She'd better take some shut-windows soon now...
Maybe after she saw what the scanners were trying to show her now, though.
Winter winds, dying sunsets, and one of the most gigantic trucks he had ever seen before in his life.
That was what Master Mechanic Nitta Tadashi was to remember later on, whenever he remembered that day. Not that he knew that at the time, of course.
"Um...Doctor?" One of the techs murmured somewhat nervously, seeing the utterly gigantic shadow slowly and carefully coming down the winding road.
"Uh, um, yes..." Tadashi wheeled out and raised his voice. "Excuse me, there! This isn't the birthing ramp section for the bigger vehicles, I'm afraid..."
"Oh, I know, I know, I've been waiting there for half a day, till me and the missus looked at the card again and realized the people at the gate had made a mistake...." The big truck rumbled, looking down at him. Tadashi swallowed.
"Oh, you." Alright, this was a different voice, obviously female, from somewhere high up. Tadashi craned his front section. "You should have told them right up that we were in the 'more then a year' bracket..."
"Yes, yes, I know, I knoww..."
Tadashi blinked. There was another Car perched on the truck's roof? Heavens, how big was he?
"And you should had woken me up, dummy. This is our child we're talking about, remember?"
Tadashi stared, and gulped. She was the gigantic truck's wife? He looked up at the female Car - a Mitsubishi Jeep in her forties if he wasn't mistaken - and then at her utterly gigantic husband. Uh, oh.... Damn, damn, massive size differences plus a mother well past forty if he wasn't mistaken - well, at least both more or less truck-ish types, so that was one less risk factor he supposed... He shook his front, reminding himself that risk factors or no risk factors, the majority of children born from the most unlikely unions usually did turn out to be quite healthy in practice.
"May I have your number?"
The Jeep nodded and called out a number, looking at a card. Tadashi looked at the Car pool. There were no less then four baby Cars there today that hadn't been picked up yet, but...
Oh, yes, that one. Well, that was a relief...
"Congratulations, sir and ma'am, you have a healthy baby daughter!" Tadashi called up. Well, this wasn't quite protocol, and he felt like he'd forgotten something quite important, but...
"Well, good!" The truck rumbled, sounding relieved, as his wife added - "Which one is it?"
Oops. "The young lady SUV in the corner there, ma'am!"
The baby Car had woken up if on cue, looking up at the looming shadow of her father. Well, parents, as her mother was still perched on her father's head...
"Ohhh, oooh, she's so cutee... Just look at those little front fog-lights..." The Jeep coo'd.
The gigantic truck rumbled, laughing. "Alright, lemme guess... She's a Pajero Mini Limited Edition, Mercedes Benz G-Class style. Or somethin' like that. Right?"
Tadashi almost laughed out loud. So he wasn't the only person who felt that way...
The vibrant green boxy little SUV smiled up at her parents heartmeltingly, showing off the lightning-like yellow zig-zags on her sides.
"No she most definitely is not" One of the techs piped up, yellow plate flashing under the lights. "I'm a Pajero Mini, and I should know, I think..."
The gigantic truck and the Jeep on his head blinked, looking at the tech and then at their daughter. There was a rather recognizable size difference.
"Oh, sorry. Didn't mean to make fun of ya, nursie..."
"No, no offence taken I mean, but..." The tech sighed. "She's not as big as a full-sized Pajero, maybe, but she's actually somewhat bigger then a Pajero Io, I think. She's taller then a Io, that's for sure..."
Master Mechanic Nitta Tadashi coughed, at that.
"Well, more to the point, she isn't a Mitsubishi Pajero at all, so..."
The truck and Jeep blinked, looking at each other.
"Um, she isn't a real Gelendewagen, though, is she?" The truck mumbled. "She...doesn't really feel like that sub-type, somehow..."
"Well, yes, she isn't a Mercedes Benz G-Class either, as she, um, has no identifiable sub-type markings at all, actually. There is something that seems like there is a sub-type marking, but it's not in any of the lists, so...well, it's on her specs here, you can see for yourselves afterwards."
The little SUV's parents just looked at each other and shrugged. Tadashi was relieved. Well, they didn't really look like people who would care overmuch about sub-type markings, but one never knew.
"Ahh. Alright, two seats in the first row with 4 more seats folded in the back...hmmm. It's not very common in SUV's, but it looks like she might have some kind of concession fitting in the back... It looks like she could rise her side windows all up and put counters out, for instance. And she has some extra metal grates inside, to fit over her windows and such...to deal with burglars, maybe?"
"...Oh." The big truck blinked. "So maybe she's gonna be a mobile mini-mart when she grows up, eh?"
"Or maybe a techhie like me..." The Jeep added, smiling. Tadashi blinked. So she was a tech.
"Or maybe a chef of some kind." Tadashi smiled. "It seems to be pretty flexible - she could use those things for anything, I think."
"OK, OK, I'm coming down now - " The Jeep disappeared from the top of her husbands roof, vrooming. Tadashi smiled as the woman appeared from behind her husband and wheeled closer to her daughter.
"Awww. You're bigger then I am..." The Jeep murmured, giving her daughter a nudgie.
"And she's smaller then I am..." The truck rumbled.
"Well, most Cars are, Y'know?"
The truck chuckled. "We're parents. Whee."
"Whee?" The Jeep mumbled. "It's bloody scary, that's what it is. At my age... No, no, you're not scary, dearie..."
The truck coughed somewhat apologetically, looking at the medical staff. Well, it wasn't like there was anybody else here now...
"It was sort of ...unexpected. We'd seen the Core go zooming off before, but nothing ever came of it, and..."
And they'd been lax with using birth control, probably. Tadashi sighed. Well, all was well if it ended well, he supposed.
"Have you decided on a name, Mr and Mrs..." Damn, where was that list, anyway?
"Kino. The name's Kino." The truck smiled.
"And her name is Makoto."
The Pajero Mini tech looked at the happy family, daughter and mother climbing into the father's back van.
There was no reason to say anything to anybody. The baby was was a cute adorable SUV who might or might not become a mobile mini-mart or a mobile restaurant some day, and that was all there was to it.
So what if those 'concession fittings' looked like they might conceiveably be used for - other things, too?
The tech sighed, then. It was no big deal, and she should just forget about it.
It wasn't like the baby Car had been born with actual weapons inside her, after all...
Pluto blinked. Awww, so cute... She cut off a yawn.
Maybe she should go take a nap now, though...
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(Posted Fri, 13 Oct 2006 18:27)
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