Neo-Mega-Leg: Flame Strike
The ringing of his alarm clock throbbed dully through Viktor's head. It was 9 o'clock. He had been sleeping for 6 ½ hours, longer than usual, but the addition of Ren had produced a strain on him he was not expecting, both physically and mentally. It had been an exhausting month.
Viktor pulled himself upwards and began to put himself together, piece by piece. First was his arm, then his legs, followed by his third arm and auxiliary power supply.
Viktor washed his face and attended to any other personal hygiene that needed to be done that morning. This routine would almost be considered normal, if one of the steps didn't include polishing the various sockets on his face with protective oil. As often as Viktor did this, he was always a little surprised by the reflection in the mirror. He hardly looked like the man he was years ago. He likely would not have even known this was himself if he weren't looking in the mirror. That face wasn't wearing his mask.
Finally, he completed himself as he felt the mask snap into place on his head. He gave it a precautionary tug to ensure that it was firmly secured in the sockets.
"Satisfactory."
He clothed himself and departed to make breakfast. It was the same routine he had been following for months, only now he had to make an extra serving for Ren. But aside from that, it was the same meal; same fruit, milk, and cricket flour blended together to make a smoothie. It was the most important meal of the day in the most efficient way possible. It only took minutes to prepare and could be consumed on the go through a straw.
He poured the two smoothies and went to go wake Ren. He finished his breakfast before he arrived at the door and placed the empty glass into the hands of one of the guarding automatons. The door was unlocked and Viktor pushed it aside.
Ren was sitting on his cot with a pad of paper in his lap. He was sketching in the old pad, only putting it down when Viktor walked in.
"Good morning," Ren said, "I was beginning to think you had forgotten about me."
"Not likely," Viktor replied, "you are too valuable to abandon."
"That's comforting to know at least, but I gotta know, why'd you lock me in here?"
"As I said, you are valuable, I will not risk you wandering and injuring yourself on unknown equipment."
"Or wandering off?"
"That as well, although you would not have been able to evade me for long if you did. You are still growing accustom to your new leg."
"Sure am. I can put it on and off without your help now. I even paced around this morning. Pacing, like a caged animal. Anyways," he said with a shrug, "I know it's in there good. I'm learning to take care of myself. You don't need to keep me as a prisoner."
"You are not being treated as a prisoner, you are being treated as a patient. If you were a prisoner I would not be as invested in your health. I am as controlling as a well-trained doctor should be."
Viktor handed Ren his breakfast.
"Drink."
Ren put his sketchpad aside and had his breakfast. Viktor looked over at the old pad, likely uncovered from one of the boxes that had been in the storage room. He was genuinely surprised by the quality of the drawing Ren had been working on, and he picked it up to better examine it.
Ren had drawn a realistic still life of his prosthetic, capturing a fair amount of detail and texture in his sketch. Viktor turned the page, expecting more images like it, but was met with disappointment. Every other sketch was a quick doodle of what Ren imagined his robotic limb would be. The last one was titled "Neo-Mega-Leg: Flame Strike," and showed an elated Ren running with an oversized leg with spikes protruding from the toes and knees and more tacky flames painted down its side. Viktor put the pad down.
"They're pretty sweet, aren't they?" Ren asked, "Is mine gonna look anything like them?"
"No." Viktor stated bluntly.
"Not even Flame Strike?"
"Absolutely not. What I made is better than it."
Viktor watched Ren put aside his empty glass.
"If you are ready, let us go." Viktor said.
Ren nodded, grabbed his crutch, and followed Viktor to the training room.
At one time, this high ceilinged room had been an assembly room, but after the factory's closure, the conveyers had all been removed and the remaining machines looted for any valuable parts. When Viktor had moved in, he sold the picked over devices for scrap and converted the large, open room into a gym of sorts.
Ren didn't take Viktor as someone who cared much for body building, or anything athletic for that matter, but the room appeared to be used frequently enough. Though this gym lacked many of the traditional methods for strength training, it housed a variety of tools to help improve more dexterous skills, such as balance. Old scorch marks on the wall hinted at the room's other purpose; to test and train with whatever weapon Viktor was working on. And, as Ren was coming to expect, there was another workbench, though this was one was larger than the one in the operating room and had a chalkboard hanging on the wall beside it. Likely this was so Viktor could design, modify, and test his creations all without having to leave the room. Efficiency, it seemed, was always at the forefront of the scientist's mind.
Viktor led Ren over to a corner of the room that had a balancing beam that stood only a few inches off the ground. He stepped up on top of it, walked to the end, and stepped off. The ease in which he did this, made it difficult to believe that his legs were made of stiff metal instead of natural flesh.
"You will not receive your new leg until you are able to do that." Viktor said, "You may use your crutches as you practice."
"That's it?" Ren asked, "This is gonna be easy. A straight line, and with my crutches no less."
"I will watch."
Ren steadied himself as he put his leg up on the beam. He shifted his weight to the crutch and slowly moved his prosthetic up and onto the beam before him.
"Easy." he boasted.
"Walk." Viktor ordered.
Ren looked down at the beam. He moved his crutch forward and lifted his leg. Immediately, his prosthetic began to wobble. On the floor, this would have been caught by the ground, but on the beam, there was nothing and Ren tumbled off and onto the waiting, cold floor.
"Still think it will be easy?" Viktor asked.
"No," Ren whined as he pulled himself back to his feet.
Falling carefully and then standing back up was something he had had much practice with in the Sump. In no time at all, back onto the beam he went. This time he didn't move his crutch forward quite so far and only lifted his leg instead of stepping with it. For minutes he did this, never moving a step until he stepped off. His arm was aching from overuse. He stretched it for a moment and then climbed back up. Again he spent minutes steading himself, but this time, he attempted a step. His leg still trembled, but not as wildly as before, and steadily, he brought his prosthetic limb around and placed it on the beam before his good one. Then he stepped off.
"One step down." Ren said.
"Nine more to go." Viktor added.
"That's fine, I have the whole day and all of tomorrow and the next day, not the day after though."
"And why is that?"
"I'll be busy."
"And what will you be busy with?"
"Learning to walk on Flame Strike, version 2."
