Zero and Leviathan both were transferred into Neo-Arcadia, Zero didn't expect a welcome. But when he arrived there was a large number of reploids to see him.
Even though he knew they had despised him they still considered him a legend, he defeated Copy X, he was a famous Maverick hunter and fought many times against many enemies and he has survived so much wars and battles that he was considered to be immortal.
Zero felt the stares he just followed Leviathan. The guardians had apparently set him his own quarters. She led him inside and asked him to wait there, and then she took off leaving him to look at his surroundings:
There was much more room in his quarters that he could ever fill up. There was a large cabinet adjacent to the door and a mirror in the opposite wall.
A large bed decorated the western wall, (Left from the entrance) and above it there was a magnifying picture frame (insert a picture in any size and the frame magnified it to fit it). There was a bedside dresser where he could put alarm clocks or anything else he could imagine.
The eastern part was a doorway leading to another room. A personal repair station:
In case of minor wounds, armor cleaning and weapon fixing when you don't trust the mechanic or maintenance reploid.
"I'll be using this a lot..." Zero said out loud to no one.
He looked down at the scrape Hyena gave him and decided to patch it up.
He entered the repair station and a robotic voice said, "Enter capsule and scanning will initiate." Zero entered a capsule in the middle of the room and a metallic object with a wide rectangle lens started examining him. A yellow light moved all over his body and then the robotic voice announced, "Damage minimal... proceeding with repairs..." some sort of device exited from a gap in the top of the capsule and went down to Zero's knee and started to work on repairing it. It took a minute until it was finished and then the robotic voice said, "Armor cleaning in process..." the capsule immediately filled with some sort of cleaning liquid, that soaked Zero's hair and then through a slit drained down to the sewers.
Zero squeezed his hair dry and surprisingly a hair fan dropped from the gap above and dried his hair completely.
The capsule then opened and Zero went out, he felt great.
He went and looked at himself in the mirror: his hair was neat and in a ponytail as always but it shined, so did his armor. It was actually clean, no dust or dirt in it. It shined and looked great.
Leviathan just entered the room and beckoned him to come with her.
"Listen, there isn't much time. We won't wait for Harpuia and Fefnir to recover. We have located a few abandoned locations near where we were attacked that recently had become active, so we'll go and check them out." She explained as they entered a large and round room, operators clicking on computers all around it.
"Right, the first place is a pyramid ruin. Reconnaissance photos show there are a number of vehicles hid around it, so you and I are going to check it out." Leviathan described the first mission Zero had as a guardian and on a large screen that appeared in the middle of the room were many pictures and floor plans of the pyramid.
"Understood?" Leviathan asked.
Zero nodded and Leviathan pulled out a wrist comm.
"Here, this is our wrist comm. If you need to contact base for reinforcements or for transfer you'll use this. And you'll receive mission objectives with it too." Leviathan installed it in Zero's arm.
"Okay operator transfer us." She informed and just before they transferred Zero managed to ask "Us?"
They arrived outside the pyramid; Zero and Leviathan were looking at the towering triangle in awe.
"What about your helmet?" Zero asked,
"I don't really need it, I just use it underwater so my hair won't get in the way." Leviathan answered and took a step closer to the pyramid.
Zero followed her and they were just about to enter the pyramid when something odd happened: Zero was sure he saw a red Blur in the corner of his eyes. But when he looked there was nothing there.
"Odd..." he said to himself, however Leviathan heard him.
"What?" she asked, following Zero's gaze.
"I was sure I saw something in the corner of my eye but it vanished..." Zero answered quickly.
"Let's just get going, we really should get inside." Leviathan said and turned back to the pyramid, she was about to take a step towards it but Zero pulled her back from her shoulders.
"What the...?" she asked.
"Trap." Zero simply said and pointed to a bear trap hidden behind a thin coat of sand.
"Thanks, could've cost me my leg... I really should be more careful." Leviathan said in embarrassment.
"Ruins like this are filled with traps." Zero said and went forward, slashing the trap with his beam saber.
"Let's go." He beckoned at Leviathan and she followed.
They entered the pyramid, walking along the first long corridor. Ignoring the occasional hieroglyphs that warned them of curses and traps.
Zero had a strange feeling that he was being followed, he turned around occasionally to look behind him but there was nothing there.
After the fifth time it happened Leviathan lost her temper,
"Will you quit doing that?!" she asked annoyed, her eyes shifting from Zero to where he was looking.
"I'm telling you there's something here!" Zero said,
"Well my sensors are not warning me of any high energy levels besides ourselves. So forget about it already!" She yelled.
"Shush!" Zero clapped his hand over her mouth.
