"Tristus?"
The two competitors glared at each other, both sets of eyes burning with hatred for the other's, one pair a bright, vibrant green, and the other a dark gray, falsely organic-looking. They were both amply armed, the Earth faerie with a staff laced in ivy, the robotic Shoyru Mitsuko armed with the body Krishna had equipped her with so long ago. They were the only two left of their ranks, the other faeries having fled when they harbored so much as a scratch, vanishing into thin air with a puff of appropriately colored smoke. The robots, however, suffered a less-appealing fate-as they were unable to teleport from place to place, they were forced to stay and fight. And almost all of them had perished from this unfortunate disability, a scant few escaping to the transport, which had long ago begun retreating into the distance, leaving so many robots behind to the mercy of the faeries.
"Tristus, can you hear me?"
The Earth faerie tried her move first, shouting a few words in an unknown language, pointing the end of her staff towards Mitsuko. Mitsuko easily evaded the attack, launching herself at the faerie, knocking her to the ground, her delicate wings getting crushed to the ground, Mitsuko's heavy body on top of her. The Earth faerie gave a little shriek of horror, and then disappeared from underneath Mitsuko, leaving the robotic Shoyru to fall to the ground among the scrap metal of her former comrades.
Mitsuko struggled to her feet, seeing no more faeries that might try and strike her down. She had suffered her share of dents and injuries, but judging by the looks of the surrounding area, she was the only robot still in commission, activated and running, save for Tacitus, the relentless Lupe pushing his nose among the scraps of robots, searching, a worried look on his face. All the others were groaning on the ground, many not deactivated, but in pieces. It would take thousands of outside sources to put back together all of their parts to whole robots, strewn into places. It was almost a makeshift junkyard in its own right, in a strange way, in the middle of a barren desert.
"Tristus, don't be stupid. I know you can hear me."
As she looked down, she could see that her foot was atop the screen of a robotic Kiko. Looking closer, she could see that it was the deactivated Kiko robot that had been Kummer. She took her foot off of the broken screen. A single word flashed momentarily onto the facial screen. "Message." She blinked, wondering if she were imagining things. As soon as she had blinked, the word was gone.
Mitsuko turned her attention to Tacitus. The Lupe robot was lacking one of his forelegs, leaving only exposed wires, snapping and crackling with electricity. Many voices rose for Tacitus to help them, but he ignored them, stepping over them, trying to be as polite as possible in the chaos. He kept his nose to the ground, sniffing, his eyes growing more anxious by the moment, his tail twitching nervously, probably with a misdirected flow of energy within his body.
"Stupid! Where are you!?" he howled in anguish, his body shaking from frustration and despair, not to mention the weariness he must've been feeling after the battle. Despite being among thousands of fallen comrades, many of them still half-functioning, the Lupe looked desperately alone, tail tucking itself between his legs, his metal ears drooping to the side. His behind flopped onto a patch of sandy ground amidst the robot parts, the robotic Lupe hanging his head after hours of search. Gasoline dripped from his eyes, hissing as it hit the hot sand, tears in their own right. "Stupid. . .junk-type. . ."
"Hey!"
A new voice was added into the equation, startling Mitsuko. She whipped around, the programming surging back into her false muscles, standing on guard. Although the voice couldn't have belonged to any kind of faerie they battled against, as it was distinctly masculine, she was still wary of the residents of the area-she hadn't been given time to properly check out her surroundings, as her real battle had just finished, and the memories of townspeople from Krishna's town were not pleasant ones.
Standing on the far end of the scrap metal field was a Shoyru, having to be at least in his teens, perhaps older. He was of a Desert Color, but he did not wear the golden crown-just the gold-and-blue striped shawl to cover his head from the heat of the day, though the heat wasn't as unbearable as the dirt desert Mitsuko had suffered through. He looked amiable, a curious smile on his face, but Mitsuko knew all too well that looks could be deceiving, and didn't cease her ready stance. He spoke again, seeing that he got her attention. "Don't be afraid-I'm not going to hurt you."
Mitsuko didn't trust the words, but did loosen her muscles, as the fake adrenaline was giving her body cramps. The Desert Shoyru began approaching her, carefully stepping through the scrap metal, holding out his hand welcomingly. "What happened here? Are you the only survivor?"
She didn't answer, but examined him with her eyes, suspicious. Was he allied with the faeries?
"Not very talkative, eh?" he asked, a grin spreading across his face as he got closer to her. Mitsuko took a step backwards. There might very well have been hidden weapons up the Desert Shoyru's shawl. "It's okay-I'm here to help you. M'names Philokrates, but you can just call me Phil. You've got some bad injuries, but they look curable-I can get you to a doctor that can fix up robots and Neopets alike." He spoke to her like a human would speak to a frightened Kougra, snarling in a corner, as if trying to soothe her nerves. It only served to stoke her fears, as she could remember that tone, somewhere in her memory, used before, calming her down-but having dire consequences.
She backed up more, but found herself tripping over a deactivated robot, stumbling backwards and falling into the heap of her comrades. Their moans floated into her ears, arms reaching up to grab her into their ranks. Her head flicked around nervously, wondering whether it was better to trust her deranged, former comrades or the new, organic Shoyru named Philokrates.
