Author's Note: Okay, time for some reviewer responses. While I did start Mogg out here portrayed as a weasel, he won't remain that way for the entire fic. I'm gonna take the liberty of assuming that Mogg and Doc W were friends at some point in their lives and grew--or were driven—apart. I will try to have them rebuild that assumed friendship as this fic continues.
As for the Star Wars tech thing, I based it on the Incredible Cross-Sections book for Episode Two. In the ICS it was stated that light turbolasers can pack multiple megatons of power while heavy turbolasers can dish out up to 200 gigatons. Kind of unbelievable, I know, but the ICS is considered SW canon (at least according to Star Wars Insider #68). Anyway, since SW ships can take many such turbolaser blows I'm assuming non-megatonal drilling tools won't cut into it easily.
And, yes, AHAB is meant to be annoying and insolent. Very insolent. But don't worry, karma will insure that that same insolence will come back to bite him in the rear exhaust vent. As for SID, while he did take part in mocking Smytus the first time he was introduced, he is meant to be a pretty flat and emotionless character. At least when he's doing a mission. You'll notice that I made him somewhat differential to Smytus in the last couple of chapters.
As for introspection, that's also one of the factors in storytelling I have trouble getting the right balance. When I'm hurrying I tend to put too little, but sometimes I also tend to put in to much. Anyway, keep the critique coming. I wanna improve my writing and they help a lot.
Disclaimer: I neither own MLAATR nor Star Wars.
Story Title: Metal Army
Chapter Title: Opening Pandora's Box
Alien vessel, derelict site
Dr. Wakeman climed up the scaffoliding carefully, following Col. Little and his men into the bridge of the alien derelict. Following her were Dr. Mogg, several other civilian specialists the UNERU had brought, and several more UNERU troopers. She quickly climbed into the hole drilled into one of the vessel's windows, and stepped into the bridge. She was eager—actually, excited, but it wouldn't have been scientifically professional for her to even think that--to see what the mysterious derelict had to offer.
The first thing that caught her eyes upon stepping into the frozen ship's bridge was a small bluish glow somewhere in the middle of the bridge. The glow seemed to be in the shape of a humanoid alien and was currently illuminating a few figures. With the same curiosity that made her so apt at the sciences, Dr. Wakeman moved closer toward the glow.
As she walked towards the blue hologram, her foot suddenly crunched into something. She looked down, and immediately wished she hadn't. In the dim light she could just see her foot was currently lodged into the chest of a frozen alien corpse. And its blank, dead eyes were staring blankly at her, almost accusingly. Whatever scientifically professional demeanor she had tried to project quickly disappeared.
The diminutive woman screamed involuntarily, quickly yanking her foot out of the corpse's chest. Everyone in the ship spun at her screams, the UNERU troopers whirled with guns at the ready. Just as she was regaining her composure, something grabbed the doctor's shoulder, causing her to let out another bout of yelping.
"Mom!" the thing that grabbed her said in a very familiar voice. "Calm down, it's just me."
"Oh, um, XJ-9," Dr. Wakeman sighed in relief. "You startled me."
"Startled?" another voice said. "I think 'scared witless' is a more appropriate term."
The white-haired scientist turned to see people staring at her. One of them was Mogg, she could make out the mocking smile in the faint light. "Oh, Nora, you should've seen yourself! Pity I didn't have a camera handy, that picture would've been perfect for my office desk."
"Yes," Nora said, teeth gritted in embarrassment & annoyance. "I'm sure it would've."
Mogg just shot her his oh-so-familiar superior grin and continued toward the holographic projection. Dr. Wakeman just stood where she was and burned in humiliation. Being insulted by Mogg and his cronies was one thing, but in front of a large portion of the scientific community and the UNERU was quite another. And the worse part of it was, she had actually given the fodder for the said humiliation. Mogg had just added some of his own seasoning.
"Mom, you alright?" her robot daughter asked beside her.
"Yes," she replied, teeth still gritted in mortification. "I'm quite alright, XJ-9."
She turned to face her creation and saw that XJ-9 seemed to have a very sickened look on her face. Immediately, Nora's consternation was replaced with concern. As XJ-9's mother, she had seen much of the teen robot's many moods, but she had never seen her this visibly disturbed before. Well, okay, there was that one time when XJ-9 discovered that her favorite cute boy band was in actuality 30-something year old bald men wearing wigs. But that was beside the point.
"XJ-9, is something wrong?"
"Huh? Oh, it's nothing, Mom," XJ-9 answered nonchalantly, a little too nonchalantly. "I'm fine, really."
The blue robot then shot a look at some xenobiologists examining a dead alien. The disgusted look on her immediately became more pronounced. And this didn't escape Nora Wakeman who suddenly realized what was wrong. If she, a grown and somewhat detached scientist, had reacted so badly at the sight of an alien cadaver, how would it have affected a robot girl with a very impressionable and easy-to-rattle teenage mind?
