Hey again.
I know it's been a while between chapters, but there were a couple of
annoying continuity errors I had to track down and eliminate.
-EA
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-- Attached file included as plaintext by Listar --
-- File: Mechanoia 3.txt
NOTE:
[Internal Monologue]
|Text on a paper or sign
<:> Artist: "Song playing on soundtrack" <:>
OR
<:> SFX: "Effect" <:>
========================================================================
MECHAnoia by Echo Albarn
halo three: 78%
========================================================================
<:> SFX: silence. <:>
As I began to strap into the pilot's chair, I heard a voice.
My own.
[I, Sean A. Wade, have decided that the world has gone insane.]
But what I heard next was unexpected.
[I, Dr. Julia Schneider, have decided that love is insanity.]
[I, Agent Amelia Whelan, have decided that gender is inanity.]
[I, Agent Simon DuBois, have decided that you are the insanity.]
I opened my eyes and it was dark. Dark, no light. I fumbled around
for a light switch, and realized there was none. Then, as I watched, one
light after another lit up on the control panel. I tried to shield my
eyes from the sudden bursts of light to find that my head was encased in
some sort of helmet. My brain seemed foggy, and I couldn't think. I
reached to my neck to take off the helmet, when I heard a voice. Crossed
somewhere between the ring of authority and the shriek of fear, Julia's
voice yelled over the comlink, "NO! DON'T TAKE THE HELMET OFF!"
Her voice cut through my stupor like a chainsaw through lukewarm
spam. My head lolled about a bit, then I asked (putting my hands down in
the process), "So...what's going on now?"
Still slightly shaken, she responded with, "We're connecting your
neural net to the mecha, just remain calm and it'll be okay."
Just THen evErY+thang (go|to|started)<-backwards haywire
((fubaR)) IN my brain mybrainmybrainbymrain
On the command bridge, the entire crew ripped off their headsets
as "AAAHHHHHHHH! WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO MY HEAD?!?!" came over the comm.
"Sean, stop it!" Julia yelled, adjusting her just-replaced
microphone, "Don't try to fight it. Just...um. Just try to relax. It'll
be easier that way.
<:> Blur: "Yuko and Hiro" <:>
"How can I relax when my brain is not connected to my body?" I
slurred. But for some reason, I had just answered my own question. It
reminded me, not all that surprisingly, of the days of weed and lotuses
that I spent in California. As I had those times before, I let myself
drift aimlessly into the aether.
This time, I drifted as if down a hallway, at the end of which
lay the mecha. When I reached it, I didn't exactly become one with the
devices, I merely wore them, with my conciousness inhabiting it all.
"My God...It's full of stars..." I quoted.
One of the techs who had read "Neon Exodus Evangelion" fell out
of his tipped-back chair.
"Just kidding. It's really just dark."
"How are you feeling, Sean?"
This time, Julia's voice sounded more wondering, curious than
anything.
"I feel..." I thought about it for a moment.
The bridge crew, including Mr. Fanfiction in the back there,
leaned closer to their monitors.
"I feel like..." I couldn't really figure out what I wanted to
say.
The bridge crew held their collective breath. Julia pressed her
earphone deeper into her aural canal.
"I'm rather hungry."
The sound of 7 palms hitting their respective foreheads echoed
over the tac net.
Simon, the first to recover from his bout of facefault, keyed the
tac net. "Pilot Wade, we don't need any of your stoner humor here. The
future of humanity is in your hands." he lectured.
I let out another breath and gathered my wits, preparing to exit
the compound for battle.
"Um, what now?" I asked.
Mr. Fanfiction sat up and nudged the tech next to him, who had
dozed off.
"Oh, yeah, maybe we'd better launch him." the tech said.
<:> SFX: Muted Trumpet Wah-wah <:>
DuBois stood up and pounded his fist on his raised console in the
rear of the command center, saying, "Launch the prototype already!"
Schneider, DuBois, and Whelan each reached into their shirts and
pulled out chains. On the end of each chain hung a very thick key.
D'Arcy looked up at the main monitor bank, where three red lights were
glowing softly. As chief engineer, it was his job to count off the
launch. "Command personnel, insert keys," he intoned, replaying a
pattern that had been drilled for months over. As he watched, each red
light turned yellow as the keys were inserted.
"Director DuBois! GO!"
The first key was turned, and one yellow light turned green.
"Project Leader Schneider! GO!"
Another key turn; another green light.
"Assistant Director Whelan! GO!"
The three green lights began to flash, and a synthesized voice
spoke over the intercom.
