Hey guys! Glad to be posting again! I'm sorry I havn't been posting for awhile... but PLEASEPLEASEPLEASE VOTE IF YOU DIDN'T! IT'S NOT IMPOSSIBLE FOR ANY OF THEM YET BUT VOTE OR I CAN'T DO THE NEXT CHAPTER! EVEN IF YOU DON'T CARE WHICH ONE HELP ME CHOOSE PLEASE VOTE PLEASE I NEED HELP. it's on my authors account. PLEASE EVEN YOU CAN'T CHOOSE JUST RANDOMLY CHOOSE SO I HAVE AN IDEA PLEASE.
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A few days later, and the shipping tree encounter had been forgotten. Things were normal, even Though Karkat's glares were picking up on the intensity level.
One day, I was checking some snares. I found a rabbit in one and I quickly pulled it out. As I was resetting it, I heard a snap of a twig behind me. I looked to see who it was and saw Rose.
"Oh, Hello! Sorry, didn't realize you had this snare covered already," She said with a shrug, "Catch anything good?"
I held up the rabbit and she nodded. "Guess it's feet weren't so lucky after all," She said with a smirk. She leaned into the tree and sighed. "But safety's more of a state of mind anyway. What do you think?"
I shrugged. I guess I hadn't really felt out in the open, except when I first found the group.
"Yeah, I know. If you really think about it, though, there's no such thing as safety. Just relatively being out of harms direct path. But you do what you can."
I hadn't heard Rose talk like this before. It was always snide comments, sarcastic replies, and eye rolling teasing with her. Nothing ever serious. But I guess everyone has a serious side if you know them long enough.
Before I could say anything, Karkat came running down the path, breathing hard. He was panting, and a look of wild fear in his eyes.
"Rose, I think you'll wanna see this!" He yelled. When I stood up to go to, he yelled, "No! You're the reason behind this, I know it! You stay here, or I swear to god I'll-"
"Karkat, let her come!" Rose snapped. Karkat looked really ticked, but he didn't argue. The three of us ran in the direction Karkat had come from.
When we got rather close, I could here this rumbling sound. It sounded almost like an earthquake, but I could feel no vibrations in the ground. Not to mention I wasn't sure this was an earthquake zone anyways. Karkat slowed and put his hands to his lips, signaling us to be quiet. Silently, he led us to some bushes, which Kanaya and Nepeta were also crouched behind.
"Look," He whispered as we silently peaked through the prickly leaves of the bush. What I saw terrified me. It was a parade of big, steal machines. The looked like death weapons, ready to mutilate the next village they saw. I looked forward and saw I couldn't see the front, or the back of the line. There were hundreds of em, all lined up. Head somewhere I didn't even want to think about.
"What are those things?" Kanaya asked, and I just shrugged.
"It's obvious she lead them here!" Karkat said as harsh as he could while still being quiet, "She gave away our position like I knew she would!"
"No, Karkat, these things don't know we're here. They have a different destination entirely, they don't seem to be lost." Rose said.
"But what can we do?" Asked Nepeta, who seemed the most scared of the big machines.
"We just have to change locations. We've been at this one a little too long anyway," Said Kanaya, as she gently put a hand on Nepeta's back.
"Wait..." I said, as I looked up towards where the front of the line was, "How long has this been going on?"
"Maybe five minutes. Why?" answered Kanaya.
"These things aren't that fast, the start of the line can't be too far ahead," I responded. Quietly, I went a few trees back, climbed up one, and start going through the branches tree by tree.
"What are you doing?!" Karkat said, getting up and running after me, "You'll get us all killed!"
"Not the plan," I said, and I continued my way up the line, "Just wait and see!"
I made it to the beginning of the things. The first one was just clearing down the forest in it's path, like making a road for the ones behind it. I made my way up a few more trees and carefully slid onto a branch that would soon be above the first one. Waiting till it was dead center under me, I jumped and landed softly on my toes, to not make a load clear thunk in the cabin below.
I looked to the second machine from the top. It had windows, but the captains were just messing around. They looked like doctors too me. I was lucky they didn't see me, I reminded myself to be more careful.
I examined the windows carefully, and saw there was a piece of metal that jutted out underneath it. After a certain pointed it'd be impossible to see the ground, not that it mattered with these monsters.
