First and foremost: Sorry this took so long! I've had several hundred-thousand projects
going lately, including those of the academic genre, and I'm working on those at the
moment.
And second: A BIIIG thank-you (cough) goes out to someone that seems very interested
in my work lately. I'm not going to post names or e-mails. . . but I got some colorful reviews on a
few of my fics from them. Colorful. Right. But! It seems that FF.n is incredibly on top of things
all the time, and deleted them! Thank you, FF.n! *waves flag*
*****
"Er, ma'am. . ."
Amelia stopped 'crying' suddenly and looked up, pupils wide and inquisitive. "Hm?"
"Ehm. . ."
"Ah, of course." Amelia took a step back from the guard and brushed his shirt off. She
stared at him for a moment, grinning mildly, then reached over and plucked an orange strand of
hair off of said shirt. She was still again, that same smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.
"Look, ma'am, not meanin' any, er, disrespect, but I oughta be checkin' back on me
partner and the, uh, the pris'ner, yeh know. . ."
'Damn,' thought Amelia to herself. 'Stubborn one. . . but that's manageable.' She
shuddered at the thought of what 'managing' him might involve. After a moment of
consideration, she grabbed both of his shoulders and prepared herself for what would surely be
one of her best (well, 'only' was more like it) performances to date.
***
Doctor Delbert Doppler had been close to cell block when he realized that he would have
to go back to the office. He had forgotten to get the codes for the lock. Silver's machinery would
most likely be able to break through the metal bars easily enough, but the more damage avoided,
the better off they were.
He stepped into the office again, feeling somewhat pushed. Time was running short. The
sooner he was out of here, the better. Perhaps it would have been better just to have kept going
towards Jim; after all, damages could be paid.
"Of course, time in prison cannot. . ." He pulled open a drawer and glanced at the
contents, then shut it quickly again. Nothing.
"Where is it where is it where is it where where wherewherewhere. . . ." He opened
another drawer.
"They have to keep them *someplace*. . ." He rifled through some papers, but with this
office in the disarray that it was, it was seeming more and more unlikely that he would find
anything at all. He sighed and turned around, his back to the pile of papers, looked down, and felt
that now would be a splendid time to clean off his glasses. He took them off and wiped them on
his coat mildly, then put them back onto his nose. He pushed them up, his eyes moving to the
wall in front of him. Tacked up was a sheet of parchment with bold text at the top. 'CELL LOCK
DIGIT CODING - LOCAL BLOCK ONE'.
"Of course."
***
"Okay. . . okay. . . so I pull. . . this one!" Aaron pointed to a green wire, pointing it out to
Nobody-In-Particular. He suddenly had a second thought. This wire happened to be surrounded
by seven more green wires. If this was the *wrong* wire to the *wrong* cell, then Jim might
open the thing and end up setting off enough alarms to bring reinforcements to the prison from
every possible source in a five-hundred-parsec radius. Not good.
Not good at all.
***
"You. . . you're okay!"
"Aye, lad! What, yeh think a bunch o' gill rats like these guards could get t' this ol'
cyborg?"
Jim smiled a bit at the twinkle in Silver's eye. Nothing could keep this guy down.
"Yeah, but I just thought. . ." Jim noticed Silver's lop-sided appearance and remembered
Doppler telling him that this might have happened, Silver's machinery being shut off. It was
somewhat unsettling to see those intricate works of mechanical art hanging inactive, now nothing
more than dead weight.
"Eh, Jimbo, not the push yeh or anythin', but. . ."
Jim snapped out of his thoughts. "Right! Right. . . Doc's gonna be here soon with the key
code, and we've got someone at work on the alarms."
Silver suddenly looked horrified. "Not that heap o' scrap metal!"
Jim looked at Silver, confused. "Heap of. . .? Oh!" Jim laughed out loud, but quickly
quieted himself. "No, not B.E.N.. We've got someone a little more. . . capable, I think. . ."
***
"Screw it. I'm pullin' 'em all."
Aaron grabbed all eight of the green wires that he assumed connected the alarm to the
cells. As soon as he pulled the last wire, he sighed with relief. No bells going off. No red lights
flashing. No-
"Hey!"
Aaron whirled around at the sound of the angry guard. He laughed weakly.
"Uh. . . . hi there?"
"Boy. . ." The guard's face darkened. "Do ye know exactly what it is yer doin'?"
"Uhhh. . . ." Aaron's mind raced wildly. He struggled not to panic. He could make it out
of this if he just kept his wits about him and thought of a plan. After a brief moment (in which he
did quite a bit of nervous grinning at the guard), he had formulated one that he figured would
work well enough. It was complicated. Strategic.
"WOAH WHAT'S THAT?!" Aaron pointed wildly behind the guard. The guard startled,
spreading his feet wide, but didn't budge otherwise.
"Yeh've gotta be kiddin', lad."
