"How did we come here? How did we come this far? What decisions took us here, and where will they lead us in the future? Are we right in our actions? Is there a true 'right'? What are we doing? The are questions a so-called free spirit should not be concerned with. Yet at many points, a rudie can't help but wonder, what're we-" Fink turned. Gum just blinked at him. It had been a long time since he'd really spoken to her, and she wasn't sure how to react to this strange and sudden tangent. Fink closed his eyes and laughed to himself. He shook his head and waved his hand at her. "Never mind," he whispered. " 's weather. Makes me sentimental." He turned away and went back to gazing absently at the dark clouds above. Gum blinked again, still transfixed in the same position, then turned away, trying unsuccessfully to forget the weird remark. 'Super Brothers' by Guitar Vader played over Jet Set Radio, but it didn't match their moods. Fink sat on the windowsill with Gum sitting on the couch nearby. The others were spread throughout the garage, similarly sprawled. The dark clouds that'd surprised all the meteorologists suggested rain ahead for sure, so no one had bothered going out, and they all felt pretty bored.
Suddenly the music stopped, "Yo this is the Professor giving you rudies a heads up, hahaha! But I ain't talkin to just any rudies though, this is a very special message for the GGs!"
Mew's head turned, "Did he just talk to US!"
"That's right, I'm talking to you GG!" Professor K coincidentally reiterated. "I just got this from my informant. The renovations are complete on the Rokokku building and there's gonna be some bad trouble going down on the roof. What? You think all those dark clouds came from a low pressure front? Hahaha! Apparently, that record Goji wanted is called "The Devil's Contract", and has instructions for summoning a demon to make an unholy bargain! Goji probably wants to make a deal to take over the world! You GGs are the only one's who've been able to stand up to them, so it's up to you to stop em!"
"Wow, I can't believe Professor K, master of funk, coolest of the cool, would even SPEAK to us..." Gum clasped her hands together, looking starry-eyed.
"All of the Rokokku are in a secret meeting right now, so we can count that none of them are listening in. Me and my people are spread throughout the city to do what we can, but we need your help! There are 4 contact points to their security system, so one of you has to be in place to cut each, I'll broadcast when. But first someone needs to cut the main link-up to the facility. We know they're using a lot of tech, so we're disabling the power plant. Hopefully the Rokokku building generator won't be able to power it all, but we need two of you there to help. Finally, we need a person at the East and South telephone lines to cut them at the right moment. If my numbers are right, that leaves one of you to kick in the front door and confront Goji..."
"I'm going!" Combo put his thumb to his chest, "It's our score, me and Cube's."
"Hey, I've gotten more mangled than anyone 'round here on account of that creep; I'm going, so you can kiss my black ass. Er..." Fink did his embarrassed laugh routine, "I've been hanging around you too much..."
"That's enough, Fink is going," Tab decided. "Now hush up, we need to hear this."
"-goes down at midnight," Professor K had continued, "So that only leaves us less than 45 minutes to get everything together!"
"Move out!" Tab shouted. They had been preparing since K said he wanted their help. Tab assigned rolls quickly and the gang split and scattered.
"Time is running out!" Professor K declared generically. "Can the counter-culture on the fringe of society save all civilization?"
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"EMP active," one broadcasted.
"Jamming frequency initiated," another conspirator confirmed in step.
"Disabled power facility!" an exasperated sounding voice broadcasted after a long pause.
"Hit the telephone lines now!" Professor K ordered. Gum sat crouched by the contact wires. Her nerves were on end. "Now the security points!" K barked after allowing the telephone people a minute. Gum clipped the wires, then took off around the building as fast as she could. She huffed and puffed and pushed herself hard as she blazed through the street. She had to make it in time...
She arrived at the front door, finally. It seemed Fink had literally kicked them in, the glass all shattered with one of the double door's metal frame broken and the other bent. She entered the huge lobby to see nearly a dozen suits, badly beaten, passed out, and strewn about the marble room with lush tropical plants. With a loud "Oof!" and "Ugh!" one more was thrown over the top of the stairs to bounce once and then limply slide a little ways down the steps.
