Hey, guys!
Well, work's been pretty busy lately, but on the bright side, I saw The Martian yesterday. That's a pretty good movie, I recommend seeing it. I've liked most of Ridley Scott's work, especially Alien.
Anyways, I'll be getting an eye appointment soon, so I might not be able to type as much as I'd like to. But we're getting closer to the moon, so let's get straight into it.
I don't own RWBY or Sonic. Enjoy!
Team RWBY's dorm room, Friday, 8 p.m.
14 hours until launch
Ruby's shoulders sagged with relief as she fell on her bed exhausted. "Thank god it's Friday…" she moaned, her voice muffled by the pillow. "That's some intense training..."
"Yeah… I know that Beacon is known for being strenuous at times, but being an astronaut is even more tiring," Weiss agreed as she rubbed her partner's back.
Blake stretched with her natural feline grace. "I can almost hear Rouge's 'Told you so!' concerning the difficulty of astronaut training."
In contrast to everyone else, Yang was still pretty excited and full of energy. "Guys, come on! We're going to the moon tomorrow!"
Ruby perked up hearing this. "That's right! We'll finally use this abuse to work!"
"Still, I wouldn't get too excited. We may have a lot of firepower, but something tells me that won't be enough up there," Weiss sighed. "We didn't even get trained on using the Paladins, either."
"Yeah, why would Ironwood give us two walking steel death machines if none of us knows how to drive them?" wondered Yang.
"I heard that the general is sending two mercenaries with us. They're the ones who will use the Paladins when we're on the moon." The heiress frowned disapprovingly. "I hope that he knows what he's doing."
"Mercenaries? Can't we call them something else? How about Freelancers?"
Blake rolled her eyes at Ruby's comment. "At any rate, General Ironwood seems to trust them with a mission this important, and we'll meet them tomorrow morning. For now, let's get some rest."
The other girls nodded and got into their pajamas. As they lay in bed preparing for whatever may come tomorrow, Ruby couldn't help but think that they were near the end of their adventures with the Mobians. 'I don't want to say goodbye to Sonic or Shadow… " she thought sadly as exhaustion finally took over and fell into a deep sleep.
Bullhead on approach to Atlesian airship hangar, 1:00 a.m.
9 hours until launch
"Base One, this is 479er, requesting permission to dock."
The radio crackled a bit as the traffic controller in the airship responded to the pilot's request. "479er, state your business."
"Delivery of some last minute parts requested by Miles Prower. I won't pretend to understand what they are, but the names are impressively long," the pilot of the Bullhead responded as she steered the ship to the larger one hanging over the lake beneath Beacon Academy.
The traffic controller chuckled in amusement. "Right on schedule, 479er. Go to docking bay 2-A."
"Understood." 479er smoothly brought the ship to a halt inside the landing bay. As it powered down, two figures silently jumped from the Bullhead onto the hangar floor. The huge airship was operating with a skeleton crew at the moment, so their entrance went unnoticed.
Cinder smirked as she and Neo made their way towards the secret spaceship hangar. She was wearing a black catsuit that showed off her curves, and a mask similar to one worn at masquerade parties.
Neo, however, still wore her traditional clothing so if the mission was compromised, any attention would be focused on her instead of Cinder. This was worked out beforehand, and although Neo wasn't too pleased about the arrangement, she agreed to it.
The two had snuck onto the Bullhead before it took off, and now they were ready for their mission. "Neo, I'll go to the security room and make sure things stay quiet," said Cinder. "You go to the spaceship bay and deliver our package. Take out any guards you see, but do it discreetly. No killing anyone. We don't want them to delay their launch." Before Neo could leave, Cinder held her by her elbow. "Roman speaks very highly of you… for your sake, he'd best be right."
The girl modeled after ice cream smiled and nodded, not caring about the veiled threat. She wrenched her arm away and walked into the hallway that led to the spaceship.
Cinder carefully snuck through the ship until she reached the hallway leading to the security control room. Unfortunately for her, there were two guards standing outside the room. She clenched her teeth as she tried to find a way to take them out. Her amber eyes glanced above the guards and rested on an air duct that was hung on the ceiling by a few wires. 'There's an accident waiting to happen…" she thought, smirking to herself.
The woman waved her hands and used her innate fire abilities to flash-forge two black swords. She then put them together and transformed them into a long black bow. She put an arrow on the string and aimed it at the air duct. With a musical *twang*, she released the arrow, causing the air duct to fall on the guards and knock them both out.
