To Tame Iron, Pt. III
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Blip/blip/blip….bzzzzzz…*What have they done to me? How shall prove my worth again thusly armed and clothed?...Uhhhhh…I’ve slumbered too long…Wait…what is this…I’ve been grafted with a weapon with which to smite my foes…Oh, foolish xenos! I’ll*….bzzzzzz….blip/blip/blip….restart malfunction/reboot in progress…
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Snikkit stood and nervously chewed his fingernail…More times than he cared to count (which wasn’t very high, granted) he’d found that lens in the back of the compartment radiating a sort of menace at him. He remembered all too well what had happened to Drillzit when he had first spied the light. It wasn’t on all the time, but he could swear that something or someone was trying to talk; if not to him then at him. Threatening him more like it. It made for a more hostile work environment than even he was used to.
He sighed heavily as he got back to work. The turret wasn’t going to wire itself, now was it? No boss, his mind told him, replaying one of several berating conversations he’d had over the past few days. Mumbling to himself, he twisted new wires into place and taped and soldered till his fingers burned.
Yep…this battlewagon would be the death of him yet…
Snikkit never realized how true those words could be…
As whiffs of smoke rose from the open turret on the top of the great creation, Tinkerin’Un was busy doodling schematics and measuring for cuts in the chassis for a proper driver cab. Seems dem humies drove inside the beast, possibly peaking out the top or sides to see where they was going…Somehow, this just seemed wrong. At least with a proper cab, you could feel the wind in yer ears and all and see and smell the battle as it unfolded. Leastwise, that’s what Skullsmasha had told him when he gave his latest set of demands to him…
“Dis had better be wurf it…” muttered Tinkerin’. This whole mess was costing him time and supplies; both of which he hadn’t seen any replacements for. It wasn’t that it wasn’t an honor to work directly for the Big Mek and the Big Boss, but come on…would it kill someone to toss a couple three teef his way? Honestly, he could imagine a couple right now that he wouldn’t mind killing, just to prove a point…he chuckled evilly at the thought.
This was the revelry that Tinkerin’ was immersed in when it almost happened.
It was happening just as Snikkit finished his wiring and was slewing the turret from left to right and trying to elevate the kannon. Everything looked right. The controls stuck a little, as they probably were apt to, being new and all. Glancing around the turret, he saw all the juice was flowing exactly where it should. Loads of blinky lights, ammo counter, auto-loader, big junction box with black cable stuck in…
As Snikkit was climbing down the access ladder, he froze. When had he installed a big, black cable into the primary junction box? Quickly patting his pockets, he found the scrap one cut from the ramp controls. That’s when he heard the hum…
“Dat can’t be good,” he muttered aloud.
At that very instant, Tinkerin’ had a most unpleasant visitor. Another mek, one of FixitGit’s lieutenants, sauntered into his shop, uninvited. Tinkerin’Un stopped his work to fix the interloper with a steely gaze before clearing his throat and hawking out a large wad of phlegm at his foot.
“Whadda ya want, ya coggin’ git?” he snarled.
“Now now, Tinkerin’ me good lad, is dat anyways to talk to a mate, a friend?” the mek known as Wrencha replied.
“Wrencha, we’z never been close, mates or otherwise…Whadda ya want, I’m kinda busy…”
“Oh yes…busy…what with the Big Bosses battlewagon and all. Right…well, it seems dat FixitGit is beginning to feel a bit left out of the whole process, see? And well, me and da ladz tend to agree…what wif need’n work and all. So, I’ve taken on me self to come and either lends a hand in dis build, or…”
“Or what?”
“I’ll take over da build and you’ll simply disappear like…” Wrencha answered pulling out his Kustom MegaBlasta from behind his back. The coils hummed with lethality, bathing Wrencha in a weird bluish under glow. Tinkerin’ knew he was looking at the end of the line and his only thought was what a pity that he’d never see the cab come to fruition.
Then everything flashed, which was accompanied by a monumental boom! With that, the doors of his shop were blown off the hinges and Wrencha was missing, except for his boots; which merely smoked lazily in the artificial lighting of the sheds. The displacement of the explosion rocked everything within 20 meters, throwing Tinkerin’Un off the deck onto the shop floor.
