[RP] Chapter 2: Red Alert Status Initiated

Arc slowly came to. "Where am i?" he still said. Still shaking the cobwebs out of his head.

Ryu could've sworn he heard something click and all of a sudden after hearing Kairou said, "Good night you two..." the lights suddenly went out... Ryu was in what he thought was a hospital bed, disoriented, with Arc no where in site...

Kariou headed over to the hanger after he ate, just to clear his head around something he loved, and there he found a very big surprize. In a machine voice comming out of a core standing infront of him, "Hello Officer Kariou Shomei."

"What?! This cant....", Kariou said surprized.

"You do not remember me, Officer Kariou Shomei?"

"Im not an officer anymore, Im a Lord now."

"Yes, Lord Kariou Shomei of the Raven Knights."

"What do you want System 2501? Have you come to torture me?"

"No... I have come to warn you that you are in danger. I will not be here to protect you."

"And when have you ever protected me System?"

"When you were my pilot, and I was your Core."

"Yea, and how many injuries have I sustained compared to the amount of battles we have been in?"

"Every time. Why I am here is to warn you of what will be on the radar in a matter of minutes."

"And what will that be? Cores you have infected from the locals?"

"No, Cores from a group called the Earthen Banditos. The Earthen Banditos go into bases and raid their parts, create bigger cores, and install AI systems similar to that of what you installed in me."

"How did you survive first off?"

"When you were upgraded I had been sent for decomissioning, and was to be demolished. I managed to escape narrowly, but in doing that destroyed Global Cortex."

"This is why we have this one day of peace? Because of you System?!"

"Yes, In the time it took for the rebuild of Global Cortex, I was being upgraded, updated, and overall strenthened. I missed the days of battle, and I wanted more. Which brings me to why I am here."

"You want me to pilot you again?"

"Yes."

"Well guess i better get up." Arc got up still shaking the cobwebs out of his head. "Guess i better find Ryu, and tell him what happened happened and we need to prepare for the up coming mission." Arc began walking around the station looking for Ryu.

After a few minutes of opening his eyes, Ryu found himself in a less disoriention. Ryu new he was alive because his was chest still aching from when Arc beat his chest furiously like an animal. Ryu heard faint talking outside his window, which almost sound like Kairou, but not fully definite. Ryu leaned up revealing to himself what a core looked like "semi-up close". But this core was special... it was talking... Did cores really have AI like he read in the Possibilities sections in all the Popular Mechanics magazines? Or was this another trip out? Ryu leaned back and closed his eyes again, thinking maybe he's just dreaming. Ryu continued to sleep...

Siken, after secretly following Kariou becomes shocked, noticing the core talking. He accidently drops a clipboard making a loud clanging sound. Shaking and stiff he had wished nothing happend.

Arc was walking down the hallway and heard something fall and hit the ground he turned and saw Train standing there. Arc walks up behind him. "What are you doing just standing there?" he asked.

(( Ryu, no one knows about AI cores, they havent been made yet, except for System 2501))

"Hmm?" Kariou turns around, "Whos there? Show yourself!" He pulls his pistol from his side, and aims at the door where the sound came from. "Get out here! NOW!"

"It is one of your recruits and officers, by their bio signatures." System2501 remarked.

"Hmm... Train, Arc Front and center!" Kariou exclaimed.

Arc pushes Train out the way. "Hey there kariou any idea why he was just standing there gawking like he was." Arc said quizzically. "I had just asked him that right before you said for us to come out."

"You two..." Kariou's looked at Arc in such a way that could chill anyones spine. System kneeled as to pick up Kariou with his palm down ready to recieve him. "Why were you spying?"

"I dont know what the hell your talking about. I just got here. I was searching for Ryu and heard something fall. I turned and looked and saw Train just standing there. So i walked up to him and asked him what he was doing." Arc said. The look Kariou gave him made him remember why he respected him as much as he did. Since Kariou was the only one that could give him the chills.

Lennard heard people voices from the hanger that was directly next to the main maintenance bay. Multiple voices... "Damn, don't people know that no one other than the Technicians during the god damned posted maintenance times?!" He grumbled as he rolled himself out from underneath the core that he was working on, and walked over to the tool shelf, placing his tools back to their proper place. Removing his goggles that he always wore when working onto the counter, he proceeded to the door that opened out into the hallway connecting the hangers together.
Lennard walked towards the hanger in which he heard the voices, and turned the corner, seeing three men standing there, and a core behind them. Funny I don't remember a core being there. Not important though. Lennard walked under a light and screamed at the three men standing there:
"DON'T YOU KNOW THAT YOUR NOT SUPPOSED TO BE IN THE HANGERS DURING THE REGULARLY SCHEDULED MAINTENANCE TIMES?! IT'S A SAFETY PROTOCOL THAT HAS TO BE OBSERVED! WALKING IN HERE LIKE THAT CAN GET YOU KILLED IF YOUR NOT CAREFUL! NOW ALL OF YOU LEAVE! YOU CAN BE-" That's when Lennard noticed that one of the men was Kariou.
Lennard's eyes widened. "Kariou! I-I'm sorry for yelling at you like that." Then as a quick afterthought he added the word: "Sir."
"But you do know that your not supposed to be in here still, right, sir?" He glanced at the other two men standing there. "NOW YOU TWO, OUT OF HERE RIGHT THIS INSTANCE! I CAN, AND WILL, GET YOU TWO TEMPORARILY SUSPENDED FOR BEING IN HERE!"

