Bloody hell (yes I'm British) I've really been slacking off recently
haven't I? You know how it is, you mean to do something but then wander
off, these things happen. So after that brief period of laziness, here's
another chapter, bring on the tournament (and yes proplayer, of course
there is a hi-tech solution)
Crimson leaned back in his chair, the comforting hum of active technology surrounding him. The noisy but efficient environment generator, the cheap and somewhat out-dated plasma TV, and of course the eternally active computer.
Crimson was possibly the only hunter whose PC had nothing whatsoever to do with his work, the most frequently run program was a retro, yet addictive little game called "Tetris". But right now it was in standby mode, unused as Crimson was engrossed in the news report
"And in other news" The lip-sync was off by a tiny fraction of a second due to the inferior technology of the television, most people would not notice, Crimson however was perpetually annoyed by it.
"The long awaited tournaments are due to begin, tomorrow hunters from all over pioneer will gather to fight for supremacy and the grand prize of five million meseta."
No matter how many times he heard that Crimson would always feel a little warm glow inside, so much meseta so very much.
"Over to our correspondent Chisato Madison" The screen changed to show a young girl standing outside the newly built arena where the tournament was to take place
"Hiya folks it's me Chisato here! Standing outside the coliseum where literally hundreds of hunters have been lining up for days waiting for the tournament to begin. Excuse me sir?" She said intercepting a man who had got up to get a drink "What are your thoughts on this tournament? What is your reason for entering?" The hunter grinned broadly and waved at the camera
"I'm here to kick some ass and it's gonna be freaking awesome, BOOYA!"
Chisato looked momentarily stunned "Umm okay then" She spotted a new victim "You sir! What are you entering the tournament for?" The man, dressed entirely in black didn't even turn, he simply looked over his shoulder
"I enter in the hopes that I may find a worthy opponent."
Chisato quickly recovered from this one "Just goes to show the wide variety of people entering this tournament!"
Further viewing of the program was brought to an end by a knock on the door, Crimson stood up and switched off everything except the computer and answered the polite knocking. It was Tatsu and Alice.
"Hey Tatsu? What's Alice doing here?"
"You could ask me directly, I am standing right here" Said Alice, slightly annoyed "And I'm here because I'm entering the tournament with you guys"
"Are you sure about this Tatsu? I know she can fight but the tournament is dangerous"
"She isn't made of glass you know" said Tatsu "She fought with us, she killed a hildebear that was throwing us about all over the place, and she even got rid of a telemarketer the other day."
This was pretty impressive seeing as telemarketers were androids programmed not to give up until they made a sale.
"Fine" Crimson grudgingly admitted "Alice has a right to enter, just don't say I didn't warn you when she gets hurt"
Alice kicked Crimson sharply in the ankle "STOP TALKING ABOUT ME LIKE I'M NOT HERE!"
"Oww okay okay, come in and take your coats off, I sort of forgot to get all my gear ready." Crimson looked a little sheepish
"Tetris again?" asked Tatsu sympathetically as he took off his coat and hung it on the nearest available hook, Crimson nodded, then caught sight of Tatsu's arm, it was still black, but not burnt black, shiny metallic black. Crimson grabbed the arm and inspected it. High density metal alloy, light but durable, no doubt it was wired into Tatsu's nervous system to optimize reaction times, small radar display on the wrist and a set of tools built into the fore-arm, very nice work.
Tatsu wrenched his arm free of Crimson's grip "Yes it's a robotic arm, yes its cool, yes it was expensive, no I am not going to tell you where I got it."
Crimson decided to leave it at that, through an odd legal oversight it was illegal to perform cybernetic surgery in order to improve a person, it was however not illegal to get the surgery done, the only person breaking the law would be the doctor.
Alice, who really couldn't care too much less about the details of Tatsu's body had ventured further into Crimsons home. It was pretty low-income quarters, right at the bottom end of the market, it reminded her of her place. Except Alice never had so many little flashing lights, everywhere she looked there were small electronic devices, some of them looked as if they pre-dated the pioneer project and were obsolete even back on Coral.
