I
He doesn't respond for 15 seconds.
Yeah, no, go ahead, please.

Surprisingly, the transfer is a complete success... and the file autoruns. After a lengthy booting sequence, a command prompt opens:

---

ot.




...
Um.
Why am I in a computer? What happened?

---

Chord immediately tries accessing a webcam and microphone.

The head is for the most part in a surprisingly fine condition as far as all the sensors and inner workings of the face go, but the hard drive used to store data from the Variable Weapons System is a bit banged up... and the IC chip. Sweet baby Jesus, the IC chip. Not only is its slot scratched up and widened as if someone's once pried the chop out of it violently, but the thing itself is a bit, heh, chipped at the corners, missing some pins and has some sort of weird microcontroller connected to a flat crystal soldered to it haphazardly that doesn't even do anything.

It is that bad.

Hey, uh, chief, I ain't feelin' too hChord abruptly shuts down. An entire cooling fan falls out of the abhorrent mess of spaghetti wiring in his abdomen before he falls over.

Chord picks up the metal, flips it in his hands, throws it in the air and catches it, and even punches it. Like, really hard. He gets the fat end of the stick.
Ow. Oh, yeah, this'll do!

Chord tries picking up the hunk of metal.
...Yeah, thanks for offering, but I think this single piece weighs twice as much as the entirety of me right now, which is not really what I'm looking for.

Serves ya right. says Teuta(yes that's her (wave change) name i forgot you'd get namespaces in a battle so now you know lmao), before looking around a bit. There are red specks in the air around the scene of the fight. She checks her military-grade Noise counter. Not exactly off the charts insane, but definitely elevated. Someone'll surely come check... she'd better offload the goods. She picks up the futuristic duffel bag and surfs away on a tiny stream of water, avoiding a Mr. Hertz slacking off in the vicinity, then pulses into a random antenna on someone's house. She immediately pulses out of the Wave Road entirely, ending up... somewhere in the physical realm. Probably very far. The antenna begins broadcasting something, somewhere...

Y'know what, I'll take something similar to carbon-carbon*. Light but strong, but probably not actual carbon-carbon 'cause something tells me you guys'll have something better than it.


*Yes, this is the actual name of a very strong material used in space shuttles.

After much anticipation, there is a new installment in the Hadal Claw series.

Holy crap.
Not really recovering from the surprise, he responds.
Yeah, uh, I may take a while to choose. I've never seen anything like this!
Chord walks up to the various pieces of armor on display looking like a kid on Christmas who's trying to put on a really bad poker face.

Chord is a bit confused. Robot Masters being vintage?

...Eh, he's heard that one before.

He awkwardly waves at the two other bots there whenever they decide to shift their attention back at him.
Uh. Hi.

.
He doesn't say anything, but you can tell his thoughts on the matter are mainly "what" and "why". Maybe a little of "did he seriously just say 'loco'".

Chord is very much surprised by there just being a giant mech built in plain sight. You'd expect some form of secrecy... but, based on what he'd just heard before the ride, he supposes getting into the HCCC is hard enough to where extra security inside is unnecessary.
Damn. What's that thing even for?

MIDI seems to be pulling out several large, weird machines with no clear purpose from a mess of other, mostly smaller gizmos.