Chapter 9
In to the final days
"C'mon kit let's get you washed up and I could use a shower myself as well." Rocket notes wrinkling his nostrils in distaste while watching his son over the table, after finishing his own breakfast. Trey doesn't say anything, concentrating with finishing his plate. Well, at least his appetite has returned, Rocket remarks with a small relief. One less thing to worry about.
The shower room was about as spartan as Rocket had assumed it to be. Boring white tiling on the floors and walls at the showers. Smoothed out grey natural stone walls and metal cabinet rows with pegs to hang your gear at the dressing room. He placed Trey to sit on the bench next to a pile of towels while undressing himself and his son. He kneels to Trey's level to scrub his chest and back with a sponge. Since Trey had the casts, they'd have to be careful to avoid them getting wet.
"Did it hurt Daddy? When you got them." Trey asks curiously and touches at one of the visible cybernetics at Rocket's collar with a tentative finger, having never before seen his father's implants.
"What? No, not that much. Though some others did. I was... pretty young, I think. Why'd you ask?" Rocket says suddenly standing up from crouch, making Trey swivel his ears curiously at the sound of Rocket's internal servos.
"Just wondering when I'll start growing mine. I hope they'll look as nice as yours." The kit replies innocently, making Rocket almost drop the shower head, his holding, from surprise. He blinks for a moment unable to word a reply until he suddenly remembers that his still holding the detachable showerhead and what he was supposed to do with it. The kit takes the cue as a reason to add. "I mean you're a robot, daddy. So, aren't we going to be too when we grow up?"
"Ahh, umm... It doesn't quite work like that Trey and you're not suddenly going to start growing metal parts through your skin and I'm not a robot. A Cyborg, yes, but not a robot and you shouldn't call a cyborg a robot, son. It's considered as insulting to us." Rocket explains evasively and can't help but wonder why the kit couldn't be asking something easy or 'safe like 'where does the babies come from' or something to that effect.
"But why daddy?" Trey asks, turning around so suddenly at the ladder stool his sitting on, while his back is being showered, that Rocket sprays him right in the face with it. Which makes them both giggle a bit, breaking the tension.
"So, you wanted to know what's the difference between a cyborg and a robot, son?" Rocket asks draping his son with towels, whose drying fur is starting to look comically buff and is giving the kit the spikiest hairdo ever. Trey mumbles something into towel which Rocket takes as a yes.
"A Robot is an artificially created machine who is bound by a program it was created with to perform a set task. A cyborg is... well a person who has been implanted with mechanical parts, usually for medical reasons like losing an eye or hand." The kit nods seemingly satisfied with the answer until he suddenly pipes up "Then why do you have them?". The one question Rocket fears and has no answer, not out of shame but because even he didn't know for sure even though he could and had made many educated guesses overtime. "I'll explain when you're a bit older." Rocket says retreating behind the age old parental cop-out to avoid answering which the kit accepts with a child-like 'okay daddy'.
They had been given new quarters to be together and some toys for Trey and new clothing for both of them to wear, while they were showering. Rocket was disgruntled that their clothing choices were still very limited despite being better than the 'rags' they were wearing previously. He clothed Trey into shirt and pants which he guessed to be fairly fashionable, seeing as how the kit was happily humming and looking at himself from all angles from a small wall mirror while he'd had to settle on cargo pants, crew jacket and high collared dress shirt in that weirdly ubiquitous drab olive green. Strange how every damn army in the Galaxy seemed to have those same three palette colors for dress uniforms, the other two being varying hues of grey & white.
"You be a good kit now, Trey. I've got some things to do with the military, but I'll be back afternoon." Rocket says when a soldier appears to escort him to the meeting. The kit just hums in return, already completely engrossed in playing with his new toys on the floor.
Rocket eyed the assembled people sharply when he walked in to the auditorium room. Of the twenty or so people gathered, he could recognize only Samase and some of the 'stooges' as people who had interrogated or treated him some days ago. She's standing separately from the other people in the room, chatting with a group of three others. They notice his scowl with varying levels of acceptance. Samase cuts the awkward silence by taking the lead with introductions when Rocket gets closer.
"May I formally introduce you to our Invasion response-team, Rocket. You've probably already noted that I'm the head of intelligence & security, this is Dr. Kevorken Miles -the head of medical & science team."
To which Rocket nods curtly "yes we've met".
"Commander Ravn Nightshade is representing for the military." She continues indicating at the tall and rather handsome officer in olive green dress uniform, who nods politely at his name. "And of course, our team-coordinator Lyoko Talltree, the Chairman of the planetary intelligence & defense committee."
"So nice to meet you in person Galactic guardian ranger Rocket the Raccoon, and while it's unfortunate to meet the representative from off-world under situation like this, I hope you don't take it personally." The man greets proving Rocket that his statesman-like funk wasn't merely a feeling. Hopefully the guy would turn out to be more than just a career politician, in Rocket's books those people were pretty much useless.
