Audacity chapter 23.
*I apologize for not updating at my usual pace; shit has really been crazy lately, not to mention this specific chapter was an absolute pain in the asked to write due to all the technical information I had to look up and/or infer. That aside, I have placed more material on my profile page. There is now a depiction of Cypher 01's mask for your viewing pleasure.*
Response to review by: Debido. Popular…. Australian…. Folk music…. I did not fucking know that. All I can say is "I regret nothing!" and that it is very true when you stated that there is no strength or aggression in the name Seekers… That wasn't the objective, the point of the name was to convey what they are doing, or at least what their leader is doing. But regardless, I appreciate the input.
Response to review by: Atrile. Thanks, I really like the last line of my previous chapter as well. Also, thanks a bunch for pointing out mistakes like that… They're kind of hard for me to catch. And as I stated above, I apologize for the lateness of this chapter. ( Compared to how I usually do things at least.)
Response to review by: LEGENDRY. Holy shit… You have left me with much to respond to… Sweet. As to the issue of whether or not he can Geass himself and another person at the same time, I go to the point where he can do it to multiple people ordinarily… So what's to stop him from catching someone in it and refracting it back to himself at the same time? Because I can only imagine, if everyone he Geass needed absolute direct eye contact he would have a much harder time using his power.
I am not sure whether or not people can see the Geass symbol… It clearly casts light in the anime, so in theory it should be visible to everyone… In theory. As to the G1 mobile base issue, he snuck into both Cornelia's and Clovis's command center…. That puts him at a total of two mobile basis infiltrated… Not to mention the Viceroy consulate he entered twice as well.
And to be honest with you, he did not know Euphemia would be there. His hopes were even if worst-case scenario came about, he could always pretend to surrender and Geass the person in command once unmasked.
As to the issue with Nina… That still under development… Not even I'm sure yet, at least not totally sure.
Response to review by: EVA-Saiyajin. You might as well refer to him as Cypher, or even Cypher 01. The reason I don't change the bit with CC is primarily because that's how I saw the situation in my head so I can't bear to change it… For now.
Regarding the question about Cypher and is unavoidable confrontation with Mao… You can expect Gray Jack to run interference… At a price of course.
Call of duty Fuck Yeah!
And remember children, according to LEGENDRY, my character should never negotiate anything. Ever. So be sure to correct me if he ever tries this again under my nose.
Line break.
What gives someone the right to kill another human being? The answer is simple, nothing. So the next question is; why do we kill people? Is it because we see our victim as an obstacle? Out of fear, or to protect ourselves? Or maybe it's because, in some sick and twisted way… We enjoy it?
My thoughts sullenly droned on like this as I leaned over the railing atop of the roof on the student Council building, a lit cigarette dangling from my mouth. Inhaling deeply I exhaled while sighing. It had been two days since the Kawaguchi hotel jacking. Since that time the student Council had not been able to leave the school grounds due to the small horde of news reporters that had clustered around all of the schools entrances. Except for Shirley, her parents had used the most recent terrorist actions as an excuse to help justify why they needed to go back to the homeland, and as a result they left the day after she had been released from the hotel.
Hardly anyone managed to say goodbye.
Despite all of this, I managed to keep myself busy… Of course I need to do this under the nose of Kallen and the rest of the Seekers, I sent in my mask to Outlooks firearms to be fitted with some sort of eye lens system that could be flicked open or closed. I didn't know exactly what it would look like, but Douglas said it could be done, and as long as he was under the influence of my Geass he had no reason to lie to me.
I also managed to come in contact with David Spacer, he had been more than happy to part with his unused building, as well as the land around it. Not to mention his pockets were very deep… I made sure to abuse this with a little help from my Geass. He provided me with a ring of keys that went to the building and it's fenced off surroundings, I decided I would need to upgrade it's security features to more modern digital keypads, or at least the near equivalent, but that would have to wait until later.
The building itself on the first floor was far from impressive. Dozens of rusted pipes and containers were broken down and made movement and storage on the first level nearly impossible. However the two lower levels, accessible via stairs or the currently nonworking supply elevator, were completely devoid of anything other than a few piles rusted metal. With a little work it would become a fine facility, usable for anything I wanted.
