Writer’s spot: Greetings friends! The start of another arc!
SO, some people recommended this for me to do, and I decided to use it. Everything in here was supposed to have entered the last chapter. Thanfully, It didn’t, so I manage to put everything I want while keeping a reasonable word count, so, I’m happy.
BESIDES, I plan on using this arc to maybe expand a bit more on the biology of this world or something. Later on I plan on talking more about the twin’s background (which they still don’t have) or maybe on Yllivia’s. Still not sure.
Beep, and enjoy your story!
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[Beepy, we are ready! Where are you?] Ruby asked through their link.
She heard a loud sigh coming from Gaz and held herself so that she wouldn’t laugh at his situation. Soon after she spotted him, walking around the outside of the house while slowly approaching her and the other girls, who had all changed into streetwear. Ruby was back into her so loved hoodie and Yllivia was using her usual yellow jacket and pants. Lunn was wearing her sci-fi blouse she wore on the first time Gaz met her and looked sullenly at the other two.
“Why did you put those clothes? The ones I left out for you were so much cuter!” The elf pouted.
“Practical and discreet.” Yllivia said briefly with a nod, and Ruby followed her example.
“I like my hoodies more too.” She said while hiding behind the Lynnian.
“But… You looked so cute!” Lunn said while trying to get closer to ruby, but the morfian hid herself while walking around the cat-girl. “Come here so that we can get you some better clothes…” She said while trying to approach Ruby.
“No!” Ruby replied while running away from her by keeping Yllivia between them.
[Geez, quite a scene here.] Gaz said playfully as he approached them. Ruby, being the smart girl she was, used that as a chance to distract the elf.
“Oh, beepy’s here!” Ruby said while immediately jogging towards him and away from the elf. Yllivia frowned a bit at the scene, but quickly followed the morfian.
Gaz approached the Lynnian so that he could avoid getting her jealous. Yllivia lowered her hand and petted the robot gently, but frowned a bit once she noticed something on her hand. Taking it away from the robot and staring at it, she saw as some brown grains on her hand, as well as some light brown stains on beepy’s head.
She crouched down and examined his head a bit intrigued, before sighing loudly and using the sleeve of her jacket to clean the dirt stains from his head. Ruby looked a bit confused at Gaz while he silently let Yllivia do her job.
[I did say that I was going to bury my head in shame…] He told her without moving his gaze away.
Ruby smiled a bit awkwardly at his words, but didn’t say anything else. Somehow, it seemed that Yllivia didn’t actually accept Lunn’s logic, but there was no need to tell Beepy about that. A small payback for all that teasing she had suffered. She even managed to convince Ekis to stay quiet for some time just to tease him.
[So, how are we going to the city?] Gaz asked after some time of letting the cat-girl clean him.
[Hmm? We are… Well…] Ruby stopped, slightly confused before turning back to Lunn and Yllivia. “How are we getting to the city? Didn’t Volgoff take the truck with him?” She asked the others.
“No need to worry, deary!” Lunn said with a kind smile as she hugged Ruby. “I checked it earlier, but there’s a bus that pass nearby every three hours.” The elf said cheerfully.
“Is there?” Ruby asked surprised. “I had no idea… How long until the next bus then?” She asked innocently.
[I’d say that if we don’t run right now, we are going to miss it.] Gaz said plainly.
[Why are you jinxing it?] Ruby asked with a wry smile.
“Well, seeing the clock, I would say…” The elf suddenly froze as she looked at the time on the clock imbued on her gloves. “Seven… Minutes?”
[Called it.] Gaz said as the Lunn paled and Yllivia looked at her annoyed.
“Sorius is bad with money. You are bad with time.” She said dryly.
“Sorry…” The elf murmured lowly with an ashamed look.
“Shouldn’t we hurry then?” Ruby asked worried and the two others nodded before running.
...
“Why the hurry, lasses?” The old dwarf asked as he opened the door of the bus to the three girls and their robots, who arrived from a side-road.
The first two, the lynnian and the elf seemed fine even after the short run, but the younger morfian was breathing heavily as she supported her weight on the large robotic wolf. The driver frowned a bit at the sight of the robot, worried that he might end up attacking the other people riding on the bus, but said nothing since he had no basis besides the robot’s appearance.
“We… Made it…” The young morfian said between breaths as she waited for the elf to pay for their passages. “Almost… Lost… it…” As she said those words, she let herself fall on the top of the wolf, who seemed surprised for a moment before nudging her to the bus.
“Is that one tamed?” The dwarf asked as he took the coins from the Elf.
“Beepy’s docile.” The lynnian nodded while looking at the bus. “Is it always this empty?”
“Nah. But the blacktrigger’s blockade did a hit on the business.” He answered with a shrug. “So, what does three ladies and two robots are doing in here, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“We are going to the city to get some job.” The pink haired elf said while taking a nearby seat. “We are quite tight on money, and our friends are all out right now.”
