Icon's NaNo - HubCorp, Inc.

[Rikku]

Chet Flash. <3 There is Chet Flash. Chet Flash and puns. There is no way for this not to be awesome.

[icon]

Goodness, I haven't updated this thing in absolute ages. xD; I am incredibly sorry about that.

Anyways, just hit up forty thousand words. =D SO. PUMPED. Also I'm at a few pretty awesome scenes with robots. And explosions. And slightly manic wannabe-trickster-type folks, and a mysterious... thingy that does lots of weird stuff and floats. I call it the Plot Device.

I'll post a suitable excerpt when I can find one. For the time being, have a sketchy-thingy.

SPOILER: Click to show

Relevant characters! =D Main guy up front is Crick. Cheerful-looking cockroach is James. Background guy about to get crushed by papers is Poker. Robot-y looking guy with the nice hat is named Mynod Wesp. Flitty imp lady is Eisred De Luccoi, whose name is roughly inspired by Trilly's awesome NaNo.

Yes, those are mountains and mountains of paperwork.

Bluh bluh how do I scan things? The quality on this is absolutely horrible. xD;

[Robyn]

fffff -pounces on Crick- SO adorable, omggggg

I love the amount of detail you've put into this! Really provides a great image of the environment you've so lovingly crafted in your NaNo. :') Great work, Icon!

[Rikku]

That - that is so awesome. xD What a fantastic place! The feel of it is so awesome and amusing and distinctive the characters look so fun and awesome yay

[icon]

Eeeeee! Thanks so much, you two! I'm really glad that you guys are liking this so much.

---

So. Good news. No, great news. =D Passed up 50k about ten minutes ago. And I am... surprisingly anticlimactic about it? xD; I dunno what's up with that, but hey, I'll probably feel better about it in the morning.

In the meantime, here. Have a slightly textwallish excerpt.

SPOILER: Click to show

Okay, so, prenote: I haven't edited any of this. It's probably going to be repetitive, and clunky, and horribly redundant, and full of typos and whatnot. Just bear with me for this one. xD;

Oh, and Context! Context is a very important thing. There's been a large robot invasion going on, and the employees are trying to shut it down from the inside. In this scene, Crick and Poker are trying to travel along the monorail tracks (the company's main form of transport) in order to get to the heart of the trouble.

---

Travelling along the monorail tracks was pleasant, but a bit unnerving. Even though Crick knew that none of the trains were moving due to the invasions, he still felt paranoid about the idea of getting run over by a sudden monorail. The fact that he was able to fly with such ease alleviated the anxiety a bit though.

It wasn’t until the robots showed up again that the problems began.

They came right after Crick and Poker got right out of a tunnel. It was almost te perfect ambush, in retrospect. They were mobbed by the robots- swarmed, overpowered, unexpectedly take over. However, while they had the element of surprise, Poker and Crick found that the two fo them had superior weaponry and technology.

Crick sped along, blasting as many bolts at the robots as he could, trying to dodge their retaliating attacks. Poker aimed shock blasts at the metal rail on which the monorail would have traveled. But still they pressed on, an ever growing onslaught of robotic terrors.

“It’s no use,” Crick said. “There are too many of them.”

Poker looked around quickly, then sped ahead. “Crick, cover me. I’ve got an idea.” Without giving so much as an explanation, Poker dived ahead and started to shoot his shock rifle directly along the monorail.

Crick looked at him oddly. What the devil was Poker planning to do with that electrical charge? Nonetheless, he stood his ground (Well, floated his slightly-above the ground) and prepared for the barrage of robots about to attack.

The first wave of them was practically hardly considered a challenge. He hardly had to blink before he took them down with his onslaught of charged bolts, twin beams of flashing light resulting in cascading explosions.

Whatever Poker was doing with the monorail track seemed to be helful as well- some of the robots standing directly along the rail had been shocked off, left in smoking, steaming heaps.

