Previously, on The Tale of Roy and Samantha:
When we last saw them, Roy and Samantha had just met and were heading through the wasteland that was once Roy`s village towards his home, in the hope that they can find his equipment chest; inside, they expect to find a working compass and various other supplies to aid them on their journey, even though they have no idea what that journey is…
Chapter Two:
"How much equipment do you really have, anyway?" Samantha asked.
"Why are you asking, you seem to know everything I do, don`t you?" Roy replied dismissively.
Samantha, upon realizing that she could avoid conversation with her stubborn companion, reached one hand to her temple, squeezed her eyes shut to ward off any external distractions, and concentrated. Almost immediately, she found herself bombarded by sights, images and sounds. She saw a younger Roy sitting in the kitchen, the sink overflowing with dirty dishes and the counters spattered with food stains.
A wave of embarrassment crept over Samantha as she destroyed every secret and violated any sense of privacy. In vain, she attempted to filter through the relevant memories for the ones concerning Roy's inventions. However, she found that even those were inextricably intertwined with his emotions. She saw him unveiling his first invention to his parents, a device capable of making the perfect Peanut Butter and Jelly mix. She felt as he did: first confusion and frustration when the device failed to function as intended, followed by elation and pride when the device finally applied the spread successfully.
Samantha continued in that vein until a loud voice from the real world snapped her from her trance-like state. "Are you okay? You just stared into space for like a minute." Roy asked out of concern.
"I'm fine" Samantha whispered. "It's just hard and I wish I could apologize to you for the invasion of privacy. I never meant to do it, you know, but it just happened anyway." She explained.
"Huh, can`t say that I know what it's like to download somebody`s memories, but I can empathize, sorta," Roy remarked as he stepped over a charred wooden beam.
"You didn`t answer my question: how much equipment do you have?" Samantha asked.
"Truth is, I lost count. Being an inventor is not about the glamour or the success. It's about finding new uses for things that have always existed or to solve a problem that people didn't know they had. But most of all, being an inventor is about failing over and over and learning to move on from those failures. That chest is full of the things that I've built and couldn't find a use for and by my reckoning, I've failed a lot more than I succeeded." Roy explained.
The pair continued surveying the ruins for some time until Samantha asked, "You seem to be doing just fine. I mean, you've only just lost your home and quite possibly your family, but you`re still going strong. That's surprising since you usually don`t deal with failure this well." she asked.
"Huh, I don`t know, Samantha, I think it might be the possibility that this whole thing is just a dream, or I could have gotten hit in the head harder than I thought, I guess we`ll see in time which turns out to be true," Roy replied. "but in my opinion, this is all a dream." He said coldly.
"Why would you say that?" Samantha asked Roy, "I know I`m here, so who are you to say whether or not I exist?"
"Because this is all too much," Roy stated, gesturing towards the devastated village around them. "Think about it: first, my brother wrecks the barracks and I get blamed for it. Then, I get sent off to be exiled, for a single day; I return only to find that Eggman had invaded a village that I know is very hard to find, and then to top it all off, you come along: a beautiful girl that claims to have all of my memories and is somehow indestructible; you're just a figment of my overactive imagination and all this-" he said motioning to the ruins all about him "-is just a dream."
"Believe me I'm just as confused as you are," Samantha said. "You see before I met you I came from a place that I don`t even understand and now you`re telling me that the place I can see with my own two eyes doesn`t exist, that`s just stupid!" she yelled.
Roy`s face twisted up with anger, "Alright, let me ask you one quick question to prove whether or not you exist. If you can`t answer it, then you don`t exist and this is all a dream and when I wake up Knothole will be just fine," He said conceitedly. "If you can answer it, I'll admit that you exist and none of this is a dream."
"Go ahead, I'll play your silly game," Samantha said confidently.
"Where were you born?"
Samantha was at a loss for words. Out of all the myriad of questions that Roy could have asked her that was perhaps the only one she could not answer. "I-I don`t know." she replied while staring intently at the floor, as though it would somehow provide the answer to her questions.
"See, I told you, this is all a dream and therefore you don`t exist-" Roy stated confidently. "And when I wake up, I`ll find myself still in my room with of this nonsense never happening, you understand?" Roy said elated as he turned and walked away.
Samantha caught up in just a few steps and interjected, "Well if this is a dream, then why don`t you just 'wake up' and stop teasing me with reality." She said.
"What do you mean by, 'teasing me with reality'?" Roy asked, his voice tainted with cold and dismissive anger, like that of an artist that is disappointed in their work.
"What I mean, is that I just got here and up till now I had no idea how much I was missing after all this time," Samantha replied; her voice breaking. "so why don`t you just wake up so I can go back to whiling my time away in a void while the heartache of knowing what I had and lost is still small enough to deal with!" She cried.
Roy`s resolve was thoroughly shaken. He wrung his hands, straightened his back and brushed the dust from his clothing while drawing in a deep breath to recover. "Sorry, but I want to see how this dream is going to play out, so I guess you`re going to have to get used to being here for a while," Roy said; his voice was cold, detached and dripping with sarcasm, like someone that was watching all this through a television screen.