"Perfect... I do so love it when a plan comes together," Cinder purred as she retrieved her arrow. She took a key card from a guard and inserted it into the slot on the wall. The door opened, and Cinder walked in. There was one person on duty, but the security officer never knew what hit him.
She placed the officer on a nearby chair as if he was taking a nap, then sat in the chair. She typed in a few commands and pulled up the security cameras on the monitor. Cinder typed in a few more commands so that key cameras would go on an infinite loop, and all evidence of her own entry was erased.
'Excellent… now to alert Neo.' She pulled up a camera that was pointed at Neo and moved it back and forth, signaling her to move. Neo bowed to the camera and walked towards the spaceship hangar, her umbrella over her shoulder.
Secret Hangar
Tails rubbed his tired eyes as he was finishing up the wiring for the fuel intake of the spaceship, now named the Ogygia. The ship was more advanced than anything on Mobius, and Tails was loathe to admit that some parts were even more advanced than anything he built- The Tornado X and the weapons he built for his friends exceptions to the rule. Even so, it was still pretty obvious that the ship was less advanced in comparison to the rest of the Atlesian ship.
"I just need to finish connecting the air compressor to the oxygen recycler… There we go!" he finished the wiring and shut the panel.
Aeromi fizzled into existence at a nearby holographic projector. "Tails, I think you should get some sleep. I know I'll be the one flying for most of the trip, but I'll need a set of alert eyes in a worst-case scenario. You're not good to us if you're tired."
The Mobian fox sighed. "Yeah, you're right…" He walked to the interior bay of the Ogygia, where the Spider Droids and Paladins were folded up to conserve space. He laid down on a cot he set up there earlier. "Aeromi, initiate a virus scan. We don't need you glitching out at a critical moment," he said, directing his voice to the A.I.'s holographic avatar.
Aeromi nodded. "Good idea, Tails. I'll need to shut down for a half hour, but I'll get back to integrating all the system software after I boot back up. I'll alert you if I need immediate assistance." The A.I. faded out as Tails closed his eyes and fell into a deep sleep very quickly.
This was extraordinarily convenient for Neo, who just walked in and heard the conversation. 'An A.I.?!' she thought, her eyes turning white in panic. 'They didn't say anything about an A.I.!'
Neo just stood still for two minutes, fearing that she might be discovered. When there was no alarm, she carefully walked across the hangar to the Ogygia. She entered the ship, mindful that too much time would expose her and Cinder, and all their plans would be ruined.
She opened a hatch near the engines and found the fuel intake mechanism. She disconnected the wiring and took out a small red cylinder. She then connected the wires through the cylinder, completing the circuit. It would not interfere with the flight to the moon, but once they brought the engines back online in a low-gravity environment…
Neopolitan allowed herself a smirk of triumph. No one would suspect the ship was sabotaged. She carefully placed the cover back on and swiftly exited the ship, being careful not to wake Tails or disrupt Aeromi's debugging process.
She waved a hand at a camera, indicating to Cinder that her mission was complete. Now they just needed to get out alive and preferably undetected.
Back in the security room, Cinder smiled as she erased the footage of Neo in the hangar. She then took a data card and inserted it into the console.
The card had a computer virus on it that would continue to put the cameras on an infinite loop. The genius bit of it was that after a few minutes (in other words, after Cinder and Neo left), it would resume normal camera operations one by one before deleting itself from existence.
"It seems that the mad doctor is useful for something after all," Cinder said to herself with satisfaction as she retrieved the data card.
She got up from the chair and exited the security room, stepping over the unconscious guards and sneaking her way back to the Bullhead hangar. Neo met up with her midway, and they both jumped on a leaving Bullhead.
Cinder glanced at the other girl. "I trust everything went well on your end, Neo?"
She nodded. "Yes, but there is something that you should know." Neo proceeded to tell Cinder about Aeromi.
Cinder put a hand to her chin. "An artificial intelligence program?"
"Yes. Most likely a newer 'Smart' A.I., no less."
The black-haired woman pursed her lips. "This isn't good. I'll need to contact Eggman and tell him that his base's location is compromised." She straightened her posture. "At any rate, I'm pleased with your performance tonight, Neopolitan. Those fools on the moon won't suspect a thing tomorrow."
She and Neo shared a triumphant smirk at their success. "Soon, Team RWBY and four of the most dangerous Mobians will die."
Okay, so not a lot of scenes where Neo and Cinder beat the stuffing out of everyone, but if they did that, then the launch would be delayed. And who wants that?
Remember to leave a review telling me what you thought, and follow and favorite if you want to read more! On a related note, this story now has over 100 favorites and almost 300 reviews! I mean, sweet Chaos, this is fantastic!