Rebirth of the Guardians – the long awaited sequel to chapter 17
Chapter 18 – No one likes mountain bandits
…
What the title is true!
Also since kokuhso is 'speaking' again, I'll remind those of you who forgot (myself included) kokuhso talks to Tom in plain old bold text. Tom talks back in italics and bold and maybe there will be quotations or not. Depends on how I feel about including them. (Psycho analysts should read my stuff and tell me how I think, I reveal a lot in these little notes)
-Begin-
Tom was in his guysack and moving it at maximum speed towards his base. Maximum speed being a pitiful five miles an hour. Tom sat in his front seat hunched over angry swearing to himself while reddy and Doc played cards in the back Guysack. Finally after ten hours of traveling Tom got over three large hills and fully out of sight of town. He then stopped his train and got out. Reddy and Doc met him at the container containing the mobile suit. "Gentlemen I have a personal problem. There are mountain bandits in my zoid base. My zoid base where I develop new technologies based on old earth ones and my zoid base with all my Zoids and weapons. Now these bandits are not just any bandits but mountain bandits. No-one likes mountain bandits. So reddy I will be giving you your reddler for combat. Doc you will have the choice to use any working zoid of mine other than that or you can use my mobile suit. I expect it back or you dead and it destroyed." Doc stepped back in shock, "Hey it's tough to destroy one of those without killing the pilot!" Doc paused in thought with his hand on his chin and nodded his approval and agreement. "I will go in and disable the base security measures and/or re-program to take out the bandits. I'll rescue the hostages and signal for you guys to come and blast everything when you're ready."
Reddy and Doc nodded and watched Tom as he ran off. Once he was over the next hill and long out of sight reddy said, "He can fly ya know."
"No, but I have a feeling we aren't going to move until he does all the dirty work. And yourself?"
"Can you teach me blackjack?"
"Sounds like a plan." Doc and reddy hopped into the forward guysacks cockpit and began to play cards, again.
-
As Tom ran over his third hill he heard Kokuhso talk in his mind. So are you just gonna run and run all the way to the base.
Tom stopped in his tracks "Thank you for reminding me I can fly." He thought about activating his wings of one sort and noted that they didn't come. He took out said belt and looked at the center buckle. "Crap no power." He sighed. "Kokuhso can you recharge this?"
What, is the mighty billion year old human asking little old me to help him?
"Stop being arrogant and answer, or else you'll be stuck in this body with me for millennia with out being used."
Fine, give me a shot at it. Tom watched as his hand sparked black for a moment and small tendrils of dark flames entered the belt. After a few moments of probing they stopped and came back, It's not gonna work with me. Kokuhso mentally said to Tom. The battery won't accept a mana charge.
"Well you tried. I suppose the battery in this thing would get bad after some 10,000 years or so." Tom sighed. He had lost his technological advantage. He could still win, it was his place, but it would be harder now.
Well you could get help.
"Shut up kokuhso. You know I don't involve innocents."
That wasn't the case with Doc now was it?
"He knew about my Gundam. Not only did he make it he knew it was there too."
All right, tell yourself what you want to. I'm gonna tell myself what I want to hear.
Tom stopped talking with kokuhso with that statement from him. He could fell the spirits fiery human form smirking in his mind, but Tom also knew it was his mind and he controlled it more absolutely than kokuhso would believe. So Tom walked, and walked, and walked a lot more. "At least I got here faster than the guysack." He muttered to himself as he came over a hill to the roof of his base. "Finally here." Tom muttered. He walked over to a small lip of concrete that stuck up above the ground and felt the metal that actually covered the concrete. He squatted for a moment as he remembered the near paranoid specifications he had built this building too. Two slabs of reinforced concrete separated by a two inch slab of some metal that was designed to resist bunked busters. On the outside and inside layers there was another layer of the same material two inches thick again. An Automatic laser defense grid covered a large area. He was able to pass for various reasons intentionally built into the system. But now as he looked for the one secret entry way he regretted ever leaving it without some sort of intelligent guard. It had been nice of John to do what he did, but a bad idea on his part to not have someone, an intelligent robot even, to stay there 24/7. Tom paused for a moment and returned to his original path of thought, "Why the hell did I try so hard to make it impossible to get in?" He said out loud.
