An Alternate Future

[petdr89]

Geist held her trembling gobbler close to her chest while she listened intently to what Zuri was saying. She wasn't sure what to say at first, so she didn't say anything. Zuri seemed nice, and he seemed trustworthy, but she had to make sure for herself.

When Zuri got up and walked over to Caster, she bent her head closer to the petpet and whispered, "erforsche". With that simple instruction, the small, griffin-like petpet jumped from her arms and ran into one of the subsections of the cave before anyone could stop it.

Now that Hexe was off scouting the area, Geist paid closer attention to what was going on with Caster. Unfortunately, she knew nothing about technology, so she couldn't really help. All she knew was that Cast was a highly advanced, and alien, robot; she didn't think simple tinkering around would do much good. Still, she tried to keep her hopes up. She had already lost her entire clan once in her life, and she didn't want to loose her entire family too. To her knowledge, Caster and her were the only ones left.

At first Caster didn't do anything as Zuri's tech-man person kept pushing buttons, but then one of the buttons he pushed opened up a panel on the lupe's chest, and a round metal ball rolled out of the compartment. Then eight legs shot out of the metal ball, elevating the robot spyder a few inches off the ground. The spyder's eyes flickered red, indicating it was coming online. Randomly, the spyder began walking quickly in small counter-clockwise circles, and it wouldn't stop; he looked a little hyperactive, if that was even possible.

[zash]

"Thats what I mean. Be careful with this guy. You never know what the heck will come out of him." Zuri stared at the little spyder. He cocked his head and obsereved it for a second. "Dang, Caster must of been offline for a good while. That guys seems to have built up way to much energy." Zuri knelt down and tried to coxe the little creature over to him. "Come here there little guy." He doubted it'd work but it was worth a shot. Heck, for all Zuri knew that little guy could get Caster back online.

[petdr89]

The spyder froze in place for ten seconds when Zuri spoke, and then began walking back and forth on the floor in a perfectly straight line. His mind was trying to determine what Zuri had said, and once he had deciphered it, he scurried over to Zuri and stood on his foot. He was so small that his entire body was able to fit on Zuri's foot.

[zash]

Zuri just looked at it. "Ok, I guess that works. Hey there little guy." Zuri went down to attempt to touch it. He didn't quite, fearing he'd scare it. "Do you know anything about how to get Caster online? You think you could help us out some?" Zuri pointed towards Caster. Caster was probably decently thawed out by now. Zuri hoped that this little guy could help them out a bit and get Caster back up and running.

[petdr89]

The spyder again didn't move for a total of twenty seconds, before it scurried over to Caster's life-less body. It scurried over the robot's body with ease, stopping on Caster's head. Then it pointed with one foot at a very, very, very, tiny button on the lupe's skull, that could only have been pressed with something really thin.

After pointing out the nearly invisible button, the spyder scurried onto the ground. If someone had pushed the button, a holographic keypad would have then popped up. Dreadnought wrote the numbers 020506 in the dirt with his foot; the code needed to open up Caster's frontal skull compartment. After that it was simply a matter of restarting Caster's positronic brain, but that had to be done, very, very, very carefully.

[zash]

"Hmmmmm." Zuri looked close. Indeed there was a very tiny button. "Got a needle?" He asked the mainanence guy. The guy pulled out a very small probe thing and hit the button. And indeed the keypad came up. Zuri looked over and saw the numbers 020506 and he typed them into the keypad. Then Zuri stood back, he didn't want to mess anything up. "Hey there little guy. If you could do the rest that'd be great. I really don't want to mess with it. Its seems to delicate for someone like me to mess with." Heck, he didn't even want the maintenance guy messing with it. If it was Caster's system then he didn't want to screw that up.

[petdr89]

As soon as the code was entered, the compartment opened. Dreadnought followed Zuri's instructions, walking back over to Caster. It was probably best that he did this; the slightest little twitch and it was CABOOM! Dreadnought was a robot, and robot's movements were precise, unlike organics. His movements were exact, delicate, and deliberate, as he moved wires and flipped switches. Despite seeming difficult, this was probably the easiest task the little robot had ever done. He was done in seven seconds; the compartment to Caster's brain closed and the lupe's eyes flickered to life.

Caster's head lifted, but he didn't stand; the fluid in his body was still some what frozen. He looked at Zuri, and demanded, "State your intentions."

[zash]

Zuri stared. Not entirely sure what to say, he just said, "Look after you. Its me Zuri." He looked over Caster. Obviously he was still frozen and his hydrolics and such had to be thawed out yet. It would probably be dangerous for him to try to move, he could brake himself. "Don't worry, sorta. Your somewhere safe. We will fill you in with all that has happened." Zuri now had to wait for a responce before he could do anything else. "And way to go little guy." He said to the little spyder.

[petdr89]

You could tell by Caster's blank stare that he was searching his data files. It didn't take him too long to locate Zuri's file, and he replied, "The file 'Zuri' is a sub-file of the file Mizturugi. Other sub-files include The Red Mizt. Opening file: Species, Shoyru. Skin color, red. Weight, two hundred and thirty pounds. Height, six foot three. Eye color, blue."

