The Emperor's Jubilee II

[Proto Man]

It’d been close to ten minutes since he’d reached the main entrance of the library. The forces that had chased the trio to the databanks had dispersed, which meant Proto Man was free to take his time to summon a small hover bike. The jeep was where they had ran from it, but the adolescent didn’t necessarily know the first thing about driving a car. On top of that, he had doubts that he could operate the pedals and still be able to properly steer.

A bike, however, that was a different story. Just as the robot was about to depart, he poked his head back into the build and watched as Samus stepped through the doors of a side room. “Finally,” the android muttered. “Where’s Nanoha?”

“I don’t know,” came the response as the two walked outside the building. “You’ve been busy.”

“Yes.” Proto Man hopped onto his bike as Samus made her way over to the jeep. “I don’t want to wait… I know where these people are and I’d like to stop them before they make a terrible mistake and get themselves killed.”

“Do you have a plan?” Samus asked as she flexed her arm cannon hand.

“Yes,” Proto Man replied as he powered on his vehicle. “I’m going to talk to them.” With that, the preteen took off into the air toward the on-ramp to the Information Highway. Despite having never used a gravity-free bike,his system and his own innate common sense were able to figure it out. By the time he reached the ramp, Samus and the jeep had caught up to him.

The ‘abandoned’ Imperial Metal Works weren’t that far removed from the library. On his way there, the android encountered no mobs of laser-spewing robots to slow his progress. After twenty minutes or so of the Information Highway, Proto Man took the scarcely used exit that led to the old collection of factories.

Proto Man parked his hoverbike outside of the central building. Hopping off the bike, he scanned the parking lot, which was abandoned except for some scattered garbage and an assortment of abandoned cars and service vehicles. Turning his attention to an elevated door on the side of the building, the android slowly traversed the parking lot. To a normal person, the building would have seemed abandoned and in the latter stages of dilapidation. Fortunately, Proto Man wasn’t an ordinary person. His robotic optics could piece-out which of those pieces of debris in front of those windows contained the barrels of rifles and which ones did not. His keener sense for details helped him notice the thin wires extended out of the fuel tanks of almost all the abandoned vehicles he passed.

Samus, who probably had more advanced software than he did, likewise seemed to be aware of their lethal surroundings, but the bounty hunter remained just as calm. As the pair advanced toward the door, none of the hidden guns opened up on them, and none of the cars exploded as they passed them. When he reached the top of the small flight of stairs up to the door, Proto Man held back a smile when the gate opened up for him. With Samus trailing him by a few paces, he stepped over the nondescript threshold and found himself in some sort of improvised defensive point.

What had once been a side entrance hallways for employees had become a sort of murder mill. Plaster or wooden walls were covered in thick metal sheets, and at the end of the hall stood a nasty-looking turret inside and steel and concrete nest.

“Who are you?” A voice demanded from a loudspeaker. “You have five seconds before we paint the walls with the both of you.”

The preteen android lifted his hands into the air. “My name is Blues, and I’m here to talk you all down from this ledge.” There was a pregnant pause, and then a few chuckles floated in through the door on the other side of the hallway’s entrenchment.

“Who sent you here, child? Was it that chaplain? Or perhaps the anti-terrorism agent at the Imperial Headquarters? Or was it that turtle? Which one of them knew we were here?” As if to prove that they weren’t playing around, the machine gun slowly started to hum to life, prompting Samus to ready her weapon. Proto Man pushed the woman’s hand down and stepped toward the weapon.

“J’hath sent me,” Proto Man shouted so he could be heard over the deafening weapon.” At that, the gun died down, and a beat later, the door swung open. A trio of heavily armed men stepped through, their weapons already trained on the pair in the hallway.

The man at the center cocked his weapon and glared at the preteen robot. “What did you do to the child?”

“Nothing,” Proto Man responded, raising his hands once again. “He’s relaxing at the library. Like I said, I’m here to talk.”

After mulling over the robot’s remarks for a few moments, the man lowered his weapon and gestured with his head toward the open doorway. “Come inside… you have three minutes.”