Finally, after about half an hour of searching he found the hidden door to get in. "Why did I make the door so hard to find, no-one besides me would be able to get here on anything past dumb luck. And even if they did use skill I would just give them the keys and leave." Tom grumbled to himself angrily as he opened the door. Then he slipped in silently and crawled down a ladder a long distance, until he reached a small landing about eight feet high and wide. He looked at the door handle and the small door. He had designed this small cube to fit him stretched out comfortably but the door was a mere two feet high and a foot and a half or so wide. That was designed to be hard to find and enter. So if Tom ever had to use this he could hold a large number of enemies at bay with relative ease. Of course trying to get in and leave in this thing would be advantageous to the smaller number. Tom just had to hope that once outside, where the advantage was with numbers usually, there weren't more highly armed numerous foes outside.
He finally reached the door and opened it into a dark closet. There were no bandits in the closet so Tom considered himself safe. Instead of busting down the door Tom then simply hopped up on a box in the closet and snuck into the air vent making sure to close it behind him. Then he slowly, and more importantly quietly, crawled through the air vents. After some time crawling Tom came across safe door below him. "There's the weapons vault." Tom whispered to himself. Marking the wall with a scratch from a knife he had Tom continued on. "With all the cameras I've got there, along with the guards that are there, I doubt I'll make it." He muttered as he crawled along. "Gotta change the security monitors."
After several more minutes of crawling Tom came across the reinforced soundproof, bullet proof door of the security station. He could see the next vent was too small for him to enter, an intended security bonus, along with only micro vents for the safe, and a separate air system for 'special' area's of the base. Tom thought about jumping down, but decided to move along to the next vent and look in. He saw the guard present, and un-interested. "Kokuhso can you make this man leave for a good three to five minutes?"
Of course foolish mortal! Mentally kokuhso laughed in Tom's mind Tom physically frowned but pointed his hand in the general direction of the watchman. A small black flame that would be invisible to those without any sort of mana related abilities (read sci-fi-ish magic) extended down to the mans head and suddenly he became more intent, but not on the security monitors.
Time passed and then the man spoke, "Oh man I gotta go. I wonder if I leave now if Miss Noventa will me angry with me." A moment passed, the mans face visibly pained, "OH GOD I GOTTA GO!" The man ran out of the room and Tom hopped out of the vent outside of room and ran in the wide open door.
He began manipulating the camera controls to show areas that were mostly outside of the base. The few that he left inside showed random badly lit areas or ones where virtually nothing was. He also ran the password system and changed the password to something called the 'secret cameras'. What the hell are you doing?
"I have too many cameras for one person to watch. So most of them are motion activated. When something passes in front of them their screen comes up. I'm deactivating that function and creating a few other hindrances that should make it so that they never see me on the cameras."
Why not just disable them outright?
"Cause then they'd definitely know someone was intruding. Also they would actually screen each camera they could with intent regularly for a while. I don't plan to wait until regularly is up before I take back my base."
With that Tom was done with the last of the camera alterations. He ran out of the camera room and hopped into the vent in a heartbeat. However he did hear a female screaming and the man who had gone to the bathroom defending himself. He noted that the female was being referred to as boss. "Ok so the boss is a woman." He muttered as he crawled closer to where the shouting was coming from.
What, you can't deal with women taking charge?
"No, it just means it reduces the number of people I have to kill in order to provide an immediate 'decapitation' to the group."
The group 'decapitation' being metaphorical I would assume.
"Hopefully, odds are less than 50 that boss lady will be decapitated."
Whatever, you could just consume her in hellfire my…
"Your specialty, I know." Tom sighed, kokuhso would cooperate when Tom wanted to use his physical power, but during mental conversations he was an ass.
Finally Tom came across a hole where he could barely see the back of the man who had run off. The man was saying, "Look if we're gonna argue let's at least do it in the camera room so I don't miss more time off the camera duty."
Tom looked as best he could, but the boss was in a blind spot and there was a corner, although Tom had no idea how much said corner interfered. One thing he could see was the boss's bare feet, which meant that she didn't wear shoes. A little more useful information for identification. Tom was then torn between going to the camera room vent hole and seeing the boss or getting the guns now and finishing the operation, in the end he decided to go there in case the opportunity to make the boss, and bandits, leave arose. Crawling to the security room vent Tom looked in to not see the boss again. But from the argument he could hear going on she was going to be there for some time. Dashing over to the other vent he ignored his earlier silence method and focused on speed planning to get in before they could leave. However when he hit the floor on a crouch he saw to big well armed men outside the door. "Well shit." Tom said flatly as he froze with his gun almost ready to shoot and the men froze in a similar position. "I don't suppose you'd just let my by?"
