The revelation of Ram and Rom developing into something beyond my expectations gave me a lot to think about. To this point, conversations with my proxies had been more for teasing those around me or as a means for me to “think out loud”. Even with AI subRoutines controlling them, speaking with any of them was largely like reading a script where I already knew the responses I was going to get. There may be a bit of improv on the part of the AI, but nothing that was completely unexpected.

This twist with Ram and Rom bonding with other souls really threw me for a loop. I wondered what the shadowkin Doctor DeLaMuerta would have to say on it. I had run into the mortician during a road trip, bringing the Princess home to the capital. Somehow, she was able to see the connection I had to my proxies and had implied that my own soul was stretched in multiple directions and that my mind was a bit chaotic. I made a mental note to give her a visit and consider her for the role of my psychiatrist.

Ram had done a good job of cleaning up all the damage to IronHide and prepping the frame for some new modifications. It was awkward working with her though. Like other proxies, she could read me to know what I was doing, how I wanted it done, and provide exactly the required assistance. Unlike my other proxies, I didn’t have a read on what she was doing or thinking. The connection had become a one way feed of information from me to her and that level of intimate vulnerability made me very self conscious of everything I did or thought.

Everytime I’d look at her, she’d smile and give me the next thing I needed. Imagine one day your hand is suddenly no longer under your control. The hand is friendly and helpful and reacts to your thoughts and wishes, but is still not under your control. It was unnerving to be honest and was starting to freak me out.

“Sorry Ram... I need a break,” I apologized as I handed back a part and climbed out of the cavity.

“I understand, Daddy. It’s... a big change... I’ll keep working on this,” she said quietly.

“Daddy,” I repeated. “So you’re calling me that now too... When did all the proxies start calling me some variation of dad?”

“I’m sorry, Prime! That was disrespectful, if anything I should go with father or maybe creator would be better! Maker! Should I go with Maker? Then I can say things like thank the maker, right?” she said in a panic.

“It’s fine, it’s fine. Call me whatever. You’re not usually like this. You’ve always been played as a calm and cool character that speaks more through body language than her actual voice. I wonder if this is due to that other soul inside of you coming to the surface. I appreciate the C-3PO reference, by the way.”

“Is that... bad?” she asked, as her eyes shifted pink in embarrassment.

“Nah. Just... unexpectedly cute and clearly not something that came from me. Right. Okay kiddo, I’m Audi 5000.”

I hopped out of the giant robot frame, leaving Ram with an odd twist of a smile. On the one hand, it was REALLY WEIRD having an “unscripted” conversation with her. On the other, I now had two people I could unload my bad jokes and cultural references on.

I focused on Ratchet to see that it and Rom were nearly done with the Lena Mk2 body. The final aesthetic touches were being added and she’d be ready to move in. I had been kicked off the team working on the Mk2 by Lena herself.

After witnessing what should have been my puppets crying and clinging to me, Lena was, understandably, confused and upset. I’m not so dense as to not see her level of affection for me, though I have strong doubts that the feeling is what she thinks it might be. I tried to explain to her what was going on but she only snubbed me more.

Rom would sneak nervous glances at me as she worked-- things weren’t getting any less awkward there. Lena, too, would shoot me glances, but as soon as she noticed me looking back she’d make a show of turning her back on me in a pseudo-huff. I rolled my eyes and hopped down from IronHide’s frame. Not that I could breath, but some fresh air might do me some good.

I felt like entirely too much stuff had been happening in entirely too little time. The weight of it all was threatening to crush me.

I made my way down to the lower level where my GodBomber airship lay in heavily damaged chunks, waiting patiently for someone to come and fix them. As I walked past them, visions of my epic battle against a giant robot dragon came to mind. Each gash or burn mark conjured the mistake I’d made to earn it.

I stepped out onto the landing pad beyond the hangar and looked out into the underground cave system, dimly lit by pockets of glowing crystals and moss. I heard the gentle tapping sound of someone’s footsteps passing through the room behind me.

Not wanting to get into anything with anyone, I vaulted over the railing, the ground some four or five stories below.

“[PowerExtreme(CloudBurst)],” I mumbled, invoking the power armor to materialize and snap onto me.

I shifted into jet mode and powered up the wind turbines, punching through the air and leaving an empty floor for whomever came wandering behind me. I raced through the caverns, dodging columns of stone and weaving around stalagmites. When I reached the end of the cavern, I shot straight through the waterfall hiding its entrance and out into the night sky.

I had to admit that I immediately thought of any number of giant robot cartoons that involved the hero machine launching in this manner. The idea made me a little giddy and I did a barrel roll but then my thoughts settled back down on me.