Just then a screen blinked to life in front of her. A calm female voice spoke "Welcome new user, please state the nature of the information required"
"A computer AI? Or is it just a simple program" Alice wondered aloud
"Incomplete frame of reference please define "it""
"Umm what are you?" Alice asked, a little uncertain as to where she should direct the question, she settled for speaking to the screen
"I am a Intelligent Computerized Database or I.C.D"
"What do you do?"
"Command not understood, please rephrase"
Oh damn, talking to machines was hard, you had to be really specific and ask exactly the right questions
"What is your main function?" Alice thought this was a much better way to ask. "My major function is to provide users with information"
It wasn't doing it very well, Alice thought, In fact it was being quite useless
Just then Crimson stepped in, standing next to Alice "I see you've met Iced?"
"Iced?" Alice was a little confused
"It calls itself an I.C.D, so I call it Iced"
"Oh, umm where did you get it from anyway?" Alice was curious to know "Things like this are obsolete aren't they?"
"Believe it or not a person I met at the local tavern was selling it, a real bargain too, only two hundred meseta"
"Two hundred? I wouldn't have paid that for it, I can't even get it to work"
"Well uhh neither can I actually, its database is useless, it doesn't know anything, watch." He turned to face the screen.
"Iced, what are the major components of a photon engine?
"Requested information not found"
"See" Crimson smiled sadly "It doesn't know a single thing, as far as I can tell it doesn't really have a purpose, I'd have to program it myself"
"But you still think that two hundred meseta was a good deal?
"Of course it was, all I need to do is learn how to program it and it will be perfect" suddenly Crimson faltered "If I'm here, and you're here.., who's watching Tatsu?" Crimson dashed to his living room, just a little too late, Tatsu was busily putting things away.
"Your place is a mess Crimson, why doesn't Ryzada ever make you tidy it?" He said midway through organizing a drawer.
"Because Tatsu, it was tidy before, I knew where everything was, I preferred it that way, and YOU'RE MESSING IT UP!"
Crimson grabbed Tatsu by his normal arm and frog marched him out of the room locking the door behind him.
"Alice" said Crimson in a commanding tone of voice "I'm going to go to my room and get my stuff for the tournament, you keep and eye on Tatsu and make sure he doesn't touch ANYTHING!"
Alice put the comm.. device she was playing with back on the table and nodded "Right, I'll make sure he doesn't touch anything." Tatsu was practically twitching with the urge to tidy this place up, it was why he was rarely invited round.
Ten minutes of idle chat later Crimson returned, looking as if he was about to storm a military base, without backup.
"Crimson?" Tatsu asked "Excuse me for this minor observation, but isn't that a bit too much?"
Crimson didn't shrug, he would have done but his shoulders were too weighed down. "Its just some stuff I thought I would be needing, monomate, dimate, monofluid, antidote, antiparz, sniper, saber, shot, backup sniper, mechguns, autogun and incase I need it a sonic grenade." There was a chirp from his left shoulder "Oh and of course Madhu"
Most of the equipment vanished as it was put into storage by the Mag. Alice was a little shocked by the sheer volume of equipment Crimson was taking, wasn't he supposed to be poor?
"Are you really going to need all that?" She said aghast, all she had brought was her staff, a handgun, a few healing items and Kyou, her Mag. Now freed of the encumbering weight of his equipment Crimson did shrug.
"This tournament is going to last a while" he said "I'll need a lot of healing things and of course weapons for varying situations, they may come up with a special match rule that means I can't use my sniper or something"
The randomized special rules, Alice had forgotten about them, what would she do if one of them meant she couldn't use techniques in one of her matches? She suddenly felt very under prepared.
"I only have a few monofluids and a difluid or two, that's not going to be enough" She said disheartened by her lack of readiness.
"Here borrow some of Ryzada's" Crimson said digging through a drawer "She won't mind, she's hardly likely to take a job on her own, I'll just replace them later." He produced several vials of the concentration restoring fluids and handed them to Alice, who gratefully accepted and passed them on to Kyou which immediately stored them for later use.
"How do Mags store things anyway?" Alice wondered aloud
To everyone's surprise, especially Tatsu's as he had never even seen it before, Iced answered Alice's question.
"Mags store items in a minute space inside their bodies, the item to be stored is shrank to a tiny fraction of its original size using advanced gravimetric technology to remove the space between the items atoms, decreasing its volume but also increasing its density."
