Chương 51: ****Sneak Peek**** Ch. 1 Re - A Rookie's First day

The harness clicked, pulling Stefano closer to the seat. His hands gripped the throttles of his dad's old Gatherer unit with the same weight that would've been on his shoulders. He felt both free and contained. The wonder of it all catching up faster than his mind could process.

"Order of Departure: 6" Stefano steeled himself, controlling his breathing. His thoughts and memories were like a checklist from the start of the day. Pulling each tiny detail to make sure nothing was forgotten before leaving the point of no return. The earned white jumpsuit zipped up easily earlier in the day. It was freshly printed and, luckily, free. His mother made sure to remind him that it didn't matter once out of the Academy how well he did. She was wrong, but it was nice to hear.

Second best didn't have the same ring to it. The important part was the pin. The Academy logo etched for all to see. That he was a guy with training. With knowledge.

"Mijo," said Cassandra from around the corner. She was preparing his favorite meal for before departure. Her messy, curly hair was half held together by a single hair tie that was holding on by a single, binding fabric. Her blue jumpsuit was half zipped up, and with her last patient's blood having long dried on her leg.

"Did you finish the paperwork?" It was a stack of them. About thirty pages, all needing to be signed by hand… on paper. That paperwork was the culmination of thousands of hours of training. The risks of the job. The hope of a better future. Stefano's hand had cramped from methodically signing each one the night before.

"Yeah!" he said, turning the corner.

"How do I look?" She covered her mouth and gasped; the tears welling on her face were fought back.

"Mijo. You look just like your father." She threw her arms around her son and quietly sobbed for a moment. Stefano returned the hug, a culmination of effort finally achieved. Rattle.

"Thanks, Mom," he said, finally pulling away. It was only for a moment before she straightened up, fixing his collar and inspecting the jumpsuit.

"Your lunch is ready. Remember, don't overdo it on your first vuelo."

"It's not a flight, Mom, it's a delve. I'm a Delver."

"Will your robot be using thrust?" she pouted.

"That's what I thought. It's a vuelo until it isn't." She took a deep breath and stiffened her face as best she could.

"I am proud of you, mi corazon. I know how hard you worked for this."

"Thanks, Mom. But I also know all you sacrificed. The clinic. All of Dad's FIL that he left us. I'm sorry I couldn't keep my promise to be the best in the class. But second best isn't so bad."

"Mijo. You worked so hard. Don't apologize to me. All I want is for you to believe in yourself. Wanting to follow in your dad's footsteps… it's not what I wanted for you. But I wasn't going to be in your way. So I was going to make that happen. Whatever the cost."

"Thanks, Mom. Now, at least, I can make enough FIL to get you. Us, back into Z-Block."

"I don't need that! I'm happy with what we have. But since you're an adult now. I wouldn't hate a spa day. Your mom needs a break." He laughed.

"I'll see what I can do." Stefano's stomach almost imploded from the food she prepared, using up more FIL than they could really afford. She pulled his neck down and stood on her toes to kiss the top of his head before heading to his first day. Rattle"At ease, kid," said Squad Jacob as soon as he entered the hangar. He gave a salute literally as soon as his foot crossed the threshold.

"You're stressing me out, kid. Take a breath and take a seat. We're still waiting on two more to show." As soon as he stopped saluting, Jacob took his hand to shake it.

"Name's Jacob. Just Jacob. I don't do well with titles." Jacob grinned and returned to his bench seat, opening his tablet. His short orange hair was combed to the side, sleek and straight. His wide shoulders taking the spot of two. Then there were the pins on his chest. Numerous. They glinted in the light, and all Stefano could do was stare dumbly in awe. It meant Jacob had gone to the deeper floors. Completed a number of assignments and quests. He was the real deal. He didn't have the Academy pin, though.

It made him even more impressive to Stefano. All that and with no real pre-delve training.

"Your file says your unit is a Gatherer?" said squad leader Jacob.

"Kind of old. Didn't want a new one?"

"No, sir," said Stefano.

"Uncle Wilhelm. Er. Roger Wilhelm told me to avoid getting sponsored."

"Wise. I recognize the name, but can't remember from where. The debt can be crippling. But don't hold us back because you're using something so ancient."