The next wave was more difficult, but still hardly a problem. Crick was able to blast at them easily, but a few of them got a bit close for comfort. He backed up a tiny bit. His hovering helmet gave him a much higher vantage point, but it had caused strain on his body as well. He was surprised he had managed to last so long in the thing. Nonetheless he continued to shoot away nimbly. Sharpshooting was never his strong point, but it was surprising what the stress of a robot invasion could do to your skills.

He ducked out of the way as even more of them started to appear. This was beginning to get troublesome. As quickly as he could, he shot left, right, forwards, aiming as rapidly and with as much precision as he could muster. “Poker, what yare you doing right now?”

“Just trust me, give me some time!” Was the response he got.

“Okay, but-”

“Just buy me some time! Trust me, I know what I’m doing here!”

Crick turned back, sweeping to the side in order to avoid an incoming Pipsqueak, then shot at it from the side. “I can’t hold these guys off forever, you know.”

“Hold on…” Poker was shooting his Shock Rifle against the track at the most powerful setting now- Crick was starting to doubt what he was doing.

The horde of androids was getting ever closer. Crick was beginning to panic, but he tried to keep his cool, shooting at as many of the robots as he could. A few began to notice him slowing down, however, and tried taking advantage of this.

“Poker!” Crick called. “When are you going to be ready to-”

“Heads up, Crick!” Poker interrupted, grabbing Crick and trying to speed out of the way as the Welcome Train suddenly came plowing through all of the robots quickly. Not hesitating after this move, he guided both of them down to the train, standing on the front part where Crick would have described it as the “hood” of the vehicle, except that it was a train. “Get toward the back, make sure none of them catch us,” he said. Leaning forwards, he continued to shoot the Shock Rifle downwards, shooting blast after blast at the monorail track in a steady beam.

The Welcome Train started to speed up again- slowly, slowly at first, but over time it started accelerating at a quicker pace, gaining speed until it was almost like a bullet. Some of the swarms of Pipsqueaks started to give chase after them- Crick shot at them, trying to hold as many of them off as he could. It was taking up time, sharpshooting at hordes of tiny little robotic pests; and judging by what was going on it seemed obvious that they needed as much time as they could get.

“How far along are we?” Crick asked above the din of the noise caused by pure electricity screeching electricity against the harsh metal of the monorail.

Not looking up, Poker yelled back at him. “Check one of the maps- they should show where we are- it’ll be a while before we get to 5C.”

Crick mused that going from Warehouse complex 5G to warehouse complex
5C was probably going to be one of the longest routes around HubCorp- even if it was just a straight line, it would still end up taking more time than they had.

He looked out at the scenery as they passed up- there were robots, that much was a given, but as he looked he could see rebels starting to appear- small clusters of people, making their ways out to battlte against the machinations which had been brought upon the m by a wrathful computer virus. Crick tried to see if he could recognize any of them- he could swear that he saw Yoxx and some other employees from the warehouses as he sped on, tyring to see them with their tools, attempting to takedown the robotic plague which had been haunting them for the past day or two. He wondered if he would be able to-

“Eyes on the robots, Crick!” A loud noise disturbed Crick from his musings. Poker was blasting ahead as quickly as he could. Crick looked away from the workers, shooting as quickly as he could, trying to make sure that the robots he blasted at were unable to get any closer than three or four meters away, at most.

He snuck a quick glance up again- they were getting close to 5C, he could tell. He knew some of this area, he had been over this way when he delivered files earlier. There were less rebels, and more robots making their way to take out any problems that could be occurring.

There were several loud bursts of noise, and a few large blasts of energy shot past, nearly hitting them. “Bliffin’ insane, they’re shooting at us,” Poker muttered. And that they were- several robots were tracking them as quickly as they could, and cannons positioned along the side walls of the warehouses were shooting bright electric blue bolts of energy- these were larger than Cricks bolts, though- each roughly the size of a watermelon in diameter, and as messy as a watermelon as well- probably messier. Crick cringed as he saw one of the blasts hit the opposite wall in a massive explosive display of fireworks and sizzling electricity.

He watched as Poker tried to shoot as quickly as he could now, trying to keep the blasts into a beam rather than smaller, individual bursts. “Heas up, Crick!” He called out, ducking periodically as large shots came by.
Crick grinned smugly as one of the bolts managed to take out a whole cluster of robots. This was taking up a challenge, but it was working, and that was what really matered.

