Haxxored - Tyro and Foxytail

Samantha finishes dressing as she follows him. She is silent as the door opens, slowly moving in behind him. Upon seeing the server farm her eyes light up behind her spectacles. She immediately starts walking around quietly, checking behind every corner. A server room should have a server terminal... that means a keyboard and place to hack.... She continues to walk away from Tyro in her search of the room for the terminal.

Tyro raises his weapon and slides around a server. His paw-steps are usually rather quiet but even so, the humming covers it as he slips around the tower of computers to get at the man in the blue suit, standing to attention there. A quick jab in the man's back reassured Tyro that this was one of the guards but he'd been stopped in his tracks for now. He walks onwards, searching for another door. Well, crack in the walls.

"Err...Samantha?" Leth said, nervously. "I was wondering...er...What, what do you use? I mean, I like the Slippry Library when I'm trying to do something like this...It's pretty powerful for what I want to do...I've not found anything it can't do...How about you?"

Tyro turns around, looking behind him quizzically.

"Slippry Library... good program... I broke it... copied its code... made it better... still buggy... stupid computer too slow..." she says under he breath as she continues looking for a terminal. "I need a better machine... but that'd mean getting more generators... I already have two..." She stands up straight and looks annoyed. "Where are the terminals? I want to play with Susie..." She looks up, seeing if there is room to climb on top of the servers and get a better look.

"Hmmm?" Tyro look back before the realisation hit him. "Right! You wanted a keyboard. OK, I'll keep a look out."
"No!" Leth shouts firmly. "You won't find one because all the drones here connect to everything wirelessly. Their part of the hardware! You wouldn't put keyboards on the inside of a computer, after all. What would be the point?"
"Yeah, yeah. All right. Where's the door, Leth?"
"All right, hang on." There's some manic typing from the earpiece before servos and light plastics are made to jerk out the way. "There."
Tyro turns to look towards the other end of the hallway where the door open. He deflates as he sighs before moving towards it.
"Sooo..." Leth says, "You need to check your e-mail, right? I could do that, if your desperate..."

"No... can't let anyone else see... too private." She says softly. She seems disheartened that there are no keyboards in the room, so she returns to Tyro's side, letting him lead. "Why make servers without a display? What if the wireless ceased to work? How would you repair it? This is faulty decision making... I hate who made these..." she says softly. "But you're smart, Leth. You tried to be nice... why?" she asks. "I don't know you... perhaps you're lonely? But you have a brother and father... perhaps you want to mate me?" She asks.

"I...Whagh?!" There is a few seconds of choking while bottles and things clatter to the floor on Leth's side. As he loudly swallows and gasps to regain a reasonable breathing rate, Tyro shoots her a questioning look. Leth's hacking comes to an end. Though each wheeze, Leth managed: "Want, to, mate, me? Wha?"
"You kids might be good together but can you two make a date later?" Tyro said, half-failing to beat back his smile. He walks towards the entrance, peering inside to see the long tube in the centre of the room. Otherwise it was the same bland, static plastic covering the walls as before. This room was circular for some reason though, probably because the large, glass tube in the centre. It led from the ceiling to the floor with four heavy-duty tracks around it's circumference. There wasn't a door either though. No safety procedures to stop people from tripping down there.

"I, err...I don't know what to say about that...I'd prefer to take you out first." Leth said, breathing heavily still. "No! At least, at least take you out a few times. Not that I'm expecting it! I'm not expecting it at all! It's totally up to you, I'm just thinking that maybe you'd like an evening with me, a good drink and maybe you can show me what you did to the Slippry Library?"

"That's better..." Tyro mutters under his breath before turning to Samantha. "Can you ask him to send an-" A humming of motors put cogs into a clacking motion. A simple, metal platform with three stabilising arms slides down the tracks in the tube. It stops and waits for passengers.
"Ah, he's a good lad."