The entrance to the cavern was quite a distance away from the city and I could see the lights of campfires dotting the fields and forests outside the walls. I slowly banked to take in the scenery as cooks fed their soldiers and town merchants sold local goods from carts. The soldiers looked like they came from a wide variety of species and ages, but they all looked exhausted.

Chasing geese followed by chasing actual enemies, only to return to find more enemies, had left them ragged. The realization that there were still yet more enemies gathering from the eastern alliance sank in, not to mention whatever it was my doppelganger was up to. I suddenly felt bad for the soldiers below and wished them rest where they could get it.

In the sky over the city, I could see a few harpie or avian messengers delivering parcels and letters. I wondered if they had a food delivery service. If they didn’t, I was sure it would be popular. The name “Ubertweets” came to mind and I could feel my proxies moaning in my head at me.

I cut my speed and drifted over the walls, heading back to the shop when an arrow sailed past me, followed by a bolt of some blue energy. It hadn’t even occurred to me that the soldiers along the wall would normally watch the skies for intruders; which was stupid since I’d already noticed flying deliveries.

I brought my speed back up and dodged the incoming fire, strafing the archer and mage towers. I transformed back to bot mode in order to summersault midair and change my direction before shifting back to jet and flying off at an angle my ailerons wouldn’t have been able to handle.

Crap, I was starting to raise a commotion. The safe thing would be to just head back out to the cavern entrance. I converted my arms to gun mode and poked them out of my jet form but thought better of it. I didn’t want to hurt anyone and I was the UFO here.

I veered closer to the palace than I should have and something huge and fast came flying at me. The gigantic, pink, bunny lady slammed into me, flipping me over and over in the air. As we tumbled, she got me into a position under her and kicked downwards. The strike smashed through one of my wings, and tore off one of my turbines.

The imbalance sent me into a spiral as the palace walls rushed up to meet me.

“[HotSwap(Convoy)]!” I shouted.

The CloudBurst armor vanished into [Inventory], replaced with the Convoy armor. I used my burst jets to correct my spin and slow me down some, but still ended up smashing through a wall and plowing into one of the palace courtyards.

A quick diagnostic showed that damage was minimal to Convoy, though I was getting tired of repairing CloudBurst. I pulled myself out of the rubble and upturned decorative plants to see the bunny woman stepping through the hole I’d made, dragging a huge sword behind her.

“I’m not your enemy,” I offered, holding my hands out.

“Didn’t ask,” she said, with a wild look in her eyes. “You look strong... Let’s see how strong you really are!”

The ground beneath her exploded as she, once again, came flying at me. Her blade tore the air in front of her, nearly clipping me as I burst over her. I tipped forward, converting my arms to gun mode and opened fire with steel rounds as she passed below. The bullets crashed against her aura shield, smashing it to shards.

She drove her sword into the ground, forcing her body to flip over and halt her trajectory, bringing the blade up as a shield. I hit the ground in a roll and popped up, peppering her with more steel shots. A few rounds made it past her sword blade, only to deflect off of her armor plating. Despite wearing what might be called skimpy or impractical armor, I couldn’t seem to find a soft spot.

I converted an arm to grappling claw mode and shot out my line, grabbing onto the sword. I jerked hard, yanking the blade forward. It dislodged from the ground and moved toward me but it wasn’t enough to pull it free from her grip.

I used the opening to burst forward and drive a fist into her stupid grinning face. She looked really excited and it really creeped me out. My punch connected, rocking her head back but she flowed with the force spinning around. She let go of her sword and caught me by the throat.

Another one of her explosive jumps and I was slammed into the wall.

“More!” she screamed. “This is great! Give me more!”

The grip around my throat didn’t loosen at all with the slam and I found myself being used to gouge a rut into the wall as she ran along it. Grapple arm converted into axe arm and I punched it through the gaps in her armor. My blade hooked onto some of the plating, partially tearing it away as I yanked my arm back. The sudden exposure had zero effect on the warrior. My axe flipped out to long blade mode and I grabbed the arm holding me by the wrist, clamping hard.

She stopped running me against the wall and wilted back a bit as I felt something snap in my grip. I got my footing and thrust my blade for her throat.

Clap clap.

“That’s enough Greevus, we’ll call it a draw for now,” Milliardo said, looking amused.

A draw? I looked down at a massive glowing spell, swirling around her free fist and waiting to unleash into my chest.

“My apologies Master Prime. The General was just greeting you. He tends to get carried away when he meets a strong opponent.”

“He?” I asked, looking back at the pink bunny.

The General smirked and gently shook his wrist as a healing red light wrapped around it. His smashed nose had already corrected itself, though bright red blood covered the lower half of his stupid face and stained the short fur covering his boobs.

“Got a problem with that?” he teased.

“Not with that, no. Other things like your form of greeting? Yes.”