Unfortunately, the decision was not to be made by her-she could feel the expiration of her body coming on at the most inconvenient time, her body's movements slowly fading to nothing, rendering her paralyzed. Not even her head could function much-and she even found her consciousness beginning to drift away, the area around her beginning to fade. Krishna had said nothing about deactivation when the body had used up its time-but now it was happening, and there was nothing she could do but accept it.
The woman stood, petrified, unable to believe that she had been found out. Her crimson eyes grew round and large as she was surrounded by the crowd of dark faces, the distance between her and them greatly diminishing by the moments. She tried to back up, but found herself against a wall. She turned her desperate face to Mitsuko, shouting silent words, words in a different tongue, yet ones that she could still understand.
"Go!"
But she couldn't move. What had happened to her body?
The sound of hushed voices was what woke up Mitsuko, able to see the blackish-red behinds of her eyelids. Her senses kicked in slowly, like a computer gradually booting up. The tingling sense of being recharged flowed through her limbs, and she opened her eyes, looking down at the body that Krishna had granted her. Instead of being battered and filled with sand as it had been when she last remembered it, it looked fully new, polished and dents worked out of it, the health bars on her chest displaying that she was at full statistics. She surely felt like it-resting was no longer an option. She sat up on the table that she had been laid out on, jumping down from it.
It appeared that she was in some sort of laboratory, chemicals making bubbling noises around her. It was not this that had awakened her, she knew, and she sought out the source of voices in the cold, metal room. There wasn't much light in it either, besides the eerie glowing of the volatile chemicals, so she activated her night vision, navigating through the room with relative ease, careful not to knock down any of the potentially hazardous chemicals, all labeled with white lettering.
The voices came from outside of the room, the door opened a crack, allowing the voices inside. The first definitely belonged to the Desert Shoyru who she had last seen, calling himself Philokrates, but the second was one that she had not heard before, though sounding familiar in its own right-thanks to her forgotten memories, it seemed that she ran into plenty of those voices. In an odd way, however, the voice reminded her of Krishna's, drawing her closer to the door, pressing her ear next to the crack, staying absolutely silent.
Perhaps too silent, because the door suddenly swung open, knocking her squarely in the face. Mitsuko drew back in surprise, stumbling backwards, but making sure not to run into any of the tables, just barely managing such a feat. Phil was the first one that she registered in her mind, rushing at her and catching her by the arm, making her stable once again. "Oh my God! I'm so sorry-I didn't know you were there!" he exclaimed, an expression of concern on his face, his grip tight on her hand. "Are you okay? Are you sure nothing's broken?" he asked, getting into her face, his nervous eyes flickering across her face with anxiety.
"It'll take more than a swinging door to knock this robot down she survived Fyora's troops," came the second voice again. Mitsuko tried to get Phil out of her face in order to see the person who possessed the voice-but as she laid eyes on him, it was obvious that person was not the appropriate term. He was seated in a wheelchair, using his arms to function the wheels, which was strange considering he could've easily had an electric one. (Operations to fix the nerves or any other disabling injuries had long since ceased, due to the lack of equipment for such extensive surgery.) If he could've been able to stand, he would've been of a normal human male height, perhaps taller, and he wore a tattered lab coat, similar to the one that Krishna had constantly worn. What was most striking, however, was that he was the spitting image of the person that the late Yadira had shown to Mitsuko of the person she was to track down: the green skin, the red eyes and deranged hair, it was all there. (Except for, perhaps, the fact that he wore glasses and looked much more kind than the pictured person.)
"See? I told you I'd get a respectable doctor," said Phil with a smile as Mitsuko gaped at the man in the wheelchair.
"I would advise moving aside, Philokrates-I must have a look at her conscious," said the man, wheeling himself forward. Phil stepped aside without missing a beat. Mitsuko stood, unable to move, staring down at the man like she had seen a ghost. "Don't give me that look-sure, I'm not all that attractive, but I did sacrifice a good deal of my oil quotient to restore your body," he said, lifting an eyebrow. "I'm not going to hurt you."
"You're.you're." began Mitsuko, but couldn't find a name to put to his face. It occurred to her that Yadira had never really told her what his name was.
"Trying to help you," he finished for her flatly. "Now stop shaking, or else this screw driver will end up in your eye, whether it be accidentally or intentionally," commented the man dryly, reaching up to her face and looking at it closely, squinting his eyes, moving down her body, fixing a screw every so often. "Tell me, where did you manage to get this body from? Its production date doesn't match with the production date of your hard drive."
"A half-faerie named Doctor Krishna. . ." The words stumbled off of her tongue before she even thought to censor them or lie. She was surprised at herself-it was unlike her to do something like that.
"Not surprising. Trust someone self-taught to make something so incredibly frustrating to recharge," said the man with a small smile, shaking his head, not looking Mitsuko in the eye. "I'm Dr. Sloth, by the way-yes, the one and only, before you say anything else. You're from one of those Neopian Central subdivisions, and you shouldn't trust much of what they say. Been too influenced by the faeries. People make mistakes in their lives-I just happened to make a lot more than the average Joe."
