Paradigm City - Fan Fiction - Beneath The Surface

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Beneath The Surface

Part 11

When he awoke, she was gone, but he felt more relaxed and refreshed than he had in a long time. There had been no more nightmares, and by the angle of the sun streaming through the windows, it was early afternoon. He got up and put on his robe, stretching comfortably.

"Master Roger, you’re awake," Norman came into the room with coffee.

"What happened to the piano? Did it break?" he joked.

"No, Miss Dorothy said she was going to let you sleep today," the butler said. "She asked me to tell you that she had gone down to the dig in your place. I expect her to return at any time now." Norman headed back downstairs, leaving him to wake up in peace.

Roger stretched again and enjoyed a slow sip of his coffee. She was just as capable as he was at recognizing trouble, he decided, and Dastun certainly wouldn’t mind. He had almost forgotten how good it was to sleep without dreaming.

He brought his coffee out onto the balcony. He was beginning to understand what Norman had been trying to explain. If he treated her as a friend, she would act as his friend. It made a strange kind of sense.

He drained his cup and started getting dressed. There would be many interesting things to talk about once the dig was completed.

"Master Roger?" Norman called up the stairs. "Miss Dorothy has asked you to come to the dig right away, she says it’s an emergency."

"I’m on it," he called down. He finished dressing as quickly as possible and ran down to the Griffon.

Dorothy was waiting for him at the operations center. "I know what the machine was hiding," she greeted him. "Roger, you must help us to get the people out of these buildings along the dig."

"What was it?" he asked. "A bomb?"

"No, worse. I got the charges set up, except for hooking up the fuses, so I spent some more time poking around the tunnels and followed the new one the digger made when it came to us. It’s undermining the buildings, Roger. If we collapse those tunnels, the whole block is going to come down!"

"You’re sure?" he asked.

"Yes. Look," she held up a hastily scrawled diagram. "The tunnels are here, here and here," she traced the outline of their location. "This is the area where I laid the charges."

"Did you tell Dastun? No, don’t answer that, of course you did. Where is he now?" Roger wanted to know.

"He is starting the evacuation of the buildings nearest the dig. There aren’t a lot of people living around here, but every apartment needs to be checked, and there’s a lot of those." Dorothy rapidly gave him the details. "He is telling the people that the crew has discovered the ground is unstable further out than they had realized and that it could collapse at any time so they must leave without taking anything."

Roger looked around and observed a small but steady stream of people leaving the area. "All right. Has this building been checked?"

"Yes," she replied. "The crew is doing the other side of the street, and I said we would check next door."

"Let’s get on it then," he said. "If you already laid the charges and it realizes that we’re on to it, it might attempt to set them off." He spoke into his watch, asking Norman to have Big O ready just in case.

"Ready and waiting, Master Roger," came the prompt reply.

Although it took nearly an hour, they managed to knock on every door and get the residents out of harm’s way. Roger and Dorothy met up with Dastun at safe distance.

"That’s everybody," the colonel sighed with relief. "The question is, now what?"

"There’s got to be a way to get rid of those tunnels," Roger was thinking out loud. "If they can be filled back up, there won’t be any danger. But with the digger still on the loose, there’s nothing stopping it from making new ones."

"We’ve got to get rid of it," Dastun agreed. "But how? The Megadeus is probably strong enough to crush it, but it can’t get at it underground. If the digger was gone, we could get a couple of those roadway extruders, send them in with a load of some of the debris from the dig and then fill in the gaps with that concrete mix that expands a little when it dries, just like we do when we seal off a tunnel that’s in danger of collapse." "I can lure the digger above ground," Dorothy suggested.

"No!" both men chorused.

"You can’t go in there to get it, so we must somehow bring it to you," she said stubbornly.

"It’s too dangerous," Roger told her. "I’m sure we can come up with something else." She stood silently as they tried to do so but failed.

"Those people won’t stay away indefinitely," she finally pointed out. "After a week or two, if nothing has happened, they will come back. The digger can collapse the tunnels without using explosives whenever it wants, it will just take a little longer."

"I don’t like it," the colonel frowned. "What if it decides to collapse a tunnel on you when you go down there?

"You and Roger will have to come and get me out," she answered. "There is no other choice. We have to destroy the digger while we can still find it, otherwise, it will move on to another area and we won’t know it’s there until there’s another collapse.

Roger shook his head. "We might not be able to dig you out, not if one of the buildings comes down too. We can’t take that chance."

"We must, Roger Smith." She refused to back down. They all looked up as someone shouted for Dastun from the other side of the street.

"I’ll be back in a moment," he told them. "There has to be another way to do it, we just aren’t seeing it. We weren’t supposed to set off the charges until tomorrow, so we have time yet."

"I can’t let you do this," Roger insisted. "It’s too much of a risk, Dorothy."

"Be ready, Roger Smith." Dorothy suddenly whirled and ran towards the pit, much too fast for him to catch her.

"Big O! Showtime!" he called into his watch, infuriated that the decision was out of his hands. There was a rumbling sound as the giant robot rose from the ground a bit further away from where Roger was standing. He ran to the control room and jumped into the command chair. "Action!" he shouted, moving closer to the pit.

Dorothy was suddenly climbing out of the entrance to the tunnel. Moving with incredible speed, she ran towards the Big O and safety. The ground buckled beneath her feet as the digger tunneled up towards the surface, but she managed somehow to jump to the side without losing her footing.

"Come on, Dorothy...just a little bit closer," Roger said out loud. The digger suddenly broke the surface, front drills still spinning. It went after her without hesitation, and it looked like it was even faster than she was. "Dorothy! It’s gaining on you, come on!" He took a step forward, then another.

