The Business of War

Orchestrated By C.M. Rich (Magnetman)

All rails lead to Beijing...

By The Cosmic Gladiators

Scenario J
Participants:
Wily Rescue Force (W)
Bass (W)
Cosmic Gladiators (C)

Location: Beijing, China
SA Troops: 1300
RPD Troops: 1482
Wily Troops: 683


...at least for the Cosmic Gladiators. They had been trainhopping across Asia from Moscow aboard expess freight trains for the past week and a half. Now they finally reached the end of the line, Beijing West Station.

Thanks to the automation of rail lines in recent years, nobody else was aboard the trains to find them, and with the railway police more concerned about protecting supply lines from the Scissor Army the cars were hardly ever checked. Not that there hadn't been close calls, but it was stealthy and fast.

Now they watched the city pass by as they entered it. Many buildings were in ruins, and the streets were eeirily quiet. Another great city was falling to the SA, a sad truth in the pask weeks.

The CG were there to try and save any survivoirs, as well as salvage parts. The train was shipping food and other human living supplies, so nothing useful to Cossack's forces was aboard.

Upon reaching the station, something was definitely wrong...

“Guys, something's up.” Pluto cautioned, “It's been five minutes and the unloading robots haven't appeared, neither have the security forces. I'll take a scan of the area...”

A beeping noise was heard, followed by Pluto's response

“Uh, oh. The power has been cut. Looks like someone wanted to bring this city to a standstill...”

A tense pause occured, followed by an exclamation from him. "And that somebody's the Scissor Army! They're on to us!"

Indeed, from out of the shadows came the General's Sniper Joes. Thirty easily, all firing their weapons to the Gladiators. It seemed their plan was to wait for visitors and to tear them apart, no matter who they were.

"We have to get out of here!" yelled Mercury, while turning into his liquid state to avoid damage.

"No," shouted Mars, blowing apart some Joes with his Photon missiles, "I wanna tear these jokers apart!"

Neptune dove for cover behind a streetlight. "You fight! And then you can pay for your replacement parts! We're on a budget, remember?" Mars cursed. He'd like to forget.

"Fine. We leave." Mars awknowledged grudgingly as he fired a few parting shots at the oncoming Joes.

The CG ran to a nearby staircase, Uranus pulling a piece of rubble to barricade the way in before following the rest down.

In the dark hallway, they walked for ten minutes before reaching an area where the roof had caved in.

A beeping noise from Pluto's scanner cut through the darkness. “We're trapped,” he said gloomly “the corridor is collapsed for about 600 feet.”

Suddenly, a crashing noise came from the pother end of the tunnel. The Joes were already breaking through the barricade. Their only hope was to find a door and fast.

“Night vision on!” Pluto whispered while looking around, “I found one! Go, go!”

Opening the door, the team ran into the platform for the recently built high-speed subway. The station was dripping with rainwater and other fluids.

“Where are we now?”, Mercury queeried.

“The Beijing MAGLEV system,” Pluto replied, “but without power, there's no trains, so pick a direction guys!”

"Pluto, I'm the leader!" shouted Jupiter. Jupiter had been away for quite some time and Pluto had gotten used to being the leader, so one really couldn't blame Pluto for his zeal.

Pluto, more than a little irritated at his comment, sneered, "If you're the leader, then why are you so frickin'-"

Pluto was cut off mid-sentence by Uranus, who was desperately trying to hold off the now-advancing swarm of Sniper Joes using his Gravity Twist.

His cry of, "Hello? Snipers? Going to shoot us?" was enough to prompt both Jupiter and Pluto into pointing toward the left and declaring, "That way!" Without another thought, the other-worldly team started to head down the tunnel.

Except for Mars, who quickly fired off a few rounds toward the Joes before shouting “To hell with this, follow me!"

Mars leap down the right-hand tunnel, signalling for teh others to follow. "Hurry up before those things catch us!"

"Renard, do you have ANY idea where this leads?!" Neptune asked as he started down the path as well.

