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For the past day or two, ever since he stopped by the Cooper farm and got his car fixed up, Neil has been driving aimlessly around Kansas and the surrounding area.

He's usually happy to stop for a chat. There really isn't that much to do around here except talk to strangers.

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"ooooooh! Did you win, at least?"

She drifts backwards a little bit, sinking slightly through the seat before correcting herself. "Riding in cars is tricky."

"Hmmm, I can see that."

Oh boy. Neil's smile fades as he thinks her question over; then it reappears, in company with a shrug. He doesn't answer directly.

"...you didn't?" Onoes!

"But you got away, so that's OK, right? You can make up for it."

"Oh, no. I got through that one all right-- rescued a good friend of mine, in fact. The next one didn't go so well."

Why is he (technically) breaking security to a small child floating insubstantially in his passenger seat?

Eh. Skip it.

"At least you helped your friend!" Friends are good! Penumbra approves of helping them!

"And then you can go beat the bad guys some more."

He laughs.

"Well, I would, but the bad guys are back where I came from."

"Oh.

"Well, you can probably find some here, too. There's always bad guys, because they keep having babies."

"...I've never thought about it like that before, but you know, I think you're right."

"Yep! But good guys have babies, too, so it's okay. Doggies and kitties and horses have babies, too, but they're not bad or good."

Penumbra: spreading wisdom to the world.

"...Yeah."

Dammit, why does everything have to come back to family. He summons up a smile for the kid's sake. It's not a complete falsehood.

"So where are we going?"

"Northeast."

OH BOY NORTHEAST!

"What's there?"

"I don't know; I'm not there yet."

"Ooooh, so it's a surprise?" Surprises are fun! Usually!

"Yeah, pretty much."

There's a bright flash of light from up ahead and to their left, accompanied a short time later by a very familiar sound. You only have to hear a transfer point once to know what it's like.

"Huh," he says thoughtfully. "We must be getting close to the border."

!!!!

"New people! New people!" Bounce bounce b- OK do not bounce that enthusiastically Penumbra you have just bounced partway through the floorboard.

Back up to seat level! And a bit higher as she is now peering through the windscreen and trying to see what's there.

Two or three seconds between light and sound. He thinks that might translate to about half a mile, but he's not sure.

Either way, the closer they get, the more obvious it is that what came through wasn't a person. Or at least not just a person. There's a big hulking metal thing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GN-002_Gundam_Dynames) there, mostly green with a few white parts, looking extraordinarily battered.

Neil recognizes it.

You can tell by the way his mouth falls open in pure astonishment.

!!! THAT IS A GIANT ROBOT

SO COOL

"Woooooow!"

"Yeah. Wow."

It's on the other side of the road and a good distance away; he pulls onto the shoulder and stops, but doesn't get out of the car just yet.

See Neil; see Neil thinkyface.

Penumbra doesn't bother with things like thinking. She just hops into the floorboard shadows and pops out of the roboshadow, drifting around the newcomer excitedly.

"It's like a building! Only people-shaped!"

The people-shaped building is lying on the ground, on its back.

When Penumbra approaches, it sits up.

"Shit," says Neil, and scrambles out of the car. Along the way he grabs a bag out of the back seat; then he's jogging towards Dynames at a very urgent pace, leaving the car door half-open and unlocked.

!!!!!

"It MOVED!!!"

COOLEST THING EVER, Y/MFY

Penumbra's day: made.

"Hi! Can you talk?" Wavewavewave!

Neil overtakes her with a laugh, climbing straight up the side until he can get to the cockpit.

The mech stops moving when he gets there.

A minute later, he's climbing back out with... well...

...Haro tucked under his arm.

:O!!!

A THING!

"Hey, what'd you do? What's that? You shouldn't take things, you know!" She is too excited to be properly disapproving on that last part.