“I see… And what kind of job would the three of you get?”
“Secret.” The lynnian said briefly, making the dwarf nod satisfied.
With that, all of them were already on the bus, with the morfian somehow coerced into sitting on the elf’s lap while the Lynnian sat besidest them. The robot dog sat on the corridor and even seemed to yawn a bit before laying his head on his legs. The cat robot quickly looked around and settled close to the bigger robot after finding it’s owner unavailable.
The scene seemed to attract the attention of the other four or five passengers, who all smiled wryly at the young girl’s embarrassment and looked curious at the strange wolf.
The wolf seemed to notice this, as it raised its head and looked back at then, tilting its head in confusion for a moment before turning back to the girls. For a moment he stood quiet before laying down once again, going back to what seemed a sleep.
Taking his focus out from the girls’ group, the driver quickly went on his way back to taking the bus to the city. Even if he had stopped to get these girls in the middle of the way, getting to the station late isn’t something that he could afford to do. After all, he had a reputation as a bus driver to keep.
…
[That’s… Surprising…] Gaz said in their link.
[Is it really?] Ekis asked confused. [I mean, they did look kind of scary when I saw them.]
[Yeah, I know, but in my world, some wolves did bond with the humans, becoming tamed animals.] Gaz said with a frown.
[Wait, you tamed wolves?] Ruby asked surprised, to which Gaz nodded in his mind.
[Well, technically they were called dogs, but yeah.] He replied.
[But… They are so scary and dangerous! Why would anyone want a tamed wolf?] Ruby asked confused.
[Well, after a few years of selective breeding, we ended up with a bunch of cute dogs.] Gaz stopped to think for a moment. [And they made excellent hunting partners, so it’s not like it was that bad.]
[Cute wolf?] Ekis asked while stopping to think. [I… can’t see that…] She said with a sigh.
[Take a look at my memories, there should be some of them in there.] As he said that, he felt as the goddess agreed and started to look around his memories from his world in search for something. [Taking the cue on things that have and don’t have… I don’t think I’ve seen flying vehicles ever since I arrived…] As he said that he turned towards Ruby, who was still squirming on Lunn’s lap, trying to get free, but unable to escape the elf’s grasp.
[Well… I don’t think that flying would be that safe…] She said after some time. [Not until we develop something better and safer than hot-gas lift.]
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[You don’t have anything better than that?] Gaz asked surprised, and Ruby nodded discretely. [I mean, why don’t you use something from a flying robot or something? I’m sure you could guess something with that…]
[Hmm… Well…] As Ruby tried to put into words her thoughts, the bus came to a stop.
She quickly shot up from Lunn’s lap and made a motion for the others to follow her. Lunn and Yllivia followed her almost immediately, but Gaz had to wake up the napping Mirage who refused to go away from the spot near his furnace.
Sighing loudly as the cat woke up briefly, only to jump to his back where she fell asleep once again. For a world that didn't have any tamed dogs, the robotic cats were surprisingly similar to their organics counterparts.
Beepy jumped out of the bus and immediately felt as the people looked at him in wonder, as not only were wolves seen as wild animals, but him also being a robot made him an even bigger mystery.
[Waah! So cute!] Ekis said in a cheerful voice after some time of disembarking. [They look nothing like the wolfs we saw!]
[See, I told you they were cute.] Gaz said proudly. [And you still haven’t said what you were going to say.] He told to Ruby, who was pointing a direction to Yllivia and Lunn.
[Wha? Oh, sorry.] She said while taking a step ahead and guiding their group. [You see, the clearwings are the largest flying robots around. Anything bigger than that gets too heavy to lift flight!] Ruby said to the confused Beepy.
[Clearwings?] He asked her.
[Yeah, those small robots with circuits on the wings. The ones that Yllivia uses to get the ink for her paintings.] As she said that, Gaz took a few seconds to link it to the ones he recalled as Cyberflys.
[Really? I mean, there’s nothing better than them?] Gaz asked surprised.
[Nope. After all, robots are too heavy to fly around, being made of metal and so on…] Ruby said as if stating the obvious.
[But… Why can’t you use the blimps to fly then? Shouldn’t the sky be safe since all the robots are on the ground?] Ekis asked confused.
[The sky? Safe?] Ruby asked surprised before shaking her head. [Look, just like the sea is inhabited by fishes, the ground is led by the robots, the sky is owned by the Skrylks.]
Gaz frowned a bit at her words, after all, since a long time ago he had understood every single words thrown at him, yet suddenly there was a single untranslated word in the middle. He quickly waited for Ekis reaction, but she also seemed confused.
The two were about to ask Ruby what her words actually meant, but before they could, Lunn made a question of her own.
“Deary… Are you alright?” Lunn looked worried at the morfian.
