Hey all, welcome to the next part of Afterparty, a delicious four-parter called The Subroutine. I'm trying to put more action into my fanfics, whether or not I'm good at it remains to be seen; I may just stick to cuteness after this little experiment ^_^
Enjoy!
Shiro typed furiously on the keyboard and looked up at the screen.
She hadn't been back at work a month before things were already getting challenging. Not as far as her co-workers, they'd all been very warm and accepting – for the most part – the problem was her current task. The ninja had been invited back to Borg industries to try the new fighting simulation, and things were going as well as could be expected… until Zane had gone in for the first go.
Something in the simulation's programming and Zane's own software was clashing wildly.
"Reboot the system!" Mr Borg insisted.
"Sir, we can't do that until I internally disconnect him from the main server." Shiro squeaked.
"Just be glad Pixal isn't here," Kai mentioned. "she'd freak out if she saw this!"
Zane's unconscious body was seizing uncontrollably in the VR seat as sparks shot out of the headset he was wearing.
"Shut it down! Now!" Mr Borg demanded.
"Sir, if we don't disconnect properly, he'll be vulnerable to external attack!" Shiro panicked, frantically accessing the failsafe exit procedure.
"I've had it with this!" Jay intervened, gathering a small ball of lighting in his palm to disable the headset.
"Don't touch it!" Shiro yelled.
But she was too late, Jay had already put his electrically charged hand on the power supply. There was a flash of light, as the charge flew through the seat and surged into every other computer connected to it. A whirling shut down sound followed, and all the machines went off, one after another. The entire room was silent; Jay was mortified at the destruction he had just caused, and his face burned in embarrassment.
Suddenly the headset broke in two and fell from Zane's face. He slowly opened his eyes and stood up, before promptly falling over.
"Bro, I'm so sorry! Are you okay?" Jay asked, helping him back up.
"Angel subroutine… enabled," Zane uttered in a monotone voice. "syncing activation with designated counterpart…"
"Ooh dear…" Mr Borg mumbled.
"Jay, take Zane outside to recover." Lloyd said.
"Of course," Jay agreed, guiding Zane into the elevator. "come on, let's get you some fresh air."
"Two-way protocol… now fully operative." Zane rigidly stated.
With the two of them gone, Lloyd approached Mr Borg and deeply bowed, his gaze fixed firmly on the floor.
"We're really sorry about the damage to your equipment." He said sincerely.
"Think no more about it," Mr Borg waved his hand in a forgiving motion. "Jay did what he thought best to remedy the situation."
"Sir…" Shiro glanced at her boss more sternly than she should have. "What is the Angel subroutine?"
"Oh, it's nothing, just a subsidiary program that exists as part of the Genbu processor," Mr Borg deflected. "both Zane and Pixal had the Genbu installed during their respective rebuilds."
"With all due respect, sir, don't patronise me," She grimaced. "this program has interfered with the simulation's coding – surely you informed the main programmer that this existed when you requested the simulation to be built?"
"Of course I did, but you are my main programmer, and if you had actually been here in the coding stages, it would not have gone wrong." Mr Borg frowned.
He knew it was a low blow; Shiro and Marilyn's elopement was hardly planned to coincide with the creation of this new virtual reality fighting simulator, but she looked away with embarrassment as he mentioned it.
"Mr Borg, Zane's our friend; what just happened to him?" Cole asked.
"It appears that Zane cannot use the virtual simulator, due to an internal conflict, so we will have to move to a live simulation on a recently acquired island not far from the city," Mr Borg bowed apologetically. "I will inform your sensei that you will be delayed by a day or so; accommodation will of course be provided for you."
"Please, Cyrus, be honest with us," Nya pleaded. "just tell us what this Angel thing is."
"It is… difficult to explain, it would be easier to show you," Mr Borg replied. "but Zane needs some time to recover from the shock, so please, avail yourself of the facilities and all will be revealed tomorrow."
Unconvinced, but not wanting to appear rude, Lloyd ushered Nya, Kai and Cole to the elevator. As they got in and the doors closed, Mr Borg's half-hearted smile faded. He turned to Shiro and placed his hand on her shoulder.
"Please forgive me, Shiro, it was most inappropriate of me to say what I did," Mr Borg spoke softly and sincerely. "I didn't mean it the way it came out."
"I know you didn't," Shiro politely smiled. "it was a tense situation; it would be remiss of me to hold it against you."
Early the next day, the ninja and Mr Borg – along with Shiro and a handful of other technicians – all boarded a large vessel headed to this new island of Mr Borg's. He had invested in a high-tech catamaran for this very reason, and proudly boasted about the space and specs of his new Saba 50.