"Humph, good enough for me; at least I know there`s no indecision on your part," Samantha replied; her voice was equally sarcastic and surprisingly absent of her previous sadness.
The two did not speak for the rest of the walk through the remains of Knothole until they came to what was once a street, but now resembled a freshly ploughed field of bricks and concrete came upon a burnt husk that was once a home. In fact, it was good fortune that he could recognize the street he was on at all for the surroundings resembled a no-mans-land more than it did a village, save for the odd building façade or two lying around in the pale brown-grey rubble and snow. In fact, if not for the familiar, and somehow still standing, door, Roy was fairly certain that he would not have even noticed his home.
"Come on, my room is near the back," Roy said as he entered through what was left of the doorway. "
Are you sure that your equipment chest survived?" Samantha asked as she entered behind him.
"It can take a beating, don`t worry," Roy replied confidently.
As they made their way through the decimated house, Samantha could not help but feel borrowed memories flooding her mind, she could remember running through the hallway playing tag indoors with Roy`s little brother; Reggy. She smiled a little only to have it fade as quickly as it appeared when she had an epiphany that she had no childhood of her own.
Roy at that point could not care less about the house, or even the possibility that his family was dead. To Roy, they were all fine, in fact, he was somewhat relieved; he`d always wondered what it would be like if they were all gone, not because he wanted them gone, but simply because it was a question that he wanted to know the answer to, and this dream he was having was perfect for answering it. in Roy`s eyes, he was not hurting anyone; this was all a dream, so there was no one to hurt.
The two of them made their way to the back of the house and found that Roy`s room was intact; except for the bed, which had a ceiling joist impaled in the center of it. At the foot of Roy`s trashed bed was a rectangular, mahogany chest with a flat lid and heavy cast iron metal bands acting as hinges; it looked like it weighed a ton. After brushing cinders of the ceiling off the lid, he opened up the chest with a creaking sound.
As far as Samantha could ascertain from Roy`s memories, the inventions that were kept neat and orderly in the cases on the right were the ones that Roy had already found a use for, but the items that were left in the pile to the left were the inventions that Roy could not find a real use for, and were left in a disorganized heap to be forgotten.
As Roy started to pull out the items in the cases, Samantha saw that all of them had very clear uses, there was a rifle, a backpack that seemed to be made completely of metal, yet it folded and bent as though it were made of fabric, as well as several other useful items.
All of the items in the cases were indeed useful, but Samantha, guided by Roy`s memories, was more interested in the pile of inventions on the left. Samantha surveyed each item with great interest, looking at one after another and putting each one carefully back into the chest so she did not break them. Each of the items sparked another one of the memories that she had garnered from Roy, some of them made her laugh a little, while others made her wince with phantom pain from Roy getting his fingers shut in a casing or zapped or even getting hit with a poorly aimed hammer.
Roy chanced to look over and see Samantha looking through his old inventions; the look in her eyes was familiar to him, he`d had it in his own eyes many times before.
It was the look of curiosity and wonder of what could be, and Roy could not help but wonder, Why did she tell me to wake up, dreams don`t do that, what`s going on here?
"Ok, it looks like we have very thing we need, so we should get going, Samantha," Roy said as he stood up and put the metallic backpack on in favor of his original canvas one, "we have to hurry along if we`re to find out what we`ll find northwards."
"Um, do you have the compass that you needed?" Samantha asked.
"Yep, got it right here," Roy replied, showing Samantha a grey compass with a black string for a handle, "now, we should get going." He added before leaving.
"Hey, what about the rest of this stuff, isn`t it useful somehow?" Samantha asked Roy just as he was about to leave the room.
"What about it? None of it has a use. You know everything I do, don't you? Just look through my memories and you`ll understand." Roy replied.
"I disagree, there has to be some kind of use for these, and although I don`t know what they are yet, I`ll find out sooner or later," Samantha firmly stated.
"How do you suppose we`re going to able to use any of it? We can`t even carry it, that chest alone weighs half a ton, that`s partly the reason why I use it to hold my inventions." Roy said while turning away to keep walking down the hall.
"I don`t know what you talking about, you keep saying that this thing is heavy, but it doesn`t feel all that heavy," Samantha commented.
"What are you talking about?" Roy said as he turned back around to find out.
"What the heck; how are you carrying that!?"
Samantha stood in the middle of the room with an easy smile. Roy`s equipment chest slung over her shoulder as though it weighed nothing more than a feather.
"I`m getting kinda sick of being ordered around. You're not the boss of me and I'm going to start making decisions on my own" Samantha stated calmly, "and one of those things is that we're bringing these along with us and that's that."
"Ok… fine, whatever you want, just so long as you don`t drop it on me…" Roy felt a cold chill running up his spine, "is there anything else you want to have a say in?" Roy asked.
"Well, I do need a change of clothes, I didn`t think about it before, but this cloak is completely threadbare and since this is all a dream, it shouldn`t be too hard to find something else for me to wear," Samantha replied.
