(( Written with Salt. ))
Dr. Chelsea watched the tank roar to life as he had watched so many other vehicles do over the last several years. The Hell's Raiders, God's Army, and numerous small savvy survivor groups had come and gone before these. Never before though had a group gone dragging Dr. Chelsea's apprehension like this before. Medeina hadn't meant to be malicious back then, but even now it was hard to see it that way. Hard to see her as anything but a soulless butcher when he'd watched or been forced to watch as she set the creatures kept within her labs onto his colleagues and co-workers for the sake of research. It was an event in his life he couldn't reconcile, and watching the man in armor and the young lady with him go with the machine who he felt had arbitrated the collapse of the Tabula Rasa Project gave him the same sense of needless loss that the previous gangs of salvagers and thugs had not.
Charles Chelsea watched until the sound of the tank faded into the background hum of New Eden's pleasant drone and sighed. Then, he turned away back to the small apartment where he sequestered himself away from the worlds new more dangerous wildlife.
"So!" Minx chimed enthusiastically scooping up the papers Hector had placed casually on one of the siege towers seats on the way to his accustomed place in the driver's seat, "Where to first?" Medeina scrabbled fitfully at one of the other seats before Minx set aside the sheaf of documents and hoisted the small robot up next to her.
"I recommend as Dr. Chelsea suggested. My lab, the central hub. It is likely that it will be the safest and most productive of the five. We will of course need to take a stop at the tenjin lab, which will be safer but not nearly as well stocked." Medeina said.
Hector had given thought to Dr. Chelsea's hesitation, internalizing it and thinking it over as they drove on, deciding to humor Medeina's suggestion that they stop by her original lab station first. "We might as well go there first then, get through the hard part first." he added.
As they went along however, he took time to give his equipment a once-over, as best as he could while driving. Sword and shield, obviously. M4 was hung by its strap nearby, he recalled it had a fresh magazine in but wasn't chambered, with two spares among his gear. And then there were his bionics, checking briefly that he was still at full power and that his EMP bionic reported normal. Still only got that one power cell...
At least it was still working, that much was a relief to him. Given the circumstance, as much as he tried to focus on the task at hand and use that equipment check as a means to keep himself busy, there was that faint worry that he might need that EMP projector again, sooner or later.
The Paved road of the small town had given way to a more roughly paved backroad, and before long even that gave way to an even rougher dirt road that Hector had to slow down on. The Siege Tower had a good suspension, but even Catnip's improved shocks couldn't keep the tank from jostling around and threatening to bite a tongue or jam ones tailbone up into ones skull. Hector glanced again back at the woman and the robot, those two hardly noticing the hard ride the road was providing, and looked back just in time to see something dart out of the swamp on the right in front of the tank.
Even ten years on, the impulse to slam on the brakes was still strong and Hector did so with the preternatural speed of a man who often had to make snap judgements while driving. Still, something disappeared beneath the treads of the tank. Hector hoped that the two in the back wouldn't notice. In fact, he knew for a fact they wouldn't notice just another bump among all the others, but immediately the reality of his "fact" was shattered.
"What was that?" Minx asked, startled. Hector sighed, of course they'd noticed.
"Rolled over some kind of animal with the tank." He explained.
"What? Stop the tank!" Minx ordered, more than a little alarmed. Hector craned his neck around and saw what Quinn had seen before leaving, the womans depth of concern for life in general. Only a few seconds had gone by, but they hadn't got much further than the point of impact.
Minx was the first one out of the tank, bounding to see exactly what Hector had smashed. "Looks like you mashed some poor fella's dog, Sarge." Minx intoned, blandly bemused. Hector crawled out behind her and saw why. Whatever he'd hit, it wasn't a dog. It looked like a slug, but covered in mud colored chitin and bearing a pair of long bladed claws on either side of a long broad beak with a series of what he guessed to be eyes going up it near the center. The tank had rolled over it's middle, neatly crushing it in half.
Hector was out of the tank almost immediately after her, looking around warily just in case the noise and their sudden halt were to attract attraction, not even having the presence of mind to make a remark about being called sarge. "Well, if that's what passes for a dog in this area, I'd hate to see what its owner looks like." he offered in response.
Movement caught their attention and Hector had stepped forward, instinctively putting Minx and Medeina between himself and the tank. The thing emerging from the brush from the side of the road was far less imposing than the motorcycle sized monstrosity laying crushed in the road. In fact, to Minx, it was a very welcome sight.
"It's a coyote!" She whispered sharply, "But it's so small!"
It was small. Almost as small as a large house cat, but at the same time, it appeared to be proportional normal giving it the appearance of a full sized example of it's kind. The thing that he'd seen run in front of the tank had now made it's appearance, he recognized it now that it had come back to see what had become of the monster pursuing it, and only Hectors unintended intervention had saved it. It warily sniffed at the monster, then darted back into the brush to escape the attention of the newcomers.
"Wow, was it a pup?" Minx asked, a little out of breath. Again, Hector was amused at the girls reverence for something so common.
"No." Medeina said. "They are not often seen, but there is a growing breed of coyote adapted to be smaller than their normal cousins." Minx flinched at the last word, but said nothing while Medeina began to delve into the specifics.
Hector for his part remained alert and wary, mainly wanting to ensure they weren't caught off guard by anything while they were stopped out in the open, giving a little gesture towards the tank. "We should get moving. There are likely scavengers that will be attracted to what we hit, and no telling what they might be like." he said.
Minx looked around remembering just where she was. "Oh, yeah, you're right. I'm sure miss robot here would be all too happy to see whatever that was, but it's probably better to skee-daddle. This ain't normal New England after all. Come on Medi, lets follow the nice knight." Medeina trundled back into the tank with no complaint while Minx gave the tiny canid a little wave. "Driver, carry on!"
With the hatch shut behind them, the treads soon rumbled to life once more, to leave the peculiar encounter behind them and continue on their way, towards the aging facilities that loomed ahead in the distance...