My dealings with Kallen were aggravating at best, I knew she had my best interests at heart but the way she made me do absolutely nothing was infuriating… It mostly involved puppy guarding me and not allowing me to so much as flinch in any direction. It got to the point where I nearly considered doing push-ups and other such acts of physical exertion to demonstrate that I was in perfect health… However that would've led to questions I wasn't allowed to answer. So any and all time I had away from her was spent trying to gather resources.
I inhaled deeply once more, allowing nicotine to calm my system.
What I really need to do is learn how to pilot a Knightmare… again. It would be best if I could get Kallen to help me, considering that she is the best that we have.
Deciding that this needed to get done sooner, rather than later I pulled out my phone and scrolled to Kallen's contact number. The phone rang three times before she answered.
"Lelouch? What's wrong?" I rolled my eyes at her question.
"Nothing wrong Kallen… I just have a request; no actually this is an order." I said authoritatively. "I desperately need to learn to pilot a knightmare frame, and I need you or someone else to teach me." There was a long pause before she said anything.
"If you think you're invincible or something I'm going to go right ahead and tell you that you're not."
"Duly noted, like I said this needs to get done… If you don't want to help that's fine; I just need to know where I can find a simulator."
"Of course I'll help!" Was her immediate and aggravated response.
"Good, then I'm assuming you know a place? If not we will have to use actual knightmares."
"We're probably going to end up using one of our own Sutherlands. You can sign up for classes at an actual training facility, but there's a whole mess of red tape you need to go through and I'm sure you don't want that." I nodded and put out my cigarette.
"Yeah, I get'cha. Tell Ohgi and the others to load up all of our supplies, I've secured a much better location for us to use as a headquarters from now on… But it might require a little fixing up." She seemed to perk up once I said that.
"Really? Where is it?" I smirked sideways, deciding to be cryptic.
"It's not too far off from our current location… But you'll have to wait until I bring you there to learn the rest, I'll meet you at the warehouse in an hour."
"All right, but if you hurt yourself further I'm forcibly admitting you to a hospital." She said threateningly.
I hung up shortly afterwards. Once I slid my phone into my lower breast pocket I realized something.
Oh shit… I don't have my mask. I guess I'll just have to come up with something else for now at least.
*Warehouse nine.*
As it turns out, I couldn't think of anything that would cover my identity… At least my specifications, so I decided to forgo the 'mask issue' entirely.
I stood outside of the role up gate with my arms crossed, I was kind of nervous. I had no idea how the Seekers would react to my actual identity. Oghi had taken it well enough, the same with Kallen… However I couldn't discount the fact that I was showing it to a group, and people tend to respond differently when in large numbers.
"Fuck it." I said defeated. I raised my fist and knocked on the metal loudly three times. I waited as I heard the resonating echo the voices inside, one of which was getting closer. Tamaki was the one to open the door as usual.
"Yeah? What do ya want? We're work'in here." I fought the urge to roll my eyes.
"I'm aware." I said simply as I tried to push past him.
"Hey! You can't come in here it's not safe!" Tamaki was doing a pretty good job of playing the innocent worker… For a moron.
"Yes I know this Tamaki, now let me inside so I can help dammit!" I said failing my voice with authority.
"Just who the hell do you think you are to order me around!" I narrowed my eyes and uncrossed my arms.
He didn't even notice that I used his name… Idiot…
"I'm your God damn leader, that's who… Then again I can't blame you for not recognizing me without the mask." Tamaki gave me a once over, eyes wide, mouth agape. For a moment I thought he wasn't going to respond… I was very wrong.
"Cypher is a Britannian!" I flinched back due to the volume of his question I noticed that everyone inside had gathered around.
"Do you have a problem with that?" I said threateningly.
"How do we know you're not lying?" he asked, his resolve never wavering.
"Go ask Oghi, or even Kallen they already know who I am…" I tried pushing past him one more time only to have him remain firmly rooted in his spot. "Oh my God Tamaki, if you don't get out the way I'm going to kill you." He moved slightly and let me inside.
