown place, with strangers all around him who would see him and think they saw Zero. And then they'd alert the Maverick Hunters when they found out that he was not him, and his survival would be uncovered to them. They would hunt him down and kill him again.
That idea terrified him. But when he saw the pictures of the Japanese Cherry Blossom Festival, he really wanted to go. It was about two weeks away.
For the next week, the two ideas struggled in his mind. He couldn't get seen; he didn't want to let the Maverick Hunters know that he was still alive. But he wanted to see the cherry blossoms and know what they were like in person. Sometimes he thought it was a silly thing to want to do, but sometimes he found himself imagining what it might be like.
One day, he stood in front of a mirror, thinking all this. He looked over his image, especially his hair. Clasping it in his hands, he realized that this might be what most people would recognize him as a Zero clone for. Perhaps if he cut it off, he could pass through the crowds unnoticed?
It caused a sense of unease in him. He wasn't a month old yet, but he'd not changed anything about his appearance. Cutting off his hair seemed so drastic. But if that's what it took for him to go into a crowd and not raise any attention… Polaris ran his hands over the soft hair, then pulled out his plasma blade, turned it on, and quickly lopped it off close to his helmet.
And he nearly collapsed in pain. His mind seemed to be yelling at him for doing that, causing him to gasp and lean against the sink. The bundle of loose hair fell out of his hands as a feeling of nausea and disorientation came over him. His maintenance pod… he needed to get back to it. He tried to step away from the sink, but his head whirled and so did the room, leaving him collapsed on the floor.
He was there for close to an hour before he managed to cut his pain sensors from his hair off. Still horribly dizzy, he was forced to crawl back to his room to get into his pod. After a struggle, he managed to get in. He queried the machine as to what had happened as its cover closed up over him.
After being dosed with painkillers, he got the report that his hair wasn't actual hair. It was greatly enhanced cilia that looked like hair. However, it held sensors all along the thin strands, taking in information and feeding it into his senses to give him a deeper knowledge of the spaces around him. This information included a good portion of his balance system, which was why he was getting horribly disoriented and dizzy with it cut off.
Normally, the cilia were supposed to move just enough to avoid being damaged. A pinchful of hairs could take damage without causing him pain. But cutting them all off at once was more than his systems could account for. It meant that he would be at a reduced performance level until most of the full length of hair could be replaced: two years unless someone else could replace the cilia hair correctly.
Two years. Polaris felt overwhelmed by that figure. He ordered the machine to fix him up as well as it could and prepared to sleep until things got fixed enough for him to get around.
At least he'd managed to make himself harmless?
In the days where there wasn't much he could do because his balance was screwed up, Polaris decided to learn how to draw. He found drawing guides of how to draw specific things, but he soon realized that wasn't what he wanted. That was how to draw one specific thing every single time. As he looked more and more into art trying to find that one image, he began wanting to make pictures like those he was seeing, pictures that could make others feel what he was feeling. Maybe.
He researched and found that there were many ways to learn drawing, including going away to an art school. But those required money, something he didn't think he had. But he could find some things to start with. He found mechanical pencils and papers in the filing cabinets; although many of the pages were printed on, there was usually a back side that he could take advantage of.
At first, he drew things around his room because that was most convenient. Once he got to walking around well enough, he went to other places to draw what he saw. That was said to be a good way to start.
He was on the surface one afternoon, drawing a few more early spring flowers, when a group of people came to the castle. He heard their vehicle first, a hovering truck that came in to land at the entrance where he was. Spooked, he got up to get back into hiding, only to do so too fast and drop back to the ground. His sketch papers scattered from the exhaust of the vehicle, forcing him to scramble to retrieve them.
Two of the passengers decided to hop down and help him. Another man looked on in disapproval. "I was told this place was cleared out," he said. "What are you doing here?"
Knowing he couldn't reply, Polaris continued getting his drawings back. A bit of loose rubble caused him to slip again. Thankfully, his armor was absorbing the little blows from his current clumsiness.
One of the two looked over the papers. "Looks like he's drawing the flowers and architecture," she said.
"I haven't heard of a reploid being designed as an artist," he said. "Seems like a terrible waste to me."
"Maybe he's one of the advanced ones that does it for a hobby," the other person said. He handed the papers over. "Here you go."
Polaris got back onto his feet and nodded, taking the papers. Some were a little smudged with dirt, but these were just practice drawings. Rather poor ones too, he considered as he looked at them. He wasn't quite sure what he was doing wrong, but the pictures didn't look right.
The man, who seemed to be in charge, shook his head. "Well whoever you are, this is my property now. Bought it straight from the Maverick Hunters. I don't want bums and freeloaders around, so you'd best get out of here."
"What if he's one of the infected reploids?" another on the platform asked.
