Try the truth

"Sir, there's something else you need to know about my unit," you said, gritting your teeth as you braced for the truth.

There was a pause on the other end, as McPhearson braced for the worst. "Some other malfunction?"

"Not... quite. It's hard to explain, sir, but you mentioned finding some way to trust each other, right? We decided to try something, and... well, I replaced Angel Five's Endo."

"What do you mean, replaced her Endo with what?" the Sargeant asked, his tone lowering at the idea of using non-standard tech in the Angel frame or something.

"No, you don't understand," you said, tensing up. "I replaced her Endo... with myself. I'm inside her body right now, the Rider armor fits the same as a typical Endo and lines up with the connectors. We don't know how to, uh, undo it at the moment though."

You could practically feel the heat from the Sargeant's blood boiling on the other end of the line.

"I don't normally care what you two do off-hours, but this is the kind of crap that's going to break millions of dollars of proprietary Yabusa tech!"

Angel Five cleared her throat, deciding that since the truth was out there, she might as well join in. "Sir, we may be in an awkward situation, but we're still more functional than half the other units, I just don't have access to the features of my typical Endo. On the bright side, I don't even have to worry about the batteries with Rider Five where he is."

"I--huh." It seemed like McPhearson couldn't argue with that logic, what you'd done with your Angel was not as bad as the current predicament at the station. "We're still going to have a long talk about this later about what you can and can't do with Yabusa tech. But get in here, I guess come as you are, just hurry up. What's important is we need to find Unit Seven and we're losing time."

After the Sargeant hung up, you stood up again, digging into Angel Five's wardrobe. "There, take the shirt to the left--no, further to the left," Angel guided you, as you hurried to pull out an outfit to fit under Angel Five's typical armor. Fortunately, a sports bra and boy-short panties were fairly easy to understand without a huge struggle. That's not to say there wasn't a struggle however--it took a while to get Angel Five's sizable chest to cooperate in the sports bra. You put on the jacket, riding jeans, and boots that Angel kept in her closet, surprised by how new they looked. Unlike the Angel riding suit which was designed for being encased in cowlings, this gear was meant for proper riding.

"Have you ever even used these?" you asked, sliding the jacket on and zipping it up.

"I got those at the start of the Angel project," Angel replied, "but to be honest I never actually have been on top of a motorcycle, I've only become one instead..."

You shrugged as you tested mobility with your borrowed arms and legs in the jacket, grabbing the Angel helmet which was suitable enough for normal riding. "First time for everything, we'll take the Falcon. I think that will feel easier to reach the controls than Bessie... but you're going to have to listen to my instructions on where eyes should be if we're going to get into work without crashing."

You hurried down to your garage, going as fast as you could in a still unfamiliar body, feeling strangely **** out in public with someone else's form wrapped around you. It almost felt like you were wearing an entirely wrong outfit, even if it was correct for Angel's body, but you couldn't focus on that. Once in the garage, you stepped past the Angel gear and pulled a tarp off another sportbike--a blue Hideki Falcon-7, the bike you'd trained on prior to the Angel program. The Yabusa Bull 1400, named Bessie, was the bigger touring cruiser that Spiral City motorcycle police used, but that thing was a beast even by your standards, and it felt like you had to wrestle it to do anything like turn or brake properly. With Angel Five's shorter arms and legs, you weren't even sure you could get one foot down safely on that bike.

Carefully climbing onto the Falcon, you started it up, and took right off toward the station. It felt so much bigger in Angel's body, but it was low enough to the ground that you could stay steady at the lights. While you still tried to be as safe as possible, you pushed the speed a bit to hurry into the office. Angel's quickened breath, loud in the helmet, gave you a sense that she was pretty excited to actually be on top of a bike, though she hadn't really considered it before.

"It's so different on top," Angel said as you rode. "Do you think I should take the training classes? This is way different from being so low to the ground with all the Angel controls!"

You chuckled a bit. "If you did, we could ride together. I could see it being useful, especially if the Angel program doesn't survive after this whole sabotage thing, at least it keeps you on two wheels."

Parking at the station, you hurried to the Sargeant's office, and he waved you in. McPhearson took a moment to look you up and down, squinting at you. "I don't want to know details, but I guess you look like you're functioning alright, so I guess we'll make do with what we've got. I've already talked to the other units. Do you still have Rider capability?"

