Black Market Merchant

Chapter 130: Making a Path
”What were you thinking?” Gillian yelled pacing vigorously in front of the three young girls sitting in a row on the ground outside of the powered off Mech. ”You all could have done some real damage to the machine or worse, hurt yourselves or others! Why on God’s green earth did I think it was ok to leave three juvenile girls alone in a Mech cockpit!?”

The rest of the ERM troop had surrounded them and were listening in carefully. The suddenness of the Mechs movements alarmed them and made them curious too. Several of them had tried piloting the Mech before and knew that even taking a steady step was not easy, but a mere 14-year-old girl had done it by chance.

”We are so sorry, Mr. Gillian! It was mostly an accident.” Clair pleaded. ”We got carried away, but nothing bad really happened.”

”It’s partially my fault too. I dared Hanna to do it.” Rachel replied as well.

”That may be, but it was still dangerous. I am sure that Lisa will reprimand you all somehow for this.” Gillian said stopping his pacing to look at Lisa.

”Oh, I’ll think of something.” Lisa replied giving a thoughtful nod. ”What I really want to know is, Hanna, how did you figure out how to turn it on. Not only that, but how did you gain control of the Mechs movements?”

All eyes turned to look at Hanna. Hanna instantly felt her face get hot and she looked down at the sandy tan ground beneath her. She bit her lip while trying to think of a reply. Once again, she was conflicted as to what to say.

”Should I tell them of my visions or make something up? No, there is no way I can lie now. They all saw me.” Hanna thought.

”Hanna? You are going to have to say something.” Lisa continued prodding.

”I-I figured out how to control the Mech somehow.” Hanna stuttered still looking at the ground trying to find the words. ”I don’t really understand at all, but when I touch the Mechs controls I could suddenly see how the Mech worked and its functions. I didn’t want to say anything because it sounds so strange.”

”So, was that why you were acting weird?” Clair remarked.

Hanna nodded. ”That’s also why my hands were all shaky. When all that knowledge hit me, it was so fast and too much to try and understand. Almost like pouring water out of a bucket and into my mouth while trying to catch it all. There was so much all at once.”

”What is this nonsense you are talking about? Seeing knowledge and understanding how to move a complex machine just by touching it? Ridiculous!” Gillian scoffed. ”Come on tell us the truth. You were messing around and pressed some buttons and accidentally turned it on. Or you already knew somehow.”

”No, Mr. Gillian, I’m not lying! That’s what happened to me honestly!” Hanna replied looking up at him while trying to sound brave but looking at the big man getting angry was intimidating. “I-I thought that since I touched the controls and learned about the Mech that that’s how pilots learned. Like you.”

”No, we all learned through manuals and training. Just like any other person. No one learns just by touching something alone.” Gillian retorted.

”Is there any way you can prove this?” Lisa asked. ”I have to agree with Gillian. No one learns through simply touching something. However, I’ve seen stranger things.”

Hanna felt her heart sink. She had already tried getting Rachel and Clair to do the same things as her. However, they didn’t experience the same phenomenon as she herself did. There really wasn’t any way for her to prove it. Also, her mind was turning blank and even if she wanted to try lying, she couldn’t. Then an odd set of words popped into her mind and her instincts told her that they were the right things to say.

”Can you explain to me why an Electro-transfusion Reactor Core and a Hyperlink Converter connect together to be able to produce the energy to power a simple Mech frame without overloading the system?” Hanna asked with a straight face. ”I don’t understand the whole concept, even though I know where those parts are in that Mech and how they move in a right interchange to better conserve energy.”

Everyone was silent. Clair and Rachel sat still with their mouths open starring at Hanna. They had never heard such words come out of her mouth before. Much less in real life. Lisa didn’t know what those parts were, other than in a past debriefing after her awakening from cryogenic sleep; that they were essential to a Mech and robots power systems. It struck her as extremely odd the Hanna would know those words.

Gillian crossed his arms and looked down at the little girl. ”You could have read that before. It’s written in my manual that describes the Mech. Tell me where those parts are at.”

”Under the cockpit on the left chest portion, designated to be just like a human’s heart, is where the Electro-transfusion Reactor Core is. Along with the Hyperlink Converter both are located under the casing that separates them from the gears that control the chest landscape rotation and the leg’s 360 Degree Motion Motors.” Hanna replied sincerely right away.

”Interesting…” Gillian mumbled as his angry expression faded. ”The hydraulic line that I worked on, is it fixed?”

”Yes, the oil pressure has stabilized back to the desired 28 to 32 psi range.” Hanna replied nodding. However, Gillian didn’t give a reply, and Hanna started to feel even more nervous. ”W-was that right?”

”Come with me. I want to see this with my own eyes.” Gillian said motioning for her to get up and follow him. ”You too Lisa. I want to know for sure what’s going on.”

”Alright. I do find this incident to be remarkably interesting.” Lisa replied looking at Hanna sharply. ”Girls, go join the others and wait in the tree’s shade.”

”O-ok.” Clair stuttered. She was still unable to believe what she had witnessed Hanna saying. Never in her life had Hanna ever talked about such things, nor did she herself ever read about those Mech parts. Hanna was a smart girl, but not that kind of nerdy smart.

Most of all, the look in Hanna’s dull green eyes had changed once again. No longer were they filled with the sadness of her parent’s death or inklings of revenge. Nor did they return to the timid, happy, and playful eyes from before their murders. Now they had hints of desire, knowledge, and adventure wandering in her lively eyes. Her friend was now changing again into someone she didn’t recognize.

