NINETEEN
REVERSAL OF FORTUNE
Review Corner:
randomcat23: Thank you always for the continuing support. It's hard to resist dumping information about the Guardian Force, but I think I can still manage. More hints on this chapter.
Somewhere in the desert,
Helic Republic, Delpoi Continent,
Planet Zi,
October 22, ZAC 2121
"I'm so gonna regret this!"
Saskia didn't know why it bothered her so much that Fat Bob lied to her. He was not interested in her deal. That was all there was to it. Plain and simple. It didn't go along with her plan, but that was her life. Nothing went as she planned. All she needed to do was to suck it up and go on with her life.
But this Gilvader thing had become an unhealthy obsession to her. She couldn't accept the fact that her mission couldn't be accomplished just because Fat Bob wouldn't sell the Gravity Cannons to her. Worse yet, she couldn't accept his lies. Why? Why lies? What was he afraid of? What was he hiding? Was he hiding from Helic Republic? Why couldn't he just sell the Gravity Cannons to her?
These questions, along with the urge that she had to have the Gravity Cannon, prompted to sneak into Fat Bob's caravan. Saskia understood that she was being recklessly unreasonable. She knew she couldn't justify risking her life for some Gravity Cannons that might – or might not, but she was pretty sure they did – exist in Fat Bob's inventory. And even if she were right, even if the Gravity Cannons were there, what was she supposed to do next? Steal them? There was no possible way to transport the Gravity Cannons out of Fat Bob's Hover Cargo.
But in the end, against all that logic, she just had to do it.
The moonless night was near pitch black, and the only source of light came from Fat Bob's caravan. All Sinkers had been grounded, replaced by sentry, or thugs with automatic rifles, scurrying the desert in the Hover Cargos' close proximity. Some thugs gathered up around two bonfires, chattering and laughing and cursing unintelligibly. Others wandered in the dark, watching for possible threats.
Saskia investigated the caravan for sometime from a nearby rock formation. Fat Bob sure was feeling insecure, evident from the amount of watchdogs he employed to guard his possessions. And that was understandable. Words on the desert said horrible things about him, about how he compiled his possession, and how he treated his rivals. The more he had in his inventory, the more enemies he made, and eventually they would love to see him fall.
"What am I doing?" Saskia muttered to herself exasperatedly. "This place is a lion's den! What am I doing?" She couldn't justify the risk she was taking. She was not just sneaking up on a zoid trader, she was sneaking up on a very dangerous zoid trader.
And yet, she crept forward.
The night gave her sufficient cover from the thugs as she crawled slowly, steadily, toward the Hover Cargos. The thugs were mostly ignorant, oblivious to her presence. They didn't think that an unarmed woman would have the guts to infiltrate the caravan. Saskia mustered every bit of skill she learnt during boot camp and inched forward, keeping her posture close to the ground.
A couple armed men decided to leave the bonfire and walked around the caravan, eventually stopped inches away from Saskia. Although the dark blanketed her body, she was lying on the open field without any cover, and all it need for the thugs to find her was one good look at her direction. Her heart beat twice as fast and her breath came in labored gasps, but she gathered all the energy to keep herself quiet.
"C'mon, whachya got?" one of the thugs asked impatiently.
"This stuff is hot down at Europa," the other drew some kind of a box from his pocket. "It'll make you hot and hard all night, and then some."
"Does it guarantee satisfaction?"
"Man, nobody guarantees contraband! What are you thinking?"
"Why is it contraband? People can make a fortune selling this stuff!"
"Helic Republic policy of no recreational drugs. This stuff is legal in Europa, although not for long."
"Why?"
"When Helic takes control of Europa, this will be contraband too. Then we'll have to go to Nyx to get it, if it's not contraband already by the Guylos."
"What do you mean 'when Helic takes control of Europa'?"
"What, can't you see what's going on here? Do you know how many troops Helic Republic is recruiting? It is flooded with cadets! For what? Fighting the Guardian Force? The Guardian Force is just a pinprick in Helic Republic's eyes! If a nation starts recruiting in large number, there is only one possibility…. Invasion."
"Invasion of Europa? Really, now? Are you taking too many of these blue pills, man?"
"Fine, don't believe me. Don't believe me that the blue pills will do you any good with the women, either. When you realize what you're missing, don't come crying to me!"
As the thugs moved away, Saskia lied down for a while, pondering what the thugs just conversed about. The thugs might just be talking nonsense, but it made sense to her. She started to see the thin line among recent events. Helic Military did experience an influx of recruits over the past 6 months in which she was a part of. But while her motivation to join the military was her father, most of the new recruits were cajoled by General Krauser's new plan to increase the wealth of military servicemen of Helic Republic, the most benefited of which were zoid pilots. And like moths flying to a flame, hundreds and thousands of high-school graduates raced to the boot camps to become zoid pilots.
Could it be? Could Krauser's plan be just a means to lure new recruits, because Helic Republic needed them to invade Europa Continent? But why Europa? Why not Nyx, the Dark Continent that was the home of Guylos Empire? Did President Bonneville and the Senate approve this plan? How come the president, who had been a staunch supporter of non-violence, agreed to such an aggressive strategy? And where was the Guardian Force in this new equation? Was it possible that the Guardian Force was actually trying to stop this invasion? But if it were true, then why destroyed convoys and the fortress and killed many young prospects?
