Once again, I warn that this isn't for the young and/or homophobic.
Might change the rating later XD I'm on the M track.
This chapter is in Tyler's indirect point of view.
Doctor Nero, Professor Pike, and HIVE and its orig characters belong to Mark Walden.
All other mentioned characters belong to me.
TYLER RHINNES.
Animatronics expert. Father works for a team on HIVE, and by extension, GLOVE's development crew.
Best friend and room mate of Kazuno Kobayashi.
"Welcome To H.I.V.E., the Higher Institute of Villainous Education. I am whom you may call Madame Saturn. My name is Saturnina Macaraig, and I play the role of your.... guidance advisor." The last words were accompanied with a small, ironic smile. The woman who stood before them barely passed five feet, with some of the new students throwing doubtful looks at the little brown woman who looked no more harmful than a butterfly.
"You have already been briefed on the reasons you have been sent to HIVE, although don't think that means you have had special placement, whatsoever your reasons may be. If your father or your mother or your guardian of any sort had the power to place you here, it only means that you are spoiled little brats. If you have come here because we have taken interest in your skills, then you'd better do your best not to be thrown out. Students at HIVE who don't meet the standards set, or who cause trouble for the school, tend to go M.I.A."
The little woman eyed each of them with a glint which they assumed was the reason she was hired as a teacher.
"Each of you is to be separated into your streams. There are five: Alpha stream, Technical stream, Political/Financial Stream and Henchman stream. Each of you shall be provided with any and all necessities to keep you comfortable for the next six years. There will be two people per room, and all doors will be sealed by ten P.M. Without special clearance, those who do not follow the curfew will be locked out until six in the morning, at which the automatic systems will unlock all rooms. The envelopes being passed at this moment contain all you need for your first few weeks in HIVE, including maps, rules, and HIVE student code.
And finally, I wish you all good luck. May God have mercy on your soul." Saturn raised a crucifix tied around her neck to the students in salute.
A number of gunmen rallied each student according to stream. One young Asian boy was nearly bulldozed in the process.
A hand was offered, and the boy looked up to meet walnut brown eyes. "Hi there, I'm Tyler. Tyler Rhinnes. Are you okay kid?" The brown-eyed boy pulled the other up to eye-level, finding that the Asian's height was a quarter foot less than his own. "Mmhmm. I'm fine." The boy replied, rubbing his head. "Hey, you're a nip, ain't ya?"
"A what?"
"A nip. A.... Japanese kid."
"Oh. Yes. In a way. Yes." The boy stuttered. "My name is Kobayashi Kazuno, Tyler-san."
They shook hands in a friendly manner before being filed further along a hallway. "Technical Stream, this way." A voice ordered.
"Just Tyler. Or Ty. Mind me callin' you Kazu?" Tyler continued conversation, fiddling with the opening of his folder.
"I.... I don't mind it terribly." Kazuno responded, having his own folder snatched by the Australian redhead. "Look, we've got the same room, Kazu. Well ain't that the bee's knees?"
Kazu stared, his expression almost laughable on his round face. "Wipe that stunned mullet off your face or it'll stay, eh?" Tyler said, reading the numbers on each room they passed.
They stopped at room 76, heaving the large metallic door aside to reveal a cozy-looking room with two bunk beds. Remembering what Madame Saturn had told them, Kazuno put his belongings on the top bunk of the left bed and sat at the bottom.
Tyler removed his jacket and did the same as Kazuno on the right bed, laying down wearily on the soft cushions. "Looks like you'll be stuck with me for a while, Kazu. Might as well get to know each other while we're here." He said casually.
Kazuno stayed silent, rifling through his bag and bringing out a number of notebooks which looked a combination of old, cheap, and used and overused; the pages were already a sickly shade of yellow and Kazuno handled each carefully.
"Wot's all that then?"
"My notes." Kazuno answered, taking the thin, naked tube of a ballpen and writing haphazardly with it.