"I wouldn't, sir." The doors swooshed open and two more arrived. One looked like he just came back from the worst day of his life; his pale skin looked bone white. The other walked straight to his locker, gave a slight nod to Stefano, and began changing into his own white jumpsuit.

"Huddle up," said squad leader Jacob.

"Eric, Phil. As you can see, we have a new recruit. I'm sure you can remember the first time you delved. So, why don't you introduce your-" Rattle"Sup," said the sickly looking man.

"I'm Eric. Uh. I like to drink and have fun."

"Try again," said Jacob. Eric sighed.

"I am the senior pilot, and I pilot a Beast Frame. I find the stability really nice when I'm hungover." He was underselling how skilled you had to be to achieve that stability. A very mobile mech, usually a quadrupedal unit, but not always. Hard to pull off right, and even Stefano struggled with them at first.

"Close enough," said team leader Jacob.

"I'm Phil. I pilot a Vanguard Frame. I'm the team support and tank." Vanguards dished out limited firepower, but they could take a pounding. Useful in any configuration. Phil offered to shake Stefano's hand, so he did. Eric didn't. He instead got to his locker, pulled a red bio-bag and left the contents of his stomach, inside. Phil's eyes blinked continuously as if from a tic. Noticing that made Stefano feel like a jerk…

"And you know me," said Jacob.

"I also pilot a Beast mech. I was looking through your file. You specialized with Walker Frames? A Gatherer now to earn enough for a Walker?"

"Yes, sir. Those came easy to me," said Stefano.

"A Gatherer? What? He find a planet to touchdown on-" Eric chided, only to throw up into his bag again.

"It is a rather old mech," said Jacob.

"But we'll get you there." His eyes turned to the pin on Stefano's chest, and he grinned.

"Then, you can run your own squad someday." Jacob led the way to where the units were awaiting them. Stefano's, technically a quadruped, wasn't a Frame like the rest of the squad. It was made from Earth's resources. Not from the Dungeon filament, or FIL, that was in every way possible, stronger. These units were obsolete by today's standards. The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

"Twenty years since this baby was last used… by my Dad, as his first machine. Unchanged since grandfather first used it, forty-five years before then," mumbled Stefano.

"What was that?" asked Phil.

"Nothing, sorry!" said Stefano, climbing the ladder to his cockpit. The new models are just plain better. Using FIL to print a Gatherer now was widely considered an enormous waste. Heck, FIL was practically magic. It could be fabricated into almost anything: water, food, plants, bullets, Frames. Anything. Then there were the weapons. The weapons made from Dungeon FIL weren't compatible with the old technology of Gatherer units. When it was tried, it turned the weapon into literal dust.

Dust made up of millions upon millions of nano-machines making up each component. So for now, he had to rely on simple and conventional weapons, like the minigun with the ammo backpack attachment.

RATTLE"3" [Boot Sequence Initiated] [System Online] [Diagnostics Complete] [Integrity: 100] [Fuel: 500] [Ammo: 100, 000] [OnBoard Equipment] [MiniGun] Fires projectiles 3, 000 rounds per minute at low fire rate Fires projectiles 60, 000 rounds per minute at max fire rate [Tungsten Pick Axe] Nearly indestructible Pick and Axe for Ore Gathering [Wide-Array Visual Spectrum Adjuster] Allows visual filtering of all known light spectra [Friend-Foe Tag] Assigned automatically via neurosync [Grapple Gun] Retractable, high tensile strength rope & hook [Simple Map] Breadcrumb map that is filled upon manual start Rattle"2" The full panoramic screen covered the entire depth of field, all the way to even when he would turn his head.

He clipped on the harness and was satisfied that he didn't miss anything. Stefano's thoughts went to legacy. What it meant to be piloting the same Frame as his father. How his father died, doing exactly what he was about to do.

"I saw that you were the second best pilot in your class," said Jacob.

"Academy people are usually rich with FIL though."

"Yes, sir. I was second," said Stefano through gritted teeth.

"Impressive. Who took first?"

