I understand that in general it's poor writing practice to gloss over descriptions, but I figure most everyone reading this knows what the common NPCs look like so I just gave a brief refresher on them to try and keep the length a little more manageable. If people prefer I can give more vivid descriptions in the future. Let me know.
Hopefully everyone reading likes it so far. Next chapter there's some combat, so bear with me. Anyway, here's chapter 3. Hope you all like it.
Edit: There has to be a better way to edit in the tab tags...
Chapter 3: Forging Bonds
“Will you look in to this for me, Maya?”
“You know how busy I am, Remi. I can't just drop my research to check every faulty piece of equipment the armory hands out,” the newman woman says. Tall, voluptuous, long blonde hair, short skirt; typical Maya.
Not one to take no for an answer, Remi insists, “you know how they function as well as I do. A line shield simply projects the wearer's photons outward to form a protective barrier. Even a defective unit should have some sort of output.”
“Fine,” Maya surrenders. She holds her hand out to take the small chip Remi offers up, “but I have some things I need to do before I get to this. I'll contact you when I have a chance. Is that him over there with Mina?”
“Thank you, Maya,” Remi says as she curtseys, “and yes, that would be him.”
“Well isn't he the little looker. Eli make any moves yet?”
“She does not date humans.”
“Oh,” Maya says, a little surprised, “well, do you have any plans for him or is he on the market?”
“What?” Remi says quickly, “Do not be ridiculous, Maya. That would be-”
“I'm just teasing!” Maya giggles. “You don't need to take everything so seriously you know.”
“Forgive me, we must get to our mission,” Remi says with a hint of embarrassment.
“I need to get back to work too. I'll call you when I find something.”
Maya walks off towards an elevator at the back end of the room, while Remi heads back to the reception desk.
“What was that about?” Eli asks.
“Nothing important. Maya sends her greetings, and welcomes you to the fold, Roderick. Are you both ready to depart?”
“Sort of. I took the pup down to the second floor to buy him a line shield, but all the ones they had were busted.”
“It's no big deal, really,” Roderick says, “I'll be super careful to stay out of trouble.”
“It is not that simple, Roderick. Without a line shield you are completely defenseless.”
“Not completely,” Eli disagrees, “and if he wants to continue, knowing the risks, who are we to stop him?”
Remi stays silent for for a few moments as she considers her options, so Eli steps up and says, “we need a tie-break. Mina, should we take the pup with us?”
The girl behind the circular counter looks confused as she confirms, “me?”
“Yeah, you. His fate's in your hands,” Eli nods towards Roderick.
“Uh... w-well...” Mina stammers, “I think... I think it's pretty brave for him to want to go even though he's unprotected. I... I say you should let him.” Roderick's face lights up, and he smiles as thanks to Mina, who quickly searches for something to do on her computer terminal.
“There we have it!” Eli grabs Roderick by the wrist and starts off towards the stairway. Remi sighs and follows.
“May the Holy Light guide you!” Mina shouts after them.
==========
As they reach the PPT gate junction, Eli pauses. “...where are we going again?”
Remi stares blankly for a moment before responding, “our mission today is in Tarcus.”
“Ugh. What are we doing in the capital city of Parum?” Eli asks the three of them begin walking towards the shuttle headed for Parum.
“This is a reconnaissance mission. President Dallgun believes G.R.M is somehow involved with a terrorist organization known as the Illuminus. He has asked us to infiltrate one of G.R.M's research facilities and conduct a search for evidence,” Remi turns to Roderick, “this is all classified information. Normally we would not be bringing a trainee on an assignment like this, but we are shorthanded, and the probability of combat is low. The president trusts you will not speak of this to anyone other than the two of us.”
“My lips are sealed,” Roderick nods.
“I hate Tarcus,” Eli says angrily as the group boards the shuttle.
“Why's that?” Roderick asks.
“The population of Tarus is nearly 100% Cast,” Remi answers. “As such, the Cast Supremacy movement is quite strong there.”
“The Casts in Tarcus are nothing like the ones on the Colony, pup,” Eli adds, “they look down on every other race. You'll see when we get there.”
==========
As they step off the shuttle, Roderick has a look at his surroundings. The city of Tarcus is the capital of Parum, and its Cast heritage shows in the architecture. Every structure looks as though it has a purpose. Giant skyscrapers reach up into the clouds, entire walls are made out of glass, smaller buildings are built side by side with no space between them, and the city looks almost monochromatic, nearly everything some shade of gray; there's barely any color, and no street lights anywhere. What Roderick finds most interesting though is the distinct metal smell the air has.