Aaron sighed and hung his head in defeat. "You're right. I just don't know what I was-"
He suddenly ran straight for the guard. The guard froze in shock, legs still planted wide apart in
the doorway. As Aaron was about to reach him, he suddenly dropped down and slid between the
guard's widely-placed legs.
"Hey!!" the guard shouted after him, but Aaron had already pushed himself up and was
running down the hall as quickly as his somewhat-gangly legs could carry him. He stumbled
briefly, skidded into the wall at the end of the corridor, pushed off of it quickly, and headed to the
left.
The guard followed at a brisk jog, confident that he could keep up easily enough. He
turned left at the end of the hall and stopped, staring at the empty corridor. It was a dead end, and
he hadn't heard a door open or close. The kid sure as hell didn't run past him. . . so where was h-
The guard felt a light tap on his shoulder. He whirled around, fist flying in front of him to
land a blow on the stupid kid. Scrawny or not, he had crossed the line.
"C'mere, yeh little- OWWW!!!!" The guard's fist slammed into the wall. He clutched it
with his good hand, teeth bared as he turned around to look behind him. All he saw was a brief
flash of the kid, running down the corridor, looking over his shoulder (and grinning slightly) as
he turned the corner.
***
Doctor Doppler reviewed the code one more time in his head, making sure that he would
remember it. He felt it was hardly necessary; after all, if you can memorize the ascending energy
levels for valence electrons ("One-s, two-s, two-p, three-s. . ." he muttered to himself), then of
course this would be simple as an atomic equation with given beta radiation.
"Just remember the antineutrino. . ." he continued muttering to himself. "Right." He
walked out the office door again, feeling the two small microchips in his pocket as he went. The
walk was a quiet one, the soft padding of his feet echoing slightly off of the stone walls. After
two turns, he began to hear echoes of hushed whispers mingling with his footsteps.
'And that'll be Jim.'
***
Alright, so Aaron had taken care of *that* guy. But he was lost. This was just not his day.
'Jim, buddy. . . you're a great guy. . . but the things you've gotten me into. . .'
He continued running, but slowed to a jog after hearing no sound of pursuit. He decided
that he could stop and rest for a moment. He knew that he'd been in circles once or twice, at
least. After all, the place was pretty small. How much architecture could there be? Aaron
pondered this as he leaned in a doorway. Yes, Jim had certainly pulled him into a spot. That
presumptuous, conniving, manipulative. . . Nah. Jim *was* a good guy. He was doing what he
thought was right. But still. . . He shifted his weight uncomfortably as he leaned on the solid
door.
"If we manage to somehow pull out of this intact, I'm gonna wring his humanoid little ne-
"
He suddenly felt himself falling backwards. He landed on a cold stone floor with a thud.
Sprawled out, he did not move, but blinked, clearing his vision.
"YOU!"
"Whatta ya mean, ME? You're the one that's just hanging around in doorways!"
"Yeah, well. . . you're the one going around. . . opening them!"
"What does that have to do wi-"
"Whatever, whatever, I got the alarms," Aaron said, pushing himself up. He had fallen
into the cell block, Jim having opened the door upon which he'd been leaning. Jim looked
relieved at his news about the alarms, but glanced over his shoulder. He turned back quickly.
"Seen Doc anywhere?" he whispered.
Aaron shook his head. "I thought he'd be here by now."
"And you thought correctly!"
Both boys turned quickly to see Doctor Doppler in the doorway that Aaron had fallen
through. He looked around the dank room, then turned to Jim and asked, "Mr. Silver?"
Jim pointed down the hall and quickly walked ahead of Doppler and Aaron. "He's down
here. . ." They stopped at Silver's cell. Silver puffed his chest out, inspecting each of them. He
nodded courteously, and Doppler and Aaron nodded back. Satisfied, Silver relaxed and grinned.
"Good t' see yeh. All of yeh, new an' old faces alike."
"And a, eh. . . a pleasure to see you again, Mr. Silver," Doppler replied curtly, still
somewhat resentful from the Treasure Planet incident. He stepped forward and began punching
the code into the lock. As he did so, Silver found the need within himself to strike up some small
conversation.
"So, Doc, how's t'ings goin' for yeh?"
"Fine, fine. . ."
"Not distractin' yeh, am I?"
"No. . ."
"Good." Silver rocked back and forth, shifting his weight from his dead right leg to his
good left leg. He looked up, as though he had just then thought of something. "So. . . Dops. . ."
Doppler glanced up at this new nickname. "Hm?"
"Keepin' that code straight in yer head?"
"I could. . . if a particular prisoner w-"
"Doc, s'okay, just keep working on that lock," Jim cut in quickly, looking nervously over
both shoulders down the cell block in either direction. "Y'know. . . we're kinda pressed for time
and all. . ."
"Of course, right. . ." Doppler muttered as he continued drawing the code from memory.
So far he'd managed to keep it straight. It was a simple matter of putting the digits into an
equation that one could easily compare to the-
"Say, Dops. . ."