"All this? Internal system blueprints? Alternate energy sources for mechanical motor functions? This is all..... bonzer! Damn brilliant!" Tyler flipped through each notebook with bright eyes, looking up at Kazuno with awe on his face.
Kazuno looked sheepish, putting down each notebook, muttering an intelligible 'thank you'.
"No wonder you got in here, mate." Tyler said.
"Thank you." Kazuno murmured again, the red flushing almost painfully over his light skinned face.
"Who's that?"
"That's the founder. Our headmaster, you know? Doctor Nero."
Reena Herman pushed large spectacles up the bridge of her nose, stooping over the table as she whispered to Kazuno.
"Nero, like, burned down all of Rome Nero?"
"That's the name anyway. Look at him. He's so young." Dana Rougenwall said, joined in the circle. Tyler was listening silently to the conversation between the four girls and Kazuno, who was, oddly enough, more talkative around the girls.
"Handsome too, you can't deny that." Amuri Hassan whispered.
"Who's denying? Still though." Farah Falkner turned to Kazuno questioningly. "You've met him personally, haven't you, Kazu?"
Tyler watched Kazuno's expression. The fourteen-year old Aussie noted the passing expression on his friend's face, a flickering hint of pain quickly replaced by none. "Yes. Tyler did too. We were asked to help Professor Pike with some experimentation." Kazuno replied.
"Oh wow! Who knew you had it in you?" Amuri said in awe.
"They are the best in the technical stream. The Rhinnes-Kobayashi team. It's no surprise." Said Dana, sipping her cherry soda.
"That, I can vouch for."
The students turned. "Madame Saturn! What a surprise. We were just-" "It's quite all right, Miss Herman. I have no intention to ruin your conversation, although I regret to inform you that I must steal Misters Kobayashi and Rhinnes for a moment." Saturnina told them. The boys stood obediently.
"Come along."
"Hey, Kazu, you all right in there?"
Tyler sat up in his bed, watching the bathroom door. His friend had been in there for nearly half an hour. The clock read eleven forty-seven by the time Tyler decided to check up on the Asian.
It had been four months since the two of them had been hand picked, told by Madame Saturn, during a class with Professor Pike (working machinery, graded on efficiency and cost) to assist the old professor in an experiment, one that they had sworn to secrecy. Tyler, with the knowledge of motor functions and coordinating systems in an animatronic, and Kazuno, with his notes on internal systems made to mimic the thought processes of a human brain, had begun working on Project ANIMA.
It was no surprise; not on that day.
Doctor Nero was the one who spoke to them of it first, long before that day in class.
The room was cold and official, sending shivers up the Aussie's spine. Every corner was pristine, formed to perfection. The table before them held a number of the usual office tools, although Tyler doubted that the collection of miniature knives and the large insignia of HIVE in the form of a marble statuette sitting on the corner right made for a mundane principal's table.
The two sat on cushy chairs in front of the aforementioned table and were made to wait out the Doctor's return, left alone in the unforgiving room.
"What do you think, Kazu? Are we in trouble or what?"
Tyler laughed awkwardly, clutching his side after a few huffs. Kazu nodded stiffly, keeping the cold pack to his forehead.
"They didn't have to beat us. I'm sure many others have tried escaping HIVE before." Kazuno said angrily, flinching once more when he dropped the cold pack. Tyler picked it up, with considerable hazard to his bruised ribs, and handed it back to Kazu. "Thank you, Tyler." Kazu said softly, sighing.
"Hey, if people tried to escape before, they'd have installed better locks." Tyler quipped. The two laughed, sobering quickly when Tyler felt his ribs shoot pain right up to his brain and Kazuno's head began pulsing.
It was then that the door opened.
They'd seen Dr. Nero before, the man having welcomed them to HIVE the first time. He'd spoken with that level voice, revealing nothing.
And yet, at this close an encounter, Tyler felt something entirely new about the man. Something to be feared, and yet, something he couldn't turn away from.
Judging by Kazu's widened eyes, the Asian felt it as well.