"Ania…"

"The overseer's granddaughter?! That's a tough break. You would've been a squad leader now if you had gotten first." Stefano didn't respond. What could he say? Instead, he pushed down the inadequacy and reminded himself that he was here. In this moment, right now, the Academy didn't matter anymore. This was his career now. His profession. And he was going to be the best. The tracks moved on their own, pulling him forward. Jacob's Frame was on the chute. Stefano blinked. And Jacob's Frame was gone.

He could feel his breath quickening; the first flight was always the hardest. The first scan was always the weirdest. He snorted, realizing he just called it a flight and held up a fist in the air.

"Damn you, mother!" he joked to no one.

"1" Everything spun. His stomach, his thoughts. His grip was so tight on the throttles, his fingers lost feeling. Then a rush of air popped. No, not a rush of air, a rush of a lack of air. He couldn't hear the hooks clipping anymore to move him. The seatbelt that was pressing down on his chest just a moment ago softened as his butt left the seat. His organs were more twisted than before, floating just as he was. It was freedom that he felt on his skin. In his soul. No gravity or sound. Just endless possibilities.

His back hit the seat with frightening velocity. His chest didn't expand. Lungs couldn't take air. His head snapped against the headrest while his face buried itself to his back. His cheeks were practically touching his ears. Eyes struggled to stay open. Not even tears could slip past. The vacuum tube was coming to an end. The Dungeon right ahead. Like storm clouds gathering in a drought with no real shape. He took a breath outside the tube, slamming the thruster to realign his heading and course.

Closer and closer he drew. Humidity ran down his screen as if it were raining. But it wasn't. More and more nanomachines latched on, scanning every crevice of this mech. Then it arrived. The welcome message to all new arrivals. But a second message, almost too fast to register. So fast, it may as well have been a hallucination. But in his soul, it left a mark. SYSTEM NOTIFICATION NEW PARTICIPANT REGISTERED SCANNING...

WARNING: ONBOARD WEAPONS WILL DEAL INEFFICIENT DAMAGE WARNING: NO PILOT AUGMENTATIONS DETECTED WARNING: THIS UNIT CANNOT USE EXFILTRATION SUBROUTINES IN THE 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18 FLOORS ANY PARTICIPANT ACCESSING THE 21ST FLOOR WILL BE ABLE TO REMOVE ALL HOSTILE CREATURE CREATION AND TERMINATE THE RESET CYCLE, ALLOWING FOR COLONIZATION AND TERA-FORMATION FOR A NEW HOME PLANET SCANNING... SCANNING... SCANNING...

[Ẹ̵̡̠̺͌́̈́͋̐̊̎͆̇̊̿̂͋͂̅̈̉̕͝͝͠ṟ̶͍̞̓̋̐͛͝͠r̷̨̢̛̤̼̠̈́̀̾̇̿̐̿̽̃͋̾̅̈̈́̋̚͝͝ơ̷̢̢̯̮̪̣͓̖͉̬͍̪̹̱̰̘̩͕̙̜̰͔̫̹̭̠̞̩͓͈̖̣̫̩̙̟̝̯͌̐̊͒̑̌͌̐͋͑͑̏͒̓̔̚͜r̵̢̤̟͓͚̭͉̘̰̫̱̙̩̻̗̯͕̞̳͇͙͇̥̎̂͌̒̇] OVERRIDE DENIED OVERRIDE DENIED O̴V̵E̵R̸W̸R̵I̵T̵E̶ ̴A̵P̶P̸R̴O̷V̴E̶D̴ D̷E̴L̸I̷V̴E̵R̴I̵N̴G̶ ̶M̷E̴S̶S̶A̵G̷E̸ ̵F̸R̵O̸M̷ ̵D̶A̷N̶I̷E̵L̸ ̶R̷E̵Y̵E̶S̷ Son, if you're getting this. I'm dead. I'm sorry I couldn't come home to you. This Dungeon... This Cradle, it is more than it appears, son. I found something. This place it - [E̵r̶r̵o̸r̷].

I need you to find a way to get to the 20th floor. [E̵r̶r̵o̸r̷] new home [E̵r̶r̵o̸r̷] lie. It's how I can keep my promise to your mom. I love you. It's [E̵r̶r̵o̸r̷]. [END OF MESSAGE] WELCOME TO THE CRADLE