True, she had installed an emotional failsafe program that made her daughter somewhat emotionally detached during her assignments. But that only activated during tense combat situations. And while she had been leading armed troops in this particular assignment, it could hardly be called a tense combat situation. That meant that her daughter only had her teenage persona to cope with the shock of seeing dead beings that were once sentient, living creatures. And while the teenage mind could cope with many things, dead aliens staring blankly and creepily at you were probably not on the list.
"Don't worry, Jenny," Dr. Wakeman said as if to a young child, using the name XJ-9 preferred. "It's all right, those dead aliens can't harm you."
"Mom, I'm not a little kid." Jenny replied rolling her eyes, though her expression showed that the doctor's attempt at reassuring her was not unappreciated.
The diminutive woman just gave her six-foot tall daughter a slight smile and both headed for the where the holographic device was. Though, this time, both carefully watched where they stepped.
Cluster Infiltration SloopAHAB stood just outside the Infiltration Sloop, fixing a sneering look at the drone suit that held Commander Smytus. The shrunken robot growled at him from behind the glass dome of his cockpit, but thanks to the Commander's current size it was far from intimidating. AHAB just kept on sneering, openly showing insolence that would've gotten him vaporized had he turned it on a full-sized command robot. Luckily for him, Smytus was far from being considered full-sized. Besides, if the little robot wanted to throw down with him, he would be more than ready to oblige.
The Commander finally turned away from him and started barking orders at some roach drones. AHAB just smirked. Ever since he rolled off ED-13's laboratory he had always despised command-type robots—with the exception of Queen Vexus, of course. He didn't know exactly why, but it probably had something to do with ED-13's animus against command drones. Eh, like creator like creation he supposed. Go figure.
Well, whatever the reason, he always relished the chance to bring down command units a peg or two, or ten. And the fact that Smytus already had the stigma of failure and disgrace—and a six-inch height—made him the perfect target of opportunity. Of course, he knew he shouldn't push his luck too far. But while he could, he was gonna milk it for all it was worth.
Suddenly, his "brother", SID, appeared in midair and settled to ground. Immediately, Smytus turned to him. "Finally, you're here. What took you so long?"
SID just remained his usual stoic self and droned out in his usual monotone. "I have gathered the information necessary for us to formulate a proper infiltration. Would you like me to project them, Sir?"
"Sure, why not." Smytus snarled, apparently annoyed at SID's maddeningly emotionless behavior. AHAB just chuckled silently and shook his head. Here he was being as insolent as he could just to annoy Smytus and his "brother" was doing so by being pretty deferential. What made it funnier was that SID was really earnest at being as respectful as possible.
SID gave out a slight clicking and humming as his holographic projection system activated. But instead of projecting a disguise hologram, the weevil robot projected a wire-frame schematic of the alien derelict. "According to the information the humans gathered based on their latest scans, the derelict vessel lays under 537.68 meters of ice and is tilted toward the left at an angle of 16.08 degrees. The scans also reveal that the bottom sections have sustained considerable damage, indicating that the ship crash-landed and skidded on the ground for a considerable distance."
The holographic image flipped to show the bottom area of the alien vessel. It seemed to be jagged indicating that some of the hull plates had sheered off as it skidded along the ground. AHAB saw Smytus lean forward on his tiny cockpit and stroke his chin thoughtfully. AHAB rolled his. As if he really was capable of real thought, he thought.
"Hm, that gives me an idea…" Smytus said, trailing off as if in deep thought. Of course, to AHAB this was the perfect opportunity for yet another none-too-helpful snide remark.
"Wow, really? That's just amazing!" AHAB said, putting as much sarcasm as was semantically possible in every word.
Smytus chose to ignore that one and continued, "We have a Drill Mite armored personnel carrier in the hold of the ship, right? We could use that to drill into the ice until we're right under that alien vessel. Then, we'll just drill ourselves near one of the hull breaches and we could use them as our means of entrance. It's the perfect plan! Unless someone had an objection…"
The Commander turned a sharp look at both SID and AHAB. The latter opened his mouth to say something spiteful, but the former cut him off before he could do so. "There are no objections, Commander. Your plan is workable."
SID turned a warning look at AHAB, but since his face was non-expressive his point really didn't come across. The locust-like machine spoke. "Wow, an honest-to-goodness workable from Commander Smytus, it must be some sort of omen. Next thing you know the Five Rider-Bots of the Apocalypse are gonna come barreling through on their skybikes."
"Hah, at least I came up with a plan," Smytus countered. "You've done nothing so far except make disrespectful remarks toward a superior officer. So watch it, you're on thin ice!"