"You're the former owner, we know you're face from all the pictures you have around." Said one.
"Fuck, this really sucks." Tom swore as he remained stock still. "I don't suppose you're not going to shout for help?"
"Well we'd have radioed but you've got a gun. Although thanks for reminding us of our other option." Guard B, the more intelligent sounding of the pair said, "JEFE AYUDAME!"
Then the boss and camera man appeared, and by appeared I mean burst the door open out into the hallway. Tom grinned; some of his design ideas were more useful than others. As the door crushed one guard by accident Tom shot the other, and then kicked the door in on the guard behind it as he tackled miss boss and the camera guy. After tackling both miss boss lady and the camera guy into the ground with his large arms Tom quickly rolled off the pair and to the side of the room opposite the door. Then he stopped as he held up his gun pointed at the boss and camera guy and swore, "Crap, wrong side of the room." He muttered as he remained kneeling.
Then he looked at the boss lady, her being the more important of the two mountain bandits in the room. He looked at her, and looked at her, for some reason he felt that he should know her from somewhere. So he looked at her and looked at her, and when she said, "Hey are you ogling me!" It hit Tom who she was.
"You're Sylvia Noventa!" He shouted in realization, "But wait aren't you supposed to be one of the hostages." Tom then tilted his head in this limited act of confusion.
"Yeah," The camera guy said, "But when she managed to kick every guy in the crotch that came into the room despite being tied up, and knocking them all out, we decided she deserved more."
"So," Sylvia continued, "When the boss man calls me out I duel with three of his toughest fighters. I kicked all their asses with painful beating like you've never seen."
"She stripped too." Camera guy said shyly. Sylvia then hit him.
"How old are you?" Tom asked Sylvia.
"20 if you must know!" Sylvia said angrily. "Now I've gotta deal with you sooooo…" Sylvia began to motion to a spot under a vest she was wearing and Tom fired a shot. "SWEET JESUS!" Sylvia shouted, "I was just getting out my shot flask!" Sylvia said pulling out a silver flask.
Tom didn't flinch, "I was just shooting the door to keep your comrade crushed behind it down."
Sylvia seemed to ponder while Tom stared at her and Camera guy. Camera just looked back and forth from the door and Tom with a panicked frenzied look on his face as neither person in the room with him really seemed to understand the gravity of the situation.
"Well are you going to act stupid or are either of you going to try and shoot me?" Tom said cold and bored.
Then Sylvia pointed her flask at Tom, "It's a horrible pun, but I call this thing a shot flask for a reason." (HA PUN PWN)
She squeezed the flask and, true to it's name, a bullet flew at Tom. The bullet stopped at a certain point in front of Tom and Tom simply shot the flask, also barely scraping Sylvia's skull. She remained standing, "How the hell did you shoot my head and not kill me."
"The shot must have only damaged your hair; it may not have even actually touched you." Tom said without moving. "Is the resistance done now?" Camera guy and Sylvia nodded. Tom restrained them both to each other using handcuffs. "Now be good hostages or someone else will kill you."
Tom pushed out Sylvia and camera guy, kicking the door on the guard who had been behind it on the way out. Said guard 'oomphed' and then slumped again. Tom then ran down one hand on either persons shoulder as he took what should be the naturally least populated trip to the safe. He made the trip without running into any enemies and arrived at the safe. Taking a moment to enter the code, the very long code, and scan in his various ID's required for entry. After a moment the big door opened and Tom walked in, his hostages behind him for once. "So this is the weapons vault…" Sylvia said as she looked around in awe. She then tried to grab one of the many advanced and deadly looking weapons around her only to get a yank on the handcuff keeping her and Camera guy together where Tom had stuck the pair to a bar by the entrance. She looked at the fact that both of them were handcuffed by one handcuff. She then looked at the bar, which they were stuck on one side of. As far as she could figure Sylvia could not figure out how Tom had been able to slip the two in there without removing the bar or the handcuffs.
