bzarcher | (no subject)

OK, a bit more of this thing...

It had been almost 36 hours, now. A day and a half of curious existence. No standing orders and no possibility of further orders, while the UN Security Forces had assembled them, sorted them by some incomprehensible logic, and stored them in these containment cells.

Ballade pondered the occupants of his cell. Enker and King made some sense. They were, after all, Elites. Keeping them together was like keeping the German High Command together in prison at Nuremberg. None were currently a threat, they had the status to be treated as guests as much as prisoners, and they might offer each other some measure of comfort.

In theory.

In truth, none of them had much to say to another. Enker was clearly lost in private thoughts of what had occured to lead them here. King had attempted to hold some level of command after the surrender and keep them organized, but after the security fields went up, he had similarly withdrawn.

The remaining occupants of the cell were a motley selection of the rank and file. Top, mostly staying to a corner and running his hand idly along the floor and walls out of boredom, punctuated by brief squalls of grief. Plant, mostly occupied with trying to calm Top. Yamato, who had simply settled into a meditative seiza and had not moved since. About the only thing Ballade could find in common between them all was perhaps height.

After finishing his 249th pacing circuit of the cell floor, he stopped and considered the security field for a moment. The walls, according to his sensors, were depleted osmium with unobtainum reinforcement. Nothing they could punch through if they had decided to escape. The field which formed the "door" to the cell was charged with enough power to easily fry his circuitry to the core if he'd chosen to test it. However, could he be heard through it?

"Excuse me. Is there a guard around?"

The answer came quickly enough. Four servo-armored troopers in dark gray camouflage and baby blue helmets. Three took up positions to fire into the cell, if necessary, while the fourth came to meet him in front of the door.

"You called for a guard?"

"I did." His level, assured voice was getting the attention of the others. He could hear Enker standing and walking up behind him. "Could I ask for a pen and some paper, please?"

The trooper's face was hidden behind a black klaster visor, but his body language radiated faint confusion. Obviously this wasn't something he'd been expecting.

"What are you going to do with them?"

"Write, obviously."

"Uh...yeah, ok. I'll need to ask about that."

As the troopers turned and walked away, Ballade inclined his head, then turned to face his puzzled siblings.

"So, what do you want with it? It's not like you're going to try and stop up the toilet to force them to open the door." Enker looked around for a moment, then turned back. "For one thing, they didn't give us a toilet."

It was the closest thing to a joke any of them had made since arriving, and Ballade graced it with a chuckle. "Actually, I thought I would try and figure out where the rest of us are."

"How?" That had gotten King's attention. "Our internal modems are being jammed, and these walls," he struck one, lightly, to make his point, "will scatter scanning radar."

Before Ballade could respond, the metallic tread of the guards returned, the lead trooper carrying a legal pad that had obviously been on someone's desk, and a handful of pens and pencils.

"Before I give you these, all of you need to step back away from the door." The rest of the squad trained their weapons to punctuate the instructions.

Enker and Ballade complied, stepping back to a reasonable distance. A signal passed between the lead trooper and his dispatch, and the energy field lowered with a sizzling sound and a whiff of ozone. The trooper stepped to the edge of the cell, knelt, placed the paper and pens far enough into the cell that the field wouldn't be a concern, then stood and took a few long backward strides before the field was restored.

Ballade took up the pad, then nodded to the trooper. "Thank you."

He hadn't expected that, apparently. "Um...yeah, no problem." Then, he cocked his head slightly. "Some of you will be asked to come for debriefing in a little while."

This time, it was the Robot Masters' collective turn to look puzzeled, and the trooper took the moment of awkward silence to depart.

"What could we possibly be debriefed on?"

"They'd have the location of the Fortress from the transport's navigational computer."

"Is it possible some of us decided to keep fighting?"

"Maybe they don't think Da's really dead..."

Ballade grimaced at Plant's suggestion. "Unfortunately, we all know that isn't true." He more than the others. When the status link to the doctor's heart monitor had failed, Ballade had checked every possible data link to see if the Doctor had somehow, some way, outsmarted even Death for one last escape, but nothing had returned. No lifelike duplicates, no secret mind transfers. A wave of frustration at his failure to prolong his Father's life threatened to overtake him, but with an effort of will, he silenced it, forcing it back beneath the mask of authority he normally wore as their Father's caretaker and majordomo.

The silence lasted for a long, strained moment before King reached out to tap the pad of paper Ballade still held in one hand.

"So. The paper."

"Ah. Yes."

Walking to the bench lining the back of the cell, Ballade sat and began to sketch an outline of the facility. "How many levels would you guess this prison has?"

"Probably no more than six by the height of the building. Perhaps some sublevels."

Nodding, Ballade divided the drawing appropriately. "You're right that our regular transmitters are disabled. But navigational data can't be blocked to this building. They'd affect their own equipment."

Enker leaned in over his shoulder to examine the diagram as Ballade began to create a list for each level. "Which might work, if we were equipped with homing beacons tied to the global navigation grid."

"Fortunately...you are."

"WHAT?"

"Shh. They're probably listening to us anyway, but let's try to at least act like a conspiracy."

Enker glowered, but brought his voice back down. "OK, fine. Explain?"

"Father needs....needed...me to be able to locate any of us, at any time. So each of us has a positioning beacon in our construction. Usually either near the photonic core or our primary energy taps. And I can access that data whenever required."

"I'm not sure if I should feel impressed, or violated."

"Likely both."

When he'd finished tallying the list of active beacons, the Elites shared a mix of confusion and slight depression.

"So. Of approximately 90 of us who were active at the time of father's...at the time of the attack, I can locate 60 in this building and on line."

Frowning, Enker traced over the scattered names. "Alpha Squad is intact, no surprise. Most of Beta, though I don't see Crash or Bubble. Gamma missing Hard and Needle. Delta intact. Epsilon gone except for Star...most of Zeta intact...I don't see any of the Stardroids or the Genesis units. Most of Upsilon and Omega are also missing."

King shook his head. "I don't imagine my vassals responding well if they had chosen to attack the Fortress. It would certainly explain why they are not here."

Ballade nodded. "We had left most of Delta and Zeta back at the fortress. Their presence here confirms that they were able to get it's location from the transport and secure it."

"If they left the central core online, their consciousness might have been backed up..."

"I don't really think that our captors will be interested in letting us reactivate them!"

Suddenly, the Elite's debate was interrupted by Plant putting a hand on Enker's forearm. "Someone's coming."

Tucking the pad of paper behind his back, Ballade nodded and the others dispersed around the cell as the armored troopers returned.

"Debriefing. You, you, you, and you. Stand in a line at the door, and no funny stuff."

-That- was interesting. The lead trooper pointing out Ballade, Enker, and King wasn't a surprise. But why Plant? Technically it was the XO of Zeta, but generally it stood away as a noncombatant...

Regardless, as they lined up and the door was opened, it was clear that they'd soon find out.

OK, more later. That's at least one thing I wanted to get out today...