Zane had returned to normal after yesterday's incident, much to the relief of his team (especially Jay, who held himself responsible for what happened). There were seemingly no side effects, but Nya was still concerned.
"You sure you're feeling better?" Nya asked, her voice full of concern.
"My head hurts a little, but apart from that I feel fine, thank you." He nodded.
"So, do you know what this 'Angel subroutine' is?" She pried.
"Angel subroutine?" He remarked, confused.
"Yesterday, when you got shocked by Jay, you said something about an Angel subroutine being activated… don't you remember?"
"No." Zane gently shook his head.
"Zane!" Pixal squealed.
Caught completely unawares, Zane turned around. His face lit up when he saw Pixal run over to him, and he opened his arms to her. She threw herself into his embrace and he lifted her, briefly spinning her around. The ruckus reached the attention of Kai and Jay, who were watching the ocean just a few feet away from the lover's reunion.
"Pixal!" Zane beamed, gently kissing her. "I didn't know you were here; I thought you were busy training."
"We were," Wu intervened, as he approached his students. "but Mr Borg invited us to come and watch the live fighting simulation."
"I am very excited to see you all in action." Pixal smiled.
"But you've seen us fight before." Jay laughed as they came over.
"Not on this island, it is a recent acquisition of my father's." She responded.
"I thought maybe you'd come to fight alongside us." Kai joked, winking at her.
"Sadly not," Pixal chuckled. "I have not been in training long enough."
"She is making good progress though," Wu mentioned. "perhaps you could chaperone her, see how she gets on?"
"I wouldn't mind," Kai agreed, looking over at Zane. "the question is, do you trust me to look after your missus?"
"Of course, I trust you." Zane smiled.
"But if anything happens to her, you'd better watch your back." Jay teased.
"Guys! Guys!" Cole ran over to them, looking pretty distressed.
"You okay?" Kai wondered. "You look like you've seen a ghost!"
"The island; it's… it's…" Cole stammered. "it's Master Chen's!"
"As in, that lunatic who had the elemental tournament?" Jay turned to look at Pixal. "Did you know about this?"
"Yes," Pixal stated. "my father wanted to repurpose it after Chen was banished."
"I am not sure how I feel about this revelation…" Zane nervously said.
"A team of Shinto priests have performed a purification ritual over every square inch of the island, and placed protection spells at all possible entry points," Pixal subtly took his hand. "Chen cannot be freed from the cursed realm, Zane: even if he could, he cannot return here – there will not be a repeat of what happened last time."
Zane still held some reservations about being back on the rock that once belonged to that maniac; no doubt he would be besieged by flashbacks the whole time they were there.
As they passed the numerous jagged rocks that littered the immediate area, the ferryman expertly maneuvered the vessel into position, and in one smooth motion, docked the ship without so much as a bump. The deckhands set about securely mooring the water-bound beast to the dock, as Mr Borg came over to speak with them.
"Well, here we are!" He smiled. "The new training ground!"
"It looks familiar," Lloyd baited. "when did you get it?"
"Only recently, two weeks ago at most," Mr Borg replied. "I realise it may come as a shock to be back here, seeing as this used to belong to Master Chen, but I assure you that any traces of that… charlatan have been removed."
"Yes, Pixal was telling us." Jay remarked.
"That said, the entire island is booby-trapped, my security droids are patrolling, and we will be able to monitor everything that happens here on the catamaran," Cyrus warned. "you will pair off and go in different directions; your objective is to find the hidden cabin, retrieve a flash-drive and bring it back here."
"But there's 7 of us, we can't pair off." Cole noted.
Cyrus Borg paused as he counted them, expecting a total of 6, only to see Pixal also standing in the line-up, bringing the number up to 7.
"Ah, yes, I see what you mean…" He paused for a moment.
"If I may make a suggestion?" Wu intervened.
"Of course." Cyrus nodded.
"Perhaps splitting them into two teams would be better; seeing as Pixal is still in training, perhaps it would be wise for her to be teamed with Kai and Lloyd," Wu suggested. "then we could simply put Zane with Jay, Cole, and Nya; provided, of course, that you don't object to her joining in the exercise."
"If she's happy to participate I'm happy for her to do it," Mr Borg grinned at his daughter confidently. "as long as Kai and Lloyd are alright with the arrangement."
"You can trust us, sir." Lloyd said as he and Kai bowed.
"Thank you, father." Pixal also bowed.