"Aside from it leads away from those damn joes, Nope." Mars replied, launching a photon missile down the tunnel to light the way. "MOVE IT!"

Jupiter wasted no time in flying down teh tunnel, both litterally and figuratively. "I'M ALL FOR LISTENING TO THE GUY WITH ALL THE GUNS."

Venus simply shrugged before following Neptune and Uranus, the two tallest CG members.

"I'm getting that feeling of impending doom again." Pluto commented.

Mercury chuckled. "You say that everytime Mars, Jupiter, or I have an idea. Lighten up, dude.", he said while darting after Mars shortly before Pluto sighed and followed suit.

As the Cosmic Gladiators rushed down the tunnel with the Snipers hot on their tail, a shaking motion started.

Pluto was quick to point out his prediction, “I told you-”

He was cut off in mid-sentence as the ceiling suddenly collapsed between them and the Joes, sealing the attackers off from their target.

“...never mind,” he corrected himself, “Let's get out of here!”

The CG emerged from the tunnel in a large cavern, obviously a central terminal. The station was covered with dust and rubble, indicating damage to the structure. Whatever had caused the destruction was insanely powerful, most likely with great fire-power judging by the scorch marks.

“Where are we?”, Neptune asked.

“I dunno.” said Jupiter, brushing off a dust-covered sign. “Anyone read Chinese?

“Translator on.” Pluto said to nobody. A beeping noise from his direction signified his programming was at work. “Capitol International-” Pluto paused, “I can't read the last symbol. It's scratched up...”

“Well, maybe we're at an embassy?” Jupiter guessed.

“Nah. Too big.” said Mars. “Wherever we are, it was designed for a lot of traffic.”

“Well, I think we should keep going.” Pluto suggested nervously, “Any place this big is probably being patroled like the station.”

“But if we stay then we aren't wasting time,” Jupiter responded. “You guys know the Joes are probably on our tails as we speak. They're connected wirelessly and I'm guessing they know where the tunnel goes, so they could cut us off at any time.”

“So now what?” Mars asked.

The silence as Jupiter thought deeply was short-lived.

"GET THE HELL OUT OF MY WAY!"

The Gladiators turned around just in time for Expressman to rush past, a horde of Joes about 20ft behind him.

"Oh, HELL NO." Uranus shouted as he rips a huge ass chunk of rock out of the ground and hurled it at the Joes, crushing a large number of them. The CG then made like ninjas and vanished, Mars tossing an enlarged Photon Missile at the joes before running.

"SEE! SEE! I TOLD YOU!" Pluto shouted.

"SHUT UP AND KEEP RUNNING!" Neptune said. "I DON'T WANNA BE SOME DEMENTED GENERAL'S SEAFOOD DINNER!"

As the CG ran down the tunnel, the lights suddenly flickered on.

Pluto yelled in surprise. “What the hey?! How-”

Before he could finish, Expressman came charging back through the tunnel, even zipping past the Joes.

“Out of the WAY!” he shouted in fear. A humming sound could be heard echoing omniously through the tunnel.

“OSNAP! WALL! NOW!” Pluto snapped quickly.

The CG jumped against the wall on the service platform, narrowly avoiding a Maglev car rushing past them at over 300 MPH.

The brief pause following was broken by Jupiter. “Holy-”

“Those trains are fast.” Pluto interrupted. “Stay against the wall.”

“Hey! I'm the leader here!” Jupiter said angrily.

“I know!” Pluto shouted back, “I'm not undermining your authority, but we could be killed in here!”

Jupiter opened his mouth to speak when the sound of footsteps were heard dangerously cloes...

“Shoot! The Joes survived!” Mars yelled, “RUN!”

"Unit Barrageman stop you!", exclaimed a voice.

Before Mars could pipe up, several Ion Blasts impacted the ground in front of the Gladiators while several more took out the Joes behind them before the Wily Rescue Force and Bass appeared seemingly out of thin air.

"Well now, this is quaint. The Stardroids are back." Bass quipped, seeming smug even for himself. This earned him getting Jupiter's Arm cannon, sparking with electricity, leveled with his head. If Bass were human, he'd have been sweating bullets right about then.