Now that I had a closer look, I could see guns attached about everywhere. I'd be willing to bet everything there were hidden ones everywhere too. I couldn't let the Doctors have as big of an advantage as these, so I would do as little as I could now.
Carefully, I lowered myself in between two side windows on the right side of the truck I was on. There was a safety ladder, which at the moment was to my advantage. I climbed down so I was at the bottom of the truck.
I started getting a little nervous, if one of the captains spotted me I'd be gone for sure, but I managed to ease my self under the truck. The wheels were high enough off the ground for my body to fit between the truck and the ground, and enough piping for me to hold myself up. carefully, I spun myself so my feet face the front of the machine and my head the back, and positioned myself in the middle of the truck.
The lucky thing about being with the doctors so long, I could now predict their moves. I found, as I expected, the main power source and main engine. Dead center. I used my fingernails and carefully unscrewed the sides of the protective barrier. I let the panel drop o the ground, and watched as it went behind me. I pocketed the screws so they wouldn't have those.
Behind the panel was the power source, but in a different way then I expected. Instead of a plain battery I found a cavern. I pulled myself into it, and even though it was dark there was just enough of a slight red glow from the heated metal to see.
It was the workings of the machine. However, I had now idea how it worked. Blindly, I pulled things out and ripped things up. Finally the engine looked broken, but runnable.
The key thing that made the engine grown the most was this little blue cap next to me. It started squirting oil and smoke when I had taken it off. I decided I would just take that from now on.
As I lowered myself back onto the belly of the truck, I saw tools out of the corner of my eye. I didn't know what they were or how they worked, but I snatched them and put them in my bag with the other screws.
Lying flat on the underside of the machine, I let go suddenly, and kept as still as I could till the next one rolled over me. When I was dead center, I again grabbed hold and held on.
Once again, I unscrewed the panel, but this time I pushed it inside. I leaned in and grabbed the blue thing, then again dropped. I went through the whole process twice more before I felt the line and all the trucks come to a halt.
I held my breath and held as still as possible, while men spilled out from all the trucks and ran to the front. Mine plan had worked, while they were puzzled over the first broken truck, I could break the rest of them and they wouldn't notice till they all eventually broke down. I didn't move a bit, waiting till no more stomping boots came, and all voices were ahead near the first truck. Then, I dropped and did my damage to the next truck and kept going.
There were more trucks than I had expected. My bag was getting heavy from all the screws. By the time I reached the end I'd say there had been about thirty trucks, and I ran off into the woods.
It wasn't long before I ran into Rose, Kanaya, Nepeta, and Karkat. They had their jaws dropped when I came up to them, so I took it they saw my little spectacle.
"Wow!" Nepeta squeaked, "That was... Positively awesome!" she practically purred as she jumped into my arms. "Those guy's will have a heck of a time dealing with you, huh?!" She yelled.
I put her down, "Thanks, but it won't be much longer before they figure out what I did. We better get moving and be as far aways from this place as possible when they do." As everyone turned to the campsite to pack and fly, I remembered.
"Hey, Karkat," I called, "Take this!" I threw him the bag. He opened it and saw the screws and the few tools I had time to grab, and his eyes widen.
Before he could say anything, I said to the group, "I'll be back, I just have to see something."
Rose gave me a sideways glance, but eventually sighed, "Fine. But remember because of your plan we have to leave as soon as possible, so you have to hurry too." I nodded and waited till they were gone to head down the path the death trucks had made.
I was just curious as to where they were coming from. I wasn't planning on going far, just seeing if it was nearby. I headed down maybe a mile or two before I decided to head back.
As I turned around to head back as fast as I could, I heard behind me, "Well well well. What do we have here? A runaway? Oh how sweet!"
The voice chilled me. I knew that voice, I'd now it from a mile away. Only it wasn't a mile away, it was right behind me.
"Speechless, as usual. Haven't changed a bit have ya? I guess I do have that effect on people still. I haven't changed a bit either! What do you think?"
I couldn't move. I had forgotten about her, I wasn't supposed to see her again.
"Well, turn around! Let me get a good look at you! See how much you've grown!"
Slowly, I turned around, and looked right into the cold, deadly, red circuit board pattern of her prying eyes.
"Nice to see you again, 413!" 88 Chuckled, "Now, let's get down to business, shall we?"