Samantha seems confused at the sudden reaction. "I'm a healthy female of mating age... is it uncouth for the female to ask? Maybe I offended you? I didn't mean to... you don't seem offended. Perhaps you're desperate? You seem quite eager... I'm unfamiliar with your species... perhaps you're in heat?" She thinks out loud, following Tyro into the elevator. "I don't know. I need my computer... I need my stuff... it feels... weird... without my bag..." She says. A slight rumble in her stomach shows she's also hungry, but she remains silent.

"No, no, no!" Tyro said, stepping onto the lift. The four large motors around it holding his weight with ease. "Girls come on heat, not men!"
"Not now Dad." Leth snaps before calming his tone, "I'm trying to say that I am interested in you and would like to meet you after this. However, I pride myself on being more of a gentlemanly type around women and being asked such a question caught me off guard. You interest me, Samantha, and I'd like to get to know you."

"Remember: I don't want to be a Granddad yet! Remember your bathing cap before swimming." Tyro mutters.
"Will you shut up?!" Tyro lets loose a good cackle, teamed with a sly grin.
"Ah! That's why I have kids! Pure torture!"
"Anyway, while my father attempts to wring entertainment from my embarrassment, we'll have to construct a terminal when we reach the item sorting rooms. The junk in there ought to be where your bag will be and were we can connect you to my servers. From there, you'll be able to access my systems on the boat."
"Heh..." Another sly, childish grin. "Just avoid the porn."

"I interest you? Am I strange?" she asks, thinking. "I've been called strange before. And a freak. I don't understand... I'm a normal lupine female. Perhaps I'm strange because I wear glasses? But many other people do... maybe I'm strange because of my looks? But... you can't see me, so it can't be that... what interests you about me? I'm quite a dull girl." She asks, clearly oblivious to her audible ramblings. She listens to Leth's plan and nods. "Yes, that would be acceptable. I can remote to your system... on the boat? You're on a boat?" she asks. "I didn't see water when we looked outside... that must be some communicator you have..." she continues to ramble.

"Well..." Leth said, "It does us well enough. The transmitter wasn't cheep but it's a reliable old thing. Anyway, your right; we're not on the water at the moment. There's nothing around but grassland after all. The altitudes helping with the signal."

Tyro cuts in: "Dom and Leth own an airship delivery company. Although, I've heard they do a little more than that..."

"We all know you and Mum are to blame for that..." Leth mutters brining a half-proud grin to Tyro's mouth.

"Now, Samantha..." You can hear the exasperated sigh blow over the microphone like a hurricane wind. "I really wish Dad wasn't listening but I-"
"Ah! Wait!" Tyro interjected and covered his ears with his hands. "I can't hear you. Carry on!"
"Yeah, so...er...Look, I, I'd quite like the idea of just having a massive chat with you about some of this techy...stuff 'cos, well Dom's a moron, Osiris doesn't care, Ben doesn't get it, Toivo doesn't care because she doesn't need technology, Luke and Matt have their shop, Myu won't sit still for long enough, Lucy will be more interested in chatting with friends and Thomas will just tell me to stop being such a dork. Dad's tried to keep up but...It's forgotten quickly. He has a hundred and one other things to worry about...Speaking of which...I shouldn't be blabbering about this stuff. Your in danger and another hacker might be a good idea right about now. You ought to get on the lift."

"Is he finished?" Tyro asks, a tad too loudly.

Samantha steps onto the lift, listening. she's quiet for a while before she pipes up.
"You have a lot of brothers and sisters.... your father must like sex a lot. He doesn't use condoms either. Or your mother enjoys giving birth. Or enjoys being pregnant. Or enjoys sex a lot. But none of them like computers." she frowns. "Strange. Perhaps they're odd. All my friends like computers. I would like to talk to you about them a lot. You don't seem to have friends that like computers.... are you normal? Perhaps I'm the weird one. Is it normal to like computers? I like computers and the other girls call me weird. Maybe I am the weird one. But you like computers too, but your family doesn't. Does that mean your family is normal and that you're weird? Or...." she falls silent, holding her head. "This is so confusing...." She kneels on the floor of the lift, holding her head silently. It's a few minutes before she speaks again.
"Wait, you're on an airship?"