She had almost reached Big O’s shadow when she slipped on a chunk of concrete and went sprawling. Two of the robot’s stabilizing claws reached for her, but only caught the denim of her coverall. She ripped free and somehow managed to get back on her feet before the robot could try to grab her again.

Roger waited until she ran past and stomped down on the foot pedal. The black Megadeus’ foot slammed down between her and the digger. He reached to capture the robot, but it was just too fast. It spun its wheels briefly and then suddenly turned and went around the barrier before Roger could get a hand on it.

"Dorothy!" It was more important to get her out of harm’s way. He wheeled around and saw her running towards a brick building, the digger only a few feet behind her. Just as he thought she was going to run into it she jumped, landing about four feet off the ground on the corner of the building. She started to climb upward. He moved Big O towards her.

The digger started to come after her, using its stabilizing claws to grip the brick and pull itself upwards. It seemed to realize very quickly that it would never catch her that way, and the claws abruptly released. The front drills started spinning again and it started to dig into the building, rapidly chewing away at the brick.

It backed up to make a pass from a different angle, clearly trying to undermine the corner and collapse it. As it backed up yet again, Roger decided to give it one more try. He spun the levers and brought the Big O’s hand down, successfully getting a grip this time. He tried to crush it, but the armor was too tough for him to do it with one hand.

He flipped the covers off both of the boosters and aligned the Megadeus carefully, then pushed the buttons. With a loud crash, the Big O’s hands came together, shattering the metal armor of the digger. Roger let it drop to the ground, finishing the job by stepping on the creature as if it were a bug.

He had just turned with the intent of lifting Dorothy from the building when he realized with horror that the corner was collapsing and she was no longer there. "Dorothy! Where are you?" he shouted, effectively blinded by the dust that had flown into the air as the brick crumbled.

He began to scrabble frantically through the debris, but found no sign of her. He thought to check the roof, but she wasn’t there either. He was beginning to panic when a voice from the ground caught his attention.

"Over here!" Dastun was shouting at him. He looked and saw Dorothy sitting on the ground, covered with dust but looking around. Dastun seemed to be talking to her. After a moment, he helped her to her feet and gave Roger a thumbs up.

Roger sagged back into the command chair, overwhelmed by relief. He moved the megadeus towards Dorothy and Dastun and reached down. She climbed onto Big O’s hand, giving the colonel a little wave as she was lifted up to the control center.

The moment she was safely inside, Roger pulled her into a tight embrace. "You gave me a scare there, Dorothy," he murmured into her ear. "How could you do such a thing? I thought I had lost you." She was silent for a moment, simply enjoying the warm sensation of his arms around her. There was something lacking, though. She frowned, trying to track down what it was that was missing.

"What’s the matter?" Roger was suddenly aware of the awkwardness of his position and began to pull away. "I’m sorry. I was just very glad to see you were okay. I didn’t mean to confuse you."

He was startled to feel her arms tighten around him, preventing him from releasing her. "Don’t, Roger Smith. This is..." she hesitated, looking for just the right word, "this is good."

He raised an eyebrow but remained still. He put his arms back around her, one hand absently brushing some of the dust out of her hair. "What is it, Dorothy?" he asked gently.

"I...I was afraid too," she said. "Now I feel...I feel..."

"Do you feel safe now?" his voice was soft.

"Safe...yes. Safe and..." she trailed off again. He smiled down at her, not understanding but patient nonetheless. "I want..." suddenly something clicked into place. "I want you to kiss me."

His eyes went wide and his whole body tensed. "You want me to what?"

She tilted her head and looked up at him. "I want you to kiss me, Roger Smith."

He leaned down and lightly brushed his lips against hers. "Better now?"

"Again." It was close, but not quite right.

He looked down at her thoughtfully. "I’m not sure this is a good idea."

"Again," she insisted. "Please."

He sighed a little and leaned down again, letting the contact linger for a few seconds this time. "It isn’t really the best time and place for this sort of thing," he told her.

"I understand," she said. "Thank you, Roger." She released her hold on him and stepped back.

He shook his head, trying to figure out what had brought it all on. "Let’s go home, Dorothy." They sent the megadeus to its underground carrier and walked to the Griffon.

Dastun was standing there waiting for them. "That was the craziest thing I have ever seen you do," he informed them.

"And I hope it’s the craziest thing you ever see us do," Roger told him.

Dastun nodded agreement. "There’s a crew on the way to fill in the tunnels. In a couple of days, it will be as if nothing ever happened." He looked at Dorothy curiously. "How did you manage to get off that building before it fell?" he asked. "One minute you were there, and the next minute you weren’t."

"I jumped," she said simply.

Dastun shook his head. "You can’t always take risks like that. Next time you might not be so lucky."

"I hope there isn’t a next time," Roger informed him. "So, will you need me to show up tomorrow or are you done with digging for now?"

"I think we dug up quite enough for this project," the colonel responded. "I’ve got to get back, the crew should be coming soon."

"I’m sure we’ll see you around, Dastun," Roger got into the car.

The drive home was a silent one, both of them lost in their own thoughts. "I need to get cleaned up," Dorothy told him as they walked in. "Would you be upset if I didn’t come to dinner this evening? I want to think for a while."

"That’s fine, just don’t make a habit out of it," he said with mock severity.

"A habit of thinking or a habit of missing dinner?" she asked with a small smile.

"Dinner!" he chuckled. "Go, you’re getting everything covered with dust!"

It was strange not to see her at the other end of the long table.

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