Precursor: Race for Space [Quest]

[♥ kats KAT kats ♥]

Ellie heard Tron's voice as she stared at the screen that showed Shinji, who had a predicament. He explained a way to help their comrade, but Raphael was quick on his feet and went to go look for it. Something about a disk that had Gravity on it or something. Ellie stared at the screen hoping Raphael was quicker on his feet or else Shinji may crash if he doesn't do anything or they don't get the disk in time!

B-crunk.

Ellie heard a strange noise coming from the study, where Raphael had just gone into. She hoped everything was okay. She better go and check on him! She went to the door that connected the study and the computer room. "Hey, Raphael you need help finding the disk---?" She was almost unable to ask him. She saw something heading towards the exit. Oh no you don't! She thought to herself as she quickly extended her arm towards it. Her ribbon was sent towards the bookmaster, quickly moving on him. It intended to grab a hold of the thing, for it seemed it had something in its hand! M-maybe the disk?

[Rocket!]

The Heartless didn't like that at all. It promptly began to beat at the ribbons that held it captive with it's book.

And beat.

And beat.

...good lord, will the whacking ever stop?! This thing isn't going to give up without a fight! On a good note though, it dropped one of the CDs!

The Bookmaster, as it whacked away at the ribbons, tried to pull away towards the exit. The thing was stronger than it looked, that much was obvious.

Back in the computer room, Tron noticed, with no small amount of respect, that Shinji had managed to save himself from disaster. Still, the disk would be helpful.

...hm? Well, that can't be good... bringing his attention to the team of Joshua and Fidelis, Tron grimaced. "Confirmed sighting of the Data Spheres! ...hmm... I can't read the text data. Why is that?" Puzzled, Tron began to type away at his keyboard. Determining what the text says would help more than a little!

[♥ kats KAT kats ♥]

Ellie's ribbon wouldn't be so easy to break. Especially with a pathetic book! The ribbon began to swirl around the bookmaster's body, still holding the grip it had on it. Ellie walked closer as well, but the ribbon remained tight on it. She thrust her other arm at it activating her other ribbon it moved to the disk it had dropped. It picked the disk up and brought it to Ellie. Ellie read the label, hoping it was gravity. While that happened, the other ribbon continued to wrap around the bookmaster. As it did the tip of the ribbon became sharp. "Now, hand over the other disks you stole." She demanded of the bookmaster.

[Squall Leonhart]

The other two had both gone now. Knowing he couldn't leave the terminal unguarded at this time Leon resigned himself to stay back and hoped they were both all right. There seemed to be some sort of ruckus back in the study.

Leon turned his attention to the monitors. The two on the game grid were being assaulted by a type of Heartless Leon hadn't seen before. The other two had found one of the anomalies that had to be deleted and were assisted by some sort of program protecting the computer's normal functions.

"Tron, any idea where those Heartless are even coming from?" Leon questioned. "Ordinary Heartless wouldn't have a reason to be in Space Paranoids unless they were drawn there by a Keyblade or a lot of darkness... or if were being controlled by something. Maybe you should scan the system for any place with Heartless in it besides these two. It might reveal some important locations."

[Shinn]

Raphael turned around to see the Bookmaster Heartless run off with two disks. He would have to beat himself up later for not noticing them in the first place but right now he had to make sure that it wasn't gonna get away. Raphael hoped over the desk and ran for the door.

Ellie came into the room to help out and with the help of her ribbons, managed to slow down the Heartless and even retrieve a disk. Raphael ran over behind the Heartless blocking the exit so it wouldn't escape. Raphael pulled out six cards from his deck. Now it was his turn.

He drew one card out which began to shine brightly and threw it at the Heartless. The card soon transformed into a glowing sword of light energy flying straight at the Bookmaster. Since it was too busy trying to whack away the ribbons, the sword should be able to hit it with ease.

[Rocket!]

Sw-ring.

The sword went down and through the Bookmaster, slicing it evenly in half. In that moment, it froze midswing. And vanished in a puff of black smoke. It left behind it's book. In it, you'll find two more CDs. Don't forget the Bookmaster left a CD on the bookshelf!

Ellie's eyes found ED ver2 written on the spine of the CD case. Maybe Tron knows what it means?

MEANWHILE, IN THE COMPUTER ROOM!

Tron shook his head. "If it's the MCP returning, it's definitely no surprise why these Heartless are popping up." With a roll of the eyes, he continued, "The MCP used Heartless as his own thugs often. If these Heartless aren't under the control of the MCP, they're responding to his coming back.

"Though..." Tron paused, a hesitant thought caught in his throat. "It certainly wouldn't hurt to doublecheck. Alright, turning on-- whuh oh." Looking up at the screen on his right side, Tron noticed a new breed of Heartless. Or, rather, a new variation on one. Shinji and Emma were in for trouble.

[Shinn]

Raphael had vanquished the Heartless in one swift attack, a personal best. It left behind its large book which contained two disks. He walked over to the book and looked around to see what was all inside. There he found the two disks that it had stolen from the shelf. He examined both disks to see if one of them was the "Gravity" disk he was sent to get. As for the book, Raphael decided to keep it as a memento for defeating a magic using foe even if it was only a Heartless.

Raphael then placed both disks in his pocket for safe keeping. Just in case Tron needed to use another disk. He walked over to the shelf and picked up the disk that was there examining it as well. He ran straight for the computer room once more to hand over the disk to Tron.

"I'm back! Whew, almost lost it to a Heartless but thanks to Ellie, we managed to prevent it from taking all of the disks."[/b][/color][/size]

[Rocket!]