"Err, yeah, there`s probably there`s some clothing that could fit you in my mother`s stuff, but I doubt my parent's room survived,"
"Oh, nonsense, if this is all a dream, then the clothing I need should be easy to find," Samantha replied. "in fact, if this is a good dream we might even find a whole outfit all ready for me to wear." She added with a heavy note of sarcasm.
"My dream is making fun of me… that`s a new one, all things considered; I can`t tell if this is a really good dream or a very bad nightmare."Roy thought to himself. "Well, if we`re looking for clothing, we`ll need to head to the laundry room. It`s in the basement, and there's a good chance to find something wearable..." He said aloud.
When they arrived at the entrance in the kitchen, they found the door to the basement blocked by a fallen roof joist. "Oh, this is just great, let me guess, this is one of those dreams where I have to solve a puzzle; you know I`ve heard of those, but I never thought that they would be this annoying." Roy exclaimed in annoyance.
"Ok, now I know that you`re off your rocker. I don`t know what you`re going on about with puzzles and all that nonsense and I don`t care." Samantha commented.
Samantha set down the equipment chest and said. "Now if you`ll excuse me, I`m going to get that beam out of the way so I can get some clothing."
"How are you going to do that? That thing has to weigh at least a couple of tons." Roy asked.
Samantha flexed her one free arm while peering at the chest on her other before saying, "From the looks of things I`m a lot stronger than normal, so I think I can simply just move this other thing out of the way and then we can get on with our apparently illusionary lives."
"You`re not going to let that go, are you?" Roy asked.
"Not until you realize that you`re wrong," Samantha retorted.
Without so much as a grunt of exertion, Samantha lifted the joist and tossed it aside like it was made of Styrofoam, sending it sailing across the room with a loud crash. "Now, let`s go find out if there`s something down there for me to wear," Samantha commented as she made her way down the stairs (the door broke off its hinges when Samantha picked up the joist).
"Er, yeah, I-I guess that works…" Roy stammered as he reflexively began to follow her down the stairs. He was too flustered at this point to construct complex sentences.
When they reached the bottom of the stairs, they found the basement mostly intact, save for a section of metal complete with the red and orange logo of Robotnik. "Well, that`s interesting…" Samantha said.
"Yeah, I can agree with you there, imagine what that piece of shrapnel could have come from…" Roy said as he went over to the shrapnel, completely ignoring everything else; his eyes began to rapidly scan the shrapnel, assessing each and every one of its possible purposes.
"Hello, Roy, you still there?" Samantha asked, but Roy did not reply, he just stood there, staring at the shrapnel.
"Ifhe`s going to just keep staring at the piece of shrapnel, I think I`ll take this opportunity to change my clothes while he`s not paying attention. That's a bit odd though, Roy doesn`t usually ignore people when he`s using his Instant Design, that much is certain." Samantha thought.
Then she began to peruse through the clothing, but she could not find anything that fit her in the clean clothing or even the dirty clothing, but she finally found something suitable in the dryer.
"Ah, much better, that old clothing was really starting to feel all picky," Samantha commented as she tossed her rags into a nearby trash can.
Samantha did not know how much of a fashion sense she had, but as she gazed at her own reflection in a miraculously intact full body mirror she found herself enjoying her new ensemble. Samantha was now wearing a white t-shirt, black denim pants, thick brown gloves that looked like they were for welding and a pair of white running shoes that she found in a shelf next to the washing machine.
"Ok, I`ve changed, Roy, you can turn around now," Samantha said aloud, "Hey, Roy, you alright?" Samantha asked, but Roy just stood stock still.
Samantha waved her hand in front of his face to attract his attention, but even that did not make him move. "Hey, Roy, snap out of it, hey!" Samantha shouted, but Roy stayed where he was.
Then Samantha decided to shake Roy`s shoulder a little to get him to respond, but when she did, Roy suddenly started to back away from the piece of shrapnel as if it had somehow started to attack him.
Roy stumbled backwards and fell over a laundry basket in his haste to get away from the shrapnel.
"Hey, Roy, what the heck are you doing? Stop!" Samantha shouted as Roy continued to try to get away from the shrapnel, even to the point of aimlessly clamoring at the wall in his bid to escape, but through all of it, Roy neither made a sound save for his frantic breathing nor recognized that Samantha was there.
Samantha quickly got a hold of Roy by the shoulders and said. "What`s going on, Snap out of it, now!" while staring him face to face. His eyes came into focus and he looked at Samantha with recognition in his eyes.
"Umm, why do you have me by the shoulders?" Roy inquired.
"Oh my gosh… I think you may have had a 'psychotic break'!" Samantha replied.
"That doesn`t make sense, people don't have 'psychotic breaks' while they`re dreaming-" Roy began to say.
"Get this through your thick skull: This. Isn't. A. Dream!" Samantha started the same way she would to a slightly dim-witted child, interrupting Roy, "You`re in the real world and you're gonna get us both killed if you keep up with this 'I`m in a dream' nonsense-"
"Fie woman! Fie!" Roy yelled at Samantha, "I don`t need sympathy over injuries that don`t exist from someone that is nothing more than a figment of my imagination!"