For the time being Clair would have to be patient and speak with Hanna later to know more. There was no way her best friend was hiding such a big secret from her. So, she just had to wait find out! In no time Clair and Rachel quickly joined Jillian and the others in the shade to wait and they tried their best to explain what happened to Hanna.

Gillian marched towards the Mech with Hanna following closely behind. The Mech had come to a stop out in the open area between the dam and wooded area. It was still facing the dam, as were the other two black and yellow striped Mechs. Lisa was watching Hanna carefully from behind as she followed.

Lisa carefully thought to herself along the way. ”First she asked me where Tharsis was. Then the normally reserved girl asked to climb into a Mech she has never seen before. Only to somehow manage to get it turned on by herself, moves it, and claims to understand the entire Mech by touch alone? There has to be something go on.”

Then Lisa’s thoughts wandered back to the murder of Hanna’s parents and the strange valuable locket with her parents’ picture inside. ”Very strange. Now it seems like that maybe her parents were not randomly killed by gangsters for money from the AFR. If what Hanna says is true, maybe her parents were connected to something much deeper. Eh, perhaps not. I do like to create conspiracy theories for no reason. The AFR were apparently after the Dams plans and Mr. Marshal just happened to know of them. I’ll just keep this to myself for the time being. Hanna has enough to think about for now.”

Though it was just her own fantasy’s running wild, Lisa could not help but wonder if her conspiracy might be true. Stranger things had also happened in her own time that she couldn’t explain during battles, like a sudden inspiration about how to take on an impossible task or an idiot creating a smart plan that tacticians overlooked. So perhaps this was one of those cases manifesting in Hanna.

”We are going to see how well you can perform driving the Mech.” Gillian announced as he started climbing the Mechs ladder. ”If you truly know how this Mech works, then showing me how will convince me.”

”I-I can try.” Hanna replied turning around at the foot of the ladder to glance at Lisa.

”Go right ahead. I’ll be with you.” Lisa replied giving a calming smile.

Hanna nodded sheepishly and then followed Gillian up the ladder. There wasn’t any room for Lisa to fit inside the cockpit with the other two. So, she ended up hanging on tightly to the rungs outside of the doorway. However, she could see mostly everything that was going on inside.

”Go ahead, turn on the Mech.” Gillian said to Hanna now sitting in the chair.

”Ok.” Hanna replied reaching out to start pressing the middle buttons in the correct startup sequence and immediately got the heat exhaust fans running.

If Gillian was surprised, he didn’t show it. ”Alright, now take hold of the controls and rotate the Mech so we are facing the woods.”

Hanna nodded, but before grabbing the control leavers she hesitated as worry crept in. ”What if the flow of knowledge doesn’t come or something else happens?” However, she shook her head as if clearing her mind and grabbed the Mechs leg control leavers.

The strange flow of knowledge appeared and her connection with the Mech returned!

Hanna finally knew that she wasn’t imagining it for sure. The feeling of wanting to move increased so much that her nervousness disappeared, and that same hungry smile appeared on her face. Carefully Hanna pushed forward on the right leaver, while pulling back slightly on the left leaver. This caused the left leg to stay rooted in place while the right moved forward. In the seconds that followed the Mech started to pivot and rotate slowly to face the woods.

”Now, see the area we came through before?” Gillian asked pointing through the open cockpit door. ”Go into that path and pick up a fallen tree in the loader bucket and move it out of the path.”

”Understood.” Hanna replied. Her nervous voice was gone, and an eager sounding voice seemed to be taking over.

Lisa was already impressed by little Hanna. After being with Hanna for well over a month or two, seeing this sudden and exciting change was amazing. Hanna no longer looked like the lonely, sad kid from before. If things kept going on like this Hanna’s future might end up a bright one.

Hanna felt amazing! With every motion of the Mech it felt as if they were projected as her own. The power of the Mech coursed within her and she knew that the Mech was enjoying the sensation of doing what it was created to do: Work. Arriving at the shoddy, broken tree littered pathway, Hanna stopped and leaned the Mech forward.

Being short and sitting down in the seat, little Hanna couldn’t see the ground where the trees might be. So, leaning the Mech forward to peer through the doorway was the only way to do so. Finding a good-sized evergreen tree, Hanna stood the Mech back upright and grabbed the third leaver.

Then, as if she had done so a thousand times before, Hanna guided the loader bucket under the evergreen tree’s trunk, closer to the root ball for balance. Then scooping up the tree and little of the ground underneath, Hanna cradled the tree in the bucket. Puffs of tan dirt and dust cascaded off the root ball and back onto the ground as Hanna rotated the Mech, the same way as before, to face the woods. Then lowering the loader bucket, the tree slowly tumbled out of it and thudded heavily onto the sandy ground.

”There I did it. Now what?” Hanna asked looking up at Gillian.

Gillian let out a sigh and broke out into a big grin. ”What’s next? Well Lisa, I know her punishment now. She is going to work for me as a Mech Pilot and help build the pathway!”

Lisa was taken aback by his revelation. ”What? No, Hanna is not going to do that.”

Hanna looked at Lisa with her dull green eyes filled with anticipation. ”Please? I feel like I was born to sit in this seat!”

Lisa finally let out a sigh seeing her enthusiasm and nodded. ”Fine. I’ll work things out with the Weathers.” Then thinking about her silly conspiracy Lisa thought to herself. ”Perhaps you were born for this?”