Doppler clenched his teeth and looked up, a forced grin on his face. ". . . . . . Yesss?"
"I don't mean t' be a bother, but did yeh happen t' see anythin' that may have, eh, been of
some interest t' me. . ?" Silver glanced down at his useless arm and leg pointedly.
"Oh, yes. . . yes. . ." Doppler reached into his pocket distractedly and pulled out the two
microchips. He tossed them quickly to Silver and tried to remember the digit he'd been on in the
code sequence.
Silver had caught the two small chips into his left hand, grinning. "Seems yeh managed to
do something of worth fer once, Dops!" Doppler looked up, about to comment (somewhat
harshly), but Silver was already at work on his cybernetics, full attention concentrated onto his
mechanical arm. His large left hand found the delicate work difficult, but he managed to slip one
small golden chip into a slot in the opened panel of his forearm.
Jim, Aaron and Doppler (who was looking up from his work) all watched in fascination
as Silver continued. His cybernetic eye folded open and emitted its trademark red beam. It
scanned the workings of the arm quickly, then slid shut once more. He looked up, grinned, and
snapped the panel closed. "Well, lads, we're 'bout t' see a bit o' the old Silver!" He grinned
again. The three on the other side of the bars watched expectantly, awaiting movement from the
exanimate limb. Nothing came.
"Uh, look. . . Silver. . . you sure it was. . . y'know. . . right?"
Silver looked down at his arm, concerned. He rotated his shoulder slightly, attempting to
spark some movement. "I'ss. . . s'not startin' up. . . I jus' don' know. . ." His eyes moved back
and forth quickly over it, then he looked up, gazing at them somewhat panicked. Jim blinked at
him.
"But. . . you. . . you can't just. . ."
Suddenly the arm lifted up and waved its fingers at them. Silver watched it, grinning. "I
told yeh once, I tell yeh again: ain't nothin' if I ain't a kidder!" He grinned at Jim and Aaron as
they laughed nervously, then leaned down and quickly snapped in the circuiting for his leg. It
soon moved about with the same fluid grace that it had several weeks ago.
"Never thought I'd be glad t' see these ol' piles o' scrap metal on me!" laughed Silver. He
walked up to the bars, in front of Doppler, who had given up on remembering the code, and had
started over with it. Silver watched him for a moment, then cleared his throat. Doppler looked up
with a look that silently said, 'What do you want NOW?!' Silver grinned. "Lemme give 'er a go,
Dops."
Doppler clenched his teeth again. "Be. . . my. . . guest!!" He took an annoyed step back
from the panel. Silver took a step forward in turn, and his cybernetic hand folded in. The
magazines in his arm rotated, and the more intricate tools (the same that Jim had watched Silver
tell stories with so many times), folded out. Silver put his arm up to the bars. The multi-jointed
tools reached through the bars, flew across the key panel in a series of whirs and clicks, and
suddenly a small, beeping tone sounded shortly. Silver pulled his cybernetic arm away as he
returned its appearance to that of a hand, and stepped back as the bars began to retract. Aaron
winced nervously, hoping that no alarm would go off. None did.
"Whew. . ." Aaron allowed a small, nervous laugh to escape himself. He turned to Jim.
"Well, this has gone better than we could've hoped f-"
"Oh-HO! So THIS is what's been goin' on!"
At the sound of the burly guard's voice, Jim, Doppler and Aaron all turned to their right
to see the burly guard standing at the end of the cell block, a satisfied and dark grin on his face.
"Uh. . . hi again." Aaron waved vaguely with a nervous laugh.
The guard began to walk slowly down the hall. The three watched in horrid fascination as
he pulled a flintlock out of what seemed to have been nowhere-at-all. He held it up, glancing at
it, and then stopped within easy firing range of them. "So. Us 'ere have been a bit lazy t'day, eh?
We let a couple o' lowbrow riffraff slip past us, an' I says we should be ashamed of ourselves,
we should." He cocked his flintlock. "But I says t' meself, I says that this c'n all be 'rased from
the records, if we were t' pretend it never happened. And of course that requires you all t' be-"
"Eh, that requires us all to what now, lad?" Silver stepped out from his cell, his
cybernetic arm with the flintlock out and ready to fire at the guard.
The guard gaped at Silver. "How. . . you. . ." He lowered his firearm slightly, no longer
taking aim. It was a wide enough opening for Jim. He made a dash for the guard. The guard
blinked at him and began to raise his gun again. Jim ducked and came up once more, his left arm
making an upward arc, coming under the guard's arms and knocking them in the wrist. The guard
fired the flintlock as his arms were jolted upward, but hit only the ceiling after Jim's intervention.
Jim wasted no time. He quickly gave the guard two quick punches in the stomach while
his arms were still raised and then leapt back lightly, barely missing being slammed in the back
of the head with the butt of the guard's gun. Silver was tempted to fire his flintlock, but there was
no telling how Jim was going to move, or when he was going to do it.