So she just sat in a corner fuming until camera guy, momentarily knocked unconscious by the blow with the bar woke up and remembered the weapons around him, he then tried to move and whacked Sylvia's head against the bar. Sylvia then swore loudly in several dialects including three that the camera guy understood. After a moment the guy looked at the bar and the handcuffs and asked, "Did he take them off of you?"
To which Sylvia grumbled, "No."
"Then how did he…" The camera guy trailed off as Tom walked over to them holding way, way too many weapons.
"I'm a wizard." Tom said as he yanked the pair along in some magical manner. Once he got them out from behind the bar, somehow, Tom shoved them in front and opened the door. Once the safe door was opened Tom immediately regretted it. Outside there were over eighty guys with at least one gun each pointed at Tom. Tom stared down all of them and then noted one in the front with a gun pointed at Tom and a knife at some guy's neck.
Tom paused and asked, "Are we going to call bargaining negotiations?"
"Aye that would be civil, I suppose the first on the list would be you wanting to leave alive with all the devices you currently carry on you?" The man with the knife to the hostage's neck said.
Tom glanced at his stuff and said, "Yes."
"I would assume we may also be doing hostage negotiation, am I correct?" Tom nodded.
"So I would assume you'd be willing to trade us our camera guy for the man I hold here." To emphasize who it was he was talking about the man pricked his hostage's neck. Tom nodded again.
"Well that's all good and nice that you're a typical negotiator but you've forgotten the one card you hold that we have to take from you alive." Tom showed no sign of backing down when the new element was introduced to him. "You see you just closed the door to that un-opened weapon safe. This means that you opened it and thus we need you to open in again in the future." Tom nodded again as he gripped the weapons in his hands tighter. "I would state why you can't leave now, but I think you get the idea. Of course once we get all those guns we won't need you alive of course so I figure why trade when you're all we want anyway."
Tom sighed, "You see that's why no-one likes mountain bandits. You take hostages, use a massing of your guys and then make sure to kill everyone you fight."
"Excuse me but who said we cared what people think about mountain bandits?" The man with the knife against the hostage's throat shouted.
Tom sighed, "I hold one other thing in my hands, your lives." Tom said plainly. "Just give up now and leave and you won't all die."
For a moment everyone tried to look Tom in the eye. They saw nothing unusual in it. Then he shot their leader. "I said leave." He angrily raged as the hostage ran away from his injured holder. "The first was to save on legal issues and paperwork. But the second one will kill someone." Tom watched as his threats had little effect, unless you count antagonizing 80 guys as an effect. "I didn't want to do this but…"
When Sylvia camera guy and the other hostage, Henry, awoke they were lying in the security room. They were all fine and there was no sign of anyone anywhere by the cameras. Camera guy (that's his name now) switched to the safe camera where several guns lay on the ground and there were some blood stains but no people. The camera guy began to push buttons seemingly at random until he saw a random frame still. There was a man, who looked a lot like Tom, consumed in black flames holding off an iron Kong with some sort of black field and crisping another zoid. The picture had a name, it read, "Black dragon."
-End-
OR IS IT
In their guysacks Doc and Reddy were still playing cards when doc asked, "When do we go to the base acting like we were prepared to fight?"
"When there are explosions. That's always a good time to help Tom out." Reddy said as he put down a card.
"Yeah but it's been five days." Doc added on as he looked over the hill and put down a card of his own.
Reddy looked at the clock, the hill, and his card and said, "Good point, lets' go." And the pair left.
-Real end-
Ok so it's finally done, really. I will give you some basic end credit images about what happened afterwards. Henry and Sylvia joined the newly re-formed team Ryu. Tom de-modified his command wolf and shadow fox returning them both so slightly modified base forms. Eventually Tom and Reddy returned to the places where they had seen zoid ruins where the cores were still intact and picked them up. Team ryu quickly rose the ranks and reached S-class in almost no time after this was over and gradually became the group they are today. Tom gained a relation with the IZF by playing the 'I saved the world card' and was able procure two whale kings that were able to do atmospheric exit and enter a low orbit. He garnered a full crew for one and sent it into space to become involved in a special project with an unknown objective to a majority of the people on the planet.
Camera guy became a permanent resident of the base of Team Ryu and acted as the security guard, but eventually seemed to disappear only appearing when it mattered to him, and meal time.
Yep that's really what happened. No I am not kidding you at all with that italicized 'really'.
Or the one in quotes.