"It worked" Crimson blinked "In real English too, and it explains why Mags have to float, I mean if the volume is lowered but the density is raised then weight must remain constant, so this tiny space within a Mag could contain a ton or more of compressed items, so this means that-" He was cut off by Tatsu
"That's very nice and we are all amazed, really we are, but we should get going before Ryzada comes back from wherever it is she went."
"Oh of course" said Crimson "And Ryzada is at the salon, having her hair done I think, she said she didn't want to be here when I left, she didn't want to have to say goodbye, I can see her point"
"Why?" asked Alice clearly not understanding
"Because of the chance I may not come back." Crimson shrugged as if indifferent to the idea. "The tournament isn't that dangerous is it?" Alice bit her lower lip, now very nervous.
"There are safety measures, no need to worry about that" Tatsu reassured her "But money hungry Crimson here" He jabbed Crimson in the chest with one finger "has entered in the pit fights too, and monsters aren't all that well know for showing mercy."
"Money hungry?" Crimson protested "I'm doing it for the fame and the legions of adoring fans that I may get out of this." He looked thoughtful "And maybe the money." He broke into a grin behind his mask "Who am I kidding? I love money, now lets get going before Ryzada gets back."
The trio walked down the long corridors and took the lift to the ground floor, for the first time since boot camp Crimson was going to leave the residential block, Block 8 the same as all other blocks was like a city, it had everything a person could possibly need, housing, shops, recreational facilities, a medical center and of course laboratories factories and various other places of employment. The party's destination was an area that until recently didn't even exist as an area, it was in fact a cargo hold that held foodstuffs that had been eaten since arrival at ragol, it was also several miles away, they were going to need transportation.
Crimson attempted to flag down a passing grav-taxi, but he was simply ignored. The next taxi also ignored his frantic arm gestures.
"This is STUPID" Crimson yelled at the ceiling "What is the point of having a taxi if you don't stop for people?"
"I think I could get us one" Said Alice "I'm sure of it"
"Fine be my guest" Crimson sat down "These drivers are a bunch of ignorant bastards anyway"
"Now now Crimson, mind your language, there's a lady present" Tatsu reprimanded."
And so they waited for another taxi, 3 games of blackjack later one appeared in the distance, it showed no sign of slowing down
"Well Alice? What's your brilliant plan?" Crimson asked moodily, he had lost 20 meseta in those 3 games, he was certain Tatsu cheated.
Alice didn't respond, instead she kept her sights fixed on a seemingly random point of the floor. As the taxi passed this point she mouthed one word silently
"Rafoie"
There was a deafening explosion and the taxi flipped through the air landing with a slam, it did however hover a few feet about the ground indicating the anti-grav device was still intact, just as Alice had planned.
A window appear in the side of the taxi and the driver stuck his head out
"Hey whaddya think ya doin' to my cab! Ya owe me big time for duh paint job."
Alice smiled brightly at the man "Me and my friends wanna go to cargo hold three pwease."
The taxi drivers face paled "So you guys is? Dat means you are, hunta's?" His head disappeared back inside the cab and a door lifted open on the side of the vehicle.
Alice hopped inside, still smiling "See? I told you I could get us a taxi."
Crimson just shook his head and climbed inside, Tatsu followed after him.
After an uneventful and needlessly prolonged taxi journey Crimson Alice and Tatsu had arrived at the coliseum formerly known as cargo hold three
"Dats one hun'red and tweny m ya owe me" Said the driver holding out his hand
Crimson, grumbling about it of course, handed the driver his money. It wasn't like he was even going to fix that dent, thieving scum.
The crowd was huge, the boot camp had definitely been turning out too many hunters, and with the standard soldiers also being allowed to participate there was an immense number of combatants awaiting admittance, it was however nothing compared to the number of citizens with spectator tickets. It was a good job that there were so many entrances to the place, or it would have taken a lot longer than 3 hours to get inside. Tatsu pointed this out to Crimson at least five times. Crimson still didn't like the wait. Maybe it was just the vast numbers of people who didn't recognize him in any way?
Upon admittance they were handed their tournament equipment which consisted of an all access combatants pass, a spectator seat ticket the keycard to their hotel room (They had declared themselves as a party of three" and a pager so they could be alerted when their matches were due.
