During the tumultuous years of the 22nd century, underground fortresses weren't exactly the most popular - or convenient, for that matter - places to live. The Earth's inhabitants had been digging beneath the planet for many years, as below the surface lay invaluable amounts of natural resources, which would be essential to the survival of the human race. After over a century of this kind of consistent excavation, however, the humans had attained almost all of the natural resources left in the planet, keeping enough to last them for many, many years to come. Thus, the area underground was undesireable mostly due to the barren, resource-lacking areas that resided there; the Earth's underbelly had become one giant, empty wasteland.
However, while this served as a hinderance to humans, mechanical beings were exempt from certain elements necessary to the humans' survival and could easily live beneath the Earth for as long as they wished. For example, reploids, robotic beings with the ability to feel and express human emotion, would be perfectly capable to live in such a place; however, during this time, reploids were a house divided when it came to their opinion of humans. Human defenders, also referred to as "Maverick Hunters", preferred to stay on the surface where they could remain under the watch of their human mentors and try to live an independent life. Then, there were the reploids that were spat upon by society... the "Mavericks", as they were called, the beings who would do anything in their power to rid the world of humans forever, believing themselves to be oppressed second class citizens (and weren't exactly wrong in this claim). For them, the underground ruins were not wastelands, but sanctuaries; a perfect area to remain isolated from the humans and their petty protectors for as long as they needed until a counterstrike could be planned out against them.
But the Mavericks, unfortunately, now formed only the minority of the reploid population thanks to several crushing defeats. After their last battle with the Hunter forces, they had lost almost everything they treasured in one horrific explosion that had engulfed most of their soldiers, weapons, and their entire fortress in general. The survivors, as small as they were, eventually were forced to hibernate underground and rebuild their shattered organization against all odds. Their leader, once an enthusiastic, powerful, and cunningly ingenious Maverick sympathizer, had been somehow reduced to nothing but an empty shell of himself; thus, new leaders were forced to keep things organized, and were quickly realizing that saving the organization was much harder than they had imagined. It had been months since the Mavericks' downfall, and things still had not improved in the slightest. It was almost as if this kind of depression would never cease, that the Mavericks would never be powerful enough to rise up once again and claim the planet as their own, like they had always dreamed...
To put things bluntly, as a young reploid known as Darrick woefully observed, the entire situation just sucked donkey balls.
Now, Darrick wasn't usually one to be a pessimist, so him observing something like that was a pretty big thing. Then again, how could he not be pessimistic, what with everything that had been going on in the past several months? Not too long ago, he had joined the Mavericks as a young recruit, experienced in battle tactics and combat, but was particularly talented in management, leadership, and such. Although he wasn't exactly a hard-nosed human hater, he believed that reploids certainly deserved their proper share of the society that humans had established, and hoped that one day the Mavericks may be able to attain that. And, having quickly risen to the rank of a Colonel, he really felt that a difference could be made.
But that was then, and this was now, Darrick thought wistfully as he sat in the office that day. "The office", as everybody had gotten used to calling it, was actually just the area where all of the head Mavericks usually met together and discussed the future of the organization. Their leader, Sigma, never actually attended these meetings; he seemed to lack the ability since the fall of their last fortress had damaged his psyche. No, the ones who met there were actually quite few; there was Agile, a tall, violet-armored figure of authority who seemed to resemble something of a jester, awkwardly enough. His boots were tipped at the edges, the bottom of his torso armor stuck out like knives, the helmet he wore on his head had 'flaps' on the sides that were permanently raised skyward... and yet, he was still considered an authority figure, and actually took Sigma's place in organizing and directing Maverick activities.
Darrick watched Agile as he sat. He, Agile, and the several other people sitting at that long, oval-shaped table in the office were in the middle of a meeting, one that usually occured every month. While the young Maverick wanted to believe that these meetings actually went somewhere, he knew he would just be deceiving himself; the meetings were pointless, and usually tended to debate the same useless and annoying issues that "plagued" the Mavericks over and over again. His vision to make a difference had been distorted... a year ago, when he was much more naive, he would have never imagined himself in a situation like this. But what could he do now? There was no way out of it; too many people depended on him, and even if that weren't true, there was still nothing else he could do with his life after this. He was a Maverick, after all, and Mavericks were regarded with scorn in the real world.