It was the presence of power. Something such as that could never be forgotten.
"Kazu, come on! Are you okay? Are you sick?" Tyler repeatedly knocked on the wooden bathroom door, receiving no reply from his room mate.
Quickly, deeply concerned about his friend, Tyler picked up the electromagnet he and Kazu had been working on, sticking it to the door right above the knob. Pulling it aside when he knew he had traction, Tyler unlocked the bolt on the inside, the metal rod loosed from the door.
In the bathroom, the sound of running water led him to the shower. Tyler quickly pulled the curtains aside, revealing Kazuno, a shade of sickly white, kneeling on the surface motionlessly.
The shower was cold as ice. Ignoring past decorum learned from a nagging mother, Tyler shut the water off and quickly pulled the smaller boy out of the shower, wrapping him with a towel and carrying him to the bed.
Tyler turned around, trying to remember where the surveillance cameras were placed, about to call for help. It was just then that a cold hand grabbed his wrist.
"What is it, Kazu? What happened?" He demanded.
Kazuno put a finger to his mouth and smiled oddly, as though something funny had just come to pass.
"I've got it, Tyler. I'll be the mother, you be the father. It'll be like a child." He said, wheezing laughs with each word. "It shouldn't know yet. We're all wrong. It shouldn't know..."
Kazuno closed his eyes, the smile still ghosted on his features.
It was Tyler's deepest memory of the AI.
Tyler took Kazu's notebook from the bedside long after he'd made sure Kazu was fast asleep. He wrote on the latest page, on one of the margins, LIKE A CHILD. MUST NOT KNOW YET.
He decided he'd let Kazuno explain to him when the boy was in better shape.
"Kazu, you shouldn't yourself so hard. Look at how thin you've got. I'm surprised you ain't jack of this project yet." Tyler said, wiping his brow.
His friend was leaning over one of the humanoid models, tinkering with some parts of the Central Processor.
The Asian looked up at his statement. Indeed, his cheekbones were now more striking, a large contrast to the round-faced boy that had come in his first year in HIVE. Now at age fifteen, both he and Tyler were coming to a breakthrough in their project. They had been plucked from Technical Stream classes altogether, only holding the name for show. In truth, they'd become part of the entire team of HIVE scientists working on Project ANIMA.
Tyler approached Kazu. "Wanna go for some grub?" He asked, laying a hand on his friend's soldier. Kazuno jumped at the touch, pushing Tyler away. "I'm.... fine. Just go ahead without me, Ty." Kazuno said shakily.
Tyler was worried about his friend. For a few months now, the Asian had been staying later than Tyler in the lab, sometimes staying the entire night. On the nights he DID come to the room, though, Kazu's eyes were blank, his thoughts miles away. And each night late, Kazu would go to the bathroom and stay there for a good forty-five minutes before coming out cheerful, as though there was nothing wrong.
Tyler frowned. He did not enjoy being lied to, especially when the lies were coming from his closest friend.
"Kaz, hey." Tyler said one night, lying on the top of his bunk, staring at the ceiling.
From beneath the opposite bed, Kazu looked up at Tyler.
"What is it, Ty?" He asked, stifling a yawn. "You're holdin' out on me, mate." Tyler said straightforwardly, catching Kazu's eyes.
"All those late nights, everything you've been doing right in front of me has been weird. And you keep saying there's nothing wrong, but I know my mate, and you ain't acting like the Kazuno I know. I know when something's off. So are you gonna tell me or keep hiding til I force you to tell me?"
Kazuno broke their eye contact, a look of shame on his features. "I've just been working extra on the project, is all." He replied, putting the sheets over his head.
"I get that. But those times in the bathroom. The times you wouldn't even let me touch you. Can't you tell me what's really going on?" He jumped off the bunk and approached the other, putting a hand on the sheet covering Kazu's head.
"I want to tell you but I'm afraid you'd hate me for it." Kazu said loudly, pushing Tyler's hand away.