"Repeat what I say, please?" you asked Angel Five.

"Yes, I still have Rider functionality," Angel Five parroted for you, "But my console is inside, so I don't have direct Angel connective capability when I can't access it. If we could figure out how to pull me out, I could be back to normal operation."

McPhearson shook his head. "I'm not going to waste time on that right now. I'm reassigning you temporarily." He tapped his phone, and Angel Two stepped into the Sargeant's office, holding a gauntlet computer as you typically wore as a Rider. Angel Two briefly smiled at you politely, the second-generation Korean American woman seeming slightly anxious about the issues the other Angels have encountered and was glad she was seeing a familiar face that hadn't suffered a similar fate.

"I've already briefed Angel Two on this arrangement as well as your little predicament, but you'll be accompanying her as Rider Two for now. It means we've got three full units for this search, and not a lot of time. Each Angel has a wide-band tracking module that if you get close to another Angel or Rider unit will ping their location, since their primary trackers had been disabled. Angel Two, your map will focus on the Nautilus district, I know it's a wide search area but it's easy to navigate. Rider Two, don't let up on that throttle, you need to move fast. I've got every other standard unit out setting up a perimeter to make sure they don't leave the city, so everyone should be somewhere within the city limits. Got it?"

"Yes sir," Angel Five--well, temporarily Rider Two--and Angel Two said in unison. Once dismissed, you both hurried to the storeroom to get ready.

"Weird to think I'm a Rider now," Rider Two said out loud to nobody in particular. It was certainly a strange situation, but since you were still mostly in control, tapping at the new gauntlet to configure it to your slimmer arms than a typical Rider would have. "You're doing okay, A-Two?"

Angel Two nodded a little as she affixed the cowling wings to her body. "Yeah, it's... I dunno, it has me a little rattled. I got here on my own to see if my Rider had been here, but all I saw was everyone lying on the floor like they'd all fainted. If we find everyone fast, we should swing by the Yabusa facility to see if everyone else is stabilized. Their batteries were so weird... the Yabusa tech pulled them out, they looked almost like Swiss cheese, there were big holes in the modules."

"Big holes? That's odd, that sounds more like what termites do to wood than what would happen to a battery." While the other two talked to ease some nerves, you donned some modified Rider armor, using what parts of the Rider armor fit your frame and using Angel armor components to fill in some blanks. The result still looked coherent, albeit not as seamless as a true Rider armor would look. Once you had the helmet on, you looked down to see a very convincing Rider Two.

Angel Two grinned a little, hand on her hips, as she glanced at you. "Well, that's a pretty sexy look. I wouldn't mind asking for a permanent transfer if I'd have you riding me all day..." The blush you felt cross Rider Two's face made you chuckle a little. Angel Two knelt down, waiting for you to give the transformation command. "Oh, and are you going to neural link with me before we go?"

"Shoot, I hadn't considered that," you said, still not familiar with the link interface. "My link is off, but yours is active, R-Two. Can I connect you two, are you okay with that?"

Rider Two bit her lip. "What, as in I'd have control of her body if I wanted?" she asked, barely above a whisper. "I mean, I wouldn't mind trying... we don't have much choice if you can't. I mean, I guess I technically am the Rider to connect to her anyway, right?" Given the situation, you touched the gauntlet computer and immediately linked Rider Two and Angel Two.

"Just make sure if something happens you take control of her as needed, I'm only focused on moving your body and less on her." As you hit the gauntlet one last time, Rider Two began her transformative routine, the cowlings pulling around her as she gripped and stepped on the axles. Doing your quick all-around inspection--from your perspective, she looked identical to how you'd see Angel Five, even down to the body proportions that peeked barely out of the cowlings--you hopped on top of the Angel.

"This is so weird," each of you said in near unison, albeit for different reasons. Angel Two felt a different body sitting atop her, and Rider Two was essentially shadowing your usual routine and responsibility, ironically having a sort of out-of-body experience watching Angel Two despite the reality of having an extra body in her! And for you, dealing with the new proportions of a body, even with more familiar Rider armor, required some adjusting. Trying to acclimate as fast as possible, you revved the throttle and rode out of the station to begin the search.