"Well, Demetrius, I'm glad that you had the gall to bring up an issue like this..." said Agile, who sat at the head of the table next to Darrick. He held a stack of papers in his hand, and was shuffling through them as he spoke. "But, in all honesty, I'm still a bit confused at this. What you're saying here is that if we want to increase our ranks we need to..."
"...clean out the damned bathrooms! Of course," interrupted a reploid sitting at Agile's left, a stocky, greenish-hued Maverick that resembled a lizard of some kind. "I mean, let's get serious here, people. You wanna know why barely any more soldiers have been joining the Maverick ranks? Because we have a TERRIBLE reputation for bathrooms. Disgusting!" The lizard pounded a fist angrily against the table, jarring many of the other Mavericks out of their seats in surprise. "We need to do something about that firsthand, screw everything else."
Agile, usually good at keeping his cool, simply raised his eyebrows at the lizard Demetrius while every other Maverick around him began to chatter consistently to eachother about what had just been said. The elite Maverick made a calming gesture to keep them silent before continuing. "Well, Demetrius, this whole bathroom issue hads been debated over and over again since we moved here," he explicated in a soft tone, "but the fact still remains that the bathrooms are messy because... well, nobody uses them, really. We, being reploids and all, don't need to use bathrooms. The only reason they exist is because our building crew had been using blueprints from an old human establishment, and forgot to edit that part out. Then again, they aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer... but that's another issue entirely."
"Well, we should clean 'em, anyway!" Demetrius almost shouted, the anger rising in his raspy voice. "You know, why can't we just allow humans to join us? THEN we could put those bathrooms to use, and voila, no more problem."
This statement brought about an even louder chatter from the other seated Mavericks. After calming them all down once again, Agile paused for a moment, sighing with frustration. "Demetrius... no. Just no," he said very clearly. "This entire organization is based mostly on a very, VERY strong disliking of the human race. Furthermore, I don't think humans themselves are very happy-daffy with us, either. So what makes you think that a human would be able to step foot in this establishment without being ruthlessly slaughtered in less than second? No human would EVER take that kind of risk, and even if that weren't involved..."
"Well, new and improved bathrooms might lure them in," Demetrius persisted. "I mean, come on, you'll never know until you try!"
There had been plenty of moments in the past in which Agile refused to dignify a statement with a response, and this was certainly a new addition. So instead, the violet-hued leader looked back longingly at the papers he held in his hand, which Darrick knew was actually a list of issues that Agile himself had been aching to bring up. Knowing that the list was now nothing better than a hunk of useless scrap, he ripped the papers to shreds, a mixed expression of anger and frustration on his thin face. As the small pieces of wasted tree bark drifted like snowflakes to the ground below, covering part of the desk, Agile finally looked back to his now shock-stricken colleagues. A look of poison spread across his face.
"Okay, people..." he started once again, slowly standing up from his chair in order to take more of an intimidating stance. Once he had reached his full height, he pressed his metallic hands against the surface of the table, and leaned over a bit to stare straight into the frightened eyes of the other Mavericks in the room. Darrick, being directly to Agile's right, was luckily spared from his superior's dagger eyes. "Listen to me. We've been in this room for over four hours now, and we haven't resolved a SINGLE RELEVANT ISSUE since we got here. So I'm giving all of you one last chance; anybody who has an intellegent, well-prepared, sensible to bring up, please raise your hand now."
