Reflectsor

"Affirmative. Maintaining communications." Elekteri kept his channel open and his sensory arrays powered up. one after another, bugs planted on the other gangs activated and flashed on the screens before him. There was surprisingly little to report; all that stood out was some members of Dead Eyes discussing concerns of their blackmailing being part of some crazy scheme perpetrated by an ex-member, though they appeared uncertain. They couldn't even think of what said ex-member's name might be; it seemed to be little more than unsubstantiated conjecture based on the paranoia of some less than competent rookies. Despite this, Elekteri held onto the tidbit to report later. There was little point in bothering Mal again so soon with a mere possibility. Something odd began flashing up on the center screen. A dark image that was hard to make out, accompanied by static. After flashing for a few seconds more, the image appeared fully, still dark and very blurry. A vaguely humanoid silhouette seemingly clad in some sort of armor. A faint red glow emitted from what looked like the visor of a helmet. Amid the static, a deep and bizarrely robotic voice spoke, though the message was impossible decipher as it cut out repeatedly: "ZZZZZ-UNIT D-3-ZZZZ-5W31-ZZZZ-OPERATIO-ZZZZ-SEARCHING FOR-ZZZZZZZZZ..." The surreal transmission cut out completely, and the normal feed was restored. This definitely warranted contacting Mal again, and Elekteri wasted no time doing so. "Elekteri to Mal, a transmission of unknown origin was picked up on one of our bug feeds. Audio and video were too poor of quality to accurately decipher."

Oxidus Zurrok: Friendly techno-organic alien tech wizard with a violent side. Trey Tyrrell: An ex-street fighter and criminal training to become stronger. D-313C7R1C (Elekteri Volttas): A defective runaway robot turned secret agent by pure chance.

"Understood, I will notify you immediately. I suspect we will not have long to wait." This routine was fast becoming commonplace; the others setting out for field work leaving Elekteri to watch over bugs and report his findings. Not that he ever minded it, of course. He lacked the capability to complain or argue, and most importantly, refuse a command from his superiors. It didn't matter how his capabilities were used. Successfully completing the mission was all that concerned him. Barely fifteen minutes passed since the others left before the Dead Eye's received a call. "Mal, I have confirmed contact from an unidentified third party." Whoever was calling used a voice modifier to remain anonymous. A predictable move for a blackmailer. "Hello gentlemen! I haven't much time to talk, so I'll just skip the formalities and cut straight to the heart of the matter. As you are no doubt aware, a certain man has recently been murdered, and a certain file is now in the hands of his killer. It's a shame really. If any of that file's contents were to be leaked to the authorities, the consequences would certainly be fatal to your "organization". Oh, but there's no reason to panic; you see, there is a way to prevent any further mishaps from occurring. Alas, my time is already nearly up, so it seems I'll have to hold off on the long-winded explanation. For now, just be aware that some form of payment in exchange for the safe return of your papers will be necessary in the near future. You will hear from me again soon. Goodbye for now." Elekteri reestablished contact with Mal and gave him a brief summary of the blackmailer's spiel. It was unclear who they may be, and what exactly they wanted, but they made their intentions of getting it very clear.

Time seemd to crawl as Elekteri sat watching the footage. For the past four days he remained glued to the screen, only getting up for a recharge when necessary. It was beginning to seem as though they would neverfind anything among the hours of mundane goings on, until Mal finally did see something early the next day. Elekteri asked no questions, silently taking in the newly discovered information. It was time for action once more, at least for the others. For Elekteri, it was time to spend yet more time sitting and watching security footage. With everyone else fed and on their way, He settled in for what he was almost certain be another long day.

I was beginning to think everybody else just forgot about this.