“Hmm?” Ruby blinked, getting caught by surprise by the sudden question. “W…Why do you ask?”
“Well… You’ve been nodding and shaking your head for quite some time now…” The elf said, making the girl blush in surprise.
She was so engrossed on their talk through the link that she didn’t even notice the fact that she was actually moving her head physically. Embarassed, since for others it would seem that she had gone crazy, Ruby hid her hot face on the hem of Lunn’s blouse. The elf became confused by her sudden reaction, but it wasn’t her who was about to complain.
…
The merc’s building was very similar to the one that Gaz had seen back at their old city. Many tables with rough looking men and women who watched patiently a series of screen, waiting for a job that fit their tastes to appear. The girls arrival attracted their attention for no more than a couple of seconds before they all went back to doing whatever they were doing.
Only a few gazes lingered on the two robots following the group, but even these didn’t last much longer. It was common courtesy of being a merc to not stick your nose where you don’t belong, so even the most curious one ended up minding this simple unspoken rule in the end.
Yllivia and Lunn, both somewhat used to these stares didn’t seem all that bothered, but Ruby and Gaz, who were new to the whole business still had some trouble getting used to them, so they quickly hastened their pace to get closer to the two more experienced mercenaries. Mirage… Simply ignored everything and kept sleeping soundly.
Lunn reached a nearby attendee and gave him what looked like a badge of sorts. The attendee took it and gave it a quick check, before nodding and taking it with him to one of the inner rooms. The group waited patiently, so Gaz took upon this chance to make the question that had been bugging him.
[So… What’s a Skrylk?] Gaz asked and he felt as Ekis agreed with him.
[Huh? Didn’t you have those on your world?] Ruby asked confused.
[No? It didn’t even got translated, so I have no idea on what you are talking about.] He told her.
[Really? Well… They are kind of like… really, really big birds with four wings. There’s a lot of them on the sky and they can fly forever if they feel like it…] Ruby said while focusing a bit. [They also attack anything flying on sight, so we are unable to even get close to them before our ships being destroyed. From what I heard, they are really dangerous.]
[Geez, so you don’t have airplanes nor anything like that?] Gaz asked with a mental sigh.
[Airplanes?] Ekis and Ruby asked confused. Seeing their reactions, Gaz let out another sigh, but this time his voice sounded a bit more cheerful.
[Okay, I have a new long-term goal.] He said with a mischievous tone. [To make our search easier, we have to make a flying robot body.]
[A… FLYING ROBOT?] Ruby asked surprised. [That’s impossible! Simply impossible!] She said while staring openly at him. [The pieces are simply too heavy and…]
[Ekis, search around airplanes and helicopters in my head, that should give you some inspiration. I’ll leave the planning to you.] Gaz said, interrupting Ruby’s rants.
[Okay. I’ll work on it.] She said confidently.
[Oh, and Ruby. Do you know some robot with a really sensible electromagnetic sensor?] Gaz said while turning his attention back to her.
[Huh? Yes… But…]
[Good, make a list of them for us, since that’s our only lead to find Ekis’ body right now.] He said and saw as the girl nodded, still a bit confused. [Oh, that guy is coming back. Let’s see what we’ve got.] He said, noticing that the attendant came back from the inner room, the sudden change leaving Ruby unable to follow up with her question.
“Okay, I’ve verified your identity, miss Lunn.” The guy said while giving her the badge back. “Is there something else I can help you with?”
“Yeah… We’ve been looking around for a fast job that can get us some money.” She said while leaning forward on the counter, leaving the man troubled on where to let his eyes linger, thanks to her cleavage. “Nothing too big… Have any suggestion?”
“Hmm… Well…” He said while looking back to the screens. “We could use some help with… Huh… An escort to Orrhan.” He said, but Lunn shook her head. Escorts could take too much time. “Then… Raiding a certain gang warehouse?” This time, she considered for a moment, as it was something that she and Yllivia could do, but since they had Ruby with them, she declined for now. “Well… Gathering information about a gearbox?”
This time, the elf didn’t even have enough time to consider the job before Yllivia and Ruby both took a step forward and slammed their hands on the counter.
“We’ll take it.” They said in synchro.
“Huh? Girls?” Lunn asked, surprised with their sudden change, and when the two turned to her, she paled, as she saw their eyes burning with a strange fury.
[Huh… Not wanting to stop your rage moment…] Gaz said a bit scared. [But what’s a gearbox?]
[That’s…] Ruby said while calming herself a bit. [The name given to illegal robot arenas…]
[Robot arenas?] Gaz asked, as the words took a few seconds to sink in.
[Yeah… Where they put two robots to fight… Usually, until death.] Ruby said with some anger seeping through her words.
[That’s… Cruel!] Ekis said shocked.
However, Gaz had another reaction to that.
[Hmm… Interesting…]