She closed her pack securely and slung it over her back before she eased out of her room and closed and locked the door behind her. It wouldn't stop someone who really wanted to get in, but it would give her a few minutes, at least.
A plan had already begun to take shape in her mind. No one would pay attention to her until she reached the elevator. That was when people would ask questions. There was no pointless power expenditure allowed and to send the elevator up with the full weight of the Minato would definitely waste power.
It would be difficult to get around this but not impossible. All she needed was a signature from Armstrong7 authorizing her to head up to the defense sector to stress-test the improvements she'd made on Mini. Word would have filtered to him that she had worked out some kind of improvements on the mech already, so it wouldn't be too out of the ordinary for her to stress-test the mech.
And, hopefully, with the alarms that had been set off, he would be too swamped to think too deeply into her request. There would probably be people who questioned it at the door of the elevator, but with the signature of the CO on her side, questions would only be raised when someone realized the Minato was heading away from Sanctuary instead of stress-testing. By then, she would already be too far away for them to do anything about it.
Sure, they could send someone after her, but it would be a massive waste of resources to pursue someone who didn't want to be found. The mech was one no one else could use anyway, and the food didn’t seem to have been missed as no one had raised any questions about it.
The only real loss to Sanctuary would be the tools, and it wasn't like they didn't have spares.
Her plan seemed to be the best one she could devise so she picked up one of the forms for outside stress-testing and filled the paperwork in quickly, which left the one thing only Armstrong7 could do. He had to sign it.
The man didn't like his office. He stood well above six feet tall and the tiny little space he had been allocated as the CO of the defensive level simply didn't fit him. It was too small and the chair always made him look like he was hunched over his desk. She had to imagine that he constantly toppled the tall stacks of papers he needed to peruse and sign before he sent them to his superiors.
Like John5.
Even thinking the name sent cold sweats across her skin. The man she had looked up to for all those years had tried to kill Mini in front of her nose. The sense of betrayal was absolute.
She reached the office where predictably, the tall, muscular Armstrong7 was bent over the tiny desk crammed into his tiny room. She had no idea how he didn't feel claustrophobic since he was so much larger than her.
"Jessie," the CO said and barely looked up to see who stood in the doorway. He sifted through a stack of papers while he waited for someone on the comm line in his office. "How can I help you?"
"Well, I can see you're very busy so I won't take up too much of your time," Jessica13 said meekly as she left her bag outside the door and stepped inside. "Are you? Really busy, that is."
"The people running Sanctuary weren't happy that we issued the alarm without confirming that we were under attack," he said and shook his head in what might have been frustration. "They don't think it's conducive to the secure environment they wish to foster in Sanctuary to have alarms activating all the time, so they want there to be some accountability. They also want me to speak to the entire bunker to tell them it was only a false alarm and no lives were lost and they can all settle into their lives again."
The life she now tried to escape. The reminder was a little discomforting and she clenched her hands together to keep them from shaking again.
"Anyway, how can I help you, Jessie?" Armstong7 asked without looking up from his work. "Please make it fast. I don't want to rush you but I am in something of a bind here."
"Oh, I only wanted to ask for your signature," Jessica13 said and slid the form she had filled out in front of him.
"Authorization for a stress-test outside the bunker?" he asked and finally glanced at her.
"I managed to install a new AI in my Minato mech and I need to stress-test it before he's cleared for active duty," she explained.
The CO made a face and scowled at the paper in front of him. "I'm sorry, but no. After the whole mess today, we shouldn't have anyone outside the bunker aside from those necessary for the defense of Sanctuary. I think you would be able to clear the Minato for active duty with an indoor stress-test, right?"
"It's not the best," she said with a shrug. She couldn’t do or say anything to raise his suspicions
"Well, it's the best that I can do for now," Armstrong7 said firmly and gave her the form. "If you want to try again tomorrow, I think things will have calmed by then. Until then…here…"
He reached into the steel cabinet to his left and barely avoiding upending a stack of papers with his elbow.
"This is an indoor stress-test authorization," he said, filled it in quickly, and handed it to her. "That should keep people from asking you too many questions."
She smiled. "Thanks, A7. I really appreciate it."
"Hey, good work with getting the AI to work." He shook his head in bemusement. "I don't know how you did it. That mech has been in storage for almost a hundred years and no one's figured it out. I guess