"I don`t care if you think that this is a dream or not," Samantha shouted back, "I know I`m real, and your opinions won`t change that!"
Samantha took a couple of steps back from Roy, struggling not to slap him back to reality. She drew a few deep breaths through her nose to regain her composure. After she had finally regained it, Samantha finally spoke, "Ok, until you get a firmer grip on reality, you`re not making any more decisions," she stated, "I`m not about to stand idly by while I'm being led off a cliff by someone who thinks that they won`t hit the bottom."
"So what now, do we flip coins, draw lots?" Roy asked sarcastically.
"I will be making the decisions; you have a problem with that?" Samantha replied, shooting Roy a cold look.
Roy felt another chill run up his spine, "Err, no ma`am." He said reflexively.
The heck, she`s using my lines against me; what`s up with this crazy dream? Roy thought.
"Good, now the next thing we need to do is to find some food and a way to get your head patched up, then we head… north was it?" Samantha said authoritatively.
"Yeah, that`s what Hershey said," Roy replied, "but how do you suppose we`ll find food, much less something to patch up these apparently imaginary wounds?"
"First off, enough of the 'I`m just dreaming' talk-" Samantha replied; noting the blue-black mark on the back of Roy's head that was visible though his fur. "Secondly, there are plenty of places where we can find some food, and as for your injury, I think there`s something in your 'useless' inventions that I think will do the trick," she added.
Then Samantha turned towards the stairs and said. "Follow me, I left the equipment chest upstairs." Before heading up the stairs.
Roy followed and when he reached the top, Samantha was already looking through the equipment chest for the invention she was talking about.
After a couple of seconds, she stood up holding what looked like a high-tech tape roller.
"I know people often say that duct tape fixes everything. But I'm going to give it a pass when it comes to traumatic head injuries. Haven't you picked up any common sense from me; like, at all!?" Roy commented.
"True…" Samantha replied. "but this can be used to apply a rolled up bandage; provided you tweak it a little first; think you can do it?" She asked him.
"Probably, but I need to know exactly what you need it to do before my 'Instant Design' can work properly. Besides, why are you asking me? You have my knowledge; you should be able to invent things just as well as I can." He asked with a shrug of his shoulders.
"Well, from what I've discerned, 'Instant Design' isn't just memory, there`s a biological factor that you have that I don`t," Samantha explained, "simply put: I can't do what you can."
"Huh, I never thought about that," Roy commented, "so, what was it that you needed that to do?" He asked Samantha.
"It needs to be able to make the application of bandages easier as well as make it so they don`t slip off accidentally after application," Samantha explained.
"Hmm… alright then, let me see that real quick." Roy said while reaching for the tape applier.
Samantha handed tape roller over to Roy and before it even left her hand Roy had already begun to rearrange it, removing the tape roll and replacing it with a roll of fabric that was in the equipment chest and then adding what looked like a glue dispenser to the upper part of the roller. His hands seemed to blur as they moved on their own and as though he had been working with the same device for the past twenty years. He managed all the modifications without looking at the item he was working on half the time.
"There we are, I think that`ll work," Roy said as he handed the new bandage applier to Samantha, "just press that button to begin applying, then release to cut it off and apply the setting glue at the same time." He explained.
"Wow, that was quick even for you," Samantha commented as she looked at the new device, "are you alright, I thought that you said that your head injury caused your 'Instant Design' to be painful to use?" She asked Roy.
"Yeah, I did, and my head is screaming right now, so could you please hurry up and use that thing to help me; you said that you had a plan," Roy replied. "if I were to guess, I would say that you plan to use the pressure from the bandages to stop my injury from getting worse, right?"
"Since when did you have that ability, you know, Instant Design?" Samantha asked curiously as she pulled a tab of bandage from the end of the roller to get it ready for use.
"Since I was little. I've always had a passion for machines. I guess savant would be a better term for it. I could see how all the bits and pieces meshed together to form the greater whole and how they could be rearranged to make something new, I`ve even used it to figure out chemical formulas, but I`ve never tested any of those." Roy elaborated.
"That sounds so incredible." Samantha whispered.
"Well, I sure wish my parents thought that was the case. They were horrified when I dismantled the dishwasher when I was six and they had me grounded for a week even though I was fairly certain I could have put it back together if they let me. For this one, in particular, I took a moment to assess what it would take to ease my headache, and the roller seemed to be perfectly suitable for the job." Roy explained as Samantha began to apply the bandage to his head.
Samantha applied the bandage around the top of his head, making sure not to get Roy`s ears caught underneath as well as being as gentle as possible in order to not injure him further; when she reached the wound on the back of Roy`s head, Samantha took a clean piece of fabric and used it as gauze to cushion it.
"There we are, I think that works, you know, I wonder why you didn`t realize how to fix this yourself; I mean, I did use your memories to figure this out," Samantha said.