"Why am I only mildly surprised by you morons showing up?" Jupiter commented, Bass' eyes popping open with surprise.

"S-Stardust?! I thought you were dead! I mean, the Fatal Five said that it wasn't you who with the Seven Mercinaries when they got beat down, it was some hacker guy they hired!" Bass said, sounding very shaken. Mars burst out laughing.

A number of the CG looked at their leader and resident master of all things electric. "You were in the Seven Mercs?!"

"Of course he was. How else would Magnus have taken over for him if he wasn't?" Mars said, his laughter spotting dead in its tracks. Hiss fists tightened, and Neptune suspected Mars had a grudge against Magnus, yet said nothing.

"Unit Barrageman suggests we kill them." Came a monotone comment from the oversized walking artilery bank, changing the subject faster then the crack of a whip.

"Too much hassel. I say we feed 'em to the Scissor Army before we blow this joint." Multiman replied flatly. A very loud click caused the rescue force to turn and be stareing down the Barrel of Sunstar's Rifle as well as Dark Moon standing behind him.

Sunstar grinned evily. "I have a better idea, how about WE use you colossal failures are meat shields as we barrel through town?"

"About time. Where were you?" Mars asked, readying a large photon missle.

"Eh, the Cops set up a road block and then got the Scissor Army breaking through their ranks. They didn't seem to mind when I took a few pot shots at the SA before I heard that tunnel collapse." Shift replied, his rifle humming as it began charging for one of Sunstar's trademark laser shots. "I even scored a few 2 liters of Dr. Pepper from a Seven Eleven."

"Is it safe for me to assume that the five guys standing over their are pretty much hosed now that Shift and Dark Moon are here?" Uranus asked to nobody in particular.

Dark Moon's lone eye shifted towards the bullish stardroid. "I would have to say that's a big ten-four there, bud."

The predominamtly green Mercury sighed "I thought you all were worried about our repair budget in front of a few dozen joes" he chuckled. "We're facing the Anti-Megaman, a speed demon, someone who can outnumber us in a few seconds, and a flying tank." he cricked his neck, glancing from the CG members and the Wily Reascue Force.

"You all forgetting who the reall enemy is? I thought the impending doom of all humanity, including YOUR creator." he addressed the Rescue Force. “And if we're gonna run, why stop and battle another side and risk damage?" he turned to his teamates.

"Same for you guys. None of us needs to take the risk of beating each-other to scrap and sustaining all of that damage."

(Although... I myself can just repair easily...) he privately thought to himself, looking at both sides carefully.

"Not to mention a big battle will lead the SA right to us." He finished off his little speech.

Attempting to fourther defuse the situation, Pluto continued. “So how about it guys? Just let us pass and you'll never hear from us again. Wily's got no threat from us, so you've got no reason to fight us.”

“Urngh...” Bass grunted.

Bass' urge to fight had been strong since MegaMan's death, but this was not a good time. And then a thought came to him.

“I've got an even better idea.” He said with an evil grin, “You help us with our objective and don't ask questions, we won't hurt you and you get a free ride out of here.”

“What's the objective?” Jupiter quizzed.

“We need a shipping container aboard a ship docked in this city's port. In return you get the ship and the rest of it's cargo.” Bass said temptingly.

“Lemme think about this... “ Jupiter said, before ironically turning to his teammates. “Guys?”

Jupiter was greeted with an awkward silence from his teammates due to the fact that none of them felt like working with followers of Dr. Wily, nor was it generally considered wise to steal a cargo ship.

After a few moments, Jupiter sighed and said to his teammates, "Ah, who needs you? We're doing it. And I don't care what you say."

This was treated with mild enthusiasm after some of the CG realized that there was loot to be had.

Jupiter turned to Bass. "So tell me, tall, dark and orange. Where exactly is this ship and what's onboard?"

"Okay, now I'M getting that feeling of impending doom Pluto's always talking about." Mars commented. "And normally I'm the one proposing the violent solutions that end up saving our asses."

