Rocky felt the thrust from the pack carrying him high over the city and could not help but marvel at how utterly alien a feeling it was to be flying, but at the same time, how natural it felt as well. The way the pack was designed and the sensors in the boots and gloves, it responded to his body similar to the dynamics of piloting a motorcycle. If he rolled his shoulder it pitched one way in a natural manner, and it could be further accentuated by moving the sensors in his gloves and boots for more dramatic maneuverability. The speed was controlled by the thought-to-speech application.
Rocky saw his brother flying ahead and put the application to the test. He willed the pack to increase speed and before he knew it, he was catching up. The whole process took some getting used to, and at first, he overshot and flew past Rocco and had to slow down to compensate. At that point he dropped back too far. Growing frustrated he decided to use the voice prompts, though he wasn’t sure how well it would work with the rushing wind.
“Match speed.” A ding sounded, acknowledging the command. The next thing he knew he was flying in formation with Rocco.
“Do you believe this?” He yelled.
Rocco’s face scrunched to show he couldn’t hear over the roaring wind. Rocky had an idea then, and instead thought into his Net-Comm.
“Do you believe this?”
“It’s pretty great huh?” Came the reply. “If someone told you two days ago that you’d be flying over Kallerish City would you have believed it?”
“I don’t know what to believe anymore. But I know we need to stop before we get out of this city. I can’t see a thing through this wind.”
“Yeah me either.”
“Follow me.”
“What’s going on?” Amiga flew alongside of them. She seemed to pick up on the basics even faster than they had and came up in formation seamlessly.
“Follow me!” Rocky shouted, hoping she would hear him. She did not have a Net-Com, and could not join them in their private server.
Rocky rolled his shoulders and pitched into a slightly downward trajectory. There was more than one problem that was presenting itself already with the packs. Alongside the wind that blocked visibility and hearing, it was also twenty degrees colder at this altitude, and the air was noticeably thinner. Going much higher without serious equipment to compensate would not be an option. Rocky used his Net-Comm to scan the Titannet for nearby shops that sold suitable equipment. It barely took a second before scanning the city databases and virtual networks before returning results. Rocky picked one at random and engaged his GPS tracking and followed it.
It took less than a minute to reach their destination bypassing the city traffic. Rocky overshot his target again and had to perform a few loops in order to finally get close enough to land. As the ground rushed up to meet him, he realized with growing terror that he had no idea how to land without splatting across the pavement. He hoped the device was equipped with a command for this and realized it probably would have been a good idea to listen when the scientist told him there were still some features to tell them about. Landing would have been an important one.
“Land!” He shouted as he willed the device to slow down.
“Landing mode activated.” Came a reply in his headset.
Shudders flew open along the sides and back of the device and the thrust cut off, leaving him hovering in the air.
“Ah, that’s easy enough.” He spoke to himself.
From that point Rocky willed himself to lower and the pack responded to his thought commands as though it were a part of his body’s natural functions. He lowered gently and when his boots touched the pavement, the sensors inside them sent a signal to the pack, which shut off promptly. Amiga was just a moment behind him.
Rocco on the other hand had not engaged the landing mode, and instead slowed as much as possible before giving the command to shut off the thrusters. The results were comical as the big Titan fell ten feet to the ground and as he touched down, began pumping his legs to match speed. He at first did, and landed running but tripped shortly after. He came up after a roll and looked to the other two to see if they had noticed his mishap. Rocco moved his hands out to his sides.
“What?” He said antagonistically. “It worked, I didn’t die. Don’t judge.”
Rocky laughed and looked over his shoulder at the shop that his Net-Comm had led him to. An old-fashioned fixed sign with no electronic screen displayed “Mildan’s Mining Supplies.” Simple and to the point, Rocky could respect that.
“We going mining?” Rocco asked as Rocky began to walk towards the storefront.
“Not exactly.” Came the reply.
The exterior of the shop was old fashioned, as was the door. There was no sensor that opened the door, but an archaic handle that required physical effort to pull the door open. It took Rocky several moments to work this out but eventually was able to figure out the low-tech door and stepped inside. Amiga looked equally baffled as she caught the door behind him and followed.
Inside the shop was dim and musty. There were rows of shelves and aisles filled with various equipment, and a back wall with a peg-board filled with tools like picks and axes. An old Titanoid mining bot was de-powered next to the counter.
“Hello?” Rocky called out, not seeing anyone tending the shop.
A red light appeared on the mining bot’s face screen and with a whirl of mechanical servos, it stood.
“Welcome to Mildan’s Mining Supplies.” A tinny, staticky voice sounded from the bot’s seemingly broken speaker. “Please feel free to look around. And don’t hesitate to ask me any questions.”
“Is Mildan your master?” Rocky asked the robot as he began walking and scanning the isles.
“A-A-Affirmative.” The reply came with a software glitch. Rocky sneered at the neglect from the owner of this bot. Speech files were not exceedingly difficult to adjust, even for an amateur.