"I`m wondering that myself, perhaps I was supposed to be helped by you as part of this dream-" Roy began to say.
"Oi, enough with that dream nonsense, it`s really getting on my nerves," Samantha said exasperatedly, "ok, ignoring your nonsense, we still have to find some provisions so we don`t starve while we're heading to something, we don`t know what, but we know it`s north."
"I do know where we can find some provisions, or to put it a different way, I just realized where some might be," Roy said.
"Well, it's good to see that you`re getting your head around straight, at least a little," Samantha commented, "if you think there`s something there, then lead the way." She added.
"Does this mean that I`m allowed to take the lead?" Roy asked.
"Do you still think that this is all a dream?" Samantha asked.
"Uh, yeah, I do."
"Then the answer is no," Samantha said curtly.
"Ugh, fine…" Roy sighed, "Look, let's head on over to the Freedom Fighter`s barracks; it`s that way." He added while pointing in its direction.
The two of them made their way outside and headed towards the barracks, taking pretty much the same path as Roy had taken yesterday when he was with his brother, Reggie. The village was covered in the same amount of snow as well, albeit covered with a thin layer of black and grey ash at this point.
Along the way, they passed several destroyed buildings, but one storefront in particular caught Samantha`s attention.
"Hey, I remember this place, well, sort of; you used to buy all your tunes here," Samantha commented as she surveyed the storefront.
The storefront was completely caved in, leaving only a small opening through which to get inside.
The shop`s sign, however, was intact enough for Samantha to make out "'Z`s Music Zone'…yep, this is the place," she commented, "weren`t you friends with the owner, Zoenardo?" She asked.
"Not really, it was Reggie's favourite hangout. I was just a regular and we made some small-talk, but it never meant more than that…" Roy replied.
"Look, I`m going to take a look inside to see if any of the candy bars are left in the drawer under his cash register," Samantha said as she set the equipment chest down on the snow and started to go through the minuscule opening.
"Uh, why are you doing that?" Roy asked.
"Because you need something to eat and those candy bars are there for the taking, assuming they`re still intact-" Samantha replied, "-besides if we leave them they`ll be food for the rats and cockroaches."
"Well, I can`t argue with that, but isn`t this stealing?" Roy asked from outside the shop.
"Then, in that case, you can go right ahead and say it`s all my fault," Samantha replied, "but I think it`s better to eat now and worry later," She thought of as she got all the way through the opening.
The inside of the shop looked just as bad as the outside; the ceiling for most of the shop had come down and made several areas impassable without a great deal of effort.
"You find anything!?" Roy shouted from outside the shop.
"Yeah, but you`re going to have to get out of the way real quick; I`m going to need a bigger opening to get these things out!" Samantha shouted from inside the shop.
"What the heck, I know candy bars aren`t that big, so what is she doing?" Roy thought as he stepped out from in front of the store.
"Alright, I`m out of the way!" Roy shouted when he was sure he was out of harm`s way. Roy didn't hear a reply and was about to ask what Samantha had found in the shop before he saw a store shelf sail out of the front of it; it went all the way across the street and into the building at the other side; shoving the sign to the side a little and creating a new opening in it that was large enough to fit whatever Samantha had found through it with room to spare in the process.
"What the hell are you doing, are you nuts!?" Roy screamed as he backed away from the storefront out of sheer reflexive panic.
After dust and snow settled, Samantha calmly walked out of the new hole in the shop as if it was a normal day and she had just bought something from the store.
That 'something' was a large, cubic case of CDs that was in surprisingly good condition, "Check it out, Roy, now we`ll have something to listen to on our travel north." Samantha exclaimed with a note of glee.
"You`re telling me that you went into a building to find some food and you ended up stealing a bunch of music, what are you thinking?" Roy stammered as he tried to figure out what just happened.
"Ok, two things: firstly, I found a couple of protein bars, so I did find what I was looking for." Samantha explained as she held up a handful of CDs "Secondly, I`m not stealing these. I'm saving them from being destroyed, and heck, if we ever met Zoenardo on our way north I'd totally give them back."
Roy felt a stab of pain in his heart, sure he wasn't exactly the most popular guy in town, but that didn't mean he felt it right to steal from his village "Firstly, that's stealing. Secondly, the chances that we`ll meet up with some guy who happens to live in the same village as I am is as remote as the chance that he`s still alive after what just happened last night." Roy stated.
"Careful, you`re starting to sound like you believe that this isn`t a dream after all," Samantha commented sarcastically.
"Ha, ha, very funny, this is still a dream, but I still doubt that my dream includes the guy from the music store, that`s just silly," Roy replied.
"Well, even if we don`t find him, it would still be a shame to just leave all this stuff lying around and besides, you`re not even carrying it, I am," Samantha stated, "plus, provided your Walkman survived we`ll have something to keep us entertained so we don`t get any crazier than you already are."
Roy's face scrunched up in vexation when he heard the emphasis on 'you' "Hey, now that`s uncalled for!" He snapped.