Once inside I noticed all the knightmares were in a kneeling position holding crates and pallets. The same black van was there as well, along with several older looking vehicles all of which looked capable of carrying several people.
"Kallen! Would you please inform our misguided allies that I am in fact Cypher 01?" I paused briefly. "Because apparently, with just the absence of my mask I become incredibly hard to believe." She was leaning against a red knightmare looking slightly disgruntled over something.
"Yeah that's him all right." She said almost disinterestedly while inspecting her nails. "If you still don't believe me just hang around him for a few minutes you'll notice the same mannerisms." I nodded, thankful for her assisted confirmation.
"If you have a problem with me being Britannian, then you are no better than the people we fight… Discrimination will not be tolerated here! Am I understood?" there were several nods and the occasional verbal confirmation; however Tamaki seemed determined to press the issue.
"How come you're so young?" I couldn't really blame him for asking that question, it still irked me though.
"Because… I haven't been alive long… That's probably why I'm so young." Tamaki shook his head vigorously.
"Not what I meant, how come you're fighting you don't seem to have a reason." Luckily Oghi came up and clarified.
"What he means to say is; why put yourself in this situation when you could live a perfectly happy life as a Britannian?" I shrugged and walked towards Kallen.
"Do I need a reason to do what I believe is right, besides I've already proven I'm on your side, with both actions and blood, I don't see why we're having this conversation." Before anyone said anything edgewise I began my announcement.
"I have secured a much more sizable headquarters for us, not to mention it's significantly more secluded. I suggest we wait until nightfall to move the nightmares and equipment. In the meantime I want a list of supplies that we need and/or want, regardless of what it is. I also want a list of all the new recruits that have volunteered." I said this while looking at both Ohgi and Yoshida. The two nodded and began conducting their tasks.
I walked closer to Kallen and stood in front of her with my arms crossed.
"Well? Are you going to just sit there pouting, or are you going to teach me how to use this big ass robot?" she turned around wordlessly and opened a panel on the side of the knightmare's leg. She pressed a button that caused a cable to come down after the cockpit unsealed and pushed its seat out.
"Put your foot on the bottom part and grab onto the cable." I did as I was told I nodded to her. I had seen this cable before on other knightmares.
I wonder how much weight it can lif- my thoughts were cut off as the cable jerked upwards, this caused me to lean back and lose my grip on the cable. Flailing my arms in either direction I was helpless as I began falling downwards, that was until my ankle caught the loop where I had placed my foot, causing me to dangle there indignantly.
"What the hell? A little warning would be nice!" I watched her upside down as she panicked and began pressing buttons on the side panel. Somewhere off on the other side of the warehouse I heard Tamaki burst into laughter. "Shut the fuck up Tamaki! It's not funny!" the cable then slowly brought me back down to ground level. I flipped over and pushed myself to a standing position. The next thing I felt was Kallen's hands on my shoulder as she began inspecting me while saying nervously.
"Oh my God! Are you all right? You didn't open your wounds did you?"
"No, the only thing I hurt was my pride." I stated as I put my foot on the bottom of the cable once more. "This time I'll be ready." Kallen looked at me nervously but returned her position on the control panel.
When the cable jerked for the second time I stayed upright, it lifted me all the way to the extended cockpit to which point I hoisted myself up by using one of the bars.
"Now what?" I said to Kallen as she pressed a button that caused the cable to go back down a third time.
"Just wait for me I'll show you what to do." She closed the panel and walked over to the cable, it retracted itself after she tugged on it twice. I edged over towards the main body of the knightmare to give her more room as she pulled herself up to stand level with me.
"Go ahead and sit in the seat." I complied, shortly afterwards I felt the seat move downwards slightly as Kallen began flipping and turning a small set of knobs and levers on the side of the seat.
"What are you doing now?" I asked curiously.
"Adjusting the seat for height, in case you didn't notice you're taller than me and that might affect the way you can see the monitors." She explained. "You might need to make some adjustments once the cockpit closes, but this should be good for now."