Jim kept facing the guard, but glanced back to the small group behind him. "Go, now! I'll
catch you up!"
All three protested immediately and in unison, more or less. "Jim, buddy-" "Jim, think
about-" "Jimbo-"
"GO!!" Jim had pulled his small knife out of his sleeve and was already making a run for
the guard before he could take aim again. Unfortunately, the guard already had. He fired twice at
Jim. Jim ducked the first and threw himself to the right to dodge the second. This guy had a
tendency to aim to his left.
Silver had paused for a moment, but then began pulling Doppler and Aaron out of the cell
block. After an instant's argument they both began running with him. Soon they were nearly in
panic flight. Their minds lingered on Jim back in the cell block.
***
The damned guard's eyes kept drifting back to the door. Amelia was all but sitting in his
lap, for heaven's sake, but apparently his mind was stuck on that. Bloody. DOOR. Fed up, she
grabbed his face roughly, pointing it back at her. "Look. Right. HERE," she said through gritted
teeth.
'Alright. For the greater good. Just keep that in mind, and it'll be more tolera- who am I
kidding? I'll be lucky not to vomit all over myself.'
She moved her head slowly closer to the guards, lips somewhat pursed. She did her best
not to wince as she got nearer, catching a whiff of his less-than-pleasant scent.
'God help m-' and suddenly she was being pulled away, lead by a hand firmly gripped
around her wrist. 'Didn't think that'd work!' She looked up when she heard-
"Despite all the fun you seem to be having, dear, we really MUST BE GOING!!" Doppler
shouted the last bit to the whole group more than Amelia as an individual. Nobody needed to be
told twice. Aaron had followed shortly behind Doppler, and Silver was in the rear, running
surprisingly fast for a man missing half of his biological body parts.
Amelia looked over her shoulder at the two. "Where's James?!" she shouted to Silver.
"He's in a bit of a spot, Cap'n! 'E said t' keep goin'! Wouldn't hear o' us stayin' a
moment longer!"
Amelia stopped, starting to make a break for it and head toward the cell block, but
Doppler grabbed her wrist again and pulled a bit more firmly. She glared at his hand on her wrist,
then looked up at him and saw his features set in a distressed-but-composed expression. He
shook his head once.
Amelia paused for the briefest of seconds. When she caught the movement of the guard
out of the corner of her eye, she was snapped back to reality and began running again, Aaron and
Silver now having pulled ahead. They made it out of the front door quickly, heading up the dock.
Once they'd reached the Volitant, the group made it in, each in their own manner. Aaron and
Amelia had jumped in (though Amelia with a good deal more grace and a good deal less effort),
and Silver and Doppler had opted for the short gangplank.
Amelia was at the helm already. "Doctor, raise the astral anchor. Mr. Silver, I want you
below-deck with the boy." She nodded at Aaron.
Silver's look darkened at being told what to do so repeatedly. He'd never taken kindly to
orders- but wasn't that what'd gotten him into this whole mess? He decided that now would most
likely be a time to keep quiet. Annoying as they may be, this here group had busted him out of a
situation that involved the phrase 'certain death', and that deserved a bit of gratefulness in its
own right. He took Aaron by the shoulder and began heading for the one place he could think to
go: the galley.
***
Jim flew in at the guard again. He ducked quickly, braced himself with his palms on the
cold stone floor, and made a sweep with his right leg. The guard stumbled, but regained his
balance as Jim jumped back.
"Yer but a boy!" laughed the guard, pulling the flintlock up again. "I'm a trained
profess'nal! Yeh've got no experience, and yeh've got no chance."
Jim glared at him, teeth clenched tightly. He whispered through them. "You'd be
surprised at the things you don't know."
"Oh, 'sat so?" chuckled the guard. "What, laddie, yeh get into a few fistfights in primary
school?"
"Got into a few fights-to-the-death two years ago. . ."
"Whu'ssat?"
A smile but angry smile tugged at one corner of Jim's mouth. "Nothing important." He
suddenly closed in again. He made one dodge to the right, then quickly came in straight again. He
raised his knife. The guard looked up at it, and, in blind panic, aimed the flintlock at it. Jim
moved his arm to the side with the reflexes of a lightning strike, and the flintlock moved with it.
Jim took the opportunity to kick. Hard. The guard cried out and dropped the flintlock. He bent to
retrieve it, but Jim kicked it away. It skittered into Silver's empty cell and into the shadows.
The guard looked up at Jim. Jim knew that if it came to a contest of strength, open
punches and kicks, he had absolutely no chance. He held his small knife out in what he hoped
was a threatening manner. "Don't move," he directed the guard firmly. He was horrified when
the guard smiled.
"Wouldn't dream of it, lad," he chuckled lowly. Jim studied the guard's face intently.
When the guard's eyes flicked toward something behind Jim, he knew he was in trouble. He
began to turn around, but before he could, the world exploded into a brilliant flash of white. It
slowly faded to reddish-gray, and then it was black. It was all black.