"We definitely don't want any of them around," the leader said.
The two who had gotten off to help went back to the floating truck. "I doubt he's a Maverick," the woman said. "I mean, he hasn't done anything threatening to us." Then she waved at him. "You have a safe trip back home, now." Then the platform went ahead into the building.
Someone else owned the X Hunter Castle now? Polaris wasn't sure what to do. His maintenance pod was here, and he had no idea where he would go. At least they took him to be harmless, one of them anyhow. He wouldn't hurt them.
But the castle might, he considered. There were still a great many hidden weapons and traps inside. That was probably why they had the hover vehicle, but that wouldn't protect them against everything. Going over to the panel that locked the front door, he contacted the main computer and made sure that security was powered down. When it asked him if the people there were invaders, he told it that they wee visitors and not to be harmed. The group stopped outside the main command center, but Polaris knew they wouldn't be able to get into the room. So he put his papers and pencils away in his bag and went inside after them.
At the room before the command center, there was a flight of stairs that he wasn't too fond of. They were narrow, tricky to get down currently. Putting both hands on the handrail, he walked down them carefully, slipping once but catching himself before completely falling down.
There were six of them here, all humans. Polaris had never met any humans yet, but the castle computer claimed that they were that. One of them came over to him. "Hey, careful on those steps. You have some problems with your movement programs?"
Not quite, but he nodded.
"What, you again?" the leader said. "I thought I told you that this is my property now. Leave at once."
Uncertain of how to handle it, Polaris brought his hands up and looked down. He wasn't there to hurt them. In fact, he wanted to help, so he'd be allowed to stay.
"Who are you?" the woman who had helped him before asked. When he just looked at her, she added, "Can you speak?"
He shook his head.
"What, so we have a clumsy mute artist reploid who seems to be designed for battle around?" the leader asked, not impressed. "Or can you fight?"
He nodded. That was his intended purpose, even if he was terrible at it. Perhaps they'd keep a fighter around, for protection?
"Must be a pretty worthless fighter if stairs give you issues," the leader said.
"Oh, give him a break," the woman said. "He could just be a harmless Irregular who was abandoned before he could be repaired. Say, do you live around here?" When he nodded, she asked, "Well can you do something about that door? We need to get to the computers inside to set up shop."
He nodded and went up to the door. As he did so, another woman said, "He might be an abandoned project. But aren't you forgetting that this place was last owned by a group of Mavericks?"
"The Hunters checked this place three times over to make sure that it was clean," she said. "If they didn't report him being here, he must have moved in during the past month while they were gone."
Polaris got the door unlocked for them. Wanting to ensure that they saw him as helpful and useful, he went inside and brought the computers back into activity. He also made sure that they saw that security was low right now and he could control it.
The leader watched the screens, thinking. "I see. Well it would be nice to have an operator of the old system around while we convert this place. If you want to stay here, then fine. But I want you scanned over for any traces of infection. I certainly don't want some Maverick tearing up my business before it can get started."
Polaris agreed to that, although it concerned him greatly.
The couple who had supported him first was Jenny and Matthew Tanner. They had come here with their boss, Nathan Riggs, to set up a recycling plant and garbage disposal service. Apparently, there was great demand for recycled materials and a good junkyard, but nobody wanted the massive junkyard to be built near their city. The X Hunter Castle was out of the way, a sturdy structure to add onto, and large and unwanted enough for their purposes.
Jenny was taking a break while Polaris was working on drawing. He was also waiting on the viral test to begin. "Since you seem to be an abandoned project, I don't blame you for being nervous about us," she said. "But I'm sure you'll be okay. Your behavior's been nothing like a Maverick."
'But I am,' he thought. He'd been trying to get the virus to do something to go unnoticed. It wanted to spread to other electronics, but if it did that, they'd be caught. As a desperate measure, he tried telling it that he wouldn't be able to spread it to appropriate hosts unless it went into hiding now and waited until he was ready. That had at least got it to quiet down in his own mind.
"It's going to be quite a task finding someone to fix you up, though," Jenny went on. "Mr. Riggs keeps tight control over business spending and he didn't like the figures he was getting for possible repair work on you. That means we may end up having to find someone willing to do pro bono work, but also good enough to work with you." She looked to him. "Do you have a name yet?"
There was just the one he gave himself. He nodded and wrote it on his drawing. Then he passed it over to her.
"Hmm, Polaris. That's a nice name." She put her hand on the drawing. "I hope you don't mind, but it looks like you could work on your perspective. You're drawing it as if looking at it face on. It's a good start for that, but that'll limit you."
Perspective? He'd run into the word a few times, but hadn't quite understood how it worked.