"If there is someone here we don't want them to hear us now do we?" Zero said.
He lowered his hand and continued down the corridor.
Leviathan sighed and followed, but as she turned around she though she saw something. She shrugged it off and followed Zero.
There was a fork, left right and straight ahead.
"Let's go right." Zero said after some thinking.
"Shouldn't we split?" Leviathan asked, Zero's plan had made no sense. They could cover much more ground if they split up.
"If, one of us finds the reploids who attacked you; then we should be together because alone they would surely destroy us." Zero explained.
"I see..." Leviathan understood and followed Zero to the right.
They reached a whole new corridor, lined up with statues; their mouths open wide and their hands holding bows.
Zero took a step forwards but just as his floor touched the ground two statues spit out arrows at him, he jumped backwards and the arrows broke on the floor.
"Rats! A trap." Zero exclaimed.
"Wait I know, look do you still have that chain rod?" she asked Zero.
"Yes, why what is it... oh I understand." He said and pulled out his chain rod.
He shot it at the ceiling and it grabbed on.
"Hold on to me." He said to Leviathan and grabbed her around the midsection.
He took a running start and jumped, the chain stretched farther and farther. They were just past the last two statues and Zero let go of the ceiling, they soared the rest of the way until both landed safely on the other side.
"Great idea." Said Zero.
"Thanks, let's move on." Leviathan answered blushing mildly; the strongest and smartest reploid she knew (and he was pretty handsome too) just said she had a great idea. She followed from behind him, looking at the hieroglyphs.
They walked on for what seemed like at least an hour with many twisting corridors until they reached a large room filled with sand.
As soon as they entered it a door rose up from the ground and blocked the way back.
From the sand emerged a figure; whether it was a human or reploid they couldn't tell because of the black cloak he or she was wearing.
Suddenly the man spoke in a chilling voice: "Forward and forward I go, never looking back. My limit no one knows, more of me do they lack. Like a river I do flow, and an eagle I fly.
Now guess if you can and tell me what am I?
But if you guess wrong then you will die."
Zero looked at Leviathan and she stared back.
"Forward and forward I go, never looking back..." Zero mumbled.
"My limit no one knows, more of me do they lack..." Leviathan continued.
"Like a river I do flow, and an eagle I fly." Zero ran the words in his head.
"Now guess if you can and tell me what am I..." Leviathan finished.
The chamber then started filling with sand from every corner, the sand level was rising quickly but the figure didn't move it stayed exactly as it was.
"Oh no... We have to think!" Leviathan said with a fright as the sand reached her boots.
"I know I know!" Zero said and thought frantically of anything that might match the description that the riddle stated.
"Rats!" Leviathan said, "I can't think of anything that might be right!" Leviathan yelled in panic as the sand already reached her hips.
"Grr... what can it be?!" Zero yelled in frustration.
"Zero we kind of lack the time to get mad!" Leviathan yelled as her chest was covered in sand.
"Wait a minute..." Zero said and concentrated.
"Time flies when you're having fun." He said suddenly.
"Do I look like I'm having fun?!" Leviathan yelled as her neck was buried.
"We lack time... time flies... time has no limit... the answer is time!" Zero said, as soon as the word time left his lips for the last time the sand stopped.
The figure disappeared and the sand level started to lower.
"Time! Of course, I should have thought about that..." Leviathan said wiping her arms of sand.
"Lucky you thought of it." She smiled at him in relief.
"Only because you told me I lacked the time to get mad." Zero said.
Leviathan smiled and was about to say something when a stone door groaned and started to slide downwards.
It wasn't the door they had come from, it was another door leading to a tremendous room, in the opposite end of the door stood a giant statue of Thoth; the god of Wisdom, Time, Writing and the Moon.Before the statue stood a reploid clad in red armor, horns decorated his helmet and one of his hands was a ball of spikes. It was Daemon.
Next to him stood another, a reploid with the body of a human but an ibis-like head the reploid was wielding a beam scythe Zero vaguely remembered seeing a scythe resembling this before but couldn't recall where.
"I see you have arrived earlier than I had expected. I am quite surprised you managed to solve the riddle I applaud you Zero and Leviathan but this is as far as you go. Meet Thoth, of the master's making. It's a shame really I had hoped that Neo-Arcadia would destroy the resistance before you guardians can recover. Now play nice." Daemon disappeared in a flash of white as he said the last three words and now Zero and Leviathan were facing Thoth. Thoth raised his scythe and held it with both of his hands and his eyes gleamed in gold.
Zero and Leviathan assumed their battle poses. And Zero could feel in his synthetic skin that this will be a difficult battle.
To be continued...