"Right, Yeah, I'm Rocket Raccoon, founding member of the Guardians of the Galaxy, Chief-Ranger of Halfworld and the Custodian of the Keystone quadrant and I'm here to show you how to kick some Badoon butt!" Rocket announces loudly and confidently enough that everyone in the room could hear and notice him. "Now show me what you've got so far." He says more subdued to his new 'colleagues''.
"I guess I should thank you for looking after my kit Agent." Rocket says quietly to Samase once they're all seated, and the chairman opens the meeting by laying out their current situation.
Samase squints curiously before getting a hold of herself, replying smoothly. "Ohh... thank you mister Raccoon, the least I could do." Though Rocket was pretty sure she had no idea what he was talking about, but it wasn't important right now, what was important was this meeting.
"Right you people... before we're going to get rid of those lizards..." Rocket announces rising from his seat to take Lyoko's spot at the podium. "We're going to have to move our base."
"Move?" someone calls out and Rocket raises his hands to quell the commotion.
"Right, I keep forgetting you people aren't used to this... I'll start slowly. How many of you have knowledge in nuclear physics and hyper-Euclidean math or quantum theory? Anyone?"
*crickets*
Until Dr. Miles raises a tentative paw. "I think I know what you're aiming at Mr. Raccoon, the potential of using the energy of splitting hydrogen atoms to produce electricity is widely used and its use a possible weapon has been discussed but..."
"Good, so at least one person here knows what I'm talking about when I say, 'thirty kiloton thermo baric payload carried in a ballistic missile, launched from orbit to land on our very doorstep." Rocket announces, and the room goes into another confused mumbling except for Dr. Miles who looks rather pale at Rocket's announcement.
"You sure about this. That they can do it just like that?" Lyoko inquires suddenly worried, and though he hides it well, the fear is evident in his eyes.
"Hah, it's the least they can do... You people still haven't quite grasped our situation, which admittedly is my fault since I haven't really stressed it... The Badoon don't just destroy cities and take slaves, they conquer whole star systems and destroy the planets they can't keep. They just blow them up! Destroying this keep is easy as breathing to them. I could do it too if I'd wanted to." Rocket announces, and the true gravity of the situation finally sinks in to the audience.
"So, according to you, there's nothing we can do but to surrender or they'll just blow the whole planet and move on?" Commodore Nightshade asks watching Rocket working with some kind of tubular object, not really sure what he was creating even after the off-worlder had given him a laundry-list of required materials and ordered them to bring him tools for cutting glass and diamond.
"Oh no, I never said that, but it also means that our HQ & troops have to be asymmetric and be on the move constantly, it's our only defense. Blowing up a whole planet takes time to prepare, which will be our operational window to oust them, let's not make this easier for the lizards than it already is." Rocket explains fiddling with a metal tube in his paws. "Okay it's in, let's try this out." he says lifting the tube to his eye level and switches it on by touching a small knob at the side. Bluish 3ft long 'blade' flickers to life. Rocket makes a few swirls with it before cutting out the corner end from the metal workbench.
"Oh, okay now." Ravn mumbles flabbergasted which Rocket mistakes as the man being unimpressed. "I know, Photon blades are pretty outdated, plasma sword is better and more easy to handle but this is better than nothing in such a short notice. Don't worry I'll make a training model for the weapon as well, so your boys don't cut their toes in accident while practicing... Now the flechette gun here, also known as Ripper bolt pistol... however being an old design, it's still an oldie but goldie. The pistol's done and I'll have a working riffle schematic ready for you by tomorrow." Rocket shrugs already moving on to the next weapon he had created while Ravn finds it hard to avoid staring at the table corner cut-out on the floor and the "photon blade", as Rocket called it, on the table.
"So, it shoots arrows?" Ravn asks now skeptically, he had expected the next item to be something that was even more flashy than the 'ray sword'. Rocket just shrugs and correct Ravn with a wry smile. "Supersonic, recoilless darts that can pierce pretty much anything and be modified to carry all-sorts of payloads. Magnetize the dart to bypass force fields, oversize the design and they cut through even tanks and advanced spaceships."
"Then why aren't you using them?" Ravn asks curiously, remembering how Rocket had very different type of weapons as his sidearm. "They're loud and despite having relatively long range, their effective lethal range is average at best and the magazine is very small in comparison to my photon pistols. I also don't like having to count for the wind when I shoot." Rocket replies Expertly.
"I see, so how long do you think it'll will take to get enough of these mass-produced?" Ravn accepts with interest. "I can create the prints for the automated machinery to be done in a day or so. After that we should be able to produce a working weapon in roughly once every 15 minutes." Rocket promises which makes Ravn whistle a little between his teeth.