"Fink!" Gum called out for no response. She hurriedly climbed the stairs to the upper lobby. There was a ding as the elevator on the other side of the huge grand fountain started to close. "Fink, wait!" Gum cried. She leapt onto the fountain to grind the edge, but the sandstone disagreed with the skates and she didn't get anywhere. Abandoning the idea, she jumped into the fountain and waded through it, the airborne jets of water soaking her. "Fink!" she called one last time. A hand came out the closing crack of the elevator doors and pushed it open. Gum's skates cut through the water till she hopped out the other side, entering the elevator next to Fink as he let the door close.
"Wasn't 'specting company," Fink noted.
"Thought... I wouldn't... make it..." Gum wheezed, hands on her knees.
"Look at you, you're drenched!" he laughed.
"Didn't... want you... to hafta... go it alone..." she gasped.
Fink smiled, "Thanks Gum. Our chances are better this way, and the thought means a lot to me."
Gum looked up into his kind eyes and her heart froze, "Fink, I..." She paused. Gum closed her eyes.
She stood abruptly and grabbed his head in her hands and pulled him close to kiss him deeply. He let out a muffled cry at first, which melted into a moan of pleasure. He slowly wrapped his arms around her and caressed her gently.
"Fink... I love you... I've always loved you..." she muttered between kisses. "I just needed to tell you, in case-"
Fink stopped her with a long kiss, "Gum..." he said as he pulled away. "I still love you too. If we die, we die together."
Gum opened her eyes from the daydream.
"You what?" Fink asked, blinking.
"I-" she began.
"Shh... wait... you hear that?" Fink listened. A loud, distant voice over a PA was speaking above them. It finished and another soon began.
"Amp ready," it declared.
"Bass ready," another followed.
"Treble ready," a different voice checked off as the doors opened and the pair stepped out onto the roof. There was a large, textured, strange black cylindrical platform 40 feet in diameter, which the rudies stepped onto. A large, cylindrical glass booth was in the middle. There were two smaller glass cylinders with a metal spike at the bottom at the end of a metal bar on either side of the booth. There was a metal framework tower a little removed from the roof on either side. It was dark and hard to see as an old voice spoke.
"Initiate the process!" Lights came on all around them. Inside the central booth was Goji Rokokku, surrounded by deluxe mixing equipment. There was a sudden hard jerk as the platform started rising up from the roof. "So some insects are here to make a last ditch effort to stop me, eh? You are fortunate, you will get to see history made firsthand. If you live that long..."
"Why! Why the oppression, why the contract?" Fink demanded.
"The demon will make my wish come true, the wish to make all people on this Earth totally lame! Then I will be the coolest man alive!" the old man laughed maniacally.
"That's the craziest thing I've ever heard..." Gum thought to herself.
"Of course! It all makes sense! Such and obvious an brilliant plan! I should have known!" Fink shook his fist dramatically. Great giant gears between the platform and the towers began to churn. Goji slowly lowered the expertly restored "Devil's Contract" onto the mixing board. There was a sudden shift as the platform ceased rising and began to rotate. The metal bars lowered so the metal spikes touched the platform. As they did, a pulsing rhythm started to play.
"It's a giant record!" Fink realized.
"Yes! Built to the contract's specifications! Goji cackled. Gum had to duck and Fink did a limbo move to lean beneath the metal bar as it passed. Goji's record played an eerie Italian opera. He scratched and mixed the eerie wailing to the electric rhythm and pulsing melody to form a hot beat. The rudies grasped the next beam to be dragged behind it. Fink skated over to the booth and pulled out an iron pipe from his backpack. He struck it, to no effect. Goji laughed. Fink pulled out a pistol and shot the glass, to equally little results.