"Yes! Yes, I'm on an airship!" Leth said, only too happy to avoid all conversations about the love life of his father. Especially with him right there. "We're small but quick. And we don't tend to keep these things long for whatever reason. It's lucky I invested in a black box to back up my computer every so often. The amount of computers I've had to build is ridiculous. Keeps me up to date I suppose...Oh yeah, hang on..."
There's some heavy clacking before Leth started speaking. The lift jerks upwards, moving towards then past the ceiling into a dark tunnel.
"I guess we all got our skills. Toivo's the witch, Myu took up art, Dom is a colossal dick and I do all the computer stuff. I'm always useful whenever Digital pops up out of nowhere."
"Can I stop doing this now?" Tyro asks again, just as loudly.
"Anyway." Leth continues, "The rest of the floors here aren't under my command and your getting closer to a control nexus. They tend to be up the top but I really don't know what's in there either. We've tended to stay away because we could get close with an airship. Digital's gotten wise to that; he's put up anti-air defences that'll shoot us down if we get within range. We also can't hack any of Digital's vehicles at the risk of them being shot down too. We have to go from tower to tower over the bridges between each tower-top. I'm still looking through salvage records for anything resembling your luggage Samantha. Maybe something we can make a half-decent terminal out of too."
Rooms plunged in darkness float past. They only have minute specks of light from the server towers to show what's in there. The blue winged butterflies cover some of the tubing like a sapphire paint. In the confined tube, Tyro is still covering his ears, waiting for the signal to stop. His eyes scan Samantha's face again for that signal when the lift stops suddenly.
"What's going on?" Tyro said, lifting his hands away. His ears pop as they equalise.
"Errr...." Leth mumbles.
"'Errr'? 'Errr' isn't a fantastic thing to say right now." Tyro crouches, inspecting the glass and the room ahead. They'd stopped halfway between the floor and the ceiling. They'd missed the tube's opening that the lift would normally stop at. They were currently stuck. The next floor seemed too high to try and climb.
"I'm working on it."

"Hmm... it looks like we're stuck." She points out. "Either an error in the system... it thinks this is where the floor is. An error in calibration? A late signal error? Perhaps the engines stopped. They'd need to be started... that's usually done manually. We can't get out... that's a problem. Or perhaps it's electronic? An open network? Or a closed network? Either one has problems... and I don't have my computer...." She says, growing visibly upset. "I want my stuff... I hate this place." She sighs, sitting on the floor, hugging her knees in frustration.

Tyro looks up. The next floor is too far away.

Tyro looks down. You could probably jump to the floor.

"Right. Can't go up but we can go down." Tyro said, raising his weapon above his head.

Leth manages to just about catch Tyro's last sentence: "Sorry, Dad! What are you suggesting?" Ignoring Leth, Tyro brings his weapon in a cramped arc to clash with the glass. The metal cracks the glass. Not my a major amount but by an amount that Tyro could work with. He rests his weapon next to him and moves towards the walls of the glass tube, cupping his hands over his muzzle. He takes a deep breath. A stream of fire erupts between his fingers and he quickly pressed them against the glass. A few minutes pass as the glass heats, glowing red, starting to gain energy from Tyro's fire. Cracks appear as the temperature grows, like a frozen lake giving way. With a quick shifting of weight in one direction then the other, he buts into the glass, breaking through the burning shards. He stumbles over the jagged edge, out into nothing but air. His legs peddle as he plummets to the white ground.

He lands on his paws hard. His knees slam into his chest, forcing the air out as he rolls onto his side.

"I'm OK...Be careful when you jump down here."

Samantha watches the fox, curious. As she sees him breath fire, she becomes silent. Watching as he weakens, then smashes through the glass, she watches as he falls. She remains silent, wondering if he survived, the sound of his voice setting her beating heart at ease. She tentatively looks out the smashed glass.
"He survived... he jumped, but he survived... he looks uninjured... but he can breath fire and has two tails... he's not normal... I'm normal... If I land correctly, I'll likely hurt my legs in some way... a sprained ankle... perhaps twisted something... but if I don't land correctly... broken legs... collarbone... death..." she retreats from the opening. "Not jumping." she says firmly.