At the afternoon Rocket returns to their quarters as promised and takes his son for a walk around the base to show the kit what his dad actually did 'for a living'. They've barely reached the hangar area when Rocket notices a new plane fuselage under a tarp at the hangar area with a suspicious amount of engineers hovering around it. Agent Brightwater is busily overseeing the loading of the plane into a moving rig. As per Rocket's earlier suggestions, evacuation of the base was already well under way.
"I see you've been busy, Agent." Rocket comments dryly to Samase, who turns to look at him while smiling brightly to Trey. "Ahh, Guardian Ranger. Bringing your son to work, so to speak?"
"It's good for the kits to know what their parents do for a living, speaking of work. What's under the tarp?"
"Oh, just some kind of enemy shuttlecraft, a wreck that was found in a barn not too far from here, figured it might be worth dismantling and reverse-engineering."
"That might not be the best idea." Rocket says ears flattening. "Why not? you think it might be dangerous to do?" Samase asks now concerned. "No, I'm telling you because it's MINE." Rocket growls showing his canines.
"Wow, you own a spaceship, daddy? Can I see it!" Trey yips in awe.
"Well, yeah. How else would I get here? it's like 3 parsecs from the Galacian wall to the last marker." Rocket snorts snidely.
"There's no need to be rude." Samase replies grumpily. "What's a Galacian wall and what markers? Parsec? is that a unit of distance in space?" She then inquires sharply.
Rocket eyes her thoughtfully for a moment, realizing that Procyon-6 probably doesn't have what it takes to send even a probe outside their immediate star system yet.
"Ahh, okay... Oh man, I keep forgetting how -primit- -how much you don't know." The slip doesn't go unnoticed from Samase.
"Anyway, the Galacian wall is this gigantic force field around the Keystone quadrant, -it's the area of space we're in by the way, to keep it safe from outside influence, built aeons past. Inside the quadrant there are these 'markers' which you can use to navigate through the 'empty' or 'dark sectors' as we spacers call areas where there's no stars or planets, just asteroids and gasses and dust. In any case there are six markers in the most direct route between Procyon-6 and Halfworld, one per roughly half a parsec. There used to be only two until I added the rest while mapping out the keystone wild space. Halfworld system is at the very edge of the quadrant, almost hugging the wall itself. One parsec is about 3.26 light-years or 19 trillion miles... Well you get the point why you've no idea of these things existing, yes?" He adds perhaps a bit snidely.
"That may be, but you haven't told me what you're going to do with your ship now." she notes feeling tad offended at tone Rocket is displaying.
"First I need to see what kind of damage you've done to it. Don't worry I'm not flying it anywhere without my suit and she's not going anywhere within the atmosphere without her wings attached." Rocket notes to Samase over his shoulder while walking closer with awestruck Trey to pull off the tarp covering it. "Let him." she comments shortly to her engineers when they aim to thwart Rocket.
"Okay let's see now... want to ride in a real spaceship, son?" Rocket asks mostly rhetorically from his son while taking a mental stock of the visible damages, circling the small craft. He then does something with the hidden panel at the bottom side of the cockpit fuselage to have a section of it and cockpit canopy to slide aside and small set of stairs to fold down and lifts his son to sit at the co-pilot seat before closing the canopy. Ignoring the frantic shouting and fists banging against the sides from outside that follows it, to which Rocket just waves disinterestedly. He then reached over Trey to push a few buttons on the dash in front of his son. Low humming engulfs the cockpit and the screens glow to life. Trey gasps in excitement. Rocket then does something with the interface to have the craft's A.I reboot and then go through an automated systems checklist.
"Well, what do you think, son. Neat isn't it?" Rocket asks from Trey sitting at co-pilot/passenger seat. "All these buttons... So wicked. Is it fast. Can I fly it?" The kit replies turning and craning his head and neck to take in all the sights. His father wasn't paying much attention, having engrossed himself with going through the contents of a footlocker placed behind the seats to work both as a storage and temporary seating. There's not much room for anything else in the cockpit and even a child as young as Trey had to wonder at just how little space his father seemed to require.
"If you promise me to be good while I'm away Trey. I promise I'm taking you for a flight to see what space is like when this is over." Rocket says rummaging through his things in the locker to find anything which might be useful in the future. "Away, where are you going daddy?" The kit asks suddenly worried.
"We're still at war son. I can't take you with me on missions. You'll need to stay with these nice people while I'm gone." Rocket explains patiently while carefully lifting his son back on the ground from the ship.
"Leave the ship here. I'm going to need it for reconnaissance flight in space to see the Badoon fleet compositions and hopefully figure out how they got here. It shouldn't be possible for them to cross the wall." He tells Samase who thinks this for a moment before giving a curt nod. "I don't see a reason why not. We need to know in any case. When do you think you'll be able to leave if I lend you a crew to help fix it?"
"Day after tomorrow. According to ship diagnostics there's nothing seriously wrong with it aside from the wings that you've removed. So, it's just a routine check after crash to make sure everything works before I takeoff. I'm also going to need my suit & weapons back as well and they better be intact."