Then again, none of them had been about the Minato itself, so it made sense that she had missed much of the specific information. There was also the issue of her experience with mechs as a whole being limited to what was available to her in Sanctuary.
Still, it seemed odd that he would know something about her Minato that she hadn't known until recently.
"Yes," she answered finally. "There's an actual name for it, but the AI told me that people back in the day called it Bulletfoot mode. It seems like an odd name, but I get the feeling behind it. A support mech supposed to deliver bullets by foot is suddenly able to move quicker like it was shot out of a gun."
"It seems to work on two levels, that name," Tinker chuckled.
"It’s odd, though, since our mechanics at the bunker were called bulletfoots too." She once again considered this, still no closer to a real explanation. "I haven’t been able to find out if the mode came before the nickname or the nickname is what caused the mode."
"It will be one of those mysteries," Tinker replied as they pressed on. "Something to keep your mind busy on the boring nights. You'd be surprised how many of those there are out here."
He wasn't wrong. The team of mechs marched through the night and pushed through the same forests she had come through, but at a much slower pace. The Excalibur and the Raptor were the slowest of the group, of course, and both needed time to cool off every hour or so. Tinker had to exit his mech to put grease into the lower joints of the Raptor as well.
While having those mechs with them meant there wasn't much in the world that would fuck with them, it also meant they would travel for the whole night. They couldn't cut across the forest either as they had to stay on the paths where the less agile and mobile of the mechs were still able to move.
The Excalibur would probably be able to push through the forest, Jessica13 thought, but it would mean pushing trees and even felling them, and that would do all kinds of damage to the mech itself. It was far more sensible to simply stay on the road.
It had been a long day, and Jessica13 eventually curled in her cockpit, found a reasonably comfortable position, and turned control of the mech over to Mini so she could sleep for some of the night. There wasn't much movement, which meant it was far more restful than her previous night's sleep when Mini had moved them at high speed.
She had wanted to spend time looking at the stars for a few more hours first, but the deliberate movements of the mech quickly lulled her into a deep sleep.
It had actually been a long couple of days, and she couldn't ever remember sleeping quite so well.
Despite that, she still felt like she could use a couple more hours when she was dragged slowly from her dreams of fighting alongside the Knights Mechanica by a light flashing in her eyes.
She rubbed her eyes and took a deep breath. The memory of the dreams began to slip away as she stretched as well as she could inside the cockpit. There was a trace of pain in the back of her neck that would prove to be annoying later in the day, but all she could think was she was being alerted that they were under attack.
"What's the matter, Mini?" she asked around a massive yawn.
"There is nothing to be alarmed over," he said in his calm, feminine voice. "I didn't want to interrupt your sleep but I thought you would want to know that we will arrive at the bunker in a short while. Being awake for that is advisable, according to communication from Hammerhand."
"Wait, Hammerhand is communicating with you?" Jessica13 asked and looked around hastily to confirm there was actually an external comm link open.
"We were included in the Knights' group comm link during the evening, courtesy of Mr. Tinker," Mini replied.
She grunted. "That was nice of him. How far are we from the bunker?"
"About a klick and a half," Mini replied quickly, then paused. "How did you sleep?"
Jessica13 smiled. "It was the best sleep I've had in a long time, I won't lie. I’m a little stiff and sore in places, though."
"You might want to think about installing some kind of modification that would make sleeping in the mech a little more comfortable."
She nodded agreement and focused on the fact that the group hadn’t slowed their pace. The sun had begun to rise in the distance and painted everything in a wide array of golden rays. If there was one thing she was sure of in her ever-changing circumstances, it was that she would never get tired of the many gorgeous sights that filled a world that was supposed to be desolate of all kinds of life and beauty.
Or, at least, that was the impression she had been left with before her first time Topside with Armstrong7.
She settled into the controls but let Mini retain them for a few seconds while she adjusted to her surroundings before she took over. The structure of the Bunker was now visible ahead in the road, almost impossible to miss as they approached the wide area that had been cleared around it.
Since she’d left, the road had been opened and it appeared that most of the mines had been removed to be repositioned when their defenses were set up again. There was no point in leaving them out for someone to step on accidentally when they worked to restore their security measures.
As they approached, Jessica13 realized that a handful of temporary living quarters had been erected outside the bunker, watched over by a group of mechs that assumed the responsibility of temporary security. They made use of what had once been their balloon tether station as a location