*****
Mwaha.
going lately, including those of the academic genre, and I'm working on those at the
moment.
And second: A BIIIG thank-you (cough) goes out to someone that seems very interested
in my work lately. I'm not going to post names or e-mails. . . but I got some colorful reviews on a
few of my fics from them. Colorful. Right. But! It seems that FF.n is incredibly on top of things
all the time, and deleted them! Thank you, FF.n! *waves flag*
*****
"Er, ma'am. . ."
Amelia stopped 'crying' suddenly and looked up, pupils wide and inquisitive. "Hm?"
"Ehm. . ."
"Ah, of course." Amelia took a step back from the guard and brushed his shirt off. She
stared at him for a moment, grinning mildly, then reached over and plucked an orange strand of
hair off of said shirt. She was still again, that same smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.
"Look, ma'am, not meanin' any, er, disrespect, but I oughta be checkin' back on me
partner and the, uh, the pris'ner, yeh know. . ."
'Damn,' thought Amelia to herself. 'Stubborn one. . . but that's manageable.' She
shuddered at the thought of what 'managing' him might involve. After a moment of
consideration, she grabbed both of his shoulders and prepared herself for what would surely be
one of her best (well, 'only' was more like it) performances to date.
***
Doctor Delbert Doppler had been close to cell block when he realized that he would have
to go back to the office. He had forgotten to get the codes for the lock. Silver's machinery would
most likely be able to break through the metal bars easily enough, but the more damage avoided,
the better off they were.
He stepped into the office again, feeling somewhat pushed. Time was running short. The
sooner he was out of here, the better. Perhaps it would have been better just to have kept going
towards Jim; after all, damages could be paid.
"Of course, time in prison cannot. . ." He pulled open a drawer and glanced at the
contents, then shut it quickly again. Nothing.
"Where is it where is it where is it where where wherewherewhere. . . ." He opened
another drawer.
"They have to keep them *someplace*. . ." He rifled through some papers, but with this
office in the disarray that it was, it was seeming more and more unlikely that he would find
anything at all. He sighed and turned around, his back to the pile of papers, looked down, and felt
that now would be a splendid time to clean off his glasses. He took them off and wiped them on
his coat mildly, then put them back onto his nose. He pushed them up, his eyes moving to the
wall in front of him. Tacked up was a sheet of parchment with bold text at the top. 'CELL LOCK
DIGIT CODING - LOCAL BLOCK ONE'.
"Of course."
***
"Okay. . . okay. . . so I pull. . . this one!" Aaron pointed to a green wire, pointing it out to
Nobody-In-Particular. He suddenly had a second thought. This wire happened to be surrounded
by seven more green wires. If this was the *wrong* wire to the *wrong* cell, then Jim might
open the thing and end up setting off enough alarms to bring reinforcements to the prison from
every possible source in a five-hundred-parsec radius. Not good.
Not good at all.
***
"You. . . you're okay!"
"Aye, lad! What, yeh think a bunch o' gill rats like these guards could get t' this ol'
cyborg?"
Jim smiled a bit at the twinkle in Silver's eye. Nothing could keep this guy down.
"Yeah, but I just thought. . ." Jim noticed Silver's lop-sided appearance and remembered
Doppler telling him that this might have happened, Silver's machinery being shut off. It was
somewhat unsettling to see those intricate works of mechanical art hanging inactive, now nothing
more than dead weight.
"Eh, Jimbo, not the push yeh or anythin', but. . ."
Jim snapped out of his thoughts. "Right! Right. . . Doc's gonna be here soon with the key
code, and we've got someone at work on the alarms."
Silver suddenly looked horrified. "Not that heap o' scrap metal!"
Jim looked at Silver, confused. "Heap of. . .? Oh!" Jim laughed out loud, but quickly
quieted himself. "No, not B.E.N.. We've got someone a little more. . . capable, I think. . ."
***
"Screw it. I'm pullin' 'em all."
Aaron grabbed all eight of the green wires that he assumed connected the alarm to the
cells. As soon as he pulled the last wire, he sighed with relief. No bells going off. No red lights
flashing. No-
"Hey!"
Aaron whirled around at the sound of the angry guard. He laughed weakly.
"Uh. . . . hi there?"
"Boy. . ." The guard's face darkened. "Do ye know exactly what it is yer doin'?"
"Uhhh. . . ." Aaron's mind raced wildly. He struggled not to panic. He could make it out
of this if he just kept his wits about him and thought of a plan. After a brief moment (in which he
did quite a bit of nervous grinning at the guard), he had formulated one that he figured would
work well enough. It was complicated. Strategic.
"WOAH WHAT'S THAT?!" Aaron pointed wildly behind the guard. The guard startled,
spreading his feet wide, but didn't budge otherwise.
"Yeh've gotta be kiddin', lad."