A brief silence followed; the several other Mavericks in the room, now relatively surprised at their superior's sudden reaction, didn't seem corageous enough to actually raise a hand. However, Darrick watched carefully from the sidelines as one particular Maverick in the back, a thin, red-hued humanoid with a sullen-looking face, cautiously raised his right hand. Although his apprehensiveness only allowed him to raise his arm halfway up, the other Mavericks began to catch on, and soon enough pretty much every other Maverick in the room had their hands raised high to the sky, sans Darrick. Agile huffed a bit.
"Well, okay then, maybe I need to specify a little more," he began again, returning to his upright position. "when I meant 'intellegent, well-prepared, sensible' issues, I was NOT including issues that involve East-Canadian terrorism."
With this proclamation, half of the Mavericks reluctantly put their hands back down, leaving only three left on the other side of the table, still as eager as ever.
"...or overly-sharp kitchen forks and knives..."
Pouting, two others lowered their hands, leaving only the red-armored humanoid left, the same one that had been first to raise his hand.
"...OR the incident involving the tarantulas running rampant through the ventilation ducts."
With a longing look still plastered on his innocent-looking face, the last remaining Maverick wistfully lowered his hand slowly back under the table. As of now, everybody seated at the table now had their sights tightly directed towards Agile, who had taken his seat once again and happened to be staring venomously right back at them.
"Hmph. Fine, then!" the head Maverick suddenly blurted out, throwing his hands madly into the air. "No more issues, eh? Well, GOOD THEN! I'm sick of sitting here and listening to you all ramble about nothingness for one day. All of you are free to march your sorry behinds the hell-diddly-el out of here, if you've got nothing left to say. Meeting adjourned. Go back to your duties and make sure not to screw up like you usually do. GO!"
Before anybody else could get another word in, the flustered Agile swung his chair in the opposite direction so that he was now completely out of view of the other Mavericks in the room. Darrick, he himself surprised at his comrade's sudden outburst, was now unsure of what to do; everybody in the room had grown completely silent due to the command, trying to figure out if Agile had really cancelled the entire meeting or if this was all just some giant, stupid prank. After a few seconds, he hastily decided that if anybody was going to step in and handle this situation, it might as well be him.
"Err... well..." Darrick nervously began, rising up from his chair to address the others and letting his entire frame show. His body was generally mid-sized for a humanoid like him, with an armor pattern comprised of only dull-blue with some black trimmings and a skin-colored face, with a small matting of brown/reddish hair covering his scalp. He himself had always though that this look never signified any kind of real authoritiy, but never really considered it an important thing.
"Alright, everybody," he called out to the unnerved, silent group. "Err... I'm pretty sure you all heard what Agile said pretty clearly. All of you can go for now and return to your normal duties. Agile and I will discuss matters for a little bit, and, uh..." Stumbling on his words, Darrick remembered how much he hated giving orders like this. "...well, maybe we can set up another meeting some time later this month. But for now, you're all dismissed. Thank you all, and, uh... have a nice day." Lord, how he hated trying to word things right.
But, luckily for him, his message got across well enough. Although the Maverick delegates still seemed to express a mixture of dissapointment and utter confusion, they all did what they were told. One by one, they abandoned their seats and headed for the double-doors behind them, chattering endlessly to eachother along the way. Soon enough, every last seat had been emptied, leaving only Darrick and a very disgruntled Agile remaining. Darrick, still standing in a tensed-up position, glanced over to his superior.
"Er... well, they've all left, sir," he said nervously, hoping that he wasn't asking for trouble; he knew that Agile could get dangerous when he was angry, even to his most trusted allies. "I'm sorry the meeting had to go over like that... things have obviously been a little shaky around here lately. If you want some privacy, I'd be glad to leave-"
"No, no, wait," Agile suddenly interrupted, spinning his chair around to face the desk once again. His voice sounded exceedingly calmer than it was before, which was definitely a good thing, although a hint of depression still remained. "Just sit down, Darrick. Probably best that we discuss some matters."
"Oh, alright," Darrick muttered, now fully relieved that his superior wasn't in any kind of raging temper. As he took his seat, he let go of a small sigh of relief that he'd been keep pent up inside him, and sat at full attention to listen to what Agile had to say. The room hung in an awkward silence for a bit before the violet Maverick finally began to speak.