"How do you know Doctor Krishna?" asked Mitsuko, confused. She had remembered Krishna telling her that someone named Frank Sloth was villainous, and the cause for the world being so desolate and barren. This man, however, didn't look hostile-in fact, he looked quite vulnerable without his legs in commission.
Dr. Sloth looked up at her, cocking an eyebrow, pausing in his fixing of her body. He finally shrugged and continued his work, pushing up his glasses with a nudge by his shoulder. "Scientist/scientist thing. . .there's not many of us anymore, I've gotta get supplies from somewhere. Not usually Krishna, I must admit-we don't have quite the. . .strongest relationship," replied Dr. Sloth sarcastically, rolling his eyes. He patted Mitsuko's chest suddenly, as if approving. "There we go. All better."
"Where am I?" asked Mitsuko, her mind still unable to accept what had just happened, so trying to move onto different subjects.
"The Lost Desert, in Sakhmet City. Trust me, you were pretty heavy to drag all the way to Sakhmet," said Phil, grinning. "But it's okay, because now you're talking. I thought you were a mute one before."
"Do you know where you originally came from? You're not a Neopian Central model in the slightest-and you have no production number. I've seen one like you before, but you have a lot less information than I would expect if you were actually that particular robot," commented Dr. Sloth, sitting back in his wheelchair. Mitsuko shook her head slowly.
"No. . .I can only remember waking up in Doctor Krishna's. I suppose I was created before then, because he said he found me in a junkyard. . .but beyond that, I have no idea whom my creator is."
"That's odd," said Dr. Sloth, twisting his face into a confused expression. "It's not like a robot to lose just some of their memory. . .usually the majority of their personality and sentience goes with it. Oh well." He shrugged and wheeled his chair around, beginning to exit the room. "I'm going to fix something up for dinner. . .Philokrates, you can stay for the night if you'd like, but I'm not cleaning up after you ever again," Dr. Sloth called as his voice faded into the distance.
"So, what's your name?" asked Phil, a smile seeming to be forever engraved onto his face.
"It's Mitsuko," she answered cautiously, not fully trusting the Shoyru yet.
"Mitsuko? That's a pretty name," he said. "Y'know, the doc's right, you're pretty unusual for a robot. Are you some kind of warrior type, or maybe a custom companion one?"
"I said, I don't know. . .my memory's mostly gone."
"Hmmm. . .that's too bad. Oh well, at least that means you aren't constrained to one thing, right? It means you're almost like a real Neopet!" said Phil, his eyes sparkling. "That means you can't be ordered around and stuff. . .well, maybe people will think they can because you do kind of look like a robot on the bottom. But the point is, you're not enslaved to a single task. You're free to do what you please, aren't you?"
"I. . .guess. . ."
"Well, then, you want to see around the town? There's plenty of things to see, especially since the RBT is coming to Sakhmet pretty soon. . .well, I guess that's not too fortunate for you," said Phil, seeming to consider his words, rubbing his chin. His eyes seemed glazed for a moment as he thought things over within his head, and then refocused on Mitsuko, presenting a question. "Well. . .let's see. . .can you fly?"
"Yes. . .I can hover, too, if necessary."
"Good. Then we won't have to take the streets. I swear, some people these days. . .in any case, it probably wouldn't be too great of an idea to roam the streets of Sakhmet now without you being labeled as participating in the RBT."
"RBT?"
"The Robotic Battle Tournament. It's a source of entertainment, a bright light in the endless black tunnel of our existence, I guess, to some- a kind of gladiator game among robots, held by the faeries, and Neopets sponsor a robot. It's only called a tournament, because the sponsor of the last robot standing wins some cash sum that's nominally pointless, as it'll probably go into just repairing the poor piece of scrap metal. They sometimes say they'll grant the robot one wish, or some dung like that to encourage sentient ones to enter-but it never happens," Phil wrinkled his nose in disgust, obviously disapproving of the RBT. "It's barbaric-what Neopets will do just for entertainment is truly degrading to our species as a whole."
It dawned on Mitsuko that that must've been the reason the faeries had been blocking RARE's path-perhaps they wanted to prevent RARE from entering Sakhmet and liberating all of their potential candidates for gladiators in the RBT. A swelling of anger began to rise into her chest. They had obliterated so many robots.for what? For some petty competition that they held? Just so they could have a bit of fun?
"But there's no reason to bring about the negativity of that situation," said Phil, shaking his head. "C'mon, the doc will have dinner ready in an hour or so-in that time, I'll show you around." Phil continued talking as he guided her out of the house into the dark of the night.
Despite being a desert, the nighttime was surprisingly mild, Mitsuko sinking into the cool sand. The sky above was, for a change, not cloudy, but perfectly clear, revealing all of the sparkling stars against a blanket of deep blue. Mitsuko gazed up at it in wonder. She hadn't been outside all that much in her two years with RARE, and scarcely had she ever seen the sky clear, without a single cloud in the sky. Phil seemed to notice her fascination with the sky, craning his neck backwards to look at it as well. "Well, look at that. Mother Nature decided to grace us with some good weather for a change."