He clambers to his paws once more...slowly. He rubs his chest with his free hand while he uses his weapon, that he managed to cling onto, as a crutch to stand upright again. He coughs and wheezes while keeping an eye on the pitch black in front of him.

"Hopefully, no-ones about..." He mumbles before turning around, looking back up at Samantha.

"Well...What if I caught you?" He asks. "Even if it all goes wrong, you'll land on me. I'm all soft and fluffy, me." Tyro flutters his eyelashes to go along with his cheeky grin.

His chuckles are drowned out by Leth's mumbling: "Oh no...no, no, no..."

The lights suddenly flicked on. The darkness was purged by the brightness that made Tyro wheel around again. He holds his weapon ready by his side, still rubbing his new bruises. Footsteps echo through the server room, clicks of weapons; Tyro stands his ground.

"I/O - what?!" Leth burbles. "Maybe the antenna needs adjusting..."

The motors in the platform jerk into life. The platform quickly passes the hole and ceiling, upwards towards the top at quite a rate.

"Samanth-" Leth's voice dropped out entirely, only to be replaced the high-pitch scream of what could have been a computer modem. The bleeps and screeches end as abruptly as Leth did, replaced with a small voice. I was definitely a woman's voice. It had the occasional flat-tone in it for some reason.

All the earpiece was doing now was whispering the same few lines: "I got you away from the nasty Red Fox. Master needs him gone for now. He's too much trouble but you and me can still talk. I doubt you'd want to run. Not when we could look at these lovely drawings of yours. Oh dear, this one looks painful but the face he's pulling says otherwise..."

She cuts off into a low chuckle.

"Maybe if your a good girl, you'll get to try some of these out on your new boyfriend, hmm?"

"Who are you?" Samantha asks, still curled up. "You hacked his network... or he hacked yours and you took control. Or it's open frequency and your jamming his signal. They were helping me. Do you want to help me? You don't sound like it... you sound like you like hurting people. That's bad. Are you a bad person? Do you plan on hurting me? Please don't hurt me. I wouldn't like that. Do you plan on hurting Tryo? Or Leth? Please don't hurt them. I like them. I think Leth wants to marry me. Or fornicate. He didn't say. But he said he'd like to talk to me... he's the first boy to say that. Do boys say nice things to you?" She asks into the headset, sitting still in the elevator.

"Nice boys say and do as I please. I make sure of it." The elevator was beginning to slow. "You can get back to your potential man-whore when we've had a little talk, girl to girl."

The elevator slows to a crawl then halts at the end of the glass tube. The tracks in the centre of the tube stopped just above the floor and the tube itself gave ample head room before being capped off.

The room was clearly the top of the tower. The glass created a dome into the bright day outside while the supports of the window frames make a lattice of white over them both, casting large shadows over the floor.

The floor around a central point was littered with crayons, colouring chalks and pencils. A few stacks of paper were on the floor, spread out with plenty of what looked like designs, doodlings and drawings for things from cars to weapons. Some were detailed and complex; others had stick men attacking each other with swords.

"Ah! So your..y, you, y..." The voice on the earpiece mimicked this new voice that seemed to gain stage-fright as she turned to a clear-glass console behind her. She was tall and thin but not in a way that suggested she'd snap in half at any second. The woman was clearly another Kitsune from the two tails waving back and forth in panic with sharp sways.

"I thought this would work...no..I...Oh..." The earpiece continued to copy her desperate whispers. She was wearing a white shirt and a bright blue skirt to go with it. She didn't seem bothered about socks or shoes, like Tyro, and so was walking on her paws. She kept the long scarlet hair back from her face with a black scrunchy. "I really didn't think I...oh..but Master...I...eerr...You!" She points a black finger at Samantha with no conviction but more fear on her face.

"Come, come...come...Could you come over here please?"