They set off in the direction of one of the larger visible buildings, with Remi leading, Eli in the middle and Roderick bringing up the rear. They walk for several minutes in silence, with Roderick, and especially Eli subject to hateful stares from empty eyes. It doesn't seem to bother Roderick, but he can see Eli's head slowly tilting towards the floor. Roderick quickens his pace to catch up to her.
“Hey, Eli?”
“Huh? What's up, pup?” Eli asks, picking her gaze up off the floor to look at him.
“I was, uh, just wondering if you'd maybe feel like helping me set up a training regiment for myself?” Roderick asks.
His plan seems to work. Eli's face instantly brightens as she says, “sure. We can set something up as soon as we're done here.”
“Awesome,” Roderick says, “I really appreciate the help.”
“No problem pup,” Eli says, now beaming, “I'll have you in tip-top shape before you know it. You'll have girls swar- oof!”
Eli is interrupted as she collides with a Cast, who stares her down with a look of contempt as he growls, “watch where you're going, mutt.”
Eli steps forward to say something but Roderick holds out his arm in front of her, moving towards the Cast himself, “I apologize. It my was my fault she ran in to you.”
The Cast takes a step forward as well, putting him only about a foot away from Roderick, so he can say, “ha, one sub species sticking up for another. How amusing.”
Now that they're within grabbing distance of each other, Roderick realizes he may have made a mistake in standing up to the Cast, who's easily a foot taller and looks more like a bipedal tank than anything else. Not wanting to back down though, he swallows the lump in his throat to say, “there's no need to make something out of nothing. I apologized, there was no damage done, let's just leave it at that.”
The Cast takes another step forward, leaving only inches between them and forcing Roderick to crane his neck to maintain eye contact. After a few tense moments of silence, the Cast scoffs and walks away.
“You didn't have to do that you know,” Eli says.
“I know,” Roderick replies, keeping his eyes fixed on the Cast for a few moments longer before turning to face Eli.
“...Thanks, pup,” Eli says, giving Roderick a hard pat on the back.
“What is keeping you both?”
Eli and Roderick quickly spin around to face Remi, and they both blurt out, “nothing!” in unison, as they walk over to meet her.
Remi stares at them skeptically, “I understand this is not a pleasant place for either of you. The sooner we complete out mission, the sooner we can leave.”
They all turn to set off again, but before they begin to move Roderick's hand shoots out from his side, prompting both ladies to look over their shoulders and Eli to yell out, “pup!?”
Roderick has an old looking Cast with a long gray beard and funky goggles for eyes by the wrist, whose hand is only an inch or so away from Eli's rear end. The Cast chuckles to himself before saying, “very good, Mr. O'Laughlin!”
At the sound of the Cast's voice, both Remi and Eli turn quickly as they shout, “Headmaster!”
“It's been a while since anyone's caught me. I see you're taking good care of your trainee,” he says as he pulls his hand away and tucks it behind his back, where it latches on to the other one.
“Roderick,” Remi says, “this is Headmaster Nav.”
“I... what?” Roderick says, shocked. “What's the headmaster doing running around trying to grope people?”
“He can gauge your fitness level with just a touch,” Eli whispers.
“What are you doing here, Headmaster?” Remi asks, changing the subject.
“Oh, nothing to worry yourselves about. I'm on my way back to the Colony already, actually. I haven't seen the two of you in ages, so I had to take this opportunity to say hello!” Nav says. “Now that I've done that, I really must get going,” he says as he begins to walk away. He looks over his shoulder to say “I'll be keeping my eye on you Mr. O'Laughlin. Make those two proud!”
As they start off again towards their destination, Eli gives Roderick another hard pat on the back, “I don't think I've ever seen anyone actually catch the headmaster before. Good thing you did too,” Eli says, “I've been pretty lazy lately. He never would have let me hear the end of it.”
“I still can't believe the headmaster is really an old closet pervert,” Roderick says.
“Do not let his appearance fool you,” Remi warns, “his skills are legendary.”
==========
“We are here.”
The trio is in an alley next to the huge building they'd been walking to. It's an alley by definition only though, as it's nearly as spotless as the streets out front.
“According to the schematic, this door should grant us access to the basement levels of the building,” Remi says, approaching the door she's apparently talking about.
“Looks like it's locked,” Eli says, pointing to the red light highlighting the door's control panel.
“I'm pretty handy with locks, if we need to get in,” Roderick says, moving to take a closer look at the door itself.
“That will not be necessary,” Remi says while tapping keys on the holographic interface. It only takes her a few seconds to get the light to switch from red to green. As the door slides open she boasts, “the encryption was weak.”
“Let's just get this over with,” Eli says, stepping into the elevator the door was concealing, “I hate going underground.”
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