"You idiot friend's ramblings aside, the Cargo ship is in a dock due west from here." Doc Robot began. "There should be a rather large container marked with Master's logo near the front of it. Unfortunately, the Scissor Army is currently engaging the RPD between where we are and where the docks are at the moment."

Sunstar put his rifle on his pack and crossed his arms. "And this should mean anything, how exactly? Your bud over there can duplicate himself faster then an Olymic runner can do the 100 yard dash. Why not just get him to make a whole lot of copies and rush the lines with o' guns-fer-brains there backing him up?"

"You're forgeting Barrageman's got a slow Rate of Fire." Venus noted. "Even Zig shoots faster then he does."

Bass grunted. "Are you forgetting that the strongest robot in the world is standing RIGHT HERE?"

"And are YOU forgetting exactly how damn powerful the Special Forces of the RPD are?" Expressman said sharply. "They're retooled Gamma Armors for cripe's sake!"

"Not to mention that there might be Scissor Army Officers hanging around. Unlikely, but it's possible. For all we know, they could have Chargeman waiting in the background should the RPD get the upperhand." Mars warned. "Now, I have a plan."

"Do I have to be bait again?" Neptune asked, but Mars shook his head.

"No, I just need a Multiman Clone, some wires, and a big ol' rock." Mars replied, getting a confused look from the Rescue Force.

Jupiter grinned "Gonna MacGyver up a Bomb?"

"You know it." he replied smugly.

“But where do we find any of that down here?” Pluto said with realism, “It's not like they'd leave rocks in a tunnel where people go through in speeding bullets, and getting a wire from the tracks is a very bad idea. And we can't risk going to the surface or in either direction.”

“There is a water management corridor through this wall.” Barrageman said, pointing at the side of the tunnel.

A beeping sound from Pluto confirmed this. “Hmm, he's right. But you guys won't like this...”, he said with a face that suggested disgust.

Sunstar replied, “Lemme guess. When-”

“...he said water management, he meant sewer?” Pluto interrupted, “Yup.”

“Ugh. This day just got that much worse...”, Terra grumbled.

“So, how do we get through?”, asked Jupiter. “That's 2 feet of solid concrete.”

A noise of a gun loading clicked from Mars' direction.

“Oh, right.”, Jupiter responded. “Just keep it quiet, we don't want the SA finding us.”

“How do I keep an EXPLOSION quiet?!”, Mars yelled. Unfortunately, his loud voice echoed down the corridor. “Oops.”

Footsteps were immediately heard from down the tunnel, signalling an approaching squadron.

“F-”, Bass tried to shout obscenely, but was drowned out by Mars shooting an opening in the wall.

“Get going!”, Jupiter ordered.

As they jumped through the hole, Pluto was hit by a sniper shot in the back.

“OW! Sonofa-” Pluto said, assessing the damage with his sensors. “My cooler is damaged! I... I can't use my secondary and special attacks!”

The two teams run down the tunnel, Mars setting off another explosive to cave in the entrance to prevent being followed.

"Now you see why I wanted to bring along a missile from the Aries?!" Mars gripped as he dashed up to Jupiter on his skates. "I could have blown a large part of the SA forces in the area appart with one!"

"Quit your gripping and keep running!" Multiman shouted. "They could have a demolition crew with them for all we know!"

After about 20 minutes of running, the group found a entrance to the surface, which Barrageman had already blown a hole in when he told the others. Jupiter poked his head out and saw the two large forces, plus Wily's, duking it out three blocks away.

"What now?" Terra asked after Jupiter informed those below. "It's not like we can ask them to step aside while we head to the docks. And Mars blowing them up will only get them attacking us."

"Pfft, who cares?" Mars replied, spinning the revolvers on his arms. "I wanna kill something."

“I could get us to the port down here if I could just get my hands on a city map file.”, Pluto said to stop Mars. “Probably something like in a GPS module on one of the native Tablet Computers...” Looking around, he mumbled to himself about the locations he spotted... “...clothing store... overpriced... McDonalds... hate their food... offices... offices... wait? A mall! If we can sneak in there I can get a GPS from an electronics store...”