“Is he here?”
“Negative. My owner has died.”
Rocky found a a few pairs of welding goggles hanging from a hook and pulled off three pairs.
“He died?” Did Rocky hear a note of empathy or regret from the tinny speaker? He didn’t think these old models were equipped with any type of advanced AI. Especially not a simple mining bot. “Who is in charge of the store?”
“My owner did not want to see the store fall into the hands of the Trade Alliance when he died, and since he did not have any pups of his own, he willed it to me.”
Well that was a new one. Did the Trade Alliance even allow robots to own property?
“Do you have any of the old-style breathers?”
The robot’s face screen flashed a few times, and it got up. It disappeared into the back of the store for a few minutes and eventually came back, setting a dusty box on the counter.
“These are illegal for me to sell today. But when my owner was still alive, they were considered legal.”
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“Legal, illegal. It’s all just words on a piece of paper.” Rocky said with a charming smile that he suddenly realized would be meaningless to the robot’s programming.
The robot stood motionless for a moment. Rocky stared at him, thinking of a way out of this situation that would allow everyone to benefit.
“My programming does not allow me to break Zenith regulations.” The robot replied.
“I have an idea.” Rocky said. “We will pay for the goggles here, but for the breathers…how long has it been since someone has done any maintenance for you?”
The robot’s screen flashed a few times, and it was at that point Rocky realized that it was a sign the CPU was processing information. Back in the old days, deep inside the sunless mines, the flash would have been an appropriate indicator to miners.
“It has been nearly a decade now.”
“A decade? You’ve been on your own for that long?”
“Affirmative.”
“Let me look at your speaker and speech unit, I can fix that. I’ll also check for updates to your operating system and help install them. In exchange you give us three of those breathing units. You aren’t technically selling them then, it’s more like a trade or a barter, and there’s no regulations against that right?”
The screen flashed again, and this time it took much longer for the robot to reply.
“After scanning Zenith regulation codes, I have determined this deal to be acceptable.”
“Right, do you have any tools?” Rocky said with a smile.
* * * *
“I have to admit, that was some pretty quick thinking.” Amiga said as the trio exited the store.
“Well, I might not have my brother Rocco’s muscles or fighting skills…” Rocky turned towards the bigger Procyon following behind. “Or my older brother’s tactical skills, but I do have my moments. And we have what we need now.” Rocky replied, donning a pair of the new goggles over his eyes.
The other two did the same, and next they placed the rebreather units over their muzzles.
“Since you don’t have a Net-Comm, you’ll just have to follow our lead. We don’t have a way to communicate with you in the air.” He said to the Foxen.
“Don’t worry about me. I’ll keep up.”
“If I hold up a fist like this.” Rocky demonstrated. “That means stop. I can’t think of anything else we need. Can you think of anything?” He turned towards Rocco.
“Anything else I can just point at.” Rocco replied casually.
“Right.” Rocky agreed.
“Ready to roll.” Rocco stated.
Without further delay, with their new gear equipped, they all started their packs and lifted off into the air. High in the sky once more, they looked down over vast expanses of the deteriorating city, which was juxtaposed with lively holographic signs and scenes everywhere you looked. Some of the holographic advertisements were twenty or thirty stories tall, and all types of neon colors blinked and flashed everywhere one looked. At the same time, much of the buildings themselves were barren and lifeless, the habs most people lived in were depressing and cheerless. Kallerish City was a strange mix of vibrant life and dull decay, all rolled into one.
Armed with goggles and a rebreather, Rocky could go higher and faster than before without as much consequence, besides the chill in the air. His heart leaped and thrilled as he pumped up the acceleration, testing the limits of the devices, and he cheered to himself as the air around him crackled and boomed, as they broke the sound barrier. Without further pomp or circumstance, they quickly left the city behind.
Next rocketing high over the surrounding hydroponic farms, some stacked many stories tall and enveloped by luscious green farmland, they sped across the fields and valleys until they left the borders of Kallerish completely. They were quickly zooming over the Wildlands, vast expanses of rough lawless terrain in between the cities. In those Wildlands, typically anything could and did happen, and if the unforgiving environment and nature didn’t kill you, the mutants and crazies that lived there would.
“Over there.” Rocco said into the Net-Comm.
Rocky followed the other Procyon’s pointing finger and saw a long caravan of said mutants and crazies traveling across the terrain. They looked like a frightening barbarian horde and whatever place they were headed to rob and loot, he was simply glad to not be there. The trio slowed significantly from the speed of sound only a few minutes later as the wildlands turned into pockets of civilization. When they dropped back down to about sixty miles an hour, the detention center was just coming into sight.
Nobody had been quite sure of the surveillance capabilities of the facility, so they looped around low and landed on the roof, like the scientists had suggested. It was a safe bet that they would not be expecting any unwanted visitors from above, that was Rocky’s hope at least.