Aaron sighed and hung his head in defeat. "You're right. I just don't know what I was-"
He suddenly ran straight for the guard. The guard froze in shock, legs still planted wide apart in
the doorway. As Aaron was about to reach him, he suddenly dropped down and slid between the
guard's widely-placed legs.
"Hey!!" the guard shouted after him, but Aaron had already pushed himself up and was
running down the hall as quickly as his somewhat-gangly legs could carry him. He stumbled
briefly, skidded into the wall at the end of the corridor, pushed off of it quickly, and headed to the
left.
The guard followed at a brisk jog, confident that he could keep up easily enough. He
turned left at the end of the hall and stopped, staring at the empty corridor. It was a dead end, and
he hadn't heard a door open or close. The kid sure as hell didn't run past him. . . so where was h-
The guard felt a light tap on his shoulder. He whirled around, fist flying in front of him to
land a blow on the stupid kid. Scrawny or not, he had crossed the line.
"C'mere, yeh little- OWWW!!!!" The guard's fist slammed into the wall. He clutched it
with his good hand, teeth bared as he turned around to look behind him. All he saw was a brief
flash of the kid, running down the corridor, looking over his shoulder (and grinning slightly) as
he turned the corner.
***
Doctor Doppler reviewed the code one more time in his head, making sure that he would
remember it. He felt it was hardly necessary; after all, if you can memorize the ascending energy
levels for valence electrons ("One-s, two-s, two-p, three-s. . ." he muttered to himself), then of
course this would be simple as an atomic equation with given beta radiation.
"Just remember the antineutrino. . ." he continued muttering to himself. "Right." He
walked out the office door again, feeling the two small microchips in his pocket as he went. The
walk was a quiet one, the soft padding of his feet echoing slightly off of the stone walls. After
two turns, he began to hear echoes of hushed whispers mingling with his footsteps.
'And that'll be Jim.'
***
Alright, so Aaron had taken care of *that* guy. But he was lost. This was just not his day.
'Jim, buddy. . . you're a great guy. . . but the things you've gotten me into. . .'
He continued running, but slowed to a jog after hearing no sound of pursuit. He decided
that he could stop and rest for a moment. He knew that he'd been in circles once or twice, at
least. After all, the place was pretty small. How much architecture could there be? Aaron
pondered this as he leaned in a doorway. Yes, Jim had certainly pulled him into a spot. That
presumptuous, conniving, manipulative. . . Nah. Jim *was* a good guy. He was doing what he
thought was right. But still. . . He shifted his weight uncomfortably as he leaned on the solid
door.
"If we manage to somehow pull out of this intact, I'm gonna wring his humanoid little ne-
"
He suddenly felt himself falling backwards. He landed on a cold stone floor with a thud.
Sprawled out, he did not move, but blinked, clearing his vision.
"YOU!"
"Whatta ya mean, ME? You're the one that's just hanging around in doorways!"
"Yeah, well. . . you're the one going around. . . opening them!"
"What does that have to do wi-"
"Whatever, whatever, I got the alarms," Aaron said, pushing himself up. He had fallen
into the cell block, Jim having opened the door upon which he'd been leaning. Jim looked
relieved at his news about the alarms, but glanced over his shoulder. He turned back quickly.
"Seen Doc anywhere?" he whispered.
Aaron shook his head. "I thought he'd be here by now."
"And you thought correctly!"
Both boys turned quickly to see Doctor Doppler in the doorway that Aaron had fallen
through. He looked around the dank room, then turned to Jim and asked, "Mr. Silver?"
Jim pointed down the hall and quickly walked ahead of Doppler and Aaron. "He's down
here. . ." They stopped at Silver's cell. Silver puffed his chest out, inspecting each of them. He
nodded courteously, and Doppler and Aaron nodded back. Satisfied, Silver relaxed and grinned.
"Good t' see yeh. All of yeh, new an' old faces alike."
"And a, eh. . . a pleasure to see you again, Mr. Silver," Doppler replied curtly, still
somewhat resentful from the Treasure Planet incident. He stepped forward and began punching
the code into the lock. As he did so, Silver found the need within himself to strike up some small
conversation.
"So, Doc, how's t'ings goin' for yeh?"
"Fine, fine. . ."
"Not distractin' yeh, am I?"
"No. . ."
"Good." Silver rocked back and forth, shifting his weight from his dead right leg to his
good left leg. He looked up, as though he had just then thought of something. "So. . . Dops. . ."
Doppler glanced up at this new nickname. "Hm?"
"Keepin' that code straight in yer head?"
"I could. . . if a particular prisoner w-"
"Doc, s'okay, just keep working on that lock," Jim cut in quickly, looking nervously over
both shoulders down the cell block in either direction. "Y'know. . . we're kinda pressed for time
and all. . ."
"Of course, right. . ." Doppler muttered as he continued drawing the code from memory.
So far he'd managed to keep it straight. It was a simple matter of putting the digits into an
equation that one could easily compare to the-
"Say, Dops. . ."
Doppler clenched his teeth and looked up, a forced grin on his face. ". . . . . . Yesss?"