The three walked to their room, Crimsons face shining with delight at his new toy
"It's got a backlit crystal display, its not even liquid, do you have any idea how old the technology for this thing is?"
"No we don't, please enlighten us" Tatsu sighed
"Ignore him" said Alice "I'm listening even if Tatsu isn't" Alice loved history, she had read file upon file of information regarding Coral and of course her favorite subject, the first hunters.
And so Crimson gave an in depth explanation of the pager he now held, by the time he was done Alice knew exactly how to work hers and probably fix it if it broke. They had also reached their hotel room.
"Okay here goes" Said Crimson, producing the keycard and inserting it into the slot at the side of the door. The door slid open and the card was returned, Crimson pocketed it and reminded himself to look at the reading device later.
The room itself was unspectacular, less than what Tatsu was used to but more than Crimson was. 3 single beds, basic entertainment system, which Crimson began examining immediately, and basic environmental control.
There was a sound of electrical sparks and a few curses from Crimson
"What are you doing?" Alice asked, leaning over Crimsons shoulder
"I'm trying to, oww dammit, fix up this TV they only gave us a few channels, sonofa bitch, wait wait, there, done." Crimson stood up looking pleased with himself, despite the burned fingertips.
"Umm so what did you do to it?"
"It's quite simple really, when there are channels that you haven't subscribed to, their signals are scrambled by a small device in the TV, by running a parallel circuit past this device you can receive the unscrambled signal and watch that channel, and it can't be traced because the signal is also running the standard way, the best part is that you can remove the new wiring leaving no trace." Crimson continued to look pleased with himself
"I don't get it" Alice shook her head in confusion
Crimson sighed "We have free TV"
"Oh, why didn't you just say that?"
"I did, you just didn't know that was what I said."
"Umm okay, if you say so Crimson" Alice yawned "I'm kinda sleepy, its taken us so long to get here, I think I'm going to have a quick nap."
An excellent idea, and one that Tatsu had already acted upon. He was sleeping soundly having decided to test the beds while Crimson fooled around with the TV. Crimson wasn't tired but tried to get some rest anyway, matches started the next morning and it could be his turn at any time.
Crimson leaned back in his chair, the comforting hum of active technology surrounding him. The noisy but efficient environment generator, the cheap and somewhat out-dated plasma TV, and of course the eternally active computer.
Crimson was possibly the only hunter whose PC had nothing whatsoever to do with his work, the most frequently run program was a retro, yet addictive little game called "Tetris". But right now it was in standby mode, unused as Crimson was engrossed in the news report
"And in other news" The lip-sync was off by a tiny fraction of a second due to the inferior technology of the television, most people would not notice, Crimson however was perpetually annoyed by it.
"The long awaited tournaments are due to begin, tomorrow hunters from all over pioneer will gather to fight for supremacy and the grand prize of five million meseta."
No matter how many times he heard that Crimson would always feel a little warm glow inside, so much meseta so very much.
"Over to our correspondent Chisato Madison" The screen changed to show a young girl standing outside the newly built arena where the tournament was to take place
"Hiya folks it's me Chisato here! Standing outside the coliseum where literally hundreds of hunters have been lining up for days waiting for the tournament to begin. Excuse me sir?" She said intercepting a man who had got up to get a drink "What are your thoughts on this tournament? What is your reason for entering?" The hunter grinned broadly and waved at the camera
"I'm here to kick some ass and it's gonna be freaking awesome, BOOYA!"
Chisato looked momentarily stunned "Umm okay then" She spotted a new victim "You sir! What are you entering the tournament for?" The man, dressed entirely in black didn't even turn, he simply looked over his shoulder
"I enter in the hopes that I may find a worthy opponent."
Chisato quickly recovered from this one "Just goes to show the wide variety of people entering this tournament!"
Further viewing of the program was brought to an end by a knock on the door, Crimson stood up and switched off everything except the computer and answered the polite knocking. It was Tatsu and Alice.
"Hey Tatsu? What's Alice doing here?"