“Well, we can't do it over the surface,” Mercury reminded. “They're not going to ignore us just cause they're fighting.”

“If we can get beneath the building, Mars and Barrageman can blow a hole to the surface, hopefully a basement so it's guaranteed nobody notices. Now we could got that way to get under it...”, Pluto said, shuddering and pointing to a tunnel filled with rats, roaches and piles of you-know-what. “...or try to find a way around...”

Sunstar gagged and said, “I vote for going around.”

“Hey, it's my desicion.” Jupiter said cockily, trying to get back his leadership position.

“As long as you speak first, oh-great-leader.” Pluto said sarcastically. “We need to do this before those Joes break through that barricade...”

"Oh please." Mars commented. "I have a better idea."

Jupiter looked at the CG's resident lord of all things explosive. "Does it involve you making a bomb?"

"Surprisingly no. We just need to bust through some of these office buildings to get around the fighting."

Uranus sighed. "Lemme guess, I have to do the grunt work?"

"No, that's what he's for." Sunstar said, motioning to Dark Moon. "Get to work."

The demon sighed before crashing through some buildings, the noise drowned out quickly by all the fighting.

"That was surprisingly effective." Multiman commented as he looked through the very semetrical hole left by dark moon before the large group followed the black behmoth, who had stomped a few SA Joes into the ground as he ran through the building.

“How the heck did they not notice that?” Pluto gasped, eyes wide open in shock.

“They're probably ignoring us because the fight is the main problem.” Bass observed. “If we don't get too close then we probably CAN go right by them...”

“Then why did we just put a hole through those buildings?” Pluto wondered in retrospect.

As if in response, one of the office towers leaned on it's foundation from a missing support beam, knocking several others into eachother like highly destructive dominoes. Both forces gradually stopped fighting to look for the disturbance. The CG bolted into a builiding to prevent being spotted.

“Well, THAT was a hairbrained plan.” Pluto said angrily. “And I hope to whatever deities exist that we didn't kill anyone...”

“SA units and RPD units are now on high alert,” stated Barrageman “aversion tactic is no longer feasible.”

“Damn.” Mars said under his breath. “So where are we?”

“We're in a car park.”, Pluto replied immediately while looking around. “Maybe we can use a couple trucks or something as a distraction. I could control them remotely and send them into the crowd while we sneak past them. Also, one of the cars might have a GPS-”

“Are you still going on about a FRIGGIN map?” Jupiter snipped in annoyance.

“We don't know this city!” Pluto snapped back. “There could be escape routes and other highly useful things right under our nose, but we can't get that info without getting an internet connection or taking it from a machine that already has it!“

“Can the arguement, I found a stupid GPS already.” said Sunstar, holding up an electronic device.

“Don't mind if I do.” Pluto said, grabbing the device and plugging his tail into it. “Frick! We can't get a sattelite signal! Must be out of range.”

“Forget range!” Bass angrily shouted. “That thing is worthless! The Seven Mercenaries took out all the sattelites a month ago!”

“You're kidding me.”, Pluto hissed between his clenched teeth, chucking the device at a wall. “When we get off this planet, the Marauder is gonna be BLOWN OUT OF THE FREAKING SKY.” Pluto stopped himself, clearing his troat to say “So now what?”

“The truck diversion.” Jupiter said blankly.

“Forget it.” Pluto said, regretting having brought it up. “The ceiling is too to get a truck in here, there won't be any.”

“How about several dozen cars?” though Terra.

“Well of course, but that-”, Pluto paused. “You've got an idea, don't you?”

“35 or so cars are just as good a distraction as two big trucks.” Terra confirmed.

“My processor can't handle that many vechles, though.”, Pluto pointed out. “Driving is hard!”

“Can you honk the horns all at once?”, Terra asked.

“Okay, that'll work.”, Pluto replied.

“Good. Let's put the plan into action!” Terra said proudly.