I nodded and looked inside the machine. But I saw could only be described as a cluster fuck of technology. There were four monitors, one on the left and right and two in the front; one was at a slight angle above the one at eye level. The next thing I noticed were two pistol grip joysticks. They had spherical attachments on the top as well as a series of triggers and finger separators on the actual handle itself. There were also three dials, all of which were powered down and displayed nothing but I was sure one of them displayed the power source to the knightmare itself, the other two I had no idea about.
"Scooter over some…" Kallen said with a flat tone. I edged to the corner of the seat as far as I could allowing her to hunch next to me. The seat then slid forward allowing the back hatch to close with a loud hiss. I tried not to lose focus as Kallen's body was literally pressed against mine in several places due to the confines of the cockpit, despite this she still pointed out several features on the knightmare.
"You see those two silver panels down there?" I looked down and noticed what she had described.
"You mean these things?" I asked as I tapped one of them with my foot.
"Yeah, those are the controls for the legs and land spinners. Reach down there and look for a little loop just like the one on the table that brought us up here." I leaned down while grunting lightly, feeling around for some sort of purchase to the so-called 'loop' I found it near the top of the panel and pulled it towards me. "Do the same to the other one." She ordered. With a similar grunt I found the other loop and did the same. "Slip your feet into them, when you want the knightmare to go forward using the land spinners all you need to do is angle your feet forwards." She explained.
"You can turn, push or pull the plates in just about any direction; the corresponding leg on the knightmare will go in the same direction to the best of its ability."
"How I dictate the knees?" I asked after not seeing any clear control for that specific part.
"Typically the knees will lift if you raise your foot while it's in one of the loops, the opposite will happen if you pushed downwards." She described using hand motions. "If you push down the knee will straighten out." I flexed and moved the controls at my feet experimentally, they did nothing in there powered down state, but I got a feel for their resistance nonetheless.
"Okay now that you got that, these two joysticks here control the arms. It's about the same concept, if you push forward on one that arm will go forward, if you pull back, the arm will also pull back."
"I'm assuming it's the same for left and right and up and down?"
"That's right." She said as she shifted to get more comfortable… If that was even possible. "These little spheres on the top of the joystick control the thumbs, it's almost the same concept as the other two controls I just showed you, however this one allows you to press on to the sphere." She paused and pressed the sphere multiple times in demonstration. "This will automatically open or close the hand of the knightmare with just one press. And if you spin it while it's pressed down you will just move the wrist." I nodded and slid my hand into the other joystick putting my fingers in the brass knuckle like finger separators.
"How do I control the other individual fingers?" I asked as I fiddled with it, already having a faint idea.
"Just squeeze or push your fingers outward on the corresponding separator, here it will be easier to show you once it's on." She dug into her pocket and extracted a USB looking device, shortly afterward she plugged it into a slot just under the center dial. She entered a seven digit code in the knightmare hummed to life, all four of the screens displayed the status of the knightmare and several startup sequences.
"That Dial on the left tells you your energy filler levels, the one in the middle displays your knightmare's physical condition, as well as any equipment you have linked with it. The one on the right shows the orientation of the knightmare such as the pitch and yaw."
"Can't you just call it up and down?" I asked sarcastically this caused her to roll her eyes at me.
"You have to call it by its proper name." She stated flatly, I took it as almost a challenge.
"Oh really? Okay then, from now on I will only refer to knightmares as 'big ass robots' and nothing else." She face palmed at my declaration.
"Please don't, that sounds really stupid."
"So does pitch and yaw…" I fired back with a crooked smile.
"Whatever." She said dismissively as she continued her explanations. "These four screens here are all links to cameras and the fact sphere sensor. You need to press this button to analyze things using the fact sphere." She pressed a button at the top left of the screen directly in front of me.
"It allows you to get more detailed information, as well as a thermal scan." She pressed the button again causing the fact sphere to close. She then explained which buttons did what, some were meant to zoom in on an image, some to zoom out, and others changed the visual system on the monitors entirely. Basically; anything that couldn't be done using the manual controls could more than likely be done using the panel system.