"Then just TELL ME. I can't hate you, Kaz! I know you. And I thought you were a good enough mate to know me. You KNOW I wouldn't hate you, no matter what it is. I mean, this is a school for villains for Pete's sake. What could you possibly have done that's any worse than all this?"
Tyler gestured wildly at his surroundings, making a point.
Kazuno threw the blanket off and sat up, brushing too-long ebony hair from his face.
"I- Tyler, I...." Kazuno started, rubbing his face vigorously as though to clean the insecurity away.
"I'm...."
Tyler stared expectantly.
"Gay."
There was silence following that statement, the Aussie taken aback. He'd expected something nasty, something criminal. Perhaps something along the lines of him killing someone or messing up the plans of a year's worth of research by twelve teams. Something work related. Something school related.
He'd never expected this.
"You.... You had me worried for almost a year over your damn night habits and that's all? That's all it is?" He said, half laughing, his voice anger marred with hilarity.
Kazuno stared at him with wide eyes, unable to believe what Tyler was saying.
"I'm.... wow. Is that it? I mean.... I thought you were sick. You're not sick are you?" Tyler grabbed him by the shoulders and looked him over. "No, I'm.... I mean, what?" Kazu stuttered, pushing Tyler's hands off. "Nothing. No, I mean.... It's.... It would've been nice if you'd told me sooner. We're mates, ain't we? You ain't got nothing to hide around me. I don't care if you're a fruit." Tyler told him, a relieved smile painting his features.
"Even if I'm the kind of fruit that gets turned on by touches alone?" Kazuno said quickly, almost intelligibly, looking red as a berry.
Tyler stared, first at Kazu, then at his own hands. "Ah..." He raised them away from Kazu apologetically. "So that's... and the bathroom trips... Ah..."
"Well don't look at me like someone's died! How long's this been going on?" Tyler asked, settling into his own bed.
Kazu lay back, and the two began to talk. Just talk, something they hadn't done in a long time.
In the morning, things were going much better.
But....
"Amuri told me to ask you if you'd like to go on a date." Kazuno said slowly, as he and Tyler held together the metallic limbs, to be welded in by the latter.
"Coo. That'd be nice." Tyler said absently.
"The date's with Amuri, by the way." Kazuno said, his tone dry as dust. "Oh really? That changes things, then." Tyler said sarcastically, finally finishing the job.
"Seriously, Ty. What should I tell her?" Kazuno said. Tyler turned to him, the Aussie snickering almost instantly.
"What!?"
Again, a pout rose on Kazuno's face, one for which Tyler had to hold back laughter.
"Nothing. And about Amuri, tell her it's a date." Tyler said.
"All right then." Kazuno said wearily, dropping his tools.
"Hey, Kazu, aren't you tired asking dates for other girls from me? I mean, you're not my secretary or anything." Tyler asked carefully.
"Nah. It's life's fulfillment when I get to load you with all the dates you have to suffer through." Kazuno said, uprighting the android.
"Well... What about you? Don't you want any dates, or something? You get lonely, don't you?"
Tyler received a dry glare in response. "Don't do anything stupid, Tyler." Kazuno said gravely. "All right, don't you get all narked." Tyler muttered.
Kazuno's glance was apologetic, small as it was.
They activated the android, its voice belting a mechanical "Hello" as it walked back and forth. Its steps then became more steady, its movements more fluid.
It was learning.
Perhaps it was all a dream. He didn't know.
Tyler was barely conscious, unable to read the blinking time on the clock. Above him was shadowed, blocking the sole light from the bathroom.
That close, he could make out handsome features, a thin face, prominent cheekbones, dark eyes.
He raised a hand, as if to make certain this was all real. A cold hand met his.
The face lowered to whisper something by his ear.
"Tyler...
"I am lonely."
Tyler looked to the bedside table. A glass sat, the powder already settling at the bottom. Perhaps this was important.
He looked up again, cold lips meeting his.
.end.
Sorry for the shortness D8
This'll be followed by a continuing chapter and explanation.
Review please. and thanks for reading 8D