The vehicles drive two by two out of the garage, stopping a distance from the battle. Then, they all started honking their horns, attracting the attention of the SA Joes. Programmed to kill anything that was human, several started firing at the vehicles. However, the majority continued battling the RPD. The CG stood looking on at the fight from the parking garage.

“Oh, well.”, Terra said glumbly.

“Well, THAT worked spectacularly well.” Pluto said with sarcasm. “I'm fresh out of ideas. Mars? Jupiter?”

"Only this." Mars said as he formed a photon missile about 4x larger then normal. "I'm gonna launch this sucker at 'em."

Pluto sighed. "I had to ask...."

"SYONARA!" Mars shouted as he threw the missile out of the garage, which crashed into the center of the SA forces before it detonated, blowing a small chunk out of the forces and confusing them long enough for one of the RPD's Special Forces to rip through their front lines and start laying waste to them while the other three in its group caught up.

"Well, that worked surprisingly well." Jupiter commented, then Mars quickly shot a glare at Pluto.

"And if anyone takes a shot at the Seven Mercs, it's gonna be ME putting a missile into Hyper Storm's face." He said in a near-threatening tone. This caught all three off guard, as Mars was usually more for just blowing random things up in an attempt to hit the enemy. Neptune, having suspected something earlier, merely narrowed his eyes at Mars' comment.

Jupiter didn't say a word, but you could tell by his expression he wanted to. He'd never guessed Mars knew Magnus that well.

“You KNOW Magnus?”, Pluto said, braking the silence. “Whatever, just give him a good beating for me, will ya?”

“Can do.”, Mars replied with fire in his eyes.

“Well... your plan worked excellently. The RPD are setting up an explosive to make sure they've destroyed the enemy troops before leaving...”

Right on time, an explosion ripped through the former brawling area. The RPD forces abandoned the smoldering crater left in their wake.

“Is this the part where we run as fast as we can the the harbor?”, Pluto suggested.

“We do?” Expessman said quickly before running into the distance.

“That settles that. Let's get going...”, Jupiter said with authority.

Upon reaching the harbor, the CG gaped at the four football fields of steel that was the Empress of San Lorenzo.

“This thing is huge!”, Sunstar said in awe.

“It's a cargo ship, of course it's big.” Pluto said with minimal interest. “Do you know how much freight has to go in and out of this port every year?”

“Figure unknown.” Barrageman said generically, before ending with “Durrr.”

“We'll get the container off with the crane, then you can get out of here.” Bass explained. “That ship is fusion-powered, so you can get back to Siberia without refueling once.”

The Wily bots started up the crane, lifting a container marked with Wily's logo.

“I wonder how nobody noticed that emblem?” Pluto said in regard to the huge emblem. “And what's inside it?”

Meanwhile, Bass was using radio to talk to Barrageman, who was operating the crane.

<Be careful, you moron! That thing is carrying a nuclear warhead!>, he yelled over the radio com.

Back on the ship, Pluto dismissed the whole thing. “Ah, well. It's probably nothing important. I'd better get to the bridge...”

The Wily bots put the crate on a truck, then signalled to the CG that they could go.

“Okay, guys. Let's blow this joint!”, Pluto said happily, plugging his tail into the ship's control panel.

The ship pulled out of the harbor, leaving the smoking city. The CG were looking forward to getting back, but it wasn't over yet.

“Hey, are those other ships?”, Terra asked.

A voice chattered over the ship's radio, warning them to go back. “This is the Robot Police Department, turn back now or we will take offensive actions!”

“Oh, crap! They're probably upset we stole the ship!”, Jupiter said in reget of his earlier descision.

“This is the Robot Police Department, turn back now or we will take offensive actions!”, the voice blarred again. A rewind noise was heard, then the phrase was repeated a third time. “This is the Robot Police Department, turn back now or we will take-”

“This looks bad.” Pluto calculated. “That's a recording, which means that the SA took over those ships!”

The battleships started firing on the freighter, causing great damage to the cargo and ship.

“Shoot! What do we do? What do we do?!”, Pluto yelled in a panic.