"Oh, my bad. I just assumed you did know. I'll make sure I come see you first thing from now on." It seemed a reasonable assumption to make, all things considered. But the last thing Oxidus wanted to was displease the man who had given him the key to making a new permanent home for himself. It would take some doing, but this new city would provide the perfect place for him to finally settle down again. Though couldn't help wondering on occasion what had become of his old home back on Alternia. Was the security system still working? Were the maintenance robots still functioning? Were they keeping the lab clean? Did he leave the water running? No, he definitely turned that faucet off before he left. "It was for the best.", he would remind himself. Before deciding to leave home, he looked for any possible way to get things back to the way they were before the Empress had announced the new social hierarchy, ranting and raving about a need to eliminate the "lowbloods" to weed out the weaklings and preserve the sanctity of the blood. It all came from out of nowhere, as if something in her mind had snapped. Perhaps it was the stress of dealing with affairs on Alternia, on top of those associated with the ongoing war against a myriad of attackers, who sought to wipe out all trollkind. That, compounded with the fact she had already been through the loss of one world-the Troll race's original home world, Beforus, destroyed at the hands of the very same armies who continue to menace them. The part about eliminating lowbloods didn't quite seem to stick at first, but the blood sanctity part sure did. The sea-dwelling, amphibious violetbloods became the most well-treated beings on the planet, and were free to treat the "lesser" land-dwelling castes as poorly as they pleased. Not wanting to be the only ones being looked down on and mistreated by others, trolls of purple, indigo, and cerulean blood followed suit with the sea-dwellers, taking their frustrations out on the castes set lower than their own on the spectrum. Conflicts between castes arose, and resulted in many fights and killings, which have since spiraled further and further out of control, to such a point that it has become a fact of life for the troll race that highbloods will kill lowbloods, whatever their motivation may ultimately be. Protests, rallies, and rebellions abounded, but to no avail. Every idea Oxidus had come up with was already tried by someone else, and had already failed numerous times. When the well of ideas ran dry, that was when he finally decided it was time to go. He does sometimes wish he could've done more, but he doesn't regret his decision, nor does he regret up on Valucre. It's turned out to be a much nicer planet than his intended destination anyway. And in spite of his circumstances, he's the happiest he's been since before everything went bad for his people. Oxidus continued bashing rocks until his presence was rather loudly requested by Thurgood. He dropped the rock he was holding and leaped up to the top of the cliff. "You don't have to shout ya know. What's up?"

Elekteri strode rigidly down the street on his way back to the office. Though his joints were all highly articulated, he barely bent them as he walked, as if trying to appear as much like a stereotypical robot as he could, despite clearly looking thoroughly modern, which ended up drawing some attention. He gave the act up half way through his trip, and when he reached the office and was sure nobody was still looking at him, he entered and rejoined his associates, ready for the next task. The job of perusing the footage from the cameras fell to him and Teddy. A week's worth would indeed take a while to get through, but with two people watching, it wasn't likely they'd miss anything. Elekteri scanned the screen intensely with his wide, V-shaped optical sensory array. After ten minutes of silent observation, he spoke up for the first time in a little while. "I detect no unusual events in this current time frame. I recommend increasing playback speed. As long as we both remain focused on the screen, there is little chance we will miss anything." Without waiting for any input from his partner, he set the playback speed to two-hundred percent intent on getting through the footage as quickly as possible while being able to pick up on every detail.

Oxidus was, among other things, an engineer. Not because he had traveled what any human would consider the traditional path to such a career, but because he simply chose it as a hobby, and effectively made a career of it. He was naturally brilliant, owing to a genetic mutation that affected his mind. After pupating, his mind began developing at a rapid pace. His ability to easily learn and retain vast amounts of information far surpassed that of normal limebloods, and was on par with the most gifted goldbloods on all of Alternia, and as he grew, he developed a strong interest in the advancement of technology. He passed through the schooling system several years earlier than the majority of his peers, and immediately sought employment with the empire. In short time, he had effectively become an engineer and I.T. consultant to the Empress, while still only a young teen. The position paid well, and he used his great income to construct a personal lab for his own projects, including many a healing device for use both on-world by the common troll, and off-world by soldiers fighting to defend the planet from constant attack, as well as his ambitious experiments with techno-organic conversion and space travel via wormholes. With these details in mind, it should be unsurprising that construction work was a little outside of his wheelhouse. Not that there was anything difficult to understand about the crushing of rocks into smaller pieces, but he was much more accustomed to the usage of his hands for handling heavy machines and parts, and for carefully assembling more delicate machinery. He had never used them to crush anything before. It was an odd sensation to him, the feeling of stones breaking into progressively smaller bits, until it was more or less just dust. But it also wasn't especially stimulating. It was only due to his personal determination to never quit anything until the very end that he managed to find a way to stave off the boredom that had arisen from the simple repetition of picking up a rock, crushing it, setting the bits aside, and repeating. He began trying different methods of breaking up the stone; karate chopping it, axe-kicking it, smashing it on his head, and even crushing between his thighs. Anything to make the process more enjoyable. The first day of work had been a long one, at least from Oxidus' perspective, but he still managed to have some fun with it, and he had no doubt that it was all going to be worth it. This project would be the biggest he had ever worked on. Nothing he had ever created came close to matching it in scope. He hoped that when all was said and done, he would be able to set himself up just as he had before. A moderately sized hive with plenty of space, and a large enough basement to build a new lab in which he begin his experiments anew. With any luck, by introducing his unique brand of troll ingenuity to Valucre, he may start a technological revolution! Or something to that effect. It was a nice thought anyway. Oxidus spent the majority of the night awake, as nocturnes do, browsing the Alternian web through an intergalactic wi-fi connection on his strange looking handheld device. It wasn't until only two hours before the crack of dawn he decided to lay down and rest. Those few hours of sleep were enough, and as he arose and exited his tent, he was greeted by the sound of a siren, followed by an explosion, and knew immediately what that meant. Oxidus approached John and Thurgood to greet them. "Hey, what's up? That blast was loud as hell. If I wasn't already awake, that would've gotten me up. Anyway, I already heard what's happening today, and I'm ready to go. Don't wait up boss-man!" He ran off to the blast site and set to work getting rock moved and broken up, once again doing so in a variety of ways.