Caster paused after reciting Zuri’s bio, processing this information. "Several errors have been found in his units data files. Categories include height, weight, skin color, eye color." He then went on to explain, "You do not match the description in this unit's database. Either you are not Zuri, or this unit's files have been tampered with."

He stopped talking, looking to Zuri for an explanation. Meanwhile, Dreadnought scurried to Zuri again. Apparently, he wanted to inspect him too.

Geist was overjoyed when Caster began working again, but she decided against saying anything for the time being. Caster looked like he was on to something, and she wanted to know what it was. She wanted answers as much he did; she had to know if she could trust this guy too.

[zash]

"You know. People do change over time. Such as skully. He is no longer an infant but a young child by now. He is no longer small, he has grown and possibly could have a slight color change to him by now. In summary, people can change in many ways, such as I." Zuri did his best to kinda explain why he was different. He didn't want to go into detail upon why he was the way he was. "I am Mizturugi. I am different then what I was. I too have changed over time. We do not stay the same. I grow old and my hair color may change and my weight will definently change; my eye color, its the same as Strips, he can change his as well." Of course Zuri didn't have a choice, his was permantly red now, no longer that color of innocents. "All I can say is that you would have to quiz me or update your files, because they are just old; they have not been updated in quite some time by now." Zuri continued to kneel down near Caster.

[petdr89]

Caster didn’t say anything until Zuri was finished, but you could somehow tell he was preparing to debate him. “Correction, though organics do change over time, their body color and eye color remain the same. Strips’s eye color does not change.” He paused, eyes flickering for a moment. “This unit cannot conform your identity, an explanation is required.” Unfortunately for Caster, his guns were still frozen; otherwise he would have drawn them by now. He knew about paintbrushes and things like that, but he didn’t want to just guess as to why Zuri was different, he wanted the exact reason. Being a robot, he generally didn’t right off believe everything that organics told him; he needed evidence. He didn’t have anything against organics, and he wasn’t trying to be argumentative either; he was merely acting according to his programming.

A worried look came across Geist’s face as it appeared that Caster didn’t trust Zuri. She had met Zuri in the past, and Caster was right, Zuri did look different. She didn’t believe him to be who he said he was either, and she was starting to feel uneasy. Looking across the room, she realized her spear had been taken inside and propped against the wall. She was still cold and weak from dragging a heavy robot, but she managed to quickly get to her feet and run across the room, grabbing her spear in the process. She stood in a defensive position as other people drew their swords all around her, but they didn’t advance upon her; perhaps they were waiting for orders to do so. Geist had thought about the getting her spear part of her plan, but unfortunately she hadn't thought past that. Now she was just standing there with her spear in front of her, not really knowing what to do.

[zash]

"That is true." Zuri said looking at Caster. Then Geist ran across the room. Zuri didn't really give her much attention till she grabbed her spear and people were drawing their swords. Apparently she was having some sort of panic attack and was freaking out. Zuri turned his head and looked at her for a sec and turned back to Caster. "Leave her be." Zuri said to the people surrounding Geist. "But you do know there is such a thing as the lab ray and experimentation and paint brushes. People can change that way. Which is what happened to me." Zuri was neither lieing nor telling the truth. He did get experimented on and it was techniqually the reason to his changing, but it wasn't the reason to why he is the way he is now. "Much like Abby, she chaned do the lab ray, she also made a deal with a dark faerie and that's why she is a vampire. This world is messed up in many ways. And person, calm down would ya." Zuri said to Caster and then to Geist. He still couldn't remember her name. "And if ya really need to you could take a DNA sample, I mean really. Also, this is the rebel base by the way, so unless your with the Darkest faerie your safe.

[petdr89]

Zuri was right to go about dealing with Caster logically; logic was the only thing he really responded to. And it was working; Caster was beginning to believe him. His next question should have been when did Zuri change? But he had stopped caring. He took him up on his DNA offer, and had dreadnought pluck a single scale from Zuri and return it to him. After confirming Zuri's identity, he replied, "Identity confirmed."

Seeing people sheath their swords calmed Geist, but not much; she was still on edge. Who knows why she was acting like this; normally she was mild-mannered. Perhaps two days of no sleep was getting to her, she wasn't used to it. Or perhaps she was picking up on the emotions of her scared petpet. When Zuri told her to calm down she rambled off a few things in German that most likely no one understood but her and Caster, and Caster was ignoring her. Eventually, though, she realized why she wasn't getting through to anyone, paused, and calmly asked, "Vas ist here going on?"

[zash]

"Ok, what is going on here? Uh pretty much nothing. Your in the headquarters of the rebel force." Zuri said as he stood up and walked towards Geist. He rubbed his forehead and eyes. "Here we'll get you a room. But yeah, we're trying to kill the Darkest Faerie and return things back to normal. The Darkest Faerie and the Darigans joined forces and basically took over the Neopia. We are trying to reverse that." Zuri had walked up to about 4 feet from Geist. "But yeah, whats up with you?"

[petdr89]

Geist wasn't sure how to respond; there were so many things up with her, but she didn't know where to start, and she didn't feel well. "Eh, mein kopf, es hurts." She had a really bad habit of switching between German and English mid-sentence, so you just had to guess as to what she was trying to say. Obviously something hurt; she was also tired and probably needed to get some rest. Caster could catch her up later with what was going on later, when her head wasn't clouded.