"Tell me, Darrick..." Agile began, clearing his throat out a bit. "I want to know something from you. We've been sitting in this room listening to pointless chatter for over four hours now, and during that entire time, you haven't uttered a word. Now, from my personal view, it seems like there's something you've wanted to say..."
"Wha - me?" Darrick stuttered, scolding himself mentally for making himself look like an idiot. "Well... no, I really don't have much to say, besides the fact that the meeting didn't really go over very well."
"...ah. So what you're implying is, these past few monthly meetings have kind of sucked lately?"
"Yeah, I guess that's a good way to sum it up."
Agile's face looked grim, Darrick noticed. And, having known Agile for a while now, he knew that it wasn't just because they both knew that their "meetings" were utterly useless; the entire state of the Maverick organization was in shambles, and it undoubtedly had plagued Agile's mind since the day he took control of Maverick activity. Darrick, noticing that they both had been silent for a while now, decided to break the ice once again by coming up with something else to talk about.
"So..." he began casually enough. "Have you heard any word from Sigma lately?"
Agile huffed a bit. "Sigma? Nah. He hasn't spoken a word to me since August, and even then... well, he didn't really say anything coherent. Sounded like he was muttering something about an 'invincible army of angels', but from the way he was talking, he could've actually been saying 'sugar pie hunybunch, you know that I love you'. I have no friggin' clue what he was talking about, and honestly, I don't give a damn."
Darrick raised his eyebrows. "Uh... huh," he replied with caution. "Well, do you know anything about Sigma's conditon now?"
"Nope," he replied simply, his voice taking an innocent tone that Darrick had never really heard in him before. "It would be nice if SOMEBODY from the medical wing would tell me how he's doing. But for now, I just want to forget about Sigma, because he sure as hell isn't doing much to help us out now. From now on, when anybody asks me about him, I'm just going to forget the small talk and say he's a vegetable. Make my live a lot easier."
"Well... what about Serges?" Darrick asked, his inquisitive nature getting the best of him. "I though he was supposed to be at this meeting too."
"Yes. He was..." Agile said, sounding overly annoyed. "I did ask him to come, actually. But he's busy! He's ALWAYS busy, working in that stupid lab of his downstairs. Doesn't seem that the welfare of our ENTIRE ORGANIZATION matters much to him anymore. His crappy LAB EXPERIMENTS matter more now! Ugh." He let out a very strong sigh, shaking his head in disgust. "I hate to say this, Darrick, but I think this may be one of the first times when I wished Violen were still around. I mean, sure, he was an idiot, but he was still another source of entertainment."
Violen... Darrick recognized the name immediately. Violen had been one of the three original 'X-Hunters', along with Serges and Agile. Ever since the fall of the last fortress, Violen had disappeared; reports later claimed that he'd escaped the fortress earlier on, in an attempt to dodge the Hunters. Although he was bulky, ape-faced, and not exactly the sharpest knife in the drawer, Darrick recalled forming an awkward friendship with him during the time that he knew him. The Mavericks had no idea where he'd gone, and since it had been months since his disappearance, the odds of them finding him again were getting slimmer and slimmer.
"Well... what is it that Serges is doing, exactly?" Darrick asked, sounding more and more concerned with each question. "Last time I talked to you about, you said that he still wasn't done with that whole 'fusion' thing. You know, with those two traitor Mavericks..."
"Oh, I don't know," Agile replied with frustration. "He's been very secretive lately. Have you noticed that? Not only has he neglected to attend Maverick meetings, but he hasn't left that laboratory downstairs in... weeks, I think. Who knows what he's doing? Maybe he's building some kind of mechanical chocolate fairyland! Not like he would tell ME!" He angrily pounded a fist against the table, causing Darrick to recoil in shock a bit. "And that 'fusion' thing. Bah! I've been pestering him for WEEKS about that, and he's refused to show me any kind of work that he's done. I don't know why he needs to hide anything from ME."
