Rage's alarm woke him up at noon the next day, and he remembered that the new pair of legs Alpha had given him should have replaced his old pair during the night. He wanted to test those sleek beauties somehow, be it during a mission or in the Arena.

He checked the memory chip at his door, which could record messages left by early visitors, and found one from almost seven hours before. Rage knew only one person who even woke up at that time. Alpha.

I guess he won't leave me alone.

He called up the hall camera recording, seeing Alpha's earnest face stuck in freeze-frame. He looked relaxed, for once. Rage let the message play.

"Hey, Rage," said Alpha with nonchalance, "I added those legs to the Fallen Angel. I must admit that it looks impressive. But it needs more work." Rage rolled his eyes. "Speaking of work, today is the day of our first mission together."

What!

"That's all. I'll be at my hanger, number one-fourteen. And don't sleep too late."

Shut up.

It looked as though Rage's wish had been transmogrified into a little nightmare. How wonderful.

Rage took a long shower, to spite Alpha, dressed in his favorite pilot suit, and strolled to the AC hangar Alpha had named. It wasn't locked, so he opened the pilot-technician access door and walked in.

The hangar was in pristine condition. Ravens were not often interested in religion, but the built and maintained their own places of worship. Alpha's was the epitome of a Raven garage. But his space was far more than any Rage had seen before. Its scattered extra parts, unpainted, unused, and clean, gave a vision of crispness to the hangar. The sounds of robotic arms, gears, hydraulics, blowtorches, the thrum of high-intensity lamps, and the barely perceptible vibration of the garage's immense power source provided a hymn to which Alpha could work. Rage knew that voices in this place would be a violation. He inhaled, catching hints of paint, ozone, and raw metal. Healthy or not, he loved that smell. It was the smell of progress. The smell of life.

Alpha's armored core, named for its owner, dominated the hangar. Its dark blue, black and red form knelt on the floor. Its arms supported it, and its hands were spread in contact with the polished surface on which it lay. Did Alpha know that his AC looked as though it were praying?

And Alpha himself was atop the massive shoulders of his machine. He seemed to be tinkering with the head-neck hydraulic system. Ten meters above the ground, using an old ratchet to tighten bolts, Alpha seemed to be in his second home — his first, an armored core's cockpit. He was working animatedly, and Rage saw him smiling to himself.

Rage, who knew enough not to interrupt such a sacred moment, waited for Alpha to notice him. After a few minutes, Alpha glanced at the large digital clock on the wall above his entrance, then looked down and saw Rage. Grabbing the safety harness he had laid on the Alpha's left shoulder, he strapped it on, hooked it to his rocket rack, and slid to the ground.

"Enough work for today," he said as he walked to Rage. "I can always mess around later."

He pointed to the spot where he had been working, "I just increased the head's planar range of motion to a full one hundred and eighty degrees." He saw that Rage was not incredibly interested. "Yeah. Why don't I get my AC warmed up. Go on to your hangar and do the same. I'll see you at the north transport station."

Rage nodded and jogged the relatively short distance to his armored core's location. He was excited about its new appearance. He walked to the door, eased it open, and flicked the switch that opened the dark hangar's outside doors. As the sunlight streamed into the spacious garage, Rage gasped. The Fallen Angel stood at full height, slender and deadly. Alpha had changed her paint scheme to ruby red and deep crimson. Rage never knew that a piece of metal could be beautiful.

Alpha's AC design was equal parts art and science.

Now to see how she runs.

He ascended the light metal ladder that led to the cockpit hatch. As soon as he got in, he fired up his generator, noting for a second time that its low whine was different. He had been bothered by it during the Arena match. What had changed? He would have to do a booster burn test to see if its capacitor was up to his standards. Though he knew little of how any armored core parts worked, Rage understood that the generator was a marvel of technology. Like a human, an AC ran off of the chemical energy released by reactions in its power source. While humans had limited food options, ACs could use a wider variety of matter, the stronger its chemical bonds, the better. Not as powerful as a nuclear reaction, but more efficient, versatile and safe. Besides, reactors small enough for an armored core were illegal. No Corporations wanted some stupid pilot to give others solid ground for terrorist accusations, even if the actual likelihood of a nuclear detonation was low.