"You could ask me directly, I am standing right here" Said Alice, slightly annoyed "And I'm here because I'm entering the tournament with you guys"
"Are you sure about this Tatsu? I know she can fight but the tournament is dangerous"
"She isn't made of glass you know" said Tatsu "She fought with us, she killed a hildebear that was throwing us about all over the place, and she even got rid of a telemarketer the other day."
This was pretty impressive seeing as telemarketers were androids programmed not to give up until they made a sale.
"Fine" Crimson grudgingly admitted "Alice has a right to enter, just don't say I didn't warn you when she gets hurt"
Alice kicked Crimson sharply in the ankle "STOP TALKING ABOUT ME LIKE I'M NOT HERE!"
"Oww okay okay, come in and take your coats off, I sort of forgot to get all my gear ready." Crimson looked a little sheepish
"Tetris again?" asked Tatsu sympathetically as he took off his coat and hung it on the nearest available hook, Crimson nodded, then caught sight of Tatsu's arm, it was still black, but not burnt black, shiny metallic black. Crimson grabbed the arm and inspected it. High density metal alloy, light but durable, no doubt it was wired into Tatsu's nervous system to optimize reaction times, small radar display on the wrist and a set of tools built into the fore-arm, very nice work.
Tatsu wrenched his arm free of Crimson's grip "Yes it's a robotic arm, yes its cool, yes it was expensive, no I am not going to tell you where I got it."
Crimson decided to leave it at that, through an odd legal oversight it was illegal to perform cybernetic surgery in order to improve a person, it was however not illegal to get the surgery done, the only person breaking the law would be the doctor.
Alice, who really couldn't care too much less about the details of Tatsu's body had ventured further into Crimsons home. It was pretty low-income quarters, right at the bottom end of the market, it reminded her of her place. Except Alice never had so many little flashing lights, everywhere she looked there were small electronic devices, some of them looked as if they pre-dated the pioneer project and were obsolete even back on Coral.
Just then a screen blinked to life in front of her. A calm female voice spoke "Welcome new user, please state the nature of the information required"
"A computer AI? Or is it just a simple program" Alice wondered aloud
"Incomplete frame of reference please define "it""
"Umm what are you?" Alice asked, a little uncertain as to where she should direct the question, she settled for speaking to the screen
"I am a Intelligent Computerized Database or I.C.D"
"What do you do?"
"Command not understood, please rephrase"
Oh damn, talking to machines was hard, you had to be really specific and ask exactly the right questions
"What is your main function?" Alice thought this was a much better way to ask. "My major function is to provide users with information"
It wasn't doing it very well, Alice thought, In fact it was being quite useless
Just then Crimson stepped in, standing next to Alice "I see you've met Iced?"
"Iced?" Alice was a little confused
"It calls itself an I.C.D, so I call it Iced"
"Oh, umm where did you get it from anyway?" Alice was curious to know "Things like this are obsolete aren't they?"
"Believe it or not a person I met at the local tavern was selling it, a real bargain too, only two hundred meseta"
"Two hundred? I wouldn't have paid that for it, I can't even get it to work"
"Well uhh neither can I actually, its database is useless, it doesn't know anything, watch." He turned to face the screen.
"Iced, what are the major components of a photon engine?
"Requested information not found"
"See" Crimson smiled sadly "It doesn't know a single thing, as far as I can tell it doesn't really have a purpose, I'd have to program it myself"
"But you still think that two hundred meseta was a good deal?
"Of course it was, all I need to do is learn how to program it and it will be perfect" suddenly Crimson faltered "If I'm here, and you're here.., who's watching Tatsu?" Crimson dashed to his living room, just a little too late, Tatsu was busily putting things away.
"Your place is a mess Crimson, why doesn't Ryzada ever make you tidy it?" He said midway through organizing a drawer.
"Because Tatsu, it was tidy before, I knew where everything was, I preferred it that way, and YOU'RE MESSING IT UP!"
Crimson grabbed Tatsu by his normal arm and frog marched him out of the room locking the door behind him.
"Alice" said Crimson in a commanding tone of voice "I'm going to go to my room and get my stuff for the tournament, you keep and eye on Tatsu and make sure he doesn't touch ANYTHING!"
Alice put the comm.. device she was playing with back on the table and nodded "Right, I'll make sure he doesn't touch anything." Tatsu was practically twitching with the urge to tidy this place up, it was why he was rarely invited round.