With those words, Phil opened his wings, the soft wind inflating the skin flaps. With one steady push downwards with his wing muscles, he was into the air, pumping a bit more to get some more height. Turning around in the air, hovering slightly, he motioned for Mitsuko to follow. She did so, extending her wings to their maximum length and then activating the boosters on the back of them, kicking up some sand beneath her as she ascended into the air, the boosters glowing a bright yellowish-orange. Once they were level with one another, Phil took off towards the main part of the city, astonishingly fast on his small natural, wings. Taken off guard, Mitsuko hurried after him, careful not to accelerate too much.
The two looked down at the great city, mostly ruined palaces and large buildings, makeshift roofs of weak wood thrown over the tops so that they could once again become places for sleeping and commerce alike. Below them, Neopets bustled about, again not a single human among their ranks. It was unusually busy for nighttime, and among the organic Neopets, Mitsuko could see flashes of metal-robotic Neopets, most deactivated and being carted around to the center of town. The center of town was set up like a large arena, a dusty circle surrounded by stands, marked by a few scant ropes.
"It'll be much larger and extravagant in a few days. . .the faeries will make sure of it. Spruce it up with their magic. Many will migrate here just to see this stupid tournament. . .Sakhmet should be crawling with their filth in no time," spat Phil, his face darkening. His disapproval was shameless, and he growled to himself angrily.
"You don't like it then."
"No! I loathe it!"
"You're organic. You have nothing to fear from this competition. Yet you hate it, and I feel nothing towards it." Mitsuko looked at him, staring him directly in the eye. "Why?"
Phil was quiet for a moment as they hovered, seeming to contemplate his answer. He spoke, but slowly, unlike the chipper, fast speech he had rattled off before. He had shifted quickly from annoying to insightful in mood. "The tournament always comes here. . .I've seen it far too many times. I've seen so many robots go down. . .sentient ones and stupid ones alike. It makes no sense. . .we make them like ourselves, to think, and comprehend, and then sacrifice them in battle? That's what happens to most of the sentient ones anyway."
"What's it for, though? Really?"
"It was originally just an annual competition to see who could build the best warrior model. . .but it has increased to much more. It's like an Olympics for battle-type robots. Much good they'll do! They only destroy each other," laughed Phil bitterly, his sarcastic mood unsettling. "They are only many gladiators in a battlefield. . .they have no regard for the robots themselves."
"I'm a robot. You speak as if I'm not even here," said Mitsuko coldly. Phil looked at her with an odd expression. A smile slipped across his face, breaking his damper mood.
"Yeah, I guess you are. Sorry about that. . .still, I'd rather think of you as organic," said Phil, his expression suddenly pleasant. "That way, we can be friends. Not saying that we couldn't be friends because you're a robot. . .but. . ."
"I don't need friends," replied Mitsuko, her expression bland. "Do you know the reason I was created, Mr. Phil?"
"Just Phil is fine."
"I asked you a question, Mr. Phil."
"No. No, I don't know why you were created."
"Neither do I, Mr. Phil. But I have programming within me that allows me to destroy. That allows me to destroy both flesh and machine. I am one of those warrior types, Mr. Phil, deep within me, whether I choose to deny it or not. Have you ever stopped to consider that perhaps these robots want to die for just the sake of fighting?" asked Mitsuko. Phil's face was bamboozled, his eyes wide and mouth hanging open vacantly.
"But. . .but that's impossible. Why would a robot want to risk their lives for something so pointless?"
"I don't know, Mr. Phil. But maybe. . .maybe liberating them would be pointless."
The two floated silently above the ring, watching as check-ins began for robots, papers exchanging hands. "It doesn't change the fact. . .that I don't like it," whispered Phil to himself, shaking his head. Mitsuko did not reply, but allowed herself to be taken on the rest of the tour of Sakhmet City, although there was not much else to visit, besides the ruins of the palace and the market place, all which they did not directly get involved with.
They soon landed once again in front of the place where they had started, the tingling smell of food drifting into Mitsuko's nose. It did not appeal to her, of course, but Phil seemed to react immediately, wrinkling his nose. "Ugh. . .I forgot that Frank's an atrocious cook," mumbled Phil to himself, moving his hand to his nose to evade the smell. "You want to go to my place?"
Mitsuko looked at him evenly, judging him slowly and steadily. She measured him up critically, taking in account all of the words he had said, folding her wings against her back. The silence between them was extremely awkward, but Mitsuko hardly noticed the mood. Finally, she opened her wings once again, giving a slow nod. "Okay," she replied, her voice steady and dragged out, sounding like it were muffled by molasses. "Okay," she repeated, with more conviction, blinking hard. "Okay."
Phil's face lit up like a light bulb, seeming to brighten up the darkness of night. "Okay!" he said, bouncing into the air, taking to the wing. "Just follow me, it's not that far away-you can stay with me, if you like, I always wanted a roommate."
"And the doctor?"
"He'll be fine. The man's been alone for the majority of his life. You think that it bothers him?" asked Phil. It was a rhetorical question, not to be answered, but Mitsuko couldn't help but feel the answer on her tongue, and spoke it silently for only herself to hear, the image of Krishna's tortured face as she left still imprinted strongly in the caverns of her memory.