The fusion; another strange aftermath of the fall of their last fortress, Darrick recalled. The whole idea started up after two renegade Maverick technicians, T-17 and T-18, hijacked an escape capsule that was intended to hold the entire Maverick forces. Because of this disregard, scores of Maverick soldiers were left to die in that fortress, cutting down their ranks drastically. Thus, as a punishment to the two, they were both forced into a reploid "fusion" experiment involving the two of them joining together to form a new super-Maverick. Agile and Serges had conjured this idea up months earlier, Darrick remembered, and Agile was still concerned over its advancement.
"Ugh, I don't know WHAT'S going on, if you want my honest opinion..." Agile lamented, letting a sigh escape his lips. "Maybe I'm not cut out for this job. I mean, I just can FEEL my authoritative powers slowly slipping away from me! Do you what that's like, Darrick?! It's horrible! It's almost as if I won the lottery, and then had a bunch of super-intellegent sabertooth tigers invade my house, tie me to a chair, steal my money, and then BURN in with a... err, a... burning thing. Yeah! Do you realize what kind of crippling emotional damage I'm getting from all of this?!"
"Sir, sir! Calm down!" Darrick begged of his superior, noticing that he was beginning to hyperventilate far too much. "C'mon, now. If you just sit here and keep complaining to yourself all day, NOTHING'S going to get done."
"Oh, OKAY then, Darrick!" Agile snapped in a high-pitched, mocking tone. "Thanks for the frickin' reality check, O Glorified Sage of Advice. I'm sure you've just got everything figured out, haven't you? I'm SURE you have a better way to approach the situation?"
"...err, well, now that you mention it..."
"I KNEW it," Agile said damningly. "Well, alright then, Captain La-De-Frickin'-Da! Let's hear what you damn well have to say, since you obivously think you're so much smarter than everybody else in this building. Go ahead! Spew your biggoted tripe. See if I'm impressed."
Darrick paused for a moment; he really wasn't sure if he and Agile were on the same wavelength, or if Agile still had some sanity left in him, but somehow he forced himself to press on. "Oh-kay..." he began cautiously. "Well, for one thing, I think you might have misinterpereted me. I never said that I was smarter than you, sir, I was just saying that other things could be done to help the situation."
"Huh. well, it's not like your opinions ever really do anything for our benefit..."
"Nevertheless," Darrick interrupted, the impatience beginning to rise in his voice. "Hear me out on this one, Agile. Listen, you're the guy we voted to keep this place running while Sigma's out of commission, right?"
Agile huffed a bit. "Well, yes."
"And, as the Maverick in charge of temporarily taking Sigma's place, you have the right to every bit of information involving everything that's going on around here? If somebody working for you is developing something in secret, you still have full authorization to find out exactly what they're doing?"
He paused. "Err... well, yes. But even-"
"Well, then what are you sitting around here for?" Darrick asked with a strong, commanding voice, forcing his superior to focus his attention on him. "What you need to do is get the hell out of this stuffy office and exercise your authority. You want to find out what Serges is working on, right? Then what you do is march right down to his lab downstairs and find out EXACTLY what he's doing by any means necessary. Confront him, talk to him about it, get what information you can out of him. If he won't comply, you sure as hell MAKE him comply." Darrick took in a bit of air. "Do you understand what I'm saying here?"
Agile, surprisingly enough, had been renedered speechless. Although he had been fully prepared to denounce Darrick's words with a series of arguments, something in his comrade's advice struck a chord in his mind. Right before Darrick's eyes, the expression on Agile's face transformed from pure rage to innocent curiosity; his brow was furrowed, and he was rubbing his fingers against his chin. The more he thought about it, the more it began to make sense, Agile mentally noted.
"Hmm..." he grumbled, slowly beginning to nod his head. "Darrick, you know... that might actually be one of the most sensible ideas that I've heard all day."
Darrick had to stop and stare for a moment. "Uh... really?" he asked lamely.