Ten minutes of idle chat later Crimson returned, looking as if he was about to storm a military base, without backup.
"Crimson?" Tatsu asked "Excuse me for this minor observation, but isn't that a bit too much?"
Crimson didn't shrug, he would have done but his shoulders were too weighed down. "Its just some stuff I thought I would be needing, monomate, dimate, monofluid, antidote, antiparz, sniper, saber, shot, backup sniper, mechguns, autogun and incase I need it a sonic grenade." There was a chirp from his left shoulder "Oh and of course Madhu"
Most of the equipment vanished as it was put into storage by the Mag. Alice was a little shocked by the sheer volume of equipment Crimson was taking, wasn't he supposed to be poor?
"Are you really going to need all that?" She said aghast, all she had brought was her staff, a handgun, a few healing items and Kyou, her Mag. Now freed of the encumbering weight of his equipment Crimson did shrug.
"This tournament is going to last a while" he said "I'll need a lot of healing things and of course weapons for varying situations, they may come up with a special match rule that means I can't use my sniper or something"
The randomized special rules, Alice had forgotten about them, what would she do if one of them meant she couldn't use techniques in one of her matches? She suddenly felt very under prepared.
"I only have a few monofluids and a difluid or two, that's not going to be enough" She said disheartened by her lack of readiness.
"Here borrow some of Ryzada's" Crimson said digging through a drawer "She won't mind, she's hardly likely to take a job on her own, I'll just replace them later." He produced several vials of the concentration restoring fluids and handed them to Alice, who gratefully accepted and passed them on to Kyou which immediately stored them for later use.
"How do Mags store things anyway?" Alice wondered aloud
To everyone's surprise, especially Tatsu's as he had never even seen it before, Iced answered Alice's question.
"Mags store items in a minute space inside their bodies, the item to be stored is shrank to a tiny fraction of its original size using advanced gravimetric technology to remove the space between the items atoms, decreasing its volume but also increasing its density."
"It worked" Crimson blinked "In real English too, and it explains why Mags have to float, I mean if the volume is lowered but the density is raised then weight must remain constant, so this tiny space within a Mag could contain a ton or more of compressed items, so this means that-" He was cut off by Tatsu
"That's very nice and we are all amazed, really we are, but we should get going before Ryzada comes back from wherever it is she went."
"Oh of course" said Crimson "And Ryzada is at the salon, having her hair done I think, she said she didn't want to be here when I left, she didn't want to have to say goodbye, I can see her point"
"Why?" asked Alice clearly not understanding
"Because of the chance I may not come back." Crimson shrugged as if indifferent to the idea. "The tournament isn't that dangerous is it?" Alice bit her lower lip, now very nervous.
"There are safety measures, no need to worry about that" Tatsu reassured her "But money hungry Crimson here" He jabbed Crimson in the chest with one finger "has entered in the pit fights too, and monsters aren't all that well know for showing mercy."
"Money hungry?" Crimson protested "I'm doing it for the fame and the legions of adoring fans that I may get out of this." He looked thoughtful "And maybe the money." He broke into a grin behind his mask "Who am I kidding? I love money, now lets get going before Ryzada gets back."
The trio walked down the long corridors and took the lift to the ground floor, for the first time since boot camp Crimson was going to leave the residential block, Block 8 the same as all other blocks was like a city, it had everything a person could possibly need, housing, shops, recreational facilities, a medical center and of course laboratories factories and various other places of employment. The party's destination was an area that until recently didn't even exist as an area, it was in fact a cargo hold that held foodstuffs that had been eaten since arrival at ragol, it was also several miles away, they were going to need transportation.
Crimson attempted to flag down a passing grav-taxi, but he was simply ignored. The next taxi also ignored his frantic arm gestures.
"This is STUPID" Crimson yelled at the ceiling "What is the point of having a taxi if you don't stop for people?"
"I think I could get us one" Said Alice "I'm sure of it"
"Fine be my guest" Crimson sat down "These drivers are a bunch of ignorant bastards anyway"
"Now now Crimson, mind your language, there's a lady present" Tatsu reprimanded."
