The Sixth Experiment

She let out a sigh at the questions instead of actions, but she should have seen this coming.

"Yes, Rez, SX6 has the potential to grow stronger than anything you've ever seen, eventually, it may even become more than a machine."

"And you may not know it, but it has already gained data on the both of you, Rez's agility and Julie's strength could be quite potent, and despite my field, it may have picked up on my abilities as well."

Cortana genuinely seemed worried as she was saying all of this, but it went back to the tired expression as she faced Julie.

"As for who I work for.. You'll meet him soon enough, but don't worry, he doesn't intend to harm you, but he is licenced to question you."

The field continues to grow in intensity...

"Gathered data on us? So SX6 is a learning robot." Rez said before thinking to himself, 'Kinda reminds me of my old gizoid friend, Xenox.'

Rez shook his head as he came back to the current moment.

"You said he was 'potentially dangerous.' That means they could still be good. But you're not even gonna give SX6 a chance to prove themself?" Rez said as he crossed his arms.

After a few moments, Rez turned to Spiral. Spiral nodded and and made a chirping noise. Spiral circled Rez once then fused with them. A wave of white light rippled across Rez's skin as Hyper-Go-On energy coursed through his body.

"If it's a fight you want, then I guess it's a fight you'll get! If you wanna get to my friends, then you'll have to get through me!" Rez said as he stepped between Cortana and the robots.

'I gotta remember to stay clear of any metal. Don't wanna get shocked again.'

This wasn't helping her panic - Rez was ready to pick a fight with them, and here Julie was unsure of what to do.
She has magic, but she wasn't quite ready to fight in an electric environment - water conducts electeicity after all.
Though shaking and almost in tears, she finally reaches behind her, and a crystalline bat seemed to form out of thin air...

"What the fuck is wrong with you?!" She swings it in front of her, getting into the best fighting stance she could while holding us. "Y- you're not taking them or us, got it?!" She looks to Rez, still clearly upset, but too mad to care. If she had to fight, she'd fight.
Who makes the first move...?

Cortana takes a breath and reaches behind her back, taking something off, and now holding it. It appeared to be a chakram, with a cyan line at the ring's center and at the edges.

"We'll see who wins then." 

She grabs two sides of the chakram and holds it like a steering wheel, firing a pulse at Rez.

Rez fixed his eyes on Cortana and readied himself. As she fired the pulse blast, Rez launched off like a sprinter straight towards the blast. When he was about two feet from it, he flipped into the air, over the blast.

Rez landed back on the ground, then rushed towards Cortana. He began circling them rapidly, just out of striking range.

"You'll have to try harder than that if you want to beat me!"

Rez then gripped the ground with his hand and used his momentum to launch himself feet first in a spiral towards Cortana's back.

And the fight officially begins.
Julie jumps to the side away from her blast, coming to a stop as she watches Rez attacking Cortana. Julie seethes and groans, but feeling the need to do something, she begins pulling water from the air as much as she could, and slings it at Cortana.

When Rez ran circles around Cortana, he ended up generating an enormous amount of static, so when he launched himself through the air, all she had to do was throw her hand down to start sending Rez on a course to crash into the ground.

As to deal with Julie's water attack, she grabs the chakram diagonally, and enlarges it, putting the hole through the attack, leading for it to get sucked into the chakram.

She then points to Julie's earring to send a shock to it, what will they do?

Rez hadn't taken into account the extra static he would have made, or that this... person, would be able to control it. He slammed face first into the ground a couple feet away from his opponent.

"Urgh. Th-that hurt." Rez said as he got up and rubbed his beak.

Rez then saw Cortana go for Julie.

"Julie, watch out!" He shouted.

Rez reacted quickly and rushed over to grab Julie, hopefully in enough time to save them both from the attack.

She would have just pitifully jumped to the side and likely have gotten hit if Rez didn't get involved. She would have been thankful, but she clearly wasn't thinking straight.
After a bit, she growls deeply and loudly, before rushing toward Cortana...

A thought came to her mind as she ran at them with intention to slam them with her ice bat. If one of them could handle the shock, could they move the two robots out of the field...?

Cortana throws her Chakram at Rez while slamming her hand to the ground, creating an electric pulse through the ground.

She does not however, move out of the way of Julie.