Seeing his expression, Jenny took a pencil and began to show him. "Here, see? The sides of the box are flat rectangles, true, but if you draw them like this, at an angle, it gives the illusion of depth to the flat paper. You can manipulate perspective too for a certain feel, but since you're just starting out, just draw what you see, as if your vision were flat." She then passed the paper back to him.
As if his vision were flat? Polaris looked at the angled box she had made; it did look like it was fully there, as opposed to his flat drawing. Looking at the box of nails he was drawing, he gave it a try. His mind tried to say that it was a flat straight-edged and regular box, but if he imagined his vision as being a picture, he could see how there seemed to be angles other than right ones on the box when viewed from a corner.
"That's it," Jenny said, watching him. "Keep on practicing drawing regular objects like that box." She chuckled. "At one time, I wanted to be an art teacher. Even started studying at college for it. But look where I ended up, at a start-up garbage company. Life's funny like that."
Then Mr. Riggs entered the room. "We're ready for your test, reploid," he said.
"His name is Polaris," Jenny said as he got up. She clasped his hand briefly as he walked by. "Good luck."
Her words must have worked, for the test came up negative.
One of the hazards of a modern day junkyard was malfunctioning robots that came in. Many had just enough power to activate and start causing chaos. Sometimes, this even included ones with weapons, like the met with a severely dented helmet that was firing off energy bursts and turning erratically. The humans had all cleared out, leaving Polaris to handle it.
He fired his buster when he got within ten feet of it, causing it to duck under its helmet. A crack appeared; whatever had damaged it previously had hit it hard. Since his hair was hanging only a couple of inches past his shoulders (and that was only on his right side), he had to walk over to make sure he didn't slip on the rubble in the yard.
When it peeked out, he fired his buster again, causing it to keep hiding. Then he switched to his plasma blade and struck it right in the middle. That destroyed it, but he made sure to pierce the energy tank so there was no chance of it activating at all.
That took care of today's problem. Polaris looked around just in case, but saw no more. Then he headed back for the entrance to the castle itself. With the traps removed and filled it, it was much easier and safer to do so.
Inside, he heard some workers with Mr. Riggs. "Can he handle any Mavericks that might come in, though?"
"They won't be sending the corpses of Mavericks here," Mr. Riggs said. "We'll just be dealing with broken down and trashy robots." Then he laughed. "But it is nice, you know. We could either pay a hefty fee to the Maverick Hunters to help us take down those buggers, buy an expensive reploid to work here, or call on him and pay with cheap art supplies. Once we find a way to fix his balance system, I'm sure he'd be happy to stick around."
Polaris paused. On one hand, it was nice that Mr. Riggs had accepted him. But then, had it been just about money? Well, whatever it was, he was safe here and they were giving him a job to do. It was good.
He came into the room they were waiting in and waved out to the outside to indicate that he had cleared it. The human workers left to get back to their work, while Mr. Riggs thanked him and gave him a yellow box. "I thought you might find some use for these. Have fun." Then he went back to the command room to keep doing his job of running the business.
Looking over the box, he saw that it was crayons, waxy sticks in a variety of colors. That seemed pretty nice, he thought. So far he'd only drawn with pencils that made black or gray, depending on how hard he pressed it to the paper. Jenny had shown him how to work with shading, so maybe she'd show him color now.
And later that day, she did. "He's really not putting much into that, is he?" Matthew asked about Mr. Riggs. "Crayons are usually given to children to draw with."
"We can still work with them," Jenny said. Then she put a yellow crayon close to her face and took a deep breath. "Ah, I love the smell of crayons. So many rainy days I spent coloring as a kid. Anyhow, we can start talking about color theory."
Polaris watched as she sorted the sixteen crayons. They could be sorted several different ways. Like blues, greens, and violets were cool colors, and reds, oranges, and yellows were warm colors. And arranging them another way, red, blue, and yellow were primary colors, while orange, green, and violet were secondary. Then there was the difference between tints and shades, and how to mix colors, and the neutrals of black, white, gray, and brown.
He spent a lot of those days with the Tanners in their off-hours, learning directly about art while indirectly picking up other things.
I always have fun trying to come up with plausible reasons for Zero that have that unwieldy hair. For balance, as receptors for extra senses? Or even just an appearance and pride factor. As a Zero clone, Polaris has that long hair too, only he colored his orange.
A longish chapter, but it's fine that way as it gives a little info on how he is now, how he was in the past, and what helped formed him into who he is. There is a fairly significant change here from the B&G version, but I can't really explain it until the next chapter.
Also, on Jenny's use of the term Irregular... it doesn't mean that the reploid in question is violent or dangerous, just that it is malfunctioning noticeably, or irregularly. It was the original term used for the Maverick Hunters, before the Maverick virus itself showed up. But when you have a sentient and intelligent being that is operating wrong, so to speak, that being could turn dangerous, hence the need for fighters on the Irregular Hunter force.