In a slightly modulated female tone, it said, "MECHA LAUNCH
VOTE- DuBois: Yes. Schneider: Yes. Whelan: Yes. Unanimity Acheived."
A pause before continuing, "The MECHA would have been launched in
3 minutes, 47 seconds from the time of the alert, were we to ignore the
*debacle* in the locker room. Possibility of success were this a real
launch..."
"WHAT?" I said, throwing tact out the window.
"...78%. Is there a problem, Mr. Wade?"
In the control room, the image of the mecha bay was replaced by a
live shot of Sean, nose splint and all.
"Damn right, there's a problem! You people woke me up for a
drill?"
Whelan took hold of her microphone. "Would you rather we sent you
out there to die with no training?"
That cut through some more of the fuzzy feeling in my brain.
However, I held my tongue. That wasn't to last, as I realized there was
something wrong. "Who was that other voice?"
D'Arcy got his cue here and grinned madly at no-one in particular.
He keyed up an individual comm line and his image appeared on one of the
cockpit screens of the mecha. Still grinning, he told me this: "That was
our base computer, and..."
He was interrupted by the subject of his declamation. "Dr. D'Arcy.
You may have built me, but I'm a big girl now. I think I can introduce
myself."
Brian made an expansive gesture that said "Go ahead".
Another comm screen lit up in the cockpit, displaying a mildy
pulsating pink torus.
It made a noise not unlike a throat clearing before beginning,
"Hello, Sean. I am a-"
"Wait, wait, wait!" Everytone turned around to see what the new
interruption is, when it was just lil' ol' me. "Couldn't someone get me
out of this thing first?"
If this computer had a body, she would have glared at me right
then. It didn't, so it started over as if I had not spoken. "I happen to
be-"
"Whoa, Brian," One of the techs asked, "Don't you think we should
get him out of there?"
Brian nodded.
The computer started once more. "I HAPPEN TO BE...Oh, screw you
people, none of you are listening anyway."
D'Arcy leaned back in his chair and called out (in a more relaxed
tone), "Whelan, lockdown." There was a loud clunk as the first lock was
replaced...
-sometime later-
Sean Wade did not sleep the sleep of the just, or that of the unjust.
He slept the sleep of the extremely-fricking-tired-and-if-you-think-
about-waking-me-up-again-I'll-rip-your-nuts-out-through-your-throat-
even-if-you're-a-woman.
Julia Schneider stood in the doorway of Sean's room, watching him
intently as he slept. She didn't know why she was interested in him, but
she was.
Brian D'Arcy walked past Julia on his way back to his office to deal
with his tempermental computer, when he heard groaning and curses, both
male and female, coming from behind his superior's door. He knew exactly
why he quickened his pace away from there.
Simon DuBois groaned, loud and long.
Mostly because Amelia Whelan had placed QUIXOTIC on a triple word score.
========================================================================
<:> Smashing Pumpkins: "Le Deux Machina (synth)" <:>
MECHAnoia CAST LIST:
----------
MAJOR PERSONAS:
Pilot #00: Sean A. Wade
NSA Agent #1 "Spook" (Director of Operations): Simon DuBois
NSA Agent #2 "Feminazi" (Asst. Director): Amelia Whelan
Science/Medical Head (Project Leader): Dr. Julia Schneider
AI/MECHA Technician "Mr. Fanfiction": Dr. Brian D'Arcy
BRIDGE CREW:
Commander-
Simon DuBois
Engineering-
Brian D'Arcy
David Heller
Medical-
Julia Schneider
Jillian Sato
Situational/Command-
Brian D'Arcy
Amelia Whelan
Julia Schneider
Tactical-
Amelia Whelan
Gene Tyler
AND:
The Bridge Computer
Lunchlady: Ethel Petersen
========================================================================
NEXT TIME, ON MECHAnoia, HALO FOUR!
Someone appears. But it's not another pilot.
Someone does something illegal. But it's not the enemy.
And cafeteria food still sucks.
"NOBODY KNOWS YOU WHEN YOU'RE DOWN AND OUT", COMING SOON...WATCH FOR IT!
========================================================================
Authorial Notational Thingamabob:
It's understood that you kinda start to get feedback and C&C
after several parts of the story have been released, but when you've
written part 4 and some of 5 already, you kinda get lost in where you
want to go with the tale you tell. I *have* started work on 5, as
directionless as ever, but hopefully I won't smeg it up too badly.
========================================================================
"MECHAnoia, halo three" (C) 2000, Echo Albarn/Mirror in the Dark Prod.
========================================================================