Gum suddenly heard and indistinguishable electronic sound from behind her and turned, and was picked up by the throat by a cold, metal hand. Gum gagged, prompting Fink to turn. Floating in air holding Gum was a giant robotic version of the Rokokku Rhino. Fink kicked a wallie off the booth to grind the metal beam, leaping at its end to strike the robo rhino with his pipe, Fink landing carefully so he would not jump off the platform. The monster barely felt the attack, throwing Gum into Fink. Fink felt himself being pulled outward. The record was speeding up, increasing centrifuge. As they picked themselves up from a heap, the rhino roared and stomped its foot in midair.
"He's gonna charge!" Fink yelled. They both dived to the side as it rushed forward and embedded its horn in the booth, Goji ignoring the distraction. "Man, I'll bet that thing uses a lot of double As" Fink joked.
"That' it!" Gum snapped her fingers. "Fink, those towers are powering this thing, we've gotta bust them up!"
"I'm always up for smashing something!" Fink cheered enthusiastically, brandishing his pipe. He took off toward the edge of the record, jumping off as he reached the gears. Fink landed on a big gear, waited for it to rotate him to the other side, then jumped onto another and repeated the jump to land on the tower. Gum was somewhat awed, a mistake would mean falling to one's death, and Fink busted the hard trick without a moment's hesitation. He started to bash the tower to pieces with his pipe. Gum waited for the record to rotate her over to the other side and leapt onto a wire leading to the other tower, then began to stomp the bars of the tower till they bent and broke. Robo rhino pulled its horn out of the booth, levitated over to Fink and opened its mouth. Fink leapt off the tower onto another gear as a searing jet of flame reduced the tower to slag.
"Whoa, and you can cook and egg with it too!" Fink exclaimed, jumping onto the record. Gum broke another support and the tower began to creak and groan. She jumped off to grind across the wire. The robo rhino became motionless and fell down into the clouds below. As Gum's tower collapsed, it yanked the wires out with it. Gum dove to grab the edge of the record as her support fell out from under her, holding on with one hand as gravity and centrifuge tried to throw her off.
"Gum!" Fink shouted. He dashed and slid over to the edge of the record and grabbed Gum's arm just before she fell. He grabbed her arm with his other hand, but found centrifuge was making him slide toward the edge and he had to let go to hold onto the record with one hand. The needles were getting close to the center of the record.
"It's almost time!" Goji laughed joyously.
"Fink, I'm slipping!" Gum shrieked.
"I won't let you fall!" Fink gritted his teeth.
"You have to let go, stop him before it's too late!" Gum cried.
"I'd rather be a nerd with you than hip without you..." he strained. Gum's mouth dropped, tears formed in her eyes.
There was a crackle of static as the needle hit the center of the record. The record slowed to a stop as the music died. Fink pulled Gum back up onto the platform. Nothing else happened.
"No! Why isn't it working!" Goji threw a tantrum of disbelief. Suddenly, he had to shield himself as the window cracked by the rhino shattered as Fink hit it with his pipe. Dropping the pipe, he grabbed Goji and dragged him out through the hole and pressed him up against the booth wall.
"Cause it was probably just an old indie record, a hoax, ya kook," Fink punched him playfully in the shoulder.
Goji covered his face with his arms, "Please forgive me! I'm just an eccentric old man who wanted to be cool!"
"You don't force people to think you're cool, they're just supposed to admire you, that's what cool is," Fink went on like a cheesy after-school special. "You're not supposed to try to be cool, caring what other people think is the anti-cool," he shook Goji hard now sternly, then threw him to the ground. "Now no more being shady, cause you know I'll beat your ass if you are, right?" Goji nodded meagerly. The record locked back into place on the roof. "Good," Fink nodded and walked with Gum to the elevator, the sea of workers and armed guards that had formed parting to make room for them.
Gum had trouble saying anything the rest of the night. The whole thing had been too weird for her.
When they left the building, it was raining.
"Huh..." Fink looked up and held out a hand to catch the droplets. "I guess it was a low pressure front after all."