"HELL yes!" Agile enthusiastically responded, a new kind of optimistic attitude brimming within him. "It makes sense, it really, really does! I mean, I'm the main man around here, aren't I?"
"Err... yes, of course."
"And, me being the main man around here, I'm entitled to know everything about everything that's happening around here! Correct?"
"Yup."
"Right! I'm the biggest frickin' cheese in this building. If somebody like Serges is hiding something from me, I have every right to find out what that is, right? I mean, what the hell's stopping me?"
"Absolutely nothing, sir."
"OF COURSE!" Agile boldly declared, leaping out of his seat. "It's the perfect idea! C'mon, Darrick, follow me to the laboratory downstairs. We're gonna take care of this whole mess RIGHT NOW. Now time like the present, if you ask me. We'll sort all of this out, and be back in time for lunch. Come, Darrick, destiny awaits!"
"...well, alright, but maybe we should-"
But Darrick was far too late. Before he could say anything more, the newly energized Agile had already thrusted himself out the door, his metallic boots clanging vociferously against the carpeted flooring. Darrick, knowing that it'd be a foolish gesture not to follow him, quickly lifted himself from his seat and headed in his superior's direction.
Well, this has been one interesting day, hasn't it? Darrick thought with sarcasm. At one moment we're discussing the non-repairable damage done to the enitre Maverick organization, and the next we're surging through the doorway to make changes for the better. Christ... I've been here for only a little more than a year, and I'm already getting tired from trying to keep track of all this.
"I remember... when we could sleeeep on stooonesss..."
A soft, melodious voice drifted throughout the sewers, filling the underground caverns with a sense of peace. It was a voice very rarely heard in a dark, contaminated, smelly, and overall undesireable place such as this... but still, there it rang, drifting through the circular tunnels and greeting the ears of any who were fortunate enough to hear.
"Now we liiie together... in whispers and moans..."
But the truth remained, however, that no sensible living being would ever spend their precious time in a disgusting place like a sewer. No, the only creatures hearing this foreign melody were the ones who normally infested these sewage-filled passages; rats scurrying about, fish gliding through the contaminated waters, and even an alligator or two that somehow found its way there. But if human or reploid had actually ventured down there, they might have been a little confused to find out who was singing this partially unknown song.
"When I was all messed up... and I heard opera in my head..."
The source of the song could actually be traced back to a small, raft-like structure, which was steadily floating along the sewer's murky, greenish waters. The raft itself didn't seem like it was any example of quality worksmanship; mostly, it was a combination of several pieces of wood, all loosely bound together by a few pieces of twine. This wasn't exactly a good thing, considering the weight of the people intended to ride the thing.
Those people happened to be two traveling reploids, both lost and searching for the home they had been forced to leave behind. They each sat at opposite ends of the raft, minding their own business; sitting at the far left was a thin, short reploid, with a full body armor tinted with a faded yellowish color. His face was very notably disheveled, with half-opened bloodshot eyes, matted brunette hair, and an expression that yearned for some kind of eternal sleep. He sat very still, his back facing his raft-mate, trying to ignore all his surroundings and keep himself undisturbed.
However, on the far other side of the raft, things seemed to take a full 180 degree spin in terms of overall mood. Sitting on the other side was a very bulky, fearful-looking reploid, with unnaturally large arms, a sizable belly, and a face that wasn't exactly the most welcoming. Despite these qualities, however, the red and yellow hued behemoth wasn't acting at all like it seem he should've; with a happy-go-lucky look on his face, he held a small wooden paddle with both hands, pushing the raft along with cheer and aplomb. A smile implanted on his face, he continued to sing:
"Your love was a lightbulb... hangin' over my bed..."
As cheery and bright as this bulky reploid happened to be, not everybody shared a similar cheer. The thin figure sitting at the other end of the raft, his friend's shrill voice bouncing from eardrum to eardrum, looked back at his friend. His entire body began to convulse a bit, and his face began to look exhausted and sunken in.