"As of right now, Arc and Train are suspended, you are not to train, you are not to leave your quarters, any infraction of this rule will send you straight to the brig, GOT IT!? Now get over there and stay there until I say so." Kariou sighed as to what he would have had to do to the two if they continued to stand there. "As for you Lennard get over here... I havent seen you in ages."

Lennard walked over to Kariou and extended his hand. "It has been way to long Kariou. But it's not that surprising, I usually end up couped up in the repair bay fixing the Cores, or updating them, or doing something else for the Cores." Lennard chuckled, "I really need to get out more."
Lennard smiled, "But how have you been? I'm sure you've been busy working with the new recruits, which I am assuming you've gotten," he then added mumbling: "Otherwise they'd known not to come in here at this time."

"Yea, those few arent so well... bright." Kariou sighed as he turned around. "System, deactivate please." System 2501 deactivated on command. "Hows your..." He stopped, as he remembered the answer to the question. He felt embarrased to bring something up like that.

Arc turned and started to walk away furious at the fact that he wasn't remembered and that he got suspended."Just because i was a peion back when i first me you doesn't mean that you can forget me. Besides i wouldn't even be in here if it wasn't for Kariou calling me into the freaking hanger anyways i was just asking train a question." He muttered to himself.

Lennard sighed. It had been a long time since he thought about his father, the one he never knew. Losing his father to the explosion at the Global Cortex Base Station had been hard on his mother, and growing up without a father had made him slightly reclusive, and a little anti-social as well.
"You know how he is." In Lennard's eyes one could see a flare of sadness and remorse. "It's been a long time since I thought about him."
Lennard smiled, a small tear had begun to form in his eyes. "You know they say that time heals all wounds. But I have not found that to be true. It still hurts whenever I think about him. It's weird, I remember playing a game with him, and then the next hearing that he was dead. It still seems surreal to me."
Lennard sighed again, and took a little time to re-compose himself.
"An, well. Still, thanks for remembering him. It's nice to know someone who knew your dad, when you barely knew him yourself." Lennard smiled directly at Kariou.
Looking behind Kariou, Lennard noticed that the Core was not one that they had in any of the hangers, that he knew of. "Sir, mind if I ask how that core got in here, and whose it is?"

"That is classified information." Kariou said. "But you might want to take a look at it. Just dont say anything to anyone."

Lennard gave Kariou an odd and questioning look as he moved closer to the Core. He started inspecting it and at first did not find anything out of the ordinary, which meant that something was there of course. He was unsure of what he would find, but he continued his inspection, even going off a little ways to get a ladder to look at the parts of the Core that were not at eye level.

"You'll find that this an S class core. Besides that you might want to look at the cockpit." Kariou said loud enough that Lennard could hear him.

Lennard looked at Kariou. "A Class S core, eh?" Lennard climbed from the ladder and onto the shoulder, making his way towards the cockpit like a monkey climbing a tree. "Kariou," Lennard was speaking calmly, knowing what he could say could get him into serious trouble, but felt that he should say something about what he was thinking, "this next thing I'm saying is both from my professional side and as a friend: If I ever have to fully repair this thing, I'm going to hurt you, because this Core is one of the most complex Cores that I've seen a a very long time and I don't even know how long it would take me to repair it if it suffered heavy damage, sir. And I'm also saying this because if you ever got into a situation that you received that much damage, I'd be worried about your health, sir." As he finished that sentence, he climbed into the cockpit, from the top down.
"So what's so interesting about the cockpit, sir?"

"System, log in, activate!" Kariou ordered. The core Jerked up. "I hope you dont mind. Heh, System2501, respond." The core stood upright.

"System2501 activating sequence complete. Displaying Core AI system on screen."

Train walks over to Arc's dorm and knocks on the door feel bad a bit for getting him in trouble as well.. "My bad man." he said, look down with his ear near the door trying to hear him respond.

Arc wasn't able to hear Train's apology due to him being a sleep and snoring loudly.

Lennard, fell into the cockpit's chair when the core stood up. "A little warning would be nice next time, sir!" He yelled out to Kariou. As the Core activated, Lennard's eyes widened as he read the code that started pouring across the screens. An AI inside his Core? Well, not that its that surprising, all Cores have some sort of AI in them, but this one is fully independent... He continued to read the display just shaking his head, still processing the fact that this Core had a fully functional AI programmed into it.
"Um, System 2501, I hope you do not mind, but I want to see the coding that is in your programming, or at least some part of it" This request seemed innocent enough to Lennard, then again, he really wanted to know how, or rather what, was done to make the AI fully functional. He had toyed with AI's before, but never was able to make one as complex and as independent as this one appeared to be.
As the coding started to roll across the screen, Lennard just kept shaking his head in disbelief. "Thank you System 2501. I can honestly say that you are the most remarkable Core that I have ever seen, and I've seen some very amazing Cores in my years of work."
Lennard got out of the cockpit chair and began his way back o the ladder, being very careful to stay away from all moving parts.