By David C. Daoust
Ratchet, at the very least, found himself excused from the Splicer grind that had taken up so very much of his time but days before. This was largely thanks to the fact that Harper managed to get their skill level twice as high, in half of the amount of time. The First Wave boy felt like everything worked out just perfect. It did not dawn on him for a second that he had just learned an invaluable lesson, one that all men at some point do: the worse you do at something, the less you’re chosen to do it. He made a note to try that again sometime, as he enjoyed his newfound downtime– doing a whole lot of nothing.
Despite it all, seemingly, going in his favor, Ratchet and Harper had not been getting along very well. He did not think it was going to change any time soon. Especially considering, both, Harper and Grace, decided, Ratchet and Dicey, were huge liars.
This was thanks to their story of the massive mechanical dragon soaring through the skies of Twin Crown.
A story that, both, Ratchet and Dicey, decided was behind the crazy lies Harper and Grace told them, soon after, about the glowing woman that had magically appeared within the very Family Room they all now occupied.
That is, until Margo showed up with an extremely similar story… and had the new bot-Form to prove it! Not to mention the talking bunny rabbit that was now a constant companion to the trio of young girls.
Margo’s ‘proof’ put a crinkle in the two teams feud, but not an end to it. Dicey had taken to arguing with Grace just as often as Harper was snapping at Ratchet.
Listening to the two girls argue had become the norm, for the most part Ratchet could tune them out. The current argument, however, got his attention. Mainly, because what the girls were saying did not make sense.
“No, they won’t take those ones,” Dicey argued, “We won those— they only take the mechs we lose.”
“What makes you think that?” Grace asked.
“Uhh… Because they let us salvage the drones we destroyed,” Dicey explained as though it was obvious.
“I don’t think they have set rules, Dicey,” Grace scoffed.
“Well, that’s what they’ve been doing,” Dicey explained at a slightly higher octave, “They even let me collect my winnings. And they only took that one mech we lost… even though there were plenty closer.”
“What are you guys talking about?” Ratchet interrupted the two girls.
Ratchet had assumed the two young sisters were in the virtual space leveling their skills with Harper. From what he’d heard, he now suspected maybe the two girls were out in the desert… mainly because they used the word ‘drone’.
“Are you guys running your Spider-mechs or helping Harper?” Ratchet tried to clarify, gesturing to where Harper sat before the farwall, looking very much like a mindless zombie, bunny in her lap, as Margo seemed to snooze beside her.
“We’re fighting off drones outside,” Grace revealed. “They been coming in waves ever since we went back out.”
“You went back out?” Ratchet had no idea. The fact drones were coming in ‘waves’ pulled him out of his triumphant ‘downtime’ and set him up in his seat, on the very edge.
“Yeah, we popped back to collect those drones we blasted,” Dicey, invoking their earlier teamwork, took a turn answering.
“What for?” Ratchet was surprised.
The ‘duh’ was unspoken, yet clear in Dicey’s voice as she answered: “So, I could use my engineering skill to try and repair them…”
“Did it work?” Ratchet pressed.
“Sure did,” Grace stated, “I had to go mine some metals, but we got four drones now…”
Ratchet knew there was one spliced to the helm, plus the two the girls kept from before… and they blasted two in the desert…
“You just salvaged one?” Ratchet was too busy trying to tally the drones, to really realize that the girl just said she mined real world metals from the moon. A fact that would amaze him– went right over his head.
“No, I mean, we got five counting the one at the helm,” Grace corrected herself.
“Well, we had six, but we lost one a little bit ago,” Dicey confessed.
“There’s only the two of you…” Ratchet felt like things weren’t adding up.
“Oh, cuz I switched to the new one to make sure the repairs got it working right,” Dicey began to say.
“We actually have a bunch up there, they just aren’t all repaired yet,” Grace threw in, pointing up to the roof.
“They showed up for a new round… and I lost it,” Dicey finished a bit crestfallen.
Ratchet did not know who ‘they’ were, it sounded like they were playing for vehicles though. He was familiar with the idea, First Wave teens tended to pass their vehicles around from victor to victor. Obviously not in ‘battles’, but in races- no problem. He knew his brother managed to replace his lost Skyscreamer, soon after it dropped out the sky during that Drone Raid on Grady, in such a contest. Ratchet only found out later that his brother had risked Ratchet’s own vehicle to win it.
“Here comes a new wave,” Grace suddenly alerted them as her attention shifted to her view screen.
Dicey slapped her visor back over her head, ready for action.
“How many usable mechs we got?” Ratchet asked.
“Four,” Grace said again.
“Five, counting the helm one,” Dicey corrected.
“We can’t use that one though,” Grace snapped at Dicey.
“I’ll get on and help…” Ratchet volunteered as he went to collect another visor.
“Help? Really?” Grace asked sarcastically.
“He’s not so bad now,” Dicey interjected on Ratchet’s behalf, “I showed him how to play!”
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