Patting himself down, making sure he was all there, Tinkerin’ bellowed, “Snikkit!!”
…
Several seconds earlier…
Things were whirling and buzzing in the turret. Snikkit instinctively knew that something wasn’t right. He didn’t remember wiring the turret to move and make decisions on its own. Well, what’s the worst that could happen?
The worse happened a split second later…The auto-loader lit up and hummed into life. An arm reached around and slammed a shell into the breach.
“Uhhhhh, boss…” Unfortunately, he never finished the sentence. The turret cranked around, the barrel fiddled with an elevation adjustment, and the kannon roared into life. A split second later the flash/bang of the shot echoed through the shops.
Snikkit’s ears rang uncontrollably. His head hurt and the smell of cordite in the compartment was almost too much to bear…
Just then, he heard…
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Blip/blip/blip…*Primitive by my standards, but satisfactory for the time being. ‘Ware beast! I’m about to send you back to the hell that spawned thee*….
BOOOMMM!!!!
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…that angry buzzing again. Scrambling back into the turret, Snikkit realized that his boss was gone. A forlorn sense of loss gripped him, then a sense of revenge. His beady eyes locked onto the junction box and the black cable. With a snarl, he grabbed a handful of cable and snipped it from the box and the wall. Panting, he watched as the remainder of the cabling coiled back along the turret compartment and slipped down into the darkness of the compartment area. Growling with rage, or the closest thing that he could come to, Snikkit readied to jump down and get the errant cabling when he heard, “Snikkit!!!”
Scrambling out of the crew compartment, Snikkit found his boss sitting next to the battlewagon, blinking his eyes and holding his ears…Curses escaped through Tinkerin’Un’s craggy lips as Snikkit scampered to stand in front of him. He chose not to notice the enormous grin plastered on his little assistant’s face, or the little whiffs of smoke clinging to his shoulders and head.
“Yez boss?”
“Yez boss…yez boss?” he snarled. “Wot da hells just happened??!!”
“Uhhh, it was da wirin’ sees…I was clippin’ and tapin’ and doin’ wot was told to me, and suddenly all da lights light up ‘n the auto loading thingy goes haywire, grabs a shell and ….” Snikkit’s tale trailed off to a shrug. As he stood there, waiting for the hammer to literally fall, he glanced in the compartment. There was that light again…and now it was blinking and what not…he almost didn’t catch all the boss’s reply.
“…and boom…Well, at least the turret’s a success. Course, we coulda waited til we was at the range first…pity about poor Wrencha…course accidents and all that…tough life being a mek in the shops…danger round every corner I says…”
“Yep…”
“Yep? Yep? Is dat all ya gotta say, ya miserable git! Look at my shed, look at my doors!!! Who’s gonna replace dem, eh? I’ll tell ya who, ME!!!” he screamed waving his arms in the air and pacing back and forth. Breathing heavily, Tinkerin’Un stopped and stared into the middle space of his racing mind. Things just couldn’t get much worse, right? I dunno…it sounded like an old argument he’d had once already…heaving a great sigh, he turned to Snikkit.
“Well, me lad…yaz better goes an’ gets the Sergeant Major…someone’s gonna have ta watch the shop tonight, and it ain’t gonna be me…” Tinkerin’Un said sagely, shambling towards the back of his shop to the door that led to his sleeping area…”Make sure ya straighten up the shop all smart like before turning in, Snikkit…If ya don’t, you’ll find yerself on Mugla’s Kannon Krew in da morning…”
After calling for the Sergeant Major, Snikkit began to pick up the tools scattered about by the explosion. He shook his head as he polished off the grime on several spanners and pliers and hung them up on corresponding pegboards. After a bit, two lumbering nobz entered the shop through the hole in the doors (they being doors only in the most literally loosest definitions).
“Oi! Snikkit! Wot’s happening here?” one asked.
Snikkit looked at the nobz, then the doors, and shrugged. “Target practice, I suppose…” and went back to cleaning.
…
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Blip/blip/blip….*Uhhhhhh…why can’t I fire this accursed thing again? What has happened? One foe smitten by my anger and thunder, and now this???*....error code/reset/reset….*It’s that little one…too cunning for his own good…I shall have to deal with him and soon*….reset all/restart functions online/reboot in progress…blip/blip/blip
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End Part III