"V...Violen..." he called, his voice sounding raspy and throated. "Could you please... stop singing? It... it HURTS..."
The large figure, about to breathe more life into his wistful melody, stopped dead in his tracks after hearing his partner's plea. Setting his paddle to rest on the raft, he turned to face the irritated reploid.
"Stop singing, you say?" Violen asked him with a gentle voice, not quite sure how to handle the request. "Well... why would you want me to do that?"
"Well, because..." the other reploid began groggily. "I'm not... not feeling very good. It's already really noisy... your voice makes things really noisy... EVERYTHING IS REALLY NOISY..."
"Well, Gulch, there's a reason why you think everything's noisy," Violen stated, "and that's because you're hungover, my boy."
"Ehhh..." Gulch groaned, turning his head towards the other end of the sewer tunnel. "You don't... know... nuthin'."
"Oh, I don't?" Violen rebuttaled, starting to get annoyed at his friend. "Kind of funny, you saying that I'M the one who doesn't know anything on this raft. You wanna know why there's a constant buzzing in your ears right about now? YOU'RE HUNGOVER. You stayed up all night boozing yourself to death, and now you're hungover because of it. And, to top THAT off, you embarrassed the hell out of me in Clemenstown after you attacked that guy on the street..."
"He was COMING ON to me!" Gulch proclaimed, rage present in his tone.
"Gulch, he was a parapalegic."
"...you don't need your limbs to sexually offend somebody, Violen."
Violen had to pause to pause at that remark. "Ahh... right," he said warily. "Maybe we should get off this subject. But the truth remains, Gulch - you need to stop this whole drinking thing. You've been doing it nonstop since we left the desert, and I think that it's really starting to attack your sanity."
"Hey, I've been drinking for a LOT longer than since we left the desert, pal!" he exclaimed angrily. "Years longer. You've only known me for a few months, man... don't go tellin' me what I'm gonna do with my life. I'm not willin' to change..."
"Well, nevertheless," Violen began again, grabbing the paddle once again and continuing to row the raft along. "Even if you can't quit it, could you at least tone it down a little bit? Remember, we're looking for the rest of the Mavericks! How the hell are we gonna find them if you're gonna be swimming in moonshine the whole time?! Honestly! We've been searching from town-to-town since May! And it's DECEMBER! Yeesh..."
Gulch let out a loud burp before continuing. "Err... well, how do you know that they're all alive? Maybe they died when the fortress exploded..."
Violen paused in thought. "Well... yeah. That's always a possibility," he humbly admitted. "But then again, we're the Mavericks, right? We always have a plan to execute if we're faced with the destruction of a fortress. And I just have a FEELING that they're alive, you know? An intuition. Something in the back of my mind keeps telling me to push forward, Gulch, and I can deny what my brain tells me to do! I certainly knows a lot more than I do..."
"Maybe it's a tumor," Gulch said out of the blue. "I remember once, I had a tumor in my Coke that told me to ditch the sugary crap and switch to alcohol. Never went back since, man."
"...uh...huh," Violen muttered slowly. "Gulch, do you know what a tumor is, by any chance?"
"...yeah. What, you think I'm stupid or somethin'?"
"No, no, I just - ahh, never mind." The bulky Maverick knew very well that if he were to stretch the conversation further, things could get pretty ugly. Thinking fast, he quickly changed the subject to something less arguable. "So... how much longer do you think it'll take before we reach the next town?"
"Ahh... not too much longer, I don't think," Gulch said groggily. "Although, I still think it might be easier if we just took the roads aboveground instead of rafting down here..."