Elekteri gave a nod and headed out with cameras in hand. He affixed in various areas around the terminal, checking to ensure they wouldn't be easily noticed while still providing an ample viewing angle. It proved simple enough to balance stealthy placement and high visibility, though remaining inconspicuous proved more difficult. The droid constantly looked over his shoulder as he worked, hoping that passersby wouldn't notice what he was doing and make a fuss about it. He was surprised that no one seemed to take notice, like they all had personal matters that were more pressing than discerning why the strange robot was planting small black gadgets in specific places. The last was put in place, and Elekteri headed for secluded bit of alleyway and pulled out his crystal. "Cameras are placed and active. Awaiting further instruction."

"Your dad ain't okay. The wannabe dark wizard musta fixed him so he can't tell the truth. So we can't trust a word he says 'till it wears off." Trey looked directly at Doctor Leonard. "Do us a favor an' keep ya mouth shut for a while." Suddenly he began shrinking down to normal size, the sword shrinking with him, back down to the form of a one-handed blade. "Since we know one-eye ain't gonna be a real problem for us, there ain't no reason for me to keep bein' giant. Not yet anyway. I say fuck the drunk wannabe cowboy and that backstabbin' assassin bitch, and whoever the goddamn hell those other weird-ass anime rejects are supposed to be. Ain't like we actually need 'em. We can find these generators, break 'em, murder Doctor Psychotic, and get on with our lives. Good plan right? Sure it is. C'mon, let's go find us some clones to grill." Trey started off in a random direction, leaving his group to follow if they so chose.

At Mal's command, Elekteri switched the screen back to the normal camera feeds, and checked that the guard was still unconscious before untying him and slipping out quickly just as he was beginning to stir. He made his way to the back of the base, opting to take a longer route as simply hurrying along the shortest path would surely seem like strange behavior for a guard droid. He glanced back at the hallway briefly before quietly exiting through a side door and finding his way to the rendezvous. "The security room is clean. It will appear as though the guard had fallen asleep." Elekteri looked the old van over. He was skeptical of it's condition and expressed his concern openly. "Are you absolutely certain this vehicle is reliable?"

"Cameras will be operational momentarily." With a press of a button on the console, the cameras activated, and their feeds flashed on screen all at once. Nary a blind spot could be found anywhere in the tunnel now. "Cameras are functioning." Nothing and no-one would get past Elekteri's well-honed optics unnoticed. At that point, it was just a matter of watching and waiting for the right moment to move.

"I am in position." Elekteri's synthesized robotic voice came through the crystal, accompanied by the faint buzz of electricity. It proved easy for the rogue android to move about the fort in the guise of a guard droid. He had made his way quickly to a security room and used his electrical generator to subdue the guard by sending a current through his brain while he was focused on the cameras, and tying him down to the chair. This was certainly not where a defective runaway bot would typically expect to end up; most would be hunted down by their creators and either reprogrammed or scrapped. But not D-313C7R1C, or as he was now known, Elekteri Volttas. As far as his would-be pursuers are aware, Elekteri was taken offline after being brought down by Aphelion. His processor, which had malfunctioned during the initial test run of his generator and caused him to go haywire, was repaired and properly insulated to prevent another incident, and he was given his alias and a few upgrades that allowed finer control over the channeling of electricity through his body. The cameras provided a good view of most of the fort, inside and out, and Elekteri could easily silence any patrolmen that may intrude. "I will watch for trouble and await your signal."