"Oh, come now. You're the one constantly telling me that I am nothing more than a dream." Samantha snapped back.
"Fine by me, it doesn`t look like you`ll listen anyway…" Roy commented in an act of defiance.
"Well, now that that`s settled, let`s get these into the chest," Samantha said as she opened the equipment chest and began to place the case of CDs inside.
"Um, what about the protein bars?" Roy asked.
"Oh, right, here you are." Samantha replied as she retrieved a small cardboard box out of the CD case, the side of the box read, 'Super Sonic Protein: run as fast as our hero with just one bite!'
She handed the half-full box over to Roy with about eleven bars. "Heh, well, I knew that Zone was into physical training, but I didn`t think he`d fall for such a cheap slogan-".
"Uh, didn`t you buy the exact same product about a week ago?" Samantha interjected, "Don`t go making a comment until after you`ve checked your facts."
"Hey, quit using my lines on me; just because you can claim to have all of my memories doesn`t mean that you get to be me all of a sudden there`s more to a person than just their past." He added.
"I know, but that doesn't` mean that I can`t say 'your lines'; you don`t own sentences, nobody does," Samantha replied.
"Well, it still a silly slogan," Roy commented as he opened one of the bars and took a bite, "but these aren`t half bad."
"Yeah, I know, and they also are providing you with enough energy for you to start healing that head wound of yours," Samantha commented, "assuming you`re not so brain damaged that you can`t use your healing ability, that is."
"Wait, how do you know. Oh right-." Roy said.
"Yes, and assuming that we replace those bandages regularly and it doesn`t get infected in the meantime, I know that you have the capability to get that head wound of yours healed in about three days, give or take a few hours; that is," Samantha said.
"Yeah, that makes sense," Roy commented, "I guess I should start healing myself at this point." He added as he placed his hand over his wound; his hand immediately began to emit a barely visible deep-red glow from its palm.
"Are you healing alright, or is that red glow actually your head lighting on fire?" Samantha asked.
"Very funny, I'm healing just fine, thank you," Roy replied as his hand continued to glow softly, "I`ll be done in a minute, then we can get going." He mentioned.
After a few minutes, Roy`s hand stopped glowing and he took it off of his wound, "Ok, that`s enough for now," He said, "With a wound this bad, I might cause problems for myself if I heal it too quickly."
Then Samantha closed the lid on the equipment chest and slung it over her shoulder and said, "Alright then, now that our little detour is over and done with, let`s move on to the barracks, shall we?"
"Yeah, you`re right," Roy commented, "it`s actually not that far away from here, just a couple of blocks."
The two of them made their way through the ruined village and over to the barracks and found it, surprisingly, intact.
"Ok, that`s a little odd, one would think that this building would be the first thing that the Eggman would target," Roy commented as they neared the building, "so why is it still standing? I mean, it doesn`t even have a scratch."
"I don`t know either, that is a little weird," Samantha commented in agreement.
When they tried to get into the building, they found the door locked.
"Ok, this just keeps getting weirder; this door is only ever locked when the soldiers are doing practice maneuvers, so why is it locked now?" He asked.
"I don`t know that either, but that`s not really all that important," Samantha replied, "what is important is whether or not this building has the supplies we need for our trip northward; so in that sense, I`m going to break that lock so we can get on with our lives." She added as she set the equipment chest back down.
Samantha stepped in front of the door and pulled back her fist with the intention of knocking the door off its hinges with a single punch.
With an audible whooshing sound, Samantha`s fist rocketed towards the door, only to find that instead of knocking it off its hinges, Samantha`s fist put a perfect hole straight through and soundly cemented her hand in place.
"Ah, crap, now I`m stuck…" Samantha complained as she tried to get her hand out of the door, shaking it around in its frame in the process.
"Oh, wow, I did not see that coming," Roy commented.
"Oh, you quit it with your sarcasm!" Samantha snapped at Roy, her hand still stuck in the door.
"Actually, I wasn`t being sarcastic; I honestly did not see this coming, though it is amusing," Roy replied.
"Well, regardless of what you did or did not predict, the fact is that I`m still stuck; so do you have any idea on how to get my hand out of this thing?" Samantha asked.
"Well, you could just rip the door off its hinges with the new leverage you have, but that would still leave the door on your hand and might bring the side of the barracks down on top of us in the process," Roy said aloud, but mostly to himself, "let`s see, in order to get that door off your hand, I would need to- oh, that`ll work!" He exclaimed as he started for the equipment chest.
"So I take it you`ve figured something out, right?" Samantha asked as Roy began to rummage through the equipment chest.
"Yeah yeah, I have, hold on a second…" Roy`s voice trailed off as he continued to search for something in the equipment chest; the lid obscured Samantha`s view, so she could not tell what Roy`s plan entailed.
"There we are; I think this will work!" Roy exclaimed as he stood up from behind the equipment chest while holding what looked like a piece of handheld welding equipment.
"Uh, what is that?" Samantha asked as Roy made his way over to her with his new invention.