"Yes."
The two competitors glared at each other, both sets of eyes burning with hatred for the other's, one pair a bright, vibrant green, and the other a dark gray, falsely organic-looking. They were both amply armed, the Earth faerie with a staff laced in ivy, the robotic Shoyru Mitsuko armed with the body Krishna had equipped her with so long ago. They were the only two left of their ranks, the other faeries having fled when they harbored so much as a scratch, vanishing into thin air with a puff of appropriately colored smoke. The robots, however, suffered a less-appealing fate-as they were unable to teleport from place to place, they were forced to stay and fight. And almost all of them had perished from this unfortunate disability, a scant few escaping to the transport, which had long ago begun retreating into the distance, leaving so many robots behind to the mercy of the faeries.
"Tristus, can you hear me?"
The Earth faerie tried her move first, shouting a few words in an unknown language, pointing the end of her staff towards Mitsuko. Mitsuko easily evaded the attack, launching herself at the faerie, knocking her to the ground, her delicate wings getting crushed to the ground, Mitsuko's heavy body on top of her. The Earth faerie gave a little shriek of horror, and then disappeared from underneath Mitsuko, leaving the robotic Shoyru to fall to the ground among the scrap metal of her former comrades.
Mitsuko struggled to her feet, seeing no more faeries that might try and strike her down. She had suffered her share of dents and injuries, but judging by the looks of the surrounding area, she was the only robot still in commission, activated and running, save for Tacitus, the relentless Lupe pushing his nose among the scraps of robots, searching, a worried look on his face. All the others were groaning on the ground, many not deactivated, but in pieces. It would take thousands of outside sources to put back together all of their parts to whole robots, strewn into places. It was almost a makeshift junkyard in its own right, in a strange way, in the middle of a barren desert.
"Tristus, don't be stupid. I know you can hear me."
As she looked down, she could see that her foot was atop the screen of a robotic Kiko. Looking closer, she could see that it was the deactivated Kiko robot that had been Kummer. She took her foot off of the broken screen. A single word flashed momentarily onto the facial screen. "Message." She blinked, wondering if she were imagining things. As soon as she had blinked, the word was gone.
Mitsuko turned her attention to Tacitus. The Lupe robot was lacking one of his forelegs, leaving only exposed wires, snapping and crackling with electricity. Many voices rose for Tacitus to help them, but he ignored them, stepping over them, trying to be as polite as possible in the chaos. He kept his nose to the ground, sniffing, his eyes growing more anxious by the moment, his tail twitching nervously, probably with a misdirected flow of energy within his body.
"Stupid! Where are you!?" he howled in anguish, his body shaking from frustration and despair, not to mention the weariness he must've been feeling after the battle. Despite being among thousands of fallen comrades, many of them still half-functioning, the Lupe looked desperately alone, tail tucking itself between his legs, his metal ears drooping to the side. His behind flopped onto a patch of sandy ground amidst the robot parts, the robotic Lupe hanging his head after hours of search. Gasoline dripped from his eyes, hissing as it hit the hot sand, tears in their own right. "Stupid. . .junk-type. . ."
"Hey!"
A new voice was added into the equation, startling Mitsuko. She whipped around, the programming surging back into her false muscles, standing on guard. Although the voice couldn't have belonged to any kind of faerie they battled against, as it was distinctly masculine, she was still wary of the residents of the area-she hadn't been given time to properly check out her surroundings, as her real battle had just finished, and the memories of townspeople from Krishna's town were not pleasant ones.
Standing on the far end of the scrap metal field was a Shoyru, having to be at least in his teens, perhaps older. He was of a Desert Color, but he did not wear the golden crown-just the gold-and-blue striped shawl to cover his head from the heat of the day, though the heat wasn't as unbearable as the dirt desert Mitsuko had suffered through. He looked amiable, a curious smile on his face, but Mitsuko knew all too well that looks could be deceiving, and didn't cease her ready stance. He spoke again, seeing that he got her attention. "Don't be afraid-I'm not going to hurt you."
Mitsuko didn't trust the words, but did loosen her muscles, as the fake adrenaline was giving her body cramps. The Desert Shoyru began approaching her, carefully stepping through the scrap metal, holding out his hand welcomingly. "What happened here? Are you the only survivor?"
She didn't answer, but examined him with her eyes, suspicious. Was he allied with the faeries?
"Not very talkative, eh?" he asked, a grin spreading across his face as he got closer to her. Mitsuko took a step backwards. There might very well have been hidden weapons up the Desert Shoyru's shawl. "It's okay-I'm here to help you. M'names Philokrates, but you can just call me Phil. You've got some bad injuries, but they look curable-I can get you to a doctor that can fix up robots and Neopets alike." He spoke to her like a human would speak to a frightened Kougra, snarling in a corner, as if trying to soothe her nerves. It only served to stoke her fears, as she could remember that tone, somewhere in her memory, used before, calming her down-but having dire consequences.
She backed up more, but found herself tripping over a deactivated robot, stumbling backwards and falling into the heap of her comrades. Their moans floated into her ears, arms reaching up to grab her into their ranks. Her head flicked around nervously, wondering whether it was better to trust her deranged, former comrades or the new, organic Shoyru named Philokrates.