One disk is blank, while the other reads "Gravity_ver1". Sounds right! The disk that remained on the shelf had "ED_ver1" on the side. I think it's a safe guess that it's related to the other ED disk.

Tron's voice responded right away to Raphael. "Heartless? Out there?! That can't be good... wait, what kind was it, Raphael?" Tron's thoughts were quickly reviewed the different kinds of Heartless. If it was some kind of Space Paranoids Heartless, then that'd mean the system had a leak somewhere... which would be very very bad! "Oh, and no one was hurt, right?"

[Rocket!]

Suddenly, Shinji's voice rang out through the computer room.

"If you hear me, we're going to need a bit of help!"

This was definetly directed at the three in the room.

[I can transfer over what you say here to there via a post of my own, or you can post both here and there. If it's munny you want, I'd just do the copy/paste thing and go with both.

Don't tell Pryth I said that. xD]

[Squall Leonhart]

"Looks like trouble in there. Did you find it?" Leon asked of the returning pair. He promptly acquired the disc with Gravity_ver1 on it and took it over to the terminal's CD slot. He didn't tell Tron it was coming, the program seemed well enough aware of what was going on in the outside world.

'I hope this can help them Tron,' he thought to himself as he loaded the program into the system. He kept his exterior cool and eyes on both of the displays. It looked like things were pretty tough on either side.

[Shinn]

"No, no one was hurt Tron, thank goodness. But the Heartless that we encountered was using this book."

Raphael held the book up for Tron to see. Raphael wasn't knowledgeable on the different types and different names of the Heartless, but he believed that Tron knew well enough and could make an educated guess as to what the Heartless was.

He handed over the disks to Leon so he could use them to assist the others. He heard the speaker coming from one of the groups that were in the cyber world. He turned his head over to the screens.

"Don't you worry guys, help is on the way. Leon just sent you something that should do the trick."

[Rocket!]

"Great job Raphael, Ellie!" praised Tron. "You found the Gravity disk. Looks like it's an earlier version, but that shouldn't be a problem.

"Emma, Shinji, the Game Grid should have increased Gravity now. This means the Heartless will have a much harder time trying to knock you off the bikes. However, stunts might be a little harder to pull off.

"This doesn't mean their attacks do any less damage though. Don't let 'em knock you or the bike too much, okay?"

Speaking of which, both of them just got a pretty darn hard blow to the backs. Ow.

Wincing, but definitely sure that they would be able to work through it, Tron focused back on the trio in Hollow Bastion. "Again, great work guys." Seeing the Bookmaster's remaining object, Tron whistled. "Now that's a relief. Okay, it looks like the Heartless out there aren't the same kind as in here. This is good, and bad."

Continuing, Tron's voice wavered a bit as a hint of worry entered his voice. "The good news is there isn't some kind of leak in Space Paranoids. The MCP doesn't have any kind of way out, for the time being. The bad news... well, is that the Heartless was trying to steal CDs. CDs we'll probably need, if we want everyone to come home without a scratch.

"Why would a Radiant Garden Heartless, like that Bookmaster, try and help the MCP like that? Or how, I guess, would be a better question. How did it know?"

[Aside: Doing good guys! We're coming up on the halfway point!]

[Squall Leonhart]

'Good question,' Leon agreed inwardly. "Can you two watch the terminal for a little? I'll be back as soon as I can."

Leon left the secret lab and exited back to Ansem's study where he opened a small item from his jacket pocket and started talking into it. Something about a guy named Cid being told to watch out for any compromises in the security system and to call him if any Heartless in town were getting near the computer in Merlin's house. Or something like that. Probably not important. He did mention one thing at the end of the conversation with the little item though.

"By the way, do you know if there are any spare hard drives around the lab out here?"

[High's .Valentine.]

[Been invited by the Quest Master]

Inside Merlin's house, there was the usual subtle noises of a house lived in. The hum of a running computer, tea pots bubbling, and light snoring. Suddenly, an obnoxiously loud and victorious tune rattled the peace. A man sitting in the corner, with his head tucked into his chest, arms crossed, and tea cup balanced on his thigh [lots and lots of practice], jolted awake. Of course, the tea cup fell right off his thigh, and cracked on the stone floor. Luckily, Cid Highwind had drained the cup of tea before nodding off. But now, he had another broken cup on his hand. Bad habit of taking tea cups wherever he go…

The tune continued relentlessly. It took the sleepy pilot another several seconds to remember what it was, and several more seconds to remember where it was located. It was of course, tucked in his orange stretchy belt as usual. Pulling out a black rectangular device, he flipped it open and held it to his ear.

“Whaddya want?” Cid snapped as he rubbed the back of his neck. That’s what you get for falling asleep on a chair…creaky bones and sore muscles. The voice on the other end of the contraption was familiar, which wasn’t surprising since only the original members of the Committee had the communicator.

The man nodded, remembering that Leon couldn’t see him, and grunted in reassurance. Standing up, he nudged aside the broken glass. Back to work. Clean up later.

Back at his comfortable workspace, phone still next to his ear, Cid checked the system, all the while trying to remember if they did indeed have one of those hard drives sitting around. Luckily for Leon, Cid always tried to keep doubles of any sort of electronics. Machines were moody items and one could never quite trust them.

“System looks alright fer now, but I’ll keep an eye on it,” clicking the keyboard, Cid answered casually. “Yeah, I have a spare hard drive here. What do ye need it fer?”

[/blockquote]

[Rocket!]

[I'm just confirming that that is a hard drive Cid has. The one that'll have the four in the computer kissing the ground you walk on, if you get it.

Welcome aboard High!]