"This, is an arc-welder, and I`m going to use this to cut the door off of your arm," Roy explained, "so if you`ll hold still really quick, I`ll get that off of you."
Then Roy flicked a switch on the side of the arc-welder and it immediately came alive with a hissing crackle; a powerful stream of electricity now coursed between two nodes at the end of it, which was now pointed towards the hole that Samantha`s hand was stuck in.
"Um, a-are you sure that thing is safe?" Samantha asked nervously as the arc-welder drew closer to her arm.
"Yep, I designed it to be safe and precise, and beyond that, your incredible durability should keep you from getting hurt, even from the arc itself," Roy explained.
"Are you sure about that? I mean, we don`t even know how much damage I can take, for all we know, you could end up slicing my arm off with that thing." Samantha protested.
"Then I`ll just have to not touch you with the beam, but from the data, I saw through my goggles, your arm should have no problem with the molten metal that will come off of the door as I cut it," Roy explained.
"Alright, but if you`re wrong, then I am going to knock your head off," Samantha said.
"Okay then, I`m cutting the door now, just hold still for a moment," Roy said as he began to melt a spot in the door.
From that melted spot, Roy proceeded to carve out a section of the door with Samantha`s arm directly in the center, but when he was above Samantha`s arm, a bead of molten metal developed and dripped on her arm.
However, apart from charring an exposed piece of leather from Samantha`s glove, the molten steel simply slid off of her as if it were simply water, not even her fur was damaged; Samantha noticed this, but said nothing to Roy as he continued to carve a hole in the door.
"Alright, I think that`ll work," Roy said as he stood up and set the arc-welder to a lower setting, "go ahead and pull your arm out so I can continue to cut the door."
Samantha pulled her hand out of the door along with the piece; the metal had cooled somewhat, so no more molten pieces were dripping off of it.
"Holy crap! That door was three inches thick; you just put your fist through three inches of solid steel without breaking a sweat!" Roy exclaimed as he reviewed the disk of metal that was still attached to Samantha`s wrist.
"Yeah, yeah, I`m really strong, but now how do I get this thing off of me?" Samantha asked while waving the chunk of the door on her arm around.
"Well, since it is no longer attached to the side of the barracks, you might just want to rip it off of your arm; you are strong enough to do that; that much is certain," Roy replied.
"Yeah, you`re right; one moment…" Samantha said as she took ahold of the chunk of metal with her other hand.
Her hand tightened on the chunk of metal, and with no real strain on her face caused her fingers to embed themselves into the steel, but when she pulled her hand away, she simply pulled a piece of the steel chunk off of her arm.
"Ok, that`s a little irritating," Samantha commented as she looked at the now greatly deformed piece of steel.
"Maybe you should keep ripping pieces off until the rest of it just falls off." Roy suggested.
"Yeah, I was just thinking that," Samantha commented, "while I'm getting this thing off me, why don`t you finish cutting that door down." She said Roy.
"I`m already done; take a look," Roy replied smugly while gesturing towards the now empty doorway; two pieces of metal were left behind where the door attached to its hinges and another was where the door`s lock was; heat waves were emanating from the tip of the arc-welder as Roy held it in a pose that he thought looked cool, but really just looked silly.
"You got the door open? Well, good, now just give me a moment so I get this this off the rest of the way, then we can go get some supplies." Samantha commented as she turned her attention back to the annoyance on her arm.
Samantha proceeded to rip chunks of metal from her unwanted accessory, sending handfuls of steel flying off into the distance in the process. After a few seconds of this, Samantha succeeded in freeing her arm.
"Whew, finally, I`m glad that`s over," Samantha commented as she shook her hand around a little to relieve the stiffness it had developed, "but it looks like I`m going to have to replace these." She added with a note of disappointment as she surveyed her now ruined gloves; one was charred and torn at the wrist and the other had its fingers ripped off during the issue with the steel chunk.
"Maybe we`ll find another pair in here, it is a military barracks, after all. It's gotta be chocked full of good equipment." Roy suggested.
"Yeah, sounds about right, actually," Samantha said in as she closed the lid on the equipment chest and heated it up.
Samantha rummaged through the barracks first; it was miraculously still intact save for the door that they jest destroyed. Nonetheless, she still had to struggle to fit the equipment chest through the door. Luckily, the inside was sufficiently spacious so she didn't have the same problem.
The inside of the barracks was expansive, easily enough to hold three or four houses inside with room to spare. As Roy and Samantha surveyed the empty hallways and rooms Roy felt a chill creep up his spine. "This is all too weird." He thought.
"I don`t get it, why is everything where it`s supposed to be? I mean, the village was just wiped off the face of the earth, yet all this equipment is just sitting here in perfect order, as if all the soldiers had simply walked out of the door like nothing was going on." Roy wondered as they walked through the surreally clean barracks.
"I was wondering that myself, and this doesn`t look like a coincidence," Samantha said in agreement. "It looks even cleaner than it does when Sally is making an inspection." She mentioned.
"Yeah, that`s true," Roy commented, laughing a little.