Unfortunately, the decision was not to be made by her-she could feel the expiration of her body coming on at the most inconvenient time, her body's movements slowly fading to nothing, rendering her paralyzed. Not even her head could function much-and she even found her consciousness beginning to drift away, the area around her beginning to fade. Krishna had said nothing about deactivation when the body had used up its time-but now it was happening, and there was nothing she could do but accept it.
The woman stood, petrified, unable to believe that she had been found out. Her crimson eyes grew round and large as she was surrounded by the crowd of dark faces, the distance between her and them greatly diminishing by the moments. She tried to back up, but found herself against a wall. She turned her desperate face to Mitsuko, shouting silent words, words in a different tongue, yet ones that she could still understand.
"Go!"
But she couldn't move. What had happened to her body?
The sound of hushed voices was what woke up Mitsuko, able to see the blackish-red behinds of her eyelids. Her senses kicked in slowly, like a computer gradually booting up. The tingling sense of being recharged flowed through her limbs, and she opened her eyes, looking down at the body that Krishna had granted her. Instead of being battered and filled with sand as it had been when she last remembered it, it looked fully new, polished and dents worked out of it, the health bars on her chest displaying that she was at full statistics. She surely felt like it-resting was no longer an option. She sat up on the table that she had been laid out on, jumping down from it.
It appeared that she was in some sort of laboratory, chemicals making bubbling noises around her. It was not this that had awakened her, she knew, and she sought out the source of voices in the cold, metal room. There wasn't much light in it either, besides the eerie glowing of the volatile chemicals, so she activated her night vision, navigating through the room with relative ease, careful not to knock down any of the potentially hazardous chemicals, all labeled with white lettering.
The voices came from outside of the room, the door opened a crack, allowing the voices inside. The first definitely belonged to the Desert Shoyru who she had last seen, calling himself Philokrates, but the second was one that she had not heard before, though sounding familiar in its own right-thanks to her forgotten memories, it seemed that she ran into plenty of those voices. In an odd way, however, the voice reminded her of Krishna's, drawing her closer to the door, pressing her ear next to the crack, staying absolutely silent.
Perhaps too silent, because the door suddenly swung open, knocking her squarely in the face. Mitsuko drew back in surprise, stumbling backwards, but making sure not to run into any of the tables, just barely managing such a feat. Phil was the first one that she registered in her mind, rushing at her and catching her by the arm, making her stable once again. "Oh my God! I'm so sorry-I didn't know you were there!" he exclaimed, an expression of concern on his face, his grip tight on her hand. "Are you okay? Are you sure nothing's broken?" he asked, getting into her face, his nervous eyes flickering across her face with anxiety.
"It'll take more than a swinging door to knock this robot down she survived Fyora's troops," came the second voice again. Mitsuko tried to get Phil out of her face in order to see the person who possessed the voice-but as she laid eyes on him, it was obvious that person was not the appropriate term. He was seated in a wheelchair, using his arms to function the wheels, which was strange considering he could've easily had an electric one. (Operations to fix the nerves or any other disabling injuries had long since ceased, due to the lack of equipment for such extensive surgery.) If he could've been able to stand, he would've been of a normal human male height, perhaps taller, and he wore a tattered lab coat, similar to the one that Krishna had constantly worn. What was most striking, however, was that he was the spitting image of the person that the late Yadira had shown to Mitsuko of the person she was to track down: the green skin, the red eyes and deranged hair, it was all there. (Except for, perhaps, the fact that he wore glasses and looked much more kind than the pictured person.)
"See? I told you I'd get a respectable doctor," said Phil with a smile as Mitsuko gaped at the man in the wheelchair.
"I would advise moving aside, Philokrates-I must have a look at her conscious," said the man, wheeling himself forward. Phil stepped aside without missing a beat. Mitsuko stood, unable to move, staring down at the man like she had seen a ghost. "Don't give me that look-sure, I'm not all that attractive, but I did sacrifice a good deal of my oil quotient to restore your body," he said, lifting an eyebrow. "I'm not going to hurt you."
"You're.you're." began Mitsuko, but couldn't find a name to put to his face. It occurred to her that Yadira had never really told her what his name was.
"Trying to help you," he finished for her flatly. "Now stop shaking, or else this screw driver will end up in your eye, whether it be accidentally or intentionally," commented the man dryly, reaching up to her face and looking at it closely, squinting his eyes, moving down her body, fixing a screw every so often. "Tell me, where did you manage to get this body from? Its production date doesn't match with the production date of your hard drive."
"A half-faerie named Doctor Krishna. . ." The words stumbled off of her tongue before she even thought to censor them or lie. She was surprised at herself-it was unlike her to do something like that.
"Not surprising. Trust someone self-taught to make something so incredibly frustrating to recharge," said the man with a small smile, shaking his head, not looking Mitsuko in the eye. "I'm Dr. Sloth, by the way-yes, the one and only, before you say anything else. You're from one of those Neopian Central subdivisions, and you shouldn't trust much of what they say. Been too influenced by the faeries. People make mistakes in their lives-I just happened to make a lot more than the average Joe."