As Rez turns back around from helping Julie, he watched her rush towards Cortana. Though the blue cat still seemed to be focused on him. Rez then thought to himself,

'Ok. She uses electricity to fight. What takes out electricity?'

He noticed the chakram and energy wave rushing towards him.

 "Oh crap!"

Rez backflipped into the air, the chakram trimming the edge of his tail feathers, and the energy wave going underneath.

After Rez landed on the ground, he thought again,

'I've got it! An insulator. Hmm...'

Rez looked down at his scarf before he pulled it off his neck and began to wrap it around his hand, making sure to cover the entire glove.

"Let's hope this works!" He said as he sped up towards Cortana to go for an air punch.

Julie prematurely jumped to get away from the energy wave that Cortana shot specifically at Rez, but was unsure exactly how to deal with it.
Swinging the bat as hard as she could as she jumped, she swings to slam it into Cortana's torso/abdomen.

Just as planned.

Cortana's Chakram boomeranged back towards Julie as she got hit with the ice bat, it hurt quite a bit, but she manages to grab the bat and shock it in hopes of transferring to Julie, despite being a poor conductor.

As for Rez, while the aerial scarf punch wasn't something she was expecting, the pulse climbed up the roof of the field and shot downwards towards Rez's translator chip, albeit weaker due to travel

Rez was about to throw his punch, when a sharp pain surged through his body.

"GYAAA!"

Rez fell to the ground in front of Cortana, but behind Julie. He saw the chakram flying back towards Julie's back 

"Julie! Behind you! Argh!"

As Rez reached a hand out towards Julie, pain shot up his spine. Rez curled up on the ground as he held his neck with both hands. Spiral un-fused and was freaking out.

"Rez?! Ar-eee y-y-y-you ok-k-kay?!"

Rez then realized what the pain he was feeling came from.

'My translator chip. Ergh, it must have gotten fried... from the pulse.' Rez slowly pulled Spiral in for a hug.

"I-I'm ok buddy. I think."

Rez winced in pain as he sat up and wrapped his scarf back around his neck.


"There's no way we can beat her. Electricity is just too fast."

Julie got the warning far too late, as she was already in a frozen panic trying to pull her bat away from Cortana as she fired the electricity through the bat. She screamed out and ripped her hand from the bat nigh-instantly, gripping her stinging hand with the other and holding it close to her chest... only for the chakram to slam her in the back, knocking her down and causing her to cry out a very loud expletive upon falling over onto her front, landing on her arms that were unable to catch her as well as getting a face-full of concrete.
She was genuinely tearing up from this. She wasn't a fighter, she should have just tried to run. She decided to not even get up, she just lays there, accepting whatever fate may come.
She didn't even know if Rez was okay.

(If I could, I'd go back and edit the previous posts where she summoned a bat made of ice and stuff like that.)

Cortana... winced at the sight of the two going down just like that, especially Julie, who was in incredible pain. She calls back the chakram and puts it back into her back.

"I truly do apologize for this... I promise to make it up later."

The static would eventually get to their nerves and keep them paralyzed as they are taken somewhere...

After a while, they end up in cells in a rather fancy lab, healed up and repaired, while a brown fox awaited them to wake up.

Once Rez woke up, he took in his new surroundings. He then turned his head and saw the brown fox.

"Hey! Who are you, and where are we?" Rez asked.

"Rez, where are we?" Spiral said to his friend as he woke up as well.

"Just a sec Spiral, I'm trying to figure that out." Rez paused a few moments before turning back to Spiral, then back to the fox.

"Did... Did you fix my translator chip?" Rez asked the fox, slightly confused as to why they would do that.

Julie's eyes open slightly, laying on her side with her skirt bunched up uncomfortably around her legs and her hair a mess, as she looks around. She groans, getting up and stretching, then handling her skirt so it's more comfortable.
She sighs. "Really...? I thought it was just a nightmare... where am I?"

"Ah, tsuini (finally), I was wondering when you'd wake up!"

The brown fox spoke in a very eastern accent after he gets up, a noticeable detail was his gloves, which were metal and had blue lines running through it.

"I did fix the translator chip, took some data from it as well, I'd like to question your wisp friend as well, you see."

"As for where you are, you are in my ra-" ahem "laboratory, I can't tell you where in the world you currently are, but you will be brought back where Cortana-san found you."