"I don't mean t' be a bother, but did yeh happen t' see anythin' that may have, eh, been of
some interest t' me. . ?" Silver glanced down at his useless arm and leg pointedly.
"Oh, yes. . . yes. . ." Doppler reached into his pocket distractedly and pulled out the two
microchips. He tossed them quickly to Silver and tried to remember the digit he'd been on in the
code sequence.
Silver had caught the two small chips into his left hand, grinning. "Seems yeh managed to
do something of worth fer once, Dops!" Doppler looked up, about to comment (somewhat
harshly), but Silver was already at work on his cybernetics, full attention concentrated onto his
mechanical arm. His large left hand found the delicate work difficult, but he managed to slip one
small golden chip into a slot in the opened panel of his forearm.
Jim, Aaron and Doppler (who was looking up from his work) all watched in fascination
as Silver continued. His cybernetic eye folded open and emitted its trademark red beam. It
scanned the workings of the arm quickly, then slid shut once more. He looked up, grinned, and
snapped the panel closed. "Well, lads, we're 'bout t' see a bit o' the old Silver!" He grinned
again. The three on the other side of the bars watched expectantly, awaiting movement from the
exanimate limb. Nothing came.
"Uh, look. . . Silver. . . you sure it was. . . y'know. . . right?"
Silver looked down at his arm, concerned. He rotated his shoulder slightly, attempting to
spark some movement. "I'ss. . . s'not startin' up. . . I jus' don' know. . ." His eyes moved back
and forth quickly over it, then he looked up, gazing at them somewhat panicked. Jim blinked at
him.
"But. . . you. . . you can't just. . ."
Suddenly the arm lifted up and waved its fingers at them. Silver watched it, grinning. "I
told yeh once, I tell yeh again: ain't nothin' if I ain't a kidder!" He grinned at Jim and Aaron as
they laughed nervously, then leaned down and quickly snapped in the circuiting for his leg. It
soon moved about with the same fluid grace that it had several weeks ago.
"Never thought I'd be glad t' see these ol' piles o' scrap metal on me!" laughed Silver. He
walked up to the bars, in front of Doppler, who had given up on remembering the code, and had
started over with it. Silver watched him for a moment, then cleared his throat. Doppler looked up
with a look that silently said, 'What do you want NOW?!' Silver grinned. "Lemme give 'er a go,
Dops."
Doppler clenched his teeth again. "Be. . . my. . . guest!!" He took an annoyed step back
from the panel. Silver took a step forward in turn, and his cybernetic hand folded in. The
magazines in his arm rotated, and the more intricate tools (the same that Jim had watched Silver
tell stories with so many times), folded out. Silver put his arm up to the bars. The multi-jointed
tools reached through the bars, flew across the key panel in a series of whirs and clicks, and
suddenly a small, beeping tone sounded shortly. Silver pulled his cybernetic arm away as he
returned its appearance to that of a hand, and stepped back as the bars began to retract. Aaron
winced nervously, hoping that no alarm would go off. None did.
"Whew. . ." Aaron allowed a small, nervous laugh to escape himself. He turned to Jim.
"Well, this has gone better than we could've hoped f-"
"Oh-HO! So THIS is what's been goin' on!"
At the sound of the burly guard's voice, Jim, Doppler and Aaron all turned to their right
to see the burly guard standing at the end of the cell block, a satisfied and dark grin on his face.
"Uh. . . hi again." Aaron waved vaguely with a nervous laugh.
The guard began to walk slowly down the hall. The three watched in horrid fascination as
he pulled a flintlock out of what seemed to have been nowhere-at-all. He held it up, glancing at
it, and then stopped within easy firing range of them. "So. Us 'ere have been a bit lazy t'day, eh?
We let a couple o' lowbrow riffraff slip past us, an' I says we should be ashamed of ourselves,
we should." He cocked his flintlock. "But I says t' meself, I says that this c'n all be 'rased from
the records, if we were t' pretend it never happened. And of course that requires you all t' be-"
"Eh, that requires us all to what now, lad?" Silver stepped out from his cell, his
cybernetic arm with the flintlock out and ready to fire at the guard.
The guard gaped at Silver. "How. . . you. . ." He lowered his firearm slightly, no longer
taking aim. It was a wide enough opening for Jim. He made a dash for the guard. The guard
blinked at him and began to raise his gun again. Jim ducked and came up once more, his left arm
making an upward arc, coming under the guard's arms and knocking them in the wrist. The guard
fired the flintlock as his arms were jolted upward, but hit only the ceiling after Jim's intervention.
Jim wasted no time. He quickly gave the guard two quick punches in the stomach while
his arms were still raised and then leapt back lightly, barely missing being slammed in the back
of the head with the butt of the guard's gun. Silver was tempted to fire his flintlock, but there was
no telling how Jim was going to move, or when he was going to do it.
Jim kept facing the guard, but glanced back to the small group behind him. "Go, now! I'll
catch you up!"