So many questions, so little time. Saskia put all these questions at the back of her mind and continued her path toward the Hover Cargos. It was dark and quiet. She tiptoed around the perimeter of one Hover Cargo to look for an opening, but after 20 minutes of moving in stealth, she couldn't find any opening. So she moved to the other one, just as an armed thug blasted a door open. Alcohol reeked from his breaths, and he was careless enough to leave the door open behind him. Saskia easily sneaked into the Hover Cargo before the door shut close.
The interior of the Hover Cargo reminded her of Helic Military headquarters. It was magnificent in height, doubly so in length, and it was actually bigger than the barrack she used to live in. A couple of Sinkers were parked on the floor, and judging from the amount of unoccupied space Saskia would think that the Hover Cargo could take a dozen more.
But zoids were not Saskia was looking for. She ventured deeper into the transport to find a door to the other section of the cargo bay. She made sure that nobody was there when she opened the door, then slipped behind it. The adjacent chamber was where Fat Bob stashed his parts. Saskia's mouth went dry as she inspected the pile of rare parts. Many people would want to pay a lot for some of the exotic parts, which sounded strange because Fat Bob seemed to store it for collection rather than trading.
And it took her less than 5 minutes to spot the ones she'd been looking for. Four Gravity Cannons in fair conditions lied on the ground. Saskia inspected them once more, but she couldn't determine if they were in working condition. Rust and corrosion covered the mouth of the cannons, a sure sign that they had not been fired in a very long time. The fact that the Gilvader was missing all 4 or its Gravity Cannons, and Fat Bob had 4 of them in the same condition as the Gilvader when she first saw it, made her believe that these were the actual cannons of the Gilvader. Fat Bob might just take the cannons from the zoid, but deemed the rest of the zoid unsalvageable.
That also meant Fat Bob knew the location of the Gilvader.
Unfortunately, her luck ran out. Two armed men came into the chamber, directly in front of Saskia. Both she and the thugs froze in disbelief, then one of the thugs raised his rifle. Saskia lunged at him with her left hand clubbing at his face. He was a scrawny man, and Saskia packed quite a bit of meat under her skin. The combination of Saskia's lunging movement and his own state of shock tripled the effect of the punch, and it knocked him out cold immediately. His gaunt frame jerked backward and rammed the other thug. He fell down, but not before inadvertently fired his machine gun to the ceiling.
"Oh crap!" Saskia knew what would come next. Those shots reverberated throughout the entire chamber, and more armed thugs would swarm the vicinity. She had to get out quick. She snatched the machine gun from the downed thug and slammed its butt at his head, taking him out. Then she ran as fast as she could.
Three armed thugs had made their way into the Hover Cargo, and fired at will as soon as they spotted Saskia. Bullets whizzed above her head and ricocheted on the metal wall. Saskia kept her head down as she kept her pace, gunning for the exit, but stopped right at the door. Every single thug outside was making their ways into the Hover Cargo through the same door Saskia was using as an exit.
With three gunmen shooting at her from the back and two dozen more coming at her from the front, Saskia quickly ran out of time. She ducked and threw herself behind some crates, and got an idea when she saw the Sinkers. She climbed one of the Sinkers and strapped herself on the command couch. The Sinker groaned in protest, but Saskia quickly turned the zoid on to nominal condition.
"Please, don't do this now," she whispered, half begging. "Please get me out of here…"
The Sinker's complaining purr turned into a frustrated wail, but Saskia slammed her foot on the pedal. The Sinker jerked roughly in a series of objections, and fought for control with Saskia. She held the joystick tight while flooring the accelerator, forcing the Sinker to glide forward through the door, and after what felt like hours of struggling, the Sinker yielded.
But it just wasn't Saskia's luck with zoids. The Sinker glided too close to the wall on its left, and Saskia overcompensated the joystick. The Sinker spun uncontrollably and rammed itself onto the door. The Sinker's scream blended with the sound of the horrible crash. Then it whirled like a windmill before crashing on the desert sand, upside down, busting both its rocket boosters.
Saskia should've kept herself on the ground.
Saskia's ears were still ringing when the thugs forced the cockpit open, then dragged her out. They immediately bound her hands behind her back, then forced her to stand up and towed her back toward the Hover Cargo, where Fat Boy was waiting.
"My, my, my, aren't you persistent," Fat Boy sneered. "Look what you did to my zoid! You are the worst zoid pilot I have ever seen."
"You lied!" Saskia growled weakly. "You have those Gravity Cannons!"
"And you are trespassing!" Fat Bob chomped on his cigar. "Who are you? Who do you work for?"
"I told you."
"Yet you make it impossible for me to believe you. One more time, lady, who are you, and who do you work for?"
"My name is Saskia van Leewenhoek, I am a Master Technician at Helic Republic. I mean you no harm. I only want the Gravity Cannons, nothing more, nothing less."
"So that's the game you want to play, huh?" Fat Bob chuckled hoarsely. "You should've talked when you had your chance." He turned to his guards. "Bring her inside! Let's see how tough she is!"
"No! No! I'm telling the truth!" Saskia cried out, but it wouldn't matter anymore. His demented grin and his body language told her that he wasn't really interested in the truth. He just wanted to see her in agony. And she knew it was going to be a rough night to go through… if she could go through it at all.