AHAB raised an eyebrow and banged a foot against the ice. "Funny, doesn't seem thin to me."
"Ha, ha," Smytus said dryly. "You're a regular comedian."
"Thanks, and you're a regular pipsqueak."
Smytus' face reddened. "That's it, one more crack out of you and I'm gonna personally turn you into scrap metal!"
"Bite my shiny metal tush." AHAB answered.
"THAT'S IT! I'M GONNA—" Smytus started rage, but then two drones blocked the Commander and restrained him.
"Whoa, take it easy, Sir!" One said. "The technician said you needed to watch your oil pressure."
"Yeah," the other agreed. "You need to calm down, Commander. Find your happy place, find your happy place…"
Meanwhile, SID stepped up to AHAB and glared at him. "You must stop this at once, AHAB."
"Oh, come on, SID." AHAB said. "I was just tryin' to humble the guy. Cog knows he needs to be humbled."
"I'm serious, AHAB." SID said, shaking a warning finger at AHAB. "We need to make sure this mission is a success, and all this mockery does nothing to assure that."
"It's not our problem," the locust-like drone snorted. "It's Smytus' mission, if it fails he pays the price, not us."
"Wrong. Need I remind you that we are untested prototype designs who are merely 'tagging along' on this mission. If it fails both of us stand a good chance of being discontinued. I wouldn't want that, would you?"
AHAB opened his mouth to counter, but then closed it again. He hated to admit it, but SID had a point. If they failed they stood a good chance of being discontinued. And there were only three possibilities for discontinued models.
The first possibility was the best they could hope for. If the designs were versatile enough, they could be reprogrammed to do menial task and maybe even assigned a family. The second was a far less reassuring alternative. Many discontinued models were melted down for scrap and recycled. But even that wasn't as bad as the third alternative.
The third only happened if the Queen was in a not-so-happy mood. Her Highness was known to use discontinued models—sometimes even non-discontinued models—as "stress-relieving" devices. And if there was one thing a drone didn't want it was being used as something Vexus could take her anger out on.
"Alright, SID, you win. I'll stop with the insults."
"Good. Now come on," the black robot said, pointing at the Drill Mite two of the escort ant drones were unloading from the ship, "lets go."
As they headed for the ship AHAB pulled out the hand he had hid behind his back while he was talking to SID. Two of its three fingers were crossed.
Alien vessel"Hm, interesting." Jenny and Dr. Wakeman heard Mogg say. "This is apparently a holographic recording device. What's perplexing is, there seems to be optical receptors that might be used to record an image."
The device in question was held in Mogg's right hand. It was still projecting the same hologram it had projected when Jenny and Ct. Burke's squad had found it, and it was still stuck saying "shop-shop-shop…" repeatedly.
"Maybe it uses non-optical means to record the image." Dr. Wakeman said. "If you'll notice, the image isn't in full color but in hues of blue. This leads me to think that this device doesn't actually 'see' what is being recorded but instead scans it and forms an image from the said scanning."
"Or, it could be that the image projector can only project in blue hues, nullifying whatever color an image may have." Mogg answered. "Though from the lack of any visible image capture receptors, I'm inclined to agree with you."
At that, Jenny raised an eyebrow. Mom and Mogg actually agreeing on something? That was new, but, surprisingly, not really unexpected. Whatever differences they had with each other, both still had the common interest of science. And Jenny knew that her Mom was capable of forgetting everything else when some interesting sciency stuff caught her attention. Maybe Mogg, as much of a jerk as he seemed, was also like that. Well, at least she thought so.
Whatever the reason, his mother and her rival were currently discussing the possible operating mechanisms in a civil manner that would have fooled you into thinking that they were friends. But, of course, peace never lasts long—heck, that was one of the reasons she was built—and her mother was no exception. Though this time the civil moment was interrupted not by either of the rivals, but by the British accented voice of Colonel Little.
"I'm sure all this is very interesting, but I'm more concerned with the entire message recorded on that little device. And the fact that it was speaking English."
"American English or British English?" some random soldier quipped, though a look from the colonel immediately cowed the UNERU trooper.
"What's so strange about that?" one of the teen hackers Jenny had met on the Renzetti asked. "I mean every alien or Cluster invader that ever landed always spoke in English."
"Actually," a xeno-culture expert answered. "Those aliens only speak English when they're on Earth, they speak in their native languages outside our solar system. As for the Cluster, there is evidence that a large part of the Cluster Empire's original founders originated from rogue Earth robots."
"But that doesn't explain this little fact," another random scientist added. "The way the ice is layered around this ship, it has to have been here for at least a thousand years! And I don't think there was anything anywhere near English as we know it today back then."
"Maybe is ship is from the future!" the white-haired scientist Jenny had mistaken for her mother several hours before suggested. "This entire could be a time machine!"