"Good, good," Cyrus smiled. "now, is everyone ready to commence the operation?"
"Subroutine operative, alliance engaged." Zane and Pixal replied simultaneously, in a hollow computerized fashion.
Such a response caused an air of mild concern, especially as the two appeared to return to their normal, relaxed selves mere seconds later. Kai and Lloyd glanced at each other and wondered exactly what they'd gotten themselves into by agreeing to escort Pixal on this training activity.
"Best of luck to everyone!" Mr Borg cheered, as the ninja split up and ventured onto the island in their respective groups.
"I'm sure she's fine." Nya assured.
"I know she is," Zane agreed. "she has progressed well in her training with Sensei Wu."
"And Kai and Lloyd know they'll be in trouble if they don't look after her." Jay quietly laughed.
"Is it wrong that I kinda want them to mess up?" Cole glanced at Zane, knowing his opinion was controversial. "I'd give almost anything to see the snowstorm that destroyed this island the first time."
"I will attempt to bring up the memory files for you," Zane offered. "once we are back at the temple."
"Everyone, get down!" Jay hissed.
They all immediately sunk into the long grass as a veritable horde of security droids marched past, completely unaware of them. Zane used his scanner to determine how many enemies were nearby, and how close they were – or weren't – to the hidden cabin.
Admittedly, he was mildly distracted by the absence of his wife, and quite surprised that Cyrus did not put them together for this exercise. Having said that, he understood that there would be times when they would be apart, and she would have to fend for herself, but at least she had Kai and Lloyd with her this time around.
"The cabin is at least 3 miles away," Zane muttered. "but the closer we get, the more droids we are likely to encounter."
Once the coast was clear, they emerged from the grass and continued on their way. Nya could see, that for all his protesting otherwise, Zane was not quite right. He seemed to drift in and out of his own mind – he would flip between appropriate situational alertness and going glassy eyed, glancing at the forest with pain-filled familiarity. No one wanted to be back here, least of all Zane, who was reminded of a number of things he wanted to forget.
"This place gives me so many bad vibes," Jay fretted. "I don't know what Mr Borg was thinking."
"Based on what Pixal said, he wanted to reclaim it as part of New Ninjago," Cole theorized. "and he went to a lot of trouble to make sure Chen couldn't come back to this island, even if he got out of the Cursed Realm."
"Yeah, I get that, but seriously, a whole team of priests to cleanse the island?" Jay gestured dramatically with his arms. "I can't be the only one who thinks that was excessive."
"You are aware this island is huge, right?" Cole chuckled.
As they approached a derelict building, Zane stopped.
Cole and Jay stood either side of him and watched as he attempted to take in every detail of the unkempt structure. They wondered what was so special about this one in particular that he would pause so forebodingly – it wasn't the cabin they were looking for, and it looked much like the other neglected buildings that were falling apart after several years of disuse.
"Taking in the scenery?" Cole asked.
"This is where it started..." Zane muttered darkly. "It is not the original building – this is what they rebuilt after I destroyed it."
"So, this is where...?" Nya began, placing her hand on his shoulder.
"This is where they decided to test my powers... where they cut off Pixal's arm..." Zane looked down at his hands. "I will never get that image out of my head; it haunts me."
"I'll never understand why they thought that was a good idea," Jay added, trying to lighten the mood. "I mean, if you've gotta test a guy's elemental power, use the power-absorbing staff you conveniently have lying around; don't provoke him into a rage."
"Clouse did not care if it was a good idea or not, he was too interested in flexing his control over his minions," Zane said angrily as his eyes narrowed. "he was an egotistical, self-important narcissist, who thought that the sheer number of men under his command would be enough to control the fallout of what he did."
"I can't imagine what it was like for you to see Pixal being assaulted like that, but it's all in the past now," Nya tried to assuage Zane's guilt. "thanks to you, she has her new body and is learning to defend herself – she'll never be that vulnerable again."
"Nya's right," Jay nodded in agreement. "Pixal couldn't be in better hands than yours."
Zane looked up, and the anger in his expression simply melted away. He smiled peacefully at Jay, pulling his friend in for a hug. Jay was startled at first, but patted Zane on the back reassuringly; he had no idea how much his nindroid companion appreciated that comment.
"My apologies for getting caught up in the moment – let's continue on." Zane beamed, letting go of Jay and making an abrupt turn to walk around the building.
Cole for one was amazed at how quickly Zane's demeanour could change. As they deftly made their way further into the woodland, he watched the ice ninja's confident gait, and wondered if there was in fact an internal switch for his emotions.