"How do you know Doctor Krishna?" asked Mitsuko, confused. She had remembered Krishna telling her that someone named Frank Sloth was villainous, and the cause for the world being so desolate and barren. This man, however, didn't look hostile-in fact, he looked quite vulnerable without his legs in commission.
Dr. Sloth looked up at her, cocking an eyebrow, pausing in his fixing of her body. He finally shrugged and continued his work, pushing up his glasses with a nudge by his shoulder. "Scientist/scientist thing. . .there's not many of us anymore, I've gotta get supplies from somewhere. Not usually Krishna, I must admit-we don't have quite the. . .strongest relationship," replied Dr. Sloth sarcastically, rolling his eyes. He patted Mitsuko's chest suddenly, as if approving. "There we go. All better."
"Where am I?" asked Mitsuko, her mind still unable to accept what had just happened, so trying to move onto different subjects.
"The Lost Desert, in Sakhmet City. Trust me, you were pretty heavy to drag all the way to Sakhmet," said Phil, grinning. "But it's okay, because now you're talking. I thought you were a mute one before."
"Do you know where you originally came from? You're not a Neopian Central model in the slightest-and you have no production number. I've seen one like you before, but you have a lot less information than I would expect if you were actually that particular robot," commented Dr. Sloth, sitting back in his wheelchair. Mitsuko shook her head slowly.
"No. . .I can only remember waking up in Doctor Krishna's. I suppose I was created before then, because he said he found me in a junkyard. . .but beyond that, I have no idea whom my creator is."
"That's odd," said Dr. Sloth, twisting his face into a confused expression. "It's not like a robot to lose just some of their memory. . .usually the majority of their personality and sentience goes with it. Oh well." He shrugged and wheeled his chair around, beginning to exit the room. "I'm going to fix something up for dinner. . .Philokrates, you can stay for the night if you'd like, but I'm not cleaning up after you ever again," Dr. Sloth called as his voice faded into the distance.
"So, what's your name?" asked Phil, a smile seeming to be forever engraved onto his face.
"It's Mitsuko," she answered cautiously, not fully trusting the Shoyru yet.
"Mitsuko? That's a pretty name," he said. "Y'know, the doc's right, you're pretty unusual for a robot. Are you some kind of warrior type, or maybe a custom companion one?"
"I said, I don't know. . .my memory's mostly gone."
"Hmmm. . .that's too bad. Oh well, at least that means you aren't constrained to one thing, right? It means you're almost like a real Neopet!" said Phil, his eyes sparkling. "That means you can't be ordered around and stuff. . .well, maybe people will think they can because you do kind of look like a robot on the bottom. But the point is, you're not enslaved to a single task. You're free to do what you please, aren't you?"
"I. . .guess. . ."
"Well, then, you want to see around the town? There's plenty of things to see, especially since the RBT is coming to Sakhmet pretty soon. . .well, I guess that's not too fortunate for you," said Phil, seeming to consider his words, rubbing his chin. His eyes seemed glazed for a moment as he thought things over within his head, and then refocused on Mitsuko, presenting a question. "Well. . .let's see. . .can you fly?"
"Yes. . .I can hover, too, if necessary."
"Good. Then we won't have to take the streets. I swear, some people these days. . .in any case, it probably wouldn't be too great of an idea to roam the streets of Sakhmet now without you being labeled as participating in the RBT."
"RBT?"
"The Robotic Battle Tournament. It's a source of entertainment, a bright light in the endless black tunnel of our existence, I guess, to some- a kind of gladiator game among robots, held by the faeries, and Neopets sponsor a robot. It's only called a tournament, because the sponsor of the last robot standing wins some cash sum that's nominally pointless, as it'll probably go into just repairing the poor piece of scrap metal. They sometimes say they'll grant the robot one wish, or some dung like that to encourage sentient ones to enter-but it never happens," Phil wrinkled his nose in disgust, obviously disapproving of the RBT. "It's barbaric-what Neopets will do just for entertainment is truly degrading to our species as a whole."
It dawned on Mitsuko that that must've been the reason the faeries had been blocking RARE's path-perhaps they wanted to prevent RARE from entering Sakhmet and liberating all of their potential candidates for gladiators in the RBT. A swelling of anger began to rise into her chest. They had obliterated so many robots.for what? For some petty competition that they held? Just so they could have a bit of fun?
"But there's no reason to bring about the negativity of that situation," said Phil, shaking his head. "C'mon, the doc will have dinner ready in an hour or so-in that time, I'll show you around." Phil continued talking as he guided her out of the house into the dark of the night.
Despite being a desert, the nighttime was surprisingly mild, Mitsuko sinking into the cool sand. The sky above was, for a change, not cloudy, but perfectly clear, revealing all of the sparkling stars against a blanket of deep blue. Mitsuko gazed up at it in wonder. She hadn't been outside all that much in her two years with RARE, and scarcely had she ever seen the sky clear, without a single cloud in the sky. Phil seemed to notice her fascination with the sky, craning his neck backwards to look at it as well. "Well, look at that. Mother Nature decided to grace us with some good weather for a change."