All three protested immediately and in unison, more or less. "Jim, buddy-" "Jim, think
about-" "Jimbo-"
"GO!!" Jim had pulled his small knife out of his sleeve and was already making a run for
the guard before he could take aim again. Unfortunately, the guard already had. He fired twice at
Jim. Jim ducked the first and threw himself to the right to dodge the second. This guy had a
tendency to aim to his left.
Silver had paused for a moment, but then began pulling Doppler and Aaron out of the cell
block. After an instant's argument they both began running with him. Soon they were nearly in
panic flight. Their minds lingered on Jim back in the cell block.
***
The damned guard's eyes kept drifting back to the door. Amelia was all but sitting in his
lap, for heaven's sake, but apparently his mind was stuck on that. Bloody. DOOR. Fed up, she
grabbed his face roughly, pointing it back at her. "Look. Right. HERE," she said through gritted
teeth.
'Alright. For the greater good. Just keep that in mind, and it'll be more tolera- who am I
kidding? I'll be lucky not to vomit all over myself.'
She moved her head slowly closer to the guards, lips somewhat pursed. She did her best
not to wince as she got nearer, catching a whiff of his less-than-pleasant scent.
'God help m-' and suddenly she was being pulled away, lead by a hand firmly gripped
around her wrist. 'Didn't think that'd work!' She looked up when she heard-
"Despite all the fun you seem to be having, dear, we really MUST BE GOING!!" Doppler
shouted the last bit to the whole group more than Amelia as an individual. Nobody needed to be
told twice. Aaron had followed shortly behind Doppler, and Silver was in the rear, running
surprisingly fast for a man missing half of his biological body parts.
Amelia looked over her shoulder at the two. "Where's James?!" she shouted to Silver.
"He's in a bit of a spot, Cap'n! 'E said t' keep goin'! Wouldn't hear o' us stayin' a
moment longer!"
Amelia stopped, starting to make a break for it and head toward the cell block, but
Doppler grabbed her wrist again and pulled a bit more firmly. She glared at his hand on her wrist,
then looked up at him and saw his features set in a distressed-but-composed expression. He
shook his head once.
Amelia paused for the briefest of seconds. When she caught the movement of the guard
out of the corner of her eye, she was snapped back to reality and began running again, Aaron and
Silver now having pulled ahead. They made it out of the front door quickly, heading up the dock.
Once they'd reached the Volitant, the group made it in, each in their own manner. Aaron and
Amelia had jumped in (though Amelia with a good deal more grace and a good deal less effort),
and Silver and Doppler had opted for the short gangplank.
Amelia was at the helm already. "Doctor, raise the astral anchor. Mr. Silver, I want you
below-deck with the boy." She nodded at Aaron.
Silver's look darkened at being told what to do so repeatedly. He'd never taken kindly to
orders- but wasn't that what'd gotten him into this whole mess? He decided that now would most
likely be a time to keep quiet. Annoying as they may be, this here group had busted him out of a
situation that involved the phrase 'certain death', and that deserved a bit of gratefulness in its
own right. He took Aaron by the shoulder and began heading for the one place he could think to
go: the galley.
***
Jim flew in at the guard again. He ducked quickly, braced himself with his palms on the
cold stone floor, and made a sweep with his right leg. The guard stumbled, but regained his
balance as Jim jumped back.
"Yer but a boy!" laughed the guard, pulling the flintlock up again. "I'm a trained
profess'nal! Yeh've got no experience, and yeh've got no chance."
Jim glared at him, teeth clenched tightly. He whispered through them. "You'd be
surprised at the things you don't know."
"Oh, 'sat so?" chuckled the guard. "What, laddie, yeh get into a few fistfights in primary
school?"
"Got into a few fights-to-the-death two years ago. . ."
"Whu'ssat?"
A smile but angry smile tugged at one corner of Jim's mouth. "Nothing important." He
suddenly closed in again. He made one dodge to the right, then quickly came in straight again. He
raised his knife. The guard looked up at it, and, in blind panic, aimed the flintlock at it. Jim
moved his arm to the side with the reflexes of a lightning strike, and the flintlock moved with it.
Jim took the opportunity to kick. Hard. The guard cried out and dropped the flintlock. He bent to
retrieve it, but Jim kicked it away. It skittered into Silver's empty cell and into the shadows.
The guard looked up at Jim. Jim knew that if it came to a contest of strength, open
punches and kicks, he had absolutely no chance. He held his small knife out in what he hoped
was a threatening manner. "Don't move," he directed the guard firmly. He was horrified when
the guard smiled.
"Wouldn't dream of it, lad," he chuckled lowly. Jim studied the guard's face intently.
When the guard's eyes flicked toward something behind Jim, he knew he was in trouble. He
began to turn around, but before he could, the world exploded into a brilliant flash of white. It
slowly faded to reddish-gray, and then it was black. It was all black.
*****
Mwaha.