“Alright, kid, we’re coming up on Warehouse Complex 5C,” Poker said. “Get ready to jump.”

“What? Jump?” Crick asked. “Why would we need to get ready to jump?”

“Just trust me and jump when I tell you too,” Poker said hastily. He held up on the shooting forward and started strafing the security cannons as they shot at him. He managed to take out a good three of them in a dazzling motion. “Crick, keep an eye on those robots!”

Crick looked up. The Pipsqueaks were starting to get closer. “Poker…”

“Crick!” His tone of voise was harsh. “Just keep shooting, and jump when I tell you to!” They continued speeding ahead, only starting to decrease slowly by a tiny bit. Crick could see the station entrance starting to appear.

“Get ready…”

The swarm of robots was gaining ground, inching ever closer

“Get ready…”

Poker gripped the two guns in his now sweat-dripping hands.

“Wait for it…”

“Wait for it…”

Crick turned to see a massive blue bolt of energy aiming right for the ship.

“NOW!”

(*NOTE: For best effect, imagine the upcoming scene happening in slow motion, preferably with awesome background music to match.)

The duo jumped off. Poker jumped into a neat roll as the blast of electric energy hit the Welcome Train square in the end, causing it not only to explode, but to hit all of the Pipsqueaks with shrapnel in the process.

There was a massive explosion as they flew into the station, backs illuminated by the fiery monstrosity of a collision. Crick looked over to see that Poker had put on shades.

The two of them landed without a hitch. Crick was surprised that they looked so good, considering that they had just managed to fend off an entire veritable army of diminutive psychopathic robots between the two of them.

The pair of them basked in the moment of wreckage for a few seconds.

“So.”

“So,” Poker replied.

“That was a pretty cool trick with the explosion,” Crick said.

“Thanks. Learned it from an old friend.”

“It certainly seemed to work for you.” Crick turned to face Poker. “And that thing with the Shock Rifle- what was that about?”

“Oh, that?” Poker shrugged it off. “That was an old trick I learned. The Welcome Train runs on an electric rail- give it an extra boost of electricity and it powers up on its own.”

Crick shrugged. “I… don’t think that’s quite how it works.”

“Suit yourself. This is a Science Fiction story- the laws of physics don’t need to be nearly as realistic here.”

They stood, watching the explosion for just a bit more. The monorail track had begun to burst into flames- there were several scorch marks around the station. Parts of the Pipsqueaks’ bodies littered the ground.

“Well,” Crick finally said after what seemed like an eternity of time.

“Well,” Poker answered, casually and coolly as ever.

“What say you that we take down that virus menace once and for all?”

Poker turned to look at Crick, and gave him a wink. “I say that there’s nothing I’d like to do more.”

[/hr]

Sorry, no real puns in this one. No Chet Flash either. Sorry 'bout that, all.[/spoiler]

[icon]

Ffffff- hitting a bit of a wall. >_> I've only written, what, about six hundred words in the past two days. And I mean, good, good, that's better than nothing, yes! But but but there's still more to this story. I know that it's nowhere near finished. The main arc is almost wrapped up, yes, but after that it's just supposed to go back to its quirky little self, assorted odd anecdotes and amusing things and what have you, but at this rate I'm not even going to get that far. It's. Kind of disconcerting. D:

And it's a shame, it really is! It's a massive shame. I need to be writing more of this. But I just sort of... can't. xD; I've been so sidetracked by my other projects and such that I forget "whoops I have NaNo to be working on too" and it's just sort of blergh. I feel like part of it is because I'm already past 50k. It's like my subconscious is telling me, "Hey, whoop-de-doo! You've reached the bare minimum! Congratulations, that's good enough!"

Except that it's not good enough. If I hold on to these ideas for too long without putting them down somewhere I'm going to forget them, and that would probably be even worse. So.

I think I'll just go back to writing explosions and psychopathic gentlemanly suave robots until I get my inspiration back. Yeah. That's cool.