Once the quick power-up sequence was over, Rage routed the preset allotments of energy to his computers, weapons, boosters, and other crucial systems. It was said that using manual adjustment for this power distribution could squeeze greater performance from a machine, but too much squeezing could damage the armored core and its pilot. Add the task of tweaking each small detail during complex actions, and the situation would certainly be fatally distracting. Most pilots and armored cores did fine with two settings: "Normal mode," used mainly for inter-mission movement, and "Combat mode," whose name was self-explanatory. Some specialized machines used variations on these — "Scout mode," "Boost mode," and others — but for years, the two defaults had served Ravens well.

Rage guided his armored core to the meeting place, feeling the power of his new configuration. He met up with Alpha and boarded the transport plane. If nothing else, Rage thought, I've got a benefactor with nice toys.

#

Rage was eager to learn, despite his indifferent fade. Alpha knew that he couldn't toss Rage into action; he would need to be eased into his abilities. He chose a relatively easy mission. That way, it wouldn't be too hard for Rage to follow Alpha's instructions.

Their shared transport glided steadily in the sky while Alpha gave Rage a mission synopsis over the radio.

"Murakumo has sent us on our way to a Chrome outpost. It has two primary interests. First is its large number of weaker muscle tracers, the spider-type 'bots. Sure, I never got extra for killing a bunch of weak robots, but it's good practice. There's also a sealed warehouse. If we can get in, there may be a stash of presents waiting for us."

"Wait. How did you hear about that?"

"You saw the map that came with our mission request? Well, Murakumo indicated that there was nothing of importance," he called up the map on both pilots' heads-up displays, highlighting a point, "after this sector."

"So?"

"Why would Murakumo want us to clean this place out?"

"Why not?"

"Because they want that equipment."

"Right, Alpha."

"Anyway. We're going to break in at the same place, same time."

"What! I don't go on these tandem missions, but isn't it standard procedure to have one guy go through the front door while the other finds a different way in?"

"Do you really think that trick still works? We've been doing that for centuries, and humans can't be stupid enough to ignore it. And this isn't a normal mission."

"There are enemies. There's me. Except for you, everything is normal."

"Rage, either of us could obliterate all the forces inside that building. You are here to learn."

"Most Ravens train in the — "

"Arena? I think you've had enough of that. And the Arena doesn't have multiple enemies, traps, mazes, and the like. In other words, it's fair. The Human Plus won't be so kind."

"Fine."

"And Rage? Keep an open mind while I instruct you."

"That's what you're paying me for."

Alpha had to smile at that.

#

They touched down without incident, just outside the factory's shielded doors.

"Rage, why don't you give those new legs a test run?"

"Gladly."

Automated defense guns popped up from the roof of the raised entrance structure. They took aim at the nearest moving target, Rage. He set his AC into a graceful run, enjoying the new speed and agility provided by the legs. It was like floating on air. None of the guns was able to score a hit on him by the time he was able to bring his own weapon to bear. The cannon had a limited vertical range of motion, so he boosted above the roof and above the emplacements, raining machine gun fire upon the poor robotic howitzers. At this time he saw Alpha picking along the back of the building, sending a rocket into each of the shield's generators, cutting off its power little by little.

As Rage landed at the end of his airborne parabola, he finished off the last of the four emplacements. Alpha called to Rage over the radio, "Let's get inside before they restore power up here."

Alpha was right about the ease of the mission. The two greased through the underground building, destroying the little spider guards as they went, and soon came to the mission's end-point, where they were supposed to branch out and clean the remaining rooms. The halls were silent.

"Murakumo won't be too happy with us for crossing this line; however, we have the perfect excuse."

"What's that," asked Rage with boredom.

"Why should we waste our time searching this place, when breaking this door will bring all of the guards here?"

"Alpha," stressed Rage, "that will be a lot of MTs."

"And. . .?" Rage was sure that Alpha had a smug smile on his stupid face.

"And we will be overwhelmed."

"Nope. Now get ready to cover me when I open the door."

Rage sighed loudly enough for Alpha to hear over the radio. "Yeah." He was no longer too thrilled about working with this man.

Alpha sent his laserblade's jet of pale fire jumping from its wrist mount. He sliced through the large door with silken ease. And the building-wide alarm began blaring a recorded message: "Staff. Security breach. R and D sector. Please send guards for intruder removal. I repeat. . ."

The small spider muscle tracers hadn't shown up yet, but they were certainly coming. Alpha said, "Let's go in and see what we can find."