“I don't know!”, Jupiter said in confusion. “These are MILITARY ships! We're DOOMED!'

"LIES!" Mars proclaimed. "Three of us have Emergency Weapons that can probably blow half of New Jersey off the map!"

"Oh yeah..." Jupiter mused. "And there's Neptune as well..."

Neptune shrugged. "So does this mean I get to blow something up?"

"In a four-way E-weapon Tag Team with Me, Mars, and Sunstar? Most likely." Venus commented, having already planned ahead for one of Mars' all-out-assult ideas as soon as the RPD ships appear.

"Sweetness." replied Neptune in a way that would never make you guess that he's usually the voice of reason among raving lunatics.

The four CG members quickly got as far forward on the ship as they could, their E-Weapons activated. Panels all over Mars' legs and torso opened, causing more high-explosive launching weapons to appear then in an entire anti-tank devision, as well as a pair of AA Mortar cannons that emerged from his Backpack.

Sunstar's rifle began charging, causing the air to heat up intensely while a shower of Bubble Bomb's loaded with stars began appearing over the Cargo Ship due to Venus' weapon. A Tempest of water with a large amount of Aqua-Marine from Neptune also appeared in front of the ship.

Thankfully, Aqua-Marine is nullified by normal Ocean Water which is always good to know seeing as how there won't be any half-disolved Whales washing up on a beach somewhere because of Neptune.

Uranus and Dark Moon sighed in unison with Pluto while Jupiter seemed concerned if this plan would accually work. Sure, the Emergency Weapons would probably blow those ships apart, if not off the face of the earth, but it would leave all four of them extremely low on energy. If there was any upside, it's that there'd still be several of the CG still standing to defend from any other ships that may arrive.

Signalled by the sound of massive explosions, four of the five battleships were taken out, but one was still standing, unphased. It opened fire on the cargo ship, taking out the communications recievers.

“That's not good.” Pluto said in thought.

“So? We can go without radio!” Jupiter replied.

“How are we supposed to contact Cossack for a rendevouz point?” Pluto predicted. “We can't just dock at an RPD-controlled port!”

Mercury reminded them of the situation at hand. “Guys! We still need to take out that last-”

As if on cue, Mars took out the bridge to the last ship, leaving it to drift at sea. With the computers all stored in the bridge, the ship was basically dead.

“...ship.”, Mercury finished.

“But we still need a radio.” Pluto repeated.

“Have you forgotten what your antenna is for?”, Terra asked.

“No, I haven't.” Pluto corrected. “It's for wireless internet only, ok? It can only operate on the 2.4 GigaHertz band, which is nowhere near the frequencies needed to communicate over radio. So unless we get a radio transmitter, we're sunk.”

“How can we NOT have radio? We're robots!”, Uranus reminded. “All the other RMs have built-in radio coms!”

“Well, our new bodies weren't made on Earth.”, Pluto explained. “All of us have Quantum Particle Signalling built in for communication over long distances in space, but no radio.”

“Wait, how far does that reach?”, Jupiter asked. “Couldn't we just call someone up in space?

“Our personal QPS systems are not very powerful.”, Pluto answered. “We have to be within 10 million miles of the recipient, or another QPS-capable relay device with a greater range, such as a satellite or spacecraft. 10 million miles isn't very far in space!”

“Uhh... I think I don't have one of those whatever-it's-called things that works...”, Uranus cut in. “I don't think it works if I got one, but I know Saturn doesn't got a whatever-you-called it but he's got a radio.”

“I was wondering why I could never contact you or Saturn with my cell-phone functions...”, Jupiter realized.

“That's because in space-faring civilization, phones and pretty much everything else uses Quantum Signalling. They're simply not compatible!”, Pluto finished his techno-babble. “Anyways, now for the long trip back to home base...”. After what had happened today, he was looking forward to a few days of rest.

The Cosmic Gladiators had had a good stroke of beginner's luck. Thanks to their tactic to stay hidden and not get into fights, they made it through relatively unscathed. But next time they would not be so lucky...

END

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