"Well, on the bright side of this whole weirdness, it means that this barracks has everything we need for our trip northward," Samantha said, "Hopefully, this includes a new pair of gloves." She added.
"Here," Roy noted pointing at a clearly labeled floor plan that was hanging on the wall, "according to this map on the wall, there is an armory room just through that door over there." Roy said as he pointing towards a door with a symbol of a sword and a shield on the front.
The two of them made their way into the armory room (for once, the door was unlocked and didn`t have to be broken down by Samantha) inside, they found a multitude of weapons and armor, pretty much anything the average soldier could ask for, including a number of choices for a new pair of gloves.
"Now, what do we need for our journey…" Samantha muttered as she looked through the items in the armory.
"Hey, Samantha, I think I found a pair of gloves that should work for you." Roy said.
"Really? Let me see." Samantha commented as she made her way over to Roy, who was standing near a rack that held dozens of pairs of gloves all neatly in a row.
"Here you are." Roy said handing over a pair of sturdy fingerless black canvas gloves over to Samantha.
"What`s with these finger holes?" she asked.
"Well, from the looks of it, these fingerless gloves are meant for the Mole Sapper Company. They routinely break rocks when digging our emergency tunnels and during trench battles," Roy explained, "I figured that these are rugged enough to handle your strength."
"Hmm, makes sense, thanks." Samantha remarked as Roy handed her the gloves.
Samantha peeled off her old pair of gloves, the ones on her right being so fragile that it tore when she attempted to replace them, and then put on the new pair, which fit like very clichéd proverb. "Now that the glove issue is taken care of all we need now is food, and lots of it," Samantha commented as she admired her new pair of gloves.
"This way, mess hall is out this door and to the right edge of the building." Roy replied.
"Good, because I`m starving at this point." Samantha remarked as she started for the door to the armory.
"If you were hungry, why didn`t you eat one of the protein bars that we got from Zone`s shop? There's plenty of em." Roy asked.
"I wasn`t hungry then, but I am now" she complained.
When they arrived at the kitchen, they found it in the same untarnished state as the rest of the barracks. "Now this is getting silly," Samantha commented. "People live here; you`d expect to find some sign of usage, but there`s nothing, not even a dirty cup in the sink!" she continued.
Then Samantha noticed that Roy was about to make a comment, but she cut him off before he could start, "Don`t you even start," She said, "if you start going on about that stupid dream nonsense I swear, I will I`ll slap you." She warned him.
"Yes, ma`am." Roy said reflexively; banishing the thought to the back of his mind and changing tracks "On the bright side at least we know that that we`ll be able to get the food we need." He sain in order to change the subject.
"Yep, but we should try to find something to eat for now as well as something to take with us," Samantha said as she set the equipment chest down in the middle of the kitchen.
"Are we going to cook something, or what?" Roy asked.
"I would like to eat cooked food, but judging from Hershey's face when she handed you that compass, I would be inclined to say that we might have a limited time to reach the rendezvous, so we`ll just have to eat some canned goods and then put the rest away for later use." Samantha replied.
"Well, we can save some of that food in your backpack as well," Roy commented. "I retrieved one from the armory; I figured that it would be a good idea to have a little extra storage space just in case."
"Good idea," Samantha commented. "Now, let`s eat something real quick to get the weight down and then head north, shall we?"
"You know, I never quite caught what Hershey meant by that. What are we even supposed to be looking for?" Roy asked while using a can opener to open a can of stew.
"We`ll probably know it when we see it," Samantha replied as she opened her own.
The pair ate their fill of canned meats and stew (Samantha devouring five whole cans by her lonesome). Upon finishing, they began to load supplies into the backpacks and the equipment chest.
"This is going to get tiresome real fast." Roy complained as he secured his now overladen backpack on.
"Oh, quit complaining; I`m carrying four times as much as you are and I`m not having any problems whatsoever," Samantha commented before humming a merry tune and hefting the equipment chest over her shoulder
"That`s because you`re strong enough to punch a hole through steel; I for one, would not have a chance of doing that without my powered gloves!" Roy grumbled. The pair completed their packing in silence before exiting the barracks and beginning their journey north…
However, as the pair made their way out of the ruined village, they caught the attention of a sinister observer. The bulbous photoreceptors of the mechanical dragonfly widened. Its quad metallic wings slid open and it buzzed into the fading evening light, revealing its slender form to be no bigger than a small bird. Eventually, it came to a stone courtyard in the center of the ruined village where it settled on a spindly branch of a scraggly chestnut tree. Beneath it was a miraculously intact hut with a figure hiding in the shadow.
The metal dragonfly pointed its shiny eyes into the shadow and began to emit a faint red light, not enough luminance to reveal its master, but it was enough to get its attention.
"Really, there are survivors?" Spoke the thin and wiry form, like a metal puppet without strings.
A metallic hand emerged from the shadows, its side an iridescent green. The metal insect flitted onto the hand`s outstretched digits before the arm retracted into the shadowy veil.
"Tell me everything..."
Edited by Zoggerific and yours truly.