"Like I- Oh, speak of the devil."

Cortana, once again in the rabbit form, came out of a nearby room and stands next to the brown fox after giving a small bow.

"Right, you wanted to say something as well, I'd like to finish first if you don't mind."

Cortana shakes her head before he sighs and continues.

"As I was saying, I brought you here to interrogate you about... That idiot, Surashu." "The one who made- what'd he call it?" "SX6, yes."

"Oh, wait, I neglected to introduce myself, gomen. (sorry) "My name is Inari Kasshoku." "But merely Inari is fine."

"You may speak, Cortana-san."

Cortana took a deep breath before stepping forward and looking at the two.

"I deeply apologize for attacking you earlier, truly." "If I had a say, I would have merely interrogated on the streets, but Inari-san insisted on this method." "If there is any way I could repay you after this, I will gladly do so."

"Both SX6 and Metal Slash are alright, and are currently in stasis." "They will be released after this."

Cortana stepped back, as they both awaited Rez, Spiral, and Julie's responses.

Rez looked to Cortana. He was mad at her for kidnapping him and his friends. Spiral noticed the look of anger Rez had pointed in Cortana's direction. He flew over to Rez's shoulder and said,

"It's not her fault, Rez. She was just following orders. Please, let it go."

Rez looked down at Spiral, then back to Cortana. He closed his eyes and lowered his head as a frown grew over his beak. He opened his eyes before saying,

"I... I guess I forgive you for the street fight Cortana. But you, Mr. Inari, you better explain why you kidnapped us." Rez said as he pointed at the fox. "If SX6 is who you really want, why do you need us?"

Julie listened to Mr. Inari speak, and honestly... still didn't get it. The most she could assume was that Inari and this 'Surashu' were rivals of a sort. She knew it wasn't personal towards her, but she was rather upset she was dragged into someone else's problems like this.

Cortana did try and relieve their worries, and though she wasn't in pain anymore, she still felt very uncomfortable.

"...so... Mr. Inari, with all due respect, why couldn't you have just let Cortana talk to us...? I have nothing to do with this, and I'm pretty sure Rez is innocent here too."

Inari sighed once more, clearly a bit frustrated.

"Cortana-san had told you, had she not?" "SX6 had taken data from the both of you and can potentially use that data for malicious purposes down the line."

"As for why she couldn't just talk, Metal Surashu had been given orders to keep Cortana-san away from Surashu's creations." "He thinks I'd steal his work or something."

"Another thing is, you, Rez have met Surashu before as well as his son." "Juri, while you haven't met either one, your sibling seems to know Curashu as well."

Cortana then speaks up to correct Inari.

"Apologies, Inari-san, but your accent is acting up again." "Just to be clear: 'Surashu' is Slash, 'Curashu' is Clash, and 'Juri' is Julie."

"Did you really need to call that out, my english is fine!"

"Yet you still have trouble with names."

"Bah!" "What do you have to say, you three?"

As Rez listened to Mr. Inari's explanation, he thought to himself,

'There's no way Mr. Slash would have built a potentially dangerous robot. Could he?'

After the fox completed his explanation, Rez looked over to Spiral.

"I don't want to believe him, but what he's saying is starting to make a little bit of sense, Rez."

"I agree bud. We've known Slash and his family longer than we've known this guy, but who knows what SX6 is truly capable of?"

Rez raised a hand to his beak in thought. After thinking it over, Rez said to Inari,


I still don't believe what you're saying about Slash one hundred percent. But if it means protecting innocent lives, I guess Spiral and I can help you for now."

Julie thinks on it, even listening to Rez's reasoning... it all just seemed rather strange.
"I... I didn't know that P- my sister", no way in Hell was she giving this guy free info., though she had her guesses he already knew, "knew anyone by that name, but it'd explain why SX6 seemed to know her."
She sighs, thinking hard...

This guy was super fishy, but she was a little... scared of them all the same.
"What do you need us for again? I just don't want anymore trouble..."

Kasshoku looked a bit annoyed, didn't he just tell them?

"Thank you for cooperating, like I just said, I want you to tell me everything you know about Surashu, SX6, His metal copy, and his family."

Cortana on the other hand, took the chakram lookin' thing and placed it in a slot on a nearby computer, as her fur glew vibrantly.