With those words, Phil opened his wings, the soft wind inflating the skin flaps. With one steady push downwards with his wing muscles, he was into the air, pumping a bit more to get some more height. Turning around in the air, hovering slightly, he motioned for Mitsuko to follow. She did so, extending her wings to their maximum length and then activating the boosters on the back of them, kicking up some sand beneath her as she ascended into the air, the boosters glowing a bright yellowish-orange. Once they were level with one another, Phil took off towards the main part of the city, astonishingly fast on his small natural, wings. Taken off guard, Mitsuko hurried after him, careful not to accelerate too much.
The two looked down at the great city, mostly ruined palaces and large buildings, makeshift roofs of weak wood thrown over the tops so that they could once again become places for sleeping and commerce alike. Below them, Neopets bustled about, again not a single human among their ranks. It was unusually busy for nighttime, and among the organic Neopets, Mitsuko could see flashes of metal-robotic Neopets, most deactivated and being carted around to the center of town. The center of town was set up like a large arena, a dusty circle surrounded by stands, marked by a few scant ropes.
"It'll be much larger and extravagant in a few days. . .the faeries will make sure of it. Spruce it up with their magic. Many will migrate here just to see this stupid tournament. . .Sakhmet should be crawling with their filth in no time," spat Phil, his face darkening. His disapproval was shameless, and he growled to himself angrily.
"You don't like it then."
"No! I loathe it!"
"You're organic. You have nothing to fear from this competition. Yet you hate it, and I feel nothing towards it." Mitsuko looked at him, staring him directly in the eye. "Why?"
Phil was quiet for a moment as they hovered, seeming to contemplate his answer. He spoke, but slowly, unlike the chipper, fast speech he had rattled off before. He had shifted quickly from annoying to insightful in mood. "The tournament always comes here. . .I've seen it far too many times. I've seen so many robots go down. . .sentient ones and stupid ones alike. It makes no sense. . .we make them like ourselves, to think, and comprehend, and then sacrifice them in battle? That's what happens to most of the sentient ones anyway."
"What's it for, though? Really?"
"It was originally just an annual competition to see who could build the best warrior model. . .but it has increased to much more. It's like an Olympics for battle-type robots. Much good they'll do! They only destroy each other," laughed Phil bitterly, his sarcastic mood unsettling. "They are only many gladiators in a battlefield. . .they have no regard for the robots themselves."
"I'm a robot. You speak as if I'm not even here," said Mitsuko coldly. Phil looked at her with an odd expression. A smile slipped across his face, breaking his damper mood.
"Yeah, I guess you are. Sorry about that. . .still, I'd rather think of you as organic," said Phil, his expression suddenly pleasant. "That way, we can be friends. Not saying that we couldn't be friends because you're a robot. . .but. . ."
"I don't need friends," replied Mitsuko, her expression bland. "Do you know the reason I was created, Mr. Phil?"
"Just Phil is fine."
"I asked you a question, Mr. Phil."
"No. No, I don't know why you were created."
"Neither do I, Mr. Phil. But I have programming within me that allows me to destroy. That allows me to destroy both flesh and machine. I am one of those warrior types, Mr. Phil, deep within me, whether I choose to deny it or not. Have you ever stopped to consider that perhaps these robots want to die for just the sake of fighting?" asked Mitsuko. Phil's face was bamboozled, his eyes wide and mouth hanging open vacantly.
"But. . .but that's impossible. Why would a robot want to risk their lives for something so pointless?"
"I don't know, Mr. Phil. But maybe. . .maybe liberating them would be pointless."
The two floated silently above the ring, watching as check-ins began for robots, papers exchanging hands. "It doesn't change the fact. . .that I don't like it," whispered Phil to himself, shaking his head. Mitsuko did not reply, but allowed herself to be taken on the rest of the tour of Sakhmet City, although there was not much else to visit, besides the ruins of the palace and the market place, all which they did not directly get involved with.
They soon landed once again in front of the place where they had started, the tingling smell of food drifting into Mitsuko's nose. It did not appeal to her, of course, but Phil seemed to react immediately, wrinkling his nose. "Ugh. . .I forgot that Frank's an atrocious cook," mumbled Phil to himself, moving his hand to his nose to evade the smell. "You want to go to my place?"
Mitsuko looked at him evenly, judging him slowly and steadily. She measured him up critically, taking in account all of the words he had said, folding her wings against her back. The silence between them was extremely awkward, but Mitsuko hardly noticed the mood. Finally, she opened her wings once again, giving a slow nod. "Okay," she replied, her voice steady and dragged out, sounding like it were muffled by molasses. "Okay," she repeated, with more conviction, blinking hard. "Okay."
Phil's face lit up like a light bulb, seeming to brighten up the darkness of night. "Okay!" he said, bouncing into the air, taking to the wing. "Just follow me, it's not that far away-you can stay with me, if you like, I always wanted a roommate."
"And the doctor?"
"He'll be fine. The man's been alone for the majority of his life. You think that it bothers him?" asked Phil. It was a rhetorical question, not to be answered, but Mitsuko couldn't help but feel the answer on her tongue, and spoke it silently for only herself to hear, the image of Krishna's tortured face as she left still imprinted strongly in the caverns of her memory.
"Yes."