And so they waited for another taxi, 3 games of blackjack later one appeared in the distance, it showed no sign of slowing down
"Well Alice? What's your brilliant plan?" Crimson asked moodily, he had lost 20 meseta in those 3 games, he was certain Tatsu cheated.
Alice didn't respond, instead she kept her sights fixed on a seemingly random point of the floor. As the taxi passed this point she mouthed one word silently
"Rafoie"
There was a deafening explosion and the taxi flipped through the air landing with a slam, it did however hover a few feet about the ground indicating the anti-grav device was still intact, just as Alice had planned.
A window appear in the side of the taxi and the driver stuck his head out
"Hey whaddya think ya doin' to my cab! Ya owe me big time for duh paint job."
Alice smiled brightly at the man "Me and my friends wanna go to cargo hold three pwease."
The taxi drivers face paled "So you guys is? Dat means you are, hunta's?" His head disappeared back inside the cab and a door lifted open on the side of the vehicle.
Alice hopped inside, still smiling "See? I told you I could get us a taxi."
Crimson just shook his head and climbed inside, Tatsu followed after him.
After an uneventful and needlessly prolonged taxi journey Crimson Alice and Tatsu had arrived at the coliseum formerly known as cargo hold three
"Dats one hun'red and tweny m ya owe me" Said the driver holding out his hand
Crimson, grumbling about it of course, handed the driver his money. It wasn't like he was even going to fix that dent, thieving scum.
The crowd was huge, the boot camp had definitely been turning out too many hunters, and with the standard soldiers also being allowed to participate there was an immense number of combatants awaiting admittance, it was however nothing compared to the number of citizens with spectator tickets. It was a good job that there were so many entrances to the place, or it would have taken a lot longer than 3 hours to get inside. Tatsu pointed this out to Crimson at least five times. Crimson still didn't like the wait. Maybe it was just the vast numbers of people who didn't recognize him in any way?
Upon admittance they were handed their tournament equipment which consisted of an all access combatants pass, a spectator seat ticket the keycard to their hotel room (They had declared themselves as a party of three" and a pager so they could be alerted when their matches were due.
The three walked to their room, Crimsons face shining with delight at his new toy
"It's got a backlit crystal display, its not even liquid, do you have any idea how old the technology for this thing is?"
"No we don't, please enlighten us" Tatsu sighed
"Ignore him" said Alice "I'm listening even if Tatsu isn't" Alice loved history, she had read file upon file of information regarding Coral and of course her favorite subject, the first hunters.
And so Crimson gave an in depth explanation of the pager he now held, by the time he was done Alice knew exactly how to work hers and probably fix it if it broke. They had also reached their hotel room.
"Okay here goes" Said Crimson, producing the keycard and inserting it into the slot at the side of the door. The door slid open and the card was returned, Crimson pocketed it and reminded himself to look at the reading device later.
The room itself was unspectacular, less than what Tatsu was used to but more than Crimson was. 3 single beds, basic entertainment system, which Crimson began examining immediately, and basic environmental control.
There was a sound of electrical sparks and a few curses from Crimson
"What are you doing?" Alice asked, leaning over Crimsons shoulder
"I'm trying to, oww dammit, fix up this TV they only gave us a few channels, sonofa bitch, wait wait, there, done." Crimson stood up looking pleased with himself, despite the burned fingertips.
"Umm so what did you do to it?"
"It's quite simple really, when there are channels that you haven't subscribed to, their signals are scrambled by a small device in the TV, by running a parallel circuit past this device you can receive the unscrambled signal and watch that channel, and it can't be traced because the signal is also running the standard way, the best part is that you can remove the new wiring leaving no trace." Crimson continued to look pleased with himself
"I don't get it" Alice shook her head in confusion
Crimson sighed "We have free TV"
"Oh, why didn't you just say that?"
"I did, you just didn't know that was what I said."
"Umm okay, if you say so Crimson" Alice yawned "I'm kinda sleepy, its taken us so long to get here, I think I'm going to have a quick nap."
An excellent idea, and one that Tatsu had already acted upon. He was sleeping soundly having decided to test the beds while Crimson fooled around with the TV. Crimson wasn't tired but tried to get some rest anyway, matches started the next morning and it could be his turn at any time.