“Whew! That was fun!” Amiga said after taking out her rebreather and pulling her goggles up to rest on top her fiery tangle of hair. “My heart is beating a hundred miles an hour. I can only imagine how that must be to fragile Titans like you.”
Rocco curled his maw at the female Titan, as if the taste of that statement were truly unsavory.
“Yeah I think I could get used to these.” Rocco finally agreed. “Those scientists are pretty crazy to give something like these to a couple of misfits like us.”
“Misfit? Who are you calling a misfit Gunrockian?” Amiga feigned being insulted by the remark. “You speak for yourself there, meathead.”
Rocky knelt and creeped over to the edge of the building. There was a small partition wall that he leaned against and peered over. All seemed quiet down below.
“This could take a little while. You two keep a lookout.” Rocky jerked his head towards the entrance below them.
Rocky then pulled up his Net-Comm and began working to hack into the building’s cloud system. The system only turned out to be single encrypted, so it was no large task to set his unit into an automated series of de-encryption codes that would test all the possible outcomes and eventually find the correct one. About a year ago he remembered being on the fence about spending such a large sum of credits for the highly outlawed software, but he had since found that it had paid for itself many times over.
While his system was working on that, he began looking up everything he could find about the nature of the detention centers, which would be a considerably harder task, as the Zenith Corporate Empire censored most information regarding their own facilities. The scientists had proposed many ideas before the trio had left, but none of them had quite enough concrete information on these sites to be incredibly useful.
As the minutes passed, Rocco grew noticeably agitated. He was never one for standing around when there was action to be done. He started fidgeting with his E-Rifle, and before long was pacing circles around the section of rooftop they occupied.
“How long is this gonna take?” He finally asked. “It’s been entirely too long since I got a chance to shoot at something.”
“Great Stars! Now I see the resemblance.” Amiga sighed. “You are just like your brother. It’s a wonder the three of you haven’t gotten yourselves killed by now. Tell me exactly how that works.”
“How what works?” Rocco looked down, Amiga was now seated with her arms propping her up behind her and her legs stretched out in front. For her part, she seemed comfortable enough to sit there all day if need be.
“How you three aren’t dead with your reckless and stupid antics? I assume this isn’t the first little adventure that the three of you have been in.”
Rocco shrugged sheepishly. “We’re just that good I guess.”
“Or lucky.” She added with a snort and squinted at the sun, which was not yet at its zenith, but was washing the land with its golden early morning rays.
“My daddy always said it was better to be lucky than good.” Rocky replied over his shoulder.
“We’re both.” Rocco nodded.
“Well I was always taught it was better to be smart than anything else.”
“We got that covered. He’s smart.” Rocco pointed at his brother.
“I’m smart.” Rocky agreed absently as his program finished calculating two-hundred and fifty-eight thousand combinations and completed the password crack. “I’m also good and lucky and in the system.”
He then began to search through the databases, looking for layouts and prisoner records. They would need to find their target before going in blindly. There were more than likely hundreds of prisoners inside, and he needed something to go on.
“So how did you meet Ricky again?” Rocco asked the beautiful young Titan.
“He found me. The soldiers had surrounded my AstroBloc and were looking for him. And Jardan.”
“Yeah, that’s my other question. How do you know that guy? He’s the one that was performing that street show right?”
“Yes.” Amiga looked out over the horizon for a moment before continuing. “He’s sometimes with me and my brother, Atani. We’ve been on something of a mission for awhile now, searching for others like me. Jardan is well connected in this city, so we help each other when we can.”
One of Rocco’s eyes opened wider. “Others like you?”
“I explained it to your brother.” She sighed. “I’m…special.”
“Tell me about it. Though special might be the wrong word.” Rocky responded off-handedly. “After what you pulled, does anyone ever trust you twice?”
“I’m sorry you guys got involved, is that what you want to hear?” Amiga returned. “But I couldn’t risk exposing myself so close to Kallerish and they had taken something important from a researcher in the Wildlands. It was something that I needed in my quest.”
“Well if you would have asked us nicely, we might have helped you with your quest.” Rocco stated.
“Fine. When we are finished healing Ricky, will you help me with my quest?”
“Sure.” Rocco returned a beaming goofy smile.
“Speak for yourself.” Rocky argued. “We’ll have to wait for Ricky to give an answer for that. We do everything together, or not at all.”
Rocky was going to say more, but he found what he was looking for, a prisoner named Timmock was being held in cell 242. With a little more digging, he found that the cell in question was two floors down, almost directly in the center of the facility. The chances for getting in and out without raising an alarm were beginning to look bleak.
“Well, the scientists gave me some explosives.” He thought out loud. “Since there’s not much of a chance to do this quietly, I guess we might as well do it the usual way.”
“My man!” Rocco fist punched the air. “What are we waiting for? Let’s make some noise!” He screamed excitedly.