"Try bringing up an arm and clenching the fist a few times." She ordered. I moved both the arms experimentally for a few seconds; everything corresponded with what I was told. Contorting the joystick as was necessary lifted the arm until it was in the center of the front screen, I then began contracting and extending my fingers causing the knightmare's and to mimic my movements. I used the sphere on the joystick to move the wrist around the same time.
"Good, now try taking a step forward, the knightmare's stabilizers should keep you from falling… Unless you disable them." I lifted my left foot and pushed it forward bringing it down quickly afterwards. There was a satisfying metallic THUD as the machines foot met the ground safely.
"Sweet, were still alive!" I cheered emphatically. Before Kallen could supply her own witty remark Tamaki came up into the view of the right screen and began shouting.
"Hey you gonna do anything? I figured you would have been doing cartwheels by now!" I pressed the external speaker button and retorted.
"Nah… I've just been busy ya know. Just keep in mind, if the knightmares a rock'in, don't come a knock'in! OMPHH!" just as I finished my sentence Kallen struck me none too lightly on the back of my head. "Dammit woman! That hurt!" I said as I reached out to stop her from hitting me again… But instead grabbed a handful of boob.
"HEY! WATCH WHERE YOU'RE GRABING!" I removed my hand immediately to cover my ears.
"WHAT I CAN'T HEAR YOU MABYE YOU SHOULD SCREAM LOUDER!" I yelled back at an equal volume.
"You know what, you can figure the rest out yourself!" that wasn't the desired effect.
"Wait, no! I'm sorry! Just relax!" I said as I try desperately to think of something to say. "It's not like I wanted to grab your boob or anything it was an accede-"
SMACK!
She hit me again, significantly harder than the last time…. In the same spot might I add. She then pressed the hatch release button causing the seat to slide outwards, allowing her to exit.
"Hold on Kallen, that is not what I meant to say!" It didn't matter, she had already walked off. "Damn it!" I swore to myself. "Fine then, I'll just do this myself, I know the basic controls and shit." I continued moving individual body parts throughout the knightmare, after about 15 minutes I gave enough courage to engage the land spinners and move around in the unoccupied half of the warehouse.
I started out simple, forward, back, left, and right. But I soon became bored of that and tried strafing. It turned out to be significantly more difficult than I had anticipated, but after a few tries and almost falling over I managed to get the knightmare to comply. I then angled legs of the knightmare so I was in a kneeling position. I tried several poses all of which mimicked what I would do if I was behind cover. But then I extended my left leg too far in the knightmare toppled over with a deafening CHRASH!
I groaned loudly and reoriented myself. I figured I might as well get used to this feeling, one way or the other I knew I would end up in it again. I press the external speaker button and spoke into the mic.
"I'm okay… For now." I announced to everyone to stymie their worrying. I checked the center dial to confirm that there was no damage to the knightmare. Shifting the left arm first I managed to get it underneath the chest of the frame and did the same soon afterwards with the right arm.
Piloting would've been an absolute cakewalk after a bit of repetitive practice… If it weren't for gravity. This single element made it significantly more difficult to access and manipulate the controls, especially while moving… And I had yet to even push this thing to its limits I could only imagine the amount of G forces that could and would be applied to me in combat.
After I brought the knightmare to a full standing position I began going through simple exercises, such as picking up an old crate and stacking it on others in various patterns. I even went so far as to attempt balancing several crates on one arm. I managed to get two on top of each other at the same time, however my attempts to put a third one on the stack resulted in what could best be described as an epic fail.
I continued on like this for several hours, until I noticed the sun had begun to set. I looked at the energy filler; I had used less than 20% due to the fact that I had been doing nothing strenuous. However my body was in a different situation, I was feeling rather stiff from not moving much at all for several hours. Going over all the controls once more my head I couldn't help but notice to levers on either side of my thighs. Not recognizing the system I pulled one of them experimentally… Nothing happened.
"That's weird…" I pushed it down only to pull it up again… Still nothing. I then turned to the other one and gave it a good yank. My body lurched forward suddenly as I heard the sound of thrusters and screeching metal. Just before my head hit the front monitor I realized something.
The cockpit had ejected.
To be continued…