"Well, I'm sorry Gulch, but I've said it once and I'll say it again - I'm not ready to take that kind of risk," Violen stated firmly. "I mean, come on now. The surface area is a deathtrap! We can't be seen up there for too long, or else some Smartass J. Human will realize who we are and rat us out. We can't have that, Gulch!" He huffed a bit as he rowed the raft along. "And, those things aside, this route IS faster. A lot more straightforward. Trust me, if we just keep going, we'll be sure to find-"
But before Violen could finish his sentence, the entire raft suddenly came to a crashing halt. An audible clanging noise filled the two reploids' eardrums, and both of them went flying every which way; Violen, stunned by the sudden halt, fell flat on his back, the raft - and most of his head - becoming engulfed in the vile sewer water below. Luckily enough for him, the raft managed to hold out and eventually surface, keeping him still a few inches above the polluted mess. Still in state of total shock, Violen barely managed to lift himself back to a sitting position.
"Wha - what the hell was that?" Violen blurted out between breaths, still trying to regain his composure. He was still completely unsure of what had happened before he looked straight above him; not too high up, a faint circle of light shined down on him, reflecting against his faded armor. Right in front the raft, there was a wall blocking the rest of the way, with small metal rungs lined up vertically towards the top. IT didn't take Violen to long to realize that they'd reached their destination... or, at least, somewhere close.
"Hey, Gulch!" he called out to his friend enthusiastically. "Looks like we've reached the end of the trail! C'mon, we'd better hurry up to the surface, and... err, Gulch?"
Turning around, Violen was surprised to see that his companion had suddenly vanished from the "safety" of the raft. This would only last for a few seconds, however; before Violen could even as much as look in a different direction to try and find him, he suddenly sprung energetically out of the murky deep, grabbing onto the raft with all his human-given strength and attempting to pull himself back up. The surprised Violen watched as he eventually managed to get his entire body back on the shaky hunk of wood, gasping for air. His entire body was covered in sewage and seaweed.
"Whew..." he huffed, finally getting himself back to a sitting position. "That was... a pretty big dive I took. My head... it's RINGING..."
"Well, Christ, man! Don't EVER do that again. You just scared the living hell out of me..." Violen exclaimed, he himself gasping for air as well. "I'm... really not in the mood for surprises today."
"Okay, okay, chill out..." Gulch grumbled, his face now looking especially disheveled after his plunge into the water. "So... why did we suddenly stop? I thought there was a clear passageway from here on..."
"Well, then you thought wrong. We've reached a dead end."
"Dead end? Is that... BAD?"
"Au contraire, mon ami. Look." He pointed towards the circle of light, and then to the ladder leading towards it. "We've reached an exit, so I'm guessing that we're under the next town right about now."
Suddenly, the hungover Gulch's face suddenly came alive as he saw what Violen was implying. "...wha... really? We can get out of here now?"
"For the time being, yeah. C'mon, follow me, and-"
Without warning, Gulch suddenly sprung out of his sitting positon and grabbed for the rungs of the ladder, knocking Violen off his duff. Still grasping onto the raft for dear life, Violen watched as the energetic Gulch climbed all the way up to the top of the wall, right under the sewer cap.
"Gulch, WAIT!" Violen yelped out in desperation, clumsily grabbing onto the lowest rung and pulling himself above the shaky raft. "Just what in the name of Zeus do you think you're DOING, man?"
"It's a NEW TOWN, man!" Gulch proclaimed triumphantly, pushing the sewer cap out of his way and letting even more of the afternoon light seep in. "And when there's a new town, then there HAS to be at least two or three more places that sell liquor. It's the only way I'll get out of this funk, man! I can't stand sobriety anymore..."
"Oh, Christ on a pancake, Gulch!" Violen called out in response, climbing after his wayward friend. "We can't keep stopping at these liquor stores and taverns all the time! We need to find-"
But it was too late, and Violen knew it. Gulch had escaped the sewer already, and was undoubtedly roaming the town by now. The bulky Maverick huffed with frustration.
"Aww... why doesn't anybody EVER listen to what I have to say?!" Violen whined as he approached the surface. "Now that maniac is gonna be strolling all over town, letting his sewage-soaked body infect everybody around him. I swear it, if he drinks himself to death, then I'm selling his body to the highest bidder and using the money to buy a first-class ticket to Bermuda..."