"Not the time machine thing again!" moaned the scientists young assistant. "Doc, what is it about you and time machines—"
Jenny listened to all this impassively. Forgetting the fact they were on a three-kilometer long ship that was full of dead bodies and partially buried under 500 meters ice, this conversation was actually pretty dull. She heard this time of talk every time her mother had some new upgrade she wanted to try out on her. Well, that and the episodes of that "Star Tech" show Brad liked to watch.
She turned and saw that Col. was also getting impatient with the discussions of the civilian specialists. They had been discussing and arguing quite some time now and the holographic device was still repeating the word "shop", still no where near repaired. Deciding that she did not want a colonel loosing his patience, and since she was getting impatient with all the discussions herself, she quickly reached over and snatched the device out of Mogg's hand.
"Hey, I was examining that, automaton!" Mogg shouted indignantly.
Jenny didn't answer and instead converted her free hand into a multiple-function tool. She looked at the device over before casually opening it with her tool arm.
"XJ-9, what are you doing?!" she heard her mother say.
"The colonel, and I have to admit, me, is curious about the entire message in this little gadget." Jenny answered, plugging in part of the devices internal circuitry to the monitor she had just deployed from her chest. "And since your discussion don't seem to be fixing this thing, I'm gonna play the message myself."
Jenny's chest monitor suddenly crackled to life. On the screen was a black-and-white image of the alien on the recording. For a moment, it seemed to do nothing. Then, the entire recording started to play.
"This is Puule Gaarko, chief designer of the Baktiod Armor Workshop." The image began, "This will be my final log entry. I have been stuck on this Force-forsaken planet for two standard months now, and I can't take it anymore. I just can't. I can't, I can't, I CAN'T!"
Jenny and the other's weren't sure what to make of the alien's strange facial expressions, but the maddened tone of his voice was unmistakable. "I don't know where that wormhole sent, but wherever we are we cannot contact the Confederacy or the Republic. The droids, including my precious ultra battle droids, have kept us alive by hunting something some sort of fat, beaked creature that walks around on this planet. I don't know what it is, but it's horrible. I'd rather eat Hutt dung than live of those foul creatures. Heh, I'd rather DIE that eat another batch of that foul meat or live on this cursed planet!"
"Someone's a little testy." Someone muttered. The recording continued.
"There's been talk amongst the crew on this ship. Talk against me!" The alien said, eyes shifting as if looking to see if someone was watching. "I know those ungrateful whelps plan to mutiny against me. They've always hated me and blamed me for the Captain's death. Yes, I know they do. They hate me. Hate me, hate me, hate me, hate me, HATE ME!!!"
Many watching the recording flinched, even Jenny. By now there was no doubt on her mind, or everyone else's, that the alien was a few screws short of sane. "Well, that's okay, because I hate them too! I've always hated them and the way they mocked me. Yes, I hate them, and this ship, and this planet. I hate having to live through this hell!
"Well, I'm going to fix al that. I've already taken care of the first part and soon I'll take care of everything." The alien raised his hand and showed that it was holding a gun. "I've executed all the mutineers, yes, I KILLED THEM ALL! In accordance with the laws of the Confederacy of Independence Systems, I have punished the mutineers. If the Confederacy ever finds us, know that I, Puule Gaarko, have kept all its laws."
"Good Lord…" Dr. Wakeman whispered . Jenny merely nodded and gave an involuntary shudder. She remembered that the dead alien that she had seen earlier had a gun clutched in his other hand. And it was more than a bet the other dead bodies probably had lethal wounds caused by that very weapon. Jenny suddenly felt another wave of the same sickening feeling she had felt earlier.
"I have put all the standard battle droids in storage and this ship on standby. I have set the entire ship to activate after this message finishes. Also, I have linked my ultra battle droids, my precious, precious, ultral battle droids, with the ships systems. So if ever someone finds us, they will be there to greet them." The alien's voice turned bitter. "If this is being played and you're from the Confederacy, congratulations, you've finally found us. If not…"
The alien trailed off he. His image merely smiled an insanely crooked smile before he suddenly jabbed the gun to the side of his head and fired. Everyone jumped back as Jenny's monitor suddenly turned dark. Everyone, including Jenny, mrely stared at the blank screen, shocked at what they had just witnessed.
But before anyone could say anything, they all heard a humming sound that progressively louder. Jenny and the UNERU trooper's flinched, beam rifles and weapons at the ready. Suddenly, the humming stopped. For a moment everyone was frozen. But nothing seemed to happen.
"I have a bad feeling about this…" Jenny started to say.
Then, everything turned on.
Author's Note: Whew, that was the longest chapter so far. I'll try to get the next one up soon. I'll have more fic writing time since it's already Christmas break here. W00t